January 20th, 2011 Issue

Page 1

WHY WAIT TILL THURSDAY? READ MYTJNOW.COM.

Women’s lacrosse joins WU sports. See Sports, page 11

College students should stand up against divisive rhetoric. See Opinion, page 5

THURSDAY January 20, 2011

Do you enjoy snowball fights? Check out the snow pictures. See News, page 3

WINTHROP UNIVERSITY

Issue 14

NEWS

Owens re-opens for classes after fire After 9 months of renovation, building houses 250 class sections BY JONATHAN MCFADDEN

campus. Owens will house about 250 class sections this semester, said Walter Hardin, associate vice president for facilities management. Leitner Construction, the same company that constructed the DiGiorgio Campus Center and will be responsible for renovating Phelps Hall, handled the job of making Owens spicand-span again.

mcfaddenj@mytjnow.com

Owens Hall re-opened for classes this semester after the building’s attic caught fire on March 6, 2010. The nine months of renovations to Owens and the Bancroft Annex cost $7 million, which was covered by Winthrop’s insurance. Owens, a $5 million

general-use classroom building equipped with SMART technology, was constructed in 2007 and provided students and faculty with a lounge area, one computer lab and two conference rooms. After the fire, 207 class sections held in Owens were displaced into other academic buildings on

Owens reopened for classes this semester after nine months of renovation. The building closed last March after the attic caught on fire. Photo by Claire VanOstenbridge • Special to The Johnsonian

Normally, Winthrop has to obtain a construction company’s bid to undertake renovation projects through a process called South Carolina Business Opportunities. This time, though, Owens got the lucky end of the draw. Thanks to special permission from state legislatures to move ahead

See OWENS page 4 HEALTH & SCIENCE

NEWS

WU wins $2.4M grant for research

WU DEBT

Initiative gives students opportunity to participate in biomedical research BY AMANDA PHIPPS phippsa@mytjnow.com

Skin cell replacement, cancer drugs and Alzheimer’s research are some topics students and professors will be able to research thanks to the INBRE II (The IDeA Networks of Biomedical Research Excellence) Initiative. INBRE is a five-year grant to develop biomedical research capacity in states that have historically had low federal research funding rates

from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) awards, said chemistry, physics and geology department chair Patrick Owens. Winthrop was one of four South Carolina undergraduate schools, along with the main research facilities USC-Columbia, Clemson University and MUSC, competitively selected to participate in the INBRE I grant awarded for 2005-2010.

See GRANT page 6

NEWS

3-day snow closure makes WU history BY KARI CHRISENBERRY Special to The Johnsonian

Graphic by Alex Miles • Special to The Johnsonian

University finances new buildings, renovations

BY CLAIRE BYUN byunc@mytjnow.com

Like many other universities, students here are not the only ones who owe money to lending institutions.

Winthrop’s total longterm debt is $75.4 million, and the money is borrowed from banks and other investment firms, said J.P. McKee, vice president of finance and business.

Banks such as Bank of America and WellsFargo supply money for Winthrop’s investments, mostly for new buildings or renovations.

See DEBT page 2

A wintry mix of snow, ice and sleet helped make Winthrop history when classes were canceled three days in a row. This was the first time in 21 years classes were canceled for three days straight due to inclement weather, said Frank Ardaiolo, vice president of

student life, in a priority e-mail to students. Students could be heard cheering from Markley’s Food Court on Sunday, Jan. 9, at 7:47 p.m. They just received the text message from Winthrop’s WU Alert stating classes for Monday were canceled. This winter storm deposited four inches of snow

See SNOW page 3

NEWS

Car accident claims life of alum one week after graduation BY JONATHAN MCFADDEN mcfaddenj@mytjnow.com

Hannah Floyd loved drinking coffee and eating. She enjoyed learning about foreign cultures and desired to teach English in China. She was a dedicated student who read her molecular biology textbook for fun before the semester even started. She wasn’t a homebody, preferring to get out of the

house and socialize; she volunteered at the Chester Animal Shelter. The pugs were her favorite. Hannah, 24, died on Sunday, Dec. 26, 2010, when her car slid off the right side of northbound Interstate 85 and hit a power pole during inclement weather. Just a week before, she

Questions? Contact us at editors@thejohnsonian.com Serving Winthrop since 1923

graduated Winthrop with honors and received both a Bachelor of Science in biology and Bachelor of Arts in psychology. Originally from Chester, S.C., Hannah lived with her best friend, senior business major Katlyn Oglesby, for two and a half years. In that time, Hannah and Oglesby formed a strong friendship devoid of arguments and filled with fun, laughter and understanding.

I N D E X

“She was the most nonjudgmental person I’ve ever met,” Oglesby said. “If you’re gay, she didn’t care; if you’re an atheist, she didn’t care; if you’re really religious, she didn’t care. She just meshed really well with everybody.”

Academic scholar Hannah attended and graduated from the South

See FLOYD page 4

CAMPUS NEWS

Hannah Floyd, left, worked as a research assistant for Heather Evans-Anderson, associate professor of biology. Photo courtesy of Heather Evans-Anderson

2-4

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

OPINION

5

CULTURE

HEALTH & SCIENCE

6

SPORTS

7-8 9 10-11


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