The Battalion: September 7, 2016 by The Battalion

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Lawrence Smelser — THE BATTALION

Trevor Knight speaks about his A&M debut during Tuesday’s news conference.

Aggies seek improvement after victory over Bruins By Heath Clary @Heath_Clary Fresh off its overtime upset of No.16 UCLA, the Texas A&M football team returned to the practice field in preparation for an 11 a.m. kickoff against Prairie View A&M Saturday. With the departures of Mike Matthews and Germain Ifedi, the A&M offensive line was a major question mark heading into the season opener. However, the young unit mitigated many of those doubts with solid play during Saturday’s game, and one of the key pieces of that success came from redshirt freshman Eric McCoy, who started the game at center. McCoy was named the SEC Offensive Lineman of the Week following his efforts, and Texas A&M head coach Kevin Sumlin said at Tuesday’s news conference that McCoy’s performance was not as much of a surprise as some people may think. “Last year we redshirted him but he traveled to every game,” Sumlin said. “He was Mike Mat-

thews’ back up. He was told, and he knew, that if Mike Matthews went down, he was the nextbest guy who can give us the best chance to win. The mental preparation and sideline demeanor was different.” The offensive line did a good job of protecting senior quarterback Trevor Knight, who was not sacked Saturday, despite attempting 42 passes. Knight scored the crucial go-ahead touchdown in overtime, giving the Aggies a 3124 advantage that they would not relinquish. Knight, though, said the offense still has things to improve on heading into this weekend’s game against Prairie View A&M and beyond. “Moving forward we just want to be sharper in every area,” Knight said. “Little reads here and there, accuracy, the list can go on and on. I just want to see us take a step [forward] as far as execution goes.” On the defensive side of the ball, the Aggies played well against

Ana Sevilla — THE BATTALION

Organization intersects floral design, philanthropy White orchids blanket a table top and a variety of other types of flowers line the room, ready to be arranged into signature maroon and white floral designs that may be sent to a veteran, a nursing home or even placed in the A&M president’s suite in Kyle Field. For the past 35 years, Texas A&M’s chapter of the Student American Institute of Floral Designers, SAIFD, has created designs for school-related events like the President’s Endowed Scholarship Banquet, the Alumni Gala, the Agriculture and Life Sciences Banquet and, as of last year, the president’s suite at every home football game. Celeste Winfield, horticulture senior and president of Tex-

Stephanie Malherbe returns to Aggieland after Olympic debut By Matt Koper @MattKoper

ven after performing on the highest stage for an athlete possible — the 2016 Olympics in Rio — it was back to classes and business as usual for junior midfielder Stephanie Malherbe when she returned to College Station. It was almost like she had never left. Malherbe was born in Temecula, California, but her parents were born and raised in South Africa, and all of her extended family lives in South Africa. Just over a month ago, with dual citizenship, Malherbe competed in the Olympics for the South African Women’s National Soccer team. Malherbe approached A&M soccer associate head coach Phil Stephenson about her interest in playing soccer for South Africa and Stephenson helped take care of the rest, helping her put together a highlight video of her freshman season at A&M. Stephenson said he had no difficulty finding highlights,

as A&M’s chapter of SAIFD, said the design of the arrangements are envisioned by William McKinley, a senior lecturer for floral design courses and the Endowed Chair of the Benz Floral Design School. Once William comes up with the concepts for the designs, members of SAIFD arrange the flowers. Winfield said the club designed arrangements for Kyle Field suites until the tradition discontinued. However, A&M President Michael Young approached William before the Fall of 2015 and proposed the reinstatement of the tradition, Winfield said. “[Young] likes white orchids,” Winfield said. “We keep them and maintain them until it’s time to go on Friday we’re going to go and decorate his box.” FLORAL DESIGN ON PG. 2

but rather difficulty reaching out to the South African Soccer Association. Fortunately, he had a connection to Kylie Louw, an assistant soccer coach at Arizona and a former South African National team player, and sent off her highlights. “One of the things we do when we send video, is we don’t tell people, ‘This player can play for you, this player is this,’” Stephenson said. “We just kind of say, ‘Watch this.’ And the highlight package of Stephanie was really good; she was doing some really good things.” Malherbe heard back from South African coach Vera Pauw in May of 2015 and went to South Africa

over the summer to try out for two weeks. Because she was still working on acquiring her dual citizenship, she couldn’t participate in the Olympic qualifiers at the time, but by December, Malherbe had completed her paperwork and South Africa had qualified for the Olympics in November. The South African Olympic squad invited her to try out, and she made the team. Malherbe said a focal point in her journey to the Olympics was playing a friendly match against the United States National Team July 9, in which she was pitted against U.S. captain Carli Lloyd. South Africa, the 54th-ranked team, was playing the defending champions. “I think that was arguably the highlight of this entire journey,” Malherbe said. “Growing up in the States, I’ve grown up watching them on TV and like looking up to them — especially Carli Lloyd — she’s been one of my idols for a long long time.” Not only did Malherbe mark her idol in the friendly, but MALHERBE ON PG.4

Morgan Engel — THE BATTALION

CONSTRUCTION

Cain Garage ahead of schedule New campus parking construction completed in time for UCLA game By Emily Bost @emmybost

FOOTBALL ON PG. 4

Nicole McKinley (left) and Shannon Chambers work on floral arrangements for SAIFD.

By Ana Sevilla @anavsevilla

AN AGGIE IN RIO

Cain Garage is set for completion on Oct. 8.

Now standing five stories high on the site where Cain Hall once stood, campus’ newest parking garage was fully operational for A&M’s game against UCLA Saturday. Cain Hall was torn down last year to make way for the new campus parking garage. Cain Hall used to host Disability Services and Student Counseling Services, but was replaced by an extra space for parking, Cain Garage, with accompanying plans for an on-campus hotel as well. Construction of Cain Garage began promptly after the destruction of Cain Hall in Spring 2016. Former A&M President R. Bowen Loftin originally had the idea to attract local and national conferences to benefit the A&M academic community, according to Phillip Ray, Vice Chancellor for Business Affairs at the Texas A&M University System. Ray said while the contractual completion date for the garage was originally set for Oct. 15, the parking garage’s construction was about five weeks ahead of schedule. “We were able to get [the garage] open and CAIN GARAGE ON PG. 2 Leah Kappayil — THE BATTALION

ENGINEER, BUSINESSMAN, AGGIE Association board chair reflects on prolific career By Pranav Kannan @PranavKannan92 Dwain Mayfield, Class of 1959, has held a lot of titles over the course of his 40-year career — lead design engineer of the F-16 fighter aircraft, vice president for Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company and currently chair of the board of the Association of Former Students at A&M. Mayfield, a first-generation college student, was led down the path to Texas A&M by a high school teacher. Graduating among the top in his class, he soon completed his Master’s degree in civil engineering and joined General Dynamics as a design engineer. Mayfield said his time at A&M greatly influenced his life. One of the most important lessons he learned, Mayfield said, was to maintain personal integrity. “Not only was my intellect shaped here, but my character was

FILE

Dwain Mayfield, Class of 1959, is the chair of the board for the Association of Former Students.

shaped here,” Mayfield said. “I would say one of the things that stuck with me was the work ethic I developed here — which was to get the job done.” Although his education was in civil engineering, Mayfield’s career led him to aerospace when he was asked to be one of the lead engineers on the F-16 program, a pro-

gram for the design of a supersonic combat aircraft called the F-16 Fighting Falcon. “My focus was towards structural design and indeterminate structures, and an airplane is just a flying bridge,” Mayfield said. After Mayfield completed his MAYFIELD ON PG. 3

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Ana Sevilla — THE BATTALION

Horticulture sophomore Shannon Chambers (left) and horticulture senior Celeste Winfield (right) learn basics of floral design in Texas A&M’s chapter of the Student American Institute of Floral Designers, or SAIFD.

September 22, 2016 Rudder Theater 7:00 - 9:00 pm “Extraordinarily skilled, passionate musicians” -The New York Times Student Admission $7 - General Admission $12 To purchase tickets, call the MSC Box Office at 979-845-1234 or visit their website at boxoffice.tamu.edu academyarts.tamu.edu | Email: avpa@tamu.edu | Facebook.com/AVPAatTAMU | Twitter.com/AVPA_TAMU

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FLORAL DESIGN CONTINUED McKinley’s wife and former business partner, Nicole McKinley, Class of 1981, said Young’s preference for flowers makes designing easier. “He likes white orchids and succulents,” Nicole said. “So it’s exciting to have a president who has an interest and preference for flowers rather than just, ‘Oh, whatever.’ It’s so much easier to work with clientele when they have already some ideas of what they’d like.” In addition to the president’s suite, SAIFD also arranges designs for the chancellor’s suite, the Board of Regents’ suite and the Texas A&M Foundation’s suite. Open to all students, SAIFD connects individuals to a learning environment with instruction on floral design basics taught by SAIFD members, Ni-

cole said. As one of only 13 chapters across the nation, Texas A&M’s chapter of the pre-professional organization encourages club members to register with SAIFD to compete in the annual American Institute of Floral Designers Symposium. Winfield said while members can compete, the vast majority of the competition is a learning experience with professional florists and presentations. “One woman actually does paper flowers and has a studio in Houston,” Winfield said. “Different people told their different stories, and their backgrounds, and how they got to do floral design and how they got into the business.” The organization also donates leftover flowers to nursing homes in the Bryan-College Station area through the Blooms Over Brazos program, Winfield said.

“This is, in fact, modeled after something that they do at AIFD,” Nicole said. “At the end of the 10-day symposium, all of these monstrous designs are broken down and they re-use the flowers and they [are taken] out to veterans, nursing homes, schools and all sorts of philanthropic places.” After working with SAIFD for the last two semesters, Shannon Chambers, horticulture sophomore and SAIFD secretary, said she’s enjoyed the experiences she’s had. “I have a lot of fun and I feel like I’m good at it,” Chambers said. “Every meeting I can say has been fun. I love the people, everyone is very nice and welcoming, and ever since I came to this I was hooked and I stayed ever since.” Students interested in SAIFD can attend weekly meetings at 5:30 p.m. on Thursdays in room 105 of the Horticulture Forest Science Building.

The IndependenT STudenT VoIce of TexaS a&M SInce 1893

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Leah Kappayil — THE BATTALION

Finishing touches of Cain Garage — including cosmetic touchups on the exterior and full landscape — are set to be completed by Oct. 8 this year.

CAIN GARAGE CONTINUED fully functional, with 1,400 spaces that were available on our Sept. 3 football game,” Ray said. “We were very pleased with that and thought it did a great job in helping the game day traffic.” Ray said the remaining construction for Cain Garage will include cosmetic touchups on the exterior of the garage, along with completing the full landscape by Oct. 8 when A&M hosts Tennessee. “It is going to be shining like a new penny on the outside, just like it is on the inside, now,” Ray said. Ray said typically it takes much longer to construct a working and usable parking garage than the amount of time it took the contractor, Gilbane Construction. “We’re very pleased to get to finish Cain Garage that many spaces ready in that short

of a construction period. There were probably about six months of construction to do a poured-in-place, five-level garage like that,” Ray said. “It’s almost unheard of — especially to do it ahead of schedule with the weather we fought through this summer.” Kyle Field, the MSC and Albritton Tower encompass the construction site that includes the new garage, Ray said. As this is such a high-traffic area at A&M, building a parking garage seemed a feasible solution to combatting high traffic and inadequate parking availability on campus, Ray said. Remington Chess, human resources development junior, said it will be beneficial to have more parking options on campus. “I definitely think it will help with the high traffic on that part of campus, but I can see how it could cause traffic if [the garage] is too full and not regulated,” Chess said.

CORRECTION A correction yesterday in The Battalion incorrectly stated that Saturday’s win over UCLA was the first victory over a ranked non-conference opponent since 1989. Unfortunately that correction was still not correct. The accurate statistic is that it was A&M’s first win over a ranked non-conference opponent at Kyle Field since 1994. We apologize for the further confusion and are constantly striving to provide our readers with true information. Again, we encourage further feedback.

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A&M RESEARCHERS CONVERT BRAIN SIGNALS TO ROBOTIC MOVEMENT

MAYFIELD CONTINUED time at General Dynamics, his career shifted again from engineering to business administration. He said his roles in business and marketing led to interaction with leaders from around the world. “I had the opportunity to meet King Hussein in Jordan on three different occasions, the President of Turkey and even Benazir Bhutto in Washington — I could go on and on,” Mayfield said. Throughout his career Mayfield said he still remained involved in many capacities with A&M. He volunteered for the Engineering Advisory Council and is a member of the Chancellor’s Century Council as well as the President’s Advisory Council. Mayfield said he encourages every graduate to continually give back to A&M. “As a young engineer, I would come back to A&M recruiting other young engineers, speaking in class and talking to students,” Mayfield said. “As soon as I could, I started being a member of the Century Club and have been a member for 38, 39 years.” In his current role as the chair of the board of the Association of Former Students, Mayfield said the Association has a broad impact on every student who walks across campus. “We [The Association of Former Students] are the core of the Aggie Network and the friendships that [students] would make here are made to last,” Mayfield said. Albert Saenz, communication senior and president of Aggie Network Student Ambassadors, said Mayfield always leads by example and embodies the core values of the university. “He was very emotionally invested in all our conversations,” Saenz said. “One of the cool things he did was that he purchased our Century Club membership. One request of his is that we continue to give back in the future — as we hear at Midnight Yell ‘Ol Rock the good Ag, that’s him.’” Jennifer Smith, Class of 2011 and

FILE

Dwain Mayfield, Class of 1959, was a lead design engineer for the F-16 with General Dynamics.

academic advisor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, met Mayfield when she served as the campus programs coordinator for the Association of Former Students. She said in addition to his many degrees, accomplishments and experience, Mayfield went out of his way to make others feel welcome. “During my first year at The Association, the staff all dressed up of the Halloween [football] game for a fun day at the office,” Smith said. “Out of the blue, someone showed up in a gorilla costume and it turned out to be Dwain. This man was a former VP at Lockheed Martin and he was walking around in a gorilla suit enjoying the festivities with staff and students — it was great.”

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Mechanical engineering Ph.D. candidate Sungtae Shin tests a robotic arm he developed using myoelectric interfacing.

Advanced technology could improve healthcare By Barath Menon @_barathmenon Imagine a robot that can be controlled by brain signals. This is exactly what researchers are developing Texas A&M’s Engineering Department. Mechanical engineering researchers at A&M are designing a robotic exoskeleton performing Myoelectric Interfacing — a process where sensors read electrical signals from the brain to control muscles and replicate movements on a robotic device. This emerging technology could open up new doors in healthcare by providing improved prosthetics and may be the foundation of a new motion input device — similar to the Xbox Kinect. Sungtae Shin, mechanical engineering Ph.D. candidate, has been studying myoelectric interfacing for more than two years. He said the concept be-

hind this device is not complex, but the science is. “The muscles emit a small voltage across the nerves, approximately 10 milliVolts,” Sungtae said. “This voltage is later amplified to the sensors in the device that the person wears. Then the exoskeleton will enable rehabilitation activity.” Sungtae has developed a machine that operates based on a few muscle gestures in the arm. Sungtae said he was interested in this technology because of his passion for computers. “I was interested in computer technology and artificial intelligence, hence why myoelectric signaling was very attractive to me,” Sungtae said. “This technology is important because it makes it possible for us to control machines using human gestures.” Reza Langari, head of the Laboratory for Control, Robotics and Animation and the Engineering Technology and Industrial Distribution Department, said this new myoelectric technology is fascinating to re-

search and has a strong potential to grow. “The way this technology works is that there is a sensor that picks up electrical activity from the brain and from various nerve paths,” Langari said. “This is similar to EEG signaling.” EEG signaling — which is short for electroencephalogram — is a method to record electrical activity in the brain from the scalp. Jill Lyster, senior administrative coordinator for engineering technology, said the engineering department has a lot more testing and developing to do before this technology becomes marketable. Sungtae said he hopes after he leaves, the research will continue on and this technology take off in the future. “The professors at Texas A&M provided me a lot of help by providing a lot of devices and technical advice,” Sungtae said. “This technology is very interesting and the applications are endless.”

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MALHERBE CONTINUED according to A&M soccer head coach G Guerrieri, she looked unstoppable and secured her spot on the Olympic team. “She was directly matched up against the World Footballer of the Year — Carli Lloyd — and Steph shut her down and did a great job of keeping control of the midfield, wasn’t just a marker, but really played her role and little bit more really well,” Guerrieri said. “That’s when we knew she was going to make the final cut.” Once in Rio, Malherbe and the South African squad played in preliminaries against Sweden in a 1-0 loss on Aug. 3, a 2-0 loss to China on Aug. 6 and a 0-0 draw on Aug. 9 against the host country Brazil. Malherbe said despite losing in the matches, people couldn’t overlook her team and how she performed during the games. “Personally, I was very proud of myself just because I never would’ve thought that I could compete against that level of opponent in my life and there I was on the field, holding my own, so that was really eye opening for me,” Malherbe said. Another memorable moment from Rio, Malherbe said, was seeing athletes like Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt and Spain’s tennis player Rafael Nadal in a dining hall. “It’s a very unique environment because you’re with all the elites in the whole world,” Malherbe said. “So, it’s really cool to be surrounded by such top athletes that are so focused and intense and ready for their events.” Because she was a semester ahead in her classes, Malherbe took time off from school for the Olympics, and since then hasn’t had any problems with coming back to school. When she got back, her

4 teammates even threw her a surprise Olympic-themed party. “I just felt the love and support constantly, not just from my teammates, but the entire A&M student body,” Malherbe said. “People that I didn’t necessarily know well or at all were reaching out on social media and really showing their love and support … Because if it weren’t for their support I wouldn’t be able to do any of that.” One of Malherbe’s teammates and friends, senior defender Grace Wright, said she was proud of Malherbe and is glad she is back with the team. “We’re all just looking forward to having her back playing and back on the field again,” Wright said. Malherbe said after returning to College Station, the Olympic experience felt unreal to her. She is currently sitting out with a minor injury and taking time to recover from the Olympics, and will be playing for the Aggies relatively soon. “Well, it just feels like a dream — the Olympics — because I was there and then I came back and two weeks later I’m sitting in class at Wehner just like everybody else,” Malherbe said. Being able to go out and compete on the highest stage and then return to the school she holds dear has made the journey worthwhile, Malherbe said. “It just makes me feel so humbled to have gotten the opportunity to have an experience like that and then to come back rejoin such an amazing environment that we have here at A&M, and just kind of join the stream of students again like it never happened,” Malherbe said. “I’m so glad that nothing changed while I was gone because I loved A&M before and I love it now.”

PROVIDED

Accounting junior Stephanie Malherbe says she was happy with her performance during the 2016 Olympics in Rio.

FOOTBALL CONTINUED

12th Man Cullen Gillaspia says it’s an honor to wear the number 12 for the Aggies.

UCLA for the first three quarters and overtime, but it was the fourth quarter where they struggled and let the Bruins back into the game. “We played well for three quarters, and I think that’s obvious,” defensive coordinator John Chavis said. “We didn’t play the kind of football that we needed to play in the fourth quarter … We’ve got to get that fixed. I think we showed a lot of people that we are capable of playing well, but we’ve got to be able to do it for 60 minutes.” Another positive sign from the UCLA game was the emergence of running backs Trayveon Williams and Keith Ford. Both played well against the Bruins, and Sumlin confirmed that Ford is healthy after getting banged up on Saturday.

“Keith Ford is good to go — he’s fine,” Sumlin said. “He was in on the last play of the game. We have depth at running back. We had two guys that didn’t play. James White only had two carries. I’ve talked to him. The way the other two guys [Ford and Trayveon Williams] were playing on Saturday, it was hard to take them off the field.” Sophomore linebacker and 12th Man Cullen Gillaspia was also a topic of conversation at Tuesday’s press conference. Gillaspia said it was a privilege to wear the number 12 on his jersey this season. “It is such a big honor to represent this university as the 12th Man,” Gillaspia said. “That had been by goal all of offseason; that is what I had been working towards.” The Aggies will kick off against Prairie View A&M Saturday at 11 a.m. at Kyle Field.

Lawrence Smelser — THE BATTALION

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