Nel^raSkan
m
COVERING THE UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA SINCE 1901
VOL. 94 NO. 137
inside
onday
Sports ~
Men’s and women’s
gymnastics teams qualify
for nationals, page 7
Arts & Entertainment
Cable channel fX comes to
Lincoln, page 9
April 10, 1995
Division cuts 24 jobs to meet bottom line
By Matthew Waite
Senior Reporter
Ten years ago, the maintenance
department at the University of Ne
braska-Lincoln employed more than
50 people.
Times have changed.
With changes in the way the uni
versity does business, the department
has taken 24 cuts in the number of
employees that come to work every
morning.
Paul Carlson, interim vice chan
cellor for business and finance, said
the maintenance reductions came be
cause UNL began contracting with
private construction companies to do
maintenance projects.
Carlson said the university called
the maintenance staff when something
broke. But repairs ran in cycles, he
said, and workers would be busy one
week and standing around the next.
With the change, Carlson said, the
salary savings were used to hire out
side labor, which is more expensive.
“You pay for their overhead, their
labor and their profit margin,” he said.
But, Carlson said, paying a more
expensive unit-price for labor would
cost less in the long run than keeping
full time employees on staff.
NU is following a national trend of
downsizing by cutting employees and
increasing efficiency.
At the March NU Board of Regents
meeting, NU President Dennis Smith
announced the creation of a task force
to review administrative processes.
But the university is straying from
national trends in that it has shied
away from large layoffs and across
the-board job cuts, Carlson said.
UNL has laid off some workers,
but they were laid off because they
were poor performers, Carlson said.
He said the university relied on attri
tion — early retirement, quitting and
death — to eliminate jobs.
“When you downsize and you have
to let people go — that’s a tough
thing,” Carlson said. “We know people
have families and mouths to feed.
“We certainly don’t do it willy
nilly and without a lot of forethought.”
One avenue the university does not
have when looking to eliminate staff
positions is contract buy-outs and early
retirement options, Carlson said. He
said the faculty had those options, but
staff did not.
According to university records,
the salaries of the 3,787 administra
tors and operations staff in the NU
system make up 25.8 percent of the
See CUTS on 6
Efficiency
■ Efficiency has become an
issue at NU and UNL. NU
President Dennis Smith has
created a committee to address it,
and Regent Drew Miller had a
similar proposal rebuked.
Miller has called for redesign
and reduction of jobs. That has
happened in the maintenance
division of the Office of Business
and Finance, where 24 jobs were
cut through attrition.
The office wants to contract
more with private companies to
do maintenance work.
Rowdy ride
Travis Heying/DN
A saddle-bronc rider from North Dakota State University concentrates Saturday night before his ride at the University
of Nebraska Rodeo Association’s College Rodeo. The rodeo ran Thursday through Saturday at State Fair Park.
Eight-second rush
draws cowboys to
brave the untamed
By Brian Sharp
Senior Reporter
The 1,500-pound black bull is quiet as it
stands in the middle of a hushed arena.
Its gaze is fixed on a cowboy lying face
down 30 feet away. He failed to stay on the
bull for eight seconds.
As the cowboy gets up, he glances over
his left shoulder and sees the bull. The bull
breaks its few seconds of hesitation.
It charges.
The cowboy franticly scrambles on all
fours for the protection of a barrel. The bull
reaches full speed and lowers its stubbed
horns.
The cowboy never makes it.
A spiteful blow to the head knocks Barry
Stephen off course and back to the ground.
Stephen suffered an intense headache and
temporary loss of balance. Amid cheers and
heroics, last weekend’s Nebraska College
Rodeo at the State Fair Park Coliseumshowed
the danger of the sport.
Tyler Fritz, a saddle-bronc rider from
South Dakota State University, left the arena
on a stretcher. Fritz’s bronc threw him head
first into the bars of the metal fence sur
rounding the arena.
Fritzlay motionless, harnessed and braced,
as the ambulance pulled to the west entrance.
See RODEO on 3
Park celebrates sorority’s anniversary
By Brian Jensen
Staff Reporter
To celebrate their 75th anniversary on cam
pus, the women of Kappa Delta Sorority de
cided to give back to UNL by building a new
park.
The park, which is behind their house on the
comer of 16th and R streets, attracted almost
400 people to its dedication ceremony Satur
day. Active Kappa Delta members, alumni and
friends stood under the cloudy canopy as guest
speakers told about the project.
“Lots of administrators across the nation are
against the greek system, so it’s nice to have a
celebration like this happen,” said Pat Niemann,
Kappa Delta national president.
Niemann called the park beautiful and said it
was one of the top projects any Kappa Delta
chapter had undertaken. Niemann said the
sorority’s national chapter gave the University
of Nebraska-Lincoln chapter $1,000 to start the
project. Alumnae contributions and the UNL
chapter paid for the remaining costs.
“Iam so impressed,” said Chancellor Gra
ham Spanier, who spoke at the ceremony. “This
park is quite remarkable and meaningful.”
UNL Landscape Services worked to put the
$10,000 park together.
“What you see now has only taken us a
month,” said Kim Todd, the project’s head
architect. “All that we have left to do is the
irrigation system and the seeding.”
Area students
hunt for eggs,
understanding
By Paula Lavigne
Senior Reporter
Lincoln elementary and junior high students
found out what it was like to maneuver a wheel
chair during an Easter egg scavenger hunt Sun
day in the Nebraska Union.
“The Hunt for Understanding,” which was
sponsored by the Nebraska Human Resource
Institute, Project PALS and Pre- Teen Junior
Project, paired counselors, orthopedically dis
abled children and non-disabled children on
teams.
The students and counselors traded off mov
ing around in the wheelchairs, which were do
nated by Madonna Rehabilitation Hospital, Jim’s
Home Health and University Health Center.
Co-chairman Mike Johnson, a junior pre
med major, said the event was a self-confidence
builder.
“We wanted to show these students what it
was like to be in someone else’s shoes,” he said.
The hunt was to be held outside, and the
students were going to be directed to Bancroft
Hall, which is inaccessible to wheelchairs.
But they accomplished the same understand
ing inside and unanimously agreed Nebraska
Union needed another elevator.
A line of six students piled up in the narrow
hallway next to the elevator as only two wheel
chairs could fit on the elevator at a time.
One of the students, Megan Merrick, waited
in line after finding her first clue.
y ou reany get to see wnat it s like to oe in
a wheelchair and what it’s like to be a disabled
person,” she said. “But we have the advantage.
We get to get out of it in the end.”
Merrick said she realized what she took for
granted.
“You can’t use your feet to get around,” she
said. “You can only use your hands. And it’s
hard.”
It was Kylie Magnuson’s first time in the
wheelchair.
“I don’t like backing up,” she said, as she
struggled to reach for her egg under a micro
wave in the union. “It’s really hard when you’re
backing up and running into everybody.”
Magnuson was joined by a pro, Darnell
Utley, who was spinning around and speeding
to the next clue, and he showed her the ropes.
Magnuson caught on and wanted the wheel
chair back from her counselor, Amy Gunderson.
“I can drive that thing much better,” she said.
“I may not be able to drive a car, but...”
The team reached the last clue and Utley
raced to the arcade to pluck his egg from behind
the Star Trek game.
After the hunt, the participants gathered to
discuss their experience. The students said they
were frustrated by the wait for the elevator and
that their amis hurt.
Counselors encouraged them to go back to
their own schools and try to find barriers that
would challenge disabled students in wheel
chairs.