thebattalion
Stocks tumble on worries about jobs, European debt
● friday,
february 5, 2010
● serving
texas a&m since 1893
● first paper free – additional copies $1 ● © 2010 student media
NEW YORK – Stocks buckled Thursday under the growing belief that the global economy is weaker than many investors expected and likely to stop companies from hiring. The Dow Jones industrials briefly traded below 10,000 for the first time in three months. Demand for safer investments sent the dollar and Treasurys higher and the euro falling. The Dow’s 2.6 percent drop was its biggest in seven months. The euro hit a seven-month low against the dollar on the news. Gold tumbled $49, or 4.4 percent. Associated Press
Toyota to recall Prius hybrid in US, Japan TOKYO – A leading newspaper says Toyota Motor Corp. will recall 270,000 Prius hybrid vehicles over brake problems in the United States and Japan. Japan’s top business newspaper, Nihon Keizai, said Friday that Toyota will soon notify Japan’s transport ministry and the U.S. Department of Transportation of the recall. Takayuki Fujimoto, a transport ministry official, said the government has yet to receive a recall notice from Toyota. Toyota spokeswoman Ririko Takeuchi said the company has not yet decided whether to recall the model in the U.S. and Japan. Associated Press
this day in
xas tehistory
Feb. 5, 1840 On this day in 1840, the Congress of the Republic of Texas passed the Law of February 5. Though there were relatively few free blacks in the republic, legislators concerned over the status of slavery attempted to restrict further the number of unenslaved blacks. The law declared that all free blacks who had entered Texas after the Texas Declaration of Independence must leave the republic within two years or be declared slaves for the rest of their lives. Those free blacks who were already in the republic before Texas independence would continue to have all the rights of their white neighbors.
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Graphic by Evan Andrews — THE BATTALION
Injuries
Gladiators
The National Center for Catastrophic Sport Injury Research tracks a number of head injury statistics related to football annually:
on the gridiron
◗ There were 44 head injury-related deaths from 1995-2004. ◗ High school players sustained 43 head injuries from 1995-2004 in which there was incomplete recovery.
◗ College players sustained five head injuries from 1995-2004 in which there was incomplete recovery.
◗ According to league officials there are about 160 concussions in the National Football League every year. SOURCE: National Center for Catastrophic Sport Injury Research
NFL’s violence rears its ugly head
L
et’s all take a quick vacation. Imagine for a second that you’re riding shotgun in a car going, say, 25 miles per hour. You, however, aren’t wearing a seatbelt. Then, out of nowhere, a wall appears. Bam!
David Harris It all happens so fast. Your head slams into a windshield. Your brain reverberates around in your skull. Sound painful? Now, flash back to reality, and … welcome to the life of an NFL lineman.
Construction science team places 5th in Vegas
See Head Injuries on page 5
University endowments across Texas fell in 2009 Nathan Alsbrooks
Katy Ralston The Battalion Caution: heavy construction ahead. These words warn people of an upcoming area undergoing maintenance, but for one group of Aggie construction science majors it means something different. These students spent three months producing a 150-page proposal for the National Association of Home Builders’ Residential Construction Management Challenge. The seven-member team was assigned the project at the end of the fall semester. They had until Jan. 6 to complete the proposal and compete with other teams across the country. Once the proposal was submitted, the teams traveled to Las Vegas, Nev., to present their proposal to a panel of judges who are all construction company executives and field questions about their process and decisions. “Students work on a residential construc-
Every Sunday in the fall, millions of Americans grab an ice-cold beverage, plop down in front of the television and indulge in watching millionaires throw their bodies around like rag dolls. It’s the pastime of this country. The National Football League. The $7.6 billion machine. And the most immoral professional sports organization in the world. Less than a week before its marquee event, everything should be roses in
Jeramie Heflin — THE BATTALION
Pictured left to right: Jody Goldman, K’rina Graham, Phillip Gazca, Loren Schleimer, and Charlie Wolfe, all members of Texas A&M’s student chapter of the National Association of Home Builders, and winners of the national competition in Las Vegas from Jan. 18-22. tion management challenge based on an actual home building site that includes specifications, plans and schematics,” said Page Browning, who heads the NAHB Student Chapters program and competition. “For example, for the 2010 See Construction on page 4
Special to The Battalion A trend among U.S. universities reveals trouble, according to a study released by the Commonfund Institute, a nonprofit group that polled 629 educational endowments on results. Endowments at several schools lost nearly one fourth of the value. In addition, a report released by the Council for Aid to Education states charitable donations to colleges and universities fell 11.9 percent in 2009, to $24.85 billion, the largest ever recorded decline in a single year. However, officials have said it’s in better shape than the numbers indicate. Both reports indicate the overall unhealthiness of endowments can be related to the recession that has plagued the American economy. However, the endowment crisis has not been
Top 5 fundraising universities 1. Stanford University ($640.11 million) 2. Harvard University ($601.64 million) 3. Cornell University ($446.75 million) 4. University of Pennsylvania ($439.77 million) 5. Johns Hopkins University ($433.39 million)
See Endowments on page 2
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