A HEALTH AND WELLNESS GUIDE SEPTEMBER 25, 2018
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 2018
LIFE • PAGE B2
Check out Cherry Creative’s health and wellness guide inside this issue
See how one WKU student practices meditation, by slacklining.
WESTERN KENTUCKY UNIVERSITY
VOLUME 94, ISSUE 05
Imagewest remembers student killed in car crash BY REBEKAH ALVEY HERALD.NEWS@WKU.EDU
Imagewest, a student-run advertising firm on campus, joined together on Friday to remember one of its stu-
dents who was killed in a car accident on Tuesday by preparing a portfolio he never finished. Twenty-year-old Brandon Brown died in a single vehicle car accident Tuesday, Sept. 18. Brown was a junior advertising major and an essential member of the Imagewest team since
May 2018. Charles Simmons sat at the desk next to Brown since the beginning of the semester. Since the accident, he said he doesn’t want to sit there. “I’m glad I sat right next to him because he helped me with everything,” Simmons said. “He’d try to help you
no matter what. He was a genuine person.” Simmons described Brown as a nice guy who never spoke negatively about anything or anyone. He said Brown was comedic, always laughing and SEE BRANDON BROWN • PAGE A2
WKU takes steps to address mold in dorms BY NICOLE ZIEGE HERALD.NEWS@WKU.EDU
SILAS WALKER • HERALD
WKU head coach Travis Hudson embraces his team after beating Middle Tennessee 3-0 to give Hudson his 600th career win in E.A. Diddle Arena on Friday. See page B4 for the full story on Hudson’s 600th win.
‘LIFELONG LOVE’ STEM majors celebrate women in science BY EMILY DELETTER HERALD.NEWS@WKU.EDU
G
irls from all over Kentucky participated in hands-on activities Saturday in an environment that allowed them to grow in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) careers and be surrounded by those with similar interests. “Anytime that you can provide opportunities outside of the four walls of a classroom to ignite curiosity and show young girls the opportunities that they have, I feel like it’s imperative for us as educators and as women in STEM to pass that torch,” SKYTeach Master Teacher Melissa Rudloff said. GEMS (Girls in Engineering, Math and Science) took place in Ogden and Snell Halls from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. The event was open for girls in grades 4-12 to learn about career options and “feel empowered to try things in somewhat of a male dominated arena,” said. Following the keynote speaker session
”It’s fun meeting new students every year and learning from them as much as they learn from me.” Science education major MADISON WELLS
featuring students from Mercy Academy in Louisville, there were multiple breakout activity-based sessions for the attendees based on their age and developmental ability. These sessions were led by women and undergraduate students from WKU in STEM majors. This year’s event was senior Madison Wells’ second year teaching a session for GEMS. Wells is a middle school science education major and said teaching the sessions is an experience she was always excited to participate in.
Her session, “Rockin’ Roller Coasters,” was engineering-focused and directed for high school girls. Participants were given a budget, materials and a time constraint and had to design and build a roller coaster out of paper. “It’s fun meeting new students every year and learning from them as much as they learn from me,” Wells said. Murfreesboro, Tennessee, junior KatieJo Kullmar is majoring in math education for middle school. She said she credits her great math teachers and interest in her school’s math club for starting her lifelong love of the subject. “If something like GEMS had been available to me while I was in school that would have been amazing,” Kullmar said, “It would be a lot of fun to be with other girls who did math and were just as excited about it as I was.” The Kentucky Science Center in Louisville brought some of its traveling equipment to set up an interactive science engagement session for attendees. Adults were also able to participate in SEE STEM • PAGE A2
Officials within WKU’s housing and facilities departments are taking steps by cleaning students’ dorm rooms to prevent the spread of mold, Mike Reagle, director of Housing and Residence Life, said. Maintenance crews from HRL and Facilities Management started walking through students’ dorm rooms on Sept. 13 in Bemis Lawrence Hall, Barnes-Campbell Hall and PearceFord Tower, wiping down all surfaces and checking the rooms’ HVAC units for cases of mold. The detailed search for mold comes after several reports of mold in HVAC leading to illness, which the Herald detailed in a front page story last week. One student said she believes the mold in her unit at Bemis Lawrence Hall caused her to become sick with flulike symptoms and need an emergency tonsil surgery. Reagle said rather than address isolated cases of mold in Bemis, Barnes and PFT, HRL has decided to check every room as a more preventative measure. The majority of reports of mold in residence hall HVAC units have been issued from Bemis and PFT, according to InSite’s “Service Request Status” database. “[We] decided that we really needed to be more proactive about that, make sure that we were doing that across the board and make sure we were hitting other areas that may or may not have problems,” Reagle said. Bryan Russell, WKU’s chief facilities officer, said maintenance crews and volunteers first enter the room for deep cleaning or wiping down all of the surfaces. He said about 30 volunteers helped with wiping down the rooms in Bemis on Saturday and about 20 volunteers helped on Sunday. Russell said technician crews will go into every room that has been wiped down and take every HVAC unit apart to check and clean its components. The technician crews will be going through the rooms on weekdays between 10 a.m. and 8 p.m. He said cleaning rooms and checking the air conditioning units in Bemis, Barnes and PFT will take about three months altogether. “We’re trying to be very thorough with our action,” Russell said.
SEE MOLD UPDATE • PAGE A3