Spring 2016 Graduation Issue
Indiana Statesman For ISU students. About ISU students. By ISU students.
Friday, April 29, 2016
Volume 123, Issue 82
indianastatesman.com
ISU Commencement ceremonies approach Stephanie Burns Reporter
The Spring Commencement ceremonies will be held at the Hulman Center on Saturday, May 7. There will be two ceremonies for the spring semester. Commencement is a ceremony where those who will be graduating after this semester are able to walk the stage and celebrate their academic accomplishments with friends and family. According to the ISU website, the first commencement ceremony for the College of Arts and Sciences and the Bayh College of Education will begin at 10 a.m. The second ceremony, for the Scott College of Business, The College of Health and Human Services, and The College of Technology will begin at 2 p.m. The number of students anticipated to attend commencement has gone up in recent years. Kristi Lawson, the Assistant Registrar for the office of Registration and Records, said about 200 more students are expected to attend this Spring Commencement compared to last year’s. Increasing enrollment and ISU’s four-year graduation guarantee are two of the possible reasons for this increase, according to Lawson. “(The increase) could have something to do with the graduation guarantee and the more intensive advising that is being done. I think we have an increase
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The spring commencement will take place Saturday, May 7, in the Hulman Center. There will be two ceremonies held in order to accommodate all of the graduates: one at 10 a.m. and the second at 2 p.m.
in students that are trying to graduate in four years and more students want to attend commencement,” Lawson said. The office of Registration and Records keeps track of all of the numbers regarding commencement and graduation. The final count of students graduating this semester will not be completed until the end of May, Lawson said.
This is because the academic colleges must verify that all degree requirements have been met in order for graduation to be official. Registration and Records does however have information available regarding commencement numbers. They are responsible for keeping count of the number of students who will be in attendance, along with
the names of each undergraduate attending the ceremony. An initial calculation from Registration and Records of the students attending the ceremony has determined that 340 students will be graduating with honors this year. This number makes up about 23 percent of the students graduating for spring and summer. Students who gradu-
ate with honors will have a special designation on their name card that will be recognized during the ceremony. An official count of honors students will be reported after grades are released this summer, Lawson said. The commencement ceremony gives students an opportunity to celebrate all of the hard work they have done to receive their degrees.
Although walking the stage at commencement doesn’t officially guarantee a degree, it is still an important event for many of the students on campus. Any student who has an active graduation application for this semester will be able to attend the commencement ceremony. Tom Norberg, a senior who is close to earning
SEE GRAD, PAGE 2
Eugene V. Debs house preserves history Private colleges hold
back investment fee details from Congress
Marissa Schmitter Photo Editor
Students might not notice the humble house that stands alone on Eighth Street. The house doesn’t look like anything special from the outside — just a two-story home with a plain white finish and rustic look. What students do not realize is that this house is keeping Eugene V. Deb’s history alive. Debs, a Terre Haute native, is most well-known for creating the Socialist Party of America. He ran for president five times, two of which were from a prison cell, according to the Debs Foundation website. Debs never became president, but his legacy still lives on in his local home. His home, which the Debs Foundation has work rigorously to restore, is now a museum that is free and open to the public. The public can roam the house; they are just asked to be respectful and to consider leaving a donation to keep the house up and running. Lisa Phillips, secretary of the Debs Foundation and professor at Indiana State University, encourages students to visit the house. “We so welcome students to take a tour of the house/museum and let us know what they think,” Phillips said. “The Debs Foundation’s purpose is to keep it open and running and keep us all taking about Debs’ legacy.” The house was not always a museum, however. Before the house was declared a historical land-
Janet Lorin
Bloomberg News (TNS)
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This monument on ISU’s campus celebrates the birthplace of Eugene Victor Debs, founder of the Socialist Party of America and five-time presidential candidate.
mark, it changed hands frequently. The house even served as a fraternity house for ISU at one point. Phillips reiterates how important it is that the home became a historic site. “The House is one of 11 National Historic Landmark sites in Indiana — not an easy designation to get.” Benjamin Kite, treasurer for the Debs Foundation, believes the house is important to keep Debs’ legacy going. “Debs’ legacy is about treating people as equals,” Kite said. “He believed in equality for women and women’s right to vote, which was unfathomable for a long time.” Phillips also believes that his legacy is important to pass on to new generations. “The House and Museum enable us to commem-
orate one of the key figures in U.S. history, Eugene V. Debs,” Phillips said. “He worked tirelessly on behalf of people who worked hard, for little pay, under dangerous conditions — the ‘working-class’ of his day.” Inside the house, which holds over 10 fireplaces and about 10 rooms, mementos given to Debs can be viewed. Some of these mementos include a handcrafted table made by one of Debs’ cellmates from prison, signed copies of books from famous authors such as Upton Sinclair and letters from all around the world. The attic has been redone by an artist who painted murals of Debs’ beliefs, campaign posters and more. The original dining table that Debs and his wife, Katherine, ate dinner at still sits in the din-
ing room. Original stained glass still lets light in as museum-goers enter the home. The original creaky staircase takes visitors upstairs where the Debs slept and kept house guests. The museum holds many other original pieces as well. Phillips said that students should not only visit the museum for the artifacts, but also to get a feel for the time period Debs lived in. “Students should visit the Debs House to better understand what life was like in the 1890s through the early 1900s, to better understand what ‘work’ was like for most people, to better understand what it was like to run for political office, particularly the presidency, five times, and to better understand our own era as most of what he stood for is just as relevant today,” Phillips said.
NEW YORK — As Congress extracts information from private university endowments, many schools aren’t providing details on one sensitive topic — fees to money managers. At least 30 universities, including the eight Ivy League schools, didn’t disclose how much they paid in performance fees to external managers like hedge funds in response to questions from lawmakers about how they manage and spend their endowments. Some schools were forthcoming in divulging lower-cost management fees, with Harvard University saying it paid 1 to 2 percent of assets on average. As many endowments struggle with returns, which support everything from professors’ salaries to student aid, fees paid to outside asset managers have come under scrutiny. Since fees have a “very material impact” on returns, Stanford University told lawmakers, the school’s internal investment management company routinely rejects external managers whose prospective gains don’t justify their charges. Performance fees are the percentage paid on investment gains in asset classes like private equity. “Endowments may not have included performance fees because, without the proper context about the returns they
generate, it could create all sorts of perception problems,” said David Fann, chief executive officer of TorreyCove Capital Partners, which advises global investors including pension funds on alternative assets. “The fee numbers can be so big, especially for the very successful funds, when you include the performance aspects.” The Senate Finance and House Ways and Means committees are examining how the largest U.S. private-school endowments support their schools and students in light of their tax exemption on investment earnings. The lawmakers sent questions to 56 schools and 46 of them provided their responses to Bloomberg. One of the 13 sets of questions asks schools “how much” they spent to manage their endowment, including outside asset managers and advisers. “Please provide details on the amounts paid, to whom, and the fee arrangement,” the inquiry says. Schools said confidentiality agreements with managers, difficulty in calculating performance fees accurately and competitive considerations prevented them from providing details about the charges. Wellesley College called them “a form of profit sharing” and therefore didn’t include them in its response.
SEE FEE, PAGE 2