Issue 17, Volume 77

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t h e o f f i c i a l s t u d e n t n e w s pa p e r o f t h e u n i v e r s i t y o f h o u s to n s i n c e 1 9 3 4

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September 20, 2011

ACL’s heavy hitters gave a good show

Issue 17, Volume 77

UNIVERSITY

College mothers balance class, family Student faces the challenges of coursework combined with the rigors of raising her three children Naheeda Sayeeduddin

THE DAILY COUGAR Like any college student, history senior Simone Jn Marie-Cannon has her fair share of reading assignments, research papers, and exams each semester. But her daily routine is a bit different from that of a typical college student.

Her day starts at 4:30 a.m. when she begins her daily grind of juggling a full-time college course load, a part-time job and raising three kids (one of whom is under the age of two), all the while maintaining her house and her sanity. The hardest thing, she said, is time management. “I think the hardest part of that is trying to figure out what point in time I get to read 100 pages this teacher wants me to read by the end of the week, along with the other teacher who wants me to read so many pages,” Jn Marie-Cannon said. “Just trying to find time to study, because

when you’re out of school, the kids are out of school — and that’s very demanding. And basically you don’t do anything when the kids are home from school. It’s their schoolwork, their food, their cleaning, their everything.” Jn Marie-Cannon is one of the many “parenting students” enrolled at UH. According to a 2009 report by the UH Child Care Task Force, roughly 8 percent of students have children under the age of five. The report does not take into account students with school-age children. While college life is more difficult for a mother, support from the UH Women’s Resource Center is available to parenting

UH art museum opens next installment of exhibition

Prof helps spinal injury with stem cell treatment

The Blaffer Art Museum has debuted the second installment of its exhibition series, “Window into Houston,” featuring artist Patrick Renner and high school students enrolled in Blaffer’s Young Artist Apprenticeship Program. Renner, a native Houstonian and teacher at Sharpstown International Grades 6-12 School, leads the Blaffer Museum’s Summer Arts Program. “Window into Houston” is open every day from 5:30 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. at 110 Milam St. and will run through Sept. 28. — Jennifer Postel

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Over 1,000 albums created and owned by the late Houston icon DJ Screw have been donated to the University of Houston libraries. The music, which was donated by Screw’s father to the John and Rebecca Moores Endowed Library Fund, will be made available for research in 2013. DJ Screw, whose given name was Robert Earl Davis, Jr., was a major influence on the Houston rap/DJ scene and creator of the Chopped and Screwed technique. He died from a heart attack in November 2000. — Jennifer Postel

CORRECTIONS In yesterday’s staff editorial, “Good fan support in Ruston; more necessary” we listed Saturday’s game time at 6 p.m. The game begins at 7 p.m.

MOTHERS continues on page 3

RESEARCH

BLAFFER

UH library to receive late DJ’s discography for research

students. Lactation rooms are available throughout the campus, WRC Director Beverly McPhail said. McPhail added that the center also provided a support group for parenting students, but attendance has been lacking. “It was sort of a catch-22 that parenting students need the support but they’re too busy to come in for an extra meeting or stay longer on campus,” she said. One of the biggest issues for a parent is childcare, McPhail said. Women

Francisco Goldman currently works as a professor of literature and creative writing at Trinity College and has won multiple awards for his work. | Paul Crespo/The Daily Cougar

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Award-winning writer speaks at UH craft talk Discusses latest novel, gives advice on fiction Travis Alford

THE DAILY COUGAR Francisco Goldman, a writer and journalist, spoke about his experience writing a novel about his wife’s death on Monday in the Honors College Commons. The event, which was sponsored by Inprint, the UH creative writing program and the Honors College,

was centered around Goldman’s new novel, “Say Her Name.” “This book is my mourning,” Goldman said. “Say Her Name” is somewhat of a memoir about the love of his life, a fiction writer named Aura, who died in a body surfing accident two years into their marriage. “I can never replace what was lost, but you can never leave it empty,” Goldman said. Goldman turned to alcohol after WRITER continues on page 3

A procedure to help eliminate the need for major surgery for patients with spinal cord injuries is being developed by a research group that includes two UH engineering professors. The treatment, which involves injecting a solution that contains adult stem cells and nanoparticles into the patients’ spinal cord, would also help with recovery. “The nanoparticles will be used to help move the stem cells in the proper direction, and I am working on the fundamentals of this process,” said Li Sun, assistant professor of mechanical engineering. After the solution is injected, a magnetic field will expose the magnetic properties of the nanoparticles and turn them into an anchor that guides the stem cells. The nanoparticles gain polarity, so they attach to each other along the line where the magnetic field is present. This way, the stem cells align properly to reconnect the separated part of the spinal cord. “We are still working on finding a proper way to coat the nanoparticles with a polymer,” said Sun. Dong Liu, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, said he is contributing with his background in dealing with the movement of nanoparticles. He’s currently working on a

method to present the nanoparticles to the adult stem cells. He said that the research is important because current methods of treatment require intensive surgery that may not even work. “You have to cut off a certain part of the damaged spinal cord, put the scaffold in and hope the stem cells grow in the right direction,” Liu said. “With this new method, we don’t need to arrange the stem cells in any physical bioscaffold. We put them in a solution because we want to inject them into the spinal cord.” Sun, an expert on material synthesis, will provide the nanoparticles. The project began when the Alliance for Nanohealth awarded a seed grant last year. The group was recently awarded a $390,000 grant from National Science Foundation. According to their website, the NSF provides funding for approximately 11,000 out of the 40,000 proposals that are sent. Sun said they have not received the money to move forward just yet, but he remains optimistic about continuing his work and watching everything fall into place. Liu said he feels that this procedure is something we could see in the near future, and that the only barrier is the toxicity of nanoparticles. “We will soon be able to demonstrate this in the lab,” Liu said. “This is something that can develop rapidly.” news@thedailycougar.com


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