SEPT23

Page 1

Vegging out

Sixth annual VegFest more than just a farmers’ market, providing local produce, agricultural activities PAGE 6

A pretty big deal Wyoming anticipates a big crowd for Nebraska’s first visit to Laramie PAGE 10

friday, september 23, 2011

volume 111, issue 025

DAILY NEBRASKAN

smart money dailynebraskan.com

Tech help desk changes hours, adds call center tammy bain daily nebraskan

Students may be in for a surprise as they seek on-campus computer help. The Information Services Computer Help Center changed its hours beginning Sept. 11. Neil Wineman, client services manager for information services at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln explained that before these changes, the computer help center was open from 7:30 a.m. until 11:30 p.m. seven days a week. Now, the center is open from 7:30 am to 7:30 p.m. on weekdays and noon to 7 p.m. on Saturdays. In addition to the changes, there is now a call center available for computer help, which is open 24/7, 365 days a year. The call center staffs both professionals and students who can help students, faculty and staff with their computer troubles. “We did a study of traffic, a study of calls, looking at the number of data, looking at the number of calls coming in and adjusted our hours to better adjust to people using them,” Wineman said. The help center also altered its staffing to meet the needs of students, he said. “We’ve got more staff available during our peak hours, which is mostly 10 (a.m.) to 4 (p.m.) during the day,” Wineman said. “Our call volumes

in the evenings were extremely low.” Wineman said it didn’t make sense for the center to utilize resources where they weren’t needed. Instead, the call center is there to help. Information services will also feature “more self-service capabilities than we had previously,” he said. Wineman said the help center’s website now has self-service for simple things, like forgetting a Blackboard password, and includes more answers to frequently asked questions. “While it looks like we’ve reduced our hours of availability, our walk-in hours have decreased, but we have more availability than we did,” Wineman said. The help center takes an average of 100 calls a day, though Wineman said that at the beginning of each of each semester “it’s quite a bit higher.” Wineman also said the help center plans to keep their former extended hours for the first weeks of every new semester to handle the high call volume that comes with the changes. The changes are to address student needs, as well as to keep up with the Big Ten. “With our joining of the Big

Help desk: see page 3

Study unveils growing impact of college degrees on lifetime income

story by frannie sprouls | art by lauren vuchetich

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incomes. There is still a slight gender gap, but it appears more when looking at the long term, Smith said. Pat McBride, associate dean of admissions, said students not only need the degree, but also need to work hard in college to set themselves apart from the others in the competitive job market. “I think most people agree that the job market is fairly competitive,” McBride said. “People need to put themselves in a better positions and be as competitive as possible.” Andersen said he feels the pressure not only to get a bachelor’s degree, but to go to graduate school. Having a bachelor’s degree in anthropology won’t initially open doors, Andersen said. “My adviser printed a sheet with different job paths that relate to anthropology and all but maybe one or two highly suggested graduate programs,” Andersen said. “The most that I could expect, I was told, from an anthropology bachelor’s degree was an hourly wage job as a cashier or some other job with no future.” Some careers don’t require getting a degree higher than a bachelor’s degree, like psychology, English or any liberal arts majors. “Some students limit themselves by thinking they have to get the job directly in their major,” Smith said. For UNL students, there are some advantages to finding a job in this economy, he said. One of the advantages is the low unemployment rate in Nebraska. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Nebraska is one of the states with the lowest unemployment at 4.2 percent. With a strong agricultural focus, Smith said Nebraska has held its own and UNL students successfully embody the hard-working Nebraska stereotype. “They are not only perceived as having excellent work ethic, but they actually have that work ethic,” Smith said.

tudents feel more pressure to get a college degree in order to make a comfortable income, according to a study released by Georgetown University. The study, titled “The College Payoff,” found the importance of having a college degree has increased. In 2002, a person with a bachelor’s degree could expect to earn 75 percent more than a person with a high school diploma, according to the study. Today, that figure has jumped to 84 percent. “A person with a college degree, on average, is going to have a higher income,” said Kelli Smith, assistant director at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s Career Services. “Certainly, it is your choice not to pursue higher education.” Rule number one of the study: Degree level matters. A person with a professional degree will make about $3.6 million during a lifetime compared to a person with a bachelor’s degree, who will earn about $2.3 million, according to the study. Smith said the likelihood of someone with only a high school degree earning more than a person with a bachelor’s degree is low. But a surprising find from the study showed there was an earnings overlap in certain cases. Of the Americans with a high school diploma, 14.3 percent earn more than a person with a bachelor’s degree. This leads to rule number two: Occupations can trump degree levels. “I think the importance (of a degree) is put (on students) because success is viewed in terms of income and not necessarily skill,” said Alan Andersen, a sophomore anthropology major. “Tech schools offer great experiences and job opportunities without granting a degree.” While some might be able to work their way up from cashier to manager, rule number three of the study is that degree level still matters most within individual occupations. One example of this is in the accounting field. Accountants and auditors with a high school diploma make $1.5 million during a lifetime compared to the $2.4 million accountants and auditors with a degree make during a lifetime, as listed in the study. The last rule: Race and gender are wild cards when it comes down to degrees and

franniesprouls@ dailynebraskan.com

Carcass class beefs up Study: Student hook pupils’ food knowledge up lingo not universal Kim Buckley

conor dunn

Daily Nebraskan

daily nebraskan

The name of the class — Animal and Carcass Evaluation — may sound macabre. Its curriculum, however, is anything but. The class, Animal Science 200, lets students at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln see the entire animal food production process – making sure burgers, bacon strips and beef jerky taste good. Bryan Reiling, an associate professor of animal science, gives lectures full of student interaction. The class is consumerbased, meaning the goal is to learn how to produce meat that tastes good to the consumer. “It’s important for us to understand the product,” Reiling said. “It’s important to know what (consumers) think and how we can best provide products that benefit their needs and purchases.” Later in the semester, the students will perform sensory analyses, essentially taste tests, of different retail cuts. “As a result, they can see

In their early years, boys and girls give each other crayons as a way to show affection. And then there’s college, an entirely new world. “hooking up” is the trend, and it’s a permanent piece of campus culture. This month, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s department of communication studies released a study on “hooking up” and how college students define it in their conversations. “College students talk about hooking up more than they’re actually doing it,” said Amanda Holman, a graduate communication studies student and

cara wilwerding | daily nebraskan

Students observe three adult cows in the animal and carcass evaluation course on East Campus. how palette differences affect value change,” Reiling said. The class comprises students with and without animal judgment experience. Students attend lectures on Wednesdays and Thursdays and laboratories on Mondays. “I would say most of (the students) enjoy what we do in the laboratory setting the most,” Reiling said. During laboratory, the students in the class inspect and

point/counterpoint page 4

QUIRKY COURSES evaluate the worth of live animals from outside animal pens. “They’re very representative of animals raised for produce,” Reiling said.

co-author of the study. Holman said 300 students at the University of Montana participated in the study as a communications class requirement. “It was an online study that was completely anonymous so students wouldn’t have to worry about being identified,” Holman said. “A majority of the students agreed that hooking up isn’t planned and it is usually influenced by alcohol.” Talking about hooking up can be “strategically ambiguous,” she said. “If a guy says, ‘I hooked up with her last weekend,’ he could mean that he simply kissed her and his friends would think he was having s e x , ” Holman said. “ A girl

carcass: see page 3

Baton twirler page 5

RESEARCH

could tell her friends that she hooked up with someone and the conversation would end there, because there would be a mutual understanding of what the girl had done.” Hooking up can’t be generalized on every college campus, she said. “It’s not the same population, especially between public and private universities,” Holman said. “There’s always going to be multiple definitions for hook ups.” Katherine Marie Coates, a freshman health and exercise science major, said she thinks hook ups are “dumb.” “In situations like that, someone almost always ends up developing feelings for

hook ups: see page 3

lauren olson | daily nebraskan

Football page 10

Let freedom read

Up in the air

Opposing offenses

Banned books week demands reflection

baton twirler practices family passion

Potent Wyoming promises to challenge huskers

@dailyneb | facebook.com/dailynebraskan

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