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By Michelle Starr
Staff writer
Making air travel more convenient
and accessible is the goal of
researchers at the University of
Nebraska at Omaha Aviation Institute.
Researchers are working on a pro
ject that might help cut down on lost
baggage, delayed flights and the hassle
of connections. It could also provide
improved service to rural travelers,
said Tracy Cellan, NASA fellow at the
Omaha Aviation Institution assigned to
the Small Aircraft Transportation
System research project
It also might help revitalize the
small craft airport industry, said Keith
H. Henry, deputy at the office of public
affairs'at NASA Langley Research
Center in Virginia.
Researchers at the Omaha Aviation
Institute, along with NASA’s. Langley_
Research Center in Virginia ancfthe
Embry Riddle Aeronautical University
in Melbourne, Fla., are trying to pro
vide increased air travel service to rural
areas and later enable citizens to use
their personal small aircraft for trans
portation.
The program, called Small Aircraft
Transportation System, which was ini
tially sponsored by Bruce Holmes,
manager of the General Aviation
Program Office in the Langley
99 ' •
Right now the trend is for small airports
to close”
Keith H. Henry
deputy at office of public affairs at NASA Langley Research Center
Research Center, is attempting to pro
vide a new method for commuters
within the next 25 years, Cellan said.
Along with increased use of small
aircraft for rural communities, the
researchers envision a transportation
system that makes it possible for some
one to live in a city, such as Lincoln,
and be able to commute to New York
City for work, with the use of a small
two- to four-person aircraft, Cellan
said.
The airplane would cost about the
same as a luxury car, such as a BMW
or Lexus, and be about four times the
speed of driving on highways, Cellan
said.
The researchers have been compil
ing financial statistics, airway maps,
airport policy information and small
airports technology information since
May 1999 to provide direct flight and
increased airway usage, Cellan said.
The S ATS program has progressed
from research of the Advanced
General Aviation Transport
Experiments program, or AGATE pro
gram.
AGATE, which began in 1994 and
will continue through 2001, has similar
goals as SATS - it is looking to
increase technology, increase pilot
training, make flying small aircraft
more accessible and revitalize the avia
tion industry.
“Right now the trend is for small
airports to close,” Henry said. “The
market for small aircraft is going down
because there are fewer pilots.”
The research at AGATE helped
fuel the SATS program.
The SATS research is in the theo
retical and testing stages, but the pro
ject will need state and federal funding,
Cellan said.
The research hopes to create a 25
percent increase in airport service
within 10 years and a 90 percent
increase within 25 years.
The project in Omaha is funded
from a grant by the Nebraska EPSCor
Program.
NU looks at future of education
■ Academic Senate talks
about distance and Internet
education and what effect
it will have on NU.
- By JillZeman
Staff writer
Members of Academic Senate pon
dered the possibilities of alternative
forms of education in their meeting
Tuesday.
University of Nebraska President
Dennis Smith spoke about the future of
UNL entering die millennium and how
the university can better serve its stu
dents.
Smith mentioned two factors that
would aid further evolution of the uni
versity - information technology and
demographic diversification.
Smith said UNL’s student popula
tion is getting older, with 22 percent of
the undergraduates over the age of 25.
Including graduate students, the
number reaches 39 percent, Smith
said.
UNL needs to discuss possibilities
for distance education because of the
increase in older students, Smith said.
“The kinds of students and the way
we educate them is going to change
dramatically,” he said.
Smith said UNL needed to decide
whether or not to pursue further action
regarding education over the Internet.
Don Jensen, a UNL professor of
psychology, said the issue of distance
education was not what materials to
make available to students but how to
monitor their progress and provide
assistance.
Smith said if the distance education
system was constructed well, it could
be more effective than large lectures.
Another issue discussed was how
to ensure student interaction if classes
via the Internet are used.
“If whether you go to MIT (the
Massachusetts Institute of
Technology), the University of
Michigan or the University of
Nebraska doesn’t matter, Avhat will
happen to campuses as we know
them?” asked Tice Miller, a UNL pro
fessor of theater arts.
Smith said UNL doesn’t need to
decide what to do about distance edu
cation, but it just has to decide whether
or not to get involved.
In other business, the Academic
Senate heard committee reports about
UNL’s Research Council, the Grading
and Examination Committee and the
University Appeals and Judicial
Boards.
Study: Teen drinking, sex linked
Sexually transmitted diseases may increase, some say
WASHINGTON (AP) - Teen
agers who drink or use drugs are much
more likely than'others to be_sexually_
active, starting sexual intercourse as
early as middle school and with a
greater likelihood of multiple part
ners, a research group said Tuesday.
With condom use among teens
being erratic at best, there is a fear that
the combination of substance abuse -
and sex could increase the 12 million
new annual cases of sexually transmit
ted diseases.
“In America, drinking and drug
abuse are bundled with high-risk sec,”
said Susan Foster, who directed the
report “Dangerous Liaisons:
Substance Abuse and Sex” for the
Center on Addiction and Substance
Abuse at Columbia University. “Yet
despite the high coincidence of sub
stance abuse and sexual activity,
remarkably few public or private pre
vention, treatment and counseling pro
grams deal with this connection.”
In its report, gleaned from a vari
ety of data on 34,000 teen-agers in
gradey’7-12, the research center
admits it’s not sure what comes first.-—
the drinking and drug-taking or the
promiscuity. In its analysis, the group
factored out other reasons - such as
socioeconomic status or race - that are
associated with either drinking or hav
ing sex but not necessarily both and
could have made the connection look
weaker or stronger than it actually is.
But the report suggests there could
J>e some lessons from adults: Adult
heavy drinkers - defined as about
seven drinks a day over two weeks -
are five times more likely than those
who don’t drink at all to have at least
10 sexual partners a year.
Ben Smilowitz, a University of
Connecticut freshman who often fmds
little social life on campus beyond
drinking parties, said his peers are not
only turning to drink because of stress,
they also are imitating adults.
“People see drinking as way of
relaxing because that’s what adults
do,” the 18-year-old said. “You go to a
football game or hockey and see adults
getting trashed.”
He says more kids are drinking
and therefore engaging in riskier
behavior all around.
The report said drug-using teens
are five times as likely to have sex than
nonusers, and three times as likely to
have it with four or more partners,
according to the two-year analysis of
data.
~ A generation ago, die report said,
fewer teens were having sex. In 1970,
5 percent of 15-year-old girls had sex;
in 1972,20 percent of 15-year-old
boys said they had sex. In 1997,45
percent of boys and 38 percent of girls
said they have had intercourse in then
teen years.
Joseph A. Califano Jr., the research
center’s chairman, and a former U.S.
Secretary of Health, Education and
Welfare under President Johnson, says
the report shows parents must realize
that today’s teens more than ever are
forced to make decisions about drink
ing, illegal drugs and sex as early as
middle school.
Califano said school counselors,
parents, clergy and other adults should
address whichever teen activity - sex
or substance use - that first comes to
their attention.
“Adults should be prepared to
work with the teen on both matters,”
he said.
The group urges middle and high
schools to create comprehensive edu
cation programs that address the link
between substance abuse and sex.
But students have a different view.
“When society tells kids don’t
have sex, don’t drink, don’t use drugs,
it’s just creating forbidden fruit,”
Smilowitz said. “Society needs to re
examine its way of dealing with kids.”
The report was funded by the
Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation
and the Carnegie Corporation of New
York. Besides data from the teens, the
report also relied on articles, expert
interviews and examination of dozens
of prevention and treatment programs
for substance abuse, sex and sexual
violence.
U.S. stops short of
cutting aid to Russia
WASHINGTON ( AP) - Defense
Secretary William Cohen accused
Russia on Tuesday of killing innocent
civilians “on a rather substantial
scale” in its stepped-up military
offensive in Chechnya. But the
administration stopped short of rec
ommending that U.S. assistance to
Russia be cut to punish Moscow.
“The world community is
increasingly becoming very vocal
and very critical of die type of activi
ty that we have witnessed in the past
several weeks,” Cohen told reporters
at die Pentagon.
But both Cohen and White House
officials stressed that the “heavy
price” to Russia would be in loss of
world esteem, not necessarily in eco
nomic or other sanctions.
He renewed an appeal to Moscow
to scale back its campaign a day after
President Clinton predicted Russia
“will pay a heavy price” if it doesn’t
reverse course in the breakaway
Muslim territory.
During an appearance in the
White House Rose Garden, President
Clinton would not take questions
about Chechnya, noting he plans a
news conference on Wednesday.
White House spokesman Joe
Lockhart suggested cutting off U.S.
aid could thwart efforts to promote
democracy and reduce the nuclear
threat in Russia.
“I don’t think this is a situation
where you would undermine your
own national security to make a state
ment,” Lockhart said.
Moscow has warned citizens of
Grozny, the Chechen capital, to flee
by Saturday or be killed in a massive
air and artillery attack.
Earlier, Clinton met with NATO
Secretary-General George
Robertson.
Robertson afterwards said the
two share a concern “about getting
over a strong message” to Russia.
“Although we can understand the
tensions and the problems facing
Russia at this time, this is not the way
to succeed in dealing with these prob
lems,” Robertson said. “What is hap
pening there is unacceptable”
Russian forces entered Chechnya
in September in pursuit of Chechen
based Islamic militants whom
Moscow blames for apartment
bombings in Russian cities that left
300 people dead.
More than 200,000 Chechens
have since fled the largely Muslim
republic, and many are living in
refugee camps in neighboring
republics.
“The situation in Chechnya must
be resolved diplomatically and not
through military means,” Cohen said.
Cohen declined to say whether
Moscow’s conduct had violated
Geneva conventions regarding pro- '
tection of civilians during wartime, or
whether its three-month military
offensive amounted to an attempt at
ethnic cleansing.
“I’m not prepared to make a judg
ment on whether they’ve violated the
Geneva conventions. I’ll leave that up
to others. But it certainly is a policy in
which they appear to be engaged in
indiscriminate killing of innocent
civilians and on a rather substantial
scale,” he said.
Cohen spoke at a joint news con
ference with Patrick Lekoyta, South
Africa’s defense minister.
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