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Jill Fazzinl, left, and Page Baumbach clap along with members of Alpha Omicron
Pi Sorority Tuesday evening while practicing songs for rush.
UNL rush moved to Labor Day
Rebecca O It mans
Staff Reporter
A traditional campus sight dur
ing the first week of classes is
missing this year: new sorority
members busy with their pledge
activities.
That’s because campus sorori
ties have not pledged new mem
bers yet.
This year’s rush week will be
held during the Labor Day break,
from Sept. 1 to Sept. 5.
During rush week, rushees visit
each sorority to decide which one
they would like to join. Sororities
plan activities, including slide
shows and skits, to tell rushees
about their chapters.
Usually, rush week took place
the weekend before classes started.
Sorority members often returned
days before to prepare for rush.
Rush preparations include mak
ing decorations, practicing skits
and learning conversation skills.
Rush has spanned the Labor
Day weekend before, but it's been
a while, said Jayne Wade Ander
son, director of Greek Affairs.
Rush week traditionally was
held before school began, she said,
because football games usually
were played over the Labor Day
weekend.
“And you know when there is a
football game in Nebraska,”
Anderson said, “you just don’t have
rush activities at the same time.”
But the football team does not
play at home this Labor Day week
end. Also, Anderson said, classes
started earlier than usual this year.
“Students would have to come
back so early,” she said, and that
would have interfered with sum
mer jobs and classes.
But for some sorority members,
postponing rush has interfered with
fall classes.
Angie Marasco, assistant rush
chairwoman for Kappa Delta So
rority, said it was hard to prepare
rush activities during school be
cause activities had to be juggled
around students’ schedules.
Not being able to go home over
Labor Day weekend is another
drawback, said Brittanie
Leffelman, rush chairwoman for
Alpha Omicron Pi Sorority.
“It’s a nice time to go home,
especially for freshmen,” she said.
But there are some benefits to
the change, Leffelman said. For
example, everyone has a chance to
get settled, she said.
The change hasn't hurt the num
ber of students planning to rush.
There are 641 rushees enrolled this
year, compared to 550 last fall.
Enrollment figures on the rise
By Paula Lavigne
Senior Reporter
After a four-year slide, enrollment
at UNL is inching toward recovery as
the children of baby boomers come
of age.
Preliminary figures show about
500 more students enrolled at the
University of Nebraska-Lincoln this
semester than last fall, when enroll
ment reached 23,854.
James Griesen, vice chancellor for
student affairs, said the increase was
caused by a rising number of high
school graduates.
The children of baby boomers are
starting to graduate from high school,
he said, and that could keep the en
rollment trend rolling into the 21st
century.
About 19,871 Nebraska high
school students graduated in 1995,
Griesen said. That number could grow
to 22,789 in 1999, he said.
The trend follows a steady four
year decline that came after a peak in
1991 of 24,620 students. But even
though the numbers went up this year,
more than five years may pass before
they peak again.
“You don’t recover from a slide
like that real quickly,” Griesen said.
“These successively smaller fresh
man classes project through the cur
riculum.”
Griesen said it was difficult to
pinpoint the trend’s future because
other factors — a 6,2 percent tuition
increase, new admission standards in
1997 and stricter residency require
ments — may influence enrollment.
And the university is not only push
ing for more students, Griesen said, it
is pushing for more quality students.
Because of stricter residency re
quirements, Griesen said, he initially
predicted a decline in the number of
non-resident students.
To offset that decline, the univer
sity spent $700,000 on special schol
arships ranging from $1,000 to
$3,540, he said. The scholarships were
offered to above average, out-of-state
applicants.
“I’m not expecting any new de
crease in non-resident enrollment
thanks to the fact that we came up
with this program,” he said. “We
didn’t want to interrupt that pipeline
coming in from other states.”
The number of students shouldn’t
decline, he said, because the resi
dency requirements and new admis
sion standards should screen out the
students who would have normally
dropped out.
The number of graduate students
also would affect enrollment figures,
he said. That number has been rising
for about 10 years.
Recruitment is another enrollment
factor. Admission workers took ad
vantage of the rise in graduates by
visiting high schools, attending col
lege fairs, making phone calls and
organizing seven Red Letter Days.
Lisa Schmidt, director of admis
sions, said her office made more
phone calls and had more people
reaching out to potential students.
“We’ve had twice as many cam
pus visitors this year,” Schmidt said.
The office works with thousands
of high school students each year, she
said, and tries to make them fresh
men at UNL.
Griesen said those freshmen have
accounted for the bilk of this year's
increase. Even though some may have
to live in a lounge or scrounge for a
parking space, they, along with the
rest of the students, may benefit from
the increase.
More students mean more rev
enue, which could mean lower stu
dent fees, Griesen said. But whatever
impact the increase has on student
fees could be offset by future fees for
the Nebraska Union expansion.
Peterson hired
by foundation
By Derek Samson
Senior Reporter
For Chris Peterson, a Nebraska
Athletic Department employee for the
past three years, a job change equals
a clean slate.
Peterson was
named a consult
ant . at the NU
Foundation on
Wednesday. He
went through an
extensive audit in
February while he
was an athletic
department fund
Peterson ra!,e/- , u
Although the
audit — sparked by allegations of
misuse ©f funds from anonymous par-,
ties — proved nothing illegal from
Peterson’s office, he said, but his
name wasn’t cleared until now.
“That’s just total exoneration,”
Peterson said. “The trustees of the
Nebraska Foundation are some of the
most powerful people in the state of
Nebraska, business-wise.
“If I was guilty of anything, the1
foundation sure as hell wouldn’t have
hired me. It’s total exoneration, which
I think I deserve.”
Peterson has been turned down for
a number of jobs since the audit,
including the athletic director posi
tion at the University of Miami of
Ohio. He said he was rejected because
of news coverage surrounding the
audit.
“There was nothing illegal at all,”
Peterson said. “That was proven. But
just the fact that there was an audit
creates the aura of suspicion. It seems
like the first articles kept popping up
about the audit and it was really hurt
ing my chances.”
Now, Peterson said, that may
change.
“This was a very good professional
move,” he said. “It will look good to
college presidents that are looking
for an athletic director. That is where
I would eventually like to end up, and
this is a good step towards that.
r.. 1 — .....
“I think this is a very good move
for me.”
Peterson was hired by NU Founda
tion President and CEO Terry
Fairfield, who said Peterson would
help the foundation develop a plan to
increase the number of endowed ath
letic scholarships.
“A program to increase scholar
ships for student athletes is part of the
impending major gifts campaign,”
Fairfield said in a news release. “We
want to develop a specific plan for the
Omaha and Kearney campuses.”
The foundation raises money for
all three University of Nebraska cam
puses — Lincoln, Omaha and
Kearney.
Peterson’s connections to the ath
letic department have ended.
“I am a native of this state, and
when I got this job, I thought it was a
job I’d be happy with for therest of my
life,” Peterson said. “But sometimes
things don’t work out as you planned.
Overall, I’m really excited.”
However, Peterson would not com
ment on whether the move was re
lated to the audit or his relationship
with Athletic Director Bill Byrne.
NU Regent Robert Allen of
Hastings said he wished Peterson
could stay, but problems between
Peterson and Byrne must have been
too intense.
“It’sobvious to all of us that when
a top-notch associate athletic director
has moved out of that kind of posi
tion, then there were some problems
there,” Allen said.
“I’m sorry to see Chris leave the
athletic department. When you look
at the tremendous talent that he had,
you really don’t like seeing him leave
the athletic department.
“At least he will still be at the
university. We need him.”
Allen said he hoped Peterson
stayed at his job at the foundation, but
he also wanted him to get a shot at an
athletic director job somewhere.
“I’d like to see the guy stay at the
university, but he’s such a talented
See PETERSON on 13
UNU,^
The number of students to attend UNL has fluctuated in the past
11 years. The preliminary enrollment for the 1995 school year is
24,354 students, up from 23,854 in 1994. The number of students
attending UNL is shown on the left, and the year of enrollment is
below.