the 132-year-old award-winning independent student-run newspaper of the university of cincinnati
Vol. CXXXIIi Issue LVVVVVVVviii
The News Record MONDAY | MARCH 4 | 2013
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Students advocate for organic food Health leaders work with administration to bring options to dining halls dani kokochak senior reporter newsrecordnews@gmail.com University of Cincinnati students in Leaders for Environmental Awareness and Protection are working closely with administrators to bring fresh, organic food to campus. Student advocates received permission to go forward with the Real Food Calculator, the first step to the Real Food Challenge — a presidential pledge to work toward providing 20 percent “real food” in dining halls by 2020. The calculator determines how healthy the food currently being served is and how much it needs to improve. The university can use the calculator without signing a commitment to the challenge, a national campaign to provide students with more sustainable food in school systems. “The commitment is still the ultimate goal because that is what [ensures] that the calculator will continue to be done each year, because any school can do the calculator just once and never do it again,”
said Page Kagafas, a fourth-year dietetics student and co-president of LEAP. “Signing the commitment [would say] our school cares to work toward 20 percent real food.” UC’s Undergraduate Student Government endorsed the commitment, while LEAP members met with President Santa Ono and presented the campaign to the University Executive Committee. “As part of our commitment to sustainability as well as continuing to make sure that we have healthy and local food options available, it is definitely a good idea for us to be involved in [the Real Food Challenge],” said Lane Hart, student body president. “Maybe we can’t implement the entire thing in year one, but we can work toward that.” Ono released a statement of support for the Real Food Challenge, and plans to create a dialogue between students and administration to bring about lasting changes, Kagafas said. The executive commitment agreed to move forward with the calculator in order to find UC’s real food percentage and
determine the feasibility of participating in the challenge as a university. “We aren’t to the point of university commitment because there is a lot to do now to gather data about what we are currently doing,” said Debra Merchant, interim vice president of student affairs and member of the executive committee. “I was impressed with the homework that [LEAP students] have done up to this point, and just by the fact that they have so much energy about this particular initiative.” UC will be the largest school in the Midwest to complete the calculator. “A lot of schools that have done the Real Food Challenge are small schools, but we are trying not to be discouraged by that because we think that UC can definitely do it,” said Mary Gorsek, a third-year horticulture student and member of LEAP. Real food is defined by four categories — community based, fair, humane and ecologically sound — based on student research. “Some schools will go through the see food | 2
ANOTHER DIRECTION Educator announces run for city council, recruited by UC benjamin goldschmidt chief reporter newsrecordNEWS@gmail.com Getting fired from Purcell Marian High School for supporting gay rights was the “sign from God” Mike Moroski needed to start his campaign for Cincinnati City Council. Moroski, the former assistant principal at Purcell Marian, gained media attention in February for refusing to recant statements he made in a blog post about same-sex marriage — ultimately losing his job over it. He was fired on the grounds of using “poor judgment.” “The point I was making, you know, I spend a lot of time with the homeless … my students … my wife … and I wish I had time to care about who married who, but I just don’t,” Moroski said. “Wouldn’t it be neat if I didn’t care so much about all these things and I could nit-pick what somebody else does with their life, but I just think it’s a waste of time.” The Archdiocese of Cincinnati received a letter of concern over Moroski’s blog post, and Moroski was given the choice to resign Feb. 4, or recant his statements and draft a plan for how he would live morally “as defined by the Archdiocese of Cincinnati,” he said. “Obviously I didn’t take either of those options, and sort of forced their hand to terminate me,” he said. Moroski’s attorney believes Purcell Marian breached Morowski’s contract, and he could be entitled to the rest of his pay and benefits until it expires. Though his career at Purcell Marian is over, Moroski is using this time to live out his dream of running for Cincinnati City Council, and might work at the University of Cincinnati in the near future. Shortly after his termination from Purcell Marian, members of the UC Division of Professional Practice and Experiential Learning reached out to him, and he applied for an assistant professorship in the program. “The way I understand it, the job would be to have my class, help connect students to nonprofit or for-profit leaders in the community … and then mentor them, teach them about professional practice, how to interview and write resumes,” Moroski said. “It really sounds like the best job in the world for me. I always kind of wanted to get into higher education.” Since about 2000, Moroski’s planned to run for city council in 2013, but when he got a job at Purcell Marian he could run until 2015. After Issue 4 passed — extending councilmember’s terms from two to four years — his run was pushed back again until 2017. “I already had a campaign manager, a branding team, a media team, social media people ready to go,” Moroski said.“In a matter of two days, the entire campaign was branded and we were registered with the Board of Elections.”
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SUSTAINABLE FOODS Students urged UC President Ono to sign a food contract.
Metro builds transit district to Uptown Boarding areas included in Clifton, Metro looks to boost ridership benjamin goldschimdt CHIEF Reporter newsrecordnews@gmail.com
keith bowers | Staff photographer
RUNNING FOR COUNCIL Mike Moroski, former assistant principal of Purcell Marian and council candidate, said his plans to run for office has been in the works since 2000. He was fired from the Catholic high school after expressing support for gay marriage. After losing his job at Purcell Marian, Councilmember Laure Quinlivan pushed Moroski to run now. “She said, ‘Just do it this year,’ and I was like, ‘Laure, I don’t even know what’s going on — I’m on administrative leave in exile, no one’s allowed to talk to me — we need to relax,’” he said. “But the job that I love got taken away from me, so here we are.” Moroski’s main goal, if elected to city council, is to help disadvantaged Cincinnatians. He has a master’s degree in business administration in nonprofit management, and has always worked in the
nonprofit sector. One of his major platforms is to change the way city council operates with big businesses and nonprofit organizations to increase effectiveness and efficiency when addressing the homeless issue. “We have 800-plus social service organizations in Greater Cincinnati, and a lot of them are really great — most of them are really great — but a lot of the services are duplicated,” Moroski said. “And the people who need the services aren’t getting them, or they don’t know where to get see moroski | 2
Cincinnati Metro is building a new Uptown Transit District this spring to boost ridership and provide University of Cincinnati students and faculty with better and safer amenities. The Southwest Ohio Regional Transit Authority acquired about $6.9 million for the project — $4 million in Federal Congestion Mitigation Air Quality funds, $1.9 million in local funds and a $1 million federal earmark. The project is estimated to cost about $4 million currently, but more may be added depending on other funds coming in, said William Gaut, director of service planning and development at Cincinnati Metro. There will be four key transitboarding areas included in the Uptown transit District; on Vine Street, Jefferson Avenue, the Hughes Corner business district and University of Cincinnati Medical Center. “The uptown area has the second largest concentration of employment in the region,” Gaut said. “We have some pretty active stops in that area, and so we decided to undertake this project to upgrade some of those stops where some of the heaviest activity takes place to improve the passenger waiting environment and safety for passengers.” The new stops will include shelters and streetscaping at key on-street locations in the area. One of Metro’s goals is to connect the hospital and university shuttle services, which could take students from the Bearcat Transportation System to the Metro. Metro hopes to increase ridership and revenue by providing better service and amenities in these key areas. Metro also hopes to cut down on traffic congestion in the area. “These are all real busy areas to begin with in terms of transit activity and pedestrian activity, and the number of nearby businesses and students,” Gaut said. If more money becomes available, Metro will continue to upgrade bus stops.
UC officials host workshop for student veterans Nontraditional students utilize military skills for civilian employment dani kokochak senior reporter newsrecordnews@gmail.com Nontraditional students from the University of Cincinnati benefited from a workshop Saturday, aimed at helping veterans translate military skills into the civilian workplace. Buck Clay, a US Army veteran and thirdyear communications student, organized the event with the collaboration of UC’s Office of Veterans Programs and Services and the Career Development Center. The workshop served as a way for UC to aid student veterans with their professional careers while completing their studies. About 15 student veterans made an appearance at the event, the first in
university history, which lasted for five hours. Federal employment was the main focus during the workshop, as well as restructuring military terminology into civilian terminology and human resource understanding. Seven speakers shared tips and tricks on employment with veterans, including Siggy Letheby, a recruitment manager from the Department of Labor’s Chicago office, who gave a live web presentation. “The federal employment process is a huge, arduous process … it takes a very long time to get in there, as well as to just understand the application process,” Clay said. Presenters from both the federal and private business sectors of employment
spoke with the student veterans. After each speaker’s presentation, the floor was open for questions and discussion. A recap of appropriate skills and verbiage on how to present oneself during an interview with a possible employer was given throughout the event. “We tried to put ourselves in the shoes of the interviewer, looking at us for their organization,” Clay said. The large disconnect between the Department of Defense and general human resource departments made employment more difficult for veterans who are searching for jobs after years in the service, Clay said. Students were informed of scholarships, such as the SMART Scholarship, which
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pays for schooling and provides a stipend from the Department of Defense. “I learned more in the last five hours than I have in the past five years,” said Nathan Johnson, a student veteran from Zane State College. “I received a lot of knowledge and materials that are useful for finding and getting a job.” Information about the workshop was sent out to student veteran programs at nearby colleges and universities, to encourage student veterans from elsewhere to come and see what the workshop had to offer. “I think it is always just important to help people … especially veterans,” said Santeri Potticary, an engineering student.