LOCAL/STATE
The Michigan Daily - Friday, March 20, 1998 -,5
Report calls for
improved literacy
Greenpeace adviser
offers nuclear caution
17-member committee
suggests ways to better
teaching techniques
-By Melissa Andrzejak
Daily Staff Reporter
As the country's focus turns more to
information and technology each day, lit-
tracy becomes increasingly important to
manage in a high-tech world. For many,
this ability to read has not yet been effec-
tively attained.
After an intensive review of the
process by which children learn to read, a
17-member national committee that
includes two University professors has
released a report titled "Preventing
Reading Difficulties in Young Children"
that discusses their findings.
The National Research Council com-
mittee, brought together under the
National Academy of Sciences, was
given the task of determining the com-
ponents necessary to facilitate literacy,
said Education Prof. Annemarie
Sullivan Palinesar.
Composed of experts from the fields of
pediatrics, sociology, reading education,
psychology and linguistics, the panel
used its collective knowledge to attempt
to develop a new understanding of what
brings about success in learning to read.
Palincsar said the diverse composition
of the council allowed the members to
view the issue of literacy from different
perspectives.
"If we don't pay attention to what we
know, the implications would be too cost-
ly," Palincsar said.
Palincsar, along with Education Prof.
Elizabeth Sulzby, sat on the committee.
The 390-page report released
Wednesday "reveals the complexity of
being an expert teacher of reading," in
addition to providing "a r-h knowledge
base from which teacher education pro-
grams can plan their own programs of
instruction," Palincsar said.
Sulzby said her time on the council
LANSING
Continued from Page 1
vote.
"MSA should play an active role in
soliciting funds from the Legislature,"
said LSA junior Ferris Hussein, an inde-
pendent MSA presidential candidate.
S "We can lean on the state Legislature
more. If we are to compete with the
(University of California at Berkeley),
we have to get the money."
MSA representatives currently are
working on establishing a lobbying group
composed of volunteers who would pre-
sent students' views in Lansing.
Funding is not the only issue debated
in the state Capitol that is relevant to the
University. Within the past year, state
legislators also have proposed bills to
establish a tuition tax credit, a sales tax
exemption for textbooks and mandato-
ry campus sexual assault counseling
centers.
Most candidates agreed that hiring a
private lobbying group would be more
costly and less effective than having stu-
dent lobbyists.
"The student lobbying group would be
more of a voice than having a paid lob-
byist" said LSA junior Trent Thompson,
the Students' Party presidential candi-
was a learning experience.
"All of us came out of this effort real-
izing that we had grown ourselves in our
own understanding," Sulzby said.
The committee found that the process
of learning to read is composed of
understanding phonetics, being able to
"read for meaning" and fostering the
development of reading fluency.
Educators must "assure that all chil-
dren entering the first grade are provided
with (these) three aspects of reading"
Sulzby said.
The lack of any of those components
leads to difficulty in future learning,
Sulzby said.
This three-part approach to learning
brings together old ideas of learning
through phonetics and new ideas concen-
trating on comprehension.
"Good teachers have always included
these aspects" Sulzby said.
She added that despite the intuitive
nature of the findings, for some teachers,
the study will improve many teachers'
approach to reading by providing a
"research basis to the communication
between teachers," Sulzby said.
The study stresses that educators
must not only know what fosters read-
ing success among children, but they
must also equip themselves to institute
these standards.
Teachers need support in developing
the expertise necessary to apply the
standards called for by the council,
Sulzby said.
Being able to understand reading diffi-
culties is a skill that must be incorporat-
ed into state certification standards for
elementary educators, the study found.
The study also addresses the need for
schools to have access to specialists to
help students with reading problems.
Other issues touched upon by the
council include how to better meet the
reading needs of children who are learn-
ing English as a second language, as well
as those of children without a pre-school
education.
date. "MSA would approve the lobbying
group's platform each semester. They
would meet with senators and congress-
men."
Not all candidates said MSA should
lobby the state Legislature. New Frontier
Party presidential candidate Elizabeth
Keslacy, an LSA sophomore, said MSA's
agenda includes so many pressing issues
that it would be hard to do justice to stu-
dent lobbying.
"MSA deals with so many issues. I
don't think they could give it the time
and effort it deserves" Keslacy said. "I
think that MSA should focus more on
campuswide issues. There may also be
valid reasons for tuition to go up."
Another key element in making the
voice of students heard on the state
Capitol, candidates said, is the encour-
agement of student voting. LSA sopho-
more Albert Garcia, an independent
MSA vice presidential candidate, said
having students registered to vote sends
a clear message to Lansing that stu-
dents are paying attention.
"When students register to vote, they
empower themselves," Garcia said. "If
state legislators are aware of how civical-
ly engaged students are, they would be
less prone to act on legislation without
speaking to students"
AP PHOTO
Malice Green's daughter, Eneatra Massey, and his widow, Rose Green, react
to the verdict in the retrial of former police officer Walter Budzyn yesterday.
TRIAL
Continued from Page 1
Detroit case was compared to the
King beating 20 months earlier
because Budzyn and Nevers are
white and Green was black.
Nevers, who was tried together
with Budzyn and convicted by a sep-
arate jury, has admitted he hit Green
in self-defense.
A federal judge overturned
Nevers' conviction in December,
and prosecutors are appealing. If
that appeal fails, prosecutors have
said they plan to also retry him on
murder charges.
The jury in the first trial was
made up of ii black jurors and one
white juror. The 1993 trial was
held in Detroit Recorder's Court,
which drew only jurors who lived
in the city. Recorder's Court was
later combined with the county
system. The new jury was made up
of five white women, three white
men, three black women and an
Asian female.
With the verdict that was rendered
by a different jury - a jury that had
a different ethnicity than the first
one - I would suggest that justice
has been served," Archer said.
"This isn't some sort of persecu-
tion of these officers," Baker said.
Wayne County Circuit Judge
Thomas Jackson set sentencing for
April 17.
By Rachel Groman
Daily Staff Reporter
As soon as University alumnus and
current Greenpeace Senior Adviser
Harvey Wasserman arrived on campus
yesterday, he headed for Nichols
Arboretum.
The dismal weather came as no sur-
prise, and he said the drizzle actually
made him feel like he was a University
student again.
Wasserman, who received a bache-
lor's degree from the University in
1967, visited campus with his multi-
media presentation titled "Killing Our
Own - The Disaster of America's
Experience with Atomic Radiation."
Wasserman's presentation last night
in the Chemistry Building was pep-
pered with nostalgic stories of his times
at the University, including anecdotes
about his work as a senior editor of The
Michigan Daily.
"I've been waiting for years to put
this on,' Wasserman said as he sat on a
desk in front of about 30 students. He
was referring to a 1997 National
Championship sweatshirt.
Putting aside all humor, Wasserman
spoke about the government's continu-
ous effort to undermine the destructive
capabilities of nuclear radiation, saying,
"The more we find out about radiation,
the more deadly we find it is.
"Nuclear power is the manifestation of
technology gone too far ... It's just not
going to work in this world," he said.
Wasserman - an internationally
known ecology activist, journalist,
author and radio commentator - has
spoken at more than 200 college cam-
puses and countless public forums
throughout the United States and Asia.
He started his career in environmental
activism early in his life and is proud of
the accomplishments he has made. "I
can point to places in my life where what
we did made a difference,' he said.
Wasserman assured students that
political activism can lead to change in
society.
He quoted the late Benjamin Spock, an
expert in child-rearing, as saying, "You
know more than you think you do.' He
related the quotation to activism, urging
students to act on their beliefs.
Wasserman juxtaposed the evolution
of the social movement against nuclear
radiation - beginning with the propa-
ganda campaigns glorifying the "bene-
fits" of atomic radiation in the 1960s.
Wasserman showed a short fili to
illustrate the rallies, fear and devasta-
tion that resulted from the presence of
nuclear weapons.
SNRE senior Mona Hanna, chair of
the Environmental Theme Semester
Planning Committee, said Wassermanis
visit was necessary because "he is very
passionate and into what he's working
on. He's also from U of M and has great
U of M stories."
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