We here at Onward State absolutely feel that everyone should have a good time, but not if it involves breaking the law and can cause serious damage to yourself and others. Police reports show that "In less than three hours State College Police arrested three drunk and dangerous drivers with very high blood alcohol levels early Thursday morning, January 14, 2010, in downtown State College." These men, aged 27 to 66, had blood alcohol levels of at least three times the legal limit of 0.08 each. According to the same report, "there were 908 drunk drivers arrested in Centre County and nearly 400 in State College alone [in 2009]."
That is an extraordinarily high percentage from State College. We may be the number 1 party school in the country, but there comes a moment where it goes from having a good time to becoming a hazard for everyone around you. There have been incidents where drunk drivers have killed students in recent times. At the risk of sounding like a public service announcement, you never know when bad decisions can end your life or another's, so please be safe.
A new social networking site called ineedcollege.com has recently come into our lives… and it’s about as useful as a rusty fork jammed between your toes. Well O.K., maybe it’s not quite that bad but these folks are trying to pull a Lloyd Christmas and tape the head back on a dead bird, then package it to us […]
Last week, we let out a story about Windows 7 being implemented to all ITS labs starting this May. To find out some more information about this change, I talked with Marcus Robinson, Director of Marketing Communications at Penn State, to discuss the entire transfer process.
The facts are as follows - starting May 15th, 2010, Windows 7, 32 bit Enterprise Edition, will be implemented into all ITS labs. Starting April 15th, 2010, students, faculty, and staff will be able to test Windows 7 in demo centers in two different locations on campus. They will be located in the Pattee and Pollock 201 (not the eTesting center) open labs. You can consider these demo centers to be an open public beta for ITS and PSU to test the new operating system on the Penn State network, but also for people to get use to the new system.
ITS and Penn State will then be keeping an eye on the fully implemented system over the summer to be on the look out for any unexpected issues and to make sure everything works before 42,000+ students arrive for the fall semester. Mr. Robinson assured me that they do not anticipate any issues when the system is fully implemented.
Now what does that mean for you, the user? Even though ITS labs will not have XP anymore, there is no learning curve for Windows 7. Windows 7 has a very simple interface and everything will be in the same location as Windows XP. It just looks a lot nicer and is a lot faster than XP.
As for Snow Leopard being implemented on the Macs in the lab, that is still in discussion, and there is no official word on that. However, as soon as Onward State hears anything about that, we will be sure to let you know.
Today is Wednesday, and aside from it being Wednesday, it is also the last day to drop or add classes for this Spring 2010 semester. Most students probably already have their schedules figured out for the semester, but it's still not too late to set things straight for these students:
Graduating Seniors
Procrastinators
Students with Suicidal Tendencies Taking Impossible 400-Level Courses
Female Students That Took a Course Hoping to Pass by Seducing Their Teacher but Now Realize that He is Gay or Married
Male Students That Took a Course Hoping to Pass by Seducing Their Teacher but Now Realize that She is Married or Not Cate Blanchett
Overweight Students in Intensive Gym Courses
Squeamish Students in Biology Lab Courses and/or Criminology Courses that Cover Serial Killers
Overly Competitive Students or Students with Anger Issues in Martial Arts Courses
And any other students that for some reason do no belong in a course they are scheduled to take this semester.
It's been a little over a week since a 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit the already impoverished nation of Haiti. Across the nation people have been working to provide aid to the island nation, from celebrities to former presidents to private citizens.
The Penn State community is no exception to this rule, with several groups and alumni both raising funds at home and providing aid on the ground.
Matthew Marek, class of '98, has been working in Haiti for a decade with the American Red Cross. He has remained in the nation and has become one of the major sources of information on the ground. Read on to see a clip of him being interviewed by CNN's Anderson Cooper and to find out what else Penn State is doing to help in Haiti.