THURSDAY
WEATHER:
Today - Partly cloudy &
cooler. Northwest wind
20 to 30 mph.
Tonight - Mostly cloudy,
low around 35 to 40.
April 25,1996
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Scott Bruhn/DN
Jennifer Cantrell, a NASA public information associate, takes volunteers through the replica of NASA’s International
Space Station parked behind Oldfather Hall.
NASA displays future at UNL
Space station replica features astronauts ’ living quarters
By Chad Lorenz
Senior Reporter
In 2002, NASA astronauts will board the
completed International Space Station orbit
ing Earth.
But today, UNL students have a chance to
board a full-scale replica of NASA’s Inter
national Space Station behind Oldfather Hall.
The space station will be at the University
of Nebraska-Lincoln, courtesy of the Na
tional Aeronautics and Space Administra
tion, through Wednesday.
“We’re proud of what we’re doing, and
we want to show it off,” said Jennifer Cantrell,
a NASA public information associate.
The replica, formed by two adjoining
trailers, shows how the two modules will
look on the inside.
The living quarters module includes the
refrigerator-sized sleeping quarters, kitchen,
entertainment area, shower and toilet. The
second section is a laboratory.
Visitors will need to look up to see a vital
part of astronaut life — exercise. A rowing
machine for the astronauts hangs from the
ceiling.
“In space, there’s no such thingas upside
down,” Cantrell said.
Because there’s no gravity in space, as
tronauts can exercise on the ceiling and use
“That’s just a pleasing
sensation for the astronaut.
It's basically a mind game."
JENNIFER CANTRELL
NASA public information
associate
the toilet on the wall.
The only way to tell directions on the
space station is the different colors of the
ceiling and floor.
“We’re calling this up, and we’re calling
this down,” Cantrell said. “That’s just a
pleasing sensation for the astronaut. It’s ba
sically a mind game.”
The anti-gravity environment requires
special equipment so astronauts can work
and live as normally as possible, Cantrell
said.
Astronauts are strapped into their beds,
which are merely sleeping bags anchored to
the ceiling, Cantrell said. Without the sleep
ing restraints, astronauts would float around
the module and bump into things.
In the bathroom, astronauts must put their
hands into a glass bubble to wash them,
Cantrell said. Water is sprayed onto their
hands, then sucked back into the unit to
prevent loose water from floating around the
module.
Anywhere an astronaut wants to work
also must be contained with a clear, plastic
“glove box” to keep loose tools and parts
from floating away, Cantrell said.
The development of the space station has
already led to a spinoff in water recycling,
Cantrell said. Astronauts will not have their
water replenished regularly because all forms
of water are cycled through filters to be used
again.
A11 shower water and water vapor is vacu
umed back into the recycling unit.
“Urine is actually recycled and turned
into drinkable water,” Cantrell said.
In the laboratory, space station visitors
will sec examples of the experiments astro
nauts will conduct.
The space station replica has been on
display across the country since March of
1995. Cantrell said the replica would con
tinue touring the United States until the real
one goes up.
“We’ll try and reach as many places as we
can with our limited budget,” she said.
Children from Lincoln schools will visit
the replica from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. today,
and it will open to the public at 3 p.m.
Commission
helps girls
go to work
By Erin Schulte
Staff Reporter '
In a world of nontraditional families, not all
girls have someone to tag along with today on
“Take Our Daughters to Work Day.”
Some girls don’t have two parents. Some
parents don’t have jobs.
Lincoln Public Schools assembled a list of
50 such girls.
Enter the Lincoln-Lancaster County
Women’s Commission. The schools sent the
list to the commission, and the commission
found the girls mentors.
Commission member Bonnie Coffey said
girls in those situations should not miss out on
the opportunity to go to work for a day.
Jan Wahl, a multicultural education profes
sor at UNL, said her experiences with the event
last year made her excited about participating
again this year.
“I had a great experience with a little third- *
grader,” Wahl said. “She went to classes with
me, helped pass things out and picked up evalu
ations. We walked all over campus and went to
a luncheon.”
Wahl will take a sixth-grader from Dawes
Middle School to class this year.
“I think ‘Take Our Daughters to Work Day’
is a viable concept given the work we still need
to do in encouraging young women about career
possibilities,” Wahl said. “Especially in jobs
like engineering, areas where there is not cross
UVCI.
Young men might need to get in on the
program, too, Wahl said.
“There’s another side of me that says it
would be a nice idea to encourage young men to
get involved in more nurturing professions,”
Wahl said.
Getting boys involved has been an argument
of the tradition since it was started four years
ago by the Ms. Foundation. Some companies
have responded to the protests.
First Data Corp. of Omaha, which employs
about 6,500 people, has decided to hold its own
“Kids to W ork” day tomorrow instead of “Take
Our Daughters to Work Day.”
“We wanted it to be more inclusive,” said
Marge Kalina, special projects coordinator.
“Ours includes grandkids, nieces, nephews,
sons, daughters and mentoring kids from
Omaha,” Kalina said.
“We understand that the day for daughters
started because in some cases women don’t
have the role models young men do, but our
company is really committed to diversity and
felt it was better to be all-inclusive.”
Kalina said about 600 kids would be visiting
First Data’s 40 Omaha offices.
Coffey said a day for both boys and girls
wasn’t as effective.
“I don’t have a problem with taking sons to
work; it should just be on a separate day.
“I think it still misses the point that we need
an opportunity to focus on girls. For one day
they get to be important, and we get to focus on
them.”
Moore: Law may reduce turnout
By Kasey Kerber
Staff Reporter
The “motor voter” law has drasti
cally increased the number of regis
tered voters in Nebraska, but one offi
cial is concerned that the law will
decrease the percentage of registered
voters who make it to the polls.
“It’s fine to register to vote,” said
Secretary of State Scott Moore. “Yet
the underlyingquestion is whether most
of newly registered voters will actu
ally vote.”
The “motor voter” law, which took
effect in 1995, allows anyone of vot
ing age who renews or receives a
driver’s license to register to vote in
one easy step.
The law contributed to a record
high of 962,869 voters registered in
Nebraska as of Jan. 1. Since the law
was implemented, 70 percent of all
new registered voters have registered
to vote through the Department of
Motor Vehicles.
But Moore said he thought the num
ber of “motor voters” wouldn’t keep
rising indefinitely.
“At one point this will level off
because not all people that renew their
license for the second or third time will
want to register to vote,” Moore said.
The “motor voter” law also allows
registered voters who haven’t re-reg
istered after changingaddresses within
their county to vote through “condi
tional ballots.”
Those ballots will be tallied 15 days
after the official election, after offi
cials have verified that voters cast only
one ballot.
“Ifit’saclose election, these condi
tional ballots may very well have an
impact as far as time is concerned,”
Moore said. “In the past a close elec
tion might be decided in two days.
Now it might not be for fifteen.”
Moore said he thought it was im
portant for voters who showed up at
the polls to be allowed to vote — no
matter where they registered.
“If someone cares enough to go to
the polls, then I want them to be able
to,” he said.
The Associated Press contributed to this
report.
Panel opinions differ
on affirmative action
uy trin bcnuite
Staff Reporter
Affirmative action based on race
is illegal and on the way out the
door, a law professor said Wednes
day.
Richard Duncan, a professor of
law at the University of Nebraska
Lincoln, said affirmative action
policies based on race should be
replaced by policies based on eco
nomic status.
Because minorities often fall into
low-income categories, he said, they
still would receive benefitsof affir
mative action.
Duncan was amongcampus edu
cators and administrators who
voiced diverse and sometimes radi
cal ideas at a panel discussion at the
Nebraska Union.
Classification by economic and
social disadvantages are legal, he
said, and would benefit the right
people.
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