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KU football closes out season with blowout loss to Baylor
Monday, December 2, 2019
WHAT’S NEW AT KU News on deck at kansan.com
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Kansas City band prepares for life after graduation
The Student Voice Since 1904
Vol. 139/Issue 27
KU changes course
After a partnership with an international student recruitment agency fell short on its projections, the University had to rethink its strategy
Man found dead
Sarah Wright/UDK
International students wave flags from their homes during the 2019 homecoming parade. There are now 109 countries represented at the University of Kansas.
Nicole Asbury @NicoleAsbury
Contributed by Hannah Cruise
Canoe Battleship
KU Recreation Services added Canoe Battleship as a new intramural sport this year. Teams shovel water into each other’s canoes in an attempt to sink them.
After years of falling international student enrollment, the University of Kansas has been forced to rethink its goals when it comes to recruiting students around the world. In 2014, the University signed a contract that could have been worth millions. It didn’t work out. The University agreed in 2014 to become one of two college partners in the United States with Shorelight Education, a Boston-based recruitment agency that connects international students with American universities. The University hoped to double its international enrollment.
The Kansan obtained an unredacted version of the Shorelight contract after a complaint was filed to the Kansas Attorney General’s Office in October 2018. The Kansan originally requested a copy from the University through an open records request, but the version obtained redacted information about how much money is exchanged between the company and the University. The unredacted version of the contract states Shorelight would be paid $2 million a year through the partnership to recruit hundreds of international students annually. However, since the number of students being recruited was so low, the partnership is not meeting its original
projections. In 2014, there were 2,283 international students at the University. Now, 2,031 international students are enrolled — an 11% decrease in the last five years. “Given the international recruitment market nationally, the original projections are no longer realistic,” Charles Bankart, vice provost for international affairs, said in an October 2018 email to the Kansan. The entities agreed on an enrollment “limit,” or max capacity of 2,650 new international students by the 2018-19 school year. No minimums were set, according to the University’s contract with Shorelight. Continue on page 2
From Lawrence locals to legends: Names that stand the test of time Contributed by David McKinney
Shannon Blunt
Contributed photo
Left to right: Hugh Cameron, Leo Beuerman, John Schneider and Jimmy Tucker are Lawrence legends.
Liam Mays
@LiamWMays
The Jayhawks will play the Buffalos in Allen Fieldhouse. Tip-off is set for 6 p.m.
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Lawrence bike shop makes best bike shop list for seventh year @TiannaJWitmer
On the horizon
Chance Parker/UDK
Despite Chick-fil-A’s announcement that it will no longer support anti-LGBTQ+ organizations, some faculty and students at the University of Kansas say their opposition to having the food chain on campus will not change. Faculty Senate President Shawn Leigh Alexander said his stance is no different from what it was in August, when he endorsed the Sexuality and Gender Diversity Faculty Staff Council’s letter expressing concerns with the University’s moves to “deepen its relationship with Chick-fil-A” by creating a Chick-fil-A coin toss and moving the organization to the Kansas Union. “Verbally saying ‘we no longer will do this’ does not change the culture and the impact of the community, so in a week, I see nothing different, other than the fact that they say, ‘We no longer do this,’” Alexander said. Chick-fil-A continued donating to anti-LGBTQ+ groups after pledging to stop donating to anti-gay groups in 2012, following Chick-fil-A CEO Dan Cathy’s comment to the Baptist Press that his company was “guilty as charged” when asked if it had a stance on marriage equality. That was the same year three Chick-fil-A petitions rose on campus — one to remove the chain from campus and two to keep it on campus. Despite this, the administration chose to renew the University’s contract with Chick-
Tianna Witmer
President Donald Trump named Shannon Blunt, a KU engineering professor, to the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology to provide information on electrical engineering and computer science.
Men’s basketball hosts Colorado Saturday
Nicole-Marie Konopelko @NicoleKonopelko
Contributed photo
A 90-year-old man who was reported missing was found dead near Yuma, Arizona. The man was last seen in Lawrence before a Silver Alert was issued for his disappearance.
Opposition to Chick-fil-A remains at KU
Lawrence has been home to many local legends — people considered eccentrics or characters, making them unlikely local celebrities. Some of these Lawrence legends include “The Blue Lady,” “The Tan Man” and “The White Owl.” The Kansas Hermit Hugh Cameron, born in 1826, was one of the first Lawrence legends. Nicknamed the “Kansas
Hermit,” Cameron walked from Kansas City, Kansas, to Lawrence and started a freighting business in 1854, the same year Lawrence was founded. Cameron quickly became a recluse after serving two years in the Civil War, according to a 1908 article titled “Famous Hermit Who Lives in a Tree-Top” in the Human Life magazine by Alice Rohe. “After the war, he became known as an eccentric, and he had a treehouse that he built and lived in in Lawrence,” said Will
Hickox, the public engagement coordinator at the Watkins Museum of History and a University of Kansas graduate. Cameron’s treehouse was located at what is now Sixth and Louisiana Streets. KU students made it a ritual to visit Cameron’s treehouse before they graduated, said Watkins Museum curator and KU alumna Brittany Keegan. Cameron supported social and political causes and grew out his hair and beard, vowing to not cut it until women had equal rights Continue on page 3
For more than 40 years, Sunflower Outdoor and Bike Shop has resided in Lawrence. It started as an army-navy surplus store in 1971 and moved to what it is today: one of America’s Best Bike Shops, according to the National Bicycle Dealers Association. This year marks the seventh year of the America’s Best Bike Shop list and the seventh time the bike shop located at 804 Massachusetts St. has made the list. Dan Hughes, co-owner of Sunflower, said the list helps the bike shop to continue to pedal ahead. “I think there are a few shops around the country, probably less than a handful, that have been on it every year, and all seven years the Sunflower has been fortunate enough to be on that list,” Hughes said. “For us, it’s an opportunity to not only review what we are doing as a business, but also to have people check us on it.” To be considered for the award, the shop must check requirements off of a standards list with things such as shop layout, store Continue on page 4