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T h u r s d a y, A p r i l 6 , 2 0 1 7 | U s i s h i e l d . c o m | v o l . 4 7 i s s u e 2 9
Law Day speaker reflects Softball on Scalia’s impact, health continues to surge by Taylor O’Neil Hall sports@usishield.com @taylorOHall318
Photo by Katie Thompson | The Shield
The Court of Appeals of Indiana listen to oral arguments in the case of Melvin Wolfe v. State during the seventh annual Law Day March 29, in Carter Hall. The case concerns a dispute over a battery charge, where Wolfe claimed self-defense in a bench trial. Law Day also featured keynote speaker Dr. Stephen L. Wasby.
by Riley Guerzini
news@usishield.com @rguerzini
Since Justice Antonin Scalia’s death in February of last year, the U.S. Supreme Court has been deadlocked 4-4 in several major cases, but that could change soon with the nomination of a new judge. “He is still very much with us today in context,” Professor Emeritus at the University of Albany-SUNY Stephen Wasby said. “What we perceive of him affects what we do now.” Wasby gave his keynote address “After Scalia, Now What?” in Carter Hall March 29 at the university’s seventh annual Law Day. He spoke about Scalia’s impact both outside and inside the court during his time as a Supreme Court Justice. “Within the court he was a son of a bitch,” he said. “He continually wrote opinions about other justices opinions on a case, even his fellow conservatives.” Scalia’s death left the Supreme Court with four liberal and four conservative justices, meaning many cases would go undecided unless one of the justices decided to break from their ideology. Wasby, who said he is a Democrat, said Scalia was unpredictable, which makes President Donald Trump’s
claim to nominate a judge “just like Scalia” all the more difficult. “He could have been the leader of the conservatives on the Supreme Court, but he wasn’t because of his
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People had much more interest in Prince’s cause of death than Scalia’s -Stephen Wasby Keynote speaker at Law day
lack of restraint,” he said. Wasby also argued that justices’ health should be properly vetted before they are chosen to be on any
Toastmasters builds communications by Gabi Wy features@usishield.com @GabiCWy
Because of her time with the Speaking Eagles, Samantha Biggerstaff has gone from saying “um” 45 times in an hour to, at the most recent meeting, only once. “It’s helped with my ability to communicate,” the senior finance and accounting major said. “It helps me be comfortable. Now, I can talk to anybody.” The Speaking Eagles is the university’s chapter of Toastmasters International, an organization that works with individuals to improve their public speaking skills. “I think it’s important for everyone if you have a job anywhere,” Biggerstaff said. “You need to be able to communicate.” Biggerstaff, the organization’s vice president of edu-
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cation, won second place at the last area Toastmasters competition. She’s been with the Speaking Eagles since fall 2015. “Toastmasters is so diverse,” she said. “I’ve realized that what you say affects others, and because of that, I can be more effective in what I say and empathize with others.” In a semester, each member is expected to give 10 speeches, followed by feedback from the other Toastmaster attendees. This includes compliments as well as constructive criticism. “The first day, I was terrified,” Biggerstaff said. “Now, I’m pretty calm. I have more confidence, and it’s made a big difference.” Chaze Patrick, a graduate student and the Speaking Eagles’ vice president of public relations, has been with Toastmasters for eight months.
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court. “People had much more interest in Prince’s cause of death than Scalia’s,” he said. Junior business administration major Charlie Peters attended the speech, and she said she thought Scalia was a good justice. “You always have those far-right people and those far-left people, and he just happened to be the far-right one at the time,” she said. “I’m a Republican, so a lot of the stuff I had personal opinions about, but it’s always good to hear two sides to things. I definitely think what he was saying about the current justice system situation is very accurate.” Judge Neil Gorsuch, who was nominated by President Trump Feb. 1, would replace Scalia if he is confirmed by the Senate. Senate Judiciary committee will vote on Gorsuch, an appellate judge from Colorado, this week. Gorsuch will have to fight off opposition from the Democrats, who plan on filibustering his nomination. “If it was a very far-right person that they were voting in, then I would definitely think that they would have some reason to not want to vote him in,” Peters said. “Because he is very middle of the line and because he votes how he believes and not what his party believes, I don’t think they should have much of a problem with him.”
No. 10 Southern Indiana (31-7) didn’t allow a run in its doubleheader sweep against Bellarmine (15-23) at the USI Softball Field Tuesday. Both starting pitchers, Courtney Atkisson (10-4) and Jennifer Leonhardt (171) pitched complete game shutouts. By winning the first game, Atkisson joined Leonhardt with double digit wins. Game one remained scoreless until second basewoman, Claire Johnson, broke through the Bellarmine defense and starting pitcher, Sabrina Fussenegger, in the fifth inning with an RBI single. Screaming Eagles shortstop, Lexi Reese, added an RBI single of her own with the next at bat to put USI up 2-0 for good. The scoring began sooner than the fifth inning in game two. With third basewoman, Mena Fulton, on second, freshman left fielder, Allison Schubert, homered to left field for her second of the season. USI added the rest of their runs in the third. Catcher, Haley Hodges, added a home run of her own and extended her home run and RBI records by going yard, and freshman pinch hitter, Bailey Slivka, added her first two RBIs with a single up the middle. Slivka entered the game for center fielder, Olivia Clark-Kittleson, after USI loaded the bases with two outs. “I was just trying to stay calm and relaxed. The more pressure you feel, the more nervous you are,” Slivka said. “I just wanted to do everything I could for my team and try to produce some runs.” Slivka said she was excited to score her first RBIs and happy that her teammates were there to support her in the moment. Head coach Sue Kunkle said she knew what she was doing by subbing in Slivka for Clark-Kittleson even though prior to the game Slivka was batting .071 (1-
for-14). “She’s an outstanding hitter, and she hasn’t gotten to show her real self yet,” Kunkle said. “She’s able to handle failure, and I knew she could handle it. We were up and whether she failed or not, I knew she could handle it and I wanted to give her the opportunity. Success or failure, she was going to be ok.” Kunkle said Slivka is a strong player that takes the ball consistently in practice and that’s how she knew putting her in the situation would pay off. She said this was an important series to take against a usually difficult opponent that will be even tougher to play against once they’re fully healthy again. “This doubleheader was a must for us. It wasn’t an option for us to lose a game, but to have two shutouts was awesome,” Kunkle said. “We played well together even though we didn’t have our usual 15 hits. I think people expect that from us, but it isn’t realistic.” After winning game two against a team from her hometown, Louisville, Leonhardt followed up her no hitter Sunday by picking up her ninth complete game shutout and lowering her ERA to 1.06. Leonhardt said it’s a team effort and for her to be so dominate requires help from the defense. During the second inning Leonhardt loaded the bases, but Hodges was able to catch a ball fouled behind home plate. “It’s a big conference game for us. The schools are close to each other, so it’s kind of a rivalry and tensions were high. My teammates helped me stay calm out there,” Leonhardt said. “It’s always the goal to have them scratch a zero up there.” With the sweep USI passes the 30 win mark with 18 games left in the regular season. They’re on pace to surpass last season’s win total of 35 and they can tie Sunday if they win the games against Saint Joseph’s College and University of Indianapolis Saturday and Sunday.
‘Yarnstorm’ hits campus by Riley Guerzini news@usishield.com @rguerzini
Last Sunday, students from Leigh Anne Howard’s Advanced Performance class ‘yarnstormed’ campus in an effort to visually communicate the ideas and theories they discussed in class. The Shield sat down with Howard, a Professor of Communication Studies, to talk about her class project. The Shield: What was the yarnstorming for? Leigh Anne Howard: This was a class project, I teach a class for juniors and seniors in communication studies called advanced performance studies and in that class we usually have a unit looking at visual communication. Students usually do a project working with the kinds of ideas and theories we work on. So this year the yarn storming project was the project connected to the visual unit in that class and so students worked in groups, we had
Photo by Megan Thorne | The Shield
four student groups and each group member had to recruit an outside of the class volunteer to help the installation. The Shield: Why would this be more effective instead of doing social activism on social media, how would it be more effective this way? Howard: I would be reluctant to say it’s more effective, but it’s very different,.
Often this kind of work is unexpected, so you’re walking through wherever you’re going and all of a sudden there’s sweaters on trees and people start talking about it, one of the things I did last night was I checked my Facebook and people had already popped some pictures of it, ‘does anybody know what this is?’ I think it’s one of the things in communication is to keep in mind that an
effective communicator understands his or her audience, understands there are multiple ways of getting a message across and then picking the way that has the most impact based upon that message.
The Shield: Was this all over campus? Howard: Yes, but it was primarily concentrated here in Liberal Arts. One of the student groups worked to
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