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WEEKEND
Students Evaluate Professors nSCANTRON: While some believe a scathing review will get an instructor fired, action is not that swift By Benjamin Becker
Daily Titan Staff Writer
NEWS: Avoid the fruit cake and the liquor this holiday season, or you might become one of the ever increasing statistics of drunken drivers
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As a part of Cal State Fullerton’s close-of-the-semester tradition, students are given license to evaluate their instructors and the quality of their classes. After penciling in bubbles, prais-
ing a professor or defiantly scribbling criticisms, students file their professor evaluation sheets into a folder that is whisked away. However, not many students are aware of what happens to their input after the papers have been sent, nor do they understand the weight evaluations carry. Upon completion of the venting session, the students’ evaluations are taken to the department office of that class. There is a designated staff person (or people) who either process the forms or send them to be processed elsewhere. Depending on the department, the evaluations may or may not be sent to
the Computer Center in the basement of the Library. This is where most departments send their evaluations to be tabulated by computer. “We usually start processing the forms about a week after finals,” said Kathy Perkins, supervisor of operations in Administrative Computing. Perkins heads the entire operation in the basement of the library and said that in the fall of 2001 the center scanned approximately 82,000 evaluation sheets and about the same in the spring of 2002. “After we have finished computing the results, the department is contacted to come pick them up,” she said. “We give them three copies of the printouts
for each instructor for their own filing purposes,” she said. However, some departments opt not to use the Scantron-style evaluations, preferring their students communicate concerns in another fashion. “Our evaluations are handwritten and are processed within our own office,” said Diane Costello, a staff member from the English Department. “Since we don’t use the Scantron evaluations, we aren’t involved [with the computer center].” Amy Castaneda, a Communications Department staff member said, “The department chair as well as each instructor is given a printout showing how students rated them. After that,
Chatting It Up
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all is left to the chair.” J. Michael Russel, chairman of the Philosophy Department, said, “Some instructors are very, very leery of them. It’s not so rare for people to not be re-hired if they’re not getting a decent student response.” Although he believes the evaluations are pretty effective, Russel said that students shouldn’t confuse their input with firing power. “No actions are taken against instructors until meeting with them,” Russel said. “Some courses are just unpopular no matter what. I don’t
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Budget Troubles Continue nFUNDS: Gov. Gray Davis proposes a midyear $60 million cut in money allocated to the CSU system By LaToya Baker
Daily Titan Staff Writer
three things. “They bring a quarter, so they feel like they’re paying for it,” Vargish said. “And if for some reason a child doesn’t have a quarter, we make sure we have plenty so they don’t get left out.” Vargish said that some will come in and know right away what they want and others will take a half hour. All the gifts have been donated. There are a lot knickknacks, toys, donated jewelry and on occasion they will get children’s books and blocks. “One of the fun things is that the kids will see me and say, ‘Remember me, remember when I went shopping
Gov. Gray Davis proposed slashing spending from hundreds of state programs Friday, outlining deep cuts in public education, health care and layoffs for thousands of state workers. Davis, who has described education as his top priority, has proposed cutting $60 million in funding to California State Universities, $200 million from community colleges and $1.9 billion in funding to elementary education all in midyear—meaning money that had been promised to these institutions for the fiscal year 2002 will be taken back, forcing the institutions to deal with the fallout. “These budget reductions are severe by any measure,” Davis said in a Los Angeles Times article. “Enacting these cuts in midyear will be an extraordinarily difficult task, but we face an extraordinary challenge.” The cuts are meant to help erase California’s $21 billion deficit. A deficit many attribute to the dot-com bust and last year’s energy crisis. “Many of the dot-coms have gone out of business so that means that there are not any revenues coming in from the sales of high-tech programs and equipment ... and so there is a lack of money coming in the budget through state sales taxes,” said Peter Mathews, a political analyst for NBC and a professor of American government at Cypress College. “The energy crisis has also contributed to the rising deficit. The governor used up the $9 billion surplus California had to buy up expensive energy,” Mathews said. “With that surplus gone and with the recession on, the deficit has been just staggering.”
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OPINION: Alex Lopez urges students to take a stand and attend the tuition protest at the Chancellor’s Office in Long Beach on Monday Please see page 5
The David statue gets a an earful as a student rests atop his torso to talk on her cellular phone.
JONATHAN WEST/Daily Titan
Children areTaught Spirit of Giving SPORTS: The Cal State Fullerton’s men’s basketball team came up short in their matchup against USC on Wednesday losing 7863 Please see page 8
TITAN
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Check out the Daily Titan online this year at http:// dailytitan.fullerton.edu. New features and sections will be available this year!
u p co m i n g n
Find out what happens through the late hours of the night in the TSU in the Daily Titan’s last issue of the fall semester.
nHOLIDAYS: Presents for loved ones are bought and specially wrapped for one quarter By Nicole Eckerle
Daily Titan Staff Writer Not many things can be bought for a quarter these days, but at the CSUF Children’s Center Holiday Store, a child can buy someone a special gift this Christmas season. Betsy Gibbs, director of the center, said that children get to go into the
store and pick out a gift, wrap it and give it to whomever they want – even themselves. “The idea of it is to give them that perspective, that it’s a time of giving, some of them get it a little bit better then the other ones, and trying to get them to think of another person’s point of view, and for the 2, 3 and 4 year olds is a difficult concept,” said Beverly Vargish, assistant director of the center. “We’re teaching them empathy, we’re teaching them about giving.” The Holiday Store is set up in Vargish’s office Dec. 18 to 19. “I bring in shelves and kind of close down and take the chairs out, and set up shelves so it looks like a little
store,” Vargish said. The head teachers bring in a couple children at a time to the store. “They’ll come in and we’ll help them find something and they’ll think of a couple people that they want to buy for and we’ll help them find it and then they wrap it as much as they can themselves, with our help,” Vargish said. Vargish said that with the age that they are, they have a hard time seeing another person’s point of view or another person’s feelings, so they just assume that it’s what they want. “Mom wants this truck or dad wants this necklace ... it’s cute,” Vargish said. The children usually buy two or
featuring Wurlitzer electronic keyboards. These pianos could be listened to through headphones allowing players, who were accustomed to the sound of 20 pianos playing simultaneously, to not interfere with others in the room. Shortly after, as technology progressed, the lab installed a Yamaha Clavinova lab in 1986. This technology allowed Baker to single out her players or pair them up. Soon after, this lab had gotten its full use and the pianos were starting to sound like it. This 16-year-old lab needed an upgrade and Baker-Jordan pressed for a new lab. The technicians had done all they could do but the equipment was worn and getting static. She credits College of the Arts Dean Jerry Samuelson and Gordon Paine, former music chair-
man with making this new lab a reality. Manufactured and installed by the Roland Corp., the instruments and equipment are all digital. Wearing headphones, students focus on monitors, featuring a bouncing ball that guides them through the notes of a melody. The pianos also allow students to insert a disk, record themselves and play their exercises back. They have a synthesizer, which allows for programmed accompaniments with an organ, guitar, bass, strings and other instrumental sounds. “It’s easy to use when you’re going off the monitor… the ‘bouncing ball’ follows the notes for you,” freshman Bryan Balderman said. He is taking beginning piano and
New Pianos Update Lab Facility nEQUIPMENT: Students can now use headphones and monitors with a bouncing ball guide By Edna Silva
Daily Titan Staff Writer The Cal State Fullerton Music Department piano lab has students using the latest technology. Installed just before the beginning of the fall semester, features in the new lab make learning the piano a more versatile and visual experience. “It’s state of the art,” said Martha Baker-Jordan, emeritus professor of music at CSUF who has been teaching at CSUF since 1975. Soon after her arrival a new lab was installed
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Students rehearse an exercise with their teacher.
EDNA SILVA/Daily Titan