Jailed for love
Tough loss
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MSU senior Hermion Chiddick chronicles her life of love, and incarceration in the tell-all memoir, I Did it for Love.
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The men’s basketball team coasts past A&M-Commerce, but falls short against Tarleton State, losing 79-75.
wichitan
ht e Wednesday
February 1, 2012
thewichitan.com
your campus/ your news
Physics major to be eliminated by 2018 Low enrollment leads Higher Ed Coordinating Board to axe program BRITTNEY COTTINGHAM MANAGING EDITOR
In November, the Texas High Education Coordinating Board unanimously voted to eliminate the MSU’s physics department. The decision was for the sake of logistics after THECB flagged the department as being a “low-producing” degree program. Starting in the Fall of 2011, physics, chemistry and geosciences were combined into one department. The physics department will be supported until August 13, 2018. The minor in physics will still be offered, said Dr. Randal Hallford, interim chair for the
new department. However, the change will have no financial impact on the university, according to President Dr. Jesse Rogers. “The university will not save one dollar,” Rogers said. The decision, said Hallford, won’t affect physics majors who were declared in the fall of 2011 from completing their degrees. Students will have this sevenyear interval to complete their degree. The summer graduation date for the last students with a bachelor of science in physics degree will have to be before August 13, 2018. Traditionally, physics is one the majors, which has a low enrollment as, compared to other programs across campus, said Dr. Rodney Cate, interim dean for the College of Science and Math-
PHYSICS pg. 5
Speaker says money key to world peace CHRIS COLLINS EDITOR IN CHIEF
Dr. Salim Azzouz surrounded by engineering students on Monday afternoon. Photo by HANNNAH HOFMANN
Part of a new era
Arab Spring protests allow MSU professor to vote in Tunisia election RACHEL FREEZE FOR THE WICHITAN
In late October, the people of Tunisia were able to publicly vote their concerns and disagreements with the government without fear of persecution for the very first time. This meant a lot to Dr. Salim Azzouz, assistant professor of mechanical engineering at MSU. Azzouz is a citizen of Tunisia, a country which has recently been in political turmoil after months of protests. Until now, Azzouz has never had the opportunity to vote in a Tunisian election. But last semester, Azzouz drove more than 370 miles, about eight hours, to the Arab American Center in Houston with his family to legitimately vote for the first time in his life. “It was a long drive, but a very good one,” Azzouz said. He voted to elect members of the
National Assembly, members who will write the new constitution. He celebrated the moment by spending time with his family at the NASA Johnson Space Center. “I traveled to Houston because I felt this was an important moment for Tunisia and I wanted to be a part of that. I took my family to take a stand,” Azzouz said with his hands over his heart. “It’s a historical moment because the people of Tunisia can now speak their minds and elect who they want. We can now elect clean people, those without blood on their hands.” Azzouz has lived in the United States for 13 years. Five of those years have been spent teaching at MSU. “I planned to move back to Tunisia after my schooling to teach there, but I was seduced by this country, and then I met my wife, so I stayed,” Azzouz said. “I grew up in the small town of La Marsa so I feel really comfortable here in Wichita Falls.” In Tunisia, the only books available for the public are technical in nature – math or science texts, he said. No humanities-related books are available. The government has banned them
all. “The reason people from that region are in the math or science fields is because those are the only books they can read,” said Azzouz. “Walking into a bookstore, I’m amazed at the amount of books available here. That’s what I like about America.” Though this was the first time for Azzouz to vote legitimately, he had voted before when he was 12 years old. He was asked by his El Omrane (Boy Scout) leader along with other boys his age to vote in the upcoming election for the National Assembly. He voted in the place of a 62-year-old man. “When I handed the card to the man he looked at me, then at the card, and stamped it,” Azzouz said. Azzouz was told to take the red piece of paper and put it in the envelope. Instead he put it in his pocket. “Even then I knew there was something wrong with what they were saying to do,” Azzouz said. Now he can speak out against the
AZZOUZ pg. 5
In 2010, the United States budgeted $663 billion to the Department of Defense. This is about half of what the entire world spends on its military, meaning that the U.S. spends roughly as much on defense as the rest of the world combined. The reason, according to Dr. Lloyd J. Dumas, political economics professor at the University of Texas in Dallas, is that people feel more secure when their country has a strong military. Dumas will be speaking at 7 p.m. in Akin Auditorium on the global economy and how it can be used as a tool to keep peace in the world. His book, The Peacekeeping Economy, was released about four months ago. “A lot of people have gotten used to the idea that security lies mainly in military strength,” he said. “They think military strength and national security are almost identical. In fact, security depends mainly on relationships. You don’t have to worry about those with which you have good relationships.” Dumas recalled the Cold War, when the U.S. was wary of Russia because of its nuclear capabilities. Britain and
France both had nukes, too, but neither country was drawn into the conflict – the reason, Dumas said, is that the U.S. had good trade relationships with these countries. “We had a hostile relationship with the Soviet Union,” he said. “We had a very positive relationship with Great Britain and France.” Dumas’ main goal of the presentation is to change people’s perceptions of the military. “I’m trying to shift our focus from thinking about national security primarily as military strength, to think about possibilities for building relationships. In particular, I’m talking about economic relationships that provide real security by tying countries together through mutual benefit.” The author said people should take a few lessons from the Iraq War, a conflict that has cost the U.S. about $1 trillion and the benefits of it are still being argued by the American people. It may have also been fought under false pretenses – the armed forces unearthed no weapons of mass destruction in the
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Psychology clinic seeks new student clientele BRITTNEY COTTINGHAM MANAGING EDITOR
Midwestern’s psychology clinic is seeking new clients. There is no charge for students, staff, faculty and immediate family. Services available vary from stress management to anxiety disorders and mild depression. This program is not only beneficial to students and the community, but also gives real-life experiences to psychology graduate students. “It was my first time having someone come in who was going to tell me very intimate, but very private thoughts and knowing that they were trusting me to listen, keep it confidential and help them, it was scary,” graduate student Susan Gross said. Dr. Laura Spiller is the new director of the psychology clinic and said it is essen-
tial for graduate students to have handson experience in the psychology field. “They received a high level of training,” Spiller said. “Our students are not going to see clients until they are well prepared. Our graduate students learn a tremendous amount with that handson experience and they get to see many different clients including more severe mental illness type cases where they do case management and learn how to interact with clients.” When students see clients in the clinic, the faculty provides supervision and oversees all the clinical care provided in the psychology clinic through individual meeting with the students and group meetings. There are three students staffing the clinic every semester and they carry
CLINIC pg. 4