"What if that CATA bus speeds up while I'm crossing the street? What if we have a pop quiz on the one day that I skip class?" As college students, we face risks on a regular basis, but so does the university itself.
Penn State Live recently profiled Gary Langsdale, Penn State's resident risk manager. He utilizes a corporate approach called Enterprise Risk Management and leads a team of employees who strive to make Penn State a safer place--in every aspect imaginable. Langsdale defines a risk as "any impediment to accomplishing institutional goals." Such impediments can pertain to data security, laboratory environments, pandemics, student behaviors, weather emergencies, and much more.
Langsdale and his team conducted 53 interviews throughout the university and identified over 100 possible risks. The top ten include the dangers of high-risk student drinking, the unique risks presented by running an academic medical center, and maintaining Penn State's reputation and the perceived quality of a Penn State degree. Check out the rest after the jump.
The best 3-day weekend has come and gone, which allowed for ample time to party study. Yesterday, there were quite a few students, professors, and members of the community who showed up bright and early to the HUB to commemorate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday(Penn State style!). Volunteers were given the option of serving the community in two ways:
Whether volunteers opted to go out to service sites and help or stay in the HUB and do service-to-go, it helped make the Penn State community a better place to live in, even if it was just for one day. Volunteers were rewarded justly though for their efforts though as they were given free t-shirts, free breakfast, AND a free lunch. As an added bonus, RAM Squad performed during the lunch break in Heritage Hall. Who says waking up early and doing community service on a Monday morning could be a waste of time? Not I. These memories will last forever (or until I throw out the free t-shirt).
If you are looking for more ways to get free stuff commemorate Dr. King, there are still 2 more events this week.
Some of you will be disappointed when I tell you that I'm not going to talk about the childhood game Foursquare in this post. I am, however, talking about the internet service called Foursquare that "gives you and your friends new ways of exploring your city."
It turns out that Harvard has teamed up with the company to create a index of ratings and reviews of local businesses as well as to promote collaboration between the different people living in and around the University.
I've seen a handful of people get into Foursquare, especially via Twitter. It seems like a pretty cool service and looks like it could take off, particularly in a college setting. It would definitely help spread the word about State College gems like Herwig's, Margarita's Pizzeria and the State Theatre, among others.
With enough users in State College, the service could create a veritable listing of awesome places to hang out, eat and drink study. Of course, this listing would be limited to the citizens of State College that are more technologically-minded at first. But if Foursquare grows to include many demographics like Facebook and Twitter have, the service would become infinitely more useful.
You can get signed up here. Let us know what you think of the service with a comment below.
Have you always wanted to get involved in movie production, but haven't felt like investing millions of dollars and years of your life? Well the Student Film Organization's 4 Day Film Festival just might be your thing.
On January 20 at 6:30 p.m. the festival will kick off in Carnegie Cinema. Groups of 2 or more will be given the guidelines for the films and will then have the next four days to complete production.
All the films will be shown on Sunday in Carnegie, and the film that most successfully follows the guidelines will get 4 free tickets to the State Theater.
Keith Boykin, editor of The Daily Voice and television pundit has been chosen to replace Soledad O'Brien as the keynote speaker for Wednesday's Martin Luther King Jr. Evening Celebration. O'Brien, a correspondent for CNN, has been deployed to Haiti to cover the developing situation in the wake of last week's earthquake.
Boykin has been active in politics for over 20 years, participating in six political campaigns, including President Clinton's successful run in 1992. He later served as a White House aide for Clinton. He is also a frequent television contributor on CNBC and co-hosts My Two Cents on BET J. In addition, he has also written three New York Times best-selling books on the African-American Gay community.
Penn State President Graham Spanier hasn't been here for as long as JoePa has, but he's become such a recognizable part of the University that I have a hard time envisioning Old State without him. Spanier has been University President since 1995 and was a member of the faculty from 1973-1982 before leaving for several administrator positions at other universities across the country.
Yesterday though, the Associated Press ran a story discussing who will succeed Myles Brand as NCAA President. Brand died of pancreatic cancer on September 16. The report names Dr. Spanier as a potential candidate for the NCAA Presidency. One of the main reasons is based on the fact that Dr. Brand had served as a University president before taking over the NCAA (University of Oregon [1989-1994] and Indiana University [1994-2002]). Brand's tenure was marked by a commitment to improving the student-athlete experience by focusing more on academics and education (something Penn State has never had a problem with). Oregon State University President Ed Ray, who is in charge of finding a replacement for Brand, has hinted that his committee is leaning towards a University President.
The report names University of Hartford president Walter Harrison, Michigan president Mary Sue Coleman, NCAA executive Bernard Franklin, and Graham Spanier as possible candidates. Nebraska chancellor Harvey Perlman (a contemporary of Spanier's), Hampton University president William Harvey, Molloy College president Drew Bogner, Widener University president James Harris and Weber State president Ann Millner make ou the rest of the committee in charge of selecting the new president, and are not considered viable candidates themselves.