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A crowd of about 40 people outside of the Old Queens building yesterday chanted, “You can put us all in jail, but the students will prevail,” as part of the second “Walk into Action.” After two weeks of attempts to get University President Richard L. McCormick to meet student demands for lower tuition — among other things — with no response, students rallied on Voorhees Mall on the College Avenue campus and around Old Queens as part of “Walk into Action: Part Two.” The first “Walk into Action” had the support of hundreds of students, which was followed by last week’s Tent State University, where students wrote letters
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Students begin the “Walk into Action: Part Two” rally for demands like lowering tuition and eliminating the new transcript fee in Van Dyck Hall on the College Avenue campus.
Byrne Seminar to examine human addiction CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Contrar y to popular belief, new groundbreaking genetics research now suggests that human addictions, from chocolate to alcohol, might actually be rooted in an individual’s DNA, proving that people pass on their eccentric addictions from generation to generation. To fur ther discuss this research, Andrzej “Andre” Pietrzykowski, an assistant professor at the University, is conducting a new Byrne Seminar
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titled “Can Junk DNA Make Us a Junkie?”, which he said aims to teach students more about this discover y. The seminar, open to first-year students, exposes that “junk DNA,” once thought to have no apparent function, actually regulates molecular biological functions that determine one’s own risk for becoming addicted, Pietrzykowski said. Because of this new finding, many scientists believe that addicts are addicts for life, Pietrzykowski said. People cannot choose their addictions, and
these addictions affect the human brain permanently. “Addiction is not strictly limited to substance abuse but can also entail activity abuse such as gambling and sex addictions,” Pietrzykowski said. “The best [addicts] can hope for is to reach sobriety, because the nature of addiction affects the brain’s chemistr y in an irreversible way,” he said. “Once someone becomes an alcoholic, for example, he or she will have to fight every day for life to avoid contact with alcohol and thereby prevent relapse.”
Since genes play an enormous role in passing over addictions, addicts must generally develop a strong will to avoid the substance or activity in question, because it is unlikely they will be able to participate in a non-excessive way, Pietrzykowski said. Addiction could go beyond substance abuse to hit areas such as gambling, Pietrzykowski said. Therefore, all students and young adolescents should be aware of what they could do to stifle an addiction from getting out of hand.
SEE ADDICTION ON PAGE 5
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METRO Middlesex County women in domestic violence relationships call a Middlesex County hotline for counseling and support.
OPINIONS President Barack Obama may have produced his birth certificate, but birthers are not satisfied.
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BY ANASTASIA MILLICKER
BY AMY ROWE
BY JOHN ZADROGA
APRIL 28, 2011
Students take demands to Old Queens
U. activists continue to ‘Walk’
SEE ACTIVISTS ON PAGE 4
THURSDAY
The Vibe Santiago Latin Jazz Quintet performs classic Hispanic music like merengue and salsa yesterday on the steps outside Brower Commons on the College Avenue campus. The Central and South American Alliance sponsored the live show, which also featured free food and refreshments.
Eleven University students of a larger group of protestors that set up camp in the third-floor landing of the Old Queens building early yesterday morning chose to stay behind after 5 p.m, when the facility closed. The group consisted of School of Ar ts and Sciences first-year students Taylor Westerlind, Renee Coppola and Molly Magier; School of Ar ts and Sciences sophomores Jorge Casalins, Jean Rodriguez and Sonia Szczesna; School of Ar ts and Sciences juniors Richard Garzon, Beth Breslaw and Timothy Cobb; and School of Ar ts and Sciences seniors Zachar y Ler ner and Bhavin Patel. They first arrived in the building around 10 a.m. as a group of more than two dozen with no intention of leaving until a list of demands, presented to the administration two weeks ago at “Walk into Action,” were met. As a result of their decision, President for Academic Af fairs Philip J. Furmanski said the student protestors could face legal and University disciplinar y repercussions, including suspension. “It is necessar y for me as a newly authorized of ficer of Rutgers University charged with responsibility in this manner to inform you that your former action constitutes a disruption, and it is in violation of both state law and University school disciplinar y hearing code,” Furmanski said Furmanski read the students Section 50.3.5 of the University policy, which states that any demonstration that interferes with the freedom of members of the academic community to go about their normal business constitutes a disruption and violates University regulations. Still, the 11 students present gave their names and agreed to accept the consequences for an overnight stay under the watch of two security guards. The group met with President Richard L. McCormick last Friday to discuss the demands and student representatives also delivered letters all last week during Tent State University, said Joseph Cashin, a spokesperson for the group. “What they’ve been still doing is … putting us off,” said Cashin, a School of Arts and Sciences first-year student. “They’re not getting anything done, and these are reasonable demands that all students care about, and reasonable demands that they can take care of.” A University statement written last Friday confirmed the meeting, but said President McCormick is still studying the student’s requests and consulting with other members of the University’s administration. One demand asked that the administration issue a public statement in support of a tuition freeze, as well as an increase of funding to the Educational Opportunity Fund (EOF).
SEE DEMANDS ON PAGE 4