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Campus operations freeze An American Robin sits in a tree as the first snow begins to fall Feb. 6 while campus closes early. ALYSSA LESLIE / THE TORCH
Snow cancels classes for second time in three months J. Wolfgang Wool News Editor Snowfall closed Lane’s Eugene, Cottage Grove and Florence campuses Feb. 6 and 7. By Feb. 10, trees had buckled under the weight of snow and ice, brushing the windshields of vehicles in the right lane along the drive to 30th Ave. coming to Lane. Lane Alerts were sent out via text and email shortly after 11 a.m. and then again after 11:50
a.m. Feb. 6. While both emails informed students Lane Transit District would cease services after 1 p.m., the first text message did not mention LTD. Several students dependent on LTD services were stranded on campus. “I saw how there was a mass exodus from campus happening so I just waited around,” student government president Paul Zito said. “It took me two seconds to pick (my friends) up, then 20 minutes to get off campus.”
Chief Human Resource Officer Dennis Carr said LTD told Lane that buses would not be able to make it over 30th Avenue after 1 p.m. According to an email from LTD Director of Customer Service and Planning Andy Vobora, this storm in particular resulted in more impromptu detours from downed trees and power lines. “What I heard unofficially was that when LTD decided to close earlier than expected
ASLCC adds environmental studies student to Senate
Student leaders endorse new senator’s initiative Taya Alami Reporter Lane’s student government filled one of the vacancies in its senate by ratifying environmental studies student Emily Aguilera. “I’m all about sustainability,” Aguilera said. “It’s one of the big things in my life.” The Associated Students of Lane Community College Senate voted unanimously to ratify Aguilera as a member during its Feb. 12 meeting. During the meeting, Aguilera told student leaders she wanted to join the ASLCC
Senate to help make sure students’ voices are heard. “I got involved in student government because I feel students’ ideas, concerns and interest should be met, and I feel I can be a big part of that,” Aguilera said. “I feel like I can contribute a lot to this group.” Student leaders said Aguilera’s initiative sets her apart. Aguilera began volunteering for the ASLCC in January, when student leaders invited her to attend Lane’s Martin Luther King Day ceremony and she volunteered to be an
usher for the event. Since then, ASLCC Sustainability Coordinator Michael Weed said, Aguilera has been volunteering for every ASLCC event possible. “It’s been a long time since we’ve had such a passionate person, and she speaks to what passion is about,” Weed said. ASLCC Student Resource Director Jennifer McCarrick said Aguilera’s positive attitude has been refreshing for the organization. “I think she will be an excellent asset to our family,” McCarrick said.
because of worsening conditions, I heard that they sent extra buses out here,” Lane Public Information Officer Joan Aschim said. Carr said Lane makes closure decisions based on LTD readiness and three local school districts: Eugene, Springfield and Bethel. “If the school districts have made a closure decision then we also follow those three large school districts and make a similar closure decision,” Carr
said. “We monitor and partner with those school districts (because) we know many of our students at Lane have children.” Facilities receptionist Debby Dybevik relayed from her supervisors that the department is currently reacting to situations as they arise and does not have a current estimates on the cost and damages to the school. However she said they believe it will be less than from the snowfall in December 2013.
Board approves new medical coding program Taya Alami Reporter Lane’s Board of Education has voted to add a new degree to the school’s offerings by unanimously approving the Associate Applied Sciences Degree of Health Information Management. The board’s vote makes Lane the third school in the state to offer the degree after Portland Community College and Central Oregon Community College in Bend. Students wishing to enroll in Portland’s program are currently facing a two-year waiting period. “Our (program) will be 100 percent online,” board member Matthew Keating said. “That’s key.” Lane Program Coordinator Shelley Williams said the necessary courses have already been
developed. The degree will also integrate itself with the college’s High School Connections program, enabling high school students to begin taking the program’s coursework prior to graduation, before they begin the second year of the program when they transition to Lane. Prior to the board’s vote during its Feb. 5 meeting, department representatives presented board members a report on their new program. According to the American Health Information Management Association, there are 104 different job titles the graduates would be qualified to choose from, although only three are listed in the application. “This particular program will also help with our continuing education program, and CONTINUED ON PAGE 2
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NEWS EDITOR
NEWS
J. WOLFGANG WOOL
Lane Community College’s student-run newspaper
STAFF EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Clifton Haney
MANAGING EDITOR Alyssa Leslie
NEWS EDITOR J. Wolfgang Wool
SPORTS EDITOR Jarrid Denney
A&E EDITOR
Laura Newman
REPORTERS
Taya Alami Jackson Dietel Crystal Gasser Cameron Hughey Tran Nguyen Chris Patrick Chris Piepgrass Anna Tatum
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MAtt edwards / THE TORCH
Continuing with the momentum of last week’s club fair, Gender and Sexuality Alliance member Patrick Burkhardt (left), with co-presidents T. Napier (middle) and Christian Mello (right), sells a penis-shaped cake to first-year student Jessica Williams during a naughty bake sale fundraiser in the Center Building Feb. 12.
Club fair opens opportunities for students Tran Nguyen Reporter On Feb. 4 and Feb. 5, with balloons floating at the entrances and music playing loudly inside, Lane’s main campus cafeteria was packed with student organizations LCC Students for Liberty, the Gender and Sexuality Alliance, and others handed out flyers and interest cards to students at lunch. According to John Price, Lane’s student government events coordinators and the fair’s organizer, 15 clubs and identity unions participated in the event, attracting interest from over 200 students. “It was a very successful event,” Price said. “Many of
the clubs and unions struggle with membership, so having these club fairs allows students on our campus to see what clubs we have here at LCC and how they can get involved.” LCC Students for Liberty President Bryan Sanders received 35 interest cards, and five people signed up for the club meeting within the first hour of the event. “This will bring a lot more people with interesting topics to our meetings,” Sanders said. Across the hall, the Gender and Sexuality Alliance was introducing its new activities, including a movie night at Titan Court, a “naughty” bake sale for Valentine’s Day and a
poster competition. “(GSA’s goals) are to help and let people in our community know that they are not alone,” GSA member Rhys Fuller said. “We are not somebody who other people can look down on.” International Students Club President Tadeus Christian Lieujaya decided to not join the club fair this term because of the fair’s inefficiency. “I don’t have time because of class and few of us were interested,” Lieujaya said. Last year, three new students signed up, but none of them actively participates in the club. First-year international student Tung Nguyen said he was impressed by the
fencing club. “I would never have a chance to do fencing in my hometown,” Nguyen said. “It’s my first time to see the real sword. It’s huge!” Nguyen said he did not want to linger around the club’s table. “The hallway is such a small place to stop and check out, with the huge flow of people coming to lunch,” Nguyen said. First-year Lane student Jack Carroll said he did not know any clubs or identity unions until this fair. “I don’t have enough time to look at what we have on our campus,” Carroll said, “but I know some of the clubs now.”
Medical coders can expect to earn $49,000 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 our entrepreneurial enterprise of training incumbent workers in both electronic records and medical coding,” Lane Dean of Health Professions Sheryl Berman said. In the healthcare industry, everything that happens must be kept track of, so every symptom and treatment is assigned a ninedigit numerical code that acts as a shorthand to medical terms, many of which are spelled with a high number of letters. The codes are used to keep medical records efficiently. Students graduating with the new associate’s degree will be certified as specialists in this aspect of healthcare. The most lucrative career path for a new graduate with the degree is working as a certified medical coder. According to the American As-
THE TORCH / Thursday, feb. 13, 2014
sociation of Professional Coders, the national average annual salary for a certified professional coder in 2013 was approximately $49,000. Berman said Lane Workforce projects, at minimum, a 28 percent increase in demand in Oregon over the next few years, with a projected demand above 30 percent outside of the state. Upon completion of the program, coders will be capable of doing their jobs unsupervised, and under some jobs, they will be eligible to work from home, as long as their computers have adequate security to protect patients’ personal information. “This degree is going to be the biggest goldmine for any student anywhere in this country,” said board member Gary LeClair, who is a gynecologist at his Springfield medical practice.
“You can get in trouble for undercoding. You can get in trouble for overcoding,” LeClair said. “If you had somebody who knew a lot about coding at your side once a week, they will pay you back in terms of charges you’re forgetting, because you don’t remember to circle that box or check that box.” The number of medical codes in use increases as more medical conditions and treatments are discovered and added to the International Classification of Diseases, which is maintained and published by the World Health Organization. The current nine-digit coding system, the ICD-9, will soon be replaced with a recently developed 10-digit medical coding system known as the ICD-10. According to the World
Health Organization, the current ICD-9 has 6,969 medical codes, while the ICD-10 will have a total of 14,199 codes. It is not possible to translate ICD-9 codes into ICD-10 codes. “We’re very aware of the ICD-9 and 10, and our program is up to date,” Berman said. “We’re getting a lot of people to come back and train and transition from ICD-9, so we’re taking advantage of that.” The transition to the ICD-10 is slated for Oct. 1, while the launch of the 11-digit ICD-11 is scheduled for 2017. “It’s going to revolutionize medicine,” LeClair said. “We’re just going to be wallowing in confusion and misinformation. If there’s somebody out there that can do coding, it will save a lot of trouble for a lot of people.”
A&E EDITOR
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ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
LAURA NEWMAN
Instructors screen documentaries in Building 19 Laura Newman A&E Editor Two Lane instructors have rallied together to present a free, four-part documentary movie series for students and faculty, which depicts injustices toward women today on a global scale. The weekly screenings are shown in Building 19, Room 250. Lane health and sustainability instructor Susie Cousar and Women’s Center coordinator Patsy Raney, a part-time social science instructor, said they are bringing the issues discussed in their classes to a larger audience. “It’s a class about patriarchy. It’s a class about dominance over ways of being in the world,” Cousar said about her Global Health and Sustainability course. “Dominance over ways of being lead to hierarchical thinking, which leads to ‘some people are worth something and some people aren’t ’ — which leads to pretty much any other health issue we have in the world.” The film series consisting of three different films: Half the Sky, America the Beautiful and Miss Representation. Half the Sky is a four-hour documentary split into two, two-hour showings. The first was shown Feb. 12. “The first two (films) are a global perspective, while the last two focus more on in this country — contemporary issues here. I want people to see those connections too,” Raney said. “Because a lot of my students will say, when they read about the realities of some sort of culture practices ... they’ll say, ‘Those poor women. I’m so glad I live here.’ That’s their initial response. They can’t see the connection.” Half the Sky is adapted from a
SFS
Laura Newman / THE TORCH
Lane instructor Susie Cousar (left) sits with Women’s Center coordinator Patsy Raney.
Showings: Building 19, Room 250, from 2:30-4:30 p.m. Feb 12- Half the Sky: Part I Feb 19- Half the Sky: Part II Feb 26- America the Beautiful Mar 5- Miss Representation book by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, two journalists who travel around the world documenting the struggles and oppression of women. The film addresses abuse, rape culture and injustice, which may disturb some viewers. However, the films don’t strictly focus on problems, but on empowerment, and solutions. “People are constantly challenging these situations, organizing to change them — regular people doing extraordinary things,” Raney said. America the Beautiful and Miss Representation deal with issues that concern women in America, such as standards of beauty, body image and the scarcity of women in power in this country. The film series syncs with the organization One Billion Rising’s Feb. 14 Valentine’s Day celebration. One Billion Rising
is a nonprofit organization that aims to fight violence and injustice towards women. Lane student Vicki Epperson, who volunteers at Learning Service through Raney’s Women in Work course, assisted in creating the film series. Learning Service volunteers spend a minimum of 10 hours in a community organization or on a special project in relation to a relevant class to earn alternative points to a final course project. “There are a few more responsibilities than I imagined for a 10-hour project. However, I’m enjoying every minute,” Epperson wrote in an email. “I am coordinating viewing rooms, dates/times, advertising, goodies (free popcorn) and presenting information about the movie series in each of my classes. I will also facilitate at each of the movies.”
Epperson took on this project because she was passionate about the themes and significance of the films. “We need to be educated that the insidious nature of gender discrimination is still very real,” she wrote. Rage, agitation and discomfort are a few of the adjectives Raney used to describe the personal impressions of these movies. “There are going to be issues there and things that are brought to people’s attention that are hard to look at, literally and figuratively, but also very important to see,” Raney said. “The awareness has to be there before action can be taken.” Both instructors encourage students to attend these screenings, but to be prepared for the global reality of these films. “You have to be open to the fact that things around you are happening that you are not aware of, and that part of getting the most out of this series is to come in open to things that you think you would know about that you don’t know about,” Cousar said, “and it can be very painful. Part of the process,
though — it’s the pain that brings you to a place of empowerment like you have never felt.” Admission for these events is free and organic popcorn will be provided for participants. Sign in for the event is required at the beginning of each viewing.
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The Torch / Thursday, feb. 13, 2014
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sPORTs EdITOR
SPORTS
JARRID DENNEY
snowstorm scrambles basketball schedule The men’s basketball team will play five games in the next 10 days
Jarrid Denney Sports Editor Due to the closure of Lane’s campus during last week’s snowstorms, all practices and games for both the men and women’s basketball teams were canceled. Both Titans squads were scheduled to face the Mt. Hood Community College Saints at home on Feb. 8, but, once the snowstorms hit, those contests were postponed to Feb. 10. However, on Feb. 10, the Northwest Athletic Association of Community Colleges website announced that the games would again have to be rescheduled, because Mt. Hood did not have school that day. The official date for the games is now Feb. 17 at Titan Coliseum. The women are scheduled to tip off at 5:30 p.m., while the men’s game will begin at 7:30 p.m. These schedule changes will affect each team differently. Both squads were given a four-day break from all basketball activities from Feb. 6 to Feb. 9, and neither team has played a game since each traveled to Roseburg on Feb. 5. to take on the Umpqua Community College Riverhawks. “I think it’s fabulous. It gave us four days off to rest our legs. You never get four days off in conference play,” Lane men’s head coach Bruce Chavka said. “It helps us because we really have only been playing seven guys.” The Titans men now enter a stretch where they will play their last five games of the regular season over a 10-day period, including three away games. They are currently in sixth place with a 5-5 record in NWAACC South Region play, but could see their fortunes change soon, as they are only one game out of second place. Four teams are tied for second in the South Region at 6-3, meaning one win could vault the Titans back into playoffs contention. “Our season is gonna be
decided here in the next couple weeks,” Chavka said. Lane began its strenuous road trip on Feb. 12 when the Titans lost to the Linn Benton Community College Roadrunners by a score of 74-67 in Albany, OR. That loss followed an 86-67 blowout over the Umqua Community College Riverhawks on Feb. 5. Sophomore forward Zach Kirschbaum led the Titans that night with 20 points and 14 rebounds. The women have a slightly easier road. They will play one fewer game than the men, due to the fact that Linn-Benton Community College carries a men’s basketball program, but not a women’s. The Titans’ women have the toughest part of their schedule behind them. They have already played the Riverhawks, who hold first place in the NWAACC South Region, as well as the thirdplace Clackamas Community College Cougars. “We’re not really relieved,” Lane women’s head coach Greg Sheley said. “I enjoy playing against good teams.” Lane is currently in second place, trailing Umpqua by one game. The Titans had an opportunity to take control of the region and complete a season sweep of the Riverhawks on Feb. 5, but were unable to capitalize. Umpqua’s tough zone defense kept Lane out of the paint, and the Titans responded by shooting a dreadful 10-of47 from three-point range, en route to a 85-66 loss. Unlike the men’s team, the Titan women will have a long waiting period until their next game. They will head to Portland Community College on Feb. 15 to take on the Cougars, meaning they will have a 10-day gap between their Feb. 5 loss to the Riverhawks and their next matchup. “I hope it won’t adversely affect us,” Sheley said. “I am hoping the extra time off will rejuvenate us for the final three weeks of the season.”
THE TORCH / THuRsday, fEb. 13, 2014
MATT EDWARDS / THE TORCH
Lane freshman point guard dyrall Goods led the Titans with a season-high seven assists feb. 1 against Clackamas Community College in Oregon City.
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