Section A • Page 2
The University Daily Kansan
Wednesday, January 14, 1998
Students say 'hola' to new Spanish format on Mondays
By Susie Gura
Kansan staff writer
Students who began Spanish classes this semester welcomed changes to the Spanish 104 and 105 lecture format.
The University announced the format change last semester. Previously, students in Spanish 104 attended five one-hour sections taught by a graduate teaching assistants, and students in Spanish 105 attended three one-hour sections taught by GTAs.
This semester, students from both courses will attend a one-hour lecture on Mondays. Lee Skinner, assistant professor of Spanish and Portuguese, taught the first combined lecture on Monday in 130 Budig Hall.
Spanish 104 students also will meet in smaller discussion sections led by GTAs for an additional four hours a week. Spanish 105 students will meet in smaller discussion sections led by GTAs for an additional two hours a week.
With the announcement of the change, some students were apprehensive about the new format.
"At first I was scared and really worried, but it was nice to focus on the grammar in lecture and then go over it in class," said Amy Lingenfelter, Overland Park senior.
"It is nice to see and learn everything we are going to know at the beginning of the week so we can review it and be ready for class," Lauffer said.
Nick Lauffer, Kansas City, Kan., sophomore, agreed.
GTAs who lead Spanish 104 and 105 discussion sections said that they were happy about the change, and that it would be advantageous for students as well as GTAs.
The new format is intended to help students learn grammar before they attend their individual discussion sections.
"It is helpful to me in class because the grammar has already been so clearly explained that I just have to review it," said Adele Daidzic, Spanish and Portuguese GTA. "I think it won't be as overwhelming for students."
She said the first day of class went well.
"No student had too many questions," Daidzic said. "I think I prefer it this way because I now spend more time practicing rules than teaching them."
Jaquel Keim-Gonzalez, Spanish and Portuguese GTA, said one grammar lesson a week allowed each section to move at the same pace, learn the same information and stay on the same level throughout the semester.
"I think it is great because it is more uniform, and it gives students the chance to deal with a professor and a teaching assistant," Keim-Gonzalez said.
Skinner taught two weeks of grammar rather than the usual one week because of the Martin Luther King holiday next Monday.
Liz Wristen, Leawood sophomore, said she was concerned by the large amount of information covered on Monday.
"I didn't like the big lecture as well as the small class discussions because we went through information too quickly." Wristen said.
A KU student reported a domestic disturbance to the Lawrence Police Department at 2:07 p.m. Jan. 11, at her home in the 800 block of Louisiana, Lawrence police said.
ON THE RECORD
The exterior window pane of a KU student's door in the 500 block of Michigan was destroyed about 1:45 a.m. Jan. 13, Lawrence police said. The damage was estimated at $250.
A 25-inch television was taken from the fifth-floor lobby of Oliver Hall Sunday, KU police said. The television was valued at $250.
Advisers untangle enrollment woes
Center helps students plan schedules and endure Add/Drop
By Gerry Doyle gdoyle@kansan.com Kansan staff writer
Many students at the beginning of the new semester need help finding their way out of the labyrinth of late enrollment and class changes.
Fortunately, help is what the Freshman-Sophomore Advising Center provides.
In its second semester, the center provides assistance to students lost in a maze of add/drop forms and schedule conflicts.
Katie Condon, Leawood sophomore, seeks schedule advice from Lloyd Spohnholtz, an adviser at the Freshman-Sophomore Advising Center. Advisers are often available for students who walk in. Photo by Ronner Nomer/KANSAN
FINDING HELP
Freshmen-Sophomore
Advising Center
132 Strong Hall
864-4371
Hours:
Mondays 8 a.m.-7 p.m.
Tuesdays - Fridays
8 a.m.-5 p.m.
The center helps more than 100 students each day, said K a t h r y n Nemeth-Tuttle, director of the center. Nemeth-Tuttle said the center would
be fully utilized by next fall's incoming freshmen.
This semester the academic advising center added a new associate director and assistant director to the staff. Dave Goodsell, associate director, and Tammara Durham, assistant director, were added to the staff in an effort to increase the availability of advising to freshmen and sophomores.
"We're just starting to get a good team together," she said. "There are a lot of people coming in now, and we would like to see more after this summer."
"This is a year where we're gearing up," said Goodsell, who was an
assistant director of the undergraduate academic center at Virginia Tech University last year. "The scope is bigger than what we did at Virginia Tech. The staff and faculty are high-quality here and make it a good place to be."
The center is expanding to assist freshmen and sophomores in all phases of advising, such as helping students resolve conflicts with class schedules and helping students understand the enrollment process, Nemeth-Tuttle said.
The center offers advising services to Oread Scholars, who were outstanding high school seniors, but it
is expanding its advising program to offer similar services to all freshmen and sophomores, said Lloyd Sponholtz, director of the Oread Scholars program.
"The program is fairly embryonic right now," Sponholtz said. "It's terrific. It shows the University is finally giving some tangible commitment to the advising process."
The center's advisers are invaluable in helping sort out confusion about class schedules, said Sylvia O'Connell, Norman, Ill., sophomore.
"I came in with some problems with my schedule," O'Connell said. "They showed me where I needed to
look and what I needed to do to fix it."
Often, students' problems can be solved without the help of a center adviser. Many questions can be answered by the students who help staff the center, said Rachel Smith, Liberal junior, who has worked at the center since September.
"They need to know things like how to add or drop classes or whether a class they need is open or not," Smith said. "We can check and see on our computer if the class is open or not. So far, I think it's been very helpful."
Computing services plan for millennium
Employees spend extra time updating records to avoid computer bug
By Aaron Knopf
Kansan staff writer
The Office of Computing Services' plan to upgrade and fix student records, library and financial computer systems for the millennium is going smoothly, computing services officials said.
fix the problem at the University in 1995.
"We actually began work on modifying programs in 1996," he said.
The problem with the programs is their inability to recognize years beyond the twentieth century. When the new century rolls around, the programs will interpret the year as 1900 rather than 2000. The problem is referred to as the millennium bug.
"The work has been going faster than what we had estimated," said John Dillard, Computing Services assistant director of programming and LAN support services. "At this point in time we're feeling pretty comfortable that we are going to get the critical things done."
He said problems such as the incorrect computer projection of graduation dates began showing up in 1996.
Dillard said Computing Services began formulating a plan to
"Those things were fixed right away as soon as they were discovered," Dillard said.
have year 2000 compatible soft ware.
Now Computing Services is fixing problems ahead of time. The plan is to prevent problems by modifying programs ahead of time, Dillard said.
Not every problem is addressed the same way, he said.
"During the '90s the University has been on a path of implementing a strategy of replacing these very old systems such as its human resources/payroll system," he said. "The potential
In the financial and library systems, the
"At this point in time we're feeling pretty comfortable that we are going to get the critical things done."
University purchased new software packages. The University recently purchased a new student-records system, but the inability to implement it before 2000 has forced Computing Services to fix the existing system.
John Dillard
Computing Services assistant director of
problems from the millennium bug simply provide additional motivation to replace older software now."
Dillard said the University did not purchase new systems just to
Dillard said one of the biggest challenges to his staff was that it must spend a significant amount of time completing year-2000 projects at the expense of small but important projects.
Richard Hermesch
Computing Services
Application Program
Manager, said his team had spent 4,000 hours since July fixing problems in 1,500 affected programs. He estimated his team had completed 30 to 40 percent of its work.
The team is on schedule to complete the work before the year 2000, Hermesch said.
Time bombs
At the stroke of midnight ending this century, these calendar anomalies will emerge:
The 'zeroes' problem
Older computer programs.store dates in two digits, dropping the century from the year. This means that in the year 2000 many computers will be unable to operate reliably.
The 'leap year' problem
Ordinarily, every fourth year has an extra day at the end of February. But the figure of 365.25 days per Earth orbit, which mandates the leap day, is not exact. As a result the first year of every new century is not a leap year. But every fourth century is a leap year. And the year 2000 is one of those centuries. So many computers will not recognize Feb. 29, 2000, as a valid date.
The 'rollover' problem
Computers that do not abjectly fail will simply "roll over" to the date 01/01/00, or January 1, 1900. This means that credit-card balances carried over from the end of 1999 will be charged for 99 years of interest — not exactly a balanced calculation.
Andrew Rohrback / KANSAN
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