SPORTS >> PAGE 8
out in his Sophomore guard Marcus Thornton has broken journey to the top is unexpected.
Vol. 102, Iss. 38 | Tuesday, February 26, 2013
second year, but his
The Flat Hat The Twice-Weekly Student Newspaper
of The College of William and Mary
BRAFFERTON REFURBISHED
Second oldest building under construction BY BAILEY KIRKPATRICK FLAT HAT ASSOC. NEWS EDITOR
The Brafferton, constructed in 1723 to serve as an Indian school during the colonial period, is the second oldest building at the College of William and Mary. The building is currently under renovation in order to house the offices of the College president and the provost by August 2013. As with the Tucker Hall renovation, members of the Virtexco construction team are paying attention to the original shell of the building during the renovation process in an attempt to preserve the historical facade of the structure.
“The renovations are going to bring the building up to code, bring the systems up to modern, safe standards but will also preserve as much of the original fabric of the building as possible,” Wayne Boy, director of facilities planning, design and construction, said. The renovations include a new staircase, a small kitchen, space for file storage and a mechanical room in the basement. The basement had to be dug out by hand before workers could begin construction because the ceiling was too low for machinery to fit. See BRAFFERTON page 3
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CAMPUS
Students lose Banner access Computer glitch causes campus-wide problems BY CLAIRE GILLESPIE FLAT HAT ASSOC. NEWS EDITOR
Students at the College of William and Mary temporarily lost access to Blackboard, Banner and the College web servers last week due to the failure of two of the College network service’s load balancers. The load balancers, located in Hugh Jones Hall and Blow Memorial Hall, control network systems, including the College’s website, faculty emails and applications for students such as Banner and Blackboard. According to the College’s Chief Information Officer Courtney Carpenter, these are not the first issues the load balancing units have had this year. The backup load balancer in Blow Hall experienced problems and was eventually replaced Thursday, Feb. 14. “The manufacturer finally just sent us a whole new unit. … It was supposed to be fully functional, and we put it online, and it seemed to be working fine,” Carpenter said. “[Then] the primary load balancer went bad. It had some failure in it, and I don’t know what the failure is. It could have been a hard drive failure; it could have been an interface. It’s electronic, so these things do go bad. When [the system] went over to the backup load balancer, that had some bad code in it.” The Information Technology department fixed the primary load balancer Thursday, Feb. 21, allowing the College’s network to operate normally. Citrix, the manufacturer of the College’s load balancers, has engineers working to fix the bad code in the recently-replaced backup load balancer. Students experienced inconveniences due to last week’s network problems caused by the load balancers. “During a typical day, I probably access [Blackboard] at least four or five times throughout the day,” Andrea Blazanovic ’15 said. “[I use it] to get the articles I need
ALL PHOTOS BY HAYLEY TYMESON / THE FLAT HAT
See IT page 3
A new staircase (left) will be added to the Brafferton. Members of the Vitrexco Construction Company (above) have paid special attention to perserve the original shell of the building.
CRIME
RESIDENCE LIFE
Student arrested for credit card fraud
Botetourt handles rodent infestations
Unattended item stolen
BY ANNIE CURRAN FLAT HAT NEWS EDITOR
BY KATHERINE CHIGLINSKY FLAT HAT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
A student was arrested last Thursday for allegedly committing credit card fraud. Police apprehended the suspect at 3:44 p.m. near Landrum Drive. The student faces criminal charges on four counts of credit card fraud and three counts of fraudulently receiving goods or services. According to Chief of Police Don Challis, the student allegedly committed opportunity theft by taking a card that was left unattended and using it to make several small purchases. The case has yet to reach the courts.
ONGOING
FH
Check back with The Flat Hat for more on this developing story.
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Residents find multiple mice in traps throughout Dinwiddie Hall in single nights
Breezy with rain High 55, Low 34
Elizabeth Gardner ’16 woke up at 3:30 a.m. to the sound of squeaking. Looking toward her feet, she was met with a sight she described as “horrifying” — a mouse was crawling on her bed. She knew from the noise that there were more than one in her dorm room. Gardner, a resident of Dinwiddie Hall in the Botetourt Complex, has caught as many as four mice in humane traps in her dorm room in one night. “They’re not terrifying looking,” Gardner said. “They’re actually pretty cute, but still — that was too far.” According to Director of Residence Life Deb Boykin, Facilities Management sent pest control to the
Inside OPINIONS
VERONIQUE BARBOUR / THE FLAT HAT
Students use humane traps in Gooch Hall l in the Botetourt Complex to catch mice.
Botetourt Complex Feb. 5, 6 and 8 to curb the mice infestations. Door sweeps were installed on exterior doors to prevent any penetrations from outside. “According to Area Director Terry Fassanella and to Work Control, there
have been no additional reports or requests for pest control since then so we have assumed the problem has been solved,” Boykin said in an email. Gardner first noticed droppings in her room after returning from winter break. For two weeks, she caught
Inside VARIETY
Merit aid for the unmerited
Aid serves an essential role in college admissions. However, when it is given to students who don’t deserve it, the money is wasted and it hurts campus culture. page 4
an average of three mice per week in humane traps, and she released them near Lake Matoaka. Then she and her roommate started catching one mouse per night. The night she woke up to see a mouse on her bed was not her breaking point, however; that moment occurred when Gardner and her roommate caught four mice in one night. Finally they decided to call the exterminator. “We didn’t want to kill them, but it just got to a point where it was too much, and it was causing an issue with our living,” Gardner said. According to Dinwiddie Resident Assistant Sarah Carroll ’15, wildlife infestations are fairly common since the Botetourt Complex is surrounded by woods. Even though the buildings See MICE page 3
Flat Hat staff members face off
The news team suffers defeat at the hands of the sports team during Campus Golf last weekend. page 5