Tuesday, October 25, 2005 News 3 Former disabled rep speaks about handicap rights Opinion 4 Sports 8 YAF surprises Suhael Momin Jason Avant quietly leads Michigan receivers ToM WOLFE 1SCUS C, E.. ARTST ..AE One-hundredfifteen years of editorialfreedom www.michikandaily.com Ann Arbor, Michigan Vol. CXVI, No. 17 2005 The Michigan Daily Language' requiremn won't change LSA faculty votes 65- 51 against proposal to give students choice of meeting language requirement with two semesters of two languages By Karl Stampfl Daily Staff Reporter LSA faculty voted down a proposal yesterday that would have allowed students to elect two semesters each of two different languages to fulfill the foreign language requirement, instead of four semesters of a single language, as is cur- rently required. During a special meeting of LSA's faculty col- lege in Angell Hall, 65 members voted against the proposal and 51 voted in favor of it. At the meeting, proponents of the proposal said it would diversify students' exposure to dif- ferent cultures, increase enrollment in less com- monly taught languages and allow students an out if they find they do not like a language after their first year. Opponents said requiring students to take four semesters of a single language forces them to become proficient in that language. LSA Student Government President Andrew Yahkind said he was frustrated with the outcome of the vote because the discussion never focused on the importance of giving students the choice to decide how to study foreign languages. "Students who choose the 2-2 option would do so in the best interests of their academic careers," he said. Early last month, LSA-SG voted 12-6 to sup- port the proposal. Before the vote, some discussion was devoted to whether even four semesters of a language is enough to make a student proficient. The Residential College administers a pro- ficiency test after its students complete the equivalent of four semesters in a single lan- guage, RC Prof. Herb Eagle said. According to Eagle, RC students boast a 90 percent success rate on the tests. "Students who work hard can become pro- ficient in two years," Eagle said, adding that giving the students the choice of taking two Language survey Results of an LSA-SG survey on foreign language study taken by 1,204 students How important is the study of foreign language to your future on a scale of 1 to 7? Average response: 4 Would you have taken advantage of the option to take two different languages? Yes: 658 No: 438 N/A: 81 No response: 27 If yes, what two languages would you have taken? So.mething other than French, Spanish, German or Italian as first language taken: 117 Something other than those four as second language taken: 340 languages may result in many students lacking proficiency in any language. Other concerns raised by some faculty mem- bers were a potential lack of enrollment in upper-level language courses and the difficulty of shifting resources to first-year classes to meet increased demand. LSA Dean Terrence McDonald assured the faculty that the logistics would be taken care of if the proposal were passed. Linguistics Prof. Sarah Thomason said allow- ing students to dabble in multiple languages would increase their understanding of how lan- guage functions. "A benefit of the two-term option is'That it helps students learn the skill of language- learning," she said. "If you take two languag- es unrelated to each other, it's particularly advantageous." Justin Benson, the budget allocations chair of LSA-SG attended the meeting in support of the proposal. "The best option for students is an option of choice," Benson said. "Basically, it all comes down to letting students choose what's best for See LANGUAGE, Page 7 EMMA NOLAN-ABRAHAMIAN/Daily Al Gore gives a lecture on Global Climate Change at the Power Center yesterday. Al Gore calls for sounder environmental policies Former vice president says there is no controversy over whether recent warming has been caused by mankind By Donn M. Fresard Daily News Editor Global warming is no longer a scientific issue, but a moral issue that mankind must confront now or face devastating conse- quences, former Vice President Al Gore said last night. Gore compared the dangers of climate change with Nazi Germany's threat to Europe in the 1930s, likening those who ignore the threat of global warming to former British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, who attempted to stay Adolf Hitler's aggression by appeasing his territorial ambitions. Quoting Winston Churchill, he said procrastination is no longer viable and that humanity is entering a "period of consequences." One of those consequences, he said, is the recent spate of devastating hurricanes, which he attributed to a rise in ocean tem- peratures caused by global warming. This year's storm season has been one of the worst in recorded history, with a record- tying 12 hurricanes, including Wilma, the strongest Atlantic storm ever observed by one measure of storm intensity. Speaking at the Power Center for the See GORE, Page 3 GRE follows SAT's lead with longe Test will be available less frequently throughout the year after changes are implemented in October 2006 By Gabe Nelson Daily Staff Reporter With the Educational Testing Service's announcement that will overhaul the Graduate Record Examination, col- lege students considering graduate school have a tough decision to make regarding which incarnation of the test they should take. The current version of the test will be phased out in October 2006 and replaced with the new GRE, a product of four years of research and testing. At first glance, the most notable change to the GRE is the overall lengthening of the test from two and a half r d hrs rto about four hours, and the fact that it will no longer be available continuously throughout the year. On the new test, Verbal Reasoning and Quantitative Reasoning sections will take an additional 50 and 35 min- utes, respectively. The Analytical Writing section has been shortened by 15 minutes. "The GRE's new verbal section is more concerned with critical thinking and style, similar to the SAT's," said Ben Baron, the vice president of graduate programs for Kaplan Test Preparation. "There will be less vocabulary on the test and more questions involving sentence equivalency and paraphrasing." Baron added, "I think the new questions are more interesting and rigorous:' David Payne, the Executive Director of the GRE pro- gram, said although the Quantitative Reasoning section will not undergo as many changes as the verbal section, See GRE, Page 3 AP PHOIU Civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks sits in a 1950s-era bus in Montgomery, Ala. In 1995, 40 years after being arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a city bus to a white person. Rosa Parks, 92, dies in Detroit Hillel "He has made the University a place thatJews throughout the country want DETROIT (AP) - Rosa Lee Parks, whose refusal to give up her bus seat to a white man sparked the modern civil rights movement, died yesterday. She was 92. Parks died at her home of natural causes, said Karen Morgan, a spokeswoman for U.S. Rep. John Conyers (D- Detroit). Parks was 42 when she committed an act of defiance in 1955 that was to change the course of American history and earn her the title "mother of the civil rights movement." At that time, Jim Crow laws in place since the post-Civil War Reconstruction required separation of the races in buses, restaurants and public accommodations throughout the South, up when they told me. But the real reason of my not standing up was I felt that I had a right to be treated as any other passen- ger. We had endured that kind of treatment for too long." Her arrest triggered a 381-day boycott of the bus system organized by a then little-known Baptist minister, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., who later earned the Nobel Peace Prize for his work. "At the time I was arrested I had no idea it would turn into this," Parks said 30 years later. "It was just a day like any other day. The only thing that made it significant was that the masses of the people joined in." The Montgomery bus boycott, which came one year after director's to attend." service C7 ~ -Jeffrey Schlussel Former chair of Hillel Board of Trustees * praised, By Carissa Miller Daily Staff Reporter support for others. Where they seem faced with rules, he will find ways of opening possibilities of the good." At a brunch earlier this month, more than 250 students, faculty, Jew- ish leaders and other supporters gath- Shekel campaign, Brooks has played a key role in the Golden Apple Award, Consider Magazine and in making Shabbat meals at Hillel free for all stu- dents. In 1997, Brooks also received the prestigious Covenant Award,