Page 2 The Behrend Beacon WEEKEND WEATHER OUTLOOK SATURDAY 42* Snow Showers High: 37° Low: 28° Electronic records policy meets critical need A decade or so into the electronic-information revolution, many people have at least a box, if not office drawers, full of computer disks containing important information that has been rendered unreadable through software and hardware updates. At the same time, the ease of change that makes the Web such a timely information resource overwrites and deletes the historical record. Alarmed at the potential loss of historical materials as well as legally mandated documents, the Committee on Institutional Cooperation's (CIC) University Archivists Group recently ap proved a statement on "Standards for an Electronic Records Policy." Penn Staters on the group included Jacqueline R. Esposito, University archivist, and Leon J. Stout, head of public services and outreach, in the University Libraries' Special Collections Library. In developing the standards statement, the group identified key components of an electronic records policy that could be customized to meet individual institutional needs. LISTSERV sends errant messages to subscribers Penn State operates thousands of listservs for groups ranging from people interested in psychology topics, to newspaper editors, to students interested in German. It appears a com mand by a student to build interest in his particular iistserv may have sparked thousands of puzzling notes to subscribers of some of those listservs, including subscribers of some of the Penn State Newswires. "There are 75,000 subscribers to the Penn State Newswires from more than 50 countries and yesterday afternoon we began to hear from some of them about the puzzling e-mail notes they were receiving about judo and kickboxing at Penn State," said Bill Mahon, director of the Department of Public Information. "One friend, a journalist who is an alum living in Florida, reported receiving 44 such messages by late afternoon," Mahon said. "The 15 differ ent Penn State Newswires are actually run on listserv software, with some special adjustments so that they do not appear or work like most other listservs." Computer staff at Penn State who are responsible for maintaining the many listservs worked until midnight to interrupt tens of thousands of the bad e-mail notes before they were sent out. They are working with the software company to ensure it can't happen again. So far the prize for the most bad e-mail messages goes to someone here in the Department of Public Information. The news bureau manager, Tysen Kendig, had 97 judo/kickboxing notes sitting in his computer's inbox. PSU brings older adults, young children together A new intergenerational program at Penn State is spicing up life in the University's child care programs, as older adults from the community spend time with young children in a col laborative effort sponsored by Penn State Cooperative Extension and funded by the Kellogg Leadership for Institutional Change initiative. The Penn State Early Childhood Education Intergenerational Program is intended to stimu late mutually beneficial interactions between children in two early childhood education and child-care programs at Penn State and senior adults. Research in the field of intergenerational programming has demonstrated the potential that these programs offer children and adult participants. As part of this new intergenerational early-childhood education program, older adults are being asked to volunteer their time and experience anywhere from twice a week to twice a month. Niagara incident under investigation On Sunday night at 10:10 p.m.. Police and Safety responded to an incident in Niagara Hall in which a male suffered a laceration to the head. He was transported to Hamot Medical Center, where he was treated and released. It is unclear at this time what occurred, but rumors of a stabbing appear to be unwarranted.No charges have been filed by either Police and Safety or the involved parties. “If there was any concern on the part of Student Affairs that students were at risk, they would take action,” said Ed Blaguszewski, manager of University Relations. Student Affairs is currently revi 2/14/02 13:45 A complainant reported that a fire extinguisher was missing from Reed near Brunos. 2/16/02 02:30 A resident reported that someone threw a snowball through their window. 2/17/02 03:05 A suspicious person was observed wandering through the north apartment lot. The individual was found to be intoxicated and was cited for underage drinking. Earn sl,ooo-$2,000 with the easy Campusfundraiser.com three hour fundraising event. Does not involve credit card applications. Fundraising dates are filling quickly, so call today! Contact Campusfundraiser.com at (888) 923-3238, or visit Anawim Community of Frenchville, PA February 24,2002 Tune: 9 a.m. Place: Bethany Retreat Center 879 to VFW Rd to Germania Rd (retreat center on right) Frenchville, PA Guests are invited to a Liturgy, brunch and presentation For more information or to make a reservation call Sr. Therese Dush or Sr. Suzanne Thibault (814) 263-4855 e-mail: AnawimCo@vicon.net SUNDAY Cloudy High: 44° Low: 25° BEHREND BRIEFS Fraternities * Sororities * Clubs * Student Groups MONDAY Cloudy High: 36° Low: 21° NEWS Friday, February 22, 2002 Yee-haw! Penn State hoedown, anyone? PHOTO BY MIKE , .LO / BEHREND BEACL Three young Lions fans show their Penn State pride with some unique cowboy hats. Perhaps they're practicing to be the next generation of Behrend cheerleaders? Keep up the enthusiasm! THOM them more humanely may sound almost strange in a world that is profit driven, but it has turned out wonderful results for the company. Thoms is trying to get the idea out to her students by creating the video-profile and presenting it to her classes. She understands the importance of profit for the lifetime of the company, but agrees with Giermak that a business can make more money if management uses a humanistic approach because employees will be happier about their work and will be less likely to quit. This means that experienced employees will remain in the company longer. She hopes that her students will adopt ideas when she shares the finished video-profile in class and at less formal sessions for the public community groups. Thoms welcomes any questions concerning revisions to the MBA program. Aug. 1 is the deadline for her new book, “Driven by the Future,” and it will be available in 2003. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO Dr. Peg Thoms, MBA professor at Behrend, is in the process of creating a new program for MBA students and has written a book titled “Driven By the Fu ture.” Students and public learn about dark matter at Astronomy by Nicky Galloway staff writer Thursday in the Otto Behrend Science Building, room 101, Dr. Roger Knacke gave a presentation entitled “The Mystery of Dark Matter in the Universe.” This lecture is part of a series of Astronomy open houses. The purpose of the lectures is to educate the public. “Scientists and colleges have a responsibility to make information available to the public,” Knacke said. The lectures are also good publicity for getting students to attend Behrend. As an added bonus the topic is “tremendously interesting and fun to talk about,” Knacke added. Knacke graduated from the University of California at Berkeley and is currently working on attempting to understand young solar systems. Room 101 was packed with several school groups and members of the Erie community interested in learning about dark matter from Knacke. Some of the FOCAL POINT i 1 V< s c , « inn schools that were in attendance were McDowell High School, Harbor Creek, and the Honors Astronomy class from Edinboro University. “I really enjoyed coming to the open house, because I like learning about astronomy and it was very interesting and informative,” said Erinn Hansen, a freshman at Behrend. Knacke explained that the universe is made up of one percent of visible matter, 29 percent dark matter and 70 percent dark energy. Dark matter is matter that astronomers know exists, but is not visible. Scientists can prove the presence of dark matter, because stars that are far away from galaxy centers move at a fairly fast speed. This speed is influenced by the existence of material scientists can not see. Using mathematical equations, astronomers have figured out that there is ten times more matter in the universe than what is actually visible. Another way scientists prove the existence of dark matter is the fact that there are clusters of galaxies. Scientists Erin McCarty, News Editor %«4*tetef»i:sp !.‘ ,' s ' > have deduced that there is not enough matter to account for the gravity that holds these 10,000 galaxies together. Therefore 100 times more matter must exist to hold these galaxy clusters together. Astronomers have also observed the effect of the dark matter, as light bends around it. The gravity of the dark matter bends light so that galaxies and stars behind the dark matter are visible. The lecture was followed by a question and answer session with Knacke. Due to the adverse weather conditions, there was no outdoor observing. The next open house is on March 28 at 7:30 p.m. in the Otto Behrend Science Building, Room 101. Dr. Donald Schneider, a professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics at Penn State University, will give a lecture titled “Quasars: the Most Distant Objects in the Universe.” This lecture will be open to the public and will include outdoor observing if the weather permits. behrco!ls @ aol.com pen otise
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