I
Forensics team
adds spice to
. communication
speakers
By Michaela Pieler
Staff Reporter
Patti Leavitt has an ability most
students envy—she’s not a bit ner
vous when she speaks in front of a
class.
Leavitt said she owed that to her
four years of experience on the
Comhusker Forensics Squad.
“I was a really bad speaker when
I first came to UNL,” said Leavitt,
president of the squad. “But the
team totally helped me out ofthat.”
The senior political science ma
jor is one of 22 members of
Comhusker Forensics.
The group meets once a week to
practice persuasive speaking, in
terpret literature or debate current
issues. And on the weekends, mem
bers travel to tournaments at
other colleges and
uni- ver
si- ties
n a -
tionwide.
Last weekend, squad members
competed in Eau Claire, Wis., where
10 members qualified for the Ameri
can Forensics Association’s national
tournament next month in Gainesville,
Fla.
“I can’t remember having such a
good season,” said Forensics Di
rector Ann Burnett, who has been
leading the squad for eight years.
The team has lost only one tourna
ment since last December, she said.
“Wc have an extremely talented
group of young people this year,”
Burnett said.
She and five assistant coaches
lead the group, which can be taken
as a class for up to two credit hours
a semester.
Team member Marna Schulte
said succeeding in a tournament re
quired both practice and experience.
For example, every speech—even
seriousones—shouldcon
in some humor,
:he said.
Schulte, a senior
political science
and communication studies major,
said she also tried to keep eye con
tact with her audience.
“You always have to keep in mind
that you ’re talking with someone and
not at someone,” site said. “Don’t try
to give a 10-minute lecture.”
Assistant coach David Tschida
said the tournaments were his fa
vorite part of forensics.
“At the tournaments, we bring
together a competitive and educa
tional activity in a very friendly
environment,” said Tschida, a
graduate student in communication
studies.
Leavitt said .she made a lot of
friends both at tournaments and
within the UNL forensics team. The
squad is like a family, she said.
Members support each other with
out being competitive.
“It’s a great chance for every
student to find a smaller commu
nity within a huge school like UNL,”
she said.
Burnett said members learned
more than how to speak more effec
tively. For instance, they learn how
to do effective research.
“It prepares you better for
classes, makes you more analyti
, cal and improves your papers,”
Ik she said. “You learn how to
K think about issues, and you
H learn how to win and lose.”
“ Mike Wagner, a sophomore
broadcasting major, said fo
rensics had benefited him more
than any one class.
“It makes communication so
much easier,” he said. “You
| will always communicate with
K people. And the better you do
" in communication, the better
you’ll do in life.”
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Charges filed against
former Husker player
By Chad Lorenz
Senior fteporfer ——
Disturbing the peace charges were
filed Tuesday against a former Ne
braska football player for an alleged
incident in Kearney on March 2.
Amy Jacobsen, Buffalo County
deputy attorney, charged Christian
Peter with disturbance of the peace of
Janelle Mues, 21.
Peter originally was cited by police
for third-degree assault after allegedly
grabbing Mues around the neck at a
bar called Einsteins.
Peter, who was on campus Tuesday
testing in front ofprofcssional football
scouts, did not speak with the media.
Jacobsen said she reviewed police
reports and witness accounts before
filing the lesser charge.
“Our office can prove there was
disturbance of the peace,” Jacobsen
said. “The assault charge is a little
weaker.”
Peter, who was co-captain for the
national championship Cornhusker
football team, was in Kearney for a
scholarship fund-raiser sponsored by
the Platte Valley Big Red Boosters.
Peter was found guilty of third
degree sexual assault in 1993 and sen
tenced to 18 months probation. He
was released from probation on Jan. 5.
He is scheduled for arraignment on
March 27. Disturbing the peace is a
class III misdemeanor carrying a maxi
mum sentence of three months in jail
and S500 fine and no minimum sen
tence.
Mankiller lecture canceled
The scheduled appearance of
Wilma Mankiller, former principal
chief of the Cherokee nation, has been
canceled, a University Program Coun
cil spokesperson said Monday,
Holly Crocker, event director for
UPC, said Mankiller was ill and would
not be able to speak.
The lecture was to be held tonight
in the Nebraska East Union.
Mankiller, the first female chief of
the Cherokee nation, is co-author of
“Mankiller: A Chief and Her People.”
In the past few years, she has lectured
at universities and conferences nation
ally, speaking about issues affecting
women and minorities.
Crocker said the event would not be
rescheduled.
— Joshua Gillin
Schick
Continued from Page 1
tcnce structure of sign language.
Like any foreign language, Ameri
can Sign Language differs from spo
ken English in many ways, Schick said.
For example, adjectives come after
nouns, like in Spanish.
Schick has another program still in
development. The computer program,
“Sign to Mind,” is a signing dictio
nary. When a word is typed in, the
screen shows someone signing that
word. Standard signing dictionaries
are hard to use because they use still
pictures to indicate hand movement.
All of her programs have been trans
ferred to CD-ROM, Schick said, in the
Barkley Memorial Center’s media cen
ter.
She said she hoped to publish all of
her programs on CD-ROM so other
universities could use them in signing
classes.
But Schick said she was concerned
that other universities might not have
the computer resources to use the pro
grams. In that respect, sign language
students at UNL were lucky, she said.
“UNL is much further ahead in in
structional technology than itrther
schools.”
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