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A / NEWS / TUESDAY NOVEMBER 9, 2010 / THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN / KANSAN.COM
The science of reliation
Karlie Brown/KANSAN
Dr. Peter Kipattrick, dean of engineering at the University of Notre Dame, presents a lecture on Beauty, Science and Our Eternal Destiny in the Alderson Auditorium at the Kansas Union. The event was co-sponsored by the St. Lawrence Institute for Faith and Culture and the Notre Dame Club of Topeka. The mission of the Institute of Faith and Culture is to be a voice for the Catholic Church to the larger culture, especially the University of Kansas.
Video encourages attacks
In past messages, al-Awlaki has justified killing American civilians as retaliation for the killing of hundreds of thousands of Muslim civilisans in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. But this appeared to be an escalation, with the 39-year-old cleric arguing that no rationale was needed to seek out and kill Americans.
Cairo — A U.S.-born radicalicler who belongs to the al-Qaida offshoot behind the cargo bomb plot on the United States told Muslims they are free to kill American "devils" at will in a video posted on extremist websites Monday.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Anwar al-Awlaki's vitriolic sermons have inspired several attacks against the United States, and Yemeni officials say he may have given his blessing to the mail bomb plot even if he did not take an active part in it. The al-Qaida branch in Yemen, al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, claimed responsibility for the foiled bomb plot.
"Don't consult with anybody in killing the Americans," al-Awlaki said in the 23-minute video, in which he appeared dressed in a white robe and turban, with a sheathed dagger tucked into his waistband.
INTERNATIONAL
Short excerpts from the al-Awaki video were released on Oct. 23, two weeks before the mail bombs were uncovered. But this was the first full posting of the video.
U. S. officials told The Associated Press last week that military aid to Yemen would double to $250 million in 2011 to help the country fight al-Qaida. The White House is seeking greater cooperation on intelligence sharing with the Yemeni government and more opportunities to train Yemeni counterterrorism teams in the aftermath of the failed mail bomb plot, a senior administration official said Sunday.
"Fighting the devil does not require a fatwa, nor consultation nor prayers seeking divine guidance. They are the party of Satan and fighting them is the obligation of the time," he said.
militarized in the Al-Awlaki also attacked rulers in the Arab world, describing them as corrupt, and he called on religious scholars to declare them "non-Muslims" for betraying the Muslim people.
Fatwas are religious rulings on even the most mundane personal issues, such as marriage or finances and have been issued to allow the killing of people deemed to have insulted Islam or to have harmed Muslims.
inspiring militants to becoming an active operative in al-Qaida's affiliate there.
"There is an American policy presented to the Yemeni government, funded by the West, for the people of this country to alienate them from their religion," said al-Awlaki, who was born in New Mexico of Yemeni parents.
In the video, al-Awlaki accused the United States of pouring money into Yemen to encourage Yemenis to shun their religion.
U. S. intelligence has linked Al-Awlaki to the 9/11 hijackers and to last year's failed Christmas day bombing of a ietliner over Detroit. He also has ties to Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist accused of killing 13 people in November at the Fort Hood, Texas, military base.
"Kings, emirs, and presidents are now not qualified to lead the nation, or even a flock of sheep," he said. "If the leaders are corrupt, the scholars have the responsibility to lead the nation."
U. S. investigators say that since he returned to Yemen in 2006, al-Awlaki has moved beyond just
He added that these leaders would have to be removed for the Muslim people to move forward.
ADMISSIONS
Standards may rise soon
BY ANGELIQUE MCNAUGHTON
amcnaughton@kansan.com
Education officials in Kansas are attempting to raise the bar on public university admissions standards.
The Admissions Task Force, assembled by the Kansas Board of Regents, met in Topeka Wednesday.
The task force, which consists of chief academic officers and admissions directors, approved recommended changes to the undergraduate admission requirements for the six public state universities.
The committee also approved the deletion of civics as a social science requirement, added career and technical education courses to the electives list, included the math provisions and changed the standards for GED graduates, home-schooled students and those over 21 years old.
The reccomendations will next go before the Academic Affairs Committee and the Board of Regents, likely in December and January, respectively. The Board of Regents will make the final decision.
"Today, under our standards if you have a D and a 21 on your ACT you can get it," Gary Sherrer said about state admission into college.
Sherrer, the chairman of the Kansas Board of Regents and the
The pre-college curriculum proposal includes changes to the English, math, social science and elective requirements. It would also require either a fourth mathematics course in the final year of high school or three courses with the requirement that the student meets ACT standard scores.
The concern about the current admission standards is that if a student receives a 21 or higher ACT score, universities are not aware what courses the student took in preparation for his or her post-secondary education. The committee believes that lack of preparation contributes to the high dropout rate amongst freshman and the low graduation rates.
Referring to an ACT study, the committee said that requiring
Increased graduation and retention rates is a common theme at the university this year. One of the major components of the changes that the committee discussed extensively before the approval was the requirement of a 17-unit pre-college curriculum.
task force, said the changes would send a message that if you want to go to a state university, you have to do more than graduate.
Barbara Romzek, senior vice provost at the University, said the hope is that the changes to admissions requirements will better communicate to students what they need to do in order to be better prepared and successful.
mathematics in the final year of high school further improves a student's change of succeeding at the postsecondary level.
Pam Robinson, board of education member for Blue Valley Schools, said the math component of the proposal would cost the Shawnee Mission school district alone $500,000.
"How will we impact the most number of kids to prepare them better, without any data?" Ronald Walker, the superintendent of Geary County Schools, said.
Resistance toward the curriculum change recommendations arose because of a lack of data to support the benefit of the proposals and to say that current students who don't take the curriculum are unsuccessful.
Advocates for the curriculum and proposals pushed the weary to consider the overall benefit and to remember that these suggestions are only recommendations and will allow for flexibility.
In light of the proposed curriculum, Emporia State University responded to the proposals in a statement that said only 130 of its current students who had ACT scores of 24 or higher would have met the proposed requirements.
Gary Miller, the provost of Wichita State University and task force member, is the representing body for all of the state university provests and is answering to the Council of Chief Academic Officers of which Jeffrey Vitter, the provost, is the chair.
Edited by Tim Dwyer
Miller said it shouldn't be about the money but about better preparing students to be successful.
The changes are the first attempt the task force has taken to change admission standards since the 2009 legislative session that gave the Kansas Board of Regents the authority to establish requirements.
The committee said they are not asking for drastic changes to the standards because "that would blow the state out of the water."
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