University Daily Kansan / Thursday, November 19, 1987
Campus/Area
Local Briefs
Regents to talk about rules for admissions
The Board of Regents will debate the merits of selective admissions at its monthly meeting today in Topeka.
The Regents will receive reports about selective admissions from the chief academic and executive officers at all six Regents schools. Each Regents school has studied selective admissions since Regents executive director Stanley Koplik proposed it in September.
In a report last week, KU Executive Vice Chancellor Judith Ramley said that the University of Kansas could live with selective admissions. She expressed several concerns, which included access for minority students, reduction of remedial courses and state financing based on enrollment.
The plan the Regents will be debating today calls for tighter admissions standards for KU, Kansas State University and Wichita State University.
Under a selective admissions plan, beginning in 1992, Kansas high school graduates would have to receive a ACT composite score of 21, be ranked in the upper third of their graduating class, or receive a 2.0 grade point average in a required high school curriculum to gain entrance into those three schools.
The Regents also will discuss:
■ reciprocital tuition agreements between the Regents and the University of Missouri Board of Curators for architecture, dental and forestry students.
■ the future of KU's personnel administration degree program.
■ increasing residence hall fees for fall 1988.
2 KU women earn engineers' awards
The Society of Women Engineers recently awarded scholarships to two KU students.
Jill MacDonald, Kansas City, Mo., senior, received the Lillian Moller Gilbeth Scholarship, and Kristen Womeldorph, Bartlesville, Oka., senior, received the Men's Auxiliary Memorial Scholarship. Both students are members of the Society of Women Engineers. MacDonald is an electrical engineering major and Womeldorph is a chemical engineering major.
Choirs, orchestra to play Beethoven
The University of Kansas combined choirs and the University Symphony Orchestra will present the major works of Ludwig Van Beethoven at 3:30 p.m. Sunday in Hoch Auditorium.
The program will include Beethoven's Symphony No. 5 in C minor, and Mass in C major. The concert is free.
Clarification
Information in a story in Tuesday's Kansan may have been unclear Kris Noyes, house resident manager for 1319 Tennessee St., said that although she collected rent from the tenant in the attic apartment after the tenant moved in, she did not offer that apartment to him to be rented.
From The Associated Press.
Two victims of car-train collision improve
By KIRK ADAMS Staff writer
Staff writer
Two 19-year-old men who were injured Tuesday night when their car collided with a Santa Fe train at a crossing at Burcham Park are in stable condition today, according to hospital spokesmen.
The driver of the car, John T. Lattin, a Kansas City, Kan., resident, was upgraded from serious to stable condition today after suffering a closed head injury and spending the night in the intensive care unit at the University of Kansas Medical Center. Lattin was moved out of intensive care today.
The passenger of the car, Jack Wise,
Lawrence resident, is in stable condition at
Lawrence Memorial Hospital. Wise received
stitches last night to repair head lacerations.
Lattin and Wise were injured Tuesday when a southbound train collided with their car at the park. Second and Indiana streets. The train was backing its cars toward the Santa Fc depot a mile away. The lead boxcar's coupler smashed through the passenger window of the car and extended more than halfway into the front seat. The train pushed the car about 100 yards.
The train had sounded its whistle and had flares burning on the back car, said H.D. Muldoon, a brakeman on the train, who was standing on the back of the train when it collided with the car.
Wise said yesterday from his hospital room that he did not remember anything about the crash.
Wise said, "All I remember was sitting down
there at the park. The next thing I know I was in the hospital, and they were cutting my clothes off."
Sgt. Don Dalquest, spokesman for Lawrence police, said yesterday that he did not know whether police had conducted a blood-alcohol test on Wise or Latin.
Lattin was unavailable for comment.
Wise said he and Lattin had been drinking before the accident but that they were not intoxicated. He said he had drank three or four cans of beer since about 1 aor 3: 10 p.m. He and Lattin had about eight cans of beer between them, he said.
Paul Gehrt, director of public relations for Santa Fe, said the train had been going 15 miles an hour at the time of the accident.
Dalquest said the district attorney would
determine whether any charges would be filed. He said police had not yet talked to Lattin or Wise.
Paul Nash, supervisor of Santa Fe's Kansas City area division, said Santa Fe had not yet investigated whether workers were following correct procedure before the accident. Nash said he had seen no indications that there had been any wrongdoing by workers.
He said Santa Fe workers would not be asked to take drug or alcohol tests unless there was reason to think drugs or alcohol had been a factor.
"Our crew appeared to be in the right condition," he said.
Singer takes philosophical approach
Gehrt said that accidents at road crossings, referred to as grade crossings, were the railroad's biggest safety problem.
By JORN E. KAALSTAD Staff writer
For aspiring opera singer Phyllis Pancella, music isn't all that's worth thinking about.
Descartes and Nietzsche are as important to her as Verdi and Wagner, said Pancella, who graduated from KU in 1986 with distinction in philosophy and with the Kathryn Nelson Award in music. That award is presented to outstanding KU students who plan singing careers.
"It is absolutely necessary for artists to combine emotion and reason," she said.
Pancella, who is from St. Louis,
is back in Lawrence to prepare for
auditions for apprenticeships with
the Chicago Opera and the
Chicago Lyrical Opera.
Also, Pancella recently won a district audition for the St. Louis Metropolitan Opera. She will compete in a regional audition in February in Tulsa, Okla., to get to the finals, which will be in New York City.
For the Chicago Lyric Opera, she will compete against 26 other singers in the finals in December for an apprenticeship with the opera. Initially, 500 singers participated in the primary auditions, she said.
Stephen Wade/Special to the KANSAN
DVGAN
Phyilis Pancella
"The Chicago and San Francisco opera companies are very prominent. They're probably the two best outside New York," she said. But, Pancella said, being accepted as an apprentice does not guarantee success.
"It's no sure thing. I must prove myself there — if I get there," she said.
John Stephens, associate professor of music, gave Pancella voice lessons while she was at KU.
"I have tremendous faith in her. She definitely has the material to succeed." Stephens said.
He said the San Francisco and the Chicago operas were highly selective.
"These companies probably have the finest programs for aspiring opera singers in the nation," Orchans said.
Stephens described Pancella as a very bright and gifted student whom he enjoyed teaching.
"She challenged me as a teacher because she was always eager to learn," he said.
Pancella has been in Lawrence since August. In addition to practicing opera, she has performed in Lawrence with songwriter and guitar player Pat Ortmeyer of Missoula, Mont.
The duo has performed as restaurants and coffeehouses such as the Paradise Cafe, 728 Massachusetts St., and the Glass Onion, 624 W. 12th St. They have been playing progressive, or contemporary, folk music, written by Ortmerge, she said.
Pancella is no stranger to contemporary music, she said.
While at KU, Pancella coached the jazz choir.
Also, she sang the part of the Mrs. Lovett in the music and theater departments' spring 1896 production of "Sweeney Todd."
KU basketball fans may remember her singing the national anthem before games at Allen Field House in 1984 and 1985.
Legislative committee rejects admissions plan
TOPEKA - A legislative committee failed for the second time yesterday to endorse a proposal that would limit admissions to state universities to students who complete college preparatory courses in high school.
But State Rep. Denise Apt. R-Iola, said she and State Rep. Jim Lowther, R-Emporia, would introduce a selective admissions bill in the forthcoming legislative session, anyway.
The Associated Press
Apt said selective admissions would reduce the number of freshmen who failed their first or second semester in college because they were not prepared.
The bill would allow public school districts four years to develop a college preparatory program before the admissions policy would become effective, Apt said.
Tuesday, the committee fainted on a 3-volume to endorse a selective admissions proposal, offered by Sen. Alicia Salisbury, R-Topeka, which included foreign language as a requirement.
"The loss in human potential is the loss I'm most concerned about." Apt said. "I think we need to prepare our kids."
Yesterday, the same proposal was brought before the committee without the foreign language requirement, but it failed on a voice vote.
Critics of the proposal say a selective admissions policy would close college doors to many Kansas students.
"The vote is not surprising," said Stanley Koplik, executive director of the Board of Regents, which governs state universities. "It's an issue
A selective admissions bill will be difficult to pass in the state Legislature, Koplik said.
that has equal fervor on both sides."
Under current law, any graduate of a Kansas high school is entitled to acceptance by a state-supported college or university.
A local legislator. State Rep. Jesse Branson, D—Lawrence, said the bill could still be passed; but support would be needed from legislators and the public.
"In the final analysis it may depend on grassroots support," Branson said.
Branson said she had not decided whether she thought Regents schools should have selective admissions.
Kansan reporter Ben Johnston contributed information to this story.
Robbery suspect arrested Warrant issued for 2nd man
By a Kansan reporter
Lawrence police have arrested one 18-year-old Lawrence man and have an arrest warrant for another in connection with the armed robbery Monday of the Lawrence National Bank branch, 27th and Iowa streets.
The arrested man is being held in lieu of $10,000 bond at the Douglas County Jail.
Police arrested the man on a charge of aggravated robbery Tuesday night after they discovered some leads in the case. Police would not disclose where the arrest had been made.
According to police, a man wearing a dark blue stocking cap and dark-colored jacket walked into the branch office at 10:43 a.m., pulled out a gun and took an undisclosed amount of money.
Lawrence police spokesman Sgt. Don Dalquest would not speculate when the second man, who is also being charged with aggravated robbery, would be in custody.
The first man appeared early yesterday in Douglas County District Court, where Judge Jean Shepherd set bond. He is scheduled to appear at 1:30 p.m. Monday for a preliminary hearing, where he will make a plea and be formally charged.
According to police, a man wearing a dark blue stocking cap and dark-colored jacket walked into the branch office at 10:43 a.m., pulled out a gun and took an undisclosed amount of money.
A bank teller sounded a silent alarm, but the man had taken off west of the bank on foot before police arrived two minutes later.
Police said some of the money was recovered but would not say how much. Officials also would not disclose what part the two suspects may have played in the robbery.
Eight to 10 officers from the Lawrence Police Department and Douglas County sheriff's office were assigned to the case, which is still being investigated. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has been aiding the investigation.
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