SERVING THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN COMMUNITY SINCE 1900 @THEDAILYTEXAN | THEDAILYTEXAN.COM
WEDNESDAY, APPRIL 25, 2018
VOLUME 118, ISSUE 147
N E WS
O PI N I O N
LI FE &A RTS
SPORTS
Two freshmen create a ridehailing app for long-distance travel between cities. PAGE 2
Students should be conscious of how much food they waste in dining halls. PAGE 4
UT students may limit themselves by identifying heavily with just one social group. PAGE 8
Longhorns’ offense shows no shortage of brilliance in lopsided win over Houston. PAGE 6
SYSTEM
PROJECT
UT System to help schools meet TEA standards By Maria Mendez @mellow_maria
To help increase student success in Texas, UT-Austin and four other UT System universities will collaborate with schools flagged as “Improvement Required” by the Texas Education Agency for the next three years. While students in Texas pre-K-12 schools are increasingly meeting the state’s education standards, 358 campuses still require improvements, according to the TEA’s 2017 accountability report. The work with pre-K-12 schools will be funded with an annual $100,000 per institution from the UT System’s Board of Regents, according to Nichole Prescott, UT System assistant vice chancellor for academic affairs. Prescott, who oversees the System’s kindergarten to college programs, said the goal of these partnerships is for colleges of education in the UT System to develop longterm solutions with these struggling schools. “The colleges of education are not going in just to fix the schools. It’s a true collaboration,” Prescott said. “They’re working with the schools to create solutions.”
This is a win-win situation for everyone involved. These experiences ... are going to spark academic research as well as provide great experiences for student teachers.” Nichole Prescott,
ut system assistant vice chancellor for academic initiatives
While colleges of education at UT-San Antonio, UT-Dallas, UT-Tyler and UT-Rio Grande Valley partner up with one or more improvement required schools in their area, the UT-Austin College of Education will act as a “knowledge management hub” and researchers will provide technical assistance with data and compile lessons on best practices, Prescott said. Through these few but close collaborations, Prescott said education colleges in the UT System will be able to help identify specific obstacles for student success in each school’s curriculum and provide training to the teachers at each school. “The reason we’re only working with (a few) schools is because it is a big commitment,” Prescott said. “It’s a lot of time and resources. So rather than providing a light touch with a
SYSTEM page 3
Alumna Kimberly Baker:
‘Immerse yourself in the culture’ Through the National Association of Black Journalists and Black Alumni Network, Kimberly Baker advocates for African-American students’ voices.
all photos courtesy of kimberly baker, and reproduced with permission Kimberly Baker with her sorority sisters in Delta Sigma Theta, a historically black sorority. Baker spent her time on campus involved in many organizations, tackling issues important to her. Baker was one of the first members of UT’s National Association of Black Journalists.
Editor’s Note: This is The Daily Texan’s eighth installment of The 5% Project in collaboration with the UT-Austin chapter of National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ). By Lacey Segars
L
ike many journalism students, Kimberly Baker’s belief that “everybody has a story to tell” led her to reporting, but Baker’s perspective on the world set her apart from many of her colleagues. “As a journalist, you have to report the news … but as a black journalist or a journalist of color, you know, we had a different take on it,” said Baker, a 1988 graduate of UT. As a high school student, Baker wrote for her school’s newspaper and at her local community newspaper in Houston. Her passion for writing led her to pursue a journalism degree at UT, where Baker was part of UT’s first
@lacethegrace_
chapter of the National Association of Black Journalists. Formed by Baker and other students, NABJ started as an informal group at UT and was advised by John Hanson, host and producer of the KUT radio series “In Black America.” That informal group then evolved into what is now NABJ. Although UTNABJ was not an officially recognized organization while she was a student, Baker said Hanson still remained very active in the lives of the students by taking them to national conventions and teaching them about the field. “(Hanson) thought it was really important to nurture us as young minority journalists,” Baker said.
Baker spent a lot of her time on campus involved in many organizations, such as the Communication Council and Delta Sigma Theta, a historically black sorority. After her graduation, Baker became a professional journalist and eventually became involved in public relations and marketing. She has remained active in the Black Alumni Network, a part of the Texas Exes that focuses on encouraging enrollment of Black students and faculty at UT, and is currently serving as their membership chair. “I think UT, as a first-rate institution, should represent the community that they serve … but also the nation, so there definitely should be more African-American students, and definitely more (African-American faculty,” Baker said. “We’re working with the Office of Admissions and the
Division of Diversity (and Community Engagement at the University) to help bring up those numbers.” In addition to recruiting and working directly with the University, Baker said the Black Alumni Network has three endowed scholarships that it offers to prospective students each year. Looking back at her time on campus as a student and alumna, Baker said her experiences at UT taught her how to turn negativity into learning opportunities. “UT is like life; you’re going to have some negativity,” Baker said. “But you, as a person, have to say, ‘I’m a member of the human race, so if this person doesn’t like me because of my color, I can’t change that person — I can only change how I react to them,’ so I take the opportunity to educate whenever I can.”
T O P: Kimberly Baker as an undergraduate student at UT, where she graduated in journalism and went on to pursue reporting, public relations and marketing. BOT T O M : Kimberly Baker today. Baker currently serves as the membership chair for the Black Alumni Network, which is a part of Texas Exes.