I n T h is I ssue .
Volume Twenty-five, Number Twenty
Tuesday,; November 4, 1997
Campus Center update
WPI scares up some halloween fun First Tech or Treat a renowned success by Adam Young Photography Editor
One artist’s rendering of the proposed Campus Center, looking from the Higgins House lawn. Alumni Gymnasium is on the left, while Harrington is to the right, with the main body of the center in between. by Sarah Walkowiak Assistant News Editor The possibility of a campus center has been .a recurrent topic of discussion at WPI since 1969. Over the last few years, many hours of hard work have been put into this idea to make it a reality. The reality draws closer as the plans for the Campus Center become finalized. Initial planning for the cam pus center began in 1993-1994 with the for mation of The Campus and Recreation Cen ter Committee. Their initial tasks were to re search a suitable site and to determine what the WPI community needed from a campus center. The committee conducted surveys and focus groups to find out what facilities and services would be needed. Campus meet ings were held to get feedback from the com
munity. One of the goals of the committee was to create a shared vision of the campus center. The committee felt that the center would strengthen the sense of community at WPI. The campus center would bring to gether students (both undergraduate and graduate), faculty, staff and student organi zations. * As the project has progressed, som e changes have been necessary. The initial plan was to construct a joint campus and recre ation center. The recreation center would be connected to the existing Alumni Gymna sium. However, due to time and budget con straints, the recreation element of the cam pus center has been postponed to a later phase. The Campus Center itself is the prior ity and will be constructed first. Connection See Center, continued to page 2
Students commended for community involvement by Alison Keach Features Editor Five students/student groups were rec ognized for their dedication to community service at this year’s Homecoming half time. They all received the Coughlin Award, an aw ard given in m em ory of E dw in B. Coughlin ‘23 who distinguished him self through his tireless involvement with or ganizations in the W orcester area. The award winners were The Society of His panic Engineers, Lambda Chi Alpha, Timo thy Adams, David Smiley, and Michael Sh annon. SHPE was nominated for its involvement in Worcester Schools and for promoting higher education to Worcester Students. Lambda Chi Alpha was nominated for the excellent example they set for the WPI com munity with their involvement with the Tee-
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News............................................ 2, 8, 9 Sports............................................... 4,5 Arts & Entertainment.................6, 7, I I Career Development.......................... 10 International House......................... 10 Editorial............................................ 11
ter-Totter-A-Thon, the LCA canned food drive, the Shelter for Homeless Veterans and the Worcester County Food Bank. Tim Adams was nominated for being ac tive in a variety of programs including Habi tat for Humanity, the Special Olympics, canned food drives and snow shoveling. David Smiley, the service coordinator of Zeta Psi Fraternity and Alpha Phi Omega, was nominated for challenging the groups he is involved in to serve the community trough food drives, dances, blood drives and clean-ups. Michael Shannon, a 1997 graduate, was nominated for his efforts in bringing “Hoop Dreams II”, a program which uses the attrac tion of sports to encourage city youth to talk about college, to WPI last year. Each recipient was presented with a con tribution of $250 to be donated in their name to a cause or organization of their choice.
C o ntents Letters to the Editor........................... 11 Announcements................................ 12 Writing Center.................................. 13 Computing........................................ 13 Student Government Association . 14,15 Club Corner...................................... 16
In it’s fledgling year. Tech or Treat was a renowned suc cess. Thanks to organized trick or treat groups and po lice support, children from lo cal elementary schools and WPI stu d e n ts v isite d the dorms for a taste o f Hallow een. Every dormitory spon sored a trick or treat station, from Morgan 4Ih to 28 Trow bridge to Institue Hall stu dents and RA’s p ro v id ed candy for ev e ry b o d y . A dance right a fte r Tech or Treat provided food and en tertainm ent for those that didn't want the night to end. Alpha Psi O m ega’s annual Masquerade Ball on Saturday night was once again a wild success. The fun and danc ing were punctuated with theatrical performances from N E W SPEA K STAFF P H O T O / ADAM Y O UN G some o f the theatre honor Beauty and the Beast. Could that be the Allen dancing with society’s prime actors. They acted out bits of plays that one of WPI's lovely angels? ranged from the witches in These and other events made it hard Macbeth to Ophelia in Hamlet. Annika Nilsen wore a colonial dress and Simon to not find something to do this week Nance was in an Alien costume, both of end. I would like to wish Tech or Treat which they made for themselves. The luck in its future years and I hope ev Ball also include a Theatre trivia contest erybody had as much fun this weekend and some wonderful food and music. as I did. D ouble, d o u b le, toil and Everybody joined in to dance to the cult tro u b le , fire burn an d c a u ld ro n bubble...” classic Time Warp.
Celebrating India’s 50th Anniversary by the Indian Student Organization As a celebration of the 50th Anniversary of India’s Freedom and on the occasion of Diwali, the festival of lights, the Indian Stu dents Organization presents India Week where a salutation is given to Gandhiji, the Father of our Nation. We will be showing Attenbourough’s 11 Oscar winning movie “Gandhi" starring Ben Kinsley, today at 8pm in Perreault Hajl. Upon searching the web for details of Gandhi’s biography, I was extremely sur prised to find him as an inspiration to so many across the world. Probably more is written on Gandhi than anyone in the modem his tory, and a com prehensive bibliography would estimate several thousands of titles and more than 400 biographies. They say if you want to find out more about him, it is somehow like a gigantic jigsaw. He lived
through the most turbulent decades in this century, at the threshold between colonial ism and industrial society - a fact that had an impact on all o f his thoughts and actions. Bapuji’s (meaning father in a regional lan guage) dream was to make Nonviolence (Ahimsa) become the very integral part of Human life, a could be panacea to all evil in human history. Gandhi could have very well learned about Nonviolence from the prin ciples of Jainism and Buddhism which are rooted back to 3000 BC. In Buddhism, the principle of nonviolence projects an ideal of universal peace, which can be expanded to include the notion of a peaceful mind. When Gandhi started his commitment back in South Africa, the English press referred to the struggle as a method of “passive resis tance”, a term responsible for that deeprooted misinterpretation of nonviolence as a form of passivity. Actions of nonviolence is See India, continued to page 2