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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 5, 1999)
Train Traffic rerouted near campus after rail twists By Jake Bleed Senior staff writer A Burlington-Northem/Santa Fe train derailed near the intersection of 14th and Avery streets at 5:47 p.m. Thursday, blocking traffic and leav ing two cars up to their axles in dirt. Traffic was rerouted from Holdrege Street between Stadium Drive and 14th Street, University Police Sgt. Carl Oestmann said. A BNSF engine arrived within 15 minutes of the accident to pull the rear sections of the train away from blocked intersections, Oestmann said. Traffic resumed after about 20 minutes, Oestmann said. The south rail of the track slipped from underneath the train, Lane Hickenbottom/DN A BURLINGTON-NORTHERN/Santa Fe train sits derailed near the intersec tion of 14th and Avery streets Thursday. pushing four cars off the rails. About 40 feet of the south rail was twisted from beneath the train. The rail also broke in one place. Two engines and five cars remained over the derailed section of track north of Avery Street at 9 p.m. The track on which the train derailed is scheduled to be replaced within a year. Parrot stolen from pet store A 2-month-old parrot was stolen from its cage in a Lincoln pet store Wednesday afternoon, officer Katherine Finnell said. Cecilia, a Congo African Gray parrot, was taken between 2 and 5 p.m. from its cage at Petco, 4701 O St., Finnell said. Valued at $ 1,300, the young par rot must be hand-fed three times every day with a special baby bird formula, said Keila Harbour, com panion animal specialist at Petco. Without the special baby bird for mula, the parrot, which cannot yet drink water on its own, may become dehydrated and die, Harbour said. The parrot was born in a parrot aviary in Florida, Harbour said, and shipped to Lincoln three weeks ago. About 64 grams of marijuana found in car, police say Lincoln police found about 64 grams of marijuana in a Lincoln man’s car Wednesday afternoon, Finnell said. Officers approached the man’s car, which was parked in an alley between 27th and 28th streets and Holdrege and Potter streets, because an officer recognized one of the car’s occupants as a wanted man, Finnell said. The passenger saw police coming and fled. As police approached the car, the driver reached down under the driver’s seat, causing police to search the car for weapons, Finnell said. During the search, police found two plastic bags each holding 28.6 grams of marijuana and a third bag with .6 grams. A metal pipe was also taken from the car, Finnell said. Police did not catch the passen ger. The driver, Thomas Henderson, 21, was cited on suspicion of posses sion of marijuana paraphernalia and less than a pound of marijuana. Compiled by senior staff writer Jake Bleed UNL gets funding to start participation in peer review PEER from page 1 plete job than others.” Paul Savory, assistant professor' of industrial engineering, did peer review at UNL from fall 1996 to fall 1998. Savory photocopied a syllabus, review sheets, student homework and tests from an engineering class he taught. He shared the teaching portfolio with Sarah Ryan, a former assistant professor of industrial engi neering. Savory said talking with Ryan made him change his usual method of writing on the board and lecturing to the class. “I know it had a tremendous impact,” he said. “I used to be known as a talk-and-chalk professor. Since then, I joke that I’ve become ‘group guy.’” Without the peer review pro gram, Savory said his only way to be evaluated regularly would be through the evaluation sheets students fill out. He said students don’t know what, they should be taught, but another faculty member does. “I know I can’t bluff you as a peer, so I have to explain why I am teaching this concept, or why I am teaching it like this,” Savory said. “Students don’t know. They’re going to go in there and do the homework no matter what I teach you.” Constance Cook, director of the University of Michigan Center for Research on Learning and Teaching, said Michigan professors will be sharing their teaching portfolios with professors from other schools. “I think peer review supplements student evaluations very nicely,” she said. The University of Michigan has used peer review programs since 1994, including classroom visits and faculty lunches. Cook said the program’s draw back was its time requirement, because most professors, nation wide, work at least 55 hours a week. The University of Michigan will be part of the peer review program because UNUs Bernstein asked it to. Bernstein wanted to use peer review with other universities and asked The Trusts for the grant. He chose the other four universities because they were research universi ties, and some were interested in peer review, he said. Eighty percent of the $750,000 will go to participating professors, who will be able to buy books and travel to academic conferences. Bernstein said about 65 UNL professors have used the program during the past five years. He asked for the grant because he wanted pro fessors to become better teachers." “The research part of my life has been very well-supported at UNL, and I wanted opportunities to sup port the teaching side,” he said. UNL rethinks reallocation, reopens employment office OFFICE from page 1 more money.” , AnQther area hurt by the moving around of money this summer was mail delivery. Mail service switched from two times a day to one. After hearing complaints from faculty and staff, mail and distribu tion services decided in September to study the situation for 90 days. Officials will then determine if changes need to be made. The department has also done some internal shuffling to make up for the cut of personnel due to the reallocation, said Ken Holm, interim director of mail distribution services. One employee was added after five were cut this summer. The department is still function ing with the decreased allocation it received this summer, Holm said. Despite rumors, Holm said, his staff is still delivering all personal and bulk mail. Two months after the change went into effect, Holm said, the situ ation is somewhat stabilized. “It looks like it’s going to work,” he said. With many departments running as efficiently as they could before the reallocations, Lewis said, he knew the cuts would hurt. “If business and finance had a whole lot of money, I would have been surprised,” Lewis said. “But we don’t have money to throw at things.” Lewis said his office didn’t expect the cuts would elicit the reac tion they did. “There is a little more reaction than we anticipated.”