Volume 124 Issue 65
kansan.com
Monday, November 21, 2011
PROMISE IN PARADISE, COLLAPSE IN COLLEGE STATION
WEIRD SCIENCE
CAMPUS
Engineering school enrollment increases
MARSHALL SCHMIDT
mschmidt@kansan.com
The School of Engineering is building the next generation of innovative thinkers — and turning out more than ever. The school's undergraduate population has increased from approximately 1,500 students to 1,900 over the past five years, and the dean expects enrollment to continue to grow to 2,300 in the next five years.
In the economic downturn, students are attracted to the engineering field because of its salary — $56,921 is the average entry level pay and its relatively stable employment. More than 80 percent of engineering graduates from the University found jobs or were continuing their education within six months of graduation.
"It's a great time to be an engineer," Stuart Bell, dean of the School of Engineering, said. "As students learn more about the opportunities in engineering, they get more excited about it."
Engineering school expansion
As part of a statewide effort to boost graduation rates in the engineering field, the School of Engineering is ramping up recruitment efforts, increasing curriculum opportunities and expanding its facilities.
The school has worked harder to recruit students in high school with the help of local industries hosting recruitment events.
"That's been driving the success
SEE ENGINEER ON PAGE 3
1,500 to 1,900 Undergraduate population increase over the last five years
$56,921
average entry salary
for engineering grads
$52,129
average salary for
nursing grads
$47,413
average salary for
accounting grads
MIKE GUNNOE/KANSAN
Daniel Kim, from Tuscon, Ariz. and Simon Lang, from Minnesota, graduate students in chemistry, show Isaac Springe, right, the properties of a non-Newtonian slime. The slime was one exhibit at the Chemistry Carnival in Malott Hall on campus Sunday.
IAN CUMMINGS icummings@kansan.com
Science experiments can be messy, and the evidence was splattered all over room 2024 of Malott Hall Sunday afternoon.
Children packed the laboratory — known for the day as the "Oobleck Room" — to play with "slime" while others gasped at fireballs and ate cotton candy in the hallways. It was all a part of the chemistry department's 16th Annual Carnival of Chemistry.
Nolan Slusser, a 9-year-old,
from Topeka, said he liked the
Oobleck Room best of all because it was "all messy and stuff"
Graduate students and volunteers entertained and educated children with more than a dozen science exhibitions throughout Malott Hall, Kate Eshelman, a graduate student in chemistry from Reno, Nev., greeted visitors at the door and said the turnout was about as good as last year. At least 100 families visited exhibits of chemistry, renewable energy, and physics throughout the afternoon.
Eshleman said she worked the Oobbleck Room last year.
This year, it was in the hands of graduate students Daniel Kim, of Tuscon, Ariz., and Simon Lang, of Minnesota, who were up to their wrists in a "non-Newtonian" slime that behaved both as a solid and a liquid. The slime was two parts corn starch and one part water, with green and yellow food coloring for added effect.
Children pressed down on the slime and felt it turn solid as they pushed the water out. But it acted like a liquid when they squeezed it through their fingers.
through their fingers. Lang said the idea was to surprise the children and spark an
interest in why things sometimes aren't what they appear.
"The biggest thing is they get to feel the difference," he said. "It's more fun than reading it in a textbook."
By mid-afternoon, the slime speckled every surface in the room. Lang said he and Kim would be responsible for the clean-up.
"it's not going to be pretty," he said.
Edited by Rachel Schultz
INTERNATIONAL
Debt crisis rattles European Union countries
Panel discusses debt in certain nations
CODY KUIPER
editor@kansan.com
The ongoing debt crisis in Europe is dominating the news and rattling stock markets lately. Whether the problem is more political or economic seems to depend on whom you ask.
On Thursday, the Center for Global and International Studies sponsored a discussion of the debt crisis featuring several professors of economics, political science and history. It focused primarily on how countries like Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain came to be in such predicaments, and how the European Union can solve these problems.
University professors have varying theories on why Europe is teetering on the edge of economic disarray, and their recent roundtable discussion placed the blame on poor political and economic decisions.
One panelist, University of Missouri-Kansas City economics professor Stephanie Kelton, put the bulk of the blame on the flaws of the continent's one-size-fits-all
currency, the Euro. But her main goal for the discussion was to end the misconception that America might find itself in a similar situation with its debt.
Robert Rohrschneider, a University professor in political science, contrasted Kelton's economic arguments with his own political theories. Although he agreed with her thoughts on the Euros' role in the crisis, he found the situation to be just as much political as it was economic.
"Europe has had economic problems for the past 10 to 20 years already, even before the onset of the current economic crisis," Rohrschneider said. "So that's why it's not just an economic crisis. It is also a political crisis because of the very fact that you don't have a
"I think a lot of people in the media, a lot of economists and ordinary people draw the wrong conclusion when they see what's happening in Europe," Kelton said, "and they think that if we don't begin to cut our deficit and get our fiscal house in order, we're next. And that's, in my view, absolute rubbish."
Victor Bailey, distinguished professor of modern British history at the University, moderated the discussion, but most of the discourse came from the audience's questions. Derek Eichman, a senior from Witchita, asked multiple questions during the discussion, which he said left him with a better understanding of Europe's economic plight.
"It put forth some fundamental components of the EU that I never really thought about before," he said. "It was a good overall introduction to the nature of the crisis."
unified political system for Europe as a whole."
"We're certainly in the planning stages of a series of tables focusing on historical and contemporary issues in Europe, as well as business, law and social studies," she said.
The event was the first of its kind organized by European Studies Coordinator Lorie A. Vanchena, but she doesn't think it will be the last.
- Edited by Jayson Jenks
SOURCE: CNN MONEY
GRAPHIC BY HANNAH WISE
Index
CLASSIFIED 11
CROSSWORD 14
CRYPTOQUIPS 4
OPINION 5
SPOURTS 12
SUDOKU 4
All contents, unless stated otherwise, © 2011 The University Daily Kansan
Today's Weather
Don't forget
The KU Jazz Singers and KU Jazz Combo I will be performing a free concert at the Lawrence Arts Center at 7:30 tonight.
Forecasts done by University students. For a more detailed forecast, see page 2A.
Hi: 45
L0: 35
Chilly, but not quite as rainy