Aztecs ROCK college food drive
WEDNESDAY November 2, 2011 Volume 97, Issue 39 W W W.T H E D A I LYA Z T E C . C O M
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ANTONIO ZARAGOZA, PHOTO EDITOR
Antonio Zaragoza photo editor San Diego State won first place at the Colleges Rock Hunger Food Drive award ceremony, which occurred yesterday at the Hard Rock Hotel downtown. The award ceremony was the culmination of a 17day food donation campaign sponsored by the Jacobs & Cushman San Diego Food Bank. The food and fundraising event encompassed local universities including Cal State San Marcos, UC San Diego, Point Loma Nazarene and SDSU in a competition to see which university could raise the most food during the contest, which ran Oct. 5 - 21. Of the four universities that competed, SDSU collected the most food and took the top prize for the fourth consecutive year. In all, the university raised 54,526 pounds, greatly surpassing last year’s total. “I was extremely nervous … After talking with some of the other
schools, it seemed like they had some really great strategies to win this year. After we heard the thirdand second-place winners, I knew we had it in the bag. I was in shock when they told us we raised 54,000 pounds of food. It seemed unreal but I was so proud of the Aztec community and their willingness to give back to the San Diego Community,” Associated Students Vice President of External Affairs Krista Parker, who was among the SDSU representatives on hand to receive the award, said. SDSU President Elliot Hirshman was a guest speaker at the event. He spoke of the commitment and determination of SDSU students to make a strong impact in the community. “I think about what our students have seen in their lives and they’ve seen everything from 9/11, two wars, to significant environmental challenges to the severe economic issues and it would be very easy for them to become fearful, discouraged and anxious. But what I see happening every day on my campus
is that our students have become leaders. They have served our nation in our volunteer military; they’ve started environmental initiatives on all of our campuses; they are creating the entrepreneurial energy that is going to move us into an economical recovery. Our students are going beyond the classroom, applying the things that they’ve learned and really making the difference,” Hirshman said. This year, A.S. and various participating organizations and clubs used a variety of strategies to raise the most food. Vice President of Finance Rob O’Keefe spoke about the ideas, which were employed this year. “This year we took a more proactive approach to getting the whole campus community involved. Over summer, A.S. collaborated with Aztec Shops, the president’s office, Student Affairs and Student Life & Leadership, Cultural Arts and Special Events, Aztec Athletics, the Alumni Association, College Councils, Residence Hall Association and Greeks to make
sure everyone was on the same page. Each campus entity played a huge role in our campus’ success this year with Colleges Rock Hunger. We also focused on having internal competitions amongst the different on-campus entities in an attempt to make collecting food a fun and engaging activity. We did really well with our “Two Minute Madness” in the second quarter of the homecoming football game against TCU, where we had several student volunteers running down the aisles collecting change from Aztec football fans,” O’Keefe said. The Aztec community already has its eyes set for next year’s challenge. “With our efforts in this year’s food drive we were able to create a great sense of pride on campus in being an Aztec. Everyone that was involved hopefully can see what kind of momentum we can create when we band together to take on an ostentatious task. As for next year’s food drive, we definitely set the bar high,” O’Keefe said.
The Aztecs are preparing for their conference tournament.
T R AV E L & A DV E N T U R E Go wild on Aztec Adventures National Parks Road Trip.
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SDSU service brings IT innovation Carl Hensley contributor As part of an effort to gear the university toward overall student and faculty success, San Diego State’s Instructional Technology Services has created a program that increases student productivity through smart classroom resources. On its website, the ITS program states, “Instructional Technology Services provides support to SDSU faculty and staff in the design, selection, production and distribution of instructional media.” The program is located in the basement of Adams Humanities and is home to several smart classrooms, a learning research studio, video conferencing facilities, video production studios and several other multimedia and training facilities for faculty. Director of the ITS program at SDSU Dr. James Frazee said it is designed to help students through
faculty with the use of technology. He also said the program is engaging and relevant for students because it lets them learn through mixed modalities in the classroom. According to Frazee, working in technologically equipped classrooms will also help students in the future because once they leave college for a career, they may have to use the same technology implemented in their classes. According to Frazee, about 93 percent of the classrooms are smart classrooms and, that statistic will increase to 100 percent within the next year or two. The technology used at SDSU includes Blackboard Academic Suite, Wimba, plagiarism-checking software such as turnitin.com and handheld clicker keypads used in large lectures. The ITS website also states the program teaches with “a process that uses instructional tools in conjunction with learning theories to
organize, sequence, present and reinforce information appropriately for particular teaching and learning situations.” Frazee said Blackboard is in the process of being updated for the coming semester and will allow students and faculty to be more interactive with one another. The new Blackboard version 9.1 will allow for Web 2.0 tools, blog posts and wikis, which can be made public or private to enrich course experience. Frazee said it will also encourage faculty to use formative evaluations throughout the semester. This will allow students to rate the course and the content during the semester rather than at the end. This process will help professors address student problems and better explain the course to the students while still in session. This new version of Blackboard will also allow teachers to post grades and course content faster and allow students to track their progress in a more timely manner. It
will also include a student progress warning system that will alert students about their progress in the course and provide them with feedback on assignments. “This makes instructors more efficient with their time in the classroom,” he said. “Teachers can post questions and students can answer them through Twitter by typing their answer and a predetermined hashtag to the course’s Twitter account.” Frazee is excited for the program’s future. Right now the ITS program is building a new multimedia classroom in Adams Humanities that will promote student success through the use of technology and student interaction with the content of the courses there. Frazee said the program is successful because of its “service orientation and single-minded focus on helping faculty,” which will nurture student success and create an efficient learning community at SDSU. More information about ITS can be found at its.sdsu.edu.
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Etched across the Plexiglas window ... were the eternal words he intended to be written on his tombstone: Cold Cruisin’. B A C K PA G E
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W E AT H E R : PARTLY CLOUDY HIGH: 78 LOW: 52 SUNSET: 5:52PM