SPDBTS
Replacing Reitsma
The Nebraska volleyball team goes with another
lefty, sophomore Nancy Meendering, to replace
the three-time All American. PAGE 9
A&E
Roll it!
A new major is in the works at UNL, and faculty members
and students alike are awaiting the debut of our state’s first
full-fledged film department. PAGE 18
August 25, 1998
A Step in the Right D rection
Mostly sunny, high 89. Mostly o' '."’y tonight, low 67.
Matt Miller/DN
NIKKI ABBOTT CALLS her mom after finding out she is in Pi Beta Phi Sorority on Monday at Burnett Hall. A record
percentage of women pledged on Bid Day.
More rush to join sororities
Record percentage of women
turn out looking to go greek
By Kim Sweet
Staff writer
The sidewalks leading to the 14
sorority houses at UNL were con
siderably less traveled during the
day on Monday.
Just last weekend, 622 women
packed the sidewalks as they visited
one house after another for the
annual sorority rush.
They retreated to residence halls
and classes Monday as they waited
to receive invitations to houses.
But a record percentage of those
women returned to the streets on
Monday evening, as they were
escorted to their new houses by the
Panhellenic representative for each
sorority.
The percentage of women actu
ally placed in a house is the highest
it has been in at least a decade, said
Mary Ann Holland of Greek Affairs.
Those increased numbers are
positive for the greek system, said
Laura Schweer, rush chairwoman
for Phi Mu Sorority.
“The greek system has a lot of
benefits that go unnoticed,”
Schweer said. “(People) don’t see
that the grade point average is high
er in the sororities than in the uni
versity.”
The more women the greek sys
tem contains, the more women it
can help, she said. This will lead to
maintaining a positive image for
sororities.
The positive image the houses
u
The greek system
has a lot of benefits
that go unnoticed
Laura Schweer
Phi Mu rush chairwoman
worked to build in the past helped to
recruit the hundreds of women that
attended rush, said Amy Ellis, rush
chairwoman for Alpha Chi Omega
Sorority.
More women from western
Nebraska made up the pool of girls
who rushed, Ellis said.
Ellis attributes this to the recog
nition statewide philanthropic activ
ities have given her house as well as
the entire greek system.
Schweer said out-of-state
recruiting by the university also has
increased rush numbers, as more
non-Nebraskans took part in the
activities this year.
While the rush chairwomen
were excited about rush numbers,
those numbers required an extra
effort on the part of many sorority
members. More rushees meant
more women to talk to each day,
Schweer said.
Though the increased numbers
created more work for sorority
members, the true dilemma came
when it was time to choose, Ellis
said.
Matt Miller/DN
KILEY SCHAFER, right, hugs a new
Pi Beta Phi pledge in front of their
sorority house.
“I think it made it harder
because there were so many good
girls ” Ellis said.
A potential problem with the
increased number of women was
solved by a new computer system
used this year by Greek Affairs. The
computer system eases the conges
tion in the houses by methodically
assigning women to houses
throughout the day.
The former system allowed
women to choose randomly which
houses they wanted to visit and
when, said Linda Schwartzkopf,
director of Greek Affairs. The new
system eliminated an overabun
dance of girls visiting one house
while another remained empty.
While the increased numbers
required extra effort by the houses,
Ellis said she welcomed it.
“Each year hopefully we'll
increase more and more.’’
Fraternity room
catches on fire
Electrical outlet blamed
By Josh Funk
Senior staff writer
A faulty electrical outlet ignited
a fire that gutted one room at Beta
Theta Pi Fraternity Monday morn
ing, fire inspectors said.
The fire caused $1,000 in struc
tural damage and $3,000 in damage
to the contents of the room, Lincoln
Fire Inspector James Ellis said.
From the attire of the 20 fraterni
ty members gathered on the lawn of
1515 R St., it was clear that the
alarm had roused several of them
from bed just after 10 a.m.
Five fire engines, two command
vehicles and an ambulance lined the
street outside the fraternity with
police blocking the intersections at
14th and 16th streets.
A hose firefighters used to extin
guish the fire snaked from one of the
engines to a hydrant and then inside
the building where fans were blow
ing clear the last of the smoke.
Deputy Chief Jerry Greenfield
said smoke was rising from the
northwest corner of the third floor
when his engines arrived.
The fire had started in the room
directly over the entrance of the Beta
Theta Pi house after the resident left
for class at 9 a.m. Monday.
Greenfield said that two other
students who live on the floor
smelled smoke and investigated the
cause.
When the students saw smoke
emanating from around the door,
they got the house manager, who had
a master key for the room, and called
the fire department, Greenfield said.
The fraternity members were
able to control the fire with extin
guishers before firefighters arrived,
Greenfield said.
The fire destroyed personal
belongings in the room and caused
structural damage around the win
dow.
Children’s museum
to play with new space
By Kim Sweet
Staff writer
There are not many places
where a 5-year-old can make a
bank transaction.
The place that provides chil
dren of all ages with an ATM card
also allows them to buy their own
groceries, drive a tractor or suit
up to fight a fire.
Of course the money is fake,
the tractor is immobile and the
fires are imagined. But that does
n’t decrease the excitement chil
dren feel as they enter the
Lincoln Children’s Museum,
ready to explore.
The museum, which attracts
80,000 visitors a year, is home to
50 exhibits that are similar to the
bank, the fire truck and the trac
tor.
As children come and go
through the museum, the staff
hopes the children will do one
thing - play.
With this goal in mind the
Lincoln Children’s Museum, at
121 S. 13th St., is planning to cre
ate an even bigger opportunity
for children to play.
After a $1.8 million citywide
bond issue was passed last May,
the museum purchased a new
location for an expanded chil
dren's museum. The museum will
move from its current location in
44
There are
so many museums
that don’t
allow children
to touch.”
Tom White
museum director of marketing
the Lincoln Square building on O
Street to 1420 P St. in the vacant
building next to Rock ’N Roll
Runza.
The museum operates under
the mission that a child’s work is
play, said Tom White, director of
marketing for the museum. White
and the rest of the staff hold the
belief that through playing, chil
dren can learn what no one else
can teach them.
“It is by getting their hands on
things where they learn how the
world is and where their place in
it is,” White said.
After renting space in its cur
rent location for the last 10 years,
the museum will have a perma
Please see MUSEUM on 6
Read the Daily Nebraskan on the World Wide Web at http://www.unl.edu/DailyNeb