Tuesday /
January 30,2001
Volume 100
Issue 93
dailyneb.com
Since 1901
WBMBBBMIiMiMiirMliMiMi Hi II if ill1 i ii n will
■
Circus days: Karen Brown finds
the paraflei between the Super
Bowi and a certain dose
presidential election
In Opinion/4 .
Two Husker football
players could qualfy for
a sixth year of eHgMHty
In SportslUesday/10
\
Lincoln’s well-known gay
dub, the Q, offers bar
goers something different
In Arts/5
. ^
—
■zMmm
Derek Lippincott/DN
KE BREAKER: Sophomore finance maw Nick touting chips the ke off his windshield Monday afternoon. Reuting, a transfer student from St Thomas University in Minnesota,
said the weather there is consistently much worse than It is in Lincoln.
City works to lighten Monday's weather woes
BY BRADLEY DAVIS
Lincolnites braced for a cold, snowy
evening Monday as UNL students enjoyed a
nightofffrom classes and anxiously listened for
word-on whether school would be canceled
today.
Interim Chancellor Harvey Perlman was
expected to make an announcement on
today's classes by 5 a.m.
Chances are, if you’re reading this, your
prayers to the snowgods went unanswered.
Rick Chermok, a meteorologist with the
National Weather Service in Valley, said most of
the accumulating snow had ended in the
Lincoln area by late afternoon Monday.
A band of heavy snow extended north and
west of the Lincoln area, from Hastings to
Columbus to Fremont, where snowfall totals
were expected to top 6 inches, Chermok said.
About 3 to 4 inches accumulated by late
afternoon in Lincoln on Monday, with temper
atures topping at 31 degrees.
Light snow was expected today, Chermok
said, but a winter weather reprieve is expected
by Friday, with temperatures forecast to reach
the low-40s.
Lincoln city snowplows were out in full
force all evening, with plowing occurring on
major arterial roads, snow emergency and bus
routes, according to the city Public Works
Department
Even though plows were shoveling, sand
ing and salting streets to make driving condi
tions better, roads as of Monday evening were
treacherous, said Tom Schwarten, a Nebraska
State Patrol traffic lieutenant
Please see WEATHER on 7
UNL's priorities
are unveiled
■The list of academic
programs is big and broad; no
specific cuts are identified.
BYjmZEMAN
Anyone who wants to see
UNL’s top academic programs
. can now put their handi on a
much-publicized document that
has been talked about for more
than a year.
The University of Nebraska
Lincoln unveiled a list of its high
est academic priority programs
Monday.
But people who were expect
ing - or fearing - a list of programs
that would get the ax might
breathe a sigh of relief.
The 100-plus page document
paints strong programs with
broad strokes, and administrators
say those that aren’t included
aren’t necessarily on their way
'out
Faculty members and admin
istrators identified the top 20 to 25
percent ofUNLis programs, which
ended up to be 102 areas of focus.
The prioritization process was
kick-started by the NU Board of
Regents, which requested the uni
versity identify its programs with
the most potential to gain nation
al recognition.
UNL Interim Chancellor
Harvey Perlman said the list was
in no way complete.
The reason the priorities were
publicized was so the university
can get input from the public, he
said.
Money will be directed to the
priorities, whether it's through
federal grants, the university’s
budget or internally, Perlman
said
“This isn’t an event, it's an atti
tude,” Perlman said.
Prioritizing goes hand-in
hand with the 20/20 statement,
which outlines goals for the uni
versity for die next 20 years.
Perlman said by 2020, there
should be some noticeable
progress in UNLs academic pro
grams.
“There’s no magic formula to
use to do this overnight,” Perlman
said.
But not all of the 102 priorities
will receive equal funding, he
said
After a final draft of the report
is approved, there will be another
prioritization of sorts, on how to
allocate money to the programs.
These decisions will be made
by college deans and administra
tors, he said.
But the preliminary list is just
die beginning, Perlman said.
Hie priorities are divided into
four areas: graduate/professional
education and research/creative
activity; life sciences, health and
natural resources; undergraduate
education and outreach.
■ Graduate and professional
programs are broken into areas
that should receive either instruc
tional emphasis or research
emphasis.
Seventeen graduate programs
are listed with an instructional
emphasis, which include muse
um studies, philosophy and
moral sciences, Spanish, interna
tional media communications
and post- colonial literatures in
English.
Please see PRIORITIES on 3
Undergrads explore limits in research
UCAREpays students
to gain knowledge
through program
BY SHARON KOLBET
I
Editor's Note: Today marks the first in a four-part
series on UCARE, the undergraduate research pro
gram.
Get paid to study.
While the phrase is often used by employers
looking to hire students for ticket booths and candy
counters, there is
% program at the
University of
Nebraska*
Lincoln that
offers under
graduate stu
dents a chance
to add to their
knowledge as
well as their bank
accounts.
Known as the Undergraduate Creative Activities
and Research Experience, the program offers stu
dents a chance to do original and independent
research.
The is unusual in its focus on giving undergrad
PleaseseeUCAREon7
Translation work allows exploration of roots
BY SHARON KOLBET_ _
UNL junior Nicole Kimbrough knows how to lis
ten.
With a research project that involves translating
nearly 150 audio tapes from Czech to English,
Kimbrough works hard to catch every word.
As part of her undergraduate research project,
Kimbrough, is working with Czech language profes
sor Mila Saskova-Pierce to preserve Nebraska’s
Czech history.
The audio tapes were recorded in the 1970s by a
University of Nebraska archivist to preserve the oral
histories of Nebraska residents who were of Czech
descent
Many of those interviewed immigrated to the
United States from Czechoslovakia and spoke of
growing up in Nebraska towns with large Czech pop
ulations.
"Back then, everyone in their community spoke
Czech. They even had Czech in the schools.”
Kimbrough said.
Some of the taped conversations have portions
in English, but others are entirely in Czech.
Kimbrough estimates it often takes 10 hours to finish
translating one 90-minute tape.
“Some of the narrators were really old when the
tapes were made, so it takes awhile to translate each
one.” she said.
Translating the audio tapes is just one facet of a
larger Czech history preservation project directed by
Saskova-Pierce.
Please see CZECH QUEEN on 7
Mtaron Kolbet/DN
,—--jiwugn,a UNL junior,is
working on an undergraduate research project to preserve
the oral histories of Nebraska Czechs. Kimbrough's project has
been funded by a grant from the UCARE project.
Privacy an issue when using social security number
[ 11INL could be forced to find a
. new way to identify students on
IDsandotherforms.
BYGWENTIETGEN
i -
In Nebraska schools, asking stu
I dents for their social security num
bers may seem as common as taking
attendance.
But schools will be left hunting
for another number to identify stu
dents if LB330 becomes law.
LB330 prohibits schools from
using a student's social security
number as a form of identification
on class rosters, student identifica
tion cards or any other public listing.
“The government never intended
a person's social security number to
be used as a student identification
number, which is the way we are
using it now,” said Sen. Pam Redfield
of Omaha, who introduced the bill.
The bill allows schools to use a
student’s social security number on
£
financial aid forms or other forms
where it’s required by law.
The increased need for privacy of
social security numbers has become
an issue because of the climbing
numbers of crimes involving identity
and the increased awareness of these
crimes among citizens, Redfield said.
“In a day and age before comput
ers, using social security numbers
probably wasn’t that big of a deal,”
Redfield said.
“Now with a social security num
ber, someone can access your entire
life.”
But at UNL, the costs of the bill
outweigh the benefits.
Earl Hawkey, the director of UNL
Registration and Records, said if the
bill was passed, UNL would need to
reissue every student’s identification
card and rewrite the university’s
computer software.
And while revamping the univer
sity’s administrative systems is pos
sible, Hawkey said, it would take
Please see IDENTIFICATION on 3
Legislature
Lagging pay
for teachers
a priority
BY GEORGE GREEN
Sen. Ron Raikes of Lincoln put it best
"Increasing teacher salaries is no simple mat
ter."
And on Monday, the Education Committee got a
taste of exactly what Raikes meant
The committee heard testimony, but did not
vote on four bills aimed at boosting lagging teacher
salaries.
Nebraska rates 44th in the nation in average
teacher salaries.
LB305, introduced by the Education
Committee, presented the heftiest and longest list of
recommendations of all of the day’s bills heard by
committee.
The bill incorporates all of the recommenda
tions of a task force, which was formed last year by
the Legislature to study Nebraska’s teacher salaries.
The highlights of the task force’s recommenda
tions include bumping up teacher salaries with
year-end stipends, providing mentoring programs
for new teachers and rewarding educators for
acquiring national certification.
Duane Obermier, president of the Nebraska
State Education Association, urged committee
members to stop studying the issue and start acting
on it.
“The state of Nebraska needs to do something
now,” he said.
Ann Nickerson, president of the Nebraska
Parent Teacher Association, echoed Obermier’s call
for immediate action.
Nickerson warned that stiff competition from
neighboring states and pending teacher shortages
could devastate the quality of education in
Nebraska.
Comparing teachers to “indentured servants,”
she said the state could not continue to watch
teachers pack their bags for other states and the pri
vate sector.
Jim Griess, executive director of the state educa
Please see TEACHERS on7
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