Legends of the Rock
Slippery Rock celebrates homecoming with a fairy-tale-themed parade. Page B-3
Friday, November 1, 2013 • Volume 97, Issue Number 8 • Slippery Rock University's Student Newspaper
the rocket
www.theonlinerocket.com
INSIDE Clarion University students protest program cuts THIS ISSUE
NEWS
History Class Roleplaying Game The history department has begun testing a new way of teaching by making history come alive through roleplaying. Page A-2
OPINION
Horsing Around at Homecoming Increased State Police presence on horses over homecoming weekend resulted in some unwanted deposits on campus. Page B-1
SPORTS
Rock Football Defeats Edinboro The Slippery Rock football team extends their winning streak with a 44-20 win over the Fighting Scots last Saturday. Page C-1
CAMPUS LIFE
Sex Olympics Educates Students SRU Hope Peer Education Mentors and Adagio Health hosted this year's Halloweenthemed Safer Sex Olympics. Page D-1
All Time Low SRU's University Program Board welcomed All Time Low for this year's fall concert along with opening band, The Big Time. Page D-1
IMAGE COURTESY OF FACES OF RETRENCHMENT, CLARION UNIVERSITY FACEBOOK PAGE
A protest took place at Clarion University regarding the program cuts being made to the music education program as well as various foreign language programs.
SRU combats 'perfect financial storm'
Third way to prevent retrenchment through the use of transfers By Jonathan Janasik News Editor
Members of Clarion University began protesting the university’s plan to let go of 36 staff members and eliminate the music education and certain foreign language programs this week, just as SRU finished plans for a win-win solution to their budget concerns. Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Dr. Philip Way explained that there are three options to deal with SRU’s projected deficit of $28,901,329 by the 2015-2016 school year. The first is to cut faculty in order to meet the budget’s targets, but he believes that it would damage the institution as well as peoples’ careers. The second way would be to try to pay the deficit by drawing from unrestricted net assets. The problem with that plan is that the administration is not allowed to draw from reserves at such a great extent, Way said.
Way has been meeting with the SRU chapter of the Association of Pa. State College and University Faculties (APSCUF) on a weekly basis since August to talk about potential solutions to solving the university’s “Perfect Financial Storm.” On Oct 23, a plan for a “third way” was finalized. “The third way would be ‘let’s work together to protect faculty positions, transferring some faculty, and working together to try and increase recruitment, retention, grant money, et. cetera in order to insure that there’s a bigger economic pie in order to cover our cost,’” Way explained. “It’s a winwin situation rather than one side winning and the other side losing.” The idea behind the third way is that the administration and faculty will participate in extra initiatives to bring money to the university, and in exchange, there will be no retrenchment for certain faculty members. “APSCUF has not succeeded
getting administration to retract the retrenchment letter,” SRU APSCUF President Dr. Patrick Burkhart said. “All that letter does is reserve that option for them to use retrenchment. But SRU APSCUF and SRU administration have accepted the third way [understanding]. The [understanding] states that no tenured or tenure-track faculty will be terminated for financial reasons.” Way explained that there was a reason why the letter was not pulled. “In the joint understanding it says that there will be no retrenchment of faculty who are tenured or tenure track. So it effectively negates [the retrenchment letter],” Way said. An alternative to retrenchment that the administration plans to utilize is transferring up to seven faculty members from declining programs to programs that use similar skillsets, explained Way. If the faculty members SEE THIRD, PAGE A-3
Campaign calls for the end of the 'F Word' By Kevin Squires Assistant News Editor
The campaign to stop the F word, hosted by Women’s Studies and RockOUT, took place Tuesday and Wednesday throughout the campus of Slippery Rock University. Students, faculty, staff, and administrators were posted at various locations and collected nearly 2,000 signatures over the two-day span. Kris Hawkins, President of RockOUT and senior psychology major, 21, said, “People see the sign and they say ‘Fuck?’ and I say no, no, you can say that all you want. This is about the word fag and faggot.” “I think a word, when it’s reduced to its letter, that speaks to how much power it has.” Dr. Cindy LaCom, director of the Women’s Studies program, said. Hawkins and LaCom both made reference to the ambiguity in the F word as intentional and an effort to get people initially thinking about their language. “This was sparked as a result of the issues we had at the university village last year and we were trying to come up with a proactive way to get
students involved about the effects of language and more specifically about the word faggot,” Hawkins stated. “We want people to be really aware of the word faggot and all of the negative meaning it has for masculinity and for men in general.” “A lot of people would think that doing something as simple as this isn’t really doing much, but you have to remember that we’re planting the seed.” Hawkins said. “We’re just here to make people think about the words they’re using.” He explained the campaign as an opportunity to make people think. “Now you have to think about ‘Hey maybe I say that sometimes. Maybe that’s not okay. What does that mean when I say that?’ You’re having that internal dialogue with yourself.” Cosponsored by the Department of Counseling and Development, President Cheryl J. Norton, Provost Phillip Way, Women’s Center, the Special Education Department, the Pride Center, the Office of Diversity SEE 'F WORD', PAGE A-2