<rss version="2.0"><channel><title><![CDATA[Advance-Titan]]></title><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/rss.aspx</link><description><![CDATA[All stories from the current issue.]]></description><generator><![CDATA[UW Oshkosh Residence Life RSS 2.0 Grabber]]></generator><item><title><![CDATA[City dumps chemicals into Lake Winnebago's Miller's Bay]]></title><description><![CDATA[The City of Oshkosh has struck a deal with Aquatic Biologists, as part of an ongoing eradication of an invasive aquatic plant species called Eurasian Water Milfoil, to chemically eradicate this plant that makes up about 20 percent of the underwater plant composition of Miller’s Bay on Lake Winnebago.
There are four different chemicals used in the indiscriminate eradication process at the following concentrations: ‘Aquathol K’ -28.5 gallons, ‘Cutrine-Ultra’  -20 gallons, ‘Navigate’  -175 lbs, and ‘Reward’ -10 gallons.
The City of Oshkosh meeting minutes make scant mention of any dealings with Aquatic Biologists. An inquiry by City Council Member Tony Palmeri on March 25 2008, and a reply by acting City Manager John Fitzpatrick stating he would get historical records on that information are the only official notes of this agenda on the City’s Web site. When asked about receiving said records, Palmeri said he “never got it.” A month later, the historical information records remain undisclosed to Council members and the public.
“There’s an attempt to be made to minimize chemical treatment these days,” Palmeri said. “We’ve been hearing ‘trust us, everything’s OK,’ and citizens have become rightly suspicious. Government bureaucrats will do what they want to do absent outside pressure.”
Aquatic Biologists reportedly said at the March 25 meeting according to the meetings minutes: “There is absolutely no chance that those chemicals will get into the drinking water supply, but if they do we will fix it.”  
Peter Havlik, former UW-Oshkosh student and Student Environmental Action Coalition member, who attended the City Council meeting expressed his concern when he said, “Everyone beware… harmful agents tend to have more drastic effects on people with weaker immune systems, i.e. children, elderly, chronically ill, pregnant women.”
Concerning the impact of chemical treatment, “even they [Aquatic Biologists] said they don’t know,” said Palmeri. “All I’ve been asking for since day one is more in depth information on this.”
A March workshop had City of Oshkosh Parks Director Tom Stephany, Water Superintendent Steve Brand, representatives from Aquatic Biologists and the Department of Natural Resources attend the discussion.
Stephany said the 2002 permit was denied for Miller’s Bay because: “It was filed late and denied in September 2002, as a late-season treatment would have problems with waterfall migration and feeding issues.”
Representatives of the DNR told Palmeri different reasons for the denial. According to notes from an August 29, 2006 Fifth Tuesday Forum, Stephany said: “In 2002, the department started communicating with the DNR about chemically treating Miller’s Bay for ‘weeds,’” Stephany said. “The organization wasn’t too fond of the idea because of the fishing environment found throughout the bay.”
The Council should be aware of the dangers, since an attempt to use the same chemical treatment in Miller’s Bay in 2002 failed to be passed based on its harm to endangered fish, plant or species, according to minutes from a March 25 City Council meeting.
The Oshkosh City Council has budgeted a $25,000 tax for the first year of eradication with a projected allocation increase for the following year to be $75,000.  
When asked about using a mechanical harvester as an alternative, Stephany said that the city had rented a harvester to use during the first and second years of operation and: “It didn’t really work.”  
He cited high rental costs for the harvester as a reason for the change to chemical treatment, and personnel and maintenance issues as reason against purchasing one.

When asked, Palmeri said, “I don’t know if mechanical harvesting works, but it should be looked into more.”

Andrew Sabai’s argument as presented at the City Council Workshop, is to purchase a mechanical harvester as the most realistic alternative that could selectively harvest the Eurasian Water Milfoil and could be purchased with the allocated money for this year alone, without dumping chemicals in the water.

Graduate student of biology at UW-Oshkosh Nicholas Bach also thinks harvesting is the “lesser of two evils,” since, “they (Aquatic Biologists) don’t know the ecological side effects.”

Bach also suggested that milfoil weevils could be a possibility for controlling the spread of the invasive milfoil. 

“The weevils prefer to lay their eggs on Eurasian milfoil, which is the non-native one, to the Northern Water Milfoil,” said Bach.

Bach explained that milfoil reproduces by fragmentation or auto-fragmentation. 

“When you grind up all the plants on the bottom, Eurasian Milfoil grows faster than the native milfoil,” said Bach. “I don’t know if weevils are the answer because there’s no over-wintering habitat. They need organic material to survive.  Miller’s Bay is all rocks and mowed lawns; it wouldn’t work out too well there. Property owners would have to stop mowing their lawns all the way to the shoreline and stop raking up leaves and other detritus to allow a wintering habitat for the weevils. Either that or pay for weevil introduction on an annual basis.”

The chemicals used for plant eradication pose a widespread problem not only to swimmers, but more importantly to our drinking water, fish and other aquatic life.  

Warning labels on all of the chemicals said to rinse skin and eyes for 15-20 minutes and “call a poison control center or doctor for treatment advice,” and elsewhere note that treatment must begin immediately. 

The dangers if one swallowed any of the chemicals are more complicated. ‘Reward’ and ‘Aquathol K’ recommend a person to not induce vomiting and “sip a glass of water” while ‘Navigate’ recommends one: “Drink one or two glasses of water and induce vomiting.” 

To Palmeri, the City’s argument is, “the chemicals are far enough from the intake valve that it wouldn’t be a problem. However, no one could say if it was an impossibility, because they don’t know.”

A public beach is adjacent to Miller’s Bay, and Miller’s Bay is less than a half-mile from the City of Oshkosh’s water intake.

The environmental hazards label for Navigate reads “This product is toxic to fish.  Drift runoff may adversely affect fish and non-target plants,” and ends with “Unless an approved assay indicates the 2,4-D concentration is 70ppb (0.07ppm) or less, do not use water from treated area for potable water (drinking water).” 

As of April 30, pier construction on Miller’s Bay began for fishermen and was currently nearing completion.

Tom Stephany said that chemical treatment of ponds and lagoons of Oshkosh have been done from 1985 to the present.

Chemical treatment is not limited to Miller’s Bay, although last year was the first Stephany recalled. Chemicals had mainly been used in lagoons and boat launches, primarily for algae control.

According to Stephany, the DNR “absolutely had no problem with what we’re doing” and the DNR signed the permits allowing the City of Oshkosh to apply the chemical treatments.

A complete study on Miller’s Bay is due to be released in November according to Stephany.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7167</link><author>Max Davies of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Wellness Center charges students summer usage fee]]></title><description><![CDATA[Students who are not enrolled in summer classes will pay a $55 fee to use the Student Recreation and Wellness Center this summer.
Director of the Wellness Center Thomas Patt said the fee is equal to the amount students who are enrolled in summer classes are paying in segregated fees to use the facility from June 16 to September 2.
Senior Megan Crow didn’t think a fee should be charged for summer use of the Center.
“You should be able to still come and use the facilities at our school on campus even if you’re not enrolled in summer school because it is still our campus,” Crow said.
Pratt explained why the $55 fee was charged.
“It’s an equity thing,” Pratt said. “There may be some inflation.”
Meaning as the economy changes the fee could possibly increase. Pratt said other auxiliary facilities on campus charge a fee for summer use. He explained at UW-Eau Claire, where he previously worked, they have a similar fee and there is also a cost to use the recreation facility at UW-Madison.
This is the first summer the center will be open, but students have been paying segregated fees towards the Center since 2005.
Oshkosh Student Association President and Chair of Segregated Fees Thomas Wolf said from 2005 to 2006 there was an initial $91.49 added onto a student’s segregated fees bill included in tuition towards the Center. In 2006 through 2007 $71.45 more was added for a total of $162.94. For 2007 through 2008 students paid $237.36 in segregated fees. This rate will not change for the 2008-2009 academic year, Wolf said.
A total of $3,110,000 in segregated fees went to the Recreation Center followed by Reeve with $2,326,871 in 2007-2008, according to the proposed segregated fees for 2008-2009 chart.
All of the segregated fees go to the Center’s operating expenses. The largest cost was a $1.6 million loan fee on an estimated $19 million, 20 year bond for the facility, followed by staff salaries at $200,000 and about $45,000 for utilities, Patt said.
The Center is not open to the community and according to the Recreation Center’s Web site, “UW Oshkosh regular, adjunct, and emeriti faculty-staff that have paid their membership fee and also possess a valid UW Oshkosh ID card may access the SRWC.”
If a student hasn’t paid segregated fees they must pay membership fee of $237 per academic year or $125 a semester to use the facility. Faculty and staff members have to pay $290 an academic year or $155 a semester, according to the Center’s Web site.
Crow said she was unaware that she was being charged $237.36 to use the facilities during the academic year through segregated fees, a cost slightly more than the membership fee of $237.
Assistant Director of the Recreation and Wellness Center Toby Bares said on a typical weekday 1,200-1,900 students come through the Center. On the weekends 500 to 600 students use the facility.

This summer due to the weather improving and with less of the student body on campus these numbers are expected to decrease. The hours of operation are also going to be scaled down, said Bares.

Bares said the Center attracts a wide variety of students.

“Typically you do have your true blue users,” Bares said. “No one I think would feel unwelcome here.”

“True blue users” are those who come to the Center three to six times a week. Bares explained, because there is such a large offering of different activities and equipment that draw in a variety of students, it was hard to determine how much of the student body used the facility.

The largest numbers the Center has had was an estimated 2,000 people come through in one day. Peak hours, from 3:00 p.m. until 10:00 p.m., are the times when the most students use the Center, Bares said.

Most days during peak hours all 80 equipment pieces are occupied, Patt said.

With such a large amount of student usage those who don’t pay segregated fees have been know to try to sneak into the center. Wolf, who also works in the Recreation Center, said students try to sneak into the Center on a daily basis. In those situations they are asked to leave, Wolf said.

Due to the $55 fee this summer Wolf believes there will be more occurrences of students trying to sneak in.

“Yes, it’s going to be a little bit more of a problem,” Wolf said. “It’s something we have to constantly watch.”

In order to deter the problem the Center is considering a variety of options including “prox readers” that are used in some resident’s halls and other technological identification equipment, Wolf said.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7169</link><author>by Jenna Kleist, of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Badger State Games migrate to UW-Oshkosh]]></title><description><![CDATA[After 22 years in Madison, the Badger State Games will be moving the track and field portion of the Games to J.J Keller Field at Titan Stadium. 
Reasons for the move were two-fold. First, the previous site that had been used to host the track and field events, Mansfield Stadium, will be under construction when the events are normally held. Secondly, the Wisconsin Sports Development Co. was looking to move the Games to the Fox Cities area in 2009.  
Director of Operations for the Badger State Games John Eisele spoke very highly about the facilities and cited several key reasons why Oshkosh was the right location to hold the track and field events for the games this year and possibly for many years to come.
“When we looked around there were numerous venues we considered, and Oshkosh is definitely one of the nicest facilities in the state, as well as, their faculty and staff has been very supportive of us and [has] been very helpful with the meet so far this year,” Eisele said.
The Badger State Games are an Olympic-style sports festival that has two components, summer and winter. It was started in 1985 by the Wisconsin Sports Development Co., to provide competitive opportunities for amateur athletes.
For the summer games there are 26 different activities to participate in, including soccer, basketball, archery and a plethora of sports that you would find in the Summer Olympics.
Depending on how well Oshkosh handles this year’s track and field portion of the Games and on how well participants feel about the new location, Oshkosh could host the Badger State Games for many years to come.
“We are excited, and we would like to keep the events in Oshkosh especially if we have a very good turnout from participants,” Eisele said. “It is centrally located and easy for people from other large cities to get to and for Oshkosh that is definitely a positive.” 
Jason Fast, assistant track coach, believes because J.J. Keller Field has a warm-up track this was one of the main reasons Oshkosh was selected to host the track and field portion of the Badger State Games.
The expected number of participants is believed to be more than 800.

“They wanted to go to a top-notch facility that could accommodate that amount of athletes and have enough space for spectators as well,” Fast said. “That’s why they ended up going with [Oshkosh] because there’s no other track in the Midwest that features a full-size warm up track equipped with a full set of hurdles and blocks and everything like that, so people can warm up on the other track, without being in the way of other competitions that are going on. They said the facility just blew them away. The Badger State Games also took into account the amount of experience that our track and field coaching staff has had putting on large meets and how smoothly [things] events are run.”

This is just another feather in the cap for the Oshkosh facilities, which have generated a large amount of interest from events outside of Oshkosh, which will host the Division III national track and field meet for the second year in a row and also generated interest from the St. Louis Rams for possibly hosting their training camp.

“I think it’s great for the campus and the city, it gives us the ability to put our best foot forward for our university through athletics,” Fast said.  “That was a goal for us to give the university a positive image in the community that we are doing things to bring people to Oshkosh and show people what a great campus we have and what a great community we have. I think we are going to achieve that through hosting these events.”

Assistant to the Athletic Director Darryl Sims believes that the economic impact will be much broader in scope than just the Oshkosh campus.

“We think it’s going to have a very positive impact on the community, certainly a huge economic impact,” Sims said. “There will be people coming into town that normally wouldn’t be. They’ll be renting out hotel rooms, they’ll be dining out at our restaurants, they’ll be buying gas at our convenience stores, so we think overall the impact will be significant.” 

It appears that renovations to the Oshkosh athletic facilities were done with the foresight that if it was done right events like the State Games and others would eventually flock to Oshkosh.

“As we said a couple years ago, if you build it they will come, and I think this is just the start of many, many events […] that are yet to come as we get more notoriety,” Sims said.

Hosting events such as the Badger State games, as well as the Division III national track and field championship will be an aid to drawing attention to Oshkosh as a prominent school for athletics. 

“The more visibility that facility gets, the easier it gets for our coaches and our admissions offices to go out and talk to potential students and student-athletes about becoming students here at UW-O and participating in any particular sport,” Sims said.

The Badger State Games track and field events will be held June 28 and 29 at J.J Keller Field.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7170</link><author>Andrew Munger of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Salvia Solution]]></title><description><![CDATA[Salvia is an herb that can be chewed or smoked and often produces a hallucinogenic high in the user that lasts as short as 30 seconds and up to 30 minutes. Salvia is also legal to buy and sell in Wisconsin.   
But it’s on the Drug Enforcement Agency’s radar; according to its Web site, Salvia is classified as a “Drug and Chemical of Concern” along with Methadone, Tramadol (a heavy sedative), Oxycodone (OxyContin) and Dextromethorphan (an ingredient in cough syrup) as a substance that’s legal to possess. But those other substances often have to be bought over the counter from a pharmacist. The only counter you have to buy Salvia over is that of stores like The Sacred Circle Spirit Shop, located at 716 S. Main St. 
On a recent visit to the store, a shop employee, who wished to remain anonymous, said the store sells one or two packets of Purple Sticky Salvia extract a week to customers usually ranging in age from 25 to 50 years old. 
“You’ve got a lot of people looking into meditation, and this is a really good meditation tool,” he said. “I mean, you’ve got the younger people who are just looking to experiment, but it’s also a lot of older people who used to experiment in the ‘60s, and they want to do it in a legal way.”
One Wisconsin state representative is worried about Salvia use among Wisconsin teens, and moved to make the drug illegal. That representative, seven-term assemblyman Dr. Sheldon Wasserman, heard about the drug when a TV news reporter called and asked him about Salvia use in Milwaukee.   
“I didn’t even know what the drug was. I’m a doctor, so I called the medical counsel of Wisconsin and got the run around and I said, ‘Does anyone even know what this drug is?’” Wasserman said.
Wasserman then researched Salvia, leading him to propose a bill in committee that would make it illegal to manufacture, distribute and sell it in Wisconsin. But the bill would not target individual users, however. 
“I don’t want to arrest people trying things, I don’t want to arrest people using it, but at the same time, I don’t want people using it,” said Wasserman, who is planning a run for a State Senate seat this November. “I want to send the message that this drug should not be for sale.”
Wasserman’s bill failed on the floor of the Republican-controlled house in March, but he plans to reintroduce the bill in January 2009.
“Salvia should be made an illegal substance in Wisconsin because of the harmful effects that it has on users,” Wasserman said. “Not only the effects on the users themselves, but if they’re driving a car they become a danger to anybody on the road. They could kill somebody.” 
Wisconsin isn’t alone in wanting to ban Salvia. Since 2005, Missouri, Delaware, New York, North Dakota and Illinois have banned Salvia. In Maine, it’s illegal for anyone under 18 to possess Salvia. In Oklahoma, it is illegal to have salvia extract. In Tennessee and Louisiana, it is legal to grow salvia for landscaping, but not for consumption.
Bills to ban or regulate Salvia are being considered in many other states, including Alabama, Alaska, California, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, New Jersey, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah and Wyoming. 
The main concern in many of the states is that Salvia is a relatively unknown drug, and not much is known about its long-term affects. In fact, Diane Zanto, director of the UW-Oshkosh Student Health Center, said she hadn’t heard much about the drug. But since the drug hasn’t reached the mainstream, that’s not surprising, she said.  
“Anytime science doesn’t support studies on substances that you ingest, you’re taking your own chances. You’re really out on a limb,” she said.
For now, Salvia is still a legal substance for users in Wisconsin. That means people, like Oshkosh junior “Mike,” (who asked to remain anonymous for fear of his parents finding out) are free to use Salvia whenever they want. 
“It’s obviously legal, and it’s a drug that I can do and not get in trouble for,” he said. “And not have certain physical consequences to my body, like dependency.”
Mike’s experience lasted only two minutes after smoking Salvia leaves.
“I felt like I was in a vortex wind tunnel, and I could almost see the air moving around me,” he said. “And I could hear it like it was a conch shell. And I just sat there on my couch, and this wind was whipping by me.”
However, the shop doesn’t “intend” for Salvia to be smoked, instead, they sell it as an incense. But in reality, the shop employee acknowledged that many people are smoking it, which produces a short but powerful high.
And such effects can impair judgement and coordination, so precautions are important to avoid any harm coming to the user, Zanto said.
“Within seconds, you have a sense of euphoria and you feel kind of high,” she said. “You want to be safe when you use a substance like that so that you don’t accidentally hurt yourself.” 
And driving while impaired is an easy way to hurt yourself. That’s why operating a motor vehicle erratically while under the influence of Salvia or any other drug, from cough medicine to LSD, will never be legal in Wisconsin.
Salvia may not be considered a controlled substance, but its effects are significant enough to warrant concern, said Bill Kraus, a retired state drug recognition expert and standard field sobriety test coordinator with more than 27 years of law enforcement experience.
“It’s just as impairing, it’s not equal to marijuana, however it does have some of the same properties,” he said.  
Salvia, which is categorized as a hallucinogen under Wisconsin drug recognition statute, causes dilated pupils. Kraus said that eyes are the first things officers look at when trying to determine if a driver is impaired and to what level, so that medical attention can be given as quickly as possible if needed.
After that, drivers are asked to perform standard field sobriety tests, like walking a line heel-to-toe. The officer then uses drug recognition tests like the Romberg balance, which determines a person’s internal clock and can help to establish what kind of substance they are impaired by. But the officer protocol for driving impaired is similar to that of driving intoxicated with the severity of the penalty being left up to the judge.
“It’s not the same as alcohol impairment where you’re a .08, .12, .15 or .2,” Kraus said.  
Beyond the psychotropic properties, users who are predisposed towards depression can sometimes experience dysphoria, or generally low mood after smoking Salvia, Zanto said.
“As a young adult, you may trigger a depression and with depression being at a pretty high prevalence rate, it could really exacerbate mood problems,” she said.
Typically, mood-altering drugs have an after effect that is the opposite of the primary effect. In the case of Salvia, which generally causes a feeling of euphoria, the opposite would be dysphoria, said Joe Abhold, director of the Oshkosh Counseling Center.
“It’s really neurochemically based. It’s your brain to trying to recover back to a baseline,” he said.
Abhold said that if users are experimenting with Salvia to change their mood, to cope with stress or to have fun, they are not learning to use their own resources for those same reasons.
“Certainly the safest thing for people to do is to not use mood-altering substances at all,” he said. “If you’re going to use these substances, I think it’s very important to be honest with yourself about whether or not it’s having any undesirable effects on your life.”
In the meantime it is solely up to the user to monitor the effects of Salvia, unless Wisconsin legislature takes it upon itself to ban the substance during the next congressional session.
 However, stores like The Sacred Circle Spirit Shop that specialize in the sale of questionable herbs aren’t too concerned.
“It’s gonna be no big loss [if Salvia is banned], there are thousands of herbs out there,” the shop employee said. “When that disappears, who cares?”]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7177</link><author>by Ben Munson and Andrew Winistorfer</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Staging a 'miracle']]></title><description><![CDATA[As is the case with many UW-Oshkosh students, Edward Kastern hails from a small rural Wisconsin town and grapples with an overloaded class schedule en route to graduation. 
Unlike most other students, Kastern was given 50/50 odds of living at birth and advised not to attend college.
“Some were supportive,” Kastern said. “There were some that were not.”
Kastern was born with cerebral palsy. He relies on a wheelchair to get around. For as long as he can remember, he’s had to overcome obstacles.
In his hometown of Chili, WI, he was placed in special education classes. As high school graduation neared, people usually relied on for support in uncertain times instead seemed to hinder his aspirations to further his education.
“Not a lot of people thought I could go to school,” Kastern said. “My guidance counselor told me that I should go home and be a vegetable and basically get out of his office. I think he motivated me to have the drive to come here.”
Kastern originally decided to pursue a degree in psychology, but ultimately made the decision to major in theatre. 
“It was kind of something I was always interested in but maybe afraid to try because of my disability,” Kastern said. “I didn’t know if people would be accepting [of] having me in the theatre.”
During his stint in the playhouse Kastern has held such roles as assigned stage manager in “School for Scandal”; he also tested his acting chops, playing the lead in a short student film called “Daisy” in which his character was to undergo sex reassignment surgery and displayed schizophrenic tendencies. 
“It was interesting,” Kastern said. “I didn’t know what I was getting myself into. I kind of knew it was about multiple personalities, but I had no idea I was going to be wearing makeup and lipstick and a pink robe.”
His personal development stretches beyond the realms of his interest in performance. He credits his time in Oshkosh as helping in break out of his shell and meet more people. 
“It’s been a growing experience,” Kastern said. “When I first moved here I didn’t know anyone. I couldn’t make it here without all the help from friends that I have. I depend on people a lot.”
One such friend Kastern made on campus was Robert Feldman, who’s been an English professor at UW-Oshkosh for 21 years. Though Feldman never had Kastern in class, the two have eaten meals together and shared 
numerous conversations.
Feldman has observed Kastern to be a highly social person on the Oshkosh campus. 
“He’s so friendly,” Feldman said. “He loves to talk to people. He loves to meet new people. He’s very easy to get along with.”
In pursuing an unconventional area of study and forging friendships along the way, Feldman believes Kastern has overcome considerable odds in getting to where he is.
“You have an experience and it’s negative and then you want to transform it into something positive,” Feldman said. “That’s what Edward is doing and it’s a wonderful thing.”
But perhaps more impressive than what Kastern has already done is what he plans to do. Along with friend and fellow theatre major Peter Simon, Kastern intends to open “Miracle Acting Group,” a school specifically for the disabled.
Simon was glad to join Kastern’s in his vision for the unique studio.
“He asked me to do it and I thought about it,” Simon said. “That just makes a lot of sense. You don’t see a lot of opportunities for handicapped persons to be able to do theatre.”
Though involved in his friend’s vision, Simon considers Kastern to be the driving force in the school’s eventual formation.
“I think it’s amazing and it’s a testament to his willpower and his drive. If he had it his way it could go anywhere, and I think it definitely has the potential to do that,” Simon said. “Thinking small term, I could see it being a very strong community outlet to ablaze and learn different arts, even if that’s all that’s accomplished, I think that would be a huge success in and of itself.”
Kastern’s said his preliminary plans are to open the school in a larger Midwestern city such as Milwaukee or Chicago. He views the concept of a school of this sort to be revolutionary.
“This school would be groundbreaking,” Kastern said. “I wish people would try to do new things, but people get so discouraged; they want to try but they’re afraid what people might think or say about them.”
Feldman too believes Kastern’s intentions to be admirable.
“What a noble pursuit,” Feldman said. “He is certainly capable of doing this. I think it’ll open the door for many people who might not otherwise even try to do such a thing.”
As Kastern makes strides toward his ultimate goal of making Miracle Acting Group a reality, he takes pleasure in proving others wrong along the way. He cites a passage he once read in a fortune cookie to describe it. 
“It’s fun to do the impossible.”]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7178</link><author>by Tyler Maas, of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Q & A with Summerfest CEO Don Smiley]]></title><description><![CDATA[Don Smiley graduated from UW-Oshkosh in 1984. He went on to work with entrepreneur extraordinaire Wayne Huizenga who owns Blockbuster Video and the Miami Dolphins. When Huizenga decided to start an expansion baseball team (the Florida Marlins) Smiley quickly became the president of the Marlins and the chairman of Pro Player Stadium. In 2004 Smiley was named the president and CEO of Milwaukee World Festival Inc., the group that puts on Summerfest each year.

Advance-Titan: How did you  get involved with Summerfest and how long have you been involved with it?
Don Smiley: I started my position here at Summerfest in June of ‘04.
A-T: How did that come about?
DS: A national search firm contacted me and said they were doing a search for president and CEO of Milwaukee World Festival Inc.
A-T: What made you qualified for that position?
DS: Through all of the event experience that I have had over the years and sporting events and special events.
A-T: Do you enjoy putting on Summerfest?
DS: Yeah, it’s a very challenging and interesting position, everyday brings something new and I rely heavily on my experience over the years in running a major sporting stadium, a sports franchise and other special event experience I‘ve had over the years to make decisions on a daily basis for the benefit of Summerfest.
A-T: What kind of economic impact does Summerfest have on Milwaukee?
DS: About $125 million indirect and direct spending.
A-T: How do you select the local acts that play at Summerfest?
DS: There are several different ways, a lot of local acts know about us and they submit their music via CDs and so on, we also recruit and reach out to local, regional and, of course, national bands who want to play here.
A-T: Speaking of national bands, do you recruit most of them or do they contact you?
DS: It goes both ways.
A-T: What are some of the things you changed and would still like to change with Summerfest?
DS: Making it better involves, we have 75 acres that Summerfest is located on, and so we have buildings and stages and amphitheaters that need constant care and upgrades to make the event better for customers.  We continually to try to improve our food and beverage offerings and we. year over year, try and increase the quality of the music that is available here at Summerfest.
A-T: How do you go about increasing the quality of music? Are you talking about the sound quality or the actual acts that you bring out?
DS: Both; the sound quality, the lighting quality, the stage experience and the quality of the acts that we sign.
A-T: What kind of process do you go through when you recruit bands to see if they are the right fit for Summerfest?
DS: Well we have a very seasoned music executive who has been doing this for over 25 years that he pretty much knows who he would like to go after on a year to year basis to try and sign here at Summerfest.  It comes down to whether or not A, that band is working at that particular time of year and B, if it’s routed, if their tour is routed to the Midwest during that particular time of year.
A-T: I would like to switch gears and ask you a couple of questions about the time you spent in Major League Baseball. How did you become the president of the Marlins?
DS: That’s a long story. I worked for a gentleman named Mr. Wayne Huizenga, and I was with him at the start of Blockbuster Entertainment, which is Blockbuster Video. We had made a conscious decision to try and get into sports. We applied for a National League East expansion franchise in 1990. 
We were granted the franchise in 1991, and we threw out our first pitch in 1993, at that time I was vice president of sales and marketing and in 1994 I was named president of the Florida Marlins and chairman of Pro Player Stadium where the Marlins and the Miami Dolphins play football.
A-T: How did it make you feel when you were named president?
DS: I was pretty excited, that was quite an honor, and I love sports and it fit right in to where I wanted to go with my career.
A-T: What did you enjoy most about that experience, starting out the franchise and eventually winning a World Series in ‘97?
DS: The whole thing, the whole experience of working with the fans, the season ticket holders, the sponsors, the other executives, the community of South Florida. and of course. the players and coaches and all of the parts that make up a Major League Baseball team. It was all very interesting and challenging and something that was really very enjoyable to go work everyday to do.
A-T: Do you ever find yourself missing it at all?
DS: Oh sure, but I very much enjoy what I am doing here in Milwaukee and at Summerfest, but I love the game of baseball, and I watch many different baseball games throughout the country with the MLB baseball package, and I’m a big Milwaukee Brewer fan.
A-T: This is the resounding question I got from students I’ve talked to on campus, will admission prices go up this year and if so why?
DS: Well from year to year admission prices must be looked at, but we aren’t raising admission prices this year. It’s very economical to get into Summerfest. If you come during the day it costs $8. On the other hand, admission prices must be looked at from a year to year basis because the talent, the stage hands and the sounds and lights, the overall production of what we do here is certainly not getting any cheaper. So, to be able to afford the bands, the acts that we sign here that’s got to be paid for somehow someway.  
If you look at other music festivals throughout the country, Summerfest is a great value, a tremendous value in as much as if you paid the highest ticket price you 
A-T: Who are you excited to see this year?
DS: Rascal Flatts, my son is a freshman at Madison, and he turned me onto them. I’m looking forward to seeing Gnarls Barkley and we have some music coming, from New Orleans this year that I am interested in seeing too.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7173</link><author>by Andrew Munger of the Advance-Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Non-trad freshman young at heart]]></title><description><![CDATA[Patricia Goetz’s two oldest grandchildren go to college in Wisconsin. Like most grandmas, Goetz listens to her grandchildren when they talk about classes, professors and exams. But unlike those other grandmas, Goetz can compare notes. 
Goetz is a 73-year-old freshman majoring in journalism. 
This is Goetz’s second time at a university. In 1980 at the age of 45 she started school at Parkside University in Kenosha, and two years later, she went to school for three years at St. Lukes in Racine to get her nursing diploma. 
After finishing school she worked as a registered nurse at St. Mary’s Hospital in Racine until she retired in 1996. 
Goetz says that she came back to study journalism because she loves to write. 
“I was first published at the age of 61, when a small publication published a poem that I wrote when I was 17,” Goetz said. 
Her English teacher was less than impressed with the teen’s poetry prowess. 
“She told me to bring it back to her when I had finished it,” Goetz said. “But I told her it already was. I wish she was still alive so I could send it to her.” 
A few years ago Goetz started school again in a continuing education program at Racine and Madison, until this fall when she decided to go to Oshkosh to get another degree. 
One of the advantages of her non-traditional status is that unlike many undergraduates, Goetz has real experience in journalism. In 1998 and again in 2003 she spent time in Israel, living there for a total of two years. While she was there she wrote a column about living abroad. Her articles were published in a writer’s newsletter called Creativity Connection.
“Marshall Cook, the teacher who published me in his newsletter became my mentor and friend,” Goetz said. It was because of his mentorship, according to Goetz, that she decided to get her degree in journalism. 
Goetz said that a lot of the confidence she has comes from the resources on campus. 
“I couldn’t have done it without the Adult Non-Traditional Resource Office,” she said. 
According to the Director of the office, Ruth Freiburger, “the ANSR Office offers advocacy and support for the 1,650 undergrad and 11,000 graduate students who are above the traditional age of 26 years.” 
Goetz added that she “also felt so welcomed by the staff at Reeve Union.” 
One of her biggest concerns coming into the university was that nobody would know her, and that she wouldn’t have an identity. But even when she is studying, the workers stop at her table to say hello and talk. 
Though Goetz only has class two days a week, she drives from Neenah to Oshkosh every day to study in Reeve. 
Her dedication is obvious to her advisors and professors. 
Grace Lim, an adjunct journalism professor, says she enjoys having Goetz in her Introduction to Journalism and Mass Media class. 
“She came to me on the first day of school and asked if this course would be too much for her to handle,” Lim said. “I have to admit I was a little worried because we spend a lot of time covering current events and pop culture. I didn’t know if she would be at a loss if I talked about how the media covers Britney and Miley Cyrus without having to explain who they are. But she caught on and she really is one of my best students.” 
In addition to impressing professors, Goetz has had quite an impact on the people who help her at the ANSR office. 
Wendy Van Ahn, also a non-traditional student, works in the ANSR office and helps Goetz with things like learning D2L and transitioning into college. “She is just such a motivator—a true inspiration. There is always that fear when you go back to school, but she’s so determined,” Van Ahn said. 
While college isn’t necessarily difficult for Goetz, she does say that there have been a few obstacles. 
“I didn’t think I would need to relearn how to study. After all, I had been to college once already,” she said. 
But after Goetz took her first history quiz, she said she realized that she would have to make some changes. 
“I was reading the textbook like a novel. I took a studies skills class, and learned how to correctly read a textbook,” she said. “Here I had this $100 book, and I was afraid to mark in it. You should see my books now.” 
Goetz said that while some people think it sounds silly for someone who is 73 years old to go back to school, she gets a warm welcome from her classmates. 
“Sometimes people smile at me when I’m in the library or headed to class, and I just smile back. I forget how old I am until I look in the mirror and see all of my wrinkles,” she said. “One day I was sitting in class, and I was looking at my arm. I thought, ‘Oh shoot, another age spot.’ And then I laughed because I’m sure I’m the only college student here that has to worry about age spots.” 
Goetz said that while she is sometimes overwhelmed with course work, she loves school and is enjoying her classes. 
Above all, Goetz credits her decision to go back to school to her love of learning. “Anyone who loves to learn needs to realize it’s a gift,” she said. “Life is about learning.”]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7176</link><author>by Jennifer LaBorde, of the Advance-Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[A-T editors take 'spiritual' journey]]></title><description><![CDATA[Andrew on smoking Salvia extract
As the smoke from the third bowl was making its presence known on my psyche, I began to attempt the lighting of a fourth. Lighter on, touch the pipe, nothing. Did I even get close? Oh my God. This stuff is really working. I can’t even discern where my hand is in relation to my body. I have to sit down. 
I hit the couch. What? The room is breathing. The TV contracts and expands. I feel like I’m adrift in a large bowl of moving gelatin; a nugget of fruit in a Jell-O cake, suspended in existence, waiting for someone to pick me out. Ben sits on his chair, laughing. 
“Are you ready to do your maze?” Ben asks.
“Maze? I can’t even feel my hands right now,” I bellow at him. I laugh. Was that funny? I can’t even tell. Man, why are we doing this?
Andrew on the reason for the column
When we decided as a team to write the story about the herb Salvia on the front page, we undertook a lot of research, reading every story about the herb printed by Wisconsin and national newspapers. But something wasn’t adding up. Nearly every story had varying facts about what Salvia could or would do to users and were clearly written by reporters who had little (if any) experience with the herb. We decided the only way we could truly write intelligently about Salvia is to actually buy some at a head shop and experience what the herb had to offer for ourselves.
The point of this column is not to glorify Salvia use or encourage anyone to do it. Instead, this is just two writer’s attempt to put the herb’s use in context and to expose what the drug actually does to its users.
Ben on buying Salvia
On Salvia day, Andrew and I drove to the only option in Oshkosh for buying the herb, The Sacred Circle Spirit Shop. The sole store employee, a man who would ultimately share his extensive knowledge of Salvia and many other organic intoxicants with us, immediately greeted us. 
The man talked to us for nearly a half-hour about the “magical” and “mystical” experiences associated Salvia and other “meditation tools,” like something he called “wild opium lettuce,” while “turning us on” to incense and tea. 
Luckily, we avoid having to pay the $100-a-gram that the store charges; the employee is kind enough to weigh out half-a-gram for us. We ended up paying $50 dollars for a half-gram of Purple Sticky Salvia Extract, which the employee says will be about 10 to 15 doses. Now there’s nothing left but to do it.
Sitting in the kitchen at Andrew’s house, I’m getting ready to light the first bowl with one of those really long matches, since we forgot to get a lighter. I remember what the shop employee said about making sure the setting is right, trying to keep barking dogs out of the room while you’re using Salvia as I look nervously through the baby gate at Andrew’s two precious pooches. I say something to Andrew, and he puts the noisiest dog in another room for a little while.
After I finish smoking the first bowl, I feel something right away.
“This stuff actually works,” I say to Andrew, although it’s tough to get the words out because I’m laughing hysterically. Not only that, but I can suddenly hear the clock ticking, the fridge humming and the birds outside chirping. Suddenly all the background noise had become really clear to me. It was pretty distracting.
Andrew on the effects of Salvia
As I sat at my kitchen table, watching Ben “trip” (which actually entailed him laughing a lot and saying, “this stuff actually works” every 10 seconds), I too began to laugh. This is it? 
Nearly everything I said made him laugh uncontrollably. I felt like a comedian. I know I’m funny (I hope), but I know I’m not funny enough to make a guy laugh uncontrollably by asking him how he’s doing.
Thanks to Ben’s interview with Joe Abhold over at the Counseling Center, we had the brilliant idea to test our level of impairment while on Salvia. This, on the surface, seems like an easy circumstance. But how do you convince someone who is laughing uncontrollably to get a hold of himself and do a third-grader’s maze? 
Luckily, he was in control enough to do it, taking three times as long as he did prior to smoking the Salvia. Then, almost as suddenly as his laughing started, he stopped. 
“Yeah, I think I’m done,” he said. 
Then, it was my turn.
I took the pipe we bought at Satori Imports (where we explicitly asked for a pipe to smoke Salvia out of), and Ben prepared a bowl. Here goes nothing. 
Inhale. Smoke is in. Tastes terrible. Almost like when you burn a pizza in an oven and try to eat a burnt pepperoni. Load up second bowl. Inhale. Whoo. I’m feeling great. Hell, how about a third? Done. A fourth? That’s when it gets tricky. I can’t work the lighter and the pipe simultaneously. Ben lights it for me. I inhale deeply. 
Everything I’ve read about Salvia didn’t really prepare me for this. I guess I should have expected that. How can you properly describe what it’s like to have the room inhale and exhale when you do? Or how a TV screen can suddenly get very big, then very small? Or how it feels like you’ve been high for 36 hours when it’s really only been three minutes? Or how laughing is the only way to relieve the madness?
Then it’s my turn to try the maze.      
I look down at the seemingly endless crypt he laid before me. I can only see my pen touching the paper. I don’t think I can do this. I begin trying in earnest to move my hands around the maze. I fail miserably, laughing ensues. I finally decide my only option is to hold the pen stationary and move the paper around underneath it. It works, I guess, but it takes me longer to do the maze high than not. Ben mentions he’s worried I’m going to punch a hole through the coffee table. I laugh uncontrollably. 
Ben on getting really ripped
With our incredibly scientific experiments over, Andrew and I decide that we should up the dosage to see if we can experience our own “spiritual journey” like the shop employee mentioned. So we each smoke a few more bowls, and now we are really ripped. 
I hug the wall as I walk to the couch. When I sit down, I start trying to remember how long it’s been since we smoked Salvia and it seems like a long time. But I don’t have a good concept of time at this point. My equilibrium is also severely disrupted. It feels like the room is spinning and I am being pulled to the side, which almost results in me peeing on the bathroom wall. But washing my hands afterwards, feeling the perfect temperature of the water as it was running down the backs of my hands, was probably the coolest experience during my short high. 
But one of the more unusual aspects of the drug is that you can essentially go back to your normal life once it is over. Little more than an hour after the last bowl, I was writing a review for the Advance-Titan about some Swedish pop singer. If I had been drinking with Andrew, I never would have been able to do that. 
Andrew and Ben’s thoughts on Salvia
One of the main concerns of the people who support a ban of Salvia is that they are afraid people will get behind the wheel of a car and kill someone. It’s obvious those people have never been on Salvia. I know that at the height of my high, I would have never have been able to work a key into an ignition and start a car; I was too busy pumping my arms in the air and laughing to have done that. It’s possible to drive a car drunk, which is probably why it happens so often, but you can hardly move on Salvia much less get in your car and drive. Where’s the real danger? 
With such a small window of opportunity (Ben and I experienced a 10-minute high), you’d have to be committed to making sure you’d be a danger on the road to be able to drive on Salvia. 
Salvia is unlikely to become a mainstream drug because: one, it’s really expensive (more than $100 for a gram of the highest potency) and two, the effects are less substantial than alcohol, marijuana and just about any other mainstream drug. 
That’s not to say it doesn’t have consequences; it does. But that’s better left to the individual user to worry about.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7179</link><author>by Ben Munson and Andrew Winistorfer</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[An Extra-Ordinary Tale]]></title><description><![CDATA[While many of us have imagined rubbing elbows with the stars, few of us will ever be able to live the dream.  But for a UW-Oshkosh student and professor, the fantasy became reality.
This April, the two experienced a glimpse of Hollywood when they were cast as extras in the Michael Mann directed, “Public Enemies,” starring Johnny Depp as the outlaw, John Dillinger.
 For Matthew Roszak, a 22-year-old Oshkosh senior, it happened by chance.  Roszak, a communications major who started theater courses this year, heard a movie was going to be filmed in Oshkosh, but didn’t think twice about it.  This was until his roommate told him of the audition for extras and suggested he should go.
“As soon as I heard about it I knew that I wanted to [audition] right away,” Roszak said.  “I was curious about how the movies work, and I’d love to be an actor so I wanted to be part of it.”
With a spring in his step and donning his father’s three-piece suit, (the extras were instructed to be dressed in 1930s apparel), Roszak arrived at Oshkosh’s Traeger Middle School in hopes of becoming part of a Hollywood film.
Roszak said the audition attracted more than 1,000 hopefuls from around the state and took two hours of waiting in the schools gymnasium.  He said everyone was given a card to fill out with personal information and had their picture taken.  They were then taken in groups to be briefed on what was happening and important filming dates. 
Wondering where this was going, Roszak found out that the real audition wasn’t your information card or photo, but waiting in line.
“As an extra your’re going to be standing around a lot, so they’re seeing if you’re patient,” Roszak said.  “They’re looking at your facial expressions, they’re looking to see if you’re getting angry or antsy and that’s what they really go off of.  I had no idea, but as it turned out, I guess I had good patience even though I had a hangover.”
John Beam, an assistant professor of mathematics at Oshkosh also went to the audition.  He said his wife, Oshkosh journalism adjunct professor Grace Lim, told him that some of her friends were going, so he decided to tag along.
At the audition he was told that if they were interested they would get back to him in a couple months.  Surprisingly, three days later they called to offer him a detective role that would be involved in several scenes.
“By the time I got the message and returned the call the next morning, it was too late,” Beam said.  “They called again about a month later, with the offer of a smaller role.” 
While he didn’t get the larger role, Beam was excited at the opportunity and thought it would be a lot of fun.
Meanwhile, Roszak was waiting for a response, and two months later he finally received a message asking if he’d be interested in a stand-in or double spot.  This would have been great, but Roszak embellished his height at the audition, and since they needed a taller actor for the stand-in they couldn’t use him, but all wasn’t lost as they asked if he’d like to be an extra.
“Yeah, lying about my height kind of bit me in the ass, but I was excited to get an extra part,” Roszak said.   “I started calling my brothers, my parents and my girlfriend right away.” 
As the movie personel kept the scene’s plot a secret, Roszak and Beam were told to meet on April 11, at Wittman Regional Airport.  Roszak said he woke up that morning with a mixture of excitement and nervousness and was looking forward to the adventure.  
“It was like Christmas morning.,” Roszak said.  “I didn’t know what I was going to get.”
On the cold and rainy afternoon, he arrived at the airport where the extras were gathered together to get haircuts and be fitted for wardrobe.  They sat around  for some time and eventually were taken to a hangar where they got set up for filming.  Roszak said the scene was the arrival of John Dillinger being escorted off of a plane by detectives after his capture.  His role was one of an onlooker who gathered to see the notorious outlaw.
He [Dillinger] was like a rock star who we were suppose to hate, kind of like Brett Michaels,” Roszak said.
After practicing with Depp’s stand-in, the movie star arrived via private jet and black Escalade.  Once on set, Roszak said they shot the scene for what seemed like forever.  They went through the scene from different camera angles, and as his role called for him to be an onlooker excited to see the outlaw, Roszak became the envy of millions of women around the world, by not only patting Depp on the shoulder but talking to him too.
When frustration mounted over the amount of takes piling up, Roszak said he lightened the mood by joking about it.
“We just got done with a really good shot, and I jokingly said, ‘Hey Johnny, that was a good one, let’s do it again.’ He looked at me and said, ‘You know it, mate,’” Roszak said.
Danielle McManus, a 22-year-old Oshkosh senior, heard of Roszaks interaction with the star and immediately turned into a jealous teenager.
“Oh my God I was trying to see him [Depp] all week,” McManus said.  “Matt is so lucky, I’d give anything to meet him [Depp].  He is so sexy.”
As exciting as this brief encounter was, Roszak said that unlike Depp, he was not the movie star and that the extras were treated accordingly. 
“[The extras were treated] as if we were props rather than people,” Beam said. 
After the seven hours of filming wrapped, Depp, or J.D. as the director and crew called him, got into his jet and took off.  For the extras it was the end of a 12-hour day and Roszak said he, and the other extras were then served a meal and sent on their way.  He said he was paid nearly $100 for his days work but would have done it for free.
This marked the end of the Hollywood experience for the two, and in the end, they both came away with knowledge, a little money and a great conversation starter.
“[It’s] mostly just a good story to tell my friends,” Beam said.
When the movie finally makes it to the big screen, Roszak said he is going to be the first in line to see if his scene made the final cut.  If not, he’ll be disappointed but not discouraged.
“This was a once in a lifetime opportunity, and I’d do it again in a heartbeat,” Roszak said.  “I’m going to buy the movie poster, and it’s going to say starring Johnny Depp and Christian Bale, and co-starring Matthew Roszak in permanent marker.”]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7164</link><author>Phil Martinez, of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Letters to the Editor]]></title><description><![CDATA[Lavender Graduation important to LGBTQ community

Recently there was a Letter to the Editor criticizing the LGBTQ Lavender Graduation ceremony on campus, accusing the LGBTQ community of separating itself and declaring it a “trap” that special interest groups fall into, which only serves to harm our cause. I feel this is an unfair characterization of Lavender Graduation, and similar programs and is based on a misunderstanding of why such “special interest groups” exist. 

LGBTQ programs on campus, just like all groups on campus which deal with minority issues, do not exist only to promote awareness and understanding to people who are not LGBTQ, but also to create a community for those of us who identify as LGBTQ to relate to each other due to our common experiences. For example, a Rainbow Alliance for H.O.P.E. meeting is not simply a place to come up with ways to promote education and awareness, but also a social gathering for LGBTQ people and allies so we can socialize with others who go through the same things we do. We hold them so that we can have a community where we are not expected to keep quiet about our relationships, where we can talk about things like discrimination without having that discrimination minimized by people who have never been through it or blamed on us, and for some of us these events are the only place we actually be “out” and honest about ourselves because we do not have any support elsewhere. 

Many people who do not identify as LGBTQ, including allies, do not understand the personal repercussions of having an LGBTQ identity and assume that we have the same experiences of non-LGBTQ people.  So when we create events or “safe spaces” it is assumed that we are “self-segregating” and irrationally avoiding heterosexuals.  In reality, it is simply to create a place where we are affirmed and understood, where you aren’t expected to be more private about your personal life than anyone else just because of the gender of your partner, where you don’t have to lie about who you are dating or friends with and where you don’t have to worry about whether or not the announcer will call out the wrong name at your college graduation.
I understand that many people who do not identify as LGBTQ often cannot see what the average LGBTQ person goes through on a daily basis, that is simply due to lack of personal experience and not necessarily a homophobic attitude, but at the same time I feel it must be addressed that this “self-segregation” is not simply a product of our own preferences as LGBTQ people, but a product of the reaction we get if we attempt to be ourselves elsewhere, even in such simple daily interactions as talking about a partner who happens to be the same sex or being referred to as the correct gender if one’s identity is not immediately apparent.  This is why events such as Lavender Graduation are important to our community, even if its importance is not apparent to those outside our community.

Jack Scheerer
Student
Programming Coordinator, Rainbow Alliance for HOPE



You can make your voice heard!

...next year.


SEND A LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Please e-mail atitan@uwosh.edu or deliver to Reeve Union 19 by 5 p.m. Tuesday. E-mail is the preferred method.
Mail letters to: Advance-Titan, Reeve Union Room 19, 800 Algoma Blvd., Oshkosh, WI 54901.

LETTER GUIDELINES

The Advance-Titan welcomes and reads all letters. Timely, well-written, provocative opinions on topics of interest at UW-Oshkosh are given first preference. 
All letters are subject to editing; not all letters can be published. Letters of length exceeding 300 words may be edited at the discretion of the A-T staff.  
Name, position, address and daytime phone are required, even in e-mail submissions (only name, position and city will be published). 
We do not publish poetry, anonymous or open letters, and letters printed elsewhere. 
Each writer is limited to one published letter per month. We cannot acknowledge receipt of all submissions. 
If your letter is chosen for publication, we will attempt to contact you for verification.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7175</link><author></author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Numbers don’t add up in proposed federal gas tax]]></title><description><![CDATA[Two weeks ago, the presumed Republican nominee Sen. John McCain announced his support for what he called a tax holiday. The proposal would eliminate the federal gas tax, which is 18.4 cents per gallon, between Memorial Day and Labor Day so that Americans would be less burdened during the peak vacation period. 

Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton also supports the tax holiday, but Barack Obama disagrees. He points out that last summer many states peeled back gas taxes, and the public and government both suffered.

The news media is mixed. Some hail McCain and Clinton for coming up with a solution to help those who have been hit hard with the surge in gas prices. Others slam the candidates for promoting a proposal that might be meant more to get votes than to actually alleviate a growing and serious problem.

But in looking at the details, it is clear that this proposal is exceptionally flawed.

Voters and officials have to understand one simple fact: when you take away or lower taxes, services decrease. Taxes are revenue, and with less revenue there is less spending on the things that Americans count on. The federal gas tax directly funds the Highway Trust Fund, which is responsible for national highway construction.

Because the presidential candidates are talking about this tax holiday in terms of numbers and money, it’s necessary to counter their argument with more numbers. 

Here’s one: 300,000. It’s the projected minimum number of construction jobs that will be eliminated for every $1 billion that the government doesn’t raise from gas tax.

Here’s another one: 10 billion. That’s the average number of federal gas taxes raised during the summer that we would be going without—or worse, having to make up in some other area.

And finally, 30. That’s the number of dollars that on average, each American driver will actually save during the three-month holiday. It’s only $30. 

But the candidates and many voters aren’t thinking of these numbers. They are looking at the ever-increasing numbers at the local Kwik Trip and BP gas stations. 

The GasBuddy Organization says that the average tax for a gallon of gas is 62 cents, which means that subtracting the federal tax of 18.4 cents, the average state tax is 43.6 cents. Each state determines their own tax, and Wisconsin is in the top seven. Wisconsin state tax is 51.3 cents, and the top taxer is California at 63.9.

With a gallon of gas costing upwards of $3.50, eliminating the tax sounds like a good idea. The price per barrel is constantly discussed on the news, and most Americans don’t know why gas prices are so high. Is it supply? Is it demand? Regardless, eliminating this tax won’t solve any problems, especially if Exxon Mobil decides to raise their prices just because the Fed lowered them—which let’s face it, is incredibly probable.

Price per barrel doesn’t mean much to most Americans, and most don’t know how it translates into price per gallon. We just know that it’s high—higher than its ever been—and that something needs to be done to decrease the amount of money leaving our wallets.

Every time we go to the pump, we pay more and more—and consequently have less money to spend on necessities. It’s upsetting, and we are calling for immediate action. With a current administration that was surprised that gas prices could even reach $4.00 per gallon, Americans are ready for a president that not only is more in touch with reality, but will work to lessen the amount of money we are spending on gas.

But this gas tax holiday is not the answer.

Unfortunately, it’s not just presidential candidates McCain and Clinton who are pushing for the gas tax holiday; there are efforts around the United States to decrease the tax for three months this summer. Some efforts agree with McCain and Clinton and want to decrease the federal tax, while others are working on a smaller stage trying to decrease individual state taxes.

Either way, this quick fix won’t help with the overarching problem and even short-term benefits are greatly outweighed. 

While dust-under-the-rug type solutions might be desirable to those of us feeling the greatest effect—the middle class—the only sustainable solutions will be renewable fuels. Americans have to demand that our current elected officials and presidential hopefuls are committed to the highest degree to funding and promoting alternative fuel research.

Americans don’t need a Band-Aid that when ripped off will cause a myriad of other problems.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7172</link><author>by Jennifer LaBorde, of the Advance-Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[STAFF EDITORIAL: End of the year: Time for some recognition before]]></title><description><![CDATA[Its been a long year. The 2007-2008 school year has been an interesting one, to say the least, and we’re all glad it’s coming to an end. But before the end-of-year celebration, we’d like to recognize the admittedly often overlooked accomplishments of the many students and faculty who have worked hard all year to make UW-Oshkosh great. 

Of course, it would be impossible to recognize every achievement from every student across campus. Each of us has had our triumphs and tragedies in our own lives throughout the past year and perhaps everyone deserves recognition, so...great job this year, UW-O! Congratulations! 

But this is after all an academic institution of higher education, so let’s celebrate our hard work. If you’re not on the list and you think you deserve to be, you probably do, so we’re sorry in advance. We promise to include you in the next one. Seriously. 

Congratulations to…

All of the Student Leadership and Involvement Award winners, including Mary DeMunck, Oshkosh Student Nurses Association, Order of Omega, the Health, Physical Education, Exercise Science and Recreation Club, Circle K, Model United Nations, International Student Association, Ann-Marie Brewer, Emily Westover, Rebecca Rennert, and Reeve Union Board.

The District 8 National Student Advertising Competition winners who beat out teams from Marquette University and UW-Madison to advance to the June 8-9 national competition in Atlanta. Team members include Nycol Block, Margaret Brill, Marie Daniel, Matt Decker, Ann DeVillers, Preston Fayas, Brittany Harms, JJ Heber, Tina Hove, Jessica Malcolm, Samuel Mark, Kelly Meyer, Jamie Neitzel, Erin School, Liz Schulze, Kelly Shew, Kirsten Strom, Ashley Taylor and Heather Verhelst and faculty advisors Kathy Fredrickson and Dana Baumgart. (Good luck in Hot-lanta!)

College of Business management professor J. Ben Arbaugh, who has been selected to be editor of the prestigious business journal, Academy of Management Learning & Education. 

College of business student Anthony Goebel, who received the prestigious Beta Gamma Sigma Scholarship and is an intern with the Green Bay Packers. (Yeah, we’re jealous)

Art professor Michelle Tobia for her exceptional work in the ceramics lab. 

Spanish professor Rocio Cortes for her work volunteering with students at Carl Traeger Elementary School.

Brent MacWilliams of the College of Nursing for working with students and community leaders to establish the first “Men in Nursing” organization in the Midwest.

Stephanie Stewart of the College of Nursing for her leadership in teaching with the use of high-tech equipment such as computerized mannequins and virtual reality program, Second Life. 

Roxie Huebscher of the College of Nursing for her work integrating traditional and non-traditional health practices in nursing education.

Psychology professor Susan McFadden, whose research on the spirituality and development of senior citizens won her the 2008 Spirituality and Aging Award from the National Interface Coalition on Aging.

Assistant professor of special education Denise Clark, who received the P.B. Poorman Award for outstanding achievement for her work with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) students and faculty.

Leigh Ann Mrotek of the Department of Kinesiology and Health, who published articles in the Journal of Neuroscience and mentored students on research projects.

Nadia Kaltcheva of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, who was awarded a research grant in September and has since used the grant to support student research in addition to her own.

Geology student and President of the Geology Club Cole Edwards, who received the award for best research paper at the Provost’s Celebration of Scholarship in addition to winning most of this year’s geology awards, including the Reginald Brook Memorial Award, Burton E. Karges Geology Achievement Award, Burton E. Karges Geology Scholarship Award, National Association of Geoscience Teachers/U.S. Geological Survey Internship, National Association of Geoscience Teachers Summer Field Course Scholarship. 

Philosophy students Brent Haroldson and Shane Hoffman, recipients of the Socratic Award, which honors graduates with the highest grade point average in the department.

The Titan student-athletes who have worked hard all year. Notably, seniors Leah Rosenbaum (volleyball), Derek Christiansen (soccer), Vanessa Virbitsky (gymnastics), Pat Detmer and Kevil Luedtke (wrestling), Nate Boehlke, Phil Prusinski, Scott Michel (track and field), Rebecca Masephol (track and field, volleyball), Andy Moriarty (football), Sarah Schettle (swimming and diving, track and field), Terri Schwamb (track and field), Ronessa Stampfli (softball), Whitney Tyriver (women’s basketball), Jordan Johnson (men’s basketball), Dana Gudel (women’s soccer), and Liz Buske (golf). 

Coaches Toby Bares (soccer), Tom Lechnier (baseball), Ted Van Dellen (basketball), Cindy Suess (softball) and Brian Schaefer (men’s club volleyball, women’s volleyball), who all achieved major milestones.

All of the students on the honor roll and all of the students receiving scholarships. (You’re better than all of us)

Special congratulations to all of the spring 2008 graduates. (Except Jeff Burger)

Enjoy your summer, UW-Oshkosh, you’ve earned it. Keep up the good work, and we’ll see you next fall.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7171</link><author></author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Optimism and hope in America’s next generation]]></title><description><![CDATA[“Every generation needs a new revolution”
- Thomas Jefferson

Something is happening.

America is changing, and America is ready for it. I’m not sure if you noticed this, (and as always, I could be wrong) but this country seems to be either on the verge or in the midst of a cultural upheaval stemming from the up-and-coming young generation. The tide is beginning to turn, and for the first time in a very long time, America seems poised to get itself together and rise to the occasion and become the truly great nation that we have the potential to become. 

Something was bound to happen.

Since the end of the Cold War, the world has been changing dramatically. Globalization and the Internet have made the world a smaller place, and it has been a struggle to make sense of everything, but now we’re ready to move forward and the first way that this change was bound to take place in America is culturally. 

The 20th Century gave birth to American popular culture in the 1950s, and each decade from this century gave us its own unique music, television, sports, movies, catch phrases, fashion trends and everything else that contributes to American culture. They became part of the American experience and American history in ways that nobody could have realistically predicted.

But now, in the 21st century, we’ve spent the last seven-odd years culturally consuming the previous 50 years because now we have the technology. Seemingly every idea throughout the course of history found its way onto the Internet, especially things within the realm of 20th century American pop culture. Every album was put online, every TV show was released in DVD box set, every relevant movie was remade with flashy new special effects and everything that ever happened in front of a video camera was put on YouTube. Somewhere along the line, our nostalgic cultural reconsumption became a multibillion dollar industry.

But as we moved to accept these ideas as commonplace, they started to grow stale, and I believe America is now ready for something new. Ready to move forward. Ready for the future. Ready for the 21st Century. 

This could be for a variety of reasons, but whatever is happening is certainly coming from the youth of this country. And it has always been my opinion that the most accurate and most immediate reflection of culture (especially youth culture) in post-modern America comes in album format, which then, in turn, influence culture once it’s being listened to by whoever chooses to listen. Perhaps this generation’s turning point was “In Rainbows.” 

Since Napster made all music free in 1998, the music industry has been trying to react profitably. They’ve been trying to figure out a way to make money in a world where the next generation (usually) wasn’t paying for music. The problem was, nobody had any good ideas on how to make it work, which left record companies promoting clever marketing schemes more than real music. 

But at some point in the months leading up to Oct. 1, 2007, Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood got stoned (according to Rolling Stone) and (perhaps accidentally) came up with what has proved to be a paradigm shifting idea of releasing their instant classic album “In Rainbows” in the now legendary pay-whatever-the-hell-you-want scheme. 

Since the album’s release, Radiohead has done everything their fans could ask for, and then some. They’ve broadcast live shows across the Internet (and they’ve all been fantastic). They’re billed as the headliner for every summer festival they plan to set foot at. They released “In Rainbows” in CD format for all of us hard-copy diehards, and it debuted  number 1 on the Billboard Charts in the first week of 2008. 

With that, Radiohead set the bar for success in 21st century music. Now, with bands like Vampire Weekend, the Black Keys, MGMT and My Morning Jacket becoming more influential by the minute, the music universe is seeing a revival not seen since the early ‘90s, and that’s not even factoring all of the artists who are raising the bar in hip-hop – Kanye West, Lil Wayne, Lupe Fiasco, M.I.A., etc.

The optimism and hope that music has provided for us has breathed new life into American culture. Perhaps you would think that this type of change doesn’t matter, but for the iPod generation, it was a major step forward. However, not everyone in this generation has been fortunate enough to be able to enjoy the current cultural progressivism that is beamed through laptops and iPods and cellphones across the country. 

Tragically, more than 4,000 young men and women have given their lives in service to this country half a world away in Iraq. Thousands more have returned home wounded. Even more have met the same or similar fate in Afghanistan. Families have been ripped apart and mothers and fathers have had to mourn the loss of their sons and daughters.

It has been a long five years since President Bush “heroically” landed on the USS Abraham Lincoln – the takeoff point for many of the aircrafts that flew into Iraq in the initial “Shock and Awe” campaign – and spoke victoriously in front of a banner that read “Mission Accomplished.”

Since then, Iraq has for all practical purposes turned into our generation’s Vietnam. A quagmire. 

But at the same time, you rarely hear of violent anti-war demonstration at home. You rarely hear of soldiers (in what is technically a volunteer army, though sometimes that seems debatable) returning home and being treated the way that Vietnam veterans (many of whom were involuntarily drafted) were treated. 

The point here, is that the generation that has grown up during the War on Terror and the War in Iraq has learned from America’s mistakes during Vietnam. We’ve learned from the often misguided hippies, but we still didn’t really know what to do about it. The Democrats gained a majority in Congress, but that didn’t change anything. 

But then on Feb. 11, 2007, a 45-year-old first term anti-war Senator from Illinois named Barack Obama announced that he was running for president and that he was going to “change this country.”

The odds were against him. Not only would he be running to be the first black president in our nation’s history, but as the first president who’s last name is one letter away from being the same as the first name of our nation’s biggest enemy (Osama bin Laden) and who’s first name rhymes with the country we are at war with (Iraq). It’s like if someone named Japan Hitler (or something to that effect) ran in 1942.

Obama’s campaign, since its onset, has been about rising above those types of superficialities that separate us as Americans. Things that separate us that we have no control over, like your name or race and addressing the things that can use some help, like overcoming the absurd red state-blue state divide and then focusing on the problems that Americans can come together and solve. 

I certainly have my doubts about Obama – as I do about pretty much any politician – but whatever movement that he intended on starting back in February of last year, it seems to be happening. It doesn’t seem to be dying down, but rather, moving forward and gaining support. 

Much of this support is coming from the “youth vote,” which many pundits and political analysts hailed as the reason behind Obama’s Jan. 3, victory in the Iowa Caucus. Coincidentally, this was the same week “In Rainbows” officially hit shelves. Obama’s support was at its lowest in the weeks following the initial online release of “In Rainbows” on Oct. 10. According to Real Clear Politics, on Oct. 16, Sen. Hillary Clinton led Obama in the polls 48.2 percent to 20.4 percent. Four months later, on Feb. 16, Obama had taken a slim lead over Sen. Clinton. I’m not saying there’s a completely direct correlation here, but it’s worth noting. 

A March 18 article from U.S. News and World Report stated that “More than 5.7 million voters under the age of 30 have participated in the primaries and caucuses held thus far. That’s a 109 percent increase from the last set of presidential primaries, according to Rock the Vote.” 109 percent!

This movement is not only cultural, but political.

So as we move forward into this new world, we can move confidently knowing that there are those in the youth of this country that are on the right track and ready to peacefully make a positive change in America. Despite the rising costs of food and gas, the economy’s unofficial recession, the subprime mortgage crisis, no end in sight in the war in Iraq, a broken healthcare system, the myriad of environmental concerns and the imminent political firestorm of this fall’s national election, we need that optimism. We need that hope.

I mean, look how far we’ve come in the past 100 years. America defeated the destructive forces of fascism and communism and embraced democracy and freedom as cornerstones of our bold new world.

With freedom and democracy guiding that hope, we can make America a nation that works with the rest of the world instead of exploiting it. We can work for peace instead of create war. We can work together to solve the problems that this country faces.

It won’t be easy – nothing of this magnitude comes easy – but it’s not impossible. 

Something is certainly happening, and I couldn’t be more excited to be living in America in 2008. It is simply an unprecedented time. And if this is our generation’s revolution, the future looks bright.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7174</link><author>by Dan Shafer, of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Senior Sendoff: editor in chief Tyler]]></title><description><![CDATA[It began with a gripe.
Only at a “university” (and I’m using that term loosely) such as UW-Oshkosh could a person be hired on the basis of his complaints. Yet it happened and, as pathetic as it may… does sound, I am greatly thankful for it.
What else but a campus newspaper would give a socially awkward kid who’s never attended a journalism class a forum (in the LighterSide) to talk about things like a fictitious date with Emily Dickinson, my hatred for holiday-themed sweaters and why I am better than both Thomas Edison and Patrick Swayze?
Making the most of this rare opportunity to grant insight of my inner most thoughts, hopes and feelings to a potential readership of 12,000 students and faculty, I never held back. Christianity, Nickelback, corporate America (sans Qdoba, Taco Johns and Monster Energy) and the events of 9/11 be damned – I wrote on. Chris Becker took a chance on me and I’d like to think it worked out, arguably better than the equally risky acquisition of Nick Olig.
Somewhere along the way, I decided I wanted to be a real journalist. I was but an English major… a terrible one at that, but I learned volumes about the craft and produced news print for every section of the newspaper except Opinion, and none but the A-T staff was my teacher.
Thanks to the guidance and experience of writers and editors like Rob Ireland, Nick Gumm, Kate Briquelet, Stephanie Barnard, Ricky Nelson and the copy-editorial thrashings (and with good reason) of Max Davies, I was handed valuable knowledge of the written word that I am sure to bring with me wherever I may go. Whether it be the putrid depths of courts reporter for a weekly newspaper in Rhinelander or the glorious pantheons of writing obituaries for a semi-monthly in Minocqua, you’ve each played a major role in the writer I’ve become and I thank you for it.
I subsequently sunk my claws into the look, feel and style of what almost accidentally became my paper and my trusted and immensely talented batch of cronies - including: Teresa Puschnig, Andrew Winistorfer, Jeffery Rutherford Burger, Zandi Brehmer, Dan Shafer, Ben Munson, Jenna Kleist, Dziewsy Chase, Felicia Clark, Axl Koch and Kevin “The Ancient Wonder” Kosterman – made my brief stint in leadership an unforgettable and deeply rewarding experience. We may have ruined the paper, but we did it our way. If anything, we’re out of debt! I have no doubt the A-T will be great without me.
I want to recognize a handful of professors who’ve impacted me in the classroom as well. The kindness and sincerity of Robert Feldman, the elegant prose and Edward Norton-like voice of Ron Rindo, the passion of Pamela Gemin and the overall talent, consideration and awesomeness of Laura Jean Baker. I’ve excelled pretty much only in your classes because I deeply respected you all. 
Additional thanks go to The Northwestern’s Dave Wasinger (a mentor of sorts) Brett Kryskowski (if it’s spelled wrong, consider a new name) and Mike Krumrei, Jim Lundstrom from Scene, the Onion’s Steve Hyden, OnMilwaukee.com’s Jeff Sherman, Rachel Hawkinson of Deluxe920 and Richard Baxter for all the advice and/or writing opportunity they’ve granted me to date. I appreciate the time you spent whipping me into shape.
So what’s next? Do you care? No? Alright. I guess we’ll see where I end up. I hear Miles Kimball is a great place to work. In the meantime between graduation and my early energy drink-related death, feel free to read my baseball musings on the MLBHub.com blog network and rightfieldbleachers.com.
I leave the way I began, with a gripe.
• If you have a sub for an extended period of time, shouldn’t they be called a “party sub”? Yeah, I know that sucked, then again so did the majority of my time in lame ass Oshkosh.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7165</link><author>by Tyler Maas, of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Senior Sendoff: cartoonist Jeff]]></title><description><![CDATA[When I was a lonely freshman at this stunning university and wasn’t too stressed with gen-eds, I really needed a hobby. I picked up the nearest uninteresting object in my reach and it just so happened to be my roommate’s copy of the Advance-Titan. I flipped through and saw a cluttered mess until I turned to the LighterSide section. As I began scanning the page, I noticed a comic section. I was intrigued for some reason, not having really any moments in life when I liked to read comics, and not having ever drawn them. As I finished the unfunny comic, I saw an ad towards the bottom, “Comic Artist Wanted.” Having an interest in illustration, I thought about it for a few minutes: easy job equals easy money. Putting together that I needed some cash and the comic section was in dire need of a revamp, I decided I would apply. 
Starting the A-T was a rocky one. People didn’t respect me or pay attention to me. It was like I was a 19-year-old at a college newspaper. I pretty much avoided coming to the office as much as possible to avoid dirty looks, if any at all. The first year was pretty much the worst. People didn’t think I was funny (still don’t) and my voice was not being heard. As the years went on, and I began getting to know “the important people,” I became more involved with staff illustrations, editorial cartoons and, eventually, advertising. 
Drawing comics was never hard for me until I started to look back on my comics I had done and realize how terrible they were. As I entered my third year at the A-T I started taking time in creating my panels and planning out punch lines. Granted, it really didn’t matter because, who reads my comic anyway, right? Even though I took more time and actually started to enjoy making my comics, it still was, and is, a struggle for readers to like my comics. I guess that’s the curse of a weird and twisted sense of humor. 
Now ending my fourth year here, I began wanting out. If I had ever had a database in my mind for ideas for funny comics, it’s long since run out. I’m done. I have nothing left to offer the A-T. I guess crappy ideas don’t last forever. So now I’m only left with thanks. Thanks to the guy who inspired me to join the A-T staff with his crappy comic strip. Thanks to the guy who hired me and told me I have to write good comics instead of bad and weird ones. Thanks to Tyler Maas for always giving me a pat on the back when I was down. And finally, thanks to my readers, yes you. All six of you.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7168</link><author>by Jeff Burger, of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Senior Sendoff: managing editor Andrew]]></title><description><![CDATA[When I was a junior in high school, as the editor of an underground newspaper, I wrote a lengthy diatribe (I think three sentences, the paper was on 8 ½ by 11) about how self-congratulatory it was for the editors of the school paper to write send-offs bragging about how they were going to great colleges and basically live better lives than the rest of us plebes. 
I bring this up, one because I am largely self-absorbed, and two, because now I am in the same position, being asked to write an essay describing how I got here, what I’m going to do next, and who I’d like to thank. Well, here it goes:
When I got to UW-Oshkosh in 2004, I lived my life as a ghost. I had no major I really cared about (did I want to be a teacher? It took six weeks as an education major to decide no) and had no idea what I wanted to do. Then, in fall of 2006, I became a journalism major, and somehow got a job working at the Advance-Titan when I hadn’t written a story in my entire life.
At the A-T, I found my place to belong, and for that, I will always be grateful. I became more than a ghost, I was a ghost with a byline. A ghost with clips and an e-mail inbox full of hate mail over reviews where people thought I “was the wrong person” to review CD’s by their favorite artists.
Over this last year as the Arts & Entertainment editor (and later as managing editor too) I wrote about everything you didn’t care about (except for that awesome Lewis Black interview). Did you hear that one band you never heard of has a record out? I did, and I think it sucked. I wrote for nearly every section this last year (boring News excluded) and in 49 out of 51 issues. Basically, you had a 96% chance of reading an issue in which I wrote something. I know that means nothing to you (except you mom and dad) but it fills me up with a feeling that nothing can match (except maybe heroin, never done that).    
Now with the obligatory thanks. Thanks to Kevin Kosterman for always being encouraging and pushing me to become the managing editor I am today. Thanks to Ben Munson for being the best damn Features and LighterSide editor money can buy and for being constant comic relief in the office. 
But my highest regards of thanks go to executive editor in chief Tyler Maas, who made me Arts & Entertainment editor and managing editor of this great paper. Without you Tyler, I wouldn’t have the confidence to go above my abilities, or the self-assuredness to pull any of this off. You took a chance on me when I was probably unqualified, and I’ll be indebted to you forever (Not literally of course. I’ll buy you a beer or something.) 
I should also thank my parents for not only letting me live rent-free in their house for the four years I was in school (lame, I know, but I’m graduating with no debt and $700 in my pocket), but for instilling in me my work ethic and always urging me to do what I like to do, not what will pay the best. Thanks to you guys, I’m looking down the barrel of life as an underpaid music critic for an online magazine (Prefix, for those of you who’d like to continue sending me e-mails about how much I suck) and couldn’t be happier.
Now, as I get prepared to graduate, and finally leave this stinkhole, I offer a good luck to the future staff of the A-T. Ben, Jenna, Dan, Phil, Will, Andy and Max; good luck putting the paper together next year, and remember to always have fun. That’s the point of this whole experience. I can’t wait to see who will trash the new Gym Class Heroes record.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7166</link><author>by Andrew Winistorfer, of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Track slips to third WIAC Championship]]></title><description><![CDATA[The UW-Oshkosh women’s outdoor track and field team couldn’t sustain a slim 67.5 to 67 lead over UW-La Crosse after day one of the two-day Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Championship held at UW-Eau Claire on May 2-3, slipping all the way to third place out of nine teams on the second day to endure its worst finish at the conference championships since 2003, when the team accumulated 162.5 points to also finish in third.
“The events that were held the first day were some of our strongest events, so I figured we would be out in front after the first day,” Oshkosh head coach Deb Vercauteren said. “I’m disappointed with our third place finish, but not with our team’s performance. We had nasty weather, which is the same for everyone, but we (still) had 27 personal records. We did a great job; the other teams were just a little bit stronger.”
The Titans tallied 140.5 points at the spectacle, 22.5 points greater than fourth place UW-River Falls (118), but 18 points less than second place UW-Eau Claire (158.5). La Crosse (192) won its second straight conference title and 24th conference crown in program history. Only the Eagles and Oshkosh (10 titles) have won the conference title of the teams still currently competing in the WIAC. The Titans had finished in the top two at conference four straight years and 21 out of the past 22 years before this year’s finish. It isn’t surprising that they didn’t extend those streaks this year, however, considering Oshkosh had its lowest scoring output at conference since 1987, when they scored 136 points to finish in second place.
“We only had one conference champion, so I think that hurt us a little bit,” Vercauteren said. “We had three events that we didn’t score in. Our goal is to always score in every single event, (but) things just didn’t fall our way this year.”
Senior Terri Schwamb defended her conference title in the hammer by winning the 26-entrant field with a throw of 191 feet, five inches. Schwamb’s throw crushed a Simpson Field record set in 2007 by Winona State University’s (Minn.) Emily King (184-9), and she earned the WIAC Co-Scholar Athlete award with UW-Whitewater’s Judy Kruckman for her efforts. Schwamb’s throw surpassed her season-best throw of 181-6 at the Benedictine University Invitational on April 19, and gave the Titans their sixth straight conference title in the hammer and ninth overall. Oshkosh has dominated the event since its inauguration in 1994, earning six more titles than the next closest team (La Crosse).
Schwamb can further cement herself as one of the all-time great throwers in NCAA Division III history at Nationals this year.
“Her main goal, even after she won Nationals outdoor in the hammer last year, was to come back and break the (NCAA) record, which is 203-6,” assistant track coach/throws coach Pat Ebel said of Schwamb earlier in the year. “She threw 198-0 (last year), so (she’s) looking at about a five and a half foot jump. Being it here (the meet’s in Oshkosh), I think she has a great chance (since) she’s familiar with the surroundings and ring that we’re throwing out of.”
Senior Rebecca Masephol automatically qualified for the NCAA Championship in the hammer by placing second (173-8) and surpassing her provisional mark of 167-0 reached on April 26 at the Oshkosh Invitational.
Junior Ayla Mitchell pulled double duty and found success twofold as she placed second in the 1500-meter run (4 minutes, 42.33 seconds) and third in the 800 (2:17.68). Mitchell automatically qualified for Nationals on April 26 at the Gina Relays with her time of 2:11.24 in the 800, currently fourth best in D-III. Oshkosh last won the 800 and 1,500 in 2004.
Other top performances in the meet came from junior Katie Kohn, who took third in the javelin (107-9); freshman Andrea Fabiano, who finished third in the 100-meter hurdles (15.22 seconds); and freshman Ellen Buchanan, who set a PR and tied with two other athletes for third in the high jump (5-1 1/4).
The 3,200 meter relay team finished second with a time of 9:22.13. The Titans last won a conference trophy in this event in 2004.
Oshkosh will next compete tonight and tomorrow at the Keeler Open in Naperville, Ill. They will participate on Saturday in the Oshkosh Open at 3 p.m., followed by the La Crosse Open on May 15, before concluding the season on May 22-24 at the NCAA Division III Outdoor Championship here in Oshkosh. Oshkosh will be looking to win its third straight outdoor national championship and ninth overall.
“(It) will be a rough road for us to be sitting back on top, but we’re hoping that we can be in the mix for a trophy, which means top four,” Vercauteren said.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7180</link><author>by Logan Bolle, of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[Local skate venue to ramp up]]></title><description><![CDATA[Many skaters call Red Arrow Skate Park in Oshkosh their home. Both kids and adults come out to skate day and night. 
According to skateboarders like Marty Wojahn and Ramio Rodriguez, it is not only a place to skate, it is a place where they can get out and enjoy the weather and stay active. The skate park creates a place to escape from daily life. At times the park may contain over 50 people enjoying the atmosphere of the park. 
Red Arrow Skate Park had been known around the country for being on the cutting edge. In the early years of the park it would be common to see professional skaters on tour stop and skate here in Oshkosh. However, for awhile now, the park has been deteriorating from wear, and as some of the skaters have told me, ‘bikers!’ There are many cracks throughout the park that create hazards for the skaters. This is creating a hard time for both experienced and new skaters alike. 
Anthony Schneider, a student here at UW-Oshkosh, along with James Baker, owner of Streets of Fire Skate Shop in Oshkosh, have been leading a renovation project to bring new hope for area skateboarders. Afraid that one day the city may tear down the park, it was time to step up and save this attraction. With great help from the Oshkosh Area Community Foundation, a goal of a brand new park seems to be in the near future.
“We are still hoping to have the project completed in spring or early summer,” Schneider said. 
Through several grants provided by the city, along with endless fundraising, the project has raised $200,000 of the projected $230,000 for the construction of the new park. A bid should be made within the next couple weeks to finalize the exact cost of the project. Schneider and Baker praise the efforts of the community and the city for their support of this project. 
Schneider said that, “The city has really stepped up.” Along with the efforts of the city, Baker really thanks the community for their help, “A lot of kids have really been involved in helping  getting the 
project underway.” 
There is still a need for some donations, so if you want to help provide a safer place where kids can stay active and involved you are still able to make a donation online at oshkoshskatepark.com, or through the Oshkosh Area Community Foundation. 
The new park was designed by a couple of skaters, along with advice from the skating community. Brian Lahti, one of the designers of the new park, explains how the new design will highlight the many qualities of the park. It also brings in many new designs and additions to the existing park. These designs can be found on the project’s Web site. According to the website, the existing asphalt will be replaced with concrete, which with proper maintenance will create a much safer surface that could last more than 50 years. 
Word about the new design and renovation has been circling the park for the last couple years. The hype by the skating community has cooled down due to the length of time it has taken to get everything together; however, now that it seems to be just around the corner, skaters like Wojahn and Rodriguez are ready for the new park and all the new elements that come with it. 
“It should be pretty exciting, the only thing I worry about is where to skate while the park is under construction,” Wojahn said. 
The expectations for the new skate park are nothing different than what Red Arrow Skate Park used to be, a park where road trips are made just to come and skate. Baker views the new park as being a “brand new facility that is very well designed, and it is going to have a lot of characteristics that are going to make people want to come and skate it.”  Who knows? Maybe skate teams will stop by to skate the park like they used to. Either way the skate park will bring a new element to the community. 
Red Arrow Skate Park will provide a place where anyone in the community can come hang out and test the new designs. In a world where everything is getting more expensive, the skate park provides an opportunity for the community to stay active and involved for free.]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7181</link><author>by Nick Peeters of the Advance-Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item><item><title><![CDATA[ONLINE EXCLUSIVE Titans headed to NCAA Tournament]]></title><description><![CDATA[After sweeping through Saturday night’s action, the Oshkosh softball team was in prime position to win the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference tournament and the automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament that goes along with it.
	They didn’t waste the opportunity.
	The Titans played thrice on Saturday, all against River Falls, and won two of the games, walking away as the last team standing in the double-elimination tournament.
	The first game found both the second-seed Titans and fifth-seed Falcons still undefeated, and River Falls less than 24 hours removed from an emotional 3-2 win over first-seed Whitewater.  Any thoughts of the momentum carrying over were quickly set aside as, after senior pitcher Ronessa Stampfli set the Falcons down in order, sophomore center fielder Whitney Tornow doubled home a run.  The Titans almost made it 2-0 when freshman shortstop Sydnee Wyss singled down the right field line, but a good throw from the River Falls right fielder Amanda Peters got Tornow at the plate.
	The Titans couldn’t keep the lead for long.  The next inning, a leadoff single and two bunt singles after loaded the bases, and a fielder’s choice groundout tied the game.  But, with two runners in scoring position and just one out, Stampfli bore down and struck out the next two hitters to keep the game tied.  It stayed that way until the bottom of the fifth, when Tornow delivered a two-out RBI single to break the tie and give the Titans a lead they would never relinquish.
	The two run-scoring hits from Tornow accounted for half of the Titans’ total hitting for the day, and they were outhit 7-4 by the Falcons.  But Stampfli didn’t walk a single batter, and struck out ten, keeping River Falls from moving its runners around the bases.
	“We strung hits together,” coach Cindy Suess said.  “We hit when we needed to, and we came through with runners in scoring position, and that made the difference.”
	The two teams met again later that evening, with River Falls having eliminated Eau Claire in the third-place game since then.  This time, against senior pitcher Amy Sullivan, the Falcons wasted no time getting to work.  Mindy Rudiger led the game off with a solo home run, and a Peters single drove in a second run.  But the Titans answered back, as Tornow delivered two more RBI with a home run of her own to equalize the game.  In the top of the third, the Falcons scored another run on an error from freshman right fielder Kayla Kodet, but after the explosive first inning, neither team could break through the rest of the way.  Oshkosh threatened in the bottom of the third, when a hit-by-pitch and walk put two runners on with one out, but failed to capitalize.
	The third game was the big one for both teams—no double-elimination safety net left, the winner goes to regionals, and the loser goes home.  And sophomore left fielder Amie Heinzelman left no doubt as to which role the Titans would fill, as she followed up Rudiger in the last game by opening this one with a home run of her own.
Faced with the likely end of her career with a loss, Stampfli was sublime.  She went the distance in the six-inning game, giving up only two hits, including a Rudiger home run that accounted for the only River Falls tally.
The Titans enthusiastically backed Stampfli with plenty of offense, including a 4-for-4 day from fellow senior Dani Olsen (which included two doubles and three RBI), and multihit games from Kodet (who also drove in three runs, and scored two of her own), junior first baseman Ashley Steltenphol, and Tornow.  After the two close wins, Suess was glad to see a stress-free third game.
	“It was a relief,” she said.  “It was a relief for all of us.  Our approach was much better than in the first championship game, and it showed on the scoreboard.”
	But the season is hardly over for the Titans.  Having won one eight-team tournament as a two-seed, they now face the prospect of doing the same thing again in the Eau Claire regional this weekend.  The Titans will match up in the first round with Aurora University of Illinois, then will play either North Central College of Illinois or Eau Claire in the next round, depending on the results.
	Winning this bracket will be no easy task.  Five of the eight teams are nationally ranked, including the Titans at #14 and top-seeded St. Thomas, the third-ranked team in the nation and owners of a sparkling 33-3 record.  But Suess has seen what her team is capable of, and is fully confident in her players.
	“It’s a tough regional, no doubt,” she said.  “But no matter where you go, that’s going to be the case.  There’s 59 teams left, and all of them have earned this.  There’s not a lot of weak teams left.”
	“I think going in as the two-seed, it’s a lot like the conference tournament for us.  Anyone can win.  You never know.”]]></description><link>http://www.advancetitan.com/story.aspx?s=7182</link><author>by Colin Anderle, of the Advance Titan</author><pubDate>Thursday, May 08, 2008</pubDate></item></channel></rss>