May 2008

All first-year students at Penn State University are being told through the college to participate in an online alcohol awareness program before the fall semester that they begin school, according to an article on KYW1060.com.

The site they must complete the course at is called AlcoholEdu for College and it is an online interactive course which has two parts: the first is about 2.5 hours and the second, done a month and a half later, is 20 minutes.

Penn State’s goal is to motivate behavior change by informing about the effects of alcohol on learning, memory, and sexual decision-making.

It is not mandatory for students to take the course, but if they are caught drinking on campus, the fact that they didn’t take the survey will be used against them during punishment.

Photo courtesy of holamun2.com.

Construction is beginning all over campus, including on the 34th Street Dormitory and Daskalakis Athletic Center expansion. There are also some other smaller projects going on, compiled from multiple sources. Here is a rundown:

34th Street Dormitory - The trailers have been moved in and site drilling has begun. There will be a BBQ involving administrators, faculty, and students in a ceremonial ground-breaking on May 20, with more details to be reported in the Triangle coming out tomorrow, May 16.

Daskalakis Athletic Center - The actual expansion of the Daskalakis Athletic Center is going to wait until after graduation, but preliminary site work has begun, such as power lines being moved and other smaller projects.

Steam pipe hole at 33rd and Market Street - The university is replacing a large underground steam pipe which they estimate to be over 40 years old. The university has left this hole with steam coming out because they need to shut off the steam to finish the replacement, which they plan to do in the summer, as it will require shutting off hot water in all of the dormitories.

Sidewalk replacements - The university is replacing sidewalks on the south side of the Academic Building at 33rd and Arch Street and also in front of the bookstore and MacAlister Hall on 33rd and Chestnut Street.

Powelton Green - The park planned for the old consolidated laundry lot at 31st and Powelton Avenue has stalled while some issues with the city get taken care of. The construction of the park began last fall but nothing has been done since the snow has melted.

Traffic light at 34th and Lancaster Avenue - This is awaiting final approval from the city and then Drexel will contract it out to a construction firm to build.

Sources: Drexel Daily Digest, Conversation with Administrators, and Observations.

Photo courtesy of The Triangle Files.

After months of very few major crimes against Drexel students, especially robberies of any kind, there have been four robberies using firearms in the last two weeks, according to the DPS Crime Logs online.

Here are the following crimes

• Friday, May 2nd, at 3:01 a.m. - Robbery with firearm at 36th and Spring Garden Street - Pending Investigation
• Monday, May 5th, at 10:43 p.m. - Robbery with firearm at 36th and Chestnut Street - Closed
• Thursday, May 9th at 11:29 p.m. - Robbery with firearm at 33rd and Spring Garden Street - Pending Investigation
• Sunday, May 11th at 10:22 p.m. - Robbery with firearm at 33rd and Powelton Avenue - Pending Investigation

Be very careful at night, and don’t walk alone if you can help it. Here is The Triangle’s Crime Log report from last week for the first and second robberies. In the second one, it should be noted that two of the suspects were later arrested:

A student reported to DPS and PPD that he had been robbed at gunpoint. The student said that he was approached by three black males who displayed two handguns and demanded money. The group took $130 and fled in an unknown vehicle. The suspects are described as black males 16 to 17 years old, apporximately 5-foot-8.

A student reported to DPS and Penn Police that he had been robbed at gunpoint by 10 to 12 black males. The suspects took $50 and fled on foot toward Sansom Street.

Tune into The Triangle’s crime log this week to learn more about the details of the third and fourth robberies.

UPDATE: DPS has provided alerts on its website detailing these four crimes for students to review. For fourth robbery at 33rd and Powelton, PPD was able to detain a suspect matching the description given, but the two students robbed were unable to identify him.

Photo courtesy of MCT Campus.

John C. Cavanaugh, current president of the University of West Florida in Pensacola, will become the new chancellor of the system that oversees Pennsylvania’s 14 state-owned universities on July 1st, according to an article in The Philadelphia Inquirer. He has run the Florida school since 2002 and was once an administrator at the University of Delaware.

The job includes helping the system’s board to set policies for the 14 universities, which enroll more than 110,000 students and setting goals for the president’s of each school.

State-owned universities are Cheyney, West Chester, Bloomsburg, California, Clarion, East Stroudsburg, Edinboro, Indiana, Kutztown, Lock Haven, Mansfield, Millersville, Shippensburg and Slippery Rock. The operating budget for the entire state system is $1.4 billion.

Photo courtesy of UWF.edu.

Philadelphia’s plan to have a wireless signal throughout its borders has collapsed, as Earthlink, the firm contracted to build it, has ended negotiations on the network’s future, according to an article on KYW1060.com.

Earthlink says that talks to give away the $17 million network for free to either the city or a nonprofit organization has fallen through. The city says that if it took over, it would cost taxpayers millions each year to operate it. Earthlink plans to cut the service on June 12th. They are also asking a federal judge to give them permission to remove the wireless transmitters that it has installed on utility poles across 80 percent of the city.

Earthlink has been trying to get out of municipal wireless contracts across the country, and has been negotiating with the Nutter administration to get out of Philadelphia’s contract as well. The original goal was to give the city a wireless Internet signal and make it available at low cost to the city’s low-income residents.

Photo courtesy of KYW1060.com.

Governor Ed Rendell yesterday said he would veto any legislation to ban smoking in public places statewide if it would weaken the law that Philadelphia already has in place, according to an article in The Philadelphia Inquirer.

“Philadelphia has taken a strong stand to support the public health of its residents, and I will not backtrack on that,” Rendell said.

Legislators on a join House and Senate committee have been trying to strike a compromise for months on a statewide smoking ban, but one of their clauses is that they want it to be comprehensive, to preempt all local municipality smoking bans, including Philadelphia’s nearly two-year-old ban. The statewide proposal also allows multiple exceptions, such as private clubs, cigar bars, and casinos.

Photo courtesy of MCT Campus.

Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter has worked out a budget deal with city council, but it appears that he will need to back off some on his wage and business tax cuts, because of the economy, according to a KYW1060 article.

The elimination of the gross receipts portion of the business privilege tax will happen over ten years instead of eight, the first-ever reductions to the net income portion of the same tax will happen, but at a rate half as fast as originally proposed. The plan for wage tax cuts over the next five years will be tweaked so that it is slightly less aggressive.

These changes are because of declining revenue projections, including a large drop in the revenue from the real estate transfer tax.

Photo courtesy of MCT Campus.

Former Democratic Presidential candidate John Edwards is beginning a campaign this morning in Philadelphia, as the chairman of a new effort to cut U.S. poverty by 50 percent in the next 10 years, according to an article in The Philadelphia Inquirer.

The group is called Half in Ten and is a compilation of many other groups. The group will build support for practical legislation to attack poverty, such as expanding child-care assistance programs and increasing minimum wage laws.

“We’re going to be out there pushing legislators, pushing the Congress, pushing presidential candidates . . . and making sure that Americans, not just politicians, are responding” to the issue, Edwards said last week on NBC’s Today Show.

Miss the days when you could open The Triangle and read about fake boobs, purple eyes and stolen flip-flops? (our web site hit counter does) Like it or not, Drexel celeb Jocelyn Kirsch is back in the news with NBC10.com reporting she is nearing a federal plea agreement in her alleged identity theft scheme.

Defense attorney Ronald Greenblatt tells NBC10 that both Kirsch and boyfriend Edward Anderton will not appear in city court Monday because the case is going federal.

NBC10’s full report

Photo courtesy of NBC10.com

Former presidential candidate and New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson will speak in Drexel’s Great Court Auditorium May 19 from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

Richardson will talk on alternative energy in an event for the Eastern Technology Council.

More info from their site below:

8:00 a.m. - 9:00 a.m. Registration, Networking, & Continental Breakfast
9:00 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. Keynote Address followed by moderated panel discussion on alternative energy applications

Governor Richardson, recently re-elected to a second term as Governor of New Mexico, has one of the most distinguished records as a public servant. Having served in Congress for 15 years in diplomatic and leadership roles, he developed a profile as the nation’s “go-to guy” when delicate negotiations with Iraq, Cuba, Sudan and North Korea required face-to-face encounters. Speaking five languages, he has been a key player in multiple hostage releases in hot spots around the globe, earning him four nominations for the Nobel Peace prize. The son of a Mexican immigrant and a California physician, he was appointed Secretary to the United Nations by President Clinton. As Secretary of Energy, he laid the foundation for an aggressive strategy to move our nation away from dependency on foreign oil, toward renewable energy sources, and securing our national laboratories. He understands, and will speak to, the significance of oil and energy, in economic, diplomatic, and strategic terms. He regards energy, its uses, its sources, and its stability as a cornerstone toward building the future and security of our country and the world.

There is no fee for students. Please register without submitting payment information.
The parking garage (34th and Ludlow Street) has daily parking available for the public at $10/per car.

Photo courtesy of Brittanica.com.