Fulbright program will send
two professors to Portugal
I
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By Sarah Fox
Staff writer
Though well-qualified, UNL
Associate English Professor Thomas
Caramagno nearly blew his chance
when applying for a prestigious inter
national honor - he missed the appli
cation date.
Caramagno was given the applica
tion by one Pf his students, who
encouraged him to apply as a Fulbright
Scholar.
Caramagno was considered a
strong candidate because he had
taught courses in gay and lesbian stud
ies and had an esteemed fellowship at
Harvard University.
Although the Fulbright deadline
had just passed, Caramagno followed
his student’s advice, and he now will
teach for three months in Portugal.
The Fulbright Program, which is
sponsored by a branch of the State
Department, sends professors and
graduate students to other countries
from the United States to study and
teach as well as imports international
instructors from abroad.
The program is more than 50 years
old and was originally created to
diminish the “appalling ignorance of
Americans,” said Wes Peterson, cam
pus coordinator of Fulbright pro
grams. The exchange helps promote
global understanding.
“It allows students of other coun
tries to get to know Americans,”
Caramagno said. However, the focus is
more academic now, he said.
The University of Nebraska
Lincoln has two Fulbright Scholars,
Caramagno and Dwayne Ball, an asso
ciate professor of marketing, who will
study overseas in the spring.
Ball will teach and research data
base marketing at die New University
of Lisbon in Lisbon, Portugal, where
he and his family will live from
January through April 1999.
Ball called his grant the “culmina
tion of a dream.” He taught in New
Zealand for a year before he came to
Nebraska.
“I’ve been here hoping for an
opportunity to go abroad ever since,”
Ball said.
Ball said he and his wife, especial
ly, had been wanting their eighth-grade
son and fourth-grade daughter to live
overseas while they still were young.
He also said his foreign study
would enable him to gather more
research about European consumer
habits.
Caramagno will lecture critical lit
erary theory to graduate literature stu
dents and conduct research at the
University of Lisbon from February to
May 1999. He said he was especially
looking forward to teaching gay and
lesbian studies on a continent where
not many courses are taught in that
field.
“They’re behind the times on queer '
theory,” he said. “They’ve been more
practically oriented. They have more
gay rights laws, but not as many (uni
versity) courses.”
Caramagno said he thought the
Fulbright grant would help his career
and reputation in the future. That suc
cess started in the early 1980s with a
post-doctorate fellowship at Harvard
University, where he wrote a book lit
eral criticism.
“The book helped me get the
Fulbright, and the Fulbright will help
me get something else,” he said.
However, the award may be more
beneficial to someone else besides
Caramagno - his 79-year-old mother
“who is always bragging.”
“She says it gives her a lot of cred
it among her friends.”
Senators prepare for new session
1999 Legislature will examine education, spending
By Todd Anderson
Senior staff writer
Despite facing a new swarm of state
senators and a new governor, the 1999
Legislature’s focus on taxes, spending
aind state education will remain the
same as last year, senators said.
About one-fifth of the state’s 49 sen
ators will be new to the floor of the
Legislature.
In addition, Gov. Ben Nelson has
not yet appointed a replacement for
the seat vacated by state auditor-elect
KateWitek.
Speaker of the Legislature Doug
Kristensen said the new senators have
trained and are searching for areas they
would like to specialize in.
Hastings Sen. Ardyce Bohlke said it
is up to the present members of the
Unicameral to integrate the new repre
sentatives into the body.
“It seems to happen naturally that
you always bring people in who have
new areas of expertise, so we have to
make sure that we can work with them,”
she said. “I think most of them under
stand the commitment they’re making,
that they’re going to have to dedicate a
; lot of time.”
__ Though many of the faces will be
new, Kristensen said the Legislature
will continue work begun last year,
specifically concerning taxes and
spending in the wake of the defeat of
Initiative 413, a proposed constitutional
amendment on the November ballot
that would have set limits on state
spending and revenue.
“The defeat of 413 I think elevated
the public discussion about public
expenditures,” Kristensen said. “But
that is an issue that receives a tremen
dous amount of attention every year in
the Legislature.”
Lincoln Sen. Ron Raikes said 413
revealed the amount of consideration
the Legislature gives fiscal issues.
“I think the record of state govern
ment in Nebraska came out well in that
discussion, although that certainly does
n’t mean that we don’t have challenges
remaining.”
While Lincoln Sen. Chris Beutler
said he has not yet identified the special
projects he will take on this session, he
said the Unicameral will continue talk
ing about typical topics:
■ Regulating large hog confine
ment operations.
■ Shifting the tax base from proper
ty taxes to sales and income taxes.
■ State aid to local governments.
■ Statewide education standards
and funding.
This year the Legislature must set
and discuss the state’s budget for the
next two years, which is expected to
amount to more than $5 billion over the
next two years.
Raikes said funding for the
University of Nebraska and postsec
ondary education always receives a lot
of attention.
He said this year’s heightened
spending for salary increases for faculty
members and administrators, as well as
capital construction costs for repairs on
the campus of Peru State College, will
make the education portion of the bud
get especially important
Beutler said it remains to be seen
how the new Legislature will work on
those issues with Gov.-elect Mike
Johanns.
“When there’s a new governor, the
Legislature and the governor have to get
to know each other a little bit” Beutler
said. “We can get a feel for him, and he
can get a feel for us so that we can iden
tity what’s important from our relative
perspectives.”
The newly elected senators who will
begin their terms Jan. 6 are:
Trenton businessman Thomas
Baker, Omaha lawyer Patrick Bourne,
Beatrice businessman Dennis Byars,
Decatur farmer Matt Connealy, Aurora
farmer Bob Kremer, Lincoln nurse
Marian Price Gering real estate agent
Adrian Smith, and Omaha business
woman Pam Redfield.
Suspects wanted for stabbings, robberies
By Josh Funk
Senior staff writer
On Sunday, police were still look
ing for two men responsible for two
stabbings and an attempted robbery in
the Near South neighborhood
Thursday night.
The three incidents, which police
believe are connected, all happened
within half an hour of each other
inside of a 15-block area.
The two men were demanding
money while threatening people with
a knife, and two of their victims were
stabbed, Lincoln Police Sgt. Ann
Heermann said.
One of the stabbing victims was
listed in fair condition at BryanLGH
Medical Center West on Sunday
j evening, and the other man was treat
I ed and released Thursday night.
The first incident occurred jusl
before 10 p.m. on 17th Street between
K and L streets, Heermann said.
A 39-year-old man was
approached as he walked north on
17“ Street.
The second man pulled a knife
and started yelling at the first man
who ran to the Handy Shop, 1700 L
St, and called police.
The next incident occurred in an
alley between 16th, 17th, L and M
streets around 10:40 p.m. when a 25
year-old man was approached by two
men, Heermann said.
The two men yelled for the man’s
money.
The man gave them his wallet
containing $4, but in the exchange he
was stabbed three times, twice in the
right biceps and once in his lower
back.
He was treated and released
Thursday night after he called police
from Yiayia’s Pizza Beer and Wine,
1423 O St.
The third robbery happened at
1202 F St. shortly after 11 p.m.
The two;men approached a 27
year-old man and asked for money.
He refused and was stabbed twice
in the left side and once in the left arm.
Then the two men took his wallet and
fled in a red four-door car, police said.
The victim was still in the hospital
Sunday night. Because of a language
barrier, police did not know how
much money he lost, Heermann said.
There are some discrepancies in
the three descriptions given, but
police said that was expected with the
trauma the victims sustained.
Both suspects are described as
Hispanic men in their early 20s with
short hair. One man is tall and slender.
The other man is short and heavy set.