University Daily Kansan, February 4. 1985
CAMPUS AND AREA
Innovative class forces decisions
Page 6
By BETH REITER Staff Reporter
Students in a business management class are making decisions for a grade — and possibly for money.
Peter Lorenzi, associate professor of business, has assigned his Business 629 students a project that uses data from his website to how to make management decisions.
"Instead of a knight facing decisions in a castle, you're a manager facing decisions in an office." Lorenzi said last week.
The project requires students to produce a computer program that simulates real-life management decisions, Lorenzi said. The simulation is similar to an electronic Dungeons and Dragons game.
But the project isn't a game, Lorenzi said — it's a way students can get practical experience they can get by doing written assignments.
"I really think it's a very useful, productive exercise," he said. "I don't think it has to be boring to be useful."
LORENZI ASSIGNED the computer project after receiving a $700 grant from the office of academic affairs. Lorenzi said the money was being used by the students doing the projects.
The grant was offered specifically
for projects innovating computer techniques in the classroom.
The class is taught in two sections. In each section, students were divided into three groups of about 15 students. The groups were given $100 for expenses, which must be budgeted and allocated to art materials and other purchases. The remaining $100 will be given to the group with the winning project.
Loreni select three leaders to organize and manage the activities of each unit.
THE STUDENTS were told the first day of class that they had to produce decision-making scenarios on floppy disks for a microcomputer. Both sections of the class have been assigned the same project. The students can ask questions, but they must make their own decisions and do most of the work themselves, Lorenzi said.
The projects must be completed by May 1. Lorenzi will then judge each project against the others as well as grade them individually. Each project will be graded on how well it was done and how well the group worked as a team.
Besides competing against each other, the groups are trying to produce projects that can be sold to a company or school. Lorenzi said.
RICH WILLIAMS, Overland Park senior, said he thought his group
could produce a project for use in other college management classes
Each student will submit an evaluation of the participation of the other members in the group. The evaluation will be similar to evaluations used by companies, Lorenzi said.
The first step in the project is deciding what a manager does and what decisions a manager must make. Lorenai said, Next, the students must solve the tech problems the computer language will be used and write a program that connects the scenarios created by the group.
The scenarios will force the students to make the decisions a manager would have to make, such as whether to answer calls personally or let a secretary answer them. Each choice a student makes leads to consequences, which lead to more decisions, Lorenzi said.
"I think that it's about the most fun and challenging thing I've done in any class," said Nancy Anderson, Lawrence senior. "It's almost like a job. Right now it's giving me confidence in myself."
Anderson, a leader of one of the groups, said her group was divided into three subgroups — marketing, production and research. She said that when managers knew the decisions her group would use because the groups were competing
Computer to aid language study
By PATRICIA SKALLA Staff Reporter
The department learned in December that it would receive a grant from the office of academic affairs for a computer.
Hiroshi Nara, Japanese graduate teaching assistant, said students would be able to use the computer whenever they wanted to do their assignments, review lessons or receive added instruction
"It is just like a workbook," Nara said. "The student can go through a routine of exams, and the computer can tell him how to do them.
"The purpose is not to decrease the human interaction with the students."
NARA SAID THE department had decided it needed a computer because teachers had a limited amount of time to devote and available to students who needed help.
The department decided that it wanted a computer that was more than a word processor. The department wanted something that could be programmed as well as print Chinese symbols, Nara said.
When the department heard that grants were going to be given, it investigated computers at the University of Michigan and the University of Illinois to see how those two universities used to help teach Japanese and Chinese.
However, a computer that can perform functions is hard to perform.
United State need computers that can be programmed and print Chinese characters, Nara explained.
The department found that the only company that produces such a computer was Fujitsu of Japan.
BÉCAUSE THERE are about 5,100 Chinese characters, the computer not only will have characters printed on the keys, it also will print certain information; the number has been entered, so that the keyboard is not too large to handle.
The thousands of characters also have many different meanings that are hard to remember. Therefore, the computer will be able to receive the English word or Chinese character and be able to find the rest of the characters that have the same meaning. Nara explained.
Nara said a computer with all
studies and benefits benefit teachers
and students alike.
Roger Shimomura, professor of art, evaluates "A Midsummer Night's Dream" by Inge S. Bach, Denmark graduate student. Bach said the inspiration for this piece came from a Danish tradition. On a university campus, gather around a bonfire to send a witch off to a faraway mountain. The university of Kansas offers an faculty Show is show on display until Feb 8 in the second-floor gallery of the Art and Design Building.
Chevenne traditions inspire artist
By MARIAN J. WEEKS Staff Reporter
W. Richard West, known to the international art world as Dick West or Wah-Pa-Nah-Yah — "Lightfoot Runner" in Cheyenne and known to Haskell Indian Junior College faculty and students as "Doc." was honored yesterday at a reception at the Lawrence Arts Center.
West, a former KU student,
greeted about 50 art enthusiasts,
former students and old friends who
came to welcome him and view an
art exhibit, paintings and sculpture
on display at the Arts Center, 9th and
Vermont streets.
The exhibit and West's visit were part of Haskell's centennial celebration activities. The exhibit will remain on display through Feb. 13.
West, who taught painting at Haskell from 1970 to 1977, served as chairman of the division of humanities. He was instrumental in decoration and drama curricula when Haskell became a junior college in 1970.
by Indian traditions and spirituality, which he combines with Christianity in his works.
"Christ is universal," he said. "He belongs to everybody. Some people today have lost their traditions and don't have anything to hang onto. If a universal Christ will give them a handle, then that's what I'm doing."
WEST SAID THAT his Cheyenne "grandmother," a great aunt named Ghost Woman, taught him Cheyenne traditions through stories. He said he didn't know his grandfather, Thunderbolt, nor his real grandmother, Big Belle Woman, who were "run off the plains into Oklahoma territory," where he said many Indians lived as prisoners of war in the 1880s.
West was standing near a painting called "The Crucification," which portrays an Indian Christ, and also near his sculpture "Cheyenne Holy Man," an Indian man in traditional dress holding a sacred pipe.
WEST SAID HIS art was inspired
"Ghost Woman gave me all these things that I didn't realize until I was older," said West, gesturing to the sculpture and sculpture that tell the stories now.
"Now I'm the old people," said West, 72.
West said that some Christians had been shocked to see an Indian Christ in his paintings.
"They have a concept of Christ as fair-skinned," he said.
WEST EXPLAINED that his portrait of Christ followed the traditions of French, Spanish and other cultures. His work also features the features of their own nationality.
"This is your Christ," he said.
"He's Black. Or this is your Christ.
He's Indian."
Danny Miller, a former student of West's who now holds West's former position as painting instructor at Haskell, said, "When I first started drawing I'd take my drawings to him and he'd laugh and he'd take his red felt marking pen and mark all through them.
"After the first year he took me seriously. I myself didn't know I was serious," Miller said.
West now lives with his wife, Rene,
near Fort Gibson Lake in Fort
Gibson, Okla., and teaches at Bacone
College in Muskegue.
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Seminar
Recreation Services 208 Robinson
Awareness
Fitness
Meet in room 202
Tues. Feb. 5 7 p.m.
Wellness Orientation—Lifestyle
Enhancement Tips—Wellness Center Tour
Presented by: Cathy Sidesinger; Wellness Center Coordinator
100 Sheet
Theme Books
PADRE
Sign up deadline: February 14 For more info: SUA 864-3477
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ISLAND
This Week's Specials
MONDAY
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16 oz. Drink
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TUESDAY
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Lasagna
Garlic Toasted Roll
16 oz. Drink
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THURSDAY
Taco Salad
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FRIDAY
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