COLLEGIATETIMES
tuesday january 29, 2008 blacksburg, va.
www.collegiatetimes.com
news APRIL 16 VICTIM TO BE FIRST LADY’S GUEST
Gun show bill denied in Senate
Student killed in car crash
Kevin Sterne, a 23-year-old Virginia Tech electrical engineering graduate student, who was wounded in the April 16 shootings, has been named on the guest list for the First Lady’s box at the 2008 State of the Union address, according to the official White House Web site. Sterne was shot twice in the right leg in room 207. His Eagle Scout training gave him the foresight to fashion a tourniquet out of an electrical cord to keep himself from bleeding to death. The photo of Sterne being carried out of Norris Hall by rescue personnel become an iconic image of the worst school shooting in U.S. history. Sterne works as the chief engineer for WUVT-FM, Tech’s radio station, which along with the Collegiate Times, is owned by EMCVT, Inc.
STUDENT DRIVES INTO POLE, CAUSES POWER FAILURE Sections of Blacksburg went without power last evening when a Jeep Grand Cherokee struck a utility pole on Progress Street. Police responded to a call around 5 p.m., and in a preliminary investigation, it was found that Thomas Searby, 19, of Blacksburg fell asleep at the wheel of his car causing him to run off the road. Damage estimated at $10,000 was reported to have been made on the pole, and Searby’s car was totaled. The accident closed down Progress Street for several hours. Virginia Tech Electric Service responded to the scene to examine the damages.
weather CHANCE OF SHOWERS high 53, low 33
corrections “Where is the diversity at Virginia Tech?” (CT, Jan. 25) had several mistakes. The lowest enrollment numbers for black students were fall 2007, but the lowest recorded numbers were 2006 — the fall 2007 numbers are not public record yet. The Commission of Equal Opportunity and Diversity was established in 2003 and in its second year when the Lee Hall issue arose; Plaza was appointed Chair in May 2004. Clara B. Cox wrote Lee’s biomarkers to reflect the controversy; therefore, there is no need for revisions. The Collegiate Times regrets these errors.
coming up TOMORROW’S CT See how the men’s basketball team fared against Florida State in Wednesday’s CT. View a photo gallery of this weekend’s wrestling match against UNC on our Web site.
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Classifieds..............6 Sudoku..................6 Sports....................8
An independent, student-run newspaper serving the Virginia Tech community since 1903 105th year • issue 9
FAMILIES OF THOSE KILLED ON APRIL 16 SPOKE OUT AGAINST CURRENT GUN PURCHASING LEGISLATION, BUT THE SENATE ELECTED NOT TO AMEND THE CURRENT LAWS CANDACE SIPOS
ct news reporter
PHOTO COURTESY OF PETER KAUFFMANN
Students gathered outside of Hillcrest Hall Sunday morning for a candelight vigil for the students involved in a car crash Saturday night. Five students were involved; one student, Nicole Lee, was killed.
DAVID GRANT
ct staff writer A Virginia Tech student was killed in a car crash Saturday night that involved four other students, all traveling in the same vehicle. The individual killed was freshman engineering major Nicole Lee, from Rockville, Md. and a resident of Harper Hall. Freshmen Gaurav Raja, Harry Rosenbaum, Trevor Helderman, Mike Hochkeppel and Lee were all traveling in Helderman’s car on their way home from a ski trip at Snowshoe Mountain Ski Resort, W.Va. Saturday evening when the car collided with a tree. The reason and site of the collision are unknown. All five were taken to Greenbriar Valley Medical Center in Greenbriar County, W.Va. Both Helderman and Hochkeppel have since
been moved to Carilion Memorial Hospital in Roanoke. Raja and Rosenbaum remain at the Greembriar Valley Medical Center. Resident advisors in Hillcrest Hall, the residence of Raja, Rosenbaum and Helderman, were alerted to the crash shortly after 8 p.m. Saturday night by a phone call from Raja’s mother, who requested the resident advisors gather the emergency contact information for the other victims of the crash. At approximately 9:20 p.m., Rosenbaum’s girlfriend, a student at Penn State, phoned freshman Justin McNatt, Rosenbaum’s roommate, alerting him of the conditions of each of those in the crash: Lee was in critical condition, Helderman was suffering from a face injury and Hochkeppel was suffering from internal bleeding, and both were in varying degrees of serious condition. Rosenbaum was suffering from a back injury and Raja
sustained relatively minor injuries. Shortly after midnight, the resident advisors learned that Lee had died. At 2:30 a.m. Sunday, 3 students, largely from Hillcrest Hall, gathered outside the dorm for a candlelight vigil for those involved in the crash. Shortly after the culmination of the vigil, around 3:30 a.m., the resident advisors were told, through McNatt, that Helderman, “was definitely going to make it.” At Rosenbaum’s request, a group of students traveled to Greenbriar Valley Medical Center to visit the injured students Sunday afternoon. The shock and pain remained heavy within Hillcrest Hall Sunday morning, as many were doubly grieved that all of those involved in the crash were freshmen. “It isn’t supposed to happen like this,” McNatt said.
RIAA lawsuit names 36 students DAVID LOCKWOOD & ASHLEY OLIVER
ct news staff In mid-January, The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) contacted 36 Virginia Tech students with pre-lawsuit letters regarding copyright infringement. “We have gathered evidence that you have been infringing copyrights owned by Recording Companies,” the letters stated. “ … The reason we are sending this letter to you in advance of filing suit is to give you the opportunity to settle these claims as early as possible.” The letters are part of the RIAA’s College Deterrence Campaign to strengthen anti-piracy initiatives on college campuses. The campaign began in February 2007 when the RIAA sent 400 pre-litigation settlement letters to 13 universities. Tech received its first wave of 16 letters in March 2007. The RIAA first identifies through which university the songs are being illegally downloaded by resolving the the IP addresses the students are using. From there, the RIAA sends the pre-litigation letters to the university, which can then
choose to either release the names of the students using those IP addresses to the RIAA, or simply forward the letters to the students. The RIAA requests that universities provide the names of the students using the IP addresses they found, therefore allowing a lawsuit to be filed in federal court. “We do not do what the RIAA asks most universities, to give names,” said Larry Hincker, spokesman for university relations. “We do want the students to know they have been apprized by the RIAA,” Hincker added. If the universities do not provide the names, and the students choose not to respond to the pre-litigation letter, a “John Doe” lawsuit will be filed in federal court, where the judge can then choose to subpoena those using the IP address, which includes both roommates if the IP address is from a dorm. While the minimum fine for each copyrighted recording is $750 under the law, students who contact the RIAA before they file the lawsuit can pay a settlement fine of approximately $3000, according to an e-mail from attorney Bruce Phillips of Student Legal Services at Virginia Tech. Upon receiving the initial warning letter, stu-
Schools that received letters in January Arizona State University Bowdoin College California State University, Monterey Bay College of William and Mary Duke University Massachusetts Institute of Technology Mount Holyoke College Rhode Island College Saint Mary's College of Minnesota Stanford University Texas Christian University University of California, Berkeley University of California, Los Angeles University of Connecticut University of Iowa University of Nebraska-Lincoln University of Texas at Austin Virginia Tech
33 11 25 15 16 19 15 22 13 15 14 26 26 25 24 22 50 36
These letters were sent during the week of Jan. 10. Since February 2007, waves of letters at this level have been sent to universities across the country. This is the twelfth wave, in which 407 pre-litigation settlement letters were sent to 18 different universities.
BEN MACDONALD/COLLEGIATE TIMES
dents have 20 calendar days to respond before a lawsuit is filed. A mass e-mail was sent on Jan. 22 warning students of the dangers involved with illegal file sharing.
Last Wednesday, the Virginia Senate Courts of Justice Committee rejected the “gun show loophole bill” in a 9-6 vote. The gun show loophole allows felons and the mentally ill to bypass background checks when purchasing firearms at gun shows because only licensed dealers, not private sellers, must perform such checks. Gov. Tim Kaine and families of the April 16 shooting victims have been advocating for this bill’s passing since its beginning. Jeff Tiller, press secretary for Kaine, said Kaine was very disappointed that the bill was rejected. “The governor has been saying pretty much all along, since we started looking at this issue, either folks want felons to own guns or they don’t,” Tiller said. “This loophole allows felons, domestic abusers and the dangerously mental ill to purchase guns at gun shows, and apparently some folks think that’s fine.” Seven republicans and two rural democrats on the Senate’s 15-member committee voted against the legislation. The republican-controlled house’s committee on Militia, Police, and Public Safety rejected a similar bill Friday, Jan. 18, with a vote of 13-9. However, many of the bill’s advocates held out hope for the democrat-controlled senate. “(Kaine) had been working with folks in the Senate to see if we could get it through,” Tiller said. “He had also been working on lobbying members of both houses to support the bill.” Kaine had also been working alongside Tech families and Virginia law enforcement to build support for the legislation. Chad Ramsey, spokesman for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, has been speaking out against the gun show loophole as well.
“This loophole allows felons, domestic abusers and the dangerously mentally ill to purchase guns at gun shows, and apparently some folks think that’s fine.” - JEFF TILLER PRESS SECRETARY FOR GOVERNOR KAINE “I knew it was going to be a major uphill climb to get it passed, but I thought, given all that’s happened and the amount of lobbying that has taken place these past few weeks, that at least Sen. Edwards would be moved to change his vote like Sen. Creigh Deeds did,” Ramsey said. Ramsey was one of over 300 people who attended the General Assembly last Monday to argue for or against the loophole’s closing. The public hearing was mostly filled with supporters of the bill, who outnumbered its opponents 3-1, including more than 20 Tech shootings victims’ parents and supporters. Ramsey stated that he was particularly disappointed with Edwards, who represents Blacksburg and Roanoke, because the he refused to speak at the committee hearing. Although the guns used in the April 16 shootings were not purchased at a gun show, advocates of the bill said that the next potential shooting could involve such weapons. But guns rights activists, like Philip Van Cleave, president of the Virginia Citizens Defense League, deny that this legislation would solve the problem. “The bill wouldn’t have made any of us any safer,” Van Cleave said. “The bill keeps coming up every year; they shouldn’t bring it up. Such a tiny, tiny percentage of guns come from gun shows that are used in crime, and that bill had all kinds of problems with it.” He stated that if someone wants to sell a few guns at a flea market without realizing that there are other guns being sold, he or she could be charged with a crime if there are at least 26 guns being sold, making the market a gun show. “It was bad legislation,” Van Cleave said. “It was
see LOOPHOLE, page three
Tech ranked No. 17 in top 100 public schools CALEB FLEMING
ct news reporter Virginia Tech was ranked No. 17 on the 2008 list of the nation’s top 100 public colleges by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance magazine. Schools achieving a spot on the list are noted for their combination of superior academic strength and affordable costs of admission. The magazine’s list was published in Kiplinger’s February issue. Tech’s latest ranking marks the third consecutive year of improvement, having risen from 20th in 2006 and 18th in 2007. Marc Wojno, Kiplinger’s senior associate editor, noted that the rankings published this year are more valuable than ever before. “This year is the most competitive year colleges have had because more kids are graduating high school and looking to go to college,” Wojno said. “What parents are looking for is to not have to pay an arm and a leg to put kids through school. They also want a school that is reputable and will give kids the education they need.” The University of North Carolina, received first place honors for the seventh consecutive year.
The University of Florida, University of Virginia, College of William and Mary, and New College of Florida rounded out the top 5. Though there are no ties in the rankings, Wojno expressed that they are very competitive, with certain positions often coming down to tiebreakers. He added that the first place position was close enough that it essentially came down to the school having lower debts at graduation, the final of 60 columns in their database. The main factor Kiplinger’s considers is academic strength. Academic quality scores account for nearly two-thirds of the school’s total point value. The data used by the magazine to rank individual programs is provided by Peterson’s, an Internet resource for education and financial services. The magazine has used Peterson’s since the rankings began in 1998. “They provide us the information we need in a way that works for our model,” Wojno said. “We like to get the information from a company that is well-known and respected for collecting college and trend data.” Peterson’s collected statistical information from over 500 public universities to be reviewed. From
there, Kiplinger’s then trimmed the list down to roughly 100, using its own academic standards. According to the Kiplinger’s Web site, the process of eliminating hundreds of universities and colleges from contention was done so with SAT scores, admission and retention rates, studentfaculty ratios and graduation percentages. Once the field had been narrowed down academically, matters of cost and financial aid availability were considered. Kiplinger’s looks specifically at the total cost for in-state and out-of-state students and the average cost for a student with and without financial need, the average debt a student accumulates before graduation, and the average percent of financial aid provided to those who have legitimate need. Overall, the process of creating the rankings for the top-100 public colleges and universities takes several months. “We start in the summer of the previous year,” Wojno said. “Our magazine process is such that our February issue deadline is November. We have a two month period from when our stories are due to when they hit the press.”
see SCHOOLS, page three
PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY TRAVIS CHURCH/SPPS
Kiplinger’s magazine recently named Tech in the top 100 public universities.
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