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Teaching teachers to teach
Program tries to boost students in science,math
By Janet Rorholm
Kansan staff writer
OLATHE — Get them hooked, and get them hooked early.
That is the advice KU professors have for elementary and junior high teachers who are trying to get more experienced.
For the past year and a half, the KU School of Education has run a program that offers classes to teachers in hopes of improving students' weak performances in science and math nationwide.
Carl Bricker, professor emeritus of chemistry, said U.S. students' lack of interest in the two fields was a problem that seemed to snowball after ninth grade.
Surveys done by education services across the nation have shown that U.S. students have done poorly in math and science as compared to students in other countries.
Bricker retired from teaching at the University of Kansas nine years ago, but continues to teach elementary and junior high teachers physical science and mathematics. Olafe as part of the School of Education's program
The National Science Foundation gave the school a grant for the program.
Doug Giesler, junior high science teacher in Olathe, said there was a danger in getting technical or abstract too soon with science because students would become bored or overwhelmed.
By taking this class, teachers learn experiments from KU professors that they can use in their classrooms.
"In science you need some degree of 'Wow.'"
Giesler said. "Then you get some real thinking. You need to pull a kid toward an answer, not throw it down their throat."
He said that by taking the class, he was learning some fresh ideas of presenting science to his students.
Sharon Moran, third-grade elementary teacher, said that it was difficult for elementary teachers to teach science.
"They're afraid to teach science," she said. "They feel they don't have the background or the understanding."
In a class taught by Clark Bricker, a retired KU chemistry professor, Kansas City area science teachers can get college credit and improve their teaching methods.
Michael Gaines, professor of systems and ecology, said the lack of money was a problem teachers needed to overcome.
"You can't slow down just because the money is not there," he said. "You still have to be creative. You just have to find ways to be creative without using a lot of money."
Kansan staff report
The Joint Committee on State Building Construction voted yesterday to approve a $1 million appropriation to plan reconstruction of Hoch Auditorium.
Committee approves cash for Hoch planning
The recommendation will be considered in the coming weeks by the full House Appropriations Committee as part of the Board of Regents budget.
The $1 million appropriation was recommended Friday by a House Appropriations subcommittee. When the appropriation was recommended by the subcommittee, it was subject to a review by the joint committee, which comprises three senators and three representatives.
Warren Corman, director of facilities for the Regents, said approval from the joint building committee was important
to the project.
"I think the recommendation of the joint committee carries a lot of weight," he said. "We should they want to do juggs
done because it is made up of House and Senate members. Their recommendation was very necessary and very positive."
Jon Jesserdan, KU's legislative liaison, said the recommendation would be considered when the full House Appropriation Committee considered the Hoch plan.
"The recommendations are key to the appropriations process," he said. "The committee usually relies heavily on its suggestions."
Subcommittee may not favor NCAA bill
By Gayle Osterberg Kansan staff writer
It also would ban penalties for a coach or player who has not violated
"The question now is, do we have students in Kansas universities being
TOPEKA - A House subcommittee probably will not recommend that the Legislature try to regulate the NCAA's national policy, two of the three subcommittee members said yesterday.
State Rep. Robert Krehbiel, D-Pretty Prairie, heads a three-member subcommittee assigned to study a bill that would prevent the NCAA from punishing athletes for the crimes of others. The subcommittee met yesterday to discuss the legislation.
Promoters of the bill had suggested that because the NCAA's headquarters are in Overland Park, the Legislature had the authority to regulate the organization's nationwide policies.
But Krehbiel said he did not think the subcommittee would recommend a bill that would set standards for national operation. Krehbiel said he would prefer a bill that affected only Kansas institutions.
The bill's main provisions would prohibit sanctions against a member college or university unless the NCAA could prove that a responsible administrator knowingly broke the rules.
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State Rep. Don Smith, D-Dodge City, a subcommittee member, said he would not support a bill that had national ramifications.
"I don't think we can do anything nationally," he said. "We lack the jurisdiction to legislate what may happen in our state." He added, "do what we can in the state of Kansas."
He said he would consider any bill the committee recommended to be an improvement of the situation.
State Sen. Wint Winter Jr., R-State, the bill's leading supporter
"Even if (the bill is not national in scope), it would be a major step forward by itself because it gives the message to the organization to do more," Winter said. "The goal here is to make things better."
In the first day of discussion, the subcommittee questioned NCAA representatives about the procedures the NCAA used in its investigations and about whether the NCAA had any regulations that would punish only the individuals involved with the violations.
The subcommittee will make recommendations to the House Federal and State Affairs Committee, which might then send the bill to the House floor for a vote.
Speaker urges war against social problems
By Shelly Solon Kansan staff writer
Peggy Woods / KANSAN
When Mary Francis Berry is in Washington, D.C., at a conference or meeting, she says she does not look at the influential people sitting at the tables smoking cigars.
She looks at the people who are waiting on them.
Mary Francis Berry takes the time to autograph a copy of Brian Lanker's book, "I Dream a World" for Wendi Coleman.
ing on it.
Berry encourages others to look with what she called her "different angle of vision."
In her speech last night, which was sponsored by the Black Student Union, Berry, a commissioner on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, stressed the importance of looking at issues and education in new and different ways.
The office of minority affairs, Panhellenic, Interfraternity Council and Delta Sigma Theta sorority also sponsored the program. About 60 people attended the speech at the Kansas Union Ballroom.
"Looking at diversity is absolutely required. It is in everyone's own interest," she said. "We need to look at old things in new ways. This type of education is absolutely necessary to live in and be productive in this society."
"They say there are quotas, and the best opportunities and jobs go to people of color and women," she said. "But if we look at history and see that the quotas for the best jobs, opportunities and education were zero for people of color in the early 1960s, but men, the issue looks a lot different. Who was complaining about quotas then?"
Berry urged people to start their own war against social problems and not to depend on politicians to solve all the problems.
"You don't have to be on one side of
"Dr. Berry showed us that equality and civil rights are not ideas limited to a particular time," he said. "They're important in Black History Month, but they are important in the other 11 months of the year also."
any issue, be for both, "she said. If they ask you if you are for affirmative action or equal qualifications, say both. If they ask you if you are the middle class or the poor, say both.
Del Shankel, interim executive vice chancellor, introduced Berry at the program.
Tanning store owner plea bargains convicted on sexual battery charges
By Michelle Betts
Kansan staff writer
The owner of a Lawrence tanning salon yesterday entered a plea bargain and was convicted of the sexual battery last year of two of his female customers.
A KU student and a Lawrence woman filed sexual battery charges in July and September of 1991 against Gerry Meyer, owner of European Tan, Health and Hair Salon, 1601 W. 23rd St.
Meyer had been charged with two counts of sexual battery that were reduced to one count of sexual battery through the plea bargain, said Chris Kenney, assistant Douglass County district attorney.
Meyer pleaded guilty to one count of sexual battery. Keeney said.
Julie Burditt, Topeka junior, was one of the women who filed charges against Meyer.
Burditt said she was pleased Meyer was convicted of the charge, although it was a lesser one than the charge she had originally filed.
"I don't want him to get away with anything, but I'm pleased that he is being punished at all," she said.
Burditt said that she did not want to be vindictive toward Meyer, but that she wanted people to be aware of what happened to her so they could protect themselves.
She said she had told friends and some of her professors about what had happened to her.
"I'm less concerned about my embarrassment than I am about this happening to other people," Burditt said.
She said she was tanning at Meyer's salon in July when he offered to let her use the tanning bed for an extra ten minutes.
He recommended a special tanning moisturizer to her, and told her he would rub some on her back after she changed into her two-piece bathing suit, she said.
He asked her if she would lay down on the tanning bed while he applied the lotion. Burditt s.id.
"The whole time I was trying to figure out how to get out of there." Burditt said. "I was very uncomfortable."
While he was rubbing moisturizer on her back, Meyer tried to take off her bathing suit bottom, she said.
She immediately yelled and told him to stop, and he ran from the room. Burditt said.
She left the salon as quickly as possible and filed a police report
Burditt said she has tried to protect others from similar experiences by telling people about what happened to her.
"I'm not going to be one of those people who just sits there and lets it happen." she said.
Meyer will be sentenced March 27 in the Douglas County District Court, and the maximum sentence for his conviction is 1 year in prison or or a $2,500 fine. Kenney said.
Meyer would not comment on his case, and his attorney, Wesley Norwood, was not available for comment.