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NC State University News Clips for October 25-27, 2003

Compiled by North Carolina State University’s News Services, a part of the Public Affairs Office. Listed below are the current news clips. Click on the headline of interest to be taken to the full text. Click on “Return to Headline List” at the bottom of each clip or use the scrollbar to be taken back to this location.

IN-STATE CLIPS

UNC bonds go to work
$3.1 billion reshaping state campuses, spurring economy

NATIONAL & REGIONAL CLIPS

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UNC bonds go to work

Oct. 26, 2003
The News & Observer
By Jane Stancill, staff writer
© Copyright 2003 The News & Observer Publishing Company.

Laura Janda, a Slavic linguistics professor at UNC-Chapel Hill, has a view outside her office that she says only a toddler boy would love.

Just below her third-story window in Dey Hall, five heavy equipment trucks chug through a maze of pipes, tunnels and rocks. The red dirt pit is the future site of UNC-CH's science complex -- the largest single construction project in the building bonanza under way at the state's 16 public universities and 59 community colleges.

During the initial blasting, Janda had to calm students who thought her classroom was being bombed. The other day, a crane lifted an enormous concrete funnel so close to her window, she swears she could have reached out and touched it.

"Either I've got the best seat in the house or I'm very unfortunate," she said. "I hate to complain about things because the alternative is worse."

North Carolina voters set the construction in motion three years ago when they approved a $3.1 billion bond issue to pay for expanding the campuses and renovating decrepit buildings. It was the biggest higher education bond issue in U.S. history.

Until this year, though, most of the work happened behind the scenes with land acquisitions, architectural drawings and engineering plans. Now, the six-year building plan is unfolding before the eyes of students and professors.

The UNC system, which had $2.5 billion to spend, has about 47 percent of its projects under construction or completed and 36 percent in the design stage. The state's community colleges have about 60 percent of their $600 million in projects done or under way.

The campuses couldn't have had better timing. Taxpayers voted for the bonds overwhelmingly in late 2000, when the economy was soaring and consumer confidence was high. Then, as the state began to issue the debt, the recession sent interest rates to all-time lows, translating into bigger bang for the campus bucks. Plus, the construction boom has come at a time when North Carolina desperately needed new jobs.

"The UNC system work is a godsend, a threefold godsend," said Dave Simpson, North Carolina building director for Carolinas AGC, an association of general contractors. "It's great for taxpayers because they're getting very low prices. The students need the facilities badly, and the construction industry needs the work."

The bond package is only part of the work. The UNC campuses have an additional $1.2 billion in construction financed by private donations, research money and user fees. These projects include dorms, parking decks and stadium improvements. Overall, the state campus construction tab is more than $4 billion at this point, and the university system is expected to push for another round of bonds eventually.

It adds up to a lot of bricks, a lot of dust and a lot of mess. Students are getting accustomed to the constant beep beep beep of construction vehicles moving in reverse. They're finding their way around barricades and jostling through crowds on narrow sidewalk detours.

And most of them won't see the finished product until they are alumni. The bulk of the work will continue through 2007.

N.C. State Chancellor Marye Anne Fox has heard all the grousing -- from faculty who have to uproot their labs to students who can't find a place to park.

"This is like having a baby," she said. "It's a long period coming and then when it's here, it's wonderful."

Campuses disrupted

At NCSU, a clawlike demolition machine tears at the old Riddick Stadium, creating mountains of concrete rubble where there once were stands. At UNC-Greensboro, a main street -- College Avenue -- is shut down, with a few gravel cut-throughs to get students from one side of campus to the other. At UNC-CH, a sign near Wilson Library features a "You are here" map, with dotted lines directing students around a science complex site.

"So many rent-a-fences," lamented Jennifer Harmon of Wendell, as she settled into a desk in her freshman Spanish class recently.

At Appalachian State University, a $48 million library project has created a gaping pit in the middle of campus -- people in Boone are calling it "ground zero."

"It's madness," said Lance Parker, an ASU senior. "It's almost a totally different school than when I started."

Adam Freseman, an NCSU junior from Greensboro, can't seem to escape the clatter near his dorm. "It's bad with the jackhammers, bulldozers and steamrollers," he said. "If I'm trying to sleep in, it's kind of rough."

His friend, Katie Brannan, a sophomore from Greensboro, is appealing a $50 ticket she got this month when she unwittingly parked in a construction zone. She didn't see a sign.

Parking on campus has become a competitive game.

"You have to wait and wait for people to leave," she said. "You just circle."

If getting around the debris is a challenge, keeping track of the construction is a logistical nightmare.

The campuses hired new facility managers and installed $110,000 in special software to monitor the thousands of details. The projects are carefully timed, with new buildings generally first and renovations later, because shutting down too many buildings at once would create a shortage of classroom and dorm space.

Planners not only manage complex building schedules but also have to carve out temporary space and move students safely around fences, detours and road closings.

"It's like playing three-dimensional chess," said NCSU architect Mike Harwood.

A 21st-century NCSU

On a picture-perfect fall day two weeks ago, workers at NCSU were gluing in the floor tiles at the $37 million Undergraduate Science Teaching Lab I, which will open in a few months. It has a 21st-century look, with a glass atrium atop a brick and concrete-columned building -- unusual aesthetic touches at NCSU, where most buildings have a square institutional appearance.

It replaces Withers Hall, a 1940s lab building that will be converted into classrooms with an $11 million renovation. Three years ago, Withers was a prime symbol for the UNC system's outdated science facilities. Legislators were led through the labs, where they were told class size had to be cut in half to ensure students' safety.

At UNCG, the new $40 million chemistry and biochemistry facility proves that science buildings don't have to be foreboding. The airy lobby features a long marble bench in front of panels of blue and yellow tile artwork depicting the DNA double helix.

The study areas have sleek, upholstered furniture and the labs -- well, Terry Nile, head of the chemistry and biochemistry department, is still pinching himself.

Nile's old lab in the Petty Building was built in the 1930s, and the counters had rotted so badly that they had to be patched with industrial tin foil.

"It looked absolutely terrible," he said. "In the old lab you felt like you were going to see Florence Nightingale or Madame Curie walk in -- it was like the Dark Ages."

As a joke, one of Nile's colleagues taped down aluminum foil on the counters of his gleaming new lab with blond wood cabinets. He points to the four fume hoods and brags.

"It's really expanded the work we can do," he said, "because we can handle toxic chemicals much more easily and much more safely."

The new science building has another modern-day element: corporate sponsorship. UNCG raised $2.5 million privately to help outfit the facility, so students now hang out in the Mountain Dew lobby and attend class in the Wachovia lecture halls.

Teresa McMillian, a biochemistry major from Pilot Mountain, is glad she won't graduate until December. She watched the new science center rise from the dirt over several years, and now she gets to use it.

Her reaction: "Wow."

Although students around the state like to complain about the construction discombobulation, they're quick to say it will be worth it.

Still, some can't understand the incongruity between the expensive new buildings and the budget cuts that have squeezed classes. One of NCSU sophomore Travis Lintner's favorite classes, environmental ethics, will be canceled after this semester, and the instructor will be out of a job.

By summertime, the UNC system will be spending $70 million a month on construction. By then, the General Assembly will be in session and the universities will also be fending off another round of cuts.

"We're spending all this money on buildings and stuff, and you kind of wonder what's more important," said Lintner, who hails from Dallas. "It makes me wish they had had a bond for adding more classes or paying teachers more."

Staff writer Jane Stancill can be reached at 956-2464.

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Razing raises rich memories of Riddick

Oct. 26, 2003
The News & Observer
By A.J. Carr, staff writer
© Copyright 2003 The News & Observer Publishing Company.

RALEIGH -- For nearly four decades, a section of grandstands has towered over the edge of a parking lot in the middle of N.C. State's campus -- a reminder that Riddick Stadium, the football heartbeat of the Wolfpack on Saturdays long past, stood there.

"I saw Roman Gabriel play there when I was in high school and said, 'This is where I want to go,' " said Harold "Bud" Deters of Garner, whose 41-yard field goal beat Florida State 3-0 in the last game State played in Riddick on Nov. 13, 1965. "I loved Riddick ... [and] the atmosphere."

Soon even the remnants of Riddick will be no more. Demolition has begun to create space for a central utility plant, classrooms and research labs that will be finished by 2006, NCSU architect Michael Harwood said.

The stadium's small field house, now headquarters for the NCSU Public Safety Department, also will be gone.

"It's kind of sad, that nothing will be left,'' said Fred Combs, a former N.C. State football All-America who lives in Raleigh and still takes occasional walks up those west bleachers to reflect on the good old days.

The heavy machinery won't eradicate the memories of the State and Broughton High players who romped across the field, which was converted into a parking lot in 1968.

Riddick Stadium, built in 1907, was named by a vote of the student body for William Carl Riddick, a former NCSU professor, the first dean of the school of engineering and university president from 1916 through 1923. Known as State's "father of athletics," he coached Pack teams in 1888 and 1899 and compiled a less-than-stellar 1-3-2 record.

With a capacity of 20,000, Riddick wasn't half the size of Carter-Finley Stadium, which now seats 53,800 and is where the Wolfpack has played since 1966.

But like Chicago's Wrigley Field, Riddick had personality and a special setting. It was quaint. Intimate. And loud.

Students could watch games from their dorm windows. And sometimes it seemed a train passing on the nearby tracks was barking signals instead of the quarterback.

"The train, that's what I remember the most," longtime N.C. State fan Joe Moore said. "The quarterback might be saying 'Hike!' and the next thing you'd hear was 'Toot! Toot!' "

On game days, players dressed in Reynolds Coliseum, marched down a sidewalk and through the tunnel beneath the railroad tracks, then ran onto the field.

"It was exhilarating to go through that tunnel," Deters said. "There were only 17,000 people there, but it was a real thrill. Both sides would be filled, and people were looking out of the dorms."

Although he enjoys games in Carter-Finley, Moore said they don't generate the same sensation as walking across campus to Riddick. "Tailgating is super [at Carter-Finley]," he said, "but it's not the same as being on campus, where everything was together."

It was in Riddick that Wolfpack All-Americas such as Gabriel, Dennis Byrd, Dick Christy, Elmer Costa and Ed "Ty" Coon ran, blocked and tackled.

It was there that coach Earle Edwards laid the foundation for an exciting era of State football. His 1957 team, led by Christy, brought State the first of its seven Atlantic Coast Conference titles or shared titles.

Broughton had memorable moments there as well. In 1961, the Caps, under coach Clyde Walker, claimed the state 4-A championship. And in 1966, in a battle of unbeatens, Broughton lost 20-7 to a Durham team led by quarterback Brad Evans, who went on to play football and basketball at Duke. About 15,000 fans packed the stands. A few weeks later, Broughton defeated the same Durham team in the regional finals.

"It was neat playing on the same field as Gabriel and Byrd,'' said Raleigh's Dave Gardner, an offensive guard on Broughton's powerhouse teams. "By playing our games there, we drew more fans from the community. Several times we filled that place."

"It was fun playing there,'' said Mike Bolton, a defensive end on the 1966 Caps squad. "It was more of an event playing in Riddick." Like many, Bolton regrets seeing the last tiers of the stadium tumble.

"It's part of Raleigh,'' he said.

Riddick was by no means perfect. There wasn't enough room for the players to dress, and the sight lines had an obstruction or two.

"There was a light pole [near] our bench, and sometimes it would block our view,'' said Dick DeAngelis, a standout lineman who played for the Wolfpack from 1955 through 1957.

For many years, State had to play rival North Carolina in Chapel Hill because the Tar Heels' Kenan Stadium could house much larger crowds.

But to Pack players and fans, bigger wasn't better then. Riddick was the place to be.

When told of plans to knock down the west stands, Moore, the State fan, said, "That's a shame. Certain things should be preserved."

Staff writer A.J. Carr can be reached at 829-8948.

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As leaf fades, what's next?

Oct. 26, 2003
The News & Observer
By Wade Rawlins, staff writer
© Copyright 2003 The News & Observer Publishing Company.

When Bryan Davis starts growing hundreds of thousands of tobacco plants in a greenhouse each March, the young farmer wrestles with the crop's uncertain future: What will his greenhouse grow, if not tobacco?

This year, Davis seeded some experimental crops: Fraser fir seedlings for Christmas tree growers and wildflowers that attract butterflies and hummingbirds. And last week, Davis stood in a research greenhouse at N.C. State University, considering another possibility -- producing plants and trees for wetlands restoration.

"I'm scouting for anything that will be profitable," Davis said.

Researchers say the greenhouses where most tobacco crops begin as seedlings floating in trays of water could produce another cash crop. Plants and trees that thrive in swamps and along stream banks grow well in tobacco greenhouses. The increasing demand for native-grown plants in environmental restoration projects makes native North Carolina plants a promising alternative crop.

To give their research roots, the horticultural scientists built a greenhouse and raised a variety of trees and shrubs, using the "float tray" method that tobacco farmers use. The Styrofoam containers floating atop several inches of water held overcup oak, black gum, Virginia sweetspire and silky dogwood -- trees and shrubs commonly found along creeks. A $70,000 grant from the Golden LEAF Foundation paid for the research.

"We looked at all those tobacco transplant houses sitting empty around the state," said Mary Peet, a horticultural sciences professor at NCSU. "I started thinking about crops that could be grown in bulk under contract and would grow relatively fast. It seemed like a natural match."

Growers have been looking for alternate uses for tobacco greenhouses since their use became common in the mid-1980s. The greenhouses sit idle eight months a year.

Compared with vegetable and flower crops, Peet said, wetlands plants are cheap and easy to grow, don't get waterlogged, require little or no winter heating and have fewer quality requirements in terms of cosmetic appeal.

North Carolina still leads the United States in producing flue-cured tobacco. But shrinking U.S. quotas have cut production to 303 million pounds in 2003, half that of five years ago.

While tobacco production is declining, laws to prevent loss of wetlands and streams mean a steady demand for plants to stabilize denuded stream banks.

Jason Guidry, an environmental specialist with the state Wetlands Restoration Program, projected a need for more than 1.8 million trees and shrubs to help offset the results of road building over the next six years. If a road construction project negatively affects an acre of stream, typically DOT must provide money to restore an acre or more of stream buffer elsewhere.

"I think there will be a market," Guidry said. "There is going to be a fairly constant stream of need. There aren't enough growers with enough material."

The in-state advantage

Many of the trees and shrubs now used for restoration come from other states. Plants grown out-of-state might not be as well-adapted to North Carolina and might introduce exotic weeds, pests and diseases.

Bill and Jennifer Cure, co-owners of Cure Nursery, a wholesale nursery in Pittsboro, have been growing wetland and bottomland plants since the mid-1990s. They produce about 50 or 60 species that occur abundantly in nature but aren't readily available from traditional nurseries.

The Cures sell seedling wetland trees in small containers for $1.25 each. In a typical greenhouse, 175,000 trees could be grown if all the floor space is used, producing $218,750. But Cure said there is a higher mortality rate among wild trees.

Given the lead time for growing plants, Cure said the biggest problem has been predicting which species will be most marketable. Cure said about 10 species have consistent demand: shrubs such as red chokeberry, silky dogwood and trees such as willow oaks and green ash.

"We end up growing a range of these species," Cure said. "A lot of it is determined by what seeds we find."

Wetland plants are just one of the alternative crops being tried. Several tobacco farmers in the southeastern part of the state have used tobacco greenhouses to produce 500,000 seedlings of sea oats to help stabilize beaches at Oak Island. The estimated cost to produce the seedlings was 20 cents per plant, and the retail value was 40 cents to 60 cents. About 350,000 plants could be produced in a growing cycle. At a profit of 20 cents per plant, that is about $70,000.

"There is a market, and people in it are making money," said David Nash, an agricultural extension agent based in Wilmington.

Last summer, farmer Marc Cox, 35, of Tabor City, grew enough tobacco plants in a half-dozen greenhouses to plant 1,000 acres of tobacco. Cox is experimenting with greenhouse-grown strawberries. "They are already talking about a large cut in tobacco," he said.

Like Davis, Cox came to the research greenhouse looking to the future. Cox said he was glad to see that he was not alone but worried about the unpredictable market for wetlands plants just the same.

"It's hard to find out who to sell them to," Cox said. "It's not like cars or insurance. You have a perishable product."

Staff writer Wade Rawlins can be reached at 829-4528.

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Feeling Uneasy About the Future

Oct. 26, 2003
Winston-Salem Journal, Media General News Service
By Kirsten B. Mitchell, staff writer
© Copyright 2003 Winston-Salem Journal

Doug and Freda Johnson remember when growing tobacco was simpler.

They planted leaf on their farm near Angier and relied on its income to raise their three children.

"It is not really just an occupation, it's a lifestyle, and we know nothing else," Freda Johnson said.

Now she wonders if - not when - she and Doug can afford to retire. "At the end of the growing season, we have lots of bills and no money," she said.

Among the expenses are lease payments to 12 quota holders, including Doug Johnson's mother, a widow whose husband farmed. But the Johnsons also send rent checks out of state to people who are a generation or more removed from tobacco farming.

"The system is sort of worn out," Johnson said. "It needs redoing."

The Johnsons' situation is not unusual. Diluted ownership of tobacco quotas is common, with some holders owning such a small share that their annual rent checks hardly pay for a week's groceries.

The tangled web of quota ownership could change under a proposal that Congress is considering.

Tobacco quota holders live in every state from Alaska to Wyoming, according to a U.S. Department of Agriculture database. They also live in Austria, Canada, England, Germany and Thailand, USDA data show.

As children and grandchildren of original quota holders moved off the farm, quota owners became middlemen in the tobacco program that Congress created during the Depression.

A farmer who owns his quota invests $1.80 per pound of tobacco grown, and has his investment returned after four seasons, according to an N.C. State University analysis. The same farmer who rents his quota spends $2.55 per pound over the same four years, the study showed.

That has made American tobacco more expensive to produce. A combination of factors - lower smoking rates, intense competition from start-up cigarette manufacturers, and a flood of inexpensive foreign leaf on the world market - make it difficult for tobacco farmers to reap the generous profits that the golden leaf once guaranteed.

In the late 1930s, the government began mandating how much a tobacco farmer could grow for an established support price. For decades, the system worked. Quota holders farmed. Tobacco was the cash king, pulling in more money per acre than any other crop in the South.

Now, though, the situation is more complicated. With the decline in tobacco use, quotas have been cut in half in recent years.

In the 1970s, Don Anderson and his father owned some quota - the government right to grow tobacco - and rented the remaining quota they needed from a retired farmer.

Today, Anderson, a fourth-generation tobacco grower, leases quota from more than 30 people. He mails quota rent checks to Indiana, New York and South Carolina, where descendants of Virginia tobacco farmers now live.

"I write checks from $133 to $17,000 and all points in between," said Anderson, who owns quota for about 25 percent of his 75-acre farm in South Boston, Va.

Farmers such as Anderson and Johnson are asking Congress for help. Tobacco-state legislators propose paying people who own quota to get out of the business. One plan proposed paying $8 a pound to quota owners and $4 a pound to active growers. Farmers who also own quota would receive $12 a pound.

Cigarette manufacturers would shoulder the buyout's $13 billion to $15 billion price tag. The cost likely would be passed on to smokers in the form of increased cigarette prices.

Debate rages over whether non-farming quota holders should be compensated.

Tommy Payne, the executive vice president for external relations for R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., thinks that only farmers, not quota holders, should be paid.

"When the proponents say they want to help farmers, I think it's a fair rebuttal to say, "OK, but 85 percent of the people who own quota aren't farmers'" in North Carolina, Payne said.

Reynolds got the number by analyzing payments to quota holders and growers in North Carolina made under a $5.15 billion trust fund created to compensate for government cuts in quota.

It's unclear how many of the 85 percent are retired farmers and how many are out-of-state owners generations removed from quota.

Supporters of the buyout plan say that quota is an inherited asset, and many of the nonfarming quota holders are widows of tobacco farmers.

"I'm sure there are multimillionaires who are going to get checks (if Congress approves a buyout), but they are the exception, not the rule," said Joe Langley, the president of the National Quota Owners Association. "The focal point should be the hundreds of thousands of people who rely on their quota for retirement."

No one knows how many growers are in that category, said Blake Brown, a professor of agricultural economics at N.C. State University. But, he said, "farmers did not invest in the stock market. They invested in quota."

The quota system, Anderson said, has outlived its usefulness.

"You start looking at what makes our costs higher, you start looking at where you cut costs, and quota is definitely something that could be taken out of the formula," he said.

Tobacco-state congressmen, meanwhile, are pushing colleagues to consider the buyout proposal, which some insist must be coupled with a controversial plan to allow the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco products. Some congressional observers say that a buyout becomes less likely with each day that passes.

As tobacco growers wait for word from Washington, they are increasingly antsy about the coming season.

The Johnsons have put off going to the bank for next year's loans.

"We're almost afraid to go because there's no security right now," Freda Johnson said.

Despite the uncertainty, Allen Bass, 23, can't imagine doing anything other than growing tobacco.

"It's all I've ever done," said Bass, who was 6 when he first plowed a tractor through the fields of his family's 100-acre farm in Gladys, Va. Bass enjoys being his own boss, working closely with his father and brother, and having the winters free to hunt.

"I feel like there will always be tobacco grown in Virginia, and I'd like to be a part of it," he said.

Kirsten B. Mitchell works in Media General's Washington bureau.

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Despite Industry Layoffs, Students Still See Future In Textiles

Oct. 25, 2003
WRAL.com
By staff report
 © Copyright 2003 WRAL.com

RALEIGH, N.C. -- From Pillowtex to VF Jeanswear, layoffs in the textile industry just keep coming.

A person might wonder why a college student would choose textiles as a major. But students and staff at North Carolina State say the industry still offers good opportunities.

As several students tested medical garments to see how to make them more comfortable, they offered just one example of work in the textiles industry that is still going strong in the United States.

"The muscle of the industry has moved off shore; the brains are right here in the U.S.," said Kent Hester, of N.C. State's Career Services.

Despite layoffs in the industry, Hester said this year's freshman class in NCSU's College of Textiles is the largest in more than five years.

The students are still learning basic fiber and yarn. But most of them also are getting into high-tech areas.

Shanna Kelly intends to research feminine products.

"Mostly, men are developing some of the things that women are using," said Kelly, who's majoring in Textile Engineering, "and I felt that there is no way a male could tell a woman what she really needed."

In N.C. State's Thermal Protection Laboratory, students test fabrics to see what will best protect firefighters. They say there are plenty of jobs right here in the U.S. doing that kind of work.

After it is determined what fabric works best, the high-tech suits likely will be made in the U.S. instead of overseas.

Chad Seastrunk said that fact keeps him and his peers from worrying about whether or not they will get jobs.

"A lot of the students in my class, being seniors, already half of them have job offers on the table, and it is only October," said Seastrunk, a textile engineering major.

Many of those job offers come from companies in the United States. According to the Career Services Department, the College of Textiles never has placed a single student in a job overseas.

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Footnotes: Kiplinger's calls UNC-CH No. 1

Oct. 27, 2003
The News & Observer
By staff report
© Copyright 2003 The News & Observer Publishing Company.

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is ranked the best value in the United States for public universities by Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine. It was the fourth year in a row that UNC-CH topped the ranking.

Other UNC campuses placed in Kiplinger's top 100 best value among public schools, including N.C. State University at 11th, UNC-Asheville at 23rd, Appalachian State University at 30th and UNC-Wilmington at 35th. North Carolina had more schools in the top 50 than any other state in the nation.

Gov. Mike Easley bragged about the rankings in a news release last week.

"The investments we have made in higher education are paying off," the governor said. "Students in our state are getting a bargain: a better education for their tuition dollar. We must continue to guard against high-dollar tuition hikes so all of our students can take advantage of 'the nation's best deal' in higher education."

Kiplinger's noted the high quality of North Carolina universities and generous financial aid. The magazine ranked schools according to cost, debt after graduation, financial aid, student-faculty ratio and graduation rates.

Author to address forum

The author of a popular self-help book will be the keynote speaker at this year's General Henry Hugh Shelton Leadership Forum at N.C. State University. Stephen Covey, author of "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People," will give a talk called "Leading High Performance Organizations."

Covey is scheduled to speak at a noon luncheon Nov. 13 at the McKimmon Conference and Training Center at NCSU.

The Shelton Leadership forum takes place Nov. 13-14 and this year will focus on the areas of corporate leadership, sustainable community development, elementary and secondary education and higher education. This is the second year for the forum, named in honor of Shelton, an NCSU alumnus and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Call 515-2261 for information.

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People: N.C. State University

Oct. 27, 2003
The News & Observer
By staff report
© Copyright 2003 The News & Observer Publishing Company.

Pam Cloer, assistant program director of the N.C. Local Technical Assistance Program at the Institute for Transportation Research and Education, received the President's Award from the N.C. American Public Works Association. Cloer has sat on the NCAPWA board for four years and works to coordinate the annual meeting registration and location each year. This award is given at the discretion of the president. The last time it was awarded was in 1999.

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UNC Board Members Suggest Alternative For Out-Of-State Students

Oct. 24, 2003
Associated Press, WRAL-TV
By staff writer
© Copyright 2003 Associated Press

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- Two members of the University of North Carolina Board of Governors are responding to a proposal to raise the cap on out-of-state freshmen with another suggestion.

Addison Bell and Peter Keber say they'll ask the board next month to approve a plan allowing individual campuses to ask permission to enroll more students from outside North Carolina.

Their proposal came in response to a controversial plan now before the board to raise the cap on out-of-state freshmen that all UNC campuses can enroll to 22 percent from 18 percent.

Their proposal would allow campuses that want a higher cap to plead their case to the UNC Board of Governors, which oversees the 16 UNC campuses.

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NCSU breaks ground on engineering building

Oct. 27, 2003
News 14 Carolina
By Katie Marzullo, staff writer
© Copyright 2003 News 14 Carolina.

N.C. State University is digging in for the next phase of a major construction project.

The university will break ground on a new engineering building on Centennial Campus on Friday.

The Department of Computer Science and Electrical and Computer Engineering is gaining a $35 million facility with more than 200,000 square feet.

It will contain modern classrooms and state-of-the-art labs and offices.

The money for the project is a result of the $3.1 billion University of North Carolina Higher Education Bond Referendum that passed in 2000.

Construction should be finished by 2005.

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TV Clip: WTVD

Oct. 24, 2003
WTVD-11
By staff report
 © Copyright 2003 WTVD.

WTVD ran a piece on the College of Design's annual pumpkin carving contest.

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Briefs: Farmers market to open at plantation

Oct. 27, 2003
The News & Observer
By staff report
 © Copyright 2003 The News & Observer Publishing Company.

A section of the defunct Chinqua-Penn plantation in Rockingham County may open as a farmers market by next summer.

Log stables that once housed the collection of horses for a family that once lived there will be converted into the market, said Joe French with the state Agriculture Department's Upper Piedmont Research Station, which owns the property.

The project, which is being funded by a $63,000 grant from teh Golden LEAF Foundation, began more than two years ago but has been slowed by poor weather and the expense of renovating or replacing rotting logs.

Chinqua-Penn closed a little more than a year ago after the non-profit Chinqua-Penn Foundation could no longer afford to keep it open. No one in the county has emerged with the funds to operate the 1925 estate.

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Founders knew how to compromise

Oct. 26, 2003
The News & Observer
By Stephen Middleton, staff writer
© Copyright 2003 The News & Observer Publishing Company.

If you worry about political "gridlock" in Congress today, don't. It's a natural part of the democratic process. If you worry, however, that our political leaders have lost the art of compromise, you should. Historically, our best leaders understood how to make deals for the good of the nation. Today, it is an open question.

When the founding fathers wrote the Constitution at Philadelphia in 1787, they did not anticipate the growth of political parties. The vast majority of the founders actually loathed political parties, mainly because they feared factionalism would result.

For example, in 1789, Thomas Jefferson stated, "If I could not go to heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all." He continued, "Public men no longer seemed to separate political and personal differences. Men who have been intimate all their lives cross the street and turn their heads another way, lest they should be obliged to touch their hats."

His misgivings notwithstanding, political parties blossomed during the 1790s. It was inevitable. Political leaders, as all people, are motivated by their common interests. James Madison understood this well, and that's why he wrote that factions -- parties -- could become a "dangerous vice."

There are no cures for factions in a democratic society, but the constitutional republic, he promised, could control their effects. Electing the right people to run the government is essential in his formula to control the effects of factions.

But just because the framers did not anticipate political parties does not mean that adversarial contests did not exist from the start.

Consider the Philadelphia convention itself. That summer, when the framers were hammering out the Constitution, they faced several controversial issues that temporarily bottlenecked resolutions on the design of the Constitution.

The debate over the Virginia plan and the New Jersey plan is a case in point. Delegates who supported the Virginia plan represented the Federalist interest. Those favoring the New Jersey plan represented the Republican point of view. The Constitution is a combination of both plans. In the Senate, representation from the states is equal, which is what the advocates of the New Jersey plan wanted. Representation in the House is based upon population, and this is what the supporters of the Virginia plan wanted.

Slavery also threatened the constitutional convention. The South wanted to count enslaved blacks for the purpose of representation, and the North, for obvious reasons, did not. The result was the three-fifths compromise: Only three-fifths of the slave population would be counted in the tally for representation.

During the 1790s, James Madison and Thomas Jefferson opposed many of the proposals Alexander Hamilton recommended to Congress. Hamilton urged Congress to allow the federal government to take over state debts. For various reasons Madison and Jefferson opposed the idea; ultimately, Hamilton got his way, and Congress adopted the assumption bill authorizing the federal government to become responsible for the nation's debts connected to the Revolutionary War.

At each point along the way, there was a possibility of gridlock. What might distinguish the founders from some of our public officials today is their penchant for compromise. The give and take at the convention was vital, and we have a better Constitution as a result of it. The Constitution does not represent the philosophy of only the conservatives, per se, or only those who believed in states' sovereignty. What we have is a Constitution that reflects the philosophy of conservatives as well as those who believed in states' sovereignty.

The art of compromise

Madison was right; you cannot do away with vigorous debate or interest-driven leaders and still have a democratic government. Partisan politics is a reality, and we should expect our leaders to have their own interests and be willing to fight for them. We also should ask them to compromise. If anything is lost in American politics today, it is the art of compromise.

Reasonable people -- reasonable statesmen and women -- have to find a way to compromise if our government is going to have energy. Government cannot run efficiently without it. This is the lesson I take from partisan politics in the early republic.

There might be times when it seems like nothing gets accomplished in this system of government. It is not a result of a flaw in the democratic process; it is probably because our leaders have forgotten the way of compromise.

It really should not matter which political party is in control. I do not see this presidential administration and this Congress any differently.

In short, if nothing seems to happen in Washington today, it is probably because our leaders need to be reminded of how vital compromise is to the political health of our nation. Perhaps it is equally important that a concerned and energetic citizenry remind them of this forgotten art.

Stephen Middleton specializes in U.S. constitutional and legal history.

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Service jobs are no less 'worthy'

Oct. 26, 2003
The Greensboro News & Record
By Michael Walden
 © Copyright 2003 The Greensboro News & Record.

We've all heard the statement that the United States is becoming a service economy.

For a full-text version of this article, please contact News Services at 919/515-3470.

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Opinion: Nanotechnology

Oct. 27, 2003
Winston-Salem Journal
By staff writer
© Copyright 2003 Winston-Salem Journal

Wake Forest University has become a serious player in the field of nano-technology - making things really small - with the recruiting of a 15-person research team headed by David Carroll from Clemson University.

A nanotechnology program has been in existence at Wake Forest for five years, and the people who know consider this recruitment a coup for the university. There are three nanotechnology programs in the Triangle, at Duke, UNC and N.C. State. But Wake Forest has proved its serious intent and admirable capacity for cutting-edge scientific research with its commitment to biotechnology and medical research. This new venture is a good fit.

The promise of nanotechnology is virtually unlimited. To grasp the notion better, think of a cell phone small enough to be used by an ant. OK, not very practical, but the science has enormous implications for quality, strength and endurance of products, as well as size.

Carroll is now the chairman of Wake Forest's Nanotech Department and an associate physics professor. Carroll and his team of post-doctorate researchers and graduate students have already developed light-emitting diodes that become high-resolution screens for Nokia cell phones and have improved medical devices for monitoring implants and organs. They've also helped with a device to track drug doses and make sure they're the right dose when released into the body.

The excitement is not just in the scientific community. The Greater Winston-Salem Chamber of Commerce is excited about the economic development potential for commercial businesses spun off from Carroll's lab. Angelos Angelou, an economic development consultant, has also praised this effort and had recommended it in a report issued this past summer. A nanotechnology presence ought also to be another magnet to attract and retain young professionals, a major effort in the revitalization project going on in Winston-Salem.

The team was recruited in August, moves into its quarters on Deacon Boulevard Tuesday and expects to be fully operational in December.

If there is one hope for the future - in addition to the science and business potential represented by this news - it is that the group will eventually move into new quarters in the downtown research park.

But even to mention that could be considered ungracious on a day when the news about this new potential is fresh. The main thing is: Welcome.

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Weather-wise, careful what you wish for

Oct. 23, 2003
The Boston Globe
By Carol Stocker, staff writer
 © Copyright 2003 The Boston Globe.

PROVIDENCE -- Gardeners keep a keen eye on the weather, so we are more aware than our neighbors that global warming appears to be already here. Since 1990, the United States has had its 10 warmest years on record, according to the National Academy of Science. We experience this personally with favorite plants such as our lilacs, which are blooming six to 12 days earlier than in past decades, and we see it in New England's longer growing season (between the last spring frost and the first fall frost), which is eight days longer on average today than in 1950, according to the Climate Change Research Center at the University of New Hampshire in Durham.

In 1965, most of Massachusetts was in Zone 5 (minimum winter temperatures 10-20 below zero) on the US Department of Agriculture Plant Hardiness Zone Map used by gardeners. Now, according to the proposed draft for a new map, most of the state is in Zone 6 (zero to minus 10) and Boston and southeastern Massachusetts are in Zone 7 (plus 10 degrees to zero).

The proposed map, drawn up by the American Horticultural Society based on the lowest average temperatures for winters from 1987 to 2001, is still under USDA review, but you can see the horticultural society proposal at www.ash.org/publications/usda--hardiness--zone--map.htm. If you feel like planting camellia, banana, or fig trees, go for it, said Chris Kennedy of Kennedy's Country Gardens in Scituate. Some years, they're making it through the winter. On the other hand, so is kudzu, the plant that ate the South, which is just now reaching Massachusetts.

Mary M. Peet, horticulture professor at North Carolina State University, calls global warming a game of "Trading Spaces" applied to climate. "The North Carolina climate has moved to New Jersey, and New Jersey's has moved to New York," she told scientists at a conference titled "Impacts of Climate Change on Horticulture" in Providence earlier this month. It was sponsored by Cornell University, Clean Air-Cool Planet (a New Hampshire-based nonprofit group), and the American Society for Horticultural Science, which also was holding its centennial conference in town.

In the long run, changes in weather, air quality, and weed and pest activity due to global warming will challenge our food production, our natural environment, and perhaps eventually, some warn, our civilization.

Still, a longer growing season and warmer winters sounds attractive. Can global warming be a guilty pleasure that is good for gardening, at least in the short term (which means our lifetimes)?

"It depends on whether you see the glass as half empty or half full," said Richard Bisgrove, an author of the new and possibly only study to date on global warming and gardening. It was commissioned by the UK Climate Impacts Programme in England and sponsored by the Royal Horticultural Society and the National Trust, with the support of Prince Charles, a keen gardener.

Bisgrove and his colleague, professor Paul Hadley at the University of Reading, applied the United Kingdom's climate change computer scenarios to gardening issues. They plugged in both a "low emissions" scenario, dependent on the use of clean and efficient technologies, and a "high emissions" scenario, based on rapid international economic growth and a reliance on fossil fuels.

Bisgrove's more aggressive model predicts that by 2080, the south of England will enjoy a Mediterranean climate with a year-round growing season. "Sir Francis Bacon wrote that the English climate is great for being outdoors, but not for standing still. That's why we all garden," he quipped. "Maybe we'll turn into a culture where we sit around in the shade sipping margaritas."

Of course, there's more to global warming than rising temperatures, and Bisgrove also looked at the effects of rising carbon dioxide levels on weather patterns.

Plants love carbon dioxide, which they use in photosynthesis. If carbon dioxide levels double, as widely predicted, plant growth will increase by as much as 50 percent, according to Bisgrove's report. The resulting superplants will be sturdier, larger, and also perhaps less appetizing to chewing insects. Some plants also may need less watering and fertilizing (because, to get technical, a reduction in the numbers and opening of stomatal pores on leaf surfaces will slow water loss.) That sounds good, but the high-fiber content also will make once-succulent veggies such as beans and asparagus less appetizing to humans. And wait till you see the weeds!

Noxious weeds, mostly introduced from abroad, already eat up 2,300 acres a day and cost $13 billion a year in this country. L.H. Ziska, plant physiologist at the USDA's lab in Beltsville, Md., said the chief beneficiaries of this carbon dioxide bonanza will be weeds with big, deep roots such as Canada thistle, which won the top spot as the most hated weed in a recent USDA survey of American farmers. Ragweed, quackgrass, and, yes, kudzu also seem to particularly thrive on high carbon dioxide levels. This is why weeds really are more tenacious in cities, where carbon dioxide levels are already high, Ziska said.

"Someone from the fossil fuel industry usually says to me, `So what? We have great herbicides,' " added Ziska. His experiments, however, found that the efficacy of modern weed killers decreases when carbon dioxide levels are high.

Bisgrove's British study predicts decreases in spring, summer, and autumn rains.

"All the UK public gardens used to close in October," he said, "but now people want them to stay open. For us, the big fear is that global warming will mean drought. "Winter rainfall will be increasingly concentrated in heavy downpours," he predicted, resulting in flooding and run-off rather than recharging of aquifers, and widespread water shortages. "That's partly because a warmer atmosphere holds more water. Flood plains will become critically important and tidal surges will increase along the coasts."

What about New England? Fluctuations in the jet stream, topography, changing ocean currents, and sea-surface temperatures make our weather difficult to predict, and conference speakers decried the lack of regional study in the United States.

The big horticultural losers here certainly will include cool-season vegetables and crops such as maple syrup and potatoes. They're going to end up in Canada, said Peet, who, like most of the conference speakers, focused on crops.

Peet also predicted problems with fruit setting for temperature-sensitive plants such as peppers, beans, and tomatoes. Breeding programs in Texas and Florida are concentrating on producing more heat-tolerant cultivars. Peet said an average, combined, day and night temperature of 77 degrees is the cut-off point for good production from these plants, plus soybeans and "a lot of others." Trees that require winter chilling, such as apples, also may fare poorly.

"The biggest risks will be to perennials and trees," said John Reilly of the Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He said most government studies have focused on annual crops such as grains, cotton, potatoes, and sugar beets.
"Better models are essential," he said. "There's not much interest from the government. The impact of climate change is a low priority, except for on energy sources."

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