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Thursday, March 4, 2010
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COLLEGIATETIMES
Nine percent of Tech students seek counseling, three percent more than the national average.
Cook employs one counselor for every 1,800 Virginia Tech students.
JOSH SON/COLLEGIATE TIMES
Cook center in line for peer approval BY CLAIRE SANDERSON | news staff writer or the first time in more than a decade, Virginia Tech’s Cook Counseling Center is seeking approval in an international counseling accreditation process. After its initial review by the International Association of Counseling Services during 2009, Tech’s application passed for the next stage of the accreditation process, an on-site inspection. Chris Flynn, director of Cook Counseling Center, received notice in October 2009 that the center had been approved for the visit. The center has been accredited before, but since the mid-1990s it has gone without accreditation from the International Association of Counseling Services. IACS is a nonprofit group that reviews university counseling centers through a professional peer-review, as opposed to a state or federally based inspection.
Among universities that have 25,000 to 30,000 students, 55 percent are accredited by IACS, according to the Association for University and College Counseling Center Directors 2008 Directors Survey. “Being accredited validates that they’ve opened their doors to outside review,” said Nancy Roncketti, executive director of IACS. “They’ve met the highest standards of the profession.” The survey reported that among the unaccredited centers, cost was the biggest reason for not pursuing accreditation. Cost may also be a reason Cook did not seek reaccreditation in the mid1990s. “The state went through some difficult times and was looking for any way to save some money,” Flynn said. “There’s a certain fee that comes with all accreditation,” said Rick Ferraro, assistant vice president of Student Affairs and head of Schiffert Health Center. “They tend to be pretty reasonable, but they’re there because they’re providing a service that you need to pay for.” According to its Web site, IACS accreditation involves a $700 initial evaluation fee and an annual fee of $850 to maintain the accreditation. There is also a field visit fee of $1,500. These costs are paid by funds generated by students through the Health Service Fee, which covers Schiffert Health Center, Cook Counseling
This is part one of a two part series about Cook Counseling Center’s endeavor to earn accredation. Center and the VT Rescue Squad. This mandatory fee was $320 per full-time student for the 2009-2010 school year, or $160 per semester. According to the AUCCCD survey, 27 percent of schools in Tech’s size range also pay for the operation of their counseling centers through mandatory student health fees. According to Flynn, Cook’s annual operating budget of roughly $1.9 million is only about onefourth of the income generated from the Health Service Fee. Although Tech, like many universities, has been experiencing budget cuts in recent years, the cuts have not affected Cook. “We’ve gotten the support of the administration to make sure we’re not affected by the budget decrease,” Flynn said. “We don’t anticipate losing any positions; in fact, we’ve asked to add another position this year.” A possibility that Flynn and Provost Mark McNamee have discussed is to add one position a year for the next four years, according to Flynn. As the center works to match IACS standards, expansion of the staff is a significant step. The
New restaurants to replace Bogen’s, attract smokers and wine lovers GORDON BLOCK news reporter The former location of Bogen’s Steakhouse and Bar is taking on a new form as a bar and wine loungeequipped restaurant. The new eatery, run by the owner of Lefty’s Bar and Grille, is scheduled to open in April or May. The leased space, located on North Main Street, will be broken into three parts. The main area of the building will become 622 North, a restaurant aimed toward “adult” consumers. “It’s not that there aren’t nice places to go get dinner,” said Sam Cotran, a manager at Lefty’s who will manage the new restaurant, “but most adults and professors go out to Roanoke for a nice meal.” The restaurant hired George Cruz, from Blacksburg Country Club, to be its chef. A menu for the restaurant has not been finalized. The left side of the building will become a bar-like area, tentatively named Dirty Turkey. Along with three pool tables, the bar will feature arcade games, and a patio is set for construction on the side of the building facing Giles Road. Using a separate ventilation system to comply with new state regulations, the bar area will allow smoking. Other areas of the building will not permit smoking. The back of the restaurant will feature a wine lounge. Management has hired a sommelier, or wine steward, to
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DANIEL LIN/SPPS
The building formerly housing Bogen’s undergoes construction before welcoming a new restaurant. work its wine lounge area. John Boyer, a professor of geography and regular customer of Lefty’s, has discussed the possibility of using the space as a “lab” to teach students about wine. “I’d been planting the seed for a while,” Boyer said. “There’s a big wine drinking community here. I’ve been wanting anybody to open a winefocused establishment for a while now.” Boyer said that a change in culture involving wine consumption could have “a very positive impact on drinking behavior.” A second floor banquet room will remain open for group events. Work has been going on for about a
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week on the building. While the building’s exterior has seen few changes other than a change to the electronic sign, the building’s interior has seen drastic renovations. Changes will be made to the flooring in many locations in the building, and areas throughout the restaurant will be repainted. Frank Perkovich, owner of Lefty’s and the new restaurant, said he felt no pressure in taking over the location from Bogen’s, which went out of business in May 2009 after operating for 27 years. Bill Ellenbogen, former Virginia Tech football player and owner of the building that housed Bogen’s and the new 622 North, could not be reached
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for comment. “Bill’s a friend of mine,” Perkovich said. “I hope he’s proud of how we bring in the next chapter of this building.” Restaurant management is taking its marketing of the restaurant online. Along with a blog featuring a walkthrough tour of the space, www. blog.622north.com, the restaurant has communicated to customers through accounts on Facebook and Twitter. Perkovich said he felt there was a market in Blacksburg for his restaurant. “There’s always room for better food, better space, better atmosphere,” Perkovich said.
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IACS accreditation standards recommend that a university counseling center have a counselor to student ratio between 1:1,000 and 1:1,500. When Cook had originally planned to submit the IACS application in 2007, only 10 counselors were employed, and the ratio was almost 1:3,000 students. “One of the barriers that we had to accreditation was our size at the time,” Ferraro said. “With a ratio that was approaching 1:3,000, we weren’t in a position to really go for that. However, we have increased the number of counselors — we have 16 now — and that brings us into an area where accreditation is more practical.” The staff additions have reduced the counselor to student ratio to roughly 1:1,800. Though it does not quite meet IACS recommendations, Flynn believes that this will not affect whether the center will pass or not. “The average ratio, nationally, is 1:2,900. Other schools have been accredited that don’t meet that criteria, and we’ve certainly had more challenges than other schools,” Flynn said. In addition to counselors, the staff at Cook includes a psychiatrist, two nurse practitioners, and a case manager. According to Flynn, there are now about 30 people working at the center to help students. see COOK/ page five
Support is tenuous for genocide resolution MICHAEL DOYLE mcclatchy newspapers WASHINGTON — Torn between international diplomacy and domestic politics, the Obama administration is speaking softly and not using any stick as a House of Representatives committee moves toward approving a controversial Armenian genocide resolution Thursday. The House Foreign Affairs Committee appears poised to approve the resolution, which asserts that, “The Armenian Genocide was conceived and carried out by the Ottoman Empire from 1915 to 1923.” House committee passage, however, is only one step in a campaign that’s intended to get the U.S. House of Representatives on the record as calling genocide the 1915-1923 events in which, by some counts, more than 1.5 million Armenians perished. That goal still could be elusive. “I’m optimistic, though I never underestimate the power of the Turkish lobby,” Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the resolution’s author, said in an interview Wednesday. The resolution has 137 House cosponsors, far fewer than the 218 that are needed for approval by the full House. Obama supported an Armenian genocide resolution when he was campaigning for president, as have other candidates, but he avoided the term “genocide” in his official statement last April marking the events. His administration’s subsequent statements could be interpreted as suggesting, but only obliquely, that Congress should leave the issue alone.
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“Our interests remain a full, frank and just acknowledgement of the facts related to the historical events,” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the House Foreign Affairs Committee last Thursday. “But the best way to do that, with all respect, is for the Armenians and Turkish people themselves to address the facts of their past as part of their efforts to move forward.” Schiff characterized the Obama administration’s apparent position as “neutral,” which he described as “a step forward” from the Bush administration’s vocal opposition to the genocide resolution. The resolution is a long-standing priority for the Armenian diaspora, politically potent and concentrated in Florida, New Jersey and California’s San Joaquin Valley. The 2000 census recorded 385,000 U.S. residents of Armenian ancestry, three times the number who claim Turkish ancestry. Supporters call the resolution a necessary recognition of a human-directed catastrophe in which more than a million Armenians were killed or forcemarched into the Syrian desert. The resolution, however, is perennially troublesome for presidents, who are pressed by worried U.S. military officers and diplomats, as well as by Turkish officials. The Turkish government considers the nonbinding resolution an insult to the nation’s 72 million people. “We don’t want anything to interfere with our relations,” Murat Mercan, the chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee of Turkey’s Grand National Assembly, said in an interview.
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