The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 85, No. 15, Ed. 1 Friday, January 23, 1998 Page: 1 of 20
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Vol. LXXXV, Issue No. 15
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Friday, January 23, 1998 |
'There was black goo coming
out of the shower and the toilet'
by Maya Balakrishnan
THRESHER hlilloRIAI STAU
At around 12:15 a.m. Saturday.
Wiess College freshman Marisa
Levy walked to her bathroom and
stepped into a mysterious puddle. "I
turned on the light and [saw that) it
was brown goo ... there was black
goo coming out of the shower [drain |
and out of the toilet. Then I started
screaming," she said. "1 opened my
closet and all my shoes were float-
ing."
Raw sewage backing up through
bathroom drains filled six Wiess
rooms with a putrid smell. The sew-
age overflowed into the bathroom
floors and completely flooded the
floors of two rooms. "At 12:15 a.m.
the shower was filled with brown
water. We called the emergency
maintenance people immediately
but they didn't get here 'til 1:30a.m.,"
Wiess freshman Allison Winnike
said.
By 2 a.m. the water had covered
their floor, soaking the carpet and
staining the tiles underneath. .
The heads of Food and Housing
stay in contact with the campus
through their beepers at all hours of
the day: also, Facilities and Engi-
neering has plumbers on call 24
hours a day who respond to emer-
gency campus calls.
This command and and response
sequence requires about an hour if a
call comes in after midnight. Assis-
tant Manager for Food and Housing
Louisa Maal said.
Immediately after seeing the first
signs, Levy and Winnike told people
about the problem at Friday night's
public party at Wiess.
Shortly after the word went out,
signs were posted on every Wiess
door instructing students not to use
their sinks, toilets or showers.
Flu mbing and cleanup crews worked
through Friday night, and, by 8 a.m.
Saturday, Wiess was able to use
water, without risk of causing
backflow of sewage.
However, on Tuesday and
Wednesday, students complained of
toilets gurgling whenever someone
in the room above them flushed.
Further investigation uncovered the
source of the problem. Wednesday
afternoon. F&H workers fed a cam-
era into the sewage pipes to see
what might have caused the obstruc-
See WIESS. Page <>
Planning for colleges 9 and 10 begins
Wiess College students hope for speedy completion of new structure
_
1|S,'. V'.1. W
Zaro Visibility," i sculpture
show of Rico student art, will l , 9
hold today from 4 to 7 p,m. In
tho is wall Sculpture Courtyard
TNs sculpture by lawns miss
(ftid '•?) Is entitled "Altec's
Caterpillar." Giles said, -The
curve of the body compelled me
to name the piece after the
famous, wise caterpillar who
smoked a hookah m that classic
Lewis Carroll tale of a
blonde gW lost In a trippy
othorworld.* Hot cocoa and
apple cider will be served at the
exhibit.
ANOSl VU/THMSHW
by Joel Hardi
THRESHER EDITORIAL STAR
. Rice hasn't seen a new college
since Sid Richardson College was
completed in 1971. Relations be-
tween'administration and students,
academs and S/Es, and men and
women have mellowed since then.
Now, with t he Dec. 11 Board of Gov-
ernors endorsement of the st rategic
plan "Rice: The Next Century," the
university hqs decided to add two
more colleges — two more build-
ings, two more college governments,
two more Beer-Bike teams and two
'more sets of ribald cheers and ar-
cane traditions—to the campus and
to completely rebuild tfiess College
on its present site.
The decision not only raises ques-
tions of "when?" and "where?," it
also has students asking questions
about enrollment increases and
shrinking campus green space, as
well as anticipating the near-end of
the annual "room jacks," which force
as many as several dozen students
each year to live off-campus.
Nine colleges become 10
Approval of the plans to build a
ninth college and rebuild Wiess
came after a period of a couple of
years in which President Malcolm
Gillis and others in the administra-
tion repeatedly suggested that both
capital projects might soon be un-
dertaken."Both were separately rec-
ommended by the 40th Anniversary
of the College System Committee
and the Strategic Planning Commit-
tee last spring, as means of better
accommodating more of Rice's stu-
dents on-campus.
The decision to build a 10th col-
lege came someti me "between May
and November, when the adminis-
tration and board began to construct
a detailed plan from the planning
committee's recommendations.
That decision "emerged as we all
looked — the faculty, the adminis-
tration and the board — at building
a ninth college and how much of a
problem students being jacked off-
campus it solved," Vice President
for Finance and Administration Dean
Currie said. "We thought 'as long as
we're talking about the long-term
strategy of the university, let's go all
the way and do what needs to be
done,"' he said.
The college system committee
had earlier found that approximately
400 off-campus students were "in-
terested in movingbn«campus."The
administration concluded that satis-
fying such excess demand would
require fhe building of two colleges,
not one. Each of Rice's eight resi-
dential colleges houses approxi-
mately 220 students, or a total of 68
percent of the undergraduates.
"Among the universities we com-
pare-ourselves with, we have got by
far the lowest proportion of our stu-
dents living on-campus, and we're
. See COhLEGES, Page 9
Kenneth S. Pitzer
WRfSHER Mr PMCVfC;
Rice's third president dies
WOULD YOU LIVE ON-CAMPUS FOR YOUR
IF YOU COULD?
The Thresher polled 167
undergraduates on questions
relating to the Board of Governor's
Dec. 11 decision to build two more
residential colleges at Rice over
the next five years. The poll showed
students were mostly in favor of
the new colleges, but large portions
did not even know about the
decision.
Complete results. Pgige 9
Don't know
by Susan Egeland
THRKSW R KDITORIA!. STAFF
'Pop-up' Houston
Christof Spieler presents a
visually stunning look at down-
town Houston, replete with, the
comic strip speech balloons that
how pass for intelligent commen-
tary in our increasingly illiterate
culture.
Features, Page 10
OPINION Page i
Tuckman on European women
A AC Page 14
7lard Rain' drowns
STY LI Page 19
Packy wants to sleep with Fox
superwoman Ally McBeal
Wiu -Hi Wi.ithc
Sunny and cold, a good day to relax
and read your favorite weekly
campus newspaper, 33-57'
Saturday
Warmer than Friday , but
temperamental, 4164"
Sunday
Calm and soothing, 46 64;
Former Rice president Kenneth
S. Pitzer died Dec. 26 in California at
the age of 83. Rice's third president,
Pitzer moved from the University of
California at Berkeley to Rice in 1961.
He left Rice in 1969 to become presi-
dent of Stanford University. After a
return to teaching chemistry and
research at Berkeley, Pitzer retired
in 1984.
While at Rice, Pitzer was influen-
tial in establishing the Brown Chal-
lenge Grant in Engineering, which
elevated engineering education at
Rice.
Pit/er's influence on Rice aca-
demics was substantial. Professor
of History Allen Matusow, whocame
to Rice in 1963, during the Pitzer
years said, "In the history of Rice,
his was a pivotal presidency."
"I Pitzer I deserves much of the
credit for elevating Rice from its
status as a nice regional school to
national university. In particular, he
vastly improved the humanities and
social sciences and expanded and
improved graduate programs,"
Matusow said.
A professor'of History and
Hanszen College master in the late
1960s. Ira Gruber agreed that Pitzer
helped to develop Rice into a na-
tional university
■
"During his term as president,
he increased the size and quality of
the faculty with higher salaries, ten-
ured appointments and an increased
emphasis on research," Gru ber said.
"(Pitzer also) supported graduate
education, created new academic
departments, Sustained the residen-
tial college system and, perhaps
most important, sought changes in
the charter that allowed Rice to
begin charging a modest tuition and
to admit African-American stu-
dents."
However, some student s were re-
sistant to decisions Pitzei* made as
president.
In 1965, Pitzer barrel the Chair- j^p
man of the U.S. Communist Party
from campus and proclaimed a ban
on any speaker who refused to "en-
gage in rational debate." He later
backed down from his position when
students staged a demonstration.
"I thought* him a most impres-
sive person and scholar, a scientist
who was interested in all aspects of
university life," Gruber said. "Rice
was fortOnate to have had him dur-*
ing a turbulent and formative pe-
riod."
Rice will establish a memorial
fund for Pitzer. Before Pitzer died,
his family established a fund for
chemistry research ancfeeducation
at Berkeley, where Pitzer served as
dran of the College of Chemist
V
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Hardi, Joel. The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 85, No. 15, Ed. 1 Friday, January 23, 1998, newspaper, January 23, 1998; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth246611/m1/1/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.