UWM Post 09/26

THEUWMPOST est. 1956

the student-run independent newspaper

September 26, 2011

Anti-Drug Trafficking Program page 5

Brewers are Division Champs page 8

Issue 5, Volume 56

Union Theatre Preview page 16

Will new ads appeal to high school grads?

Can students vote in the next UWM officials hope new ad campaign will jumpstart freshman enrollment election?

9,000 students will not be able to vote without a university ID update

By Steve Garrison News Editor news@uwmpost.com

Advertisements that UWM is running in magazines, newspapers and billboards in Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

By Danielle Mackenthun Special to The Post news@uwmpost.com

To increase freshman enrollment from previous years, the UWMilwaukee Foundation, auxiliary service accounts and non-credit enrichment courses will be funding a new marketing campaign released this fall.

No tax dollars or tuition money has been spent on the campaign.

Vice Chancellor of University Relations and Communications Thomas Luljak said that the cost for the fall semester media buy amounted to approximately $600,000. The funding will pay for television commercial time, internet advertising placements and billboard ads.

University officials are currently planning the “Powerful Ideas. Proven

Results.” campaign with the help of the marketing firm Lipman Hearne.

The campaign will appeal to both traditional and non-traditional students, Luljak said.

“The primary goal of the campaign is to recruit students,” he said. “Our messages are designed to celebrate the strong academics and learning experience at the university.”

Increasing tuition revenues is vital to the university’s budget, particularly as the state coffers dry up. The need for increased tuition revenue can also explain the university’s campaign to raise retention rates among first-year freshman, up 3.3 percent from 2006.

“Yes, I think [advertising] would help a lot, but they’d have to make sure it would be interesting to our age group,” freshman Haley Meinholz said.

According to the 2010-2011 UWM Fact Book, new freshman enrollment

peaked in 2007, with 4,525 freshmen enrolled.

Since then, freshman enrollment has dropped dramatically, with only 3,760 freshman enrolled in 2010, a 17.1 percent decline, and the lowest since 2002.

“In recent years, we have been told by many of our students that they had no idea how much UWM had to offer academically until they were already on campus,” Luljak said.

The marketing campaign will feature students and faculty members, which will communicate the strengths of UWM to build a more diverse and accomplished student body.

There are 60 universities and colleges in the area that UWM has to compete with. The marketing campaign is viewed as a vital investment in UWM’s future by university officials, with steady growth in freshman

enrollment vital to long-term success.

“The marketing campaign has received an overwhelmingly positive response,” Luljak said.

Freshman Nick Mangini said the advertisements have been affective, and he particularly liked the ones emphasizing life in the Cambridge dormitories.

“It made it feel like you were living in a condo complex, and that’s something I was looking for,” Mangini said.

If advertising manages to bring up freshman enrollment rates, the pressure could be relieved from the shoulders of the UWM community as a whole.

“When the campaign began running on television, our social media sites buzzed with our students expressing pride and excitement seeing their university portrayed in a highly professional manner,” Luljak said.

SA not separating powers

Hiring senators to executive positions necessary due to lack of involvement

By Aaron Knapp Assistant News Editor news@uwmpost.com

The UW-Milwaukee Student Association is allowing some officials to hold both seats in the senate and the executive staff, signaling a departure from a campaign promise by the dominant party, Achieving Student Action through Progress, to set and enforce separation of powers rules.

INDEX

NEWS SPORTS

Members of the executive staff, including President Alex Kostal, say that they are reluctant to enforce officials staying in one branch of the government, because there are not enough people involved with the SA. “I agree in principle that separation of powers is a good thing, but the reality of our situation is we’d be losing a lot of valuable input if we did that, because we just don’t have enough people that are that involved

1-5 6-8

FRINGE EDITORIAL

right now,” SA Executive Director of Communications Daniel Laughland said.

The SA is a student governing body that takes money generated from segregated fees, which are part of every student’s tuition, and spends that money on enriching student life on campus. It is structured similarly to the United States government with three branches: executive, legislative and judicial.

9-20 21-22

“We’re in sort of a unique situation here, having our three branches of government,” Laughland said. “If you look at how all of the other UW [System universities] do it, most of them will just have a senate and a president of the senate and then maybe some staff members there. They don’t have the same separation of powers

COMICS PUZZLES

More than 9,000 students at UWMilwaukee could be ineligible to vote in future Wisconsin elections without substantive modifications to university ID cards.

Based on previous studies, The UWM Post estimates that 9,179 students, approximately 30 percent of the campus, do not have valid, state-issued driver’s licenses, a prerequisite to voting in upcoming elections.

Black students ages 18 to 24 will be impacted most by the Voter ID Bill, on average being 27.5 percent less likely than white students to have a Wisconsin driver license, according to a 2005 study conducted by UWM’s Employment and Training Institute.

Hispanic students ages 18 to 24 will also be impacted considerably, with Hispanic women being 28 percent less likely than white women to have a driver license, and Hispanic men being 17 percent less likely than white men.

Junior Julio Guerrero, chairman of the Latino Caucus of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, said the bill will have a negative impact for students and Latinos alike. “…if you have lost an ID – if you have had an ID before but you have to get a new one – they will not give you the free Voter ID, they will have you pay the replacement fee,” Guerrero said. “So, in my opinion, it is like a poll-tax, and I think it affects our community negatively.”

Director of Enrollment Services Beth Weckmueller said that no student will be turned away at the polls because of the university, but acknowledged that the cost of updating IDs may be steep.

“We are looking at a number of options, and they all have costs associated with them, but we do not know those yet,” Weckmueller said.

Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs James Hill said that costs will hopefully be available next week.

“We have some people working behind the scene who will report next week, ‘This is how much this will cost, this is how much this will cost,’” Hill said.

The UWM Post compared findings from a 2005 report studying the number of driver’s license-carrying 18- to 24-yearolds in the Milwaukee area with UWM enrollment rates for 2010.

The 2005 study, the most recent published on the subject, was created in response to earlier Republican efforts to pass Voter ID legislation.

After accounting for race and gender, it was shown that approximately 9,179

See VOTE page 3

See SA page 2 uwmpost.com 23 24

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FROM OUR NEWSSTANDS TO YOUR BIRD CAGES

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NEWS

September 26, 2011

THEUWMPOST SA Editor in Chief Zach Erdmann

Production Editor Melissa Dahlman

Managing Editor Mike La Count

Chief Copy Editor Jackie Dreyer

News Editor Steve Garrison

Copy Editors Kara Petersen Brad Poling

Assistant News Editors Aaron Knapp John Parnon Fringe Editor Steve Franz Assistant Fringe Editors Kevin Kaber Graham Marlowe Sports Editor Jeremy Lubus Assistant Sports Editor Tony Atkins Editorial Editor Zach Brooke Photo Editor Sierra Riesberg

Distribution Mgr. Patrick Quast Off-Campus Distribution Alek Shumaker Business Manager Tyler Rembert Advertising Manager Stephanie Fisher Ad Designer Russell Pritchard Account Executive Dominique Portis Online/Multimedia Editor Kody Schafer Board of Directors Jackie Dreyer Zach Erdmann Stephanie Fisher Mike La Count Kody Schafer

Phone: (414)229-4578 Fax: (414)229-4579 post@uwmpost.com www.uwmpost.com

Continued from page 1

issues that we would have, mirroring the federal government.”

These branches are given specific powers by the constitution, so that one branch cannot become more powerful than the other. An official in one branch cannot take office in another, in order to prevent anyone from accumulating too much power and abusing it. This doctrine is known as “separation of powers.”

Although President Kostal was in the position of having a seat on the Senate and an office in the executive branch last year, he and ASAP promised in their campaign last spring to adopt a policy keeping branches of the SA separate.

“I gave it some thought, and coming out of the gate, I said ‘You know what? It’d be great if we could find enough people to fill the senate where we could separate those two, and we could have a passionate senate, a knowledgeable senate and also a great executive branch,” Kostal said.

“That’s not the way that it shook out.”

Given that there were not enough people involved or interested in SA,

according to Kostal, he decided to hire several senators for positions on the executive staff, including Michael Schultz as SA Treasurer, Arrington Stoll as Secretary and his roommate, David Sidhu, as Director of University Affairs.

“We were in an awkward position,” Kostal said. “We could have hired a lot of these people on the staff and lost their voices on the senate, or we could keep them on the senate and have a less effective executive branch. So I decided to just scrap the whole idea of separation of powers and chalked that up to a personal mistake on my behalf.”

Sidhu is tasked primarily with helping Greek organizations on campus become more inf luential at UWM, by acting as a liaison between the neighborhood, UWM’s administration and interested students.

“You see a lot of problems out in the neighborhood with partying, and it becoming almost hostile, the relationship between the neighborhood and the students, as if they weren’t part of the neighborhood,” Sidhu said.

“And we were thinking, ‘What can we do? How can we bring this more on to campus?’”

By James Sprague

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POLICE REPORTS

On Monday, Sept. 19 at 1:15 p.m., UWM police received a report of a suspicious person loitering around the Northwest Quadrant parking structure.

The suspect moved away from parking personnel no matter where they went.

On Tuesday, Sept. 20 at 2:45 p.m., a UWM officer responded to a report of smoke coming from a dumpster between Curtin and Vogel Hall. The officer reported that someone had thrown a lit cigarette into the dumpster. The officer said he wouldn't require the fire department and extinguished the fire himself with a cup full of tap water.

On Friday, Sept. 23 at 10:10 a.m., UWM police assisted the Wisconsin National Guard in looking for f lag theft suspects. The stolen f lags were recovered in the Klotsche Center the following morning.

Although technically approved and hired by the senate, Sidhu thought of and planned out the new position with Kostal, Vice President Brent Johnson and Speaker of the Senate Rick Banks.

The administration never solicited for applications on the position.

“Presidents in the past have put out large job search letters to the entire campus, so they really heavily push for collecting a lot of résumés,” Kostal said. “In other years, they’ve mainly just hired quietly, hired people that they know and what not. We did a mix of both.”

The SA website currently lists 17 vacancies in the Senate and four schools as having no representatives.

Kostal hopes that more outreach this year will eventually get SA to a point where it can have a separation of powers.

“I think pretty soon we can see a year we can separate people on staff and people on senate and have everyone be knowledgeable and passionate, but right now, as we’re still kind of building this organization and trying to get out to the senate body, it’s a necessity,” Kostal said.

Student default rates spike nationwide

Mailing Address Union Box 88 UWM P.O. Box 413 Milwaukee, WI 53201

On Monday, Sept. 19 at 12:02 p.m., a Downer resident reported that an elderly woman in turquoise clothing was dumping garbage on the front yards of two houses on the 3300 block of Downer Avenue.

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Recently released statistics from the United States Department of Education show that the rate of college students defaulting on federal student loans continues to rise — and it’s a trend that includes U. Cincinnati.

The national default rate jumped from 7 percent for fiscal year 2008 to 8.8 percent for fiscal year 2009, according to statistics released by the DOE Sept. 12.

The increase was seen throughout all sectors of higher education — public, private and for-profit institutions — as the statistics examine more than 3.6 million students from approximately 5,900 schools nationwide who began loan repayments between October 2008 and September 2009. Of those 3.6 million students, more than 320,000 had defaulted on their loans by Sept. 30, 2010.

The DOE did not consider those who defaulted after that time period as part of the data set, but the numbers still illustrate a growing issue facing both students and loan companies.

“These hard economic times have made it even more difficult for student borrowers to repay their loans, and that’s why implementing education reforms and protecting the maximum Pell grant is more important than ever,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. “We need to ensure that all students are able to access and enroll in quality programs that prepare them for well-paying jobs so they can enter the workforce and compete in our global marketplace.”

UC was not immune to the rising numbers, as an analysis by The News Record shows that since fiscal year 2007, default rates have jumped from 3.3 percent to 5.3 percent — a 2-percent increase.

The analysis also shows that UC ranks fourth out of Ohio’s five largest universities based on enrollment — The Ohio State U., Kent State U., U. Akron and Ohio U. were the other schools — regarding the default rate for fiscal year 2009.

Akron had the highest number of students defaulting on loans in the state with 7.9 percent. All five universities were under the national average, however.

See STUDENT page 3

NEWS BRIEFS Telegram to Einstein: Broken Theory?

A group of European physicists claimed to have observed particles travelling faster than the speed of light – an event that, if provable, would overturn the theory of relativity itself. The particles, called neutrinos, raced from a particle accelerator at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) outside Geneva, where they were created, to a cavern underneath Gran Sasso, a distance of about 450 miles, about 60 nanoseconds faster than it would take a light beam. If the controversial claim is found to be true, the results could truly be earth-shattering.

Albert Einstein, the father of modern physics, said that if you could send a message faster than light, “you could send a telegram to the past.”

Milwaukee Public Libraries cuts rolled back in 2012 budget Milwaukee Public Libraries will breathe a little easier under Mayor Tom Barrett’s new 2012 city budget, which rolled back service cuts previously recommended by Barrett and enacted by the Common Council. In the 2010 city budget, schedules were cut in 11 out of 12 libraries from 45 to 56 hours a week down to 35 hours a week, resulting in drops in patronage use, circulation of library materials and use of library computers. With poverty rates rising, Barrett told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, “I remain convinced that education, and access to education, and access to books, is one of the best things we can do to combat that. We’re trying to foster a positive learning environment.”

Racial tensions threaten to erupt in post-Gaddafi Libya Racial tension between dark- and light-skinned Libyans could cloud the country’s democratic ambitions, Rutgers reports.

Dark-skinned Libyans have faced discrimination by rebels who associate the African migrants with Gaddafi’s foreign soldiers of fortune, even if they have nothing to do with the former leader.

Rebels who swept through Tripoli rounded up hundreds of Africans after Gaddafi fell, pointing to identity papers from African states found on the corpses of Gaddafi troops as evidence that the population of African workers and migrants included many hired soldiers and loyalists.

290-lb man sues White Castle over inadequate seating A New York man is suing White Castle, because he cannot fit into their booths, The Village Voice reports. The 290-lb man went to a local White Castle in 2009, and, after ordering his food, he noticed the restaurant only offered booth seating.

He could not fit into the booths and, subsequently, sent multiple complaints to the company. They told him that they were in the process of renovating their restaurant’s seating, but the man deemed the replies unsatisfactory and filed a complaint on Sept. 7 citing “violations of his civil rights.”

NEWS

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STUDENT

Continued from page 2 The increase in default rate — both at UC and nationally — could be attributed not only to the U.S. economy — as mentioned by Duncan — but also by unemployment rates and the volume of loans students take out without realizing how quickly the loan amounts accumulate, said Ken Wolterman, Bursar at UC. “My advice is to take out loans for only what you absolutely need,” Wolterman said. “Live like a student now so you don’t have to when you graduate.”

Students should not include items such as iPods, vehicles or tattoos when outlining their financial aid budgets, Wolterman said, and suggests that students should

VOTE

Continued from page 1 students on campus, 33.6 percent, do not have Wisconsin driver’s licenses, a prerequisite to vote once the state’s Voter ID Bill takes effect.

The report acknowledges that a portion of the population without a driver’s license – valid or not – will have a state ID, but without an analysis by race and location, it was impossible to account for that segment of the population.

The Voter ID Bill, signed into law

by Gov. Scott Walker last May, would require people to produce on Election Day a Wisconsin driver’s license, stateissued ID card, certain, very limited number of student IDs, military ID, passport, naturalization certificate or an ID issued by a tribe based in Wisconsin.

The passage of the bill ended a decade-long quest by GOP officials to require identification before voting, and Wisconsin is now the 11th state to have approved requiring some form of photo ID at the polls.

Democrats have taken issue with the requirement, which they claim is unnecessary and costly, discouraging voting among minorities, the poor and the elderly.

Republicans claim the bill will help counteract voter fraud in the state and tried to pass similar legislation three times between 2003 and 2005.

Campus photo IDs would have to contain three items to be usable come election day: Date Of Issuance, Date Of Expiration and student signature.

Campuses across Wisconsin are currently investigating what can be done to validate student IDs for the upcoming spring elections.

Hill said the campus is looking at the legal and fiscal viability of updating IDs,

consider paying at least the interest of some of their loans while still in school.

“I encourage students who have unsubsidized loans to pay the interest each month, otherwise it will be capitalized when they go into repayment which results in a much higher payment,” Wolterman said.

Unsubsidized loans are not based on financial need and can accrue interest from the start of the loan, as the federal government pays the interest on subsidized loans — which are based on financial need — while the student is in school.

UC did see its default rate for Federal Perkins loans decrease for fiscal year 2010, however. The rate dropped from a total of 20.05 percent in fiscal year 2009 to 13.77 percent for 2010. printing adhesive stickers containing the necessary information, and enrollment letters.

Currently, adhesive stickers are the front runner for implementation, Hill said. “…it is the clearest version and the least costly,” Hill said.

At last Sunday’s student senate meeting, junior Eric Grow argued that legislation passed by the student body should mandate that stickers be both tamper-proof and unable to be counterfeited. “…the sticker would simply require a school logo or initials printed on [it], but I've been lobbying that this is a complete joke from a security standpoint,” Grow said via email. “This is to protect the university from a potential scandal of counterfeit stickers.”

Besides being a student, Grow also serves as a speaker liaison on behalf of the City of Milwaukee Election Commission.

“As a college student, I was appalled that our IDs were not acceptable because of a technicality, so I personally took up the cause of fixing this problem,” Grow said.

Grow said he has done research on the subject with a colleague at the commission and presented to the Senate what he considers an affordable, highsecurity sticker.

If the sticker was created using DuPont’s Izon manufacturing process, it would cost the university altogether $30,100 to produce 140,000 stickers, Gross said, enough to last several decades.

Grow said that this cost could be subsidized through a state grant, similar to the $10 million recently offered to the Department of Motor Vehicles in anticipation of an expected rush for Voter IDs. “Any sticker proposal is going to be comically modest in comparison,” Grow said.

September 26, 2011 3

Injustice in Milwaukee

St. Louis professor discusses social justice in Milwaukee

Dr. Todd Swanstrom gives a lecture on how inequalities between populations in cities can affect a city. Post photo by Sierra Riesberg

By Steven Schneider Special to The Post news@uwmpost.com

Dr. Todd Swanstrom, professor of public policy at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, lectured at the Hefter Center Friday evening about injustices in the American metropolis.

Dr. Swanstrom’s lecture discussed the idea of economical, racial and regional inequalities and the negative, possibly detrimental, implications they can have on the fabric of a city. This has particular resonance in a city like Milwaukee where the racial rift is patently clear and economic segregation is on the rise.

The most important aspect of his speech was the discussion of “place,” or where a person resides, and all of the connotations that come with it.

This quality in the American society is a controversial one, but what is for certain is that this idea of place has an undeniable bearing on an individual’s success in American society.

Dr. Swanstrom, however, does not condemn social inequality. After all, it is an instigator of competition so vital for economic growth.

He does argue that this clear distinction of place is a negative thing leading only to animosity.

The conversation doesn’t stop there. A city is nothing more than a culmination of “places” creating a new set of dilemmas.

Using Milwaukee and its surrounding cities as an example, Swanstrom illustrated his concept of “spatial injustice.”

The average annual income of someone in Milwaukee’s inner city is $25,000 while the average annual income of someone in Wauwatosa, Ozaukee and Waukesha is $65,000.

There is a clear divide between the interests of an individual and those of a nation. With the sheer diversity and independence with which local governments function, there has been a disconnect between these.

This leads, oftentimes, to conflicting interests, Swanstrom said.

When asked how to make someone act against their personal interest, for the greater good, Swanstrom said, “In reality, people are motivated by a sense of fairness and a need to strengthen social relationships and have commitment to a broader good.”

It is his assertion that humans need not set aside personal interest – only acknowledge those of others.

People inherently seek social balance, and the current economic crisis is a result of an increasingly myopic public.

By creating institutions that require citizens to engage across economical, racial and regional boundaries, an individual will recognize and make changes in order to equalize the conditions surrounding him or her.

Dr. Swanstrom proposed that by opening the lines of communication between people, they could, in essence, widen their reality to include the needs of others and create a more cohesive society on a grand scale.

“There are things that are really wrong with inner city communities, and unless these conversations are being had to change the way people’s mindsets are and to really bring people to the table, there will never be any means in resolving these issues,” UW-Milwaukee Ph.D. candidate Mia Price said.

Any change at the national level must first take place at the local level.

Therefore, the revitalization of American society may very well begin in Milwaukee.

Breakdown of student populations without Driver's License that might need an alternative ID to vote.

Infographic by Russell Pritchard

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NEWS

September 26, 2011

the uwm post

Campus vandal caught red-handed SA urges UWM to ban Suspect confessed to several on-campus graffiti incidents guns from buildings, supports voting with student IDs Debate over agenda setting also ensued

By Aaron Knapp Assistant News Editor Graffiti on the North side of the Physics Building by the Planetarium. Post photo by Sierra Riesberg

By Lyla Goerl Staff Writer news@uwmpost.com

University police apprehended a graffiti suspect Sept. 8 after receiving a call from a witness. The suspect, Noah Sheahan, a former UW-Milwaukee student, confessed to the police that he participated in multiple incidents of vandalism on campus.

After confessing, UWM police arrested Sheahan and brought him to the police station where he was booked and transported to the Milwaukee County Criminal Justice Facility.

According to the Wisconsin Court Circuit Access website, he has been charged with two counts of graffiti and currently awaits trial.

UWM Police Department Assistant Chief Gregory Habeck called this incident unique based on the number of ways Sheahan left his tag. A marker was used on f lat surfaces, and spray paint was used on the side of a building.

“It caught a lot of people’s attention,” Habeck said. “It exhibits the seriousness of this crime.”

Habeck emphasized that graffiti on campus is a crime.

“It’s not a ticket – it’s a Class A misdemeanor,” Habeck said.

Community Liaison and Court Officer Donald Brown assisted in providing the Criminal Justice Facility and the District Attorney office the report of this recent graffiti case.

“An Assistant DA reviews the reports and makes a determination what charges they will charge the

PUZZLE SOLUTIONS

person with,” Brown said.

Brown explained that a Class A misdemeanor is punishable for up to nine months in jail and a $10,000 fine.

When an incident like this occurs, police notify Physical Plant Services to clean up the graffiti right away.

Chapter 18 of the UWM Student Organization Handbook provides UWM’s policy towards graffiti.

Graffiti is not tolerated on campus, and the police make sure it does not happen.

“That’s not what our campus is about,” Habeck said. “Our campus is safe, and we intend to keep it that way.”

To view the UWM policy on graffiti, go to http://www4.uwm.edu/sao" http:// www4.uwm.edu/sao.

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The Student Association unanimously passed two resolutions on Sunday night in their second meeting of the semester: one urging UW-Milwaukee’s administration to ban firearms from campus buildings and another urging the administration to support stickers that will allow student IDs to be used for voting.

However, some disagreement about a bill recommending the location for a new student resource center and a disagreement between President Alex Kostal and Speaker of the Senate Rick Banks became apparent over how senate agendasetting should take place.

“I think it’s important that we have something in the bylaws to provide some oversight and to ensure that there’s not just one person in charge of setting the agenda,” President Alex Kostal said at the meeting.

Most of the evening’s legislation was brought up in some way at the four-hour long senate meeting the week before, which included a heated debate about elections bylaws. At this meeting, the senate was calm and unified by comparison, passing most of their legislation in a matter of minutes.

The controversial issue was over the senate bylaws, passed at the last meeting, vetoed by Kostal and reintroduced at this meeting with some changes by Banks. Kostal and Banks represented two opposing

views on whether or not the executive committee or the speaker alone should be responsible for setting the senate’s meeting agenda.

“This is something that I personally will not budge on,” Banks said. “I understand why it was done last year…but this is a power that constitutionally should be in the hands of the Speaker of the Senate.”

The speaker used to be in charge of setting the agenda, but after previous speakers used this power to ignore legislation that they did not like, the executive committee was established to oversee the speaker and make sure that everything was included in the agenda.

“With something that’s so important, the decision-making body needs a few people involved to ensure that legislation is being heard and that senate appointments are getting on, and, like I said before, there’s just senate oversight,” Kostal said.

The revised senate bylaws had several objections and were automatically tabled until the next senate meeting on Sunday, Oct. 9.

In addition to this debate, the senate also appointed members to numerous committees, approved two new senators and amended the bylaws of the Council of Diversity and Inclusion, an SA committee.

Legislation that originally recommended a new student-run resource center take the spot in the Union that parking and transit is vacating was also changed and now only urges “the Union renovation team to think critically of the locations for this center.”

NEWS

uwmpost.com

September 26, 2011 5

UWM students get rare opportunity from federal program HIDTA program offers students opportunity to fight drug trafficking

By Olen Burage Staff Writer news@uwmpost.com

Dean of the UWM School of Social Welfare, Stan Stojkovic, oversees 12 employees as well as student interns as part of the High Intensity Drug Trafficing Areas program. the Post photo by Austin McDowell

Online course fees raise eyebrows

Questions over reason for additional cost

By Jon Gorski Staff Writer news@uwmpost.com

Enrollment in online courses has seen a rapid increase in the past few years at UW-Milwaukee, with as many as 1,500 students enrolled entirely in online courses, according to a recent document released by the school.

These online courses, however, don't come without a cost. Extended fees of up to $275 per class have been continuously implemented, in contrast to the rest of the UW System.

But where do these fees go? And why is UWM the school with the highest fees?

In a 2009 article by the Journal Sentinel, school officials said the majority of the revenue from fees goes toward technical support and training.

It also noted that schools that generate revenue from online classes are able to spend it in whatever way they please, because the money is put into the general budget of each school – and therefore not subject to any restriction or regulation.

UWM's website does make note that students who enroll in online courses only are not charged the fees or granted access to student services like the Klotsche Center and the U-Pass.

It also notes that the majority of students who are only enrolled in

online classes are “primarily adult and nontraditional students.”

This does imply that students who enroll explicitly in online courses aren't allowed the conveniences of students who enroll in face-to-face classes.

Hybrid classes, combining both face-to-face and online components, have become more and more popular over the past couple years. 8,117 students enrolled in at least one hybrid class this year.

Student Dana Knoerr thinks that the fees are undeserved, though she understands why they exist.

“I don't think students should have to pay them,” she said.

An alternative she proposed is to “require software,” instead of the extra money being a part of tuition.

The money earned from online courses doesn't function in the same way that other fees do. Ordinarily, money accumulated through fees is sent straight to the UW System, which takes 20 percent off the top of the total amount and then returns it back to UWM for future use.

Online fees are under a different qualification. The university gets to keep and store them for financial emergencies or other such things.

As of now, the extra fees required in order to take online courses go to things like tech support, training and maintenance of systems. According to the online resources at UWM, these online fees are put directly back into the system.

When declaring any major associated with criminal justice, there are several opportunities to gain the right experience, bolster a resume and become a step closer to a career in a certain area of study.

But there are very few like the internship provided by the UWMilwaukee School of Social Welfare.

Since UWM became involved with the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas program in 2007, students have been given a unique chance at a career opportunity.

Congress created HIDTA, following the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988, as an initiative to help local, state and federal law enforcement in high drug trafficking areas. They provide reliable law enforcement intelligence to neighboring agencies to help develop more effective strategies to reduce the overall illegal drug supply in certain areas.

To date, there are 28 HIDTA locations nationwide. Every semester, HIDTA Milwaukee selects college students from schools around the county to take part in their enriching internship.

“We send students to HIDTA to be trained as intelligence analysts,” Dean of the UWM School of Social Welfare Stan Stojkovic said. “Some get hired. It’s a very sought after internship.”

UWM hires 12 of HIDTA’s nonlaw enforcement employees. In turn, 90 percent of the $1 million UWM receives from the program’s $5.4 million budget is used to pay the hired employees every year.

The UWM School of Social Welfare is very selective of which students they allow to take part in the internship.

Potential students must be of junior standing and a declared criminal justice major.

“Most internships are first come, first serve,” Stojkovic said. “We’re doing something fairly unique and rare…

It puts a positive light on the face of UWM.” Though the opportunity provides a rare glimpse into the daily activities of drug trafficking intelligence, students aren’t riding along with law enforcement officers.

“Our students don’t get involved with how they pursue drug traffickers, law enforcement, et cetera,” Stojkovic said. “That’s not our part.”

However gracious the opportunity and considerable the success, Stojkovic admits that UWM’s initiative could be bigger. Due to prior obligations with other law enforcement entities, expanding the program proves to be quite the challenge.

“We’ve got things going on with the Milwaukee Police Department, the Department of Corrections and the court systems that are very exciting,” Stojkovic said. “HIDTA is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to our involvement.”

Although they don’t have the time or the support to expand, Stojkovic has every intention to make the project more substantial.

Due to some faculty members retiring and some passing away, the initiative has been slightly set back.

“We plan on hiring four or five new faculty members in the Criminal Justice Department in the next four years to fill the void,” Stojkovic said.

As an executive board member of HIDTA, Stojkovic says that the executive director is very much in favor of expansion.

New Wi-Fi in union and library

Students have difficulty using new UWM WiFi

By Alyssa Russo Special to The Post news@uwmpost.com

Over the summer, UWMilwaukee launched a new wireless internet service called UWM WiFi in the union and the library, at least temporarily replacing the old wireless internet connection PROWLnet.

During the first week of classes, students have had difficulty connecting to the new system, instead searching for the PROWLnet system which can no longer be accessed in the union and library.

“UWM WiFi provides faster, more reliable and secure wireless service with immediate access after a one-time set-up and login,” a UWM internet campus announcement said.

“PROWLnet will continue to be the wireless service for all other public campus areas.”

UWM WiFi will be the primary wireless network in these two areas, the highest trafficked buildings on campus, for a six month trial period lasting throughout the semester.

Administrators hope that this new system will help solve the problems posed by an increasing number of students, faculty and staff using

wireless internet, thereby slowing internet speed. In some incidents, PROWLnet signal has not been strong enough in classrooms where a professor and many students have been trying to use the internet at the same time, resulting in some students losing their internet connection.

Although this new program is not streaming throughout the classrooms, administrators hope the lessened traffic on PROWLnet system will ease the strain on the network. The new system has been running in the union and the library since July and will continue to run until January 4, when administration will review the program and decide whether or not to extend it to all of campus.

“The pilot will be evaluated after six months for levels of customer satisfaction, service manageability and service viability in the context of potential deployment campus-wide, pending appropriate resourcing,” a UWM Information Technology website about the new Wi-Fi system said. “Feedback is being gathered via the online UWM WiFi Pilot survey.”

The new system has four different options of how to connect laptops and mobile devices to the internet.

Students have access to a secure

connection which requires them to log into the system using their ePanther ID and password. Students should only have to set up and log in to UWM WiFi once and should be able to connect to the internet immediately when entering the union and library.

“To set up your device, you must be in either the Union or the Golda Meir Library,” a UWM IT website said. “For personally-owned devices, instructions can be found online.”

The other three systems are: a public option, which is an unsecure connection available to students and non-students and must be renewed every hour, a sponsored guest connection that requires a submitted request and another secure connection called eduroam, a network of 3,500 schools and institutions around the world accessible with an ePanther ID and password.

The new system is also expected to be more secure and reliable than PROWLnet, allowing for students, faculty and staff to keep their internet connection even if there is a major network outage.

Aaron Knapp, Assistant News Editor, contributed to this article.

6

September 26, 2011

SPORTS

Panthers sweep weekend series Egerer returns from injury, dominates

the uwm post

NL Manager of the Year award a tight race

Three NL managers deserving of title in a season flush with dark horses

Ron Roenicke has the Brewers at the top of the NL Central Image courtesy of bleacher report.com

By Eric Engelbart Staff Writer sports@uwmpost.com

By Nick Bornheimer Staff Writer sports@uwmpost.com

The UW-Milwaukee women’s volleyball team rolled to a third consecutive three-set sweep Saturday afternoon, taking down Wright State – 25-16, 25-15, 25-16 – to remain unbeaten in conference play.

The Panthers (11-4, 4-0 Horizon) hit a season-best .351 and rallied behind junior Elizabeth Egerer, who returned from injury Friday. “[Egerer] is definitely a spark,” Milwaukee coach Susie Johnson said. “I knew we needed her to come back, because she offers that really tough, hard attack that’s intimidating to other teams. Just to have that out there is a big difference for us.”

Egerer led the team with 15 kills and hit a remarkable .481. Milwaukee also got a combined 20 kills from seniors Kerri Schuh and Mackenzie Millis and nine kills from sophomore Rachel Neuberger – all while holding the Raiders (2-12, 1-2 Horizon) to a .135 hitting performance.

The Panthers were poised coming into Saturday’s match after taking down the Butler Bulldogs in dominating fashion the night before.

Milwaukee never trailed in the first set and rattled off five straight points to conclude the first set, including an ace from Millis.

Johnson has been very impressed

by Millis’ play thus far this season and the role she’s stepped into.

“Mackenzie hasn’t had a lot of experience in the past, but being a senior, she’s watched, she’s learned and she’s been a great coach from the sidelines,” Johnson said. “Now she’s playing like a veteran, and I’m excited, because we need her to lead.”

Senior play has been a key component for the Panthers all season.

“I think the seniors are showing really good leadership,” Johnson said.

“We have freshman in key positions on our team right now, and the seniors are doing a great job.”

Milwaukee did play from behind in the second set but took a commanding late lead, putting together a 16-1 run to end the set. The final point was recorded on a kill by freshman Kayla Price.

The Panthers got off to a slower start in the third set, forfeiting the first four points of the frame.

Milwaukee regained momentum with strong play from Egerer, Millis and Schuh. Neuberger and senior Melissa Jansen combined for a big block late in the set, following consecutive kills from Neuberger and a service ace from senior Morgan Potter to wrap-up the victory.

Milwaukee takes their 4-0 conference record on the road this weekend, matching up with Cleveland State Friday night and Youngstown State Saturday afternoon.

“I’m glad we’re playing well right now. It gives the team a lot of confidence going into this first road trip,” Johnson said.

As the end of the MLB regular season approaches, the playoffs draw near, leaving many unexpected teams in the mix for a postseason berth. The 2011 season has seen a change at the helm of many National League teams, and a few managers in particular have demonstrated keen managerial abilities.

The success of the Milwaukee Brewers under first year manager Ron Roenicke, the Atlanta Braves imminent playoff position under first year manager Fredi González and the unexpected emergence of the Arizona Diamondbacks as a legit contender behind Kirk Gibson should set these managers apart from the pack in this year’s voting for NL Manager of the Year. Who is most deserving of the award? Let’s take a closer look.

Ron Roenicke, Milwaukee Brewers Ron Roenicke has done a fantastic job in taking over for Ken Macha as the manager of the Brewers. Roenicke has instilled a sense of confidence and identity in the Brewers that the team lacked during Macha’s tenure as skipper. The team’s younger players have matured and are now entering their primes. Roenicke has molded a cohesive unit out of spare parts and journeymen from other teams amidst injuries to stars Rickie Weeks and Corey Hart.

The Brewers have benefited from a stronger pitching staff, with the additions of starters such as Zack Greinke and Shaun Marcum, alongside the acquisitions of relievers Takashi Saito and Francisco Rodriguez. John Axford has taken over as the closer, showing poise beyond his experience and will more than likely hold that role for many seasons to come. The Brewers’ reinvented pitching staff has served to lower the Brewers team ERA, or earned run average, nearly an entire point from 4.58 last year to 3.60 this

year. Roenicke’s ability to properly manage the Brewers’ bolstered staff is the reason for this drastic improvement from last year.

Though no avid baseball fan was surprised at the success of the Brewers this season, not many predicted the team to do quite this well. Roenicke has shown poise and unquestionable leadership ability in his first year at the helm for the Brewers, and his presence has served to cement the team as a legitimate title contender. It will be interesting to see how the team will do next year when Prince Fielder leaves the team for free agency.

Kirk Gibson, Arizona Diamondbacks Kirk Gibson is best known by baseball fans for having hit a pinchhit, game winning home run while nursing injuries to both legs in the 1988 World Series off of Hall of Fame against closer Dennis Eckersley.

Gibson was named manager of the Arizona Diamondbacks after being the interim manager at the end of the 2010 season. The Diamondbacks won a dismal 65 games in the 2010 season, and, without any significant additions to their roster, many experts expected 2011 to be a repeat. Under the guidance of Gibson, the D-Backs have accumulated near 90 wins this season and have earned an imminent playoff appearance.

The Diamondbacks’ offensive output was even more futile in 2011 than it had been in 2010. Many unproven players were given elevated roles as players, like Miguel Montero emerging as an all-star caliber catcher.

Gerardo Parra seamlessly stepped into the role of batting leadoff, and rookie Paul Goldschmidt took over at first base. Former all-star second baseman Aaron Hill was acquired from the Toronto Blue Jays mid-season, and Justin Upton proved himself as one of the premier outfielders in all of baseball. Despite a revamped core and the contributions of Upton and Hill, the team’s offense produced almost identical numbers to 2010.

The improvement came in the other side of the equation: the Diamondbacks’ pitching staff. Ian Kennedy has had a marvelous season and aims to be the first Diamondbacks pitcher to win 20 games in a season.

Daniel Hudson, Josh Collmenter and Joe Saunders round out a solid starting rotation that is much improved from last season. The Diamondbacks most notable acquisition this season was closer J.J Putz, who has performed near perfect.

Fredi González, Atlanta Braves It’s no surprise to baseball fans to see the Braves in the postseason, but in their first year since 1990 without the venerable Bobby Cox as manager, their hunt for October seemed more elusive than it has been in years past.

Fredi González was brought in to fill the shoes of Cox and has done a magnificent job.

The Braves are in a transitional period, as youngsters Freddie Freeman and Jason Heyward have been given heavier roles in the Braves lineup. Dan Uggla was acquired to play second base and hit cleanup, Chipper Jones came out of retirement and Michael Bourn was acquired to bat leadoff and play centerfield. The Braves have endured injuries to numerous players this year. All-star catcher Brian McCann, Jason Heyward and Nate McLouth have all come down with injuries, but González proved up to the task of managing to keep the team rolling in the absence of some of its stars.

Pitchers Tommy Hanson and Tim Hudson both were subject to injuries this year as well. Brandon Beachy and Jair Jurrjens both had exceptional years under the tutelage of González and pitching coach Roger McDowell.

Rookie closer Craig Kimbrel stepped into the closer role and broke the single season rookie save record.

González demonstrated a wealth of understanding of the game in getting the most of his team.

Writer’s Pick

SPORTS

uwmpost.com

Panthers women’s soccer stays hot at home

Wins against Western Illinois and Detroit keep the momentum going

By Nick Bornheimer Staff Writer sports@uwmpost.com

The UW-Milwaukee Panthers’ women’s soccer team improvted to 10 wins during their weekend home stand, with victories over Western Illinois and Detroit, and remain unbeaten in their conference.

Friday was a senior showcase in the rout of Western Illinois (6-3), as seniors Laurel Regalie, Sarah Hagen and Makenzie Gillaspie accounted for all four goals Friday night.

“Our senior class has been great,” UWM head coach Michael Moynihan said. “Not only are our seniors all impact players, they’re great in terms of leadership and have a maturity that really helps our team.

In the first game of the home stand, the Panthers (10-1, 2-0 Horizon) offense put on a clinic but needed only one goal in the 4-0 shutout. The Milwaukee offense did not find their groove until the second half, where the team scored all of their four goals.

The Panthers threatened in the first half with 16 shots on goal but could not find the score. Hagen stepped into the penalty box in the 54th minute to drill the only goal the Panthers would need into the back of the net.

Milwaukee kept the throttle down, though, scoring again just four minutes later on a Regalie header, set up by Hagen. This was the first of two goals by Regalie, who put the Panthers up by three later in the half on a well-timed cross from freshman Kelsey Holbert.

Gillaspie recorded her first goal of the season on a PK, or penalty kick, in the 74th minute to conclude the Panther onslaught.

Sunday’s victory did not come easily. UWM was tested by Detroit (8-4-1, 1-1 Horizon) and the elements. Sunday’s match was played in a downpour, which did not play to the Panthers’ strengths.

“That’s not our forte,” Moynihan said, in reference to playing in the rain.

“We’re a better team in possession and moving the ball around. I think

we stepped up to the plate, though, and I’m really pleased with the mental approach of the players.”

Junior Helen Steinhauser put the Panthers on the board in the ninth minute with her second goal of the season. Steinhauser headed the ball in on an assist from senior Keara Thompson.

A Detroit goal from Abby McCollum in the 58th minute tied the game at one a piece, but the Panthers didn’t take long to respond as Hagen netted her 13th goal off of a rebounded shot by freshman Kelly Lewers just nine minutes later.

Detroit threatened in the final minutes, but Hagen’s goal proved to be the game winner.

Milwaukee looks to remain unbeaten in conference play. They take to the road this weekend to battle Wright State at 4 p.m. in Dayton, Ohio.

“Every conference team is going to present a different challenge,” Moynihan said. “We stepped up to the challenge today. We’ll have to see about the next one.”

Panthers take Saturday showdown against Butler UW-Milwaukee comes back home with 3-1 win over rival Bulldogs

By Mitch Pratt Staff Writer sports@uwmpost.com

The UW-Milwaukee men’s soccer team opened up their Horizon League schedule with a 3-1 victory over the Butler Bulldogs Saturday afternoon in Indianapolis.

Saturday was the debut of freshman goalkeeper Josh Rohde, who saved three of the four shots on goal that Butler managed against him and earned the win in the process.

The loss for Butler was the first home loss in Horizon League play in 15 conference titles. The Bulldogs’ last

conference defeat at the Butler Bowl came back during the 2007 season. The loss also snapped a string of 10 straight unbeaten in conference play.

The Panthers got on the board early in the game when sophomore James Ashcroft scored on a corner from Gerardo Saavedra. The offense really came to life in the second half with goals from two of their forwards.

Senior Robert Refai and freshman Nick Langford each found the back of the net with second half strikes.

The goal from Refai proved to be the game winner in the 49th minute.

He was assisted on the goal by a nice through ball from Keegan Ziada.

Then Langford came up with the big insurance goal in the 71st minute, assisted by Saavedra.

The Panthers had a few more chances very late in the contest to add another tally, but Bulldogs’ keeper Jon Dawson made saves on two Langford shots that came 25 seconds apart in the 81st minute.

The team returns to action next week with two home games against Horizon League foes. Rival Green Bay is in town on Wednesday night for the Chancellor’s Cup and then Cleveland State on Saturday. Both games are scheduled to start at 7 p.m. at Engelmann Field.

September 26, 2011 7

8

SPORTS

September 26, 2011

the uwm post

Bring ‘em out, bring ‘em out!

New schedule revealed, Panthers on prowl for Horizon League crown

By Tony Atkins Assistant Sports Editor sports@uwmpost.com

Last year, the UW-Milwaukee men’s basketball team made a huge splash and emerged as a serious contender to dethrone the Butler Bulldogs in the Horizon League.

They finished the year with a 13-5 conference record and beat the thennational champion runner-up not once, but twice in the regular season.

In the end, the Bulldogs got the win when all the chips were on the line, beating UWM 59-44 for the golden ticket to the big dance, and on to yet another national championship game behind their former star, nowUtah Jazz forward Gordon Hayward.

Meanwhile, UWM was sent to the National Invitation Tournament, then sent home by Northwestern in the first round.

That was then. It is a new era in Horizon League. With the release of the new schedule earlier this month, the Panthers are facing tough opponents, but it shouldn’t be anything they aren’t capable of taking on. They are bringing back a slew of veterans to do what they have

done before: win the regular season Horizon League Championship. This time, the guys will have to get over the hump if they want to make it to the NCAA Tournament this March.

The Panthers open their regular season title defense at the US Cellular Arena against Southwest Minnesota State. They will be tested as they match up early against schools, such as Northern Illinois, Indiana-Purdue and Texas Southern, but all these games are very winnable.

The first obstacle that stands in the way of this team will be the trip to East Lansing to face off with a mainstay in the NCAA bracket, the Michigan State Spartans. The Spartans will probably be the toughest early season test the Panthers will have, but three days later, they are scheduled to play another set of Spartans, the ones from Arkansas-Little Rock in Arkansas, which will also be a mighty task.

When the Panthers touch down in Milwaukee, they will host a Loyola team to open conference play. Last year, the Panthers and the Loyola Ramblers split their season series, winning a game a piece. Following suit is a home game against the University of Illinois-Chicago, then away games

against DePaul and Northern Iowa.

The Panthers will face another major opponent after those games.

They will host the Wisconsin Badgers here in Milwaukee in a showdown between in-state foes. Right after that, they will face Marquette in an away match up. At this point in the season, the Panthers should be primed and ready for the Horizon League gauntlet they will face throughout the rest of the year.

Some of the games in this season’s inner-league schedule will consist of the usual suspects. One game that will be especially intriguing is the New Years Eve showdown against Butler and their new transfer from Arkansas, Rotnei Clarke.

The Panthers are a talented group of athletes, and this is their time to grab the reins of the conference. It will certainly be tough, constantly facing strong teams back-to-back, but this should only make the team better as they grow together over the season.

This year’s edition of the Horizon League probably won’t be the Butler dominated conference of recent history. The winds of change are definitely blowing, Milwaukee – let’s see what you can do with it.

The Panthers earned a share of the conference title last season.

Post file photo

Party like it’s 1982 Prince is king Brewers are division champs for first time in 29 years

Fielder is more than worthy of the NL MVP award

By Nolan Murphy Staff Writer sports@uwmpost.com

Prince Fielder and Ryan Braun celebrate after clinching the NL Central. Image courtesy of JS Online.

By Tony Atkins Assistant Sports Editor sports@uwmpost.com

From the moment Ryan Braun stepped into the batter’s box last Friday against the Florida Marlins, a chill swept through Miller Park. The usual Milwaukee autumn chill was ever present, of course, but this chill was different. Something else was going on. Something big was going to happen.

Then it happened. The MVP candidate proved his worth yet again and pounded a three-run shot on a 3-1 pitch in the bottom of the eighth out through centerfield to give the Brewers a 4-1 lead over the Marlins to send the Brewers to their first – yes, first – National League Central Division title ever.

Congratulations to the Milwaukee Brewers brass.

This is a franchise that has steadily stuck to their guns, consistently

bringing in players and spending the money necessary to win ballgames.

The gambles during their climb to this point have finally paid off, and their team has reached the summit of their division for the first time in 29 years.

Congratulations to the Milwaukee Brewers fan.

This is a team that has a packed house nearly every night, full of loyal fans and supporters. These are the same supporters that stuck with this bunch through the struggles of the spring and early summer and never gave up (publicly) when things weren’t going well. You, the fans of Wisconsin, are a great part of this success and will likely be there pushing the division champs on all the way to the World Series.

Congratulations to Yuniesky Betancourt.

He’s getting there.

Congratulations to the stars.

Ryan Braun and Prince Fielder

weren’t even born the last time the Brewers won a division title.

Twenty-seven long years later, Ryan Braun signed a massive $105 million contract through 2020. (It’s only 2011.) That deal didn’t seem to faze him one bit. In fact, Braun actually stepped his game up after signing that deal and is now a legitimate MVP candidate this year. Prince Fielder also played a great deal in this team’s success, especially notable since it’s his contract year, and he’s unlikely to return. He is catching some heat for announcing that heading into the postseason. But Prince may very well be the reason this story is published.

He has played out of his mind this year – and during his whole tenure as a Brewer. That should not be forgotten.

He sure won’t.

This franchise has come a long way, and they have now truly arrived on the scene. October is going to be a fun ride. Get ready, Wisconsin.

Prince Fielder has spent six complete seasons in Milwaukee. For most of those years, Prince relished being known as the most feared hitter on the team and one of the biggest homerun threats in Major League Baseball. Many believe the National League’s Most Valuable Player award should not only be awarded to the player with the best statistical season, but one who also means the most to their team.

What has potentially been Prince Fielder’s final season in a Brewers uniform has been one for the ages, as a hitter as well as a leader. The 2011 campaign can be argued as Prince’s best statistical season as a true hitter. Prince’s statistics in 2011 are .293/.408/.544 in batting average, on base percentage and slugging percentage, respectively.

Fielder also looks to finish the season in the top five of each of the following categories: home runs, runs batted in, base on balls and on base percentage.

If Fielder wins the award this season, he would be the first player since Cal Ripken Jr. in 1991 to win the All-Star Game MVP and NL MVP. When looking at Fielder as a complete player, one must also look

past the numbers and focus on the things that don’t show up on the stats sheets. He means more to the Brewers than any figures can indicate.

Fielder has continuously showed his toughness and dedication, having played in every game this season for the Brewers. He is among the league leaders in games played, which has been the case since he entered the league in 2005.

In Ron Roenicke’s first year as Brewers manager, Prince has bought into the system. He has been active in trying to produce and move runners, plating 17 percent of his runners and dropping his strikeout rate to a careerlow 15 percent. Playing most of the season with the underachieving Casey McGehee protecting him in the fifth spot, Fielder has still managed to put up a career season. When all is said and done, Fielder would be just as happy to see teammate Ryan Braun win the MVP and have the Brewer’s wind up champions in late October.

I hope this isn’t the last we see of Prince in Milwaukee. If, in fact, it is, his mark on this team and franchise will never be forgotten. In a contract year, he put the media and his contract talks aside and just played baseball every day. That is the mark of a true player, worthy of respect and the vote for the NL’s MVP award.

10

the uwm post

September 26, 2011

Prophetic brings new life to Milwaukee hip-hop

One of Milwaukee’s only hip hop artists, Prophetic is launching the city’s hip hop scene

By Kevin Kaber Assistant Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com Not too long ago, Milwaukee emcee Prophetic graced UW-Milwaukee with his presence as an opening act at Pantherfest – displaying his talent as a true hip hop artist by freestyling and performing some of his hits, including a version of the Packers anthem “Green and Yellow,” which actually predated Lil Wayne’s. With a few full length album releases under his belt (some of which are available to stream on his website), as well as an established local record label, Prophetic is a driving force in the Milwaukee hip hop scene. The UWM Post interviewed the Pharrell-endorsed rapper, who will be performing again for the UWM audience on November 17th, about his influences, successes and his future.

UWM Post: How did you get your start as a rapper?

Prophetic: I guess I started making my own music around my freshman year of high school. You know, I’m really into art, illustrating and things like that, so that was always something I used to express myself with, and I always loved music, so I got into writing. It began as something you

love to do, then you start to see that people actually really like it, and you realize like, ‘Hey, I can really turn this into a business, into a profit.’ So it just started out of high school, and it just progressed from there.

Post: So then your influences aren’t only musical, but other arts as well?

Prophetic: Yeah, I actually went to MIAD [Milwaukee Institute of Arts & Design] for about two years. I majored in illustration and wanted to get into computer animation. But I couldn’t afford that school. It was pretty expensive, so I had to leave.

Post: How are you leaving your mark on the Milwaukee music scene?

Prophetic: I believe I’m leaving my mark by leaving a blueprint, I guess you can say. You know, coming from Milwaukee, there’s not a big industry here. It’s not a super big city. I travel out of town a lot, so a lot of people, when I tell them where I’m from, they don’t even expect hip-hop to come out of Milwaukee. So I guess just going through all of our successes and failures, it’s kind of like writing a blueprint for other people when they come out. Like alright, “do this, do this, do this.” There was no one that came before us that gave us a route, you know what I mean?

Post: Would you consider yourself one of

the forces behind the emergence of hip hop in Milwaukee?

Prophetic: I mean, yes and no. We have had artists like Coo Coo Cal. He came out with a number one song [“My Projects”].

But he didn’t really become an artist on his own. He’s just that best song other than an actual artist. I’m not trying to be a blueprint. That’s not my objective. As a result of doing what we do, it’s showing others how to go about it.

Post: How did your label, the Umbrella Music Group, start up?

Prophetic: The Umbrella Music Group is a start-up label that I own along with two of my partners, my partner Kash and my boy Axtra. These are just childhood friends that I grew up with. I started rapping with Kash, and Axtra was always just somebody I knew in my neighborhood.

And we just figured, ‘Hey, let’s come together and put our heads together and match the other side up about what music’s all about.’ I think a lot of people are so caught up over what they see on the screen.

We were more intrigued about what it took to get that person up on the screen.

You don’t really get props for things like that. It was something that we were really interested in. We just came together to start the business.

Post: So, then, what’s your goal with Umbrella? Where do you want to see it in the near future?

Prophetic: Our goal is for us to be the same as Def Jam, Bad Boy, Roc-A-Fella, where we as flagship artists break into it, and then we pick up other artists – and not just hip hop, musicians of all music genres – and promote them as if they are our artists.

Post: It’s obvious that you have a lot of love for Milwaukee, and you do all sorts of events and performances here. You just did Pantherfest and students at MIAD directed the video for “Livin In The Sky.” Is that one of your goals, to give back to the community?

Prophetic: You know what? It’s funny because I didn’t plan on it. It was just something that I was kind of going at it selfishly, you know, ‘This is what I want to do with my life as a career.’ But then I realized that it’s a big benefit doing something positive, because in our environment, there are a lot of negative things going on. When you do something positive, you actually get more ears, because you’re standing up to all of the negativity that’s going on. I just had a radio interview the other day, and I was saying that I’m not trying to be a freedom fighter

or anything like that, but I do want to strengthen where I come from. There’s a lot of people, a lot of friends that I grew up with who don’t know too much of outside their neighborhood, and there’s so much going on out here. So if I can be the voice that they relate to, then I’m all for it.

Post: What’s next for Prophetic?

Prophetic: My next show. Actually, we’re going to Atlanta to participate in this competition October 6-8 at the AC3 Festival. It’s like a big hip hop festival in Atlanta. It’s the [Enter the] Cypher Competition, so I’m going to go win that real quick. [Laughs.] And we’ve been doing a lot of behind-the-scenes work as far as our marketing and branding and hiring enough people to help us break out for national attention. So I’ll still be recording and still releasing videos. It’s a lot work.

Post: Are you planning any upcoming projects in the near future?

Prophetic: I plan to release at least a video for the rest of the year, maybe every two weeks to a week. We’ll have a lot of visuals coming up. I’m recording right now in between the shows and the traveling, so we’ll have more projects coming up in the next month.

uwmpost.com

September 26, 2011 11

Looking back, moving forward Okkervil River at the Pabst Theater

Austin's Okkervil River brought spirit and emotion to the Pabst Theater last Wednesday. Photo by C.J. Foeckler

By Steven Franz Fringe editor fringe@uwmpost.com Very quietly, Austin, Texas’ Okkervil River became one of the most consistently great rock bands of the last decade. Founded in 1998, the band’s mix of chamber folk and rollicking oldfashioned rock and roll spoke very well for the indie scene as a whole in the last 10 years. Their three-album succession of Black Sheep Boy, The Stage Names and The Stand-Ins ranks highly among any of the more critically-acclaimed bands to occupy the same folk/rock milieu.

Okkervil River’s most recent album, 2011’s I Am Very Far, is a bit of a departure

for them, and while it has featured them most prominently in critical publications, the small but enthusiastic crowd at their Wednesday night show at the Pabst Theater proved that it isn’t close to being their best-known.

On the heels of an invigorating performance from neo-grunge twosome Wye Oak, Okkervil River frontman Will Sheff took the stage with original drummer Seth WarrenCrow, a Milwaukee native and UWMilwaukee faculty member, and quickly demonstrated the histrionic stage presence that seems to have made him most notable. There’s nothing about Sheff ’s attitude toward music that isn’t theatrical. The one-time music critic,

however, has cultivated a fully-formed musical performance from an especially deep pop music expertise that’s as commanding as it is intense.

At one point, the shrieking, spastic Sheff (who had bought a new guitar that very day, which promptly fell greatly out of tune), determined to have his way, demanded that the lights be brought down for a good 20 seconds until the theater staff finally obliged. And the show ended, during a theater-shaking rendition of “Unless It’s Kicks,” with Sheff wrapping his guitar cord around guitarist Lauren Gurgiolo so tightly that they both nearly fell over.

While there were songs from I Am Very Far featured in the hour-

plus performance, the majority of the set was planted firmly in the band’s past, an odd decision in the context of the album-supporting tour. But the audience’s familiarity with past material – especially from The Stage Names and The Stand Ins, a one-two punch about the creation of pop music – seemed to trump that of I Am Very Far, which had a tough time replicating both its own studio production value (a signature of the album) and the emotional intensity of the rest of the band’s hyper-literate catalogue.

Nevertheless, “We Need a Myth” was greeted with a particularly warm reception, and “The Valley,” a terrifying song about rock music’s darker aspects,

pounded the floor until it seemed like it would crack. But the centerpieces of the show were elsewhere – the extended, monologue-interrupted “Black Sheep Boy #4,” the three-song Stage Names encore – to which the audience responded the most warmly, nearly matching Sheff himself for passion.

Considering that Okkervil River, more than most bands out there, determines the barometer for the success of their music based on how it translates to the stomping, seizing theatrics of their frontman, I Am Very Far is not soon to fully ingratiate itself into the repertoire of an underappreciated American band.

the uwm post

12 September 26, 2011

Milwaukee professor riffs on poetry’s history, evolution

Interviewing UWM’s Dr. Martin Jack Rosenblum

UWM music professor Martin Jack Rosenblum, pictured here in 1999, is heavily involved in the intersection between poetry and music. Image courtesty of Holly Ranger.

By Graham Marlowe Assistant Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com

Continuing from last week’s article, “Milwaukee legend recalls poetry’s relationship with music,” The UWM Post sat down for an interview with UW-Milwaukee’s Dr. Martin Jack Rosenblum to discuss the history of poetry, Music Lingo (Rosenblum’s album, co-authored with Jack Grassel) and the phrase “a sonic binding,” as it pertains to poetry’s word.

UWM Post: When [the records mentioned in the previous piece] were released, those poets had their own theoretical approach to the idiom “a sonic binding.” How has this shaped the perception of poetry?

Dr. Martin Jack Rosenblum: The Kerouac/Allen material is great, but in hindsight, it’s pop culture. Allen found a way to infuse it with elements that made it suitable for family entertainment.

As you hear, there’s someone playing, someone reading…and somebody laughing between the two. And what’s wrong with that, right? In fact, the Kerouac recordings raised the question of, “Oh, this stuff can be fun?”

But there are some key differences in style. With Kerouac/Allen, we have one overhearing the other. On Music Lingo, we have a conversation – nothing is overheard and what happens operates

as a duet.

With Rexroth, jazz and poetry were in the same area of exploration. He didn’t see them as anything other than two art forms being exposed simultaneously.

The thing is, the two were not bound, to my knowledge, until Music Lingo came around.

Post: Through that lens, how would you explain your own theory [of the idiom]?

MJR: A slogan that appears on a number of my albums is, “Music taking poetry too far.” I like that concept, but my theoretical approach lives on Music Lingo.

With Lingo, the idea was to get as high with language as you can, to the extent that both are so far away…that what you experience feels like one thing.

“Music lingo” is the language of music; it’s also the music of language.

The recording is improvisation. We should not lose sight of that. However, the album exists in manuscript form; we just came up with a way of notating where he would move ahead of me, areas where I’d move ahead of him…areas of simultaneity.

Post: Despite its improvisatory nature, Music Lingo is a pretty seamless listening experience. It unfolds, image by image, like a ghost story from rural Wisconsin.

What kinds of things set Lingo apart from its predecessors that listeners might not be aware of?

MJR: First of all, you can’t compare it

to screaming and hollering with rock music going on or poetry being read next to jazz. Secondly, it’s really an attempt to improvise, and Music Lingo depends on an audience. Our job was to create an art object and do so with dozens of people there, experiencing it. That kept Jack and I very objective and end-productoriented.

We kept things at a certain thematic level, and it was very hard to sustain.

It was exhilarating, but it was hard work because you couldn’t get lost. You couldn’t find yourself going, “Wait, what did I just say?” You had to keep in touch with the process.

Post: Since Music Lingo, it could be argued that you and Jack have taken a jazz musician’s approach to the reading of poetry. This could be traced to, say, The Grateful Dead’s performance ethic. Everything they did was for that moment, that venue, those people. Isn’t it ironic, then, that the techniques that preceded yours had jazz bands behind them?

MJR: You’re absolutely right. The textual basis of Music Lingo and my poetry book, Divisions I, is all about the experience of jazz: the emotions, the players, the people around you…

The basic elemental themes, which are musical, are the same. The imagery and the words are the same. The rise and fall of drama was also identical in all the performances, but there’d be

many times, using the process of jazz to approach poetry, where we’d get into a timbre, and I’d repeat sections that were connecting which were not on the page.

With this in mind, it only made sense to have an audio equivalent of the experience.

Post: What would you say your main inference is about why poetry has progressed the way it has? It seems poetry has developed this odd cultural status, something that is easily ridiculed.

MJR: Poets have fallen by the wayside for all sorts of reasons: trying too hard, not being connected to the past and not realizing that what they’re doing has been done before. Worst of all, poetry today has no form to it.

Today’s poets are trying to be not only relevant but also theatrical. In other words, I feel the tradition of oral poetry has gone in the wrong direction.

It’s become less literary and more performance-oriented. What I see and hear in the world of poetry is not objective lately. Because of that, the quality is dissipating and the performance has become hysterical, careening off the literary map into theater.

Post: Based on those inferences, how do you feel about, say, poetry on Craigslist?

To me, it’s a good gauge of where things at with art in society.

MJR: Craigslist poetry…is what it is, isn’t it? I don’t have a lot of respect for most of the poetry that I run into, mostly

because today’s poets have gone into an area that is fun only. The ethos is, “How ironic can I be?” It’s acting.

Obviously there are poets who are doing different things, but when I read a poem, I rarely see architecture. The projectivist poets addressed this, the architecture of poetry. To them, you shape it on the page the way it should sound. The manuscript for Music Lingo, if you were to look at it, is shaped exactly the way it comes out when Jack and I perform it. Jack took cues from the architecture of the written word…the ebb and flow, so to speak. Music Lingo was really my last stand in the world of fine art, and, since then, things have obviously changed.

One of the poetry community’s failures is that, in the case of Allen Ginsberg, it wanted to have the audience that Bob Dylan had. The other part is Ginsberg’s work really wanted to disturb the academic preset for what poetry was.

By doing so, he created marvelously inventive work, but for as much as I respect his work, he also set poetry back, in a way, to the extent that subjectivity began to creep into it.

You can check out all of Dr. Martin Jack Rosenblum’s works on his website: martinjackrosenblum.com.

uwmpost.com

September 26, 2011 13

A new super group is born Jagger, Stone, Marley join forces in SuperHeavy

By Graham Marlowe Assistant Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com

You know that above-average, endof-summer get-together that no one really plans but just kind of happens?

Such spontaneity can be hard to find on debut albums, but SuperHeavy – fronted by Mick Jagger, UK soul diva Joss Stone and reggae prince Damien Marley – blazes a new pop-music trail, with some help from Indian film composer A.R. Rahman and exEurythmics member and producer Dave Stewart.

Make no mistake, the don’t-thinkabout-tomorrow atmosphere is obvious here, but even the best of parties come with the occasional regret.

SuperHeavy’s self-titled album serves as a guest at that party, and, in each song, you’re led to believe that you’re actually at this thing – dancing your ass off, getting loose, talking to women and losing sense of time.

There’s an obvious, oddball chemistry amongst this songwriting team, and it’s accomplished without compromising the identity of those involved.

Every now and then, an attractive British woman (Read: Stone) gets a cultural pass to sing soul music. It is easy to envision her making a fool of American Idol participants, yet in the case of this record, she is part of a loose, multi-voice union. This somehow dilutes the egos of all involved and diminishes the stereotypical super group expectations. Anyone can write an album of party anthems. Not everyone can make you care about what happened at those parties.

With the personnel in mind, there’s a fine line between self-ref lection and f leeting, of-the-moment witticism.

Damien’s father, Bob Marley, latched onto such energy in his earliest, Catch a Fire, days and plowed through the

‘70s with a scorching live band. The thing is that nobody is stuck with the tab in this band.

Jagger, between vocal duties split like a game of musical chairs, prolongs his age-old stature as the eloquent drunk, apologetic fool (a la “Angie”). He also gets at least one big chance (“One Day One Night”) to emote and ref lect on the rundown nature of life on the road, and with the vintage, Banquet-era Rolling Stones throwback, “Never Gonna Change,” he takes two.

Where the swanky, blue-eyed Stone slides too comfortably into what’s happening, she always redeems herself. Whether she’s pillowing the voice of Jagger (“I Can’t Take It No More”) or coaxing another’s grief (“I Don’t Mind”), her hypnotic swagger comes straight from psychedelic-soul veterans Parliament/Funkadelic.

Damien’s presence is highly individual, if also warmly integrated.

On “World Keeps Turning,” he unlocks a reggae-pop cool as he unloads short, mellow paragraphs, an optimistic melancholy that also coats “Rock Me Gently,” a smooth signoff to good friends and passed time.

In the end, the message is essentially light, no matter what you’re holding in your hand to unwind for awhile. Judging by the way the Rolling Stones performed at the Super Bowl a few years back, Jagger hasn’t been this energetic about a record for many years. Even when he’s not directly involved with the on-tape magic – as in “Satyameva Jayathe,” which is sung in Sanskrit – his burnout-esque warmth can still be felt.

SuperHeavy has met “Beautiful People” in droves. The difference is where the Rolling Stones’ music provided respite from the cold hearts of hookers, hangers-on and heartbroken wannabes, the Sunday-morning afterglow is natural, not bittersweet.

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the uwm post

September 26, 2011

Irony wins supreme Cut Copy makes their mark

Youth gives tragic twist to Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s third outing

By Christopher Ryan Stone Special to The Post fringe@uwmpost.com

In the interest of passing objective judgment upon Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s new album, a list of its constituent elements is essential: the driving, synthesized strings of Disintegration-era Cure; smarmy, uninspired vocals stuck to the melody like flypaper; lyrics trite enough to feel welcome on a Killers’ single and an overbearing theme of remembrance.

The saddest part is that the above description is what it purports – a hackneyed mold into which each bland dollop of musical dough equally fits.

To add to the confusion, Hysterical is the band’s first release in almost five years (and seven years since they’ve done anything exceptional). It makes one wonder what the hell they’ve been up to.

The illustrious John Congleton produced the thing, and you’d think that such a figure, someone who has lent a sheen of melancholy sophistication to such acts as Antony & The Johnsons, John Darnielle and Bill Callahan, might be capable of beating the music into some form of sonic submission. Truth be told,

he does just that, but the main effect is homogeny, and that cannot be emphasized enough. It’s the kind of orchestral frill that gives an effective imprint to the beautiful lyrical conceits of those such as the abovementioned artists. But with doggerel, it just sounds like overkill.

“I need you to pretend that you are mine, and the water is just deep enough for another chance,” whines the angsty, teenage romantic channeled for “Misspent Youth.” Alas, his presence remains on “Maniac,” “I miss the way you stare at me as if I were a memory,” and on “Yesterday, Never,” “I wasn’t with you then, and it’s hard to tell if I am now.” And on. And on.

And on.

Yes, they’ve been aging temporally, accumulating greater distance daily from the exuberant brilliance of their selftitled, DIY release of 2005. As singer Alec Ounsworth gorgeously, dissonantly slipfalters on the finishing bars of the nearperfect “The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth” – “Like the hours I change softly, slowly, plainly blindly” – the nature of youth, of existence itself, is incessantly mutable and, thus, inescapably fleeting.

This renders the tragic fulfillment of Ounsworth’s naïve prophecy genius.

on Milwaukee

Headliners for Thursday’s show did not hold back

By Patrice Vnuk Staff Writer fringe@uwmpost.com Thursday night was a rewarding one for those who showed up to Turner Hall. Cut Copy, the headliners, drew a big crowd with Washed Out and Midnight Magic also on the ticket.

Being a big fan of both Cut Copy and Washed Out but not knowing what to expect from the show, I made sure to secure a spot next to the stage.

Midnight Magic got the night started with their stylish funkinspired sound. Lead singer Tiffany Roth earnestly engaged the crowd with her strong vocals and unabashed dancing. As far as energy was concerned, the band brought and radiated it throughout their entire performance, thereby doing their job to warm up the stage for Washed Out.

The much buzzed-about chillwave band, headed by Ernest Greene, attempted to balance between keeping with their brand of calm, cool music and putting on an entertaining and lively show. Upon seeing him, Greene was immediately added to my “pretty men with pretty voices” list, so I hardly minded that he asked the audience several times how we were doing. Their live performance, while different from their album, adapted well and seemed like a fresh take on the same music.

The anticipation and crowd grew once Washed Out left the stage. The many light stands and first-hand experience tales I heard from people indicated that Cut Copy encouraged active involvement, i.e., a lot of dancing. From what it looked like, everyone in attendance had been waiting pretty much a lifetime to see

these guys live. When the band took the stage, the crowd erupted into an almost manic cheer of excitement.

Throughout the near hour and a half set, Cut Copy played songs from all three of their albums, many of them from the most recent Zonoscope.

Their onstage antics were matched only by the hypnotic light show going on behind them. They were magnetic in almost every sense of the term.

The band ended the performance with a two-song encore, along with guitarist Tim Hoey standing on the drum set and smashing the symbols with his fists. Crowd surfers made their way overhead across the f loor, and dancers almost made the f loor collapse. There have definitely been worse Thursdays.

uwmpost.com

PAID ADVERTISEMENTS

September 26, 2011 15

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the uwm post

September 26, 2011

Now showing at a theater near you

A look at what’s to come at UWM’s Union Theatre

By Kevin Kaber

Assistant Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com

The UWM Union Theatre is one of the most notable and diverse movie theaters in the entire country, but it can be easy to overlook, in the context of studies and the day-to-day bustle of the UWM campus. Every week, the staff at The UWM Post provides a brief guide to the theater’s most notable titles, in an effort to encourage students to make the most of this unique and vibrant resource.

The critically acclaimed and award winning Danish documentary, Armadillo, premieres Friday at the Union Theatre.

Freedom (Tuesday, 7 p.m.)

If you didn’t have the chance to see Fuel a few weeks ago, another one of Josh Tickell’s documentaries, Freedom, makes its Milwaukee premiere on Tuesday as part of the Share the Earth Environmental Film Series. Along with his wife Rebecca, Tickell explores the never-ending struggle of establishing a true alternative to fossil fuels. Focusing on ethanol, a corn-and-sugar-derived fuel additive that has high hopes of becoming a cleaner, more efficient substitute to gasoline, the documentary outlines the issues surrounding the American adoption of the “green” fuel.

As part of the Freedom Tour’s stop in Milwaukee, an ethanol-powered bus, named Freedom, will be near the Union to view.

Armadillo (Friday 7 p.m., Saturday 5 p.m. & 9 p.m., Sunday 7 p.m.)

The Danish documentary Armadillo, another program of the World Cinema series, is not your average war-doc. Instead of being a traditional documentary with sit down interviews, stock footage and so on, Armadillo is some place in between fly-on-the-wall or cinéma vérité and fictional film. Filmmaker Janus Metz Pederson and his cinematographer take a true attempt at documenting a Danish squad’s mission near a Taliban camp. In the editing room, however, Pederson’s documentary footage molded into a form more suited to Hollywood, as the added music and the edits themselves were intended to heighten both the on-screen action as well as the viewer’s attention.

Le Rayon Vert (Friday 9 p.m., Saturday 7 p.m., Sunday 5 p.m.)

Also known by its American release moniker, Summer, 1986’s Le Rayon Vert will be shown at the Union Theatre in a restored 35mm print. Following the story of a young woman unwilling to commit to the single dating life, the film might seem all too common to some of today’s (and of its time’s) romantic comedies. However, the film belongs to the unconventional French New Wave group, of which Le Rayon Vert’s director Éric Rohmer is a leading member. Also a former editor of the French film criticism magazine, Cahiers du cinéma, Rohmer’s film (of which its title is an adaptation from a Jules Verne novel), is an intriguing combination of improvised dialogue and story in traditional Rohmer fashion.

uwmpost.com

September 26, 2011 17

Moneyball and the art of losing A baseball film without purpose can’t find direction

By Steven Franz Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com Upon its 2003 publication, Michael Lewis’ Moneyball sent shockwaves through the baseball world. Ostensibly a documentation about the new era of the game that had sprung up around “sabermetrics” – a style of statistical formula analysis that began in the 1970s with a small-time writer named Bill James who had the idea that wins could be systematically predicted with a variety of overlooked stats – the book was a wordy, numbers-obsessed bible that drew on the 2002 Oakland Athletics as a launching point for its critique of baseball’s outdated business structure.

Its ramifications were instantaneous: small-market baseball teams around the country (including the Milwaukee Brewers) began to incorporate its obsession with runs created and on-base percentage into their formulae. While the wisdom of Bill James (now a front office employee with the Boston Red Sox) had been around for three decades and had actually been incorporated into Major League Baseball canon in the 1990s, Moneyball was, nonetheless, a baseball revolution, widely regarded as one of the most important sports books ever written.

The only thing that the 2011 film version shares with the book is that it is about the 2002 Oakland Athletics.

The book was never particularly viewed as translatable to theaters – at least in a dramatic fashion – which is an idea that holds a great amount of traction now that the final product has emerged from rewrites, production hell and the collective doubts of almost everyone

involved to actually see the screen. And it never really justifies why it needed to be a movie to begin with.

Brad Pitt smirks his way through the film as Billy Beane, a one-time Major League washout who is, to this day, the general manager of the Oakland Athletics. At the film’s start, the Athletics have just lost the 2001 American League Division Series to the New York Yankees, along with superstars Johnny Damon and Jason Giambi to free agency. (Both players would eventually play for the Yankees.) Beane, under pressure from ownership, is challenged to put together a winning team with a miniscule $39 million payroll, which leads him to the writings of Bill James and a young one-time employee for the Cleveland Indians, Peter Brand (Jonah Hill, playing the fictional representation of real-life former Athletics Assistant General Manager Paul DePodesta).

But the film never really gets to the heart of the revolution that sabermetrics represents, only briefly touching on their substantial impact at the very end.

It attempts to function simultaneously as biography, historical drama and documentary, without ever finding the crossroads at which its diverging genres meet. As a result, the final picture is muddled and mostly ineffectual, with a few moments of brilliance shining through amidst a general lack of direction and identity.

As a biopic, Moneyball is cliché-ridden and sappy. As a dramatic reproduction of one of the greatest seasons in MLB history – the Athletics set a record that year with a 20-game winning streak capped off with a game-winning home run – it’s weak, only choosing to focus on a scant few of the players involved

while underwriting or ignoring many important cogs.

This presents a twofold problem.

On the one hand, it leaves out a great many important players, some of who were legitimate superstars, like Miguel Tejada, and conceptually undermine the film’s idea that the Athletics were without star power. On the other, the film effectively singles out individual players for their team impact, something Bill James and sabermetrical analysis, which it is ostensibly endorsing, strongly discourages.

It also paints many intelligent people in the A’s organization as clueless neophobic luddites, which is utterly, patently false. Considering that leading up to the 2002 season, the A’s won 87, 91 and 102 games from 1999 through 2001, in large part due to the people the film seems to classify as idiots – writing them into one-note corners and sucking them of weight in favor of a few snippy one-liners.

But as a documentary, the film is exceptional. The most compelling elements of its storytelling by far emerge through game video and play-by-play audio samples. During the documentary montage of the Athletics’ 20-game winning streak, the film is peerless, rivaling Ken Burns’ Baseball for its dramatic weight and poetry. At one point, a typically dramatic Bob Costas even lends voice work to the documentation of one of the greatest feats in the history of the game.

If the film had done the logical thing and been a documentary from the start, it could have been great. As it is, Moneyball is merely a star-studded capitalization on the idea that it doesn’t take star power or money to win.

An attempt to bring baseball stat nerdery to the big screen, Moneyball falls short of arguing its own importance, let alone the importance of its subject.

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the uwm post

September 26, 2011

Bourne Identity Junior

Abduction is a failed attempt at being a dignified action thriller

By Kevin Kaber Assistant Fringe Editor fringe@uwmpost.com

Abduction is a failed attempt at being a dignified action thriller.

Killers who kill Killer Elite doesn’t get past the title

By Sean Willey Staff Writer fringe@uwmpost.com

Killer Elite is trying to do a lot of things. Yes, it does succeed in being a nice, processed action flick for Mr. De Niro to pad his resume, and it possibly could land Jason Statham more personable roles. But just as the movie tells us in the opening subtitles, life is chaotic and so is this movie’s attempt at a plot.

The merits of the story that director Gary McKendry wants to tell are honorable in his first full-length picture.

You may soon find out, however, that things are mashed together solely for the sake of inappropriate complexity. It’s hard not to think, “Wait, wait, just slow down.”

If you’re going to do a tough guy vs. tough guy fight scene, especially in a medical storage lab with glass and needles, show some blood. That was almost as big a leap of faith as the one it took to look at Clive Owen’s mustache.

For the most part, though, all the fight scenes are as realistic as you’d envision them, even this one.

Stemming from the supposed truestory novel by Ranulph Fiennes (The Feather Men), which chronicles the events of two vigilantes formally of the British Secret Service, Danny (Statham)

and Hunter (De Niro) are forced into uncovering the suspected British cover-up of her majesty’s government’s involvement in the Oman War. An Oman Sheikh takes Hunter captive.

Danny runs to his rescue, not for the money but for the honor and respect he has for his mentor.

His mission is to kill three assassins.

(The Sheikh claims these three men killed his sons.) Danny must make them all look like accidents, so he does not arouse suspicion from the government.

But enter yet another hit man, Spike (Clive Owen), whose job it is to stop Danny in his tracks. That’s about it.

There isn’t any deep psyche-diving or anything like that, but there is Danny’s girlfriend who feels inappropriate to the story, to say the least.

Don’t deny Killer Elite your time if you find yourself drawn to these types of movies. It’s worthy of a watch for hardcore action lovers, but if you’re indifferent, scrolling your eyes to the next movie on the list might not be a bad idea.

De Niro must be applauded for the big-man-on-campus type of feel he gives.

It’s interesting to wonder if Statham made a nice networking choice, because De Niro may be the stepping stone he needs to finally land a role that requires more character development than just us knowing how much he works out.

Oh, teenagers these days. They always seem to be getting themselves in some sort of trouble. Whether they are underage drinking when their parents aren’t looking or finding themselves in the middle of a transnational terrorist plot, they never quite learn their lesson.

A product of MTV commercial goodness, John Singleton’s latest, Abduction, takes an already overdone story and markets it towards the teenyboppers.

Taking pages from already successful amnesic/lost-identity movies, like the Bourne series and Memento, Abduction chronicles highschooler Nathan Harper’s (Taylor Lautner, of Twilight fame) search for his true identity after finding himself on a missing persons website.

Nathan, the one-dimensional protagonist, is your average high school student – he goes to parties and crushes on the girl next door. Until he, Karen Lowell (the girl next door – and yes, romance ensues) and his token black friend, Gilly, uncover that he is not who he has been raised to believe.

Within moments of this discovery, guns are fired, Nathan’s pseudo-parents are murdered and his quaint suburban house is blown up by a bomb strategically placed in an oven. So begins the rest of the movie – a chase sequence interlaced with some cheesy romantic encounters and not nearly enough story as to why Serbian terrorists are after him in the first place.

Any chance of the movie having the slightest dignity is lost with the PG-13 rating. While violent in nature, Abduction is successful in minimizing its graphic displays of violent altercations

and gunfights, only showing enough so that the audience can play the rest out in their minds. If only the audience could play the rest of the whole movie out in their minds, it might generate a little bit more respect.

Unfortunately, Lautner’s expressionless, emotionless and bored countenance doesn’t keep up at all with Abduction’s story. After his parents are killed, Nathan has the same face on – albeit with two unnatural tears running down his cheek – as when he nabs that raunchy first face-sucking match with Karen. (Expect a nod for Best Kiss from the MTV Movie Awards.)

The dialogue is, at best, laughable.

In true Keanu Reeves fashion, Lautner’s line after he flees his blown-up house, “I just saw my parents get murdered in front of my eyes,” deserves a Razzie for acting and writing. But was acting ever the selling point behind the movie? No. The current MTV-watching generation has been so exposed to lackluster shows that the mere idea of “lowest common denominator” programming isn’t just a theory to them – it’s an unfortunate way of life and entertainment. Abduction has been produced in the same way. Nothing about it needs any intrinsic questioning, although the terrorists’ motives could have been cleared up a little more. At the very least, it needs to be something exciting to look at it, and it even fails at that.

Of course, teenagers will look at it differently and will, accordingly, make up the majority of the film’s ticket sales.

It is, after all, the Taylor Lautner action movie to end all action movies in their eyes.

uwmpost.com

September 26, 2011 19

The conclusion to an epic series

Gears of War 3 doesn’t do much to change what works

By Steven Franz Fringe Editor

fringe@uwmpost.com

There’s little doubt that when Gears of War debuted in 2006, it changed the face of video games. For one, it cemented Microsoft’s reputation not just as gaming system designers but as the developers of games themselves, being the second of the company’s industry-shifting titles after fellow shooter Halo.

But more than any series than perhaps Call of Duty, the Gears of War games came to represent the utter synergy of narrative and online gameplay (though Halo, its predecessor for the original Xbox system, deserves credit, too), culminating with the supremely popular Horde setting for Gears of War 2, in which players band together to defeat 50 waves of enemies with increasing difficulty.

The problem with arriving on the heels of perhaps one of the three best shooters

ever released is that there’s not much more you can do. Gears of War 2 was a nearly perfect video game – its environments ravishing, its narrative riveting and its online play engrossing. Where to improve?

While there are a few notable differences between Gears 2 and Gears 3, most of them positive, there’s not much done from a gameplay standpoint to distinguish the two from one another aside from the basic story, making them quite a bit like the Madden series. But the great thing about the Gears series is that the formula works so tremendously well that it ultimately doesn’t matter, and Gears of War 3 delivers an invigorating, if repetitive, gaming experience both offline and on.

One of the significant, and negative, differences between Gears 2 and Gears 3 is the sheer volume of cutscenes, which are so pervasive and lengthy that they end up disrupting the flow of the game as much as they add to the story. Gears of War

has always been a franchise that values its narrative as much as its unique and groundbreaking combat-based gameplay, and, as such, has always had a distinctly high volume of particularly cinematic cutscenes.

Most notably, the cutscenes have avoided the trap of falling into cliché and over-exposition, which is true here as well.

There’s a level of emotional depth to Gears characters untouched in other games, and a great deal of that has to do with the seriousness with which it takes its fictional narrative sequences, to its credit. Roger Ebert can eat his heart out.

But there’s such a thing as too much, and many of the cutscenes in Gears 3 deliver information over a four-to-fiveminute stretch that could have easily been accomplished during the gameplay itself, without much more emotional truth taken away. This means the narrative gameplay takes on a fight/scene/fight/scene/fight/ scene formula that becomes repetitive,

especially when not many of the combat sequences distinguish themselves from one another. (There are a few, though, including a beautiful underwater sequence where the player(s) must fight off sea monsters, mines and torpedoes from a submarine.)

But the game’s most notably massive improvement lies in its graphics, which convey a sense of texture and physical realism that has been unapproachable in the history of gaming. The environments, gorgeous as they were in the previous games, are jaw-dropping here – especially a particularly creepy level where the player navigates his way through a decimated cityscape filled with the flash-frozen ashen corpses of its inhabitants, caught forever fleeing from an unseen threat.

It can’t be overstated how important the environments are to the game, as they truly help alleviate the sometimes wearying level of repetitiveness involved in the otherwise immersive gameplay.

The same can be said, though to a lesser extent, for the online play. The developers of Gears of War 3 seem to understand just how thoroughly its predecessor absolutely nailed it. Accordingly, no important alterations have been made to the online mini-games, aside from environment and a few minor tweaks, such as the ability to construct barriers in Horde and the pricebased structure of modifier. (Barriers, “command centers” and ammunition now cost the game money you earn by completing certain achievements or levels.)

But for the most part, the structure is the same with a fresh start, which is great for gamers who didn’t want to spend the $40-plus Gears 2 required for its map packs that ultimately became required to continue playing on Xbox Live. Not falling into that trap again would probably be the best improvement Gears of War 3 could ever accomplish.

THE POST IS HIRING The Post currently has opening positions for:

Photographers Account Executives Comic Artists Section Writers Interested applicants should send an e-mail to post@uwmpost.com with the position title in the subject line.

the uwm post

20 September 26, 2011

EDITORIAL The following piece represents the views of the Editorial Board of THE UWM POST. The editorial board is not affiliated with the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee and these views do not represent the views of the university.

High cost of online courses not warranted

UWM wrong to use classes as cash cow Believe it or not, there was a time when online classes at UWMilwaukee were free, provided you took classroom courses as well.

Buried among thousands of articles within The UWM Post archives, a lone dispatch confirms this.

Dated February 9, 1999, the article “On-line courses now available to UWM students” reveals that, “Currently … in-state students who register for an on-line class pay their regular tuition; out-of-state students pay their regular out-of-state tuition.”

This was not the case for distancelearning students, but there was some justification in charging them, seeing as how they were exempt from segregated fees.

Flash forward a dozen years later.

Much has changed. For starters, the proper AP spelling is now “online.”

More significantly, the online fee originally only levied on distancelearning students now applies to everyone.

With a few exceptions, most online classes offered by UWM now come with a hefty special course fee. For College of Letters & Science classes,

that fee is $275. For Sheldon B. Lubar School of Business undergraduate classes, it’s $300. For all of these and then some, that cost is too high.

We understand money is tight at UWM right now. Considering the circumstances, it’s reasonable to charge a modest convenience fee for online classes. But UWM should understand that money is also tight for students, and several hundred dollars in surcharges are anything but modest. Frankly, it’s a bigger rip-off than textbooks.

While there are extra costs associated with developing online curriculum, they are nowhere near the amount taken in through online course fees. This is apparent when considering that UW-Madison, with a few exceptions, generally does not charge an additional fee for online classes. The disparity can only be accounted for by a deliberate decision on the part of UWM to use online course fees as a means of generating revenue.

This decision also means that charges are applied to those who can least afford them, as a recent twoyear study showed that low-income

students are among the groups that benefit most from online learning.

By making online courses so much more expensive, UWM is actually endangering the academic success of its poorest students.

This is not solely the fault of current administration.

Online courses were too expensive two years ago, when UWM’s budget was $20 million bigger than it is now, and Letters & Science courses were still nearly $200. But we believe that it is the responsibility of the current administration to work to reduce online course fees.

Online convenience works both ways. The university must find it very convenient to have students register for classes through PAWS, rather than swarming Mellencamp Hall by the thousands twice a year. Likewise, many classroom course teachers find it convenient to use D2L to conduct the bulk of their coursework. Just as it makes sense for UWM to encourage some online transactions, it behooves them not to discourage others by making them prohibitively expensive.

The gouging must stop.

LETTERS

TO THE EDITOR

All of us at THE UWM POST want to hear what you think and welcome your letters to the Editor. Feel free to comment about articles, opinions or anything you find in our weekly issues. Send your letters in an email to letters@uwmpost.com. In your submission indicate whether or not you wish to remain anonymous.

Chancellor Plenary Surely the Chancellor's promotions are inspiring and needed to advertise, advertise, to promote enrollment and it is certainly justified!

As only an older student auditing classes for personnel reasons, it is evident this is one of the most available, credited universities and open to all, non discriminate and friendly! Those of us in our age category of midlife and there are a few that stay connected here that are familiar w/ the wonder operations of this campus thru the years and Madison as well!

Just want to say keep on moving forward UWM! Constance Ann Depow

Gun Control Guns in general society DO cause a larger problem–more people die from guns in our country per year than most of the world’s other countries combined. While I do believe that we all have the right to defend ourselves from criminals who don’t have the same respect for the law, I am, frankly, skeptical about the ability of those hotheaded people among us to keep their clip in their slip after they’ve had a drink or two in them. Will be interested to see what Wisconsin’s murder-by-bullet rate looks like a year from now.

Josh Voyles Virginia Tech was pretty safe, huh?

I guess Columbine High School was safe too…

And look at those people over there in Norway… they were pretty safe too, huh? In a country that doesn’t allow any carry at all… they don’t even allow hollow point bullets there, yet somehow the killer had them.

[The gun control] argument is invalid because there are pages and pages of counter examples.

“Unsafe on campus”

Netf lix vs. Hulu Plus Netf lix’s streaming selection is horrible. I’d rather use services like TVDevo that offers more streaming options for no monthly fees. Better solution.

“Monica” I have both. I love them both. I must say that for my 8-year-old daughter, Hulu has almost NOTHING. Netf lix has many shows for her to watch.

“Aaron”

UWM Women’s Soccer Team Wow. Way to go for the women’s team. They are really playing (nationally) dominant soccer this season. Can’t wait to see how far they will go. I gotta get out and see them in person at Engelmann!

“GoPANTHERS”

The Meltwater House was originally constructed by architecture students and faculty for a competition in Washington D.C. Now the carbon neutral structure resides outside of Sandburg Hall where it will serve UWM as a classroom and meeting space. On Sunday Sept. 25 the university held an open house and invited members of the campus community to join in organic snacks and golf.

uwmpost.com

OP-ED

He’s Just Not That Into You Don’t give more than you receive

By Angela Schmitt Special to The Post editorial@uwmpost.com

Everyone has been in that awful situation where you meet someone and you like him, but for some reason, he just doesn’t seem to feel the same way about you. You can act as confused as you want, and your friends can spend hours telling you that maybe he’s just busy or something, but you know the truth. He’s just not that into you.

Oh, those six nasty little words! I almost screamed them at some girl I overheard lamenting to her friends in the bathroom of a bar recently, but I kept my mouth shut instead – until now that is.

This is the conversation I overheard.

Sad, confused girl: “So I’m really upset, because I told him that this weekend was his opportunity to really show me he cares, and he hasn’t done anything. He hasn’t even been responding to my texts, and he’s supposed to be proving himself. I don’t know what to do.”

Of course the girl’s friends all jumped in and said things like, “Don’t worry, he’ll text you back!” And, “I’m sure he likes you!” If they were good friends, though, they would’ve done what I wanted to do. They would’ve shouted at her, “DROP IT LIKE IT’S HOT.” Greg Behrendt co-wrote the bestselling book titled He’s Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys (2009, with Liz Tuccillo). In that book, he clearly states that if a guy likes you, he will make it obvious to you. If he’s not regularly texting you back, it’s probably because he doesn’t want to. And if he doesn’t even want to text you, he sure as heck doesn’t want to date you.

It’s a harsh reality. I understand that.

It’s not always easy to find someone you like and want to spend time with.

It sucks when they don’t return the sentiment, and you are left with that feeling of wondering why. What was it about me that he didn’t like?

Think of it this way. How many times has someone liked you, but you didn’t like them back? Why didn’t you like them? You didn’t want to date them, but that doesn’t mean you didn’t want to be their friend, did it? You’ve done it to people. It’s happened to all of your friends. In fact, most people, no matter how attractive they are, will find themselves at least once in a situation where they like someone who doesn’t like them back.

This kind of thing happens because we all have different tastes and opinions.

We are all looking for something specific in our partners. It’s not your fault if you didn’t have the things someone is looking for. It just means that they aren’t the right one for you.

Once you understand that, it should become a little easier to let go of the idea of that person. If you don’t let go, they will continue to disappoint you and make you feel bad about yourself, because if it’s not already working, it isn’t going to.

Once you realize that it’s not working, you need to walk away from it. It only hurts for a little bit, but it’s worth it. If you stick around, it will hurt constantly for as long as you stay, and you’re just wasting your time.

If Greg Behrendt can sell a bunch of books about it, I’m thinking he’s on the right track. Last time I checked, there weren’t any New York Times best sellers called Stick Around – He Might Want You One Day.

September 6, 2011 21

Great Lakes becoming less great

Ballast rules and invasive species threaten good ol’ Lake Michigan

By David Rangel Special to The Post editorial @uwmpost.com

Milwaukee residents are fortunate to live along such a large, picturesque body of water like Lake Michigan. The lake serves as a hub of social activity, recreation and commerce. It's an asset to our city that's deteriorating – along with the other Great Lakes – at the hands of our government.

Now more than ever, invasive species are entering the Great Lakes in alarming numbers, by way of contaminated ballast tanks on foreign freighters going up the St. Lawrence Seaway.

The International Maritime Organization came up with a standard that allows a set number of species of a certain size to be discharged from the ballasts of ships. The problem with this is that the standard was a result of political negotiations that lacked the backing from scientists, those actually knowledgeable on the subject. In fact, most scientists and conservationists argue that the implemented IMO standard for ballasts will not protect the Great Lakes from future invasive species.

Credit should be given to New York

Gov. Andrew Cuomo for regulating ballast discharge. He has implemented standards that are one hundred times more stringent than those set by the IMO. The move was a prudent, environmentally-responsible one that scientists claim should be the norm if we are to prevent further damage to the Great Lakes.

Governor Walker, along with governors of the other eight Great Lake states and Canadian officials, are asking Cuomo to ease off on his stringent agenda regarding ballast discharge. They claim that New York is implementing standards that are impossible to meet at this time.

They further fear that regulation will affect the entire Great Lakes shipping industry, possibly resulting in the closing of the St. Lawrence Seaway, as any Atlantic ships going to ports such as Chicago, Milwaukee or Cincinnati must pass through New York waters.

It is difficult to imagine that a governor would consider such drastic actions if they threatened to affect a major thoroughfare – and possibly the entire economy of their state. Cuomo likely took this into consideration when implementing the stringent ballast standards. The conclusions of Walker

and the other governors smell of an “anything for profit” stench.

Walker and crew have dropped the ball by calling Cuomo's regulations into question, rather than getting behind them. In a situation that currently seems to have no room for compromise, the betterment of massive natural resources that affect thousands of people must take precedence over the profits of the shipping industry.

It could be argued that technologies need to be perfected before they are put into use. Yet in the case of New York's strict ballast discharge standards, it's a gamble worth taking, being that the current standards are doing very little to help the Great Lakes.

One would be naive to think that the Great Lakes haven't had serious pollution problems for decades. But to maintain current IMO standards for ballasts would only be exacerbating a years-long problem that is already going to take considerable time to fix.

We must consider the finite amount of fresh water that we have to live on and the effect it will have on future generations. You don't have to be an ecofanatic to realize that this should not be a partisan issue, but, rather, a human issue.

What the hell am I going to do with my life?

Classroom courtesies See it, believe it, reach out and grab it.

Don’t be “that guy” in the classroom

By Miranda Rosenkranz Special to The Post editorial@uwmpost.com

With a solid start to the new semester, students have had ample time to get back into the school routine and figure out classroom etiquette – yet some people still ignore basic manners and consideration for fellow classmates. Irritations, such as tardiness, technological distractions and/or seating conflicts, make class more of a hassle than necessary. These offenses appear rude and distract other students and the professor. Avoiding lecture hall infractions makes the entire learning experience more enjoyable for everyone involved.

Punctuality and staying the entire time of class is expected, not optional.

There is always one person who shows up late to lecture almost every class. When the door opens in a quiet classroom, people crank their necks to see who is late. This distracts other students and interrupts the professor. Is it difficult to leave your house or dorm a few minutes earlier to make it to class on time?

Sometimes there are exceptions, but frequent tardiness is unacceptable.

Likewise, leaving early diverts attention from the lecture and interrupts the learning of students who stay the entire time period. Everyone has places to be and things to do. If a lecture conflicts with your personal or work schedule, then save your classmates the annoyance, and do not take the class.

Class is also not the place to check Facebook and stay current on the latest

TV episodes. When listening to a professor ramble on, it is easy to get distracted by someone’s laptop showing an episode of Jersey Shore or a game of Brick Breaker. Please take notes on your computer and nothing else.

Your social life may be top priority, but classmates do not want to see you or your friend’s Facebook pages. Humans are easily distracted. When a person in front is browsing the internet, people behind are probably watching, too.

Perhaps the worst classroom situation is trying to find a seat when the aisles desks are all taken. The unavoidable crotch-or-butt-in-face situation inevitably arises. If you try to slide past the person in the aisle seat with your back to them, a whack to their face with your backpack is highly likely. If you suck in your stomach and face them while trying to squeak past, the aisle sitter gets a lovely eye-level view of your crotch.

An easy way to avoid this awkward predicament is to sit in the middle of the row. If you are early to class, move in. This simple solution eliminates the possibility of a backpack whack or lointo-face exposure.

Students pay for tuition, books and miscellaneous other costs and fees. They attend lecture, take notes and study hard. Distracting people or making them uncomfortable violates their right to learn in the university environment.

Practice common courtesy in order to make the college learning experience agreeable for all involved.

By Jesse Anderson Special to The Post editorial@uwmpost.com

At age four, I wanted to be a garbage man. How fun it would have been to ride on the back of the garbage truck!

Alas, years passed and the dream of cruising the streets on the back of a grimy garbage truck faded. Then, on the first day of school, the teacher asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up, Jesse?" Hmmm...

What I didn't know then many of my peers don't know now – that is, what to do with life.

I recently overheard a girl complaining about money she "wasted" on classes she wasn't fond of. She took classes she thought would be easy, and now she was upset about it.

It was hard not to tell her my secret. After learning 2,087 lessons the hard way, I figured it out. The process revealed a pattern, and it may be worth something to readers.

In high school, still uncertain about the future, I didn't care about anything but partying and being the guy who could take it the farthest. Getting blazed all day, sleeping in class and slamming beers all night seemed awesome, for a while anyway.

Somehow I graduated and ended up a construction worker. The compensation was good at $22 an hour with full benefits. Now I could fund the party to ridiculous levels. I'd be a liar if I said I didn't enjoy working hard and playing

hard, but it evolved into discontent and disaster. That's another story.

After seven years in the workforce, I willfully became a broke college student.

College became part of a rough plan developed on the verge of heat stroke.

While swinging a sledgehammer in desert-like heat with a bunch of disgruntled, leather-faced pricks, something clicked. Being a tool wasn't cool – no matter how much cash there was to spice up my mediocre life.

When envisioning a future, pouring concrete for 40+ years wasn't appealing.

Something bigger and better was in store. I felt it.

The girl upset about her future because she let apathy choose her classes didn't see an appealing future, either. I hope she finds her way, because doing so is liberating.

With that, I introduce to you the key to perpetual happiness and motivation.

Step #1: Know thyself.

Take a fearless personal inventory.

Learn your strengths and weaknesses.

Who are you, and what do you want to give to the world? Do you like helping people? Are you creative? Do whatever necessary to realize who you really are, whether looking at old family photos, taking personality and aptitude tests or writing down your memories.

Being honest with yourself is key.

Step #2: See it.

Visualize the ideal future. I want to be a photojournalist, so I envision traveling the world, taking photos and writing.

These are my three passions. When I envision them culminating in a career that's essentially going to be 40 percent of my life, there becomes an explosion of energy and a smile that won't quit. The vision is a living, evolving thing that requires persistence and imagination.

Step #3: Believe it.

Your life is worth a noble motive.

Believe in something big. Having confidence in yourself is half the battle.

If you can know who you are and can visualize exactly what you want, you can achieve it. Remember, confidence is acting with fear, not without it.

Step #4: Reach out and grab it.

Do whatever it takes to get there.

Immerse yourself in anything to do with your vision. Getting an education is a good start. Just do it wisely. Get involved. I promise it is worth it. Make friends with similar interests, build networks, take advantage of all that UWM has to offer. Have fun, but keep the shenanigans reasonable. It's like a freight train – it's hard to get momentum going, but once you do, it's hard to stop.

Best of luck with finding your way; I believe you can do it.

22

September 6, 2011

COMICS

the uwm post

PRIMAL URGES Andrew Megow

HE SAID, SHE SAID

Kat Rodriguez

MOCK DUCK SOUP

Mitch Moeser

Andrea Thurner

LUNA’S UPSIDE DOWN WORLD

PET OF THE WEEK

Natalie is a 1 1/2 year old Shepard Beagle Mix adopted from the Wisconsin Humane Society.

She lives a few blocks from UWM in a UWM alumni household. She enjoys long walks around the UWM campus (and an occasional dip in the library fountain) as well on Downer Ave and the Lakefront.

PUZZLES

uwmpost.com

September 6, 2011

23

THEUWMPOST CROSSWORD SUDOKU ACROSS 1 Swamp 6 Lambs 11 Card game 14 Angry 15 Barbera’s partner in animation 16 Frozen water 17 NL Central division-winning outfielder (2 wds.)

19 Contend 20 Track circuit 21 Mr. T show, once 22 Await confirmation 23 Tree type 25 Earth science 27 NL Central division-winning infielder (2 wds.)

32 Suffix for hallow or eight 33 Times 34 Skip the restaurant (2 wds.)

37 Group of criminals 39 Greek letter 41 Baby word, maybe 42 Parody 44 Big hairdo 47 Japanese carp 48 NL Central division-winning infielder (2 wds.)

52 Spice in Italian seasoning 54 Bench 55 Not yours 56 Ogle 59 Freudian term 62 Superlative suffix 63 NL Central division-winning infielder (2 wds.)

66 Hair product 67 Moral principle 68 Musical production 69 Some 70 Bat droppings 71 School assignment

INSTRUCTIONS: Fill in the squares so that every row, every column, and every 3x3 box contains the numbers 1 through 9 exactly once.

DOWN

31 Newton of physics

1 Hr. part 2 Word before ether 3 Indian prince 4 Speed up (with “it”; 2 wds.)

5 That woman 6 Ruined 7 Bunny relative 8 Employ 9 Tooth covering 10 Cooking device 11 Approximately (3 wds.)

12 Cake decoration 13 Desperate 18 Creator 22 Appeal 24 Top card 26 Praiseful poem 27 Margarets, for short 28 Harvest 29 Without guilt 30 Chubby

35 Teen hero 36 Hammer this 38 Canyon part 40 Flying saucer 43 U.S. flight authority 45 Indian monetary unit 46 Long distance number 49 At the original position (2 wds.)

50 “You’re caught!”

51 Uses a broom 52 Last letter of the Greek alphabet 53 Gotten up 57 Related (to) 58 Puerto ____ 60 They follow effs 61 Gumbo vegetable 63 Normal (abbr.)

64 Unhappiness 65 Declare

solution found on page 4

GODOKU

INSTRUCTIONS: Fill the squares so that every row, every column, and every 3x3 bo contains the following letters exactly once: L, A, T, B, E, D, O, W, H. One row or column will reveal a hidden word!

solution found on page 4

solution found on page 4

This puzzle shows an original drawing as done by a lad of nine and is given to encourage young puzzlists to attempt similar work. It is told that three neighbors, who shared a small park, as shown in the sketch, had a falling out. The owner of the large house, complaining that his neighbor’s chickens annoyed him, built an enclosed pathway from his door to the gate at the bottom of the picture. Then the man on the right built a path to the gate on the right, so that none of the paths cross!

24 September 6, 2011

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