Fun on the Phone
Some students find giving and receiving prank calls an entertaining passtime. But new technology threatens to number the days of drunk dialing and telephone tomfoolery.
By Cathleen Siechta
Kansan staff writer
Heidi Crites, Wichita junior, has many ways of putting off her homework. She polishes her nails. She plucks her eyebrows. She cleans out her desk.
She makes prank phone calls.
"It's amazing how many people will talk to me on the phone for a couple of hours and tell me their life stories," Crites said. "All of my roommates get a kick out of it because we'll use the speaker phone so everyone can hear."
Crites' favorite prank is picking names randomly from the phone book and engaging those who answer in conversation. Occasionally she calls friends and acquaintances and disguises her voice.
Crites said she never has harassed the people she called; she just enjoyed the conversations.
Ryan Moore, Paula junior, also said he enjoyed making prank phone calls. He
said he often "drunk-dialed" after a night at the bars.
Photo illustration by Jenny Zeiner / KANBAN
"I'll call people up and act like I've known them all my life," Moore said. "Either that, or I'll call someone and ask them why they haven't picked me up at the airport yet. If you sound real panicky some people actually buy it."
Some people, however, may not appreciate such telephone high jinks, especially if the calls disturb their sleep or are perceived as threatening.
Photo illustration by Jenny Zeiner/ KANSAN
"Most generally, the students that ask for help have received phone calls that are threatening in nature," said Sgt. Rose Rozmiarek. "Some calls can be biased in nature, and some can just be annoying, like constant hang-ups. Whatever the case, there's usually something said or insinuated that creates an elevated concern in the student, and the calls have been going on awhile before they come to us."
According to the KU police department, 54 telephone harassment complaints were filed by students in 1993.
Whatever their intentions, prank callers, if caught, could face a maximum penalty of a 500 fine or one year in jail.
Rozmiarek said students who lived on campus could file a report with campus police. They then must go to the KU Telecommunications Department to set up a phone trap.
Students who live off campus must use their own resources to have their phone lines monitored.
"Once a student signs a release form, we keep a log of all calls made to their campus line," said Elizabeth Pesek-Shields, a customer service representative for Telecommunications. "If we put a trap on their line, we can keep a log of the exact time and place from which a call originated."
Southwestern Bell Telephone, the Lawrence area's local phone company, offers services like Call Return and Call ID that can help prank victims catch phone junkies in the act.
Call Return, also known as "star 69," reconnects the customer with the last local number that called his or her line. This connection is made by pushing the star key and the number 69. If the line is busy, Call Return will monitor it for 30 minutes and let the customer know when the line is free with a special patterned ringing. This service costs $2.55 per month.
Mike Scott, Lawrence area manager of external affairs at Southwestern Bell, said that Lawrence was the first community in Kansas to receive the Call ID option. This service, which costs $6.50 per month, features a unit that displays the phone number of the person trying to reach the customer's line. This unit costs $50-$60 if bought separately, but some telephones come with the display unit built-in.
Another option, Call Trace, is a $1 monthly service that traces the origins of prank calls and bills $10 for each successful trace. It usually is reserved for cases of threatening or obscene phone calls. After receiving the call, the customer pushes the star key and the number 57. The harasser's number is sent to area law enforcement agencies. Customers are then asked to call their Southwestern Bell Service Center to discuss the trace details.
With so many ways of catching dialing delinquents, one might think the practice of pranking would become more rare. But some students say the occasional prank call can offer a welcome diversion from studying.
"Every once in a while, it's kind of fun," said Jason Nestleroad, Wichita senior, who has received calls from someone claiming to be Charo's sister. "If the call is entertaining, I don't mind it at all. I'll just play along."
Crites said that since the point of her prank calls usually was entertainment, she was not worried about getting caught.
"With all the new technology and options like star 69, you have to keep on top of things so people don't beat you at your own game," Crites said. "But I never do or say anything to hurt anyone, and no one has ever gotten mad at me. It's just something fun to do late at night with friends."
Special treatment for student athletes a myth
Because athletes are so valued at schools like KU, some people may believe the stereotype that they receive special favors in the classroom.
By Kevin Hoffmann
Kansan staff writer
A common stereotype about athletes on college campuses goes something like this: they go to class whenever they want. If they don't turn in an assignment, it's no big deal. If they score an F on an exam, it will be changed to a passing grade. Instructors worship them.
"I think that many student athletes, especially the big name ones, could get away with stuff other students couldn't," said Bill Green, Lawrence junior. "When you have an advantage like that, I'm sure you're going to use it."
Not at KU, said Paul Buskirk, assistant athletic director for student support services. The potential may exist at some schools for athletes to be given academic privileges because sports are highly valued on college campuses.
"I could see a small percentage of instruc
tors, who are enthusiastic about athletics, as feeling some pressure to treat student athletes different," he said. "Hopefully that doesn't happen on this campus."
Mike Cormack, a graduate teaching assistant in the philosophy department, said he has had at least one student athlete in each of his courses since he began teaching five years ago. Cormack said anyone who labeled the academic efforts of a student athlete as different from the efforts of other students was wrong.
Many student athletes and instructors say that athletes don't get any special favors at KU. Many say that stereotype is inaccurate and unfair.
"The majority of the student athletes have not been any different than any other students," Cormack said. "If anything, they can be more motivated because of the other pressures they face."
Cormack, who also taught in the Western. Civilization program for four years, said that he often has had to adjust a due date for an assignment because of an athletic conflict but that it was not unlike the treatment given to other students.
Cormack said that some students may not realize that student athletes make up assignments that were missed.
"I have found that most of them are very good about making up a missed assignment right away or even before it's due," he said.
Some may think that athletes who play for a high-profile team are worshipped by instructors who are willing to give them special consideration. But Malcolm Nash, St. Louis senior and former men's basketball player, said the treatment he received in the classroom stayed the same after he stopped playing for the team.
Nash said that playing for the basketball team that won a national championship didn't lead to any special privileges in the classroom.
"It's basically the same," Nash said. "They didn't treat me any different."
I can't get anything given to me," he said.
Nash said it would be unfortunate if any athlete would receive special treatment.
"I didn't get anything given to me," he said.
FEBRUARY 15.1994 PAGE 7
KULIfe
People and places at the University of Kansas.
In January in Montreal, Quebec, Judge Raymonde Verreault sentenced a 37-year-old man to only 23 months in prison for a series of sexual assaults from 1989 to 1991 on his stepdaughter, who was 9 years old when the attacks started. Verreault, who is female, said the mitigating factor for the light sentence was that the man had "spared the victim." Said Verreault, because the assaults had been by sodomy and not "normal" intercourse, "(the victim) retained her virginity, which seems to be a very important value in their (Muslim) religion."
LEAD STORY
FRONTIERS OF SCIENCE
-South Korea's Samsung Electronics Co. announced in November that it had invented "Bio Television" - a TV set that converts a television's ordinary electromagnetic beams into waves that have an effect similar to that of sunlight on nearby plants and animals. In tests, the longevity of fish and the freshness of flowers increased by 50 percent to 100 percent when they were near the Bio Television.
-In the December Behavioral Neuroscience journal, researchers at Rotterdam's Erasmus University reported that injecting a certain hormone into young heterosexual male rats made them attempt to mate with males each day at dusk, but not at other times.
-In December, the Associated Press reported on research conducted by James Dabbs, a psychology
ΟΠРΣΤУΦXΨΩABΓΔEZHΘIKA
See WEIRD.Page 8.
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