SPORTS
TENNIS
CAMPUS
Head coach Patrick Sullivan and the Cougars seek to stay focused following their win against Mississippi State this weekend, as they now hold a 5-1 record.
Cougars show pride by submitting votes via Twitter in Shorty Awards.
Keep a clear view
SEE PAGE 5
UH nominated for social media award SEE PAGE 7 FEBRUARY
CALENDAR CHECK: 20
SVN Open Audition. Audition for a SVN show at 6 p.m. at the Center for Student Media.
THE DAILY COUGAR
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
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Issue 76, Volume 79
H O U S T O N
OBITUARY
Famed judge passes away
Students divided on faculty diversity Editor in chief
It is not just the minority faculty of the University who are concerned with the demographics of its professors, but also its students, who feel underrepresented. Public relations senior Isiah Gentry, president of the African American Student Honors Association, has attended the University since the start of his freshman year in Fall 2010, and in his four years he has had only three African-American professors, two of whom were a result of the courses’ heavy AfricanAmerican foundation. Gentry said that while he has had a diverse number of professors, male and female and from different backgrounds, it was rare for him to have a black
professor. “It has affected me a little bit, because now when I go out and I try and say I went to UH and talk about my experience, in the back of my mind I’m going to think that they didn’t really have that many (African-Americans), at least in my major, in the faculty and staff that were leading the field or teaching the information,” Gentry said. “They have a lot of African-American students, but they don’t have the faculty. That kind of says something, that you don’t have people giving the information, you just have people who are coming to get the information.” Gentry shares some of the same DIVERSITY continues on page 3
Ryan Graham Contributing writer
research about the Earth’s atmosphere revealed that the Earth has already increased by 0.7 degrees Celsius during the past 100 years. This effect has negatively altered ecosystems all across the world. He concluded that if the human population were to do nothing at all, one of the biggest effects on the Earth would be an increase of 2 degrees Celsius during the next century, which could bring adverse effects and serious risks to the human race and other life on Earth. David Hone, the chief climate change adviser in the CO2 team at Royal Dutch Shell, reviewed the complexity of the climate change issue, its social and political implications and what the population is really doing to change our current usage of fossil fuels.
Judge Frederick Eugene Edwards, 63, died Feb. 10 after complications from a long illness. A s i x t h - g e n e ra t i o n Te x a n , Edwards served 20 years as judge of the 9th District Court in Montegomery County, where he presided over the general jurisdiction court and was known f o r t a k i ng o n many complex litigation cases ranging from class actions to Edwards billion-dollar merger and acquisition cases. Since leaving the judicial bench in 2013, Edwards has served as a special judge and popular mediator. B o r n i n C l e v e l a n d , Te x a s, Edwards graduated from Conroe High School, serving under Congressman John Dowdy in Washington, D.C. in 1963, which gave him the opportunity to be an eyewitness to Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech. From there, his passion for politics and history only grew stronger. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Texas A&M University-Commerce, which was named East Texas State University at that time. He furthered his education with a law degree from the UH Law Center in 1974. Edwards also founded the Child Advocates Program in Montgomery County. The judge is survived by his wife, attorney Linda Thompson, to whom he was married for 30 years; his children, Joseph, Elizabeth and Kathryn; his daughter-in-law, Katherine; his mother, Joyce; his siblings, Jimmie, Elwanda and Wanda Minshew, and their families; his cousins Debbie and Waye Gurley and his great nieces Shelby and Jamie Threadgill.
GLOBAL continues on page 3
news@thedailycougar.com
Though the University prides itself on a diverse student body, minority representation among faculty demographics are dismal in comparison. In 2012, of the 3,622 ranked and non-ranked faculty at the University, almost 55 percent of the faculty was white. | Justin Tijerina/The Daily Cougar
NSM
Experts fuel debates on global climate change Dennis Kunichoff Staff writer
The University jumped into the topic of global warming with a public discussion about the threats, reasons and solutions to climate issues. The discussion “Climate Change: Is It a Real Threat?” was presented by the College of Natural Science and Mathematics as a part of the Energy Symposium series that began in Fall 2013. The series serves as an innovative way of addressing today’s pressing issues in global energy needs. UH Chief Energy Officer Ramana Krishnamoorti was encouraged by the student turnout and felt the symposium was a chance for Cougars to become aware of global issues. “The symposiums are a great opportunity for students to educate themselves on some of the most pressing topics of the day relating to energy,” Krishnamoorti said.
1 9 3 4
ONLINE EXCLUSIVES AT THEDAILYCOUGAR.COM
CAMPUS
Channler K. Hill
S I N C E
These are issues that their generation will be helping to solve in the coming years, so it has been gratifying to see so many students attend the first three forums.” Ramana Krishnamoorti, UH Chief Energy Officer “These are issues that their generation will be helping to solve in the coming years, so it has been gratifying to see so many students attend the first three forums.” Richard A. Feely, the senior fellow at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, emphasized the growing changes in the acidity of our ocean. The concentration of acid in the ocean has gone up by 30 percent since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, and its acidification rate is faster than ever. The global implications of a more acidic ocean include corrosion of coral reefs. Feely’s research
exhibits that the ocean absorbs about a quarter of the carbon dioxide that is released into the atmosphere, and this carbon dioxide undergoes a series of chemical reactions that ultimately creates a more acidic ocean environment. John Nielsen-Gammon, the Texas State Climatologist and Regents Professor at Texas A&M, took a more philosophical approach and provoked discussion about what climate change really meant and whom it really impacted. He said that Earth would not get hit the hardest, but humans and other types of life living on Earth. Nielsen-Gammon’s