FRIDAY, MARCH 30, 2001
Police resort to
spray as unruly
students crowd
Police officers use pepper spray to disperse a crowd in State College Friday. Crowds had gathered and
grown rowdy after Penn State lost to Temple in the NCAA Tournament earlier in the night.
by Michael C. Spearing
and Ryan Dougherty
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
" March 25. 2001
STATF. COL.LEGE. Pa Several thousand people took
to the streets and the balconies early Saturday following
Penn State's 12-point loss to Temple in the NCAA tour-
nament
As cans and bottles rained down, riot gear-clad police
tried to disperse the unruly crowd in a scene reminiscent
of last summer's arts festival disturbance.
As revelers threw small firecrackers, police used pep
per spray in their attempt to keep order. At least four
people were visibly sickened after apparently being
sprayed in the face. Emergency medical personnel were
called around 1 a.m. fora report of a woman who needed
stitches
Police detained at least four people after they failed to
disperse when ordered, witnesses said.
‘Td like to think this is to celebrate a great basketball
season, but there's so many kids in this little area, I don't
think the police understand the use of force will just get
them more riled up,” said Ryan Devlin, a Penn State mar
keting major from Irwin, Pa.
Tonight, all they needed was to have somebody point
College students go deeper into debt, study says
by Paul Wenske
March 28, 2001
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
University students are going
deeper into debt to pay for their edu
cation but don't understand the im
plication it has for their future, a con
sumer group said Tuesday in Wash
ington.
The Public Interest Research Group
released a national survey in which
78 percent of the 1,012 students who
responded admitted they underesti
mated the cost of their student loans.
On average, the students said they
would graduate with $4,846 more in
debts than they expected.
The group was joined at a news
conference by several congressmen
who said the government should in
crease its student aid program.
The group released a General Ac-
lowa students say pipe bombs
intended for fishing
by Matthew McGuire
TMS Campus
March 27, 2001
Three University of lowa students who were caught
with homemade pipe bombs in their dorm room told
authorities they intended to use them for fishing, not
mass destruction.
The students’ intent was to drop the bombs in a river
to kill or stun fish, said Charles Green, director of the
university’s public safety office.
University police evacuated the dorm rooms about
90 minutes after students reported seeing the bombs at
just after 7 p.m. on March 22. Police and state bomb
squads toured the building and removed three pipe
pepper spray. It acted like (a) spark and started a big
fire,” Devlin said.
Several street signs were torn down and at least one
unsuccessful attempt was made to topple a light pole.
One sign was thrown into a parked car.
The gathering began as something of a celebration of
the men’s basketball team making the NCAA's Sweet
16 for the first time since 1955. The Nittany Lions de
feated Providence College and the University of North
Carolina before losing to Temple Friday by a score of
84-72.
"It's our crazy way to show our pride,” said Lena
McKelvey of Doylestown, Pa., a kinesiology student.
Before the disturbance got out of hand, police were seen
leading cheers and posing for photos.
But just as last summer, chants of "We are Penn Stale”
soon deteriorated into blocking traffic and throwing
bottles.
“It's crazy. I have no clue why everyone's out here,”
said Sarah Gkonos, a marketing and international busi-
ness major from Berwyn
As far as the police response, Gkonos said, "I don’t
know if there’s any other way. I don’t know what I would
do in this situation."
She continued: “The cops may actually make things
worse, but they have to be here.”
counting Office analysis showing that
over the past three years the number
of students graduating with a debt of
more than $20,000 had nearly
doubled.
Officials at the University of Kan
sas said students this past year gradu
ated with an average debt of $ 17,904.
That was slightly higher than the av
erage student debt of $ 17,863 the year
before.
Officials at the University of Mis
souri, which is on spring break, said
they didn’t have figures immediately
available.
“ In this economy, a college educa
tion is the best investment you can
make in your future,” said Ivan
Frishberg, director of the Public In
terest Research Group’s higher edu
cation project.
“But with big loans come big prob
lems. Students are forced to take out
bombs without incident.
Adam Fisher, Nathaniel Krotz and Andrew Ritchie
were charged with possession of an explosive device
or materials. The police report filed for each student
states that each admitted to building the explosives with
the help of the other two.
Only Fischer lives in Burge Hall, the residence hall
that was evacuated. Krotz and Ritchie live in other resi
dence halls on campus.
It is against university policy to possess explosives
in the residence halls, Green said. In addition, dropping
a bomb into a body of water to kill fish is also illegal,
an lowa Department of Natural Resources spokesper
son said. The IDNR imposes a fine of $145 and $l5 for
each fish collected in such cases.
pepper
Penn State
streets
student loans to pay for college, but
most will end up with significant
sticker shock when it comes time for
repayment.”
He said nearly eight out of 10 stu
dents did not have a clear understand
ing of the implications of the debt they
took on. As a result, many students
begin their careers deep in debt.
Rep. George Miller of California,
ranking member of the House Edu
cation and Work Force Committee,
said the government should adopt a
$6OO increase in the maximum Pell
Grant, provided by the federal
government’s main financial aid pro
gram.
The increase would raise the maxi
mum Pell Grant from $3,750 to
$4,350. Besides advocating more stu
dent aid, the Public Interest Research
Group also urged more-flexible re
payment options for students.
Michigan law school can’t use
in admissions, judge rules
race
by Kenneth R. Weiss
Los Angeles Times
March 27, 2001
A federal judge on Tuesday or
dered the University of
Michigan’s law school to quit us
ing race as a factor in admissions,
ruling that its affirmative action
policies violate the U.S. Consti
tution and are not in the state's in
terest.
U.S. District Judge Bernard
Friedman dismissed the school’s
arguments that affirmative action
is needed to “level the playing
field” so minorities can compete
in a society filled with either past
or present discrimination.
“An admissions policy that
treats any applicants different
from others on account of their
race is unfair and unconstitu
tional,” Friedman wrote. He in
structed the law school to rework
its admissions criteria so they are
“race neutral.”
The ruling, which could end up
before the U.S. Supreme Court,
was criticized by University of
Michigan President Lee C.
Bollinger as conflicting with the
high court’s 1978 decision in Uni
versity of California vs. Bakke.
Th.it decision allowed schools to
use race as one factor among
many in selecting students.
“We will appeal this decision
and we arc confident we will pre
vail in higher court,” he said.
He called promoting racial di-
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versity in college and graduate
schools “a compelling govern
mental interest.”
Friedman’s ruling hands another
key victory to the Center for Indi
vidual Rights, a conservative
Washington D.C.-based firm that
has launched or joined lawsuits at
tacking affirmative action around
the country.
The center has been campaign
ing to find the case that will over
turn the Bakke decision and abol
ish all race-based admission prac
tices.
Five years ago, it succeeded in
ending affirmative action at the
University of Texas Law School,
setting a legal precedent that af
fects public colleges in several
Southwestern states.
More recently, however, the
rights center lost a similar case
before the 9th Circuit Court of
Appeals involving three white stu
dents who were denied admission
to the University of Washington’s
law school.
Complicating matters, another
judge in Friedman’s district re
cently ruled that the University of
Michigan’s use of race in its un
dergraduate admissions is legal.
So as it stands, the university can
consider race in picking under
graduates but not law students.
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often attract the attention of U.S.
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ton, Michigan, or possibly in
Georgia - is likely to be the case
that will lead to a reconsideration
of affirmative action in admis-
None of this would have any im
pact on California’s public univer
sities, which have been forbidden
from using affirmative action
since the voters banned such prac
tices in 1996 by passing Proposi
tion 209.
But a Supreme Court ruling
overturning Bakke could change
the admissions practices of private
universities, if it were to reach the
same conclusion as Friedman. He
ruled on Tuesday that the Michi
gan law school’s consideration of
race violated not only the Consti
tution but Title VI of the 1964
Civil Rights Act.
Title VI covers all those entities
that receive federal money, which
includes virtually every private
university in the country.
Curt Levey, legal director of
Center for Individual Rights, said
Friedman's ruling went even fur
ther than he had hoped.
The case, Grutter v. Bollinger,
was brought on behalf of Barbara
Grutter, a white mother who
claimed she was denied admission
to Michigan’s law school because
less-qualified minorities received
preferential treatment.
Friedman wrote that the focus
must be on the “merit of indi
vidual applicants,” not “assumed
characteristics of racial groups.”
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