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(02/12/10 5:59am)
Days after making history with their election as co-presidents of the Campus Y, UNC students Marjorie Betubiza and Elizabeth McCain are already looking ahead to the next accomplishment.The pair became the first-ever Campus Y co-presidents that are both female with their victories out of a seven-candidate field Tuesday. The organization’s constitution and by-laws required a male and a female to be co-president until last year.Betubiza and McCain said they hope their service will be as memorable as their election.They will lead one of the largest student organizations on campus, a center for service and activism that is celebrating its 150th year at UNC.The first responsibility of the new co-presidents is to develop their executive board and decide how much to change it from its current composition.Among Betubiza’s platform points are a desire to increase transparency of the executive board and to make it easier for all Campus Y members to be involved in events.McCain also wants to give Campus Y members the opportunity to set up new projects.“The great thing about the Y is that it’s composed of passionate individuals,” she said.“My biggest piece of advice would be to form as diverse of an executive board as possible,” current co-president Jimmy Waters said.In addition to finding an executive board they can work with, McCain and Betubiza will have to learn to work together after campaigning separately for the position.“Both of its leaders need to show that they represent a united stance,” current co-president Erin Marubashi said.Having already spent time working together through the Campus Y is a plus for the co-president-elects.Betubiza spent the last two years as co-chairwoman of the Advocates Human Rights committee, while McCain served as minister of information for the Campus Y’s executive board for the last year. The year before, McCain was the first-year member-at-large.“I’ve known Elizabeth for two years now. I think we’re on the same page,” Betubiza said.Waters and Marubashi will serve as advisers to McCain and Betubiza as they set up their executive board before focusing on the goals in their campaign platforms. Waters and Marubashi also had advisers when they first started their term as co-presidents.“Working with the current co-presidents and working as a team of four, we just dove right in,” Marubashi said.McCain and Betubiza will fully take the reigns following Spring Break, and the current co-presidents are confident in the new pair.“My best advice is to know that anything is possible and don’t be afraid to ask questions,” Marubashi said.Contact the University Editor at udesk@unc.edu.
(02/05/10 5:48am)
Seven UNC students are winding down their campaigns to secure one of two spots as co- president of the Campus Y.The election will take place Tuesday, Feb. 9, the same day as the student body president election. In the past, the rules required that co-presidency be shared by one male and one female, but that rule was eliminated last year. The online election is only open to dues-paying members of the Y as of Friday, Jan. 29.The two candidates with the most votes will serve as co-presidents of the Y, an organization dedicated to addressing social justice issues.This year marks the 150th anniversary of Campus Y presence on the UNC campus.In their campaigns, candidates have often focused on fiscal responsibility, inclusion of Campus Y alumni in activities and holding a sesquicentennial anniversary celebration.As co-presidents, the students will oversee the Y’s 21 committees and 12 special project groups, and represent the Campus Y when working with administrators and other campus groups.
(01/22/10 6:32am)
While most people are still focused on their New Year’s resolutions in January, UNC brought two people to campus Thursday who have fought their struggles with weight loss.Ed Brantley and Heba Salama are a married couple and finalists from season six of “The Biggest Loser,” a reality show where contestants compete to lose weight and overcome obesity.Standing in front of two life-sized pictures of their overweight selves, the North Carolina natives shared their thoughts about reaching a healthy mental and physical state.The couple first talked about the importance of living a balanced lifestyle and having healthy and satisfying meals along with time spent exercising. After going over the mental roadblocks that kept them out of shape before participating in “The Biggest Loser,” Brantley and Salama answered audience questions.
(01/15/10 4:16am)
Two years after its establishment, Carolina Firsts is expanding its reach in guiding students toward becoming the first in their families to graduate from college.
(12/01/09 4:05am)
Larry Conrad is once again knocking down technological barriers between rival universities.Conrad, the vice chancellor for information technology, is reviving an old partnership with Marc Hoit, vice chancellor for information technology at N.C. State University, on a collaboration between the two schools’ new information technology programs.The collaboration will share support staff and business practices, could save hundreds of thousands of dollars and might allow UNC to benefit from N.C. State’s experience with new software.The shared software will manage significant aspects of life at the two schools, including financial reporting and human resources.Conrad and Hoit have experience with intercollegiate partnerships as vice chancellors for information technology at Florida State University and the University of Florida, respectively, where they worked together on a similar collaboration that also used PeopleSoft, the new technology being implemented at UNC.“These are very complex systems; they’re very complex to implement,” Conrad said. But he’s not worried about working with Hoit.“Frankly, we trust each other,” Conrad added.The two universities are collaborating on the financial and human resource portions of their programs while keeping the student services components separate.The partnership comes at a convenient time for both schools. UNC is just beginning to implement the PeopleSoft software as ConnectCarolina, a new integrated administrative system.N.C. State has been using PeopleSoft for almost 12 years, and is updating to the newest version of the software.Conrad said both sides will benefit from the collaboration by contributing what each side is most prepared to give.“They’re going to invest more people, we’re going to invest more money,” Conrad said.Conrad said UNC has been saving money to implement PeopleSoft since 2007, while N.C. State already has a staff in place managing its PeopleSoft software.UNC will save money by not having to hire extra technical support, which instead will be shared with N.C. State.Conrad added that savings will likely amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars but could reach as high as $1 million.Hoit said the collaboration allows the universities to work together to resolve issues that might come up with the new technology, but the number of colleges within the universities will create difficulties as well.UNC has 17 different schools and colleges. N.C. State has 12.“It does make it harder because we now have to build a system that works for all of them together,” Hoit said.Neither Conrad nor Hoit said they could think of any disadvantages of sharing practices and technical support. The project continues a tradition of collaborations between the universities’ financial systems that first occurred in the 1970s.Contact the University Editor at udesk@unc.edu.
(10/30/09 4:54am)
The University received 3,800 doses of the H1N1 vaccine Wednesday, the first batch of the about 28,000 it has ordered.Doses received this week will begin to be distributed today to faculty, staff and students who are health care workers, as well as pregnant women on campus.UNC health officials ordered enough doses for everyone on campus, and the vaccines will arrive in batches every one to two weeks. Wednesday’s shipment will go to at-risk individuals first.Mary Beth Koza, director of the UNC Department of Environment, Health and Safety, said the long-anticipated arrival of the vaccine is not the result of sluggish action by the University’s health department.“The University has been very proactive,” Koza said.She said health officials ordered the vaccine in August from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and that the time it takes to manufacture the vaccine has caused the wait.The vaccine comes in a nasal spray and shots. Most individuals will receive the nasal spray, because the University received 3,000 nasal sprays and only 800 shots.Pregnant women, people with health problems and those younger than 2 or older than 49 years old do not qualify for the spray and will receive the shot instead.Vaccinations should prevent the number of students on campus with flu-like symptoms from growing much larger than the 1,156 students who have visited Campus Health Services since the beginning of the fall semester.Many people who get the H1N1 virus experience symptoms no worse than the seasonal flu, but the virus can lead to death.Four people have died at UNC Hospitals from the swine flu since the outbreak began, with two of those deaths occurring this month, said David Weber, assistant dean and associate chief of medicine with UNC Hospitals.Three of the four patients who died were adults. The fourth was a pediatric patient.It is not clear whether the four patients who died were part of any at-risk groups, such as young children or pregnant women, Weber said.Two-thirds of the people who have died from the swine flu nationally have had at least one underlying condition that contributed to them being at-risk, he said.Nationwide, 2,416 of the 21,823 people who were hospitalized with swine flu since August 30 had died as of Oct. 17.In comparison, UNC Hospitals has had four deaths out of an estimated 54 patients admitted with the virus, Weber said.Contact the University Editor at udesk@unc.edu.
(09/25/09 4:15am)
It’s no secret that Tom Blanton is against the government hiding information from the public.Blanton, the current director of the National Security Archive at The George Washington University, spoke in the Student Union auditorium on Thursday about the importance of government transparency.His speech, titled “The Secrecy Hangover,” was part of the Lucile Kelling Henderson Lecture Series, established in 1990.Blanton described the recent increase in classified government conversations as a “secrecy mania” that threatens the safety of citizens instead of protecting them from danger.“We are not safer in the dark,” Blanton said. “Openness is the way we correct our mistakes.”He gave the example of how openness helped end the threat of nuclear warfare between the United States and Russia, when former President Ronald Reagan revealed to his Russian counterpart, Mikhail Gorbachev, that he wanted to abolish atomic bombs.“It keeps our officials honest and also our allies more honest,” Blanton said of government transparency.Blanton formally answered a few audience questions following his speech and then stepped outside to talk to the students, faculty and Chapel Hill residents who attended.Following the talk, the audience viewed a film about government secrecy that featured Blanton.After the lecture, junior political science major Dianne Heath said that she supports Blanton’s advocacy for government transparency and understands the related significance of public involvement in politics.“As less and less people get involved, it allows the government to stay more closed,” Heath said.During the reception, Blanton talked about how the Watergate scandal and his firsthand experience of the civil rights movement and the military draft all inspired him to fight for government openness.He said he has seen the number of e-mails that the U.S. government has tried to keep hidden increase from 200,000 during the Reagan administration to 220 million during that of George W. Bush.As attempts at concealing information multiply, Blanton maintains that it’s the government’s responsibility to keep the public informed.“Most of it we have the right to know,” he said.Contact the University Editor at udesk@unc.edu.
(09/18/09 4:01am)
As a former U.S. ambassador to South Africa, James Joseph would frequently travel great distances to share his expertise.On Thursday, Joseph, who currently teaches public policy at Duke University, enjoyed a shorter commute to Gerrard Hall, where he delivered the third annual Thomas Willis Lambeth Lectureship.Joseph’s speech, titled “Remaking America: Higher Education and Civic Engagement,” called upon universities to take responsibility for the “economically and socially marginalized” through community service.After being introduced as the “voice of God” at Duke University by former Lambeth Lectureship speaker and Duke professor Joel Fleishman, Joseph, an ordained minister, began his speech with a question.“What role should universities play in the remaking of America?” he asked.He promptly answered, saying universities should do everything in their power in pursuit of the global “common good.”“It has been my experience that when neighbors help neighbors, and even when strangers help strangers, both those who help and those who are helped are not only transformed, but experience a new sense of connectedness,” Joseph said.Joseph provided powerful examples of members of society joining together for different causes and goals across the globe.He cited the efforts of blacks in the South to organize for equal rights in the late 19th century.Chip Gaul, a junior public policy and communication studies double major, said he was impressed by the lecture.“It’s nice to have someone articulate very clearly why we need to be engaged in our community,” he said. Hodding Carter, last year’s guest speaker and a member of the lectureship selection committee, said the selection of Joseph was made with confidence.“If you’ve been in any kind of public life over the last 30 years, you know him,” said Carter, a UNC professor of public policy.Joseph said he doesn’t usually speak at schools about the civic responsibility of university administrators and students, but said this lecture was a special occasion.“It’s very important that universities bring to campus people who are practitioners of what they are teaching,” he said.Joseph launched the United States — Southern Africa Center for Leadership and Public Values at Duke University. The center works to empower leaders in South Africa.“The gift of hope is as big as the gift of life itself,” he said.Contact the University Editor at udesk@unc.edu.