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Monday, November 26. 1990 / University Daily Kansan
Early Window Project traces television's affect on learning
Center studies children's play
By Nedra Beth Randolph
Special to the Kansan
Kermit the Frog was counting to 10 during an episode of "Sesame Street" while a brother and sister sat quietly playing with bright plastic Fisher Price toys. Little did they suspect that behind the metal chair the man was a video camera recording their every movement and utterance.
These children are of two nearly 300 2 and 4-year-olds participating in the Early Window Project. The project is a three-year study designed to determine the effects of television viewing on low-income children.
The study is being conducted by the Center for the Research on the Influence of Television on Children at the University of Kansas. The children participating in the study are from the metropolitan Kansas City area.
"This study is not just another evaluation of a TV show," said John Wright, co-director of the center. "It's a comprehensive study of time and media use with special attention to 'Sesame Street.'"
The money for the study is given to the Children's Television Workshop by the MacArthur Foundation. The
Children's Television Workshop chose the center at KU to conduct the study.
Although the study is financed through the producers of "Sesame Street," "The Electric Company" and "3-2-1 Contact," it is not intended to calculate the viewership of these programs.
The study is designed to find out whether watching educational programs accelerates a child's learning ability. But do they do not watch educational television.
Wright designed the study along with the other director of the center, Aletha Huston.
The focus of the study is to look at how the children's home environment affects their viewing habits, and how those TV habits affect them scholastically. The researchers want to know what positive effects TV can have on young children, not necessarily the negative effects.
"We want to know if watching 'Sesame Street' helps low-income children learn at an early age," Wright said.
The study's hypothesis is that if low-income children regularly watch quality educational programs, such as "Sesame Street," their ability to
Mary Pinoin, scientific director of the Early Window Project, said the study was trying to establish the benefits of watching quality television at an early age for low-income children.
learn is enhanced.
"We are trying to determine how the environment in the home affects what shows are viewed on television shows affect learning." Pilon said.
During the three-year program, the participants in the Early Window Project visit the center's office once a month to meet with children at home once each year.
While conducting those visits, the researcher videotapes the child's viewing of playing habits while she stands. She steps aside and again while the television is off.
The participants' parents are called on the telephone seven times during the year and are asked about what the child does in a typical day. Their views determine how much time the children spend watching television.
The Early Window Project, which is in its second year, expects to release preliminary results sometime next year.
Supreme Court will hear testimony in case of overweight nurse's rights
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — All Sharon Russell ever wanted to be was a nurse, but her weight almost got in the way.
The Associated Press
After she was kicked out of nursing school in 1985, weighing more than 300 pounds, she sued the school and won. Now the case has moved to the U.S. Supreme Court, and she's moved to the forefront in the fight for dignity for overweight people.
A federal jury last year ordered Salve Regina College of Newport, R.I., to pay Russell almost $44,000 in damages. An appeals court instructed, and the school appealed its case to the nation's high court.
"It's going to take time. It's going to take patience," Russell said. "And it's going to take people like me who have the guts to stand up and say, 'I was humiliated — this is how I felt.'"
The justices this week will hear arguments to decide a narrow, procedural point of law relating to appeals court's standard of review.
Although the decision, expected sometime next year, will have little bearing on the legal question of so-called size discrimination, it could determine whether the award must be paid.
"The important thing is more people will understand what I had to go through to get to this point," said Russell, now 26 and a pediatric nurse at All Children's Hospital in St. Petersburg.
Russell maintains size discrimination was the sole reason for her dismissal from Salve Regina, but school officials argue that she was unhealthy because she suffered from an eating disorder and was physically unable to handle patients.
"We don't dismiss students because they're fat," said Catherine Graziano, Salve Regina's dean of nursing. "We dismiss students if they have behavior problems that they cannot learn to function as nurses."
Russell said her 5-foot, 6-30 pound body didn't seem to bother administrators in 1982 when she was accepted at the small college
run by the Roman Catholic Sisters of Mercv.
After earning good grades through her freshman and sophomore years, she entered the college. Her problem began the first day.
"My instructor took one look at me and said, 'We're not going to get a uniform to fit you. You'll never get around a bed.'" she said.
She said she was used as a human guinea pig in class to show how to make a bed with a fat person or how to give a shat to a fat person.
In December 1984, faculty members presented Russell with a contract to lose two pounds a week or face dismissal. She said she signed it because "becoming a nurse was all I ever wanted."
According to the school, Russell weighed 328 pounds at the beginning of her sophomore year, was down to 297 when she signed the agreement and back up to 303 when she signed it. She was when Salve Regina notified Russell that she would not be allowed to attend her senior year.
Non-traditional students face challenge balancing family, school
By David Garfield
Special to the Kansan
Beilinda Cook said she had to back fight back tears when she read what her 12-year-old daughter wrote in her school journal.
"I miss my mom and dad. My mom's in school all the time, and I never get to see her." Cook's daughter wrote.
Cook, 37, is one of about 2,000 KU students with children. While traditional students focus on high grades and an active social life, students with families must balance their studies with being a parent. In addition to this, students continually worry about providing financial support for their families.
could work, Belinda Cook said their "income went right out the window."
As president of the Organization for Adult Knowledge Seekers at the University of Kansas, Cook tries to help students with families and other non-traditional students cope with family challenges (financial needs and career planning.
Her husband, Larry Cook, was diagnosed with progressive multiple sclerosis three years ago. He quit his job in Utah, and the family sold its home and moved back to Kansas City, Kan., in June 1989.
Because Larry Cook no longer
The family now is living on her husband's Social Security benefits. Cook knew she would have to help her with her education to get a job and support her family.
"I was forced to go out in the employment field," she said. "I'm not qualified to do anything except office work. I don't have the qualifications necessary to compensate for the needs that my family demands."
Cook is pursuing a music therapy degree at KU to improve her chances in the job market. Because of her obligations at school, which include serving on a Student Senate committee and the advisory board for Watkins Health Center, she is unable to spend as much time as she would like with her three daughters, ages 12, 13 and 14.
Her daughters are staying with Cook's brother in Kansas City, Kan., during the week to give them more of a home atmosphere.
Cook said she helped balance the many demands in her life by trying not to plan more than a couple of weeks ahead.
Despite not seeing her children as much as she used to, Cook said her daughters were proud and supportive of her for returning to school.
"It's a lot of faith," she said. "I take it a day at a time. If I mess up today, there's always tomorrow. I maintain a positive attitude."
As Cook is the primary supporter of her family, so, too, are Charlotte Burkett and Tracy Miller.
Burkett, 36, is a fifth-year senior in elementary education. She attended the University of South Florida for one year in 1978.
Because her husband was an Army officer, she had to move often. After her divorce, Burkett was able to down and continue her education
"I probably would not have gone to school until he retired," she said. "I would have been in my 45s then. That would have been a particularly good situation."
Burkett has two children: Bobby, 6, and Brian, 10. They live with her parents in Topeka.
"For them, it's been a hard adjustment," she said. "I try to compensate by doing special things for them."
It's harder on Brian, especially. I'm the only steady force in his life.
"He doesn't remember the time when we were a family. When I'm not there, his whole social support system is left out."
Barkett said that she had to juggle her time around her children and school but that her children always came first.
She said that Bobby recently was complaining and crying of a sore throat. Burkett had a geography test the next morning. She took Bobby to the emergency room at 1 p.m. Although Bobby was not seriously ill, Burkett was not able to begin study until after she came home at 1 a.m.
Tracy Miller, 25, has faced similar situations as the divorced mother of two Miller, a sophomore, said she recognized the importance of a college education.
Miller is in the process of changing her life. She was married at 18 and "finished high school by a hair."
She got into trouble in high school and was involved in drugs. She said her "whole financial situation went down" when her ex-husband went to jail
She receives no financial support from him, she said.
Miller now is living day to day financially, hoping that the Kansas Department of Social and Rebuildability will provide her with assistance.
T the school week has come to ar e end, and Miller is relaxing or her couch in her Stouffel Place apartment. As Miller talks, her children run in and out. She politely tells her children, 4-year-old Nicole and 7-year-old Cliff, to go next door and play. She smiles at them as they leave and then apologizes for what she calls the mess in her apartment.
Miller said that her children deserved food, love and a good education but that she was worried because she soon would be 39 years old. Chiff will be 12 then, and that gives her only six years to save enough money to finance his college education.
Helen Krische-Dee, 40, also is concerned about her children's concern because she must pay back her student loans after she graduates.
"Financially, it was rougher at first," she said. "We had to adjust to a drop in income. Hopefully, I'll
make more money when I graduate.
This is a better investment than a car. I will increase my own value in the workplace."
Krische-Dee, who has three children — Sahra, 9, Jessica, 11, and Kate, 9, first
enrolled at KU in 1972. Her family moved to New Mexico but returned to Lawrence in 1980. She then worked at Taco Bell before resuming her stud.
"I always wanted to continue school," she said. "I was lucky and fortunate to return. After I had realized this will be all the children I will have, I thought this was a good idea to start and get another career."
Cook also is looking forward to a new career and hopes her story can be a good example for younger students with families.
"I believe that students need to prepare themselves for situations such as mine," she said. "I believe that if my husband had better prepared himself financially, if I had better prepared myself educationally, the transition would not have been as severe as it is."
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OREAD
BILLIARDS & BOWLING TOURNAMENT
- Sunday, December 2
12 noon - 4 o'clock p.m.
Kansas Union Jaybowl
$6.00 entry fee
Men's & Women's compe
- Entry forms available in the SUA Office in the Union Deadline for entry is Friday Nov. 30 at 5:00 p.m.
en's & Women's competition available
Winners will represent KU at the regional recreational tournament March 1-2 at Kansas State University
Look for the Racquetball & Table Tennis Tournaments in Feb
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