Tuesday March 26, 2013 year: 133 No. 42
the student voice of
The Ohio State University
www.thelantern.com
thelantern
Gee wants OSU to ‘lose fat and gain muscle’
sports
aleXandRia cHaPin and caROline Keyes Lantern reporters chapin.39@osu.edu and keyes.64@osu. edu
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Friends facing off
Thad Matta will face his former assistant coach Sean Miller when Arizona and OSU play Thursday.
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year are being monitored very carefully. “We as an institution are protective of our students and protective of each other … we have policies that not only go to the issue itself but also that we create a culture in which those kinds of things are reported, not tolerated.”
I am such an avid Ohio State fan that I can’t stand to watch (basketball).
Thousands of Ohio State fans watched the men’s basketball team defeat Iowa State to clinch a Sweet 16 spot, but the president of the university wasn’t one of them — he gets “too nervous” to watch OSU games on television. During a meeting with The Lantern editorial staff on Monday evening, President E. Gordon Gee spoke about the NCAA, the Steubenville rape case, the tuition freeze, university health and wellness and student loan debt. NCAA Gee called himself a “nervous guy,” and that he often has to get up and walk around during a close game. “I am such an avid Ohio State fan that I can’t stand to watch it,” Gee said. “I joke about it with our football program, I joke about the fact that for most people it’s a football game, but for me it’s my budget running up and down the field.” Gee called March Madness “arguably one of the greatest sporting events in the country,” however he said he didn’t fill out a bracket. “That’s gambling with my heart,” Gee said. “So I don’t want to do that.” Gee said he will not be attending the basketball game in Los Angeles on Thursday because he can’t “miss class.”
andReW HOlleRan / Photo editor
OsU Presdent e. Gordon Gee in The Lantern newsroom on march 25. Steubenville rape case Gee said that the Steubenville incident was a “horrible thing.” “Obviously, (people at OSU) were brought into it in a peripheral way because one young man was wearing our shirt and talking about these kinds of issues,” Gee said. The young man was Michael Nodianos, a former OSU student who was pictured wearing an OSU T-shirt in a YouTube video laughing and joking about a rape victim. The case surrounding the rape of a high school student by two high school football players gained national attention after photos of the victim and accounts of the rape appeared online.
Gee said he believes that the university’s response to the incident was “appropriate.” “We really did try to make sure that we were supportive of the young lady and her family and we want to make sure that justice was done, and I think that we have been very consistent with that,” Gee said. Seventeen-year-old Trent Mays and 16-year-old Ma’Lik Richmond were tried in court earlier this month and were both sentenced to time in a juvenile correctional facility. The teenagers have potential to be in detention until they are 21. Gee said rapes and sexual assaults reported on campus this
Spring snow storm coats campus snow coats OsU’s campus on march 25 after a snow storm. central Ohio was expecting between 2 and 4 inches of snow.
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Rock band My Chemical Romance announced on its website that it’s broken up.
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continued as Fraternities on 3A aleXandRia cHaPin / Lantern photographer
Military students avoid losing tuition funds sam HaRRinGTOn Lantern reporter harrington.227@osu.edu
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Investigation hangs over 3 OSU fraternities Three Ohio State fraternities have been placed under investigation for possible violations of the OSU Student Code of Conduct. The Sigma Beta chapter of Sigma Alpha Mu is under interim suspension, while the Gamma chapter of Sigma Pi is “under a cease and desist order pending investigation by Student Conduct that relates to hazing,” said Student Life spokesman Dave Isaacs. A cease and desist order means the fraternity can continue to function as usual, but it needs the approval of the vice president of Student Life, Javaune Adams-Gaston, for its activities. It can continue with most of its activities, but not with social ones, Isaacs said. The Student Code of Conduct defines hazing as “doing, requiring or encouraging any act, whether or not the act is voluntarily agreed upon, in conjunction with initiation or continued membership or participation in any group, that causes or creates a substantial risk of causing mental or physical harm or humiliation. Such acts may include, but are not limited to, use of alcohol, creation of excessive fatigue and paddling, punching or kicking in any form.” OSU President E. Gordon Gee said in an interview with The Lantern Monday that he thinks it is necessary that organizations that do not abide by the Student Code of Conduct face repercussions. “By and large (in OSU’s sorority and fraternity life), I think we have self-monitoring, we have pure monitoring, we have good procedures, and if people get outside the (boundaries), I think it’s appropriate that they be appropriately admonished,” Gee said. Sigma Pi executive director Michael Ayalon said in an email the
campus
A 250-foot replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial was brought to the Ohio Historical Society Monday.
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liZ yOUnG Asst. sports editor young.1693@osu.edu
Breaking up the band
Remembering Vietnam
Tuition freeze Although Gee said state financial support is not at the level of other universities, OSU will enact an in-state tuition freeze for the 2013-2014 academic year. “If you take a look at the data around the country, the rise in our tuition is one of the lowest in the nation, period,” Gee said. Despite the tuition freeze only being for in-state students, he said the university is still raising a lot of money for student scholarship and support for all students. “About 25 percent of our students, undergraduates, are now out-of-state students,” Gee said. “Even comparatively, we are one of the great educational bargains in the country.” According to the OSU Undergraduate Admissions website, about 16 percent of the Fall 2012 freshman class was domestic, out-of-state students. Gee said one of the challenges for the university in coming years is “how do we lose weight and gain muscle?” “How do we de-bureaucratize ourselves and make ourselves less
Yannis Hadjiyannis, a member of the U.S. Army Reserve and Ohio State student, said he was taken aback when he heard he would lose tuition assistance as a result of federal budget cuts. “Initially I was pretty shocked,” said Hadjiyannis, a second-year in biology. “It took a lot out of me because it’s such a big contribution to my education.” He is just one of 39 OSU students who would have been directly affected by cuts to the military as part of the sequestration, an automatic $1.2 trillion reduction in government spending over 10 years. However, on Thursday the House of Representatives passed a bill that prevented the Department of Defense military branches, including the U.S Navy, Army and Marine Corps, from cutting their tuition assistance program, an education stipend for active-duty military members. It would have been cut to zero from
$4,500 per year, which would have directly impacted the 39 students who use the program. The bill still must be signed by President Barack Obama to go into effect, but many are hopeful that he will support it given the bipartisan backing. “I’m very pleased that the House and Senate signed this and I fully expect … that the president will sign it,” said Mike Carrell, OSU’s Office of Military and Veterans Services director. “I think it’s important for the military members to get their education and … a lot of them signed up to serve to get those education benefits.” Hadjiyannis said the public’s response toward the tuition assistance cuts was moving. “I’m thrilled to see (how) citizens and Congress responded to the situation, it’s great to see that people wrote to their representatives … to support such a beneficial program,” he said. Cuts in tuition assistance would have only impacted active-duty service members
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Kaydee laney / Lantern reporter
several branches of the U.s. military cut their education assistance programs as a result of the sequests, however they plan to restore their funding.
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