THE DAILY TARGUM
Volume 141, Number 43
S E R V I N G
T H E
Today: Mostly cloudy
R U T G E R S
C O M M U N I T Y
S I N C E
FRIDAY OCTOBER 30, 2009
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NO MARGIN FOR ERROR The Rutgers football team travels to Connecticut to face a Huskies team that they split their last six meetings with. Ten points or less decided six of their last seven meetings.
High: 61 • Low: 53
Assembly surveys hundreds, prepares results for administrators BY CAGRI OZUTURK ASSOCIATE NEWS EDITOR
The student leaders of the Rutgers University Student Assembly began to prepare the results for the “What’s on Your Mind Month” sur vey initiative for their next meeting, where they will present them to University Administrators.
“Every council did their own survey and they will be doing their own presentations in a town hall style meeting,” Assembly Chair Werner Born said. “Ideally, the way it’s going to work out is that people ask questions at the end of the presentations.” The surveys themselves have been up to the different councils to administer and distribute. The
online survey is still available for students to take on RUSA’s home page at the bottom of the Web site under “News.” “Every council has been targeting their own areas, [so] hopefully we will see ver y specific data. There is a much more general survey online but I know the councils have localized their surveys a bit,” said Born, a School of Engineering
senior. “[The] survey is pretty general. We didn’t want to narrow it down to specific questions.” The way the surveys were distributed varies by council. Some decided to send their own surveys and gather them for next week’s meeting, and some will continue to distribute University Affairs’ surveys for a longer yet more specific effort.
“The University Af fairs’ own sur vey has taken longer to form, but it’s a more specific sur vey. Some councils like the [Douglass Governing Council] decided to go with our essay than to distribute theirs,” Assembly University Af fairs Chair Ben West said.
SEE RESULTS ON PAGE 4
Controversy remains despite RUSA retreat cost reduction BY CAGRI OZUTURK ASSOCIATE NEWS EDITOR
Those who went to the Rutgers University Student Assembly’s retreat consider it a success, but some think it is too early to say. The assembly went to their annual retreat last weekend amid criticism from students at the declared maximum price of the retreat. If all 150 members went to the retreat, it would have cost $20,000, but not everyone made it. “The retreat was great,” RUSA Chair Werner Born said. “The difference between the bus ride up and back was phenomenal. When we went up, councils stuck with each other very closely, but by the end of the weekend everybody was spread out and mixed up. We also had excellent involvement from the freshmen and sophomores.” There really was no wasteful spending, Born said. Student Life paid for transportation to keep costs low. “We took yellow school buses as I promised, and the food couldn’t be called anything but camp
food,” Born said. “All together this was a weekend that student government successfully used as a rally point.” The final cost of the retreat was less than $12,000, which was 40 percent of last year’s cost, he said. Eleven organizations were involved with the meeting, as opposed to last year’s five campus councils and the University College community. The Assembly funded the retreat through University student fees, said University Affairs Chair Ben West in his column in The Daily Targum. But others do not think it is acceptable to say it was successful, because if the student representatives did attend, the retreat would have cost the full $20,000 price. “I do not think that it is kosher to take credit for cutting costs just because two-thirds of the student reps didn’t show up,” West said. “What should be happening instead is that we should question whether these retreats, which we can now see only garner one-third of the [assembly]
SEE RETREAT ON PAGE 4 ALBERT LAM
INDEX 46% HALLOWEEN
43%
Looking for a Halloween costume? Find out what this year’s top costume ideas are, from Michael Jackson to the Obamas.
Latest Governor Poll Results Chris Christie — R Gov. Jon S. Corzine — D Chris Daggett — I Not sure
NJ Books employees and movers transport boxes from 108 Somerset St. to its new location at 39 Easton Ave., following months of negotiations with Devco.
Location sign-off allows NJ Books to relocate BY ARIEL NAGI
METRO Women Aware, Inc. celebrated their 30th anniversary with a visit from renowned feminist activist Gloria Steinem, who came to speak about domestic violence.
UNIVERSITY . . . . . . . 3 HALLOWEEN. . . . . . . 8 OPINIONS . . . . . . . 10 DIVERSIONS . . . . . . 12 CLASSIFIEDS . . . . . . 14 SPORTS . . . . . . BACK
ONLINE @ DAILYTARGUM.COM
ASSOCIATE NEWS EDITOR
7% NOTE: Margin of Sampling Error, +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence
4% Information courtesy of Rasmussen Reports
GRAPHIC BY ANGELINA RHA/ MANAGING EDITOR
Challenger Chris Christie held a 3 percent lead over Gov. Jon S. Corzine in an Oct. 26 telephone survey of 1,000 likely New Jersey voters.
After months of anticipation and negotiations, New Jersey Books will finally be able to open the doors at its new location to the public once all materials are moved in. As of yesterday, NJ Books officially owns its new bookstore, located at 39 Easton Ave, said New Brunswick Development Corporation President Chris Paladino.
“It’s a step along a very long road,” Paladino said. “I’m glad [NJ Books] is moving to its new location. It does a lot to serve the community.” Devco signed away the new property on Easton Avenue to NJ Books store owner Ed Mueller yesterday, allowing demolition to occur within the next few weeks at the old NJ Books located on 108 Somerset St., in order to resume pre-construction of the Gateway project, he said.
SEE LOCATION ON PAGE 4
ANNUAL TOURNAMENT INVITES U. TO DODGE, DONATE FOR CHARITY University students are invited to dodge, duck, dip, dive and donate at an annual charity dodgeball tournament Sunday at the College Avenue Gym. Alpha Chi Omega and Delta Chi hope to raise money and awareness for the two organizations’ designated charities, the New Brunswick-based Women Aware, Inc. to support victims of domestic violence and the Jimmy V Foundation for cancer research, during the third annual “DodgeThis” dodgeball tournament, said Angelica Grimaldi, the public relations chair for the event. Last year’s event raised more than $2,000 for the two charities, and this year Grimaldi said the organizations hope to surpass that mark.
“It really just brings you back to your old gym days in high school,” said Grimaldi, a Rutgers College senior. “You never really hear of people playing dodgeball anymore, so why not come out and play dodgeball with a couple of friends and do it for a good cause?” The idea for “DodgeThis” came about three years ago, when the two greek organizations realized there were no dodgeball tournaments on campus, Grimaldi said. “You hear of flag football tournaments on campus and basketball … so you have a chance to play the other intramural sports but never really dodgeball,” she said.
The tournament, featuring teams of five to eight members comprised of teams from fraternities, sororities and other organizations, will start round-robin style so the teams can get in at least two games of dodgeball, Grimaldi said. The brackets will be based on the team’s performance in this opening round, and a champion will ultimately be named, she said. University students can still sign up to participate in the event, Grimaldi said. Registration will start at 12 p.m., and the opening ceremonies will start at 1 p.m. with the tournament to follow. — Chris Zawistowski