0 Friday, November 19, 2004
Opinion 4
Krishnamurthy on the
B-school changes
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www.mz'higandaily. com
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Vol. CXV, No. 37
©2004 The
Michigan Daily
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MCRI
to
continue
campaign
While past their original mid-October
Ceadline, gatherers push to get signatures
By Aymar Jean
Daily Staff Reporter
FOET CASEY/D~aily
Black Francis, lead singer of the groundbreaking rock band the Pixies, performs at the first of three reunion concerts at the State Theatre in
Detroit last night.
T e uniteockout iMtw
Te Pixies we tle, O uttlownil
Now a month behind schedule, the cam-
paign to ban race-conscious policies in
public education expects to soon conclude
its petition drive.
And while the end seems near, it still has
at least one more legal obstacle on the hori-
zon - the state Supreme Court.
The Michigan Civil Rights Initia-
tive is asking its petitioners to send in
their signatures by the end of the month.
MCRI has been collecting signatures to
get on the ballot in 2006. The deadline
to collect the 317,757 signatures is in
early January, although MCRI can tech-
nically continue to collect signatures if
it misses that deadline.
MCRI would not release how many
signatures have been collected to date, but
Tim O'Brien, who coordinates the unpaid
signature-gathering effort, said "most" of
the signatures are in.
The group is telling all of its petitioners
to send in their signatures by Nov. 30 or
Dec. 1 so that MCRI will have enough time
to count the signatures. The campaign,
however, had originally told its petitioners
to send their signatures in by mid-October.
"The fact that we're continuing to
do our job and continuing to work hard
should not be an indication as to exactly
where we stand," MCRI Director of Out-
reach Chetly Zarko said. He added that
the November date is "not a hard and fast
rtile; and it carthosen because it was a
convenient date that people can remem-
ber. Throughout its campaign, the group
has encouraged its circulators to send in
signatures as they collect them.
The group's January deadline, Zarko
said, is also flexible. MCRI can choose any
180-day time period to collect signatures as
long as they are finished by July 6, 2006.
The campaign chose January because they
wanted to build upon the momentum from
earlier in the year.
In the coming weeks, the state Supreme
Court will decide whether to hear a case
questioning MCRI's petition form, which
opponents claim is misleading. The form
does not mention that the state constitution
already guarantees equal protection under
law. Opponents argue this omission was
deliberate, saying MCRI wants to "deceive
the public" by arguing that affirmative
action is reverse discrimination.
The case was filed by the activist
group BAMN, which has a chapter at
the University, and has made its way
through the courts since the first ruling
in March. The lawsuits severely crippled
the campaign earlier in the year, casting
a veil of uncertainty as the campaign
failed to collect enough signatures to get
on the 2004 ballot, MCRI officials said.
Eventually, they had to delay their plans
until the 2006 election.
"What threw us for a loop were all these
legal challenges," O'Brien said.
Both O'Brien and Zarko said they are
not concerned about the largely conser-
vative state Supreme Court. Because the
appeals court ruled in MCRI's favor and
See MCRI, Page 7
J he reunion of seminal underground rock
band the Pixies is remarkable for a num-
ber of reasons, not the least of which is the
surprising energy and grace that the band - now
well into their 30s and 40s - have displayed on
a nightly basis.
At the State Theatre last night, during the first
of three Detroit shows, the most refreshing part of
the performance came at the end. Bassist/vocal-
ist Kim Deal closed the night with the classic,
winking naivete of "Gigantic," she leaned into
the microphone and uttered, with a wry smile,
"Goodnight Charles." "Goodnight, Kim," replied
frontman Charles Thompson aka Frank Black or
Black Frances.
As recently as one year ago, such pleasant-
i
ries would've been thought impossible. A Pix-
ies reunion was nothing more than the stuff of
independent rock weblogs and music-geek wet
dreams. The Boston quartet, which released
four lauded full-length albums that influenced
much of the alternative rock of the '90s (Nirva-
na, for instance, freely admitted to borrowing
ideas), broke things off in 1992 amid acrimoni-
ous rumors of broken hearts and bad drugs. Ten
years of Black solo albums, scattershot releases
from Deal's band, The Breeders, and the near
disappearance of drummer David Lovering and
guitarist Joey Santiago left little hope for rec-
onciliation.
Forgive the shock on the crowd's collective
face as the Pixies, old and strangely affable,
took the stage to the tune "I Bleed," a spiny,
self-consciously pretentious punker from their
best album, 1990's Doolittle. On the surface, it
seemed that little had changed, save for the rela-
tive weight and hairlines of the band members.
Santiago's staccato leads still darted and sliced
like knuckles, Deal's bass dropped melodic
bricks and Lovering defended the homestead, all
as Black played the psychotic carnival barker,
albeit a wiser, somehow sweeter psychotic car-
nival barker.
Deal's ear-to-ear smile and the knowing, onstage
glances - to old friends - were indications that
while the Pixies's music had remained at the fore-
front -of a usually forgetful underground music
See PIXIES, Page 8
Ohio State warns
visitors of harsher
alcohol policing
By Melissa Benton
Daily Staff Reporter
A student who cracks open a beer
while tailgating in a public area in
Columbus before Michigan plays Ohio
State tomorrow could face a fine of up
to a $1,000 and possibly six months in
jail.
It's a fate awaiting students who
are unaware of the alcohol laws in
Ohio, which are harsher than those in
Michigan.
The consequences for violating the
open container law in Michigan are not
as severe as in Ohio. "If you're over 21
and you're drinking in public, the maxi-
mum penalty is 30 days in jail or a $100
fine or both," said Dana Fair, assistant to
the vice president for student affairs.
Fair said the Office of Student Affairs
at Ohio State University contacted the
University in an effort to make sure
students are aware of the penalties for
violating Ohio alcohol laws. Fair spe-
cifically cited the law that prohibits
anyone - even people older than 21 -
from having an open container of alco-
hol in public, which includes sidewalks
and streets. He also said the penalties
that accompany the law are relatively
high.
"We want to make sure that visiting
fans from Michigan don't come in and
be surprised about our open container
policies," said William Hall, vice presi-
dent for student affairs at Ohio State.
Ohio State spokeswoman Elizabeth
Conlisk said the open container law
A Buckeye bust
Open container violation
in Ohio can lead to a $1,000
fine and six months in jail
In Michigan, the penalty
for the same citation is a
$100 fine and/or 30 days
in jail.
will be strictly enforced around Ohio
Stadium, although this was not always
the case. "Students were getting tickets
across High Street, yet in and around
the stadium the law was not being
enforced," she said, referring to the
main road running through the Ohio
State campus. Conlisk added that for
the past two years police officers have
been trying to fix that imbalance. Hall
said violators of the open container law
are typically visiting fans because they
are not aware of the consequences.
Hall said this problem arose at the
Ohio State football game against Penn
State on Oct. 30, when some students
were cited for violating the law. As a
result, he said Ohio State decided to
warn Michigan students about the alco-
hol laws before the game tomorrow.
"Penn State fans came and were not
aware. They ought to be aware, and we
ought to be helpful," Conlisk said.
Hall emphasized the importance of
making students aware of the changes
See OHIO, Page 7
TREVOR CAMPBELL/
Daily
Stockwell
Residence
Hall, which
will undergo
renovation from
2006 to 2008,
is one possible
location, for the
new market-
place-style din-
ing halls that
were approved
by the Uni-
versity Board
of Regents
yesterday. The
other residence
hall that is up
for consider-
ation for a new
dining area is
Mosher-Jordan.
Regents approve innovative dining hal
By Justin Miller
and Kristin Ostby
Daily Staff Reporters
specialty and ethnic food, as well as offering Henry said, adding that the new facility will have
healthier choices. a more contemporary feel than the dining facili-
The 45,000 square foot area will include seat- ties on the Hill, which she said were outdated. She
ing arrangements ranging from large open spaces hopes the new dining center will possibly hold
to smaller, more intimate settings. A grill and events on some nights, while on others it will be
Future students may dine in a hall complete
with a myriad of specialty foods, a pasta bar and
even a grill.
The Board of Regents yesterday approved a $21
million plan for an innovative dining center that
will be constructed on the Hill starting in 2006.
The new Hill Dining Center will be attached
to a renovated portion of either Mosher-Jordan or
Stockwell residence halls, which are also being
renovated from 2006 to 2008.
The center will be designed to seat 700 stu-
dents, and any University student will be able to
eat there.
The new hall will feature between five and
seven restaurant-style dining areas that will serve
pasta bar are among the
options being considered,
University Housing spokes-
man Alan Levy said.
However, the University
is not planning on attracting
brand-name companies to
the menu. "We don't intend
The new hall will serve
specialty and ethnic
food, as well as offering
healthier choices.
a social place complete with
televisions, pool tables and
other features.
A smaller facility, called
the Emporium, will hold
about 80 students with
one or two restaurants that
serve late-night food to be
to bring in branded entities.
This is a marketplace concept that we will do our-
selves," Levy added.
"We hope it would be a place to gather students.
I would hope that students would hang out in the
dining hall," University Housing Director Carole
connected to the new struc-
ture or be located in one of the closed dining
facilities.
"These changes reflect what students said was
most expected of residential life," Vice President
See DINING, Page 7
New standardized test to examine students' technological skill
By Margaret Havemann
ing their use of technology. The Information and
"For now, the test is an overall outcomes
applying to graduate schools or seeking employ-
cil. Students will have two hours to complete 16
i,
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