The Lookout
Lansing Community College's
Independent Newspaper since 1959
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March 28, 2008
Nancy English speaks at a
rally on March 25.
LCC GSA rallies at Capitol
Zane McMillin
Editor in Chief
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LANSING — The
LCC Gay-Straight Alliance convened at the State Capitol Tuesday,
March 25, braving the frigid weather to mourn the death of a
15-year-old
California
student.
Approximately
40 people rallied on the Capitol’s front steps in remembrance of
Lawrence “Larry” King, who was openly gay. He was shot to death
on Feb. 12, 2008, by a fellow classmate, ostensibly because of
his sexual orientation.
Gina Beaudry,
co-adviser of the GSA, said the group decided to hold a
candlelight vigil for a couple of reasons.
“It was in
memory of Lawrence King,” she said, “That kind of thing has,
unfortunately, been happening too frequently.”
Nancy
English, a volunteer with the Lansing Area AIDS Network, was one
of several people who delivered a speech at the vigil.
“We need our
allies to be seen and heard,” she said. “We need you to march
with us to teach children when (people) say ‘faggot,’ that is
not acceptable.”
English
charged those at the vigil to step up, declaring “If we want
change, we have to make it.”
Beaudry said
the group also raised awareness for anti-bullying legislation at
the Safe Schools Lobby Day on Wednesday, March 26.
That event
was the brainchild of the Triangle Foundation, whose website
states “Michigan’s leading organization serving the gay,
lesbian, bisexual, transgender and allied communities.”
According to
Beaudry, the lobby day was designed specifically to promote
anti-bullying legislation. The event went well, she said, with
over 150 attendees promoting the bill, nicknamed “Matt’s Safe
School Law.”
“(The law)
does encompass all students, making sure they are all safe,”
Beaudry said, adding that LGBT students are frequently the
target of harassment and bullying in schools.
In the end,
Beaudry said she felt the lobby day and vigil were both
successful.
“Considering
how cold it was, I think (the vigil) turned out really well,”
she said. “The number of people who showed up was successful.”
The LCC
Gay-Straight Alliance meets every Thursday at 5 p.m. in GB 262.
For more information, contact either Gina Beaudry at beaudrg@email.lcc.edu
or Jennifer Spenny at spennyj@email.lcc.edu.
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Adviser's Blog
For
What It's Worth
By Larry Hook |
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April Euphoria better
than March Madness |
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As a huge professional sports fan,
my favorite time of the year has arrived. The Major League
Baseball season is beginning and the National Basketball
Association and National Hockey League playoffs are about to
begin.
As a Detroit sports fan, I have a
lot to be excited about. Both the Pistons and Red Wings are
among the best teams in their respective leagues, and the Tigers
are one of the pre-season favorites to reach the World Series.
The Pistons
have a starting five that includes All-Stars Chauncey Billups,
Rip Hamilton and Rasheed Wallace, as well as defensive
specialist Tayshaun Prince and rebounding whiz Antonio McDyess.
This group has plenty of playoff experience and knows how to
win.
This year, the Pistons have mixed in
a talented young group of reserves that includes Jason Maxiell
and rookies Rodney Stuckey and Arron Afflalo. And with grizzled
veterans Lindsey Hunter and recently reacquired Theo Ratliff
adding grit and wisdom, the Pistons have an excellent mix of
players that could challenge for the NBA championship this
season.
The Red Wings
are led by high-flying forwards Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik
Zetterberg, and veteran defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom. I believe
Lidstrom should be a Most Valuable Player candidate this season.
The guy leads all defensemen in scoring and most importantly, he
never makes a mistake on defense.
If the Red Wings get good
goaltending they could go all the way to the Stanley Cup this
year. But that’s a big if, because starting goalie Dominik Hasek
is 43 years old and constantly battles nagging injuries. Backup
Chris Osgood had a great first half of the season, but he is 35,
and has been very ordinary in the second half.
The Tigers’
batting order is stacked. They have the defending American
League batting champion in Magglio Ordonez and the third-place
finisher in Placido Polanco. They have three guys who drove in
100-plus runs last year: Ordonez, Carlos Guillen and newcomer
Miguel Cabrera.
They have a leadoff man (Curtis
Granderson) who had more than 20 doubles, 20 triples, 20 homers
and 20 steals last season. They have a shortstop who hit over
.320 last season batting seventh (newcomer Edgar Renteria) and a
future Hall-of-Fame catcher (Ivan Rodriguez) batting eighth.
Yes, the Tigers’ lineup could
produce 1,000 runs this season. But the Tigers will need to
shore up their bullpen in order to succeed. Right now, relievers
Joel Zumaya and Fernando Rodney are on the disabled list, and
closer Todd Jones has had a very shaky spring. Someone – maybe
Zach Miner or Jason Grilli – is going to have to step up to
steady the ship in the bullpen until Rodney and Zumaya can
return.
So April is upon us and we have
three very talented teams in Detroit. That hasn’t happened many
times in the history of Motown. It should be an exciting season.
Let’s hope for at least one Detroit championship this year;
maybe we’ll even get two or three.
Just don’t expect the Detroit Lions
to be part of that equation.
Larry Hook is a graduate of
Lansing Community College and Michigan State University, with a
degree in journalism. He has been adviser of The Lookout since
the summer of 2004.
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LCC Online
Profile |
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Mary Brown
FutureTeachers Club adviser
Occupation:Science professor
At
LCC since: 1978
Interviewed by:Rich Tupica
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Professor Mary
Brown has been teaching science at LCC for 30 years and is also
an adviser for the Future Teachers Club (FTC) at LCC. The FTC is
a club designed to prepare students for a job in the teaching
field. It is meant to teach them skills on how to become a
successful future teacher.
For more information on the FTC at LCC, read The Lookout
interview with Mary Brown.
When did the
Future Teachers Club (FTC) start? How long have you been
involved?
The
Future Teachers Club started in 2004, I think. I've been
involved as an advisor since its creation.
How did the
idea for FTC first come about?
A
group of students came to us and said, “We would like to have a
club that has all of the educators involved.” They gave us a
whole bunch of ideas about what they wanted the FTC to do and we
tried to implement as many of those as possible.
What did the
students want for the FTC?
They
wanted to have opportunities to have speakers in from other
universities; they wanted to be able to visit universities.
Since then we have taken some trips to CMU, MSU, Western, U of
M; then they meet with the education adviser so that they know
exactly what to do to transfer, who they are going to be working
with. They get a lot of the inside scoop as to how to be a part
of that university.
How often are
the FTC meetings?
We
do have meetings; they are about once a month. In those meetings
they have some real general things that they talk about, like
business kinds of things, like how to set up the dates (for
events) and the book sales and the fundraisers, what their
treasury is looking like. They also have a punch card mechanism
so that the students who volunteer time get a punch card and
they get rewards for putting in time helping out the club. The
officers kind of decide what kinds of things the students in the
club are asking for. For instance the student teaching one, they
don't know how much time is involved with student teaching, they
wonder how much teaching they are actually going to have to do,
they wonder, “am I going to have to quit my job to be a student
teacher and where am I going to be placed?” That is why they had
a professor here from CMU to talk to them about what experiences
they should expect.
Who have been
some of the other presenters at FTC meetings?
We've had people who have done learning style presentations,
like “how do students learn.” One of the things we try to help
these student teachers do to figure out how people actually
learn, how education has changed over time.
I hear FTC is
going on a trip to Chicago, what are the plans with that?
We
are going to Chicago on a train on May 18-19. We are hoping that
the train experience will get the members to really know each
other, to know where each of them is transferring to, sort of a
little bonding on the trip down. Then we are going to visit
several museums, the art museum, the science museum and the
field museum that is down there, hopefully Sheds Aquarium, if we
can get time to do that. Our idea is that we are going to be
gathering educational information, see all kinds of things that
they can put in their portfolio to get ready to teach somebody.
Does the FTC
help with portfolios?
We
do, we actually had a portfolio workshop. We also had a workshop
about working on your resume, a work shop on how to interview
for a job, what it means to be professional. We try to think of
things for our meetings that will really prepare the student for
being the best professional they can be.
What are you up
to when you are not teaching or working with FTC?
I
have lately been picking up my camera and doing lots of things
with photography, I've taken a few photography classes. My
husband, Richard Brown, is a musician so I travel around a lot
with his different bands. He plays in Mason Orchestra, a Dewitt
community band, a German band that travels all around the state
of Michigan and Indiana. We also have a son, his name is Nate,
he is a researcher at an institute down in the Kalamazoo area;
he is an LCC alumni, he took about a half a dozen classes here.
Join the Future Teachers Club!
Fun monthly meetings!
Professional development opportunities!
Contact:
LCCFTC@gmail.com |
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