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march 4, 2013
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Wall-raisers
Crash kills 2 cadets, injures 1 T
hree people, including two members of the Texas A&M Corps of Cadets, were killed in a head-on collision involving a wrong-way driver early Sunday morning on Highway 290 outside of Houston. Freshman construction science major, Amy Pacheco; freshman general studies major, Miguel Hernandez; and freshman landscape architecture major, Francisco Campos were returning to College Station after attending an ROTC event in Houston when Pacheco’s Ford Explorer was struck just after 3:30 a.m. by 21-year-old Katie Thomas, according to the Harris Country Sherriff’s Office. Thomas was driving east in the westbound lanes of Highway 290 near Binford Road when her car collided with the SUV. The SUV was driven by Pacheco and caught fire upon collision. Pacheco and Hernandez, both members of Company B-1, were unable to escape the vehicle and died. Campos, a member of Company F-1, was helped out of the vehicle by a passer-by and taken to Memorial Hermann Hospital. He is in stable condition, according to officials. Thomas was pronounced dead at the scene. Deputies found beer bottles in Thomas’ car and believe alcohol was a factor in the accident, according to the Harris County Sherriff’s Office. “We in the Corps of Cadets and at Texas A&M University are in mourning over the loss of two of our cadets in a tragic car accident early this morning,” said Brig. Gen. and Corps Commandant Joe Ramirez. “We offer our sincerest condolences, thoughts and prayers to their family and friends and ask everyone to respect these families and our cadets as we mourn during these trying times.” Pacheco and Hernandez will be honored at 10:30 p.m. Monday at Echo Taps on the Quad. Julie Blanco, staff writer
David Cohen — THE BATTALION
Volunteers lift the first wall of the Ybarra family home Saturday morning, officially kicking off the Bush School’s Habitat for Humanity project that will continue on throughout March and April.
Bush School, Habitat for Humanity sponsor home Tyler Webb
School of Government and Public Service and former chief of staff to President George W. Bush. It required the students to raise $40,000 over the span of one year to build a home and new life for the Ybarra family, currently living in a crammed three-bedroom house with five children. The Bush school provided most of the volunteers for construction in addition to sponsoring the home financially. Travis Stalcup, international affairs graduate student, is one of the heads of
Special to The Battalion urrent and former students of the Bush School — along with a number of faculty — gathered Saturday to raise the walls of a fivebedroom Habitat for Humanity home in honor of former President George H.W. Bush and his wife, Barbara, for their many years of public service. The project was initiated last April by Andy Card, acting dean of the Bush
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the project committee. Stalcup said the connection between the Bush School and Habitat for Humanity was a natural one. “My wife, Rachel, is the director of development in Habitat for Humanity,” Stalcup said. “This, in addition to dean Card’s and other students’ involvement with the Habitat program, allowed us to naturally have a connection.” Stalcup said the project was a good exercise to learn about philanthropy.
w. basketball
b-cs Student hit by car
Tigers topple No. 13 Aggies at Reed, 67-52 Charity Chambers The Battalion
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or college athletes, the last game on their home court is more than just a game — it’s the culmination of their experiences at the University. They want to leave a mark. Unfortunately for the three seniors on the No. 13 Texas A&M women’s basketball team, LSU came prepared to continue its five-game win streak and the Tigers walked away from Reed Arena on Sunday with a 67-52 win. For senior night, Adrienne
Pratcher, Kristi Bellock and Cierra Windham each saw playing time in the Aggies’ regular season finale. “I think it is definitely hard being a senior and losing on senior night,” Windham said. “Just watching was difficult because you obviously want to win. Being with these two girls, we came in together as freshmen and we want to leave our legacy in the right way, so it was hard for us to go out like that.” The Aggies, fresh off a two-game losing streak to Vanderbilt and Tennessee,
were seeking a win. Instead, LSU dismantled the A&M defense behind a flurry of second-half points. The Aggies began February with a 74-57 victory over LSU in Baton Rouge, La. The Tigers managed to split the series with the win, solidifying its seed in the SEC Tournament. A&M took an early 8-2 lead, and extended the lead to 22-9 with only five minutes remaining in the first half. But LSU head coach Nikki See Basketball on page 2
See Habitat on page 3
Roger Zhang — THE BATTALION
Junior center Kelsey Bone attacks the LSU defense during the Aggies’ 67-52 home season finale loss.
greek life
An auto-pedestrian accident occurred at 12:06 p.m. Sunday on Southwest Parkway, College Station Police said. Ying Xu, bilingual education graduate student, and another female caused a vehicle to slow rapidly to avoid them as they crossed the street. A second driver swerved to avoid the first and struck Xu. Xu was taken to the College Station Medical Center. — Staff report
journalism
Annual philanthropy creates The Daily Texan adapts, tightens in evolving field educational opportunities The Battalion or its annual “Project 365” event, the Chi Psi fraternity auctioned its members and other volunteers to provide dates to the highest bidders and generate funds for the fraternity’s philanthropy, The fraternity donated the money raised through the event Saturday to the H.O.P.E. School — a school founded and supported by Chi Psi Fraternity — in the city of Kathlal, Gujarat, in northwestern India. The event began in 2005 as a fundraiser to sponsor individual students in India who could not afford quality education. As the amount of money raised grew to a surplus, the brothers of Chi Psi Beta looked to expand their philanthropy. “We wanted to take it to a grander scale,” said Rupak Gandhi, Class of 2007 and former president of Chi Psi Beta. After collecting the necessary funds, the search for a school to sponsor began. Gandhi set his sites on a school based in Kathlal, Gujarat. Gandhi’s uncle introduced
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of funding comes from,” Jacob said. “Students are changing the way they consume The Battalion n a time when digital screens compete news. They’re more interested in reading with and often replace traditional forms from screens than from print.” Although committed to printing daily, of media, the state of a physical newspawithout an answer to the budgetary shortper’s relevance is often questioned. But fall The Daily Texan must now face drawregardless of whether students and citibacks within its own organization. zens choose Twitter or “There will be blogs over print to stay major cuts from The informed, the answer “The Daily Texan is exDaily Texan’s student may be soon made periencing big questions wages,” said Krisirrelevant by a more tine Reyna, associate as to where its primary immediate concern: managing editor for can the print version source of funding comes the Texan. “Pay will of a newspaper remain from. [Students are] more be cut by 50 percent afloat? interested in reading from and managers will The Texas Student screens than from print.” lose their tuition reMedia Board — which imbursements. While — Suzanna Jacob, oversees The Daily editor-in-chief of The Daily Texan many student general Texan, the University reporters are already of Texas at Austin’s unpaid, the cuts may campus newspaper — voted Friday to cut affect newsroom diversity because not wages for all staff and tuition reimburseeveryone can afford working without rements for student managers for the upimbursement.” coming year. The board’s final decision The Daily Texan, along with The Batin favor of across-the-board cuts averted talion and most printed news publications, a more drastic move: reducing The Daily makes the bulk of its revenue from adTexan’s print schedule from five to four vertising. But while media consumers are days per week. well into a transition toward more digital Suzanna Jacob, editor-in-chief of the sources, advertising’s relevance and the Texan, said the reason for the board’s revenue it provides remains fixed in print. meeting and the options it considered “Ideally we would like to generate revarose because of reduced income. enue and make the Texan a part of [UT] “The Daily Texan is experiencing big questions as to where its primary source See Journalism on page 3
John Rangel
Laila Jiwani
COURTESY
Chi Psi fraternity members gather for “Project 365,” in which dates with members and other volunteers are auctioned to raise money for a school in India. him to the board of trustees for the school, who were looking for monetary support to keep the school running. Gandhi decided to buy the school with the help of his fraternity. Originally, the school was private, running solely on the funds provided by student tuition. Five years ago, due to a lack of sufficient resources, the school turned to the government with the intention of becoming a public school. At the time, it had only two classrooms with 75 students each. “I was actually in the pro-
cess of buying land to build my own school,” Gandhi said. Instead, he chose to help revive a failing school that the brothers of Chi Psi Beta named “H.O.P.E,” an acronym for “Here Opportunity Proves Endless.” “This was actually a huge factor in my decision to join Chi Psi Beta,” said Asad Abdullah, freshman computer science major and member of Chi Psi. “India has the highest number of children without See Project 365 on page 4
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