Metro alumnus Jonathon Stalls and Kanoa, his dog, are walking across the United States to raise awareness for Kiva, a micro-lending organization that alleviates poverty by helping small-business owners. Stalls arrived in Denver July 20 and spoke about his journey at the Auraria Event Center.

Jonathon Stalls speaks about his cross-country walk for Kiva July 20 at the Auraria Event Center. Photo by Steve Anderson

“For the longest time I’ve been so attracted to the simplicity of having everything you need in a backpack,” he said. “The idea of it … feels like something I couldn’t touch … You’re engaged in the idea of the pioneer and the group of people traveling, going west and exploring amongst the unknown and everything that’s ahead of you.”

Stalls and Kanoa started their journey March 1 at the beginning of the American Discovery Trail in Lewes, Del. The trail combines local and state trails and mixes them with pedestrian-friendly roads. Stalls said he is using the trail as a rough template for his trip. The pair walks an average of 15 miles a day and plan to arrive at their final destination, San Francisco, in November.

Stalls, who graduated from Metro in May 2009 with a degree in design and entrepreneurship through the Individualized Degree Program, said such a cross-country trip had been a big dream of his for a long time. He was introduced to Kiva by a classmate and said he felt raising awareness for the organization was the perfect reason to make the trip.

Kiva partners with microfinance institutions and private lenders, like Stalls, to help small-business owners around the world. Business owners post loan requests, and lender browse profiles to decide which ones they want to fund. Lenders can give as little as $25 or as much as the full requested amount. Stalls said there is a 98% repayment rate, and the majority of people who lend money are repaid within a few months.

“There are some people who are so passionate about [Kiva] that have their entire savings account in Kiva credit,” Stalls said. “Money that would otherwise just be sitting in a savings account is being used to stimulate, boost and save small-business owners all over the world.”

Lenders can form lending teams. Stalls’ team, as of July 23, has 281 members and has generated $203,825 in loans.

Stalls said one of the hardest parts about his journey was starting.

Jonathon Stalls and his dog, Kanoa, started their walk across the country March 1 in Lewes, Del. Photo courtesy of Jonathon Stalls

“I think that’s the scariest thing in the world, just to decide: ‘This is what I’m going to do; I’m going to do it,’” he said. “The more you start telling people, the more real it becomes.”

He said he wanted his experience to be “raw and organic.” He didn’t want to have an agenda or feel pressured to make deadlines. However, he isn’t living completely off the grid; he has a smartphone.

“[I’m] walking across the country with Android,” Stalls said with a laugh. “It’s an amazing tool. I pray to this thing every morning.” He said he uses his phone to let the press know when he’s coming to a town and to research the towns he will be going through. So far, Stalls said he has passed through more than 100 small towns.

“I’m so excited about what’s going to be around the next turn, what’s going to be in this small town,” he said. “It’s just amazing how unique and different each of these little towns are.”

Stalls said his experience has been emotional and romantic. He said the walk has given him the opportunity to really look at the beauty of the country and experience the hospitality of the people. Stalls said he tries to connect with the locals, establish trust and share his experience.

“It starts with something like, ‘Aww, that’s a cool dog. Oh, that’s (the reason he’s walking across the country) cool.’ And the next thing you know you’re staying in their guest room and having breakfast with them, and they make a call to the next town to let people know you’re coming.”

Stalls said he has stayed with more than 90 families and has only had to camp 10 times.

“It’s certainly inspirational,” said Bryan Ferguson, outdoor leadership specialist at Campus Recreation at Auraria, about Stall’s story and visit to Auraria. “Working in higher education you meet a lot of people. John was amazing, always a joy to work with.”

Jonathan Stalls and his dog, Kanoa, walk along the Pennsylvania countryside. Photo courtesy of Jonathan Stalls

Carol Gifford, Stalls godmother, came to the event to welcome him back to Denver and said she was excited to see him.

“He’s truly an inspiration. And what he’s doing, it’s making a difference,” Gifford said. “He’s showing what he can do; he’s pushing himself. And there’s the awareness to Kiva.”

Stalls and Kanoa are taking a break in Denver for two weeks and will resume their journey August 3. His cousin will join him for two-and-a-half weeks along Highway 50, and Stalls encourages others to walk with them.

For more information about joining Stalls, e-mail him at kivawalk@gmail.com. To follow his journey, check out his website and Facebook page.

In the fallout from the college-wide outage of the Metro e-mail system April 9-16, students, staff and faculty voiced frustration about the lack of communication from the college’s Division of Information Technology.

To address these issues and prevent future communication breakdowns, Metro announced the formation of the I-Tactical Committee July 7.

The 12 member group will include representatives from diverse departments and organizations, including athletics and student government.

The I-Tactical Committee is scheduled to meet every third Thursday at a location yet to be determined.

Steve Stanek, associate director of IT application services, said the I-Tactical Committee will result in greater communication on a wide variety of issues and will allow multiple departments to coordinate without “reinventing the wheel.”

“I think a great benefit is the communication that will result from getting this group together,” Stanek said.

“It will be informative in terms of hearing what others are working on around campus, but a better result will be the sharing of knowledge and expertise as people are moving forward on their individual or departmental projects,” Stanek said.

Edward Jacobs, Jr., senior educational technologist, said the committee will benefit the college by providing a forum for staff and faculty to collaborate and share ideas and projects.

“Prior to working as a senior educational technologist in academic affairs, I worked in various roles within the Information Technology Division,” Jacobs said.

And on Aug. 23, Metro will welcome its first graduate students in accounting and teacher education.

“This marks a significant milestone in the college’s journey to preeminence,” Jordan said. “I want to acknowledge the hard work of so many of our colleagues who shared my vision for Metro State’s evolution. They not only put together the innumerous facets of this initiative – from IT to academics to enrollment –but they did so in the aggressive timeline I had set, without missing a beat in all their many existing responsibilities. This is an exceptionally great day to be a Roadrunner!”

The college cleared the last regulatory hurdle June 14, when the Institutional Actions Council, the decision-making body of the Higher Education Commission, approved accreditation for Metro’s new master’s programs.

The HLC, an independent corporation and accreditation body of the North Central Association of Colleges and schools, also approved a social work master’s degree program.

Metro administrators plan to launch the social work program in the Fall 2011 semester.

Erik Roth, administrative specialist for the Metro’s master of professional accountancy program, said his department’s new graduate-level courses focus on critical thinking, decision making and communication skills.

“All courses will have research components,” Roth said. “We want to foster a culture of success with a focus on preparation for the profession. Metro State’s Master in Professional Accountancy Program expands your career options as much as you can imagine, including the CEO/CFO suite. You can tailor your academic and practical experiences to fit anything you can imagine.”

Cynthia Lindquist, chair of the special education, early childhood education, reading and educational technology section of the master’s of arts in teaching department, said her department was accepting applications from prospective graduate students for the next few weeks.

“I don’t know how many applicants we have or how many students are going to be in the program this fall, but so far there is a lot of interest,” Lindquist said. “I’ve been fielding a large number of phone calls and e-mails from students who are interested.”

For more information, or to fill out a graduate school application, visit www.mscd.edu/masters or call 303-556-2615.

The Auraria Science Building is stirring in its cocoon, shaking off the dust from years of construction and the restless dreams of uncertain and shifting funds.

The Aug. 20 grand opening ceremony is weeks away, but a glimpse of the hard-earned metamorphosis is already floating in the building’s lobby: a giant butterfly sculpture made from glass, metal and resin.

The sculpture, titled Psyche, slowly flaps its 14-foot wings in the air, pushed by the air of the building’s air conditioning system. The wings, made up of thousands of glass test tubes filled with colored materials, cast amber shadows on students passing below.

Cody Moore welds pieces of the "Psyche" butterfly July 20 in the Science Building lobby. Moore, who works for Denver-based JunoWorks, has been fabricating and installing pieces for artist Donald Lipski for two years. The large-scale art piece is one of the last projects to be completed in the new Science Building before the grand opening Aug. 20. Photo by Caitlin Gibbons.

Donald Lipski said creating the artwork, which was installed July 16-22, was a wonderful experience.

“I’ve always had a deep love for science,” Lipski said. “I’ve thought from time to time that if I hadn’t been an artist, I may have become a scientist. I’ve collaborated and consulted with scientists on many projects over the years, and it’s always been interesting; at times, exhilarating. The vital link between artists and scientists is that we all have a passion for discovery.  It just takes different paths.”

He said public institutions of higher education should emphasize and include culture at every opportunity.

“The scientists being trained here for the future need a healthy dose of creativity and openness just to absorb the constant changes they will face as the world changes around them,” he said.

Lipski’s piece was selected by members of a Colorado-mandated committee working through Colorado Creative Industries, formerly known as the Colorado Council on the Arts.

Jil Rosentrater, director of the CCI’s Art in Public Places Project, said the committee, known as the leadership team, represented the major stake-holders in the Science Building, the state legislature and the local artistic community.

“State statute directs exactly how the committee will look,” Rosentrater said. “There were 17 committee members and, of that group, 13 participated in the selection. This included a representative of the project’s architect; the project manager; the tenant, which for this project it included reps from all three Auraria schools; a [CCI] member; an artist, Michael Clapper; a [then] state senator, Jennifer Veiga; and a state representative, Joel Judd.”

Rosentrater said the leadership team first met in April 2008 to discuss the role of the public artwork and whether it would be located inside or outside of the planned science building.

“From there, we began accepting applications and 184 artists applied,” Rosentrater said. “The committee went through a process to look at 70 works and narrowed it down to five artists. Each of those five artists came to Denver in January 2009, and gave a proposal to the committee.”

The proposals were then displayed in the Auraria Library for one month so that visitors could comment on the artists’ ideas.

Fabricators John Chilton, left, and Ross Cohlmia, middle, hoist the sculpture "Psyche" into the air as Marc Donsky, right, a UCD biochemistry teacher, inspects the ceiling in the Auraria Science Building July 19.

A month later, everything seemed to be on track for both the artwork and the building’s construction. The committee reconvened and Rosentrater said they quickly agreed on Lipski’s proposal. Meanwhile, a large hole was already opened for construction on Auraria where the new Science Building would stand.

But then the economic recession froze the planned construction while state legislators and Gov. Bill Ritter searched for new ways to fund the project.

The solution that finally brought the Science Building back to life involved new sources of funding, including government issued certificates of participation.

“The state, the way they started funding capital construction, there was a question whether public art was required,” Rosentrater said. “We put everything on hold for a year while we looked into it.”

Rosentrater said Colorado Attorney General John Suthers determined that public art was not a requirement of construction funded through these new sources, forcing the Auraria Higher Education Center and the three campus colleges to reevaluate plans for the sculpture.

“We spent $249,343 on the art piece, process and management of the process by the Colorado Council on the Arts,” said Mike Turman, a project manager with Jacobs Engineering Group, Inc., which is the primary contractor for the Science Building construction.

Previously, if students were interested in a major in women’s studies, they would have to create a customized program through Metro’s Individualized Learning department.

While the stand-alone major is new, women’s studies professor Maurice Hamington said the women’s studies department is not.

“The Institute for Women’s Studies and Services is celebrating its 25th anniversary,” Hamington said.  “For many years we have had a major through the Center for Individualized Learning, but we are very pleased to finally have a stand-alone major.”

The decision to add the major came during the June 2 Metro Board of Trustees meeting, but Hamington said that credit for the program also belonged to the hard work of quite a few others.

“Many people worked over the years to make this possible, including the late Jodi Wetzel (the director of the institute for many years), Assistant Professor Arlene Sgoutas and Professor AnnJanette Alejano-Steele,” Hamington said.

Hamington, who is the current director of the institute, said the new major will benefit Metro students.

“Our program is growing by leaps and bounds,” Hamington said.  “We have increased our majors and minors manifold over the last few years, and this major will allow us to serve the Metro State student population even better.”

When the Fall 2010 semester begins, there will be the same number of undergraduate majors available for students as there was in 2009: 54.

Women’s studies will take the place of surveying and mapping major.

Assistant Vice President of Extended Campus Programs Carol Svendsen said this decision was motivated by the number of students interested in pursuing surveying and mapping as a major.

“This was a low-enrollment issue,” Svendsen said.  “However, we are going to continue to offer surveying and mapping as an area of interest.”

She said the eliminated major would now be part of a geographic information systems concentration of a land use major under Earth and atmospheric sciences.

“This connection with GIS will give surveying students broader academic preparation and open additional career opportunities,” Svendsen said.  “Likewise, the surveying area of interest will enrich the GIS concentration and provide another career direction for land use majors. Additionally, these courses will help students qualify for the Colorado Fundamentals of Land Surveying Exam. The courses will also be open to students all over the nation who seek professional development or fulfillment of their state’s requirements for education of professional surveyors.”

Asbestos was discovered in, and is being removed from two Metro computer labs.

Pauline Wall, a Metro junior in special education, walks past West Classroom 244, one location containing asbestos on campus. Photo by Daniel Clements

The asbestos was found in the carpet mastic, or glue, in both West Classroom 244 and South Classroom 103. Both labs are being remodeled this summer, said Craig Smith, Facilities Management project planner.

“We (Facilities Management) start sampling [materials] before starting any construction, as a precaution. When they pulled the carpet up, there was a black residue. And lo and behold, it contained asbestos,” Smith said.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, asbestos is a mineral fiber commonly used in a variety of building construction materials for insulation and as a fire-retardant. Because of its fiber strength and heat resistant properties, asbestos has been used for a wide range of manufactured goods, mostly in building material.

“Back in the day, there was asbestos in a lot of stuff. It used to be used in drywall, drywall mud and in older tiles,” Smith said.

Smith said the carpet in South Classroom was installed in the 90s and in West Classroom in the early 2000s.

The asbestos content is fairly low and there is not a risk of it becoming airborne, as it is in non-friable material.

A non-friable material is something that cannot be broken easily and will not disperse fibers into the air.

The quality of air is being monitored in West Classroom to ensure there is no risk. The air supply to thebuilding is turned off and HEPA filters are being used in the work area. Samples were taken before the removal process began for a baseline of the air quality, and samples will be taken after the project is completed.

The containment area will not be broken down until the air quality is within state regulated guidelines.

Central Classroom and the Technology Building also have asbestos, said Sean Nesbitt, director of Facilities Planning and Space Management.

“It’s just the nature of our campus and what was on the property before the campus was built,” he said.

Nesbitt said the Auraria Higher Education Center keeps a close record of both non-friable and friable asbestos on the campus.

More thorough sampling is done on areas known to contain asbestos before any renovations are started. If asbestos is contained and not broken up, it is more stable.

If it does need to be removed, it is done in accordance with state and federal regulations.

Nesbitt said when asbestos is found it is typically just a trace, not over the defined limit, but enough to remove the material.

Auraria does approximately 10 asbestos removal projects per year, said David Krajicek, department manager of Environmental, Health and Safety at Auraria.

“Our first priority is maintaining safety,” Krajicek said. “There will undoubtedly be more asbestos. As we remodel, we do our best to remove asbestos from those spaces.”

Every year the Environmental, Health and Safety department picks two or three buildings to do a complete survey of.

During annual inspections, Krajicek hires a contractor to comb through a building to look for any “suspect” building materials.

“The inspections are done for operations and maintenance. We can’t sample every room for every item,” Krajicek said.

He said they test “homogenous” areas within buildings, where the materials are similar.

“Anything that is not solid concrete, wood or stone can contain asbestos,” Krajicek said. “Asbestos used to be used in an estimated more than 10,000 products.”

In February 2008 construction on the Science Building was halted temporarily to remove old industrial building materials that were buried in the 70s before Auraria was developed.

In preparation for the ground breaking on the Student Success Building, Nesbitt and AHEC had soil tests conducted right after graduation. They have also been studying what historically had been on the property to help anticipate any asbestos they may encounter during the construction.

“We learned a lot from the Science Building,” Nesbitt said.

Brightly colored Legos littered the rows of tables, strewn about by the some 40 chattering children swarming around the computer lab.

Andy, left, age 11, and Aaron, age 10, choose parts from their class lego bin to help create lego robots June 23 in King Center room 111. Photo by Daniel Clements

A few teachers milled around, looking over their young students’ shoulders at the complex structures growing out of the plastic toys — robotic cars. Some were more classic, others fantastical, still others towering threateningly over their counterparts.

The children were attendants of Camp Tech, the second of two free back-to-back summer camps put on by the non-profit OpenWorld Learning and hosted by Metro.

Summer Spark, the first section of the camp, from June 14-18, was for sixth to eighth graders and focused on leadership training exercises, including developing service projects for students to do themselves.

Students at Camp Tech, which ran six hours each day June 21-25 and included children from third to eighth grade, learned about a range of technical skills, including how to use Microsoft Office, robotics and graphic design.

The participants are low-income, high-risk students and almost all are in the Denver Public School system, OpenWorld Learning Development Specialist Tiffany Deines said although several Aurora residents and two children from Puerto Rico were present this year.

The non-profit’s primary programs are after-school technology training classes at eight DPS schools during the school year.

Abel Moreno, a professor and the chair of Metro’s CIS department, said many of the participating students are missing out on an exposure to technology at an early age which is becoming essential to the educational process. Learning about computers in what Moreno calls “top notch” lab facilities will prove to be invaluable later in their schooling.

“There’s still a digital gap,” Moreno said. “[Here, the students] are actually being exposed to the latest technology.”

Another benefit of being hosted by Metro, Deines and Moreno agreed, is giving the students, many of whom have parents who never went to college, the experience of actually being on a college campus. The idea of higher education will not be as intimidating, Moreno said, and memories of what it looks like will begin to be engrained.

“They will know, ‘Oh, I’ve been there,’ Oh, I know what that’s like,’” Moreno said.

Deines said the staff has also found that students who tend toward hyperactivity can especially benefit from working with technology — the concentration necessary when working on computers and with robotics brings out the children’s focused side.

“We didn’t know that,” Deines said. “We were able to have that added benefit — a sort of perk.”

Davion, an 8-year-old third grader from Commerce City, proudly displayed his nearly-completed robot car, pointing out its special features and personal touches, including the place where the “Lego guy” would sit to operate his vehicle.

“It took a lot of work. It took a lot of inspiration,” David said, describing the efforts he and his four-person team (including his sister and cousin) had put into their device.

David said his favorite part of the summer camp was learning to work on the computer.

“I love working on the computer,” David said. “Sometime I feel like all I want to do is work on the computer.”

David’s cousin, Eliseo, is 9 years old and going into fourth grade. He said the camp brought him a new perspective on academia.

“We wanted to do summer school, but it was kind of boring until today,” Eliseo said. “We realized it’s kind of cool.”

All the students from Camp Tech worked on a final project to present the skills they learned during the work.

Metro donated space in the King Center and in the Seventh Street Classroom for the camp, as well as parking and full use of the campus, including the swimming pool, Deines said. Greenberg Traurig, an international law firm with a branch in Denver, sponsored the funding for the camp with a $10,000 donation.

OpenWorld Learning provided the staff for the camp, although Metro staff and faculty remain on call, Moreno said.

OpenWorld Learning works with DPS teachers as well as other related organizations to recruit children they think would benefit from the summer camp, although this number is restricted by the number of available computers at the host site, in this case, Metro. Students are allowed into the program on a first come, first serve basis, and those who don’t make it are put on a wait list, Deines said.

The Denver Bible Church protested the rainbow of people who made their way down Colfax Avenue June 20 in the 35th Annual PrideFest Parade.

“It’s not only my duty as a brother but it’s my obligation because I’m an ambassador of Christ,” Brian Enyart said. “So I [say] ‘the demons have read the word of God, and they shudder. Obviously it hasn’t done anything for you (gay people) because you hate the word of God.’”

A member of the Denver Bible Church stands along Colfax holding an anti-gay sign. Everett Stadig, another member of the protest group, said the group was not there because of hate but because they "love these people and don't want them to go to Hell." Photo by Daniel Clements

Enyart said he and members of the church were protesting because it was the church’s responsibility to show the community that homosexuality is “sin in the most vile form.”

Various churches such as St. Paul Church and Metropolitan Community Church of the Rockies walked in the parade to show their support for the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered community. Jamie Scholfield, a protester with the Denver Bible Church, said he thought such churches think they are doing the right thing, but they are misinformed.

“I believe there is a lot of bad teaching and a lot of people who believe what they want to believe,” Scholfield said. “They cherry-pick what’s in the Bible, but the Bible says there is a way that seems right to them but leads to death. They (GLBT-friendly churches) don’t realize they’re holding someone’s hand all the way to Hell.”

A group of counter-protesters gathered in support of the GLBT community. Kyle Pommer said he had been counter-protesting all day along the parade route to distract from the message the church was sending.

“I’m here to distract the hatred with my shiney-things sign,” Pommer said. He carried a sign that read, “Gays have more fun,” and was decorated with silver pieces of reflective material. “It’s not right for people to hate other people for their sexuality … God loves everyone.”

Juliet Letteney said she was counter-protesting to show that there are people who are not going to listen to the church’s message and that the protest actually made the GLBT community “more full of love.”

“They’re here preaching their hate and how much they believe that what is here (PrideFest) is perversity and hatred … but the Bible never said anything about hate,” Letteney said.

Protester Jo Scott said that it was important for members of the community to step up and share the word of God. She also said that despite what the counter-protesters thought, their protest was not driven by hate, but instead truth.

“I deal with the truth,” Scott said. “Truth is hate to those who hate the truth. Because it makes some people angry doesn’t negate the fact it’s the truth.”

These candid opinions were compiled by Sector Brands, LLC, a company hired by the board of trustees to conduct a name assessment in March and April to help determine if Metro’s brand needs a new label.

Stacy Lewis, a partner in Sector Brands, said the presentation was not designed to recommend a particular course of action for college administrators to pursue.

“We were responsible for presenting detailed information so that the board of trustees could have an informed discussion about the brand,” Lewis said.

Lewis said her firm’s presentation to Metro’s Board of Trustees June 2 completed the contract between the college and Sector Brands.

The findings included the observation that “some degrees are viewed as top notch but overall, quality/perception of a Metro State degree is viewed as less than other four-year colleges in Colorado.”

Forty-three percent of alumni surveyed responded that they don’t believe a Metro degree has the same value as other four-year colleges, according to the Sector Brands presentation.

The value is seen as improving but not yet on the same “league” as many other state institutions and the majority of people interviewed for the study felt the awareness of Metro outside of the seven-county Denver metro area is extremely low.  The study described the regional and national awareness of Metro as being “off of the radar.”

Locally, many involved in the study believe awareness and understanding are too low given the college’s size, history and impact, the Sector Brands presentation stated.

“People don’t know us or get us, even in the Denver area,” one of the respondents in the study said.  “We’re still Denver’s best-kept secret”

The presentation stated, “General agreement that Metro State’s association with the Auraria Campus confuses and doesn’t enhance its name or reputation.  Proximity to community college fuels two-year institution confusion.  Some see all three institutions as a ‘package deal.’  Most did not feel that a name would help address this problem but could clarify Metro State’s status on campus.”

Sector Brands concluded that Metro State has significant hurdles to address before formally pursuing any name change:

• The name Metropolitan State College of Denver is inextricably linked to the College’s mission, and any attempt to change the name will be viewed as an attempt to shift the mission and position in Colorado’s higher education hierarchy;
• Closing the gap of understanding between the vision of preeminence and how it serves to advance the College’s mission is a critical step before using any name change to advance the vision;

Cathy Lucas, associate vice president for communications and advancement, said the presentation from Sector Brands provided good research for the board to consider.

“We were very pleased with Sector Brands and how they gathered information,” Lucas said.

She said the next step for the board of trustees would be a closer examination of available options for the future of the college’s brand.

“The trustees made a motion to have a bigger assessment at their retreat in August or September,” she said.

In the meantime, Lucas said her job would involve educating interested parties on what the Sector Brands investigation discovered.

“I’ll be reaching out to the different constituency groups to let them know where we are at in this process,” Lucas said.  “This includes alumni, faculty, staff and external groups, such as the board of trustees leaders, local business leaders and members of the legislature.”

Lucas said these legislators were members of the Metro caucus, a fluid group of state senators and representatives, who help advance the college’s political agenda.

“There is a legislative process just to change the name if that’s what is decided,” Lucas said.  “But for now, we’ll just provide some follow-up information and later, if a name change is on the table, we would start by soliciting input to see what the name would be.  And this would probably just be step one in a 10 to 15-step process.”



The student, who was in walking into room 155, called The Auraria Police Department from her cell phone, and the suspect was arrested while she was still on the phone with the police.

According to APD Chief John Mackey, the suspect, Ronald Triggs, is a registered sex offender and has an extensive criminal history, including past incidents of indecent exposure. Triggs had no affiliation with the campus and has been banned from Auraria. If he comes onto campus again, it will be a trespassing offense, Mackey said.

No timely warning or crime alert was issued since the arrest took place immediately after the incident.

To report a crime on campus, call 911 from any campus phone or 303-556-5000 from a cell phone to reach APD. Calling 911 from a cell phone will connect the caller with Denver Police and may slow the response time.



Samuel Muro of Denver, right, and Amy Lynn look at a sculpture June 3 at the grand re-opening of the Metro State Center for Visual Arts. The center relocated to its new home in the Santa Fe Art District this past spring. Photo by Steve Anderson

The re-opening of the Metro Center for Visual Art at 965 Santa Fe Dr. also marked the 20th anniversary of the CVA and one of the first milestones of Metro’s 45th-anniversary year.

CVA Director and Curator Jennifer Garner said the new location is only part of the planned expansion of the gallery.

“In five years I see us expanding far beyond where we are now,” Garner said in a video released by the Metro Office of College Communications.  “I see us probably doubling our educational outreach programs.  I’m able to reach out to even more significant collections, national and international collections, so I really see that we’re going to be an amazing place in five years.”

The CVA, which was previously located in the Lower Downtown art district in Denver, is a division of Metro’s Art Department.

“The non-profit art space makes an important contribution to visual art offerings available in Denver and the Rocky Mountain West, bringing in art that would not otherwise be seen here,” the CVA website states. “The Center for Visual Art contributes to Metro State’s status as the only public higher education art program in Colorado to maintain accreditation from the National Association of Schools of Art and Design.”

The gallery featured an inaugural exhibition, “Mix: CVA + The Art District on Santa Fe.”  The exhibition included artwork from surrounding galleries including 910 Arts Studios, Access Gallery, Artists on Santa Fe, CORE New Art Space, Sandra Phillips Gallery, Sizzle and Bang, Space Gallery and Spark Gallery.

Future events include a Metro alumni exhibition July 16 to Aug. 28, and “Soaring Voices: Recent Ceramics By Women From Japan,” Sept. 9 to Nov. 6.

The CVA is funded in part by Metro but relies upon the additional support of memberships and private donations to bring significant art to Denver and to the lives of at-risk youth.

The CVA’s hours of operation are 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and noon to 5 p.m. Saturday.

The 12th-annual Celebration of Educational Excellence featured professional photographers to take senior pictures and booths with area college representatives to meet the high school graduates and answer their questions about higher education.

Paul Benevides, vice president of the Metro Student Association of Social Workers chapter, said the event was a good way for students in the foster program to form connections.

“The main focus of today’s event with the Celebration of Educational Excellence is for foster youth in the state of Colorado,” Benevides said. “Many of the graduates are mobile in the foster youth system, and they lack connection with a high school, or a social network or even with mentors or educators involved in their life in a consistent basis because they are so mobile.”

He said the event recognizes the graduates who have pursued their education on their own and with little or no outside help.

“Many of them missed graduation from their high school,” Benevides said.  “The Celebration of Educational Excellence holds this event at Metro State College with the Student Association of Social Workers organizing and sponsoring the event on campus.  All of the students walk across the stage; they all receive their diplomas. They are recognized for their efforts achieving education.”

The high school graduates were also entered into drawings for educational supplies including laptop computers, DVD players and digital cameras.

Zachary Alston, 17, said he has been fortunate to have had far less experience in foster care homes and group homes than many of his peers, but he still appreciates the opportunity participate in the celebration.

“I earned my GED from Emily Griffith, and this is a good way to get us motivated for going to college,” Alston said.

Alston plans on attending CCD before transferring to the Colorado School of Mines to pursue a degree in public relations.

“I’m going to focus directly on my school,” Alston said.  “It’s nice to see the different colleges out there, the different opportunities and the different routes I can use to get to my main goals.”

When the Celtics and Lakers tip-off June 3 it will be the second time the two have faced off in the NBA Finals, and it will be the third consecutive Finals appearance for L.A. These two teams have each won a championship in the last two seasons, but with the upcoming free-agent market being stacked it may be the last appearance for each team for a while — but that doesn’t take away from the rivalry that will be at the forefront this month. Here are some of the other great team rivalries in professional sports, including a couple Colorado teams:

Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees (MLB)
Chicago Cubs and St. Louis Cardinals (MLB)
Indiana Pacers and New York Knicks (NBA, 1990s)
Ohio State and Michigan (College Football)
Denver Broncos and Oakland Raiders (NFL)
Colorado and Nebraska (College Football)
Boston Bruins and Washington Capitals (NHL, 2000s)
Detroit Red Wings … and Everyone (NHL)

The second floor of Brooklyn’s restaurant provided neutral territory for the old to reminisce about their success and failures during their tenure in SGA and for the new to take their oaths of office. The inauguration ceremony is a SGA tradition and has been held every year since the organization’s creation seven years ago. This year the event cost $2,717.66, former Vice President C.J. Garbo said. The cost included the reservation of the space, food and gratuity for the wait staff.

All the new members were certified by the Election Commission Chair Jessica Hagood as meeting all the minimum requirements to qualify for a position in SGA.

Each incoming member was then required to take a brief oath of office, which the new chief justice of the student court, Steve McGarrah, administered.

Richmond Boakye and Simon Ayesse are serving another term in the senate. Boakye did not attend the ceremony. Jesse Altman, Emily Hill, Trucly Vo and Jia Jing Zheng will all be serving for the first time in the student government. Michelle Sprowl will serve another term as a SACAB representative. Sean Anderson will also join SACAB. Neither Sprowl nor Anderson attended the ceremony. Kat Cammack will start her term as the student trustee July 1.

According to Garbo, those who did not attend the ceremony will not be able to participate in training or get paid until they complete all the necessary institutional paperwork. They will also need to take the oath of office, which needs to be administered by a justice or officer.

Outgoing President Andrew Bateman encouraged new President Sammantha O’Brien and senate members to spend less time fighting among themselves and on internal matters and more time focusing on the chance to make the school, campus and state a better place.

“Don’t make my mistakes; make your own,” Bateman said.

Garbo took a moment as outgoing vice president to offer some advice to the new VP, Tess Halonen. He encouraged her to always support her president publicly, but fight battles behind closed doors.

O’Brien’s inaugural address was short. She said she learned a lot from her time in the organization, which inspired her to run for president.

The SGA will conduct training the week of June 1 for new members, then will have a retreat later in the summer to set their agenda and resolutions for the 2010-2011 school year.

Senate for the 2010-2011 school year:
Jesse Altman
Simon Ayesse
Richmond Boakye
Emily Hill
Trucly VO
Jia Jing Zheng
*There are still four vacant positions. The president may appoint the positions, or a special election can be held to fill the spots.

President: Sammantha O’Brien
Vice President: Tess Halonen
Student Trustee: Kat Cammack
SACAB Representatives:
Michelle Sprowl
Sean Anderson
Chief Justice of the Student Court: Steve McGarrah

Photo by Ben Wiebesiek

The Tivoli Parking lot southwest of the Tivoli will also have a change in rates Aug. 9. Parking customers will no longer be assessed an hourly rate. Instead, a flat fee of $6 will be collected from all vehicles exiting the lot. This fee will be good for all-day parking.

According to a statement from parking and transportation services for the Auraria Higher Education Center, the changes in parking rates are being implemented in preparation for the upcoming construction of Metro’s Student Success Building. The 143,000 square foot Student Success Building will be the first building in the Metro neighborhood at Auraria and will be located west of the TAPS parking garage along Auraria Parkway.

Campus mad science event probes mysteries of life, death, big foot

The usual shoebox diorama depicting life in an ancient pueblo was missing. The gurgling volcano of vinegar and baking soda couldn’t be found. And the brightly- colored diagram of the nitrogen cycle might as well have been printed on the side of a milk carton.

This is not your parents’ science fair.

Auraria’s first Mad Science Fair arrived May 21 at the Tivoli Turnhalle replete with ghost hunters, Sasquatch chasers and UFO believers.

The event, sponsored by the Metro Crypto Science Society, aimed to explore the intersection of scientific inquiry and paranormal mystery.

Crypto Science Society President Jemé Conrad said her organization created the event to be a forum for students to submit their research or experiments they have done in a wide variety of categories.

Lucia, right, performs an angel card reading for Virginia Mays during the Mad Science Fair May 21 in the Tivoli Turnhalle. "I also do tarot card readings," Lucia said. "The difference between the angel cards and tarot cards is the angel cards are based on the angels and saints, which are recognized by all religions." Photo by Dan Clements

“[It] is a mad science event because our organization deals with all sorts of science that’s not necessarily considered mainstream,” Conrad said. “The Metro Crypto Science Society, we’re a science organization that explores the gamut of science so we look at everything from metaphysics to ghosts to string theory to time theory to anything we want to talk about that’s not necessarily a part of the scientific landscape.”

Conrad said her organization was trying to bring back the high school science fair experience so students could interact in a fun environment while hearing different scientific presentations from different speakers on a variety of topics.

“We try to be as inclusive as possible so we don’t want to draw the line for where science stops,” Conrad said. “Science intersects and interconnects all of these discussions, and one of our biggest goals is to create a feeling of accessibility and fun.”

Arvada resident Terry Meyers said he definitely didn’t find the fair boring.

“This was really cool,” Meyers said. “I really liked the giant spider booth. And the speaker had some really good points about what ties the universe together and how we should all be looking into it.”

Claude Swanson, a physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Science Teaching Center and the Brookhaven National Library, gave the keynote address.

“We are in a revolution in science. This is a whole new era,” Swanson said.

Swanson’s presentation focused on phenomena, such as teleportation, long-range healing and extrasensory perception, which he said were proved by experimental research but unexplained by scientific theories.

“Several years of intense research revealed a number of phenomena which are real and yet violate current physics,” Swanson said. “The Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research lab conducted large scale tests of ESP and what they found on the effects exceeded chance by cumulative odds of trillions to one.”

Swanson, who received his Ph.D. from Princeton, asked the audience how science could possibly explain it all.

“It means we have psychic abilities and not just a few of us,” Swanson said, “We all have this ability. But we have to learn to quiet the chattering mind.”

Swanson said his principal interest has been a so-called “theory of everything,” a concept he explores in his book, “The Synchronized Universe.”

Metro marketing student Kathyrn Moberg, was skeptical of the intentions of some at the event.

“I just started to get the impression that everybody was out to sell something,” Moberg said. “People should give away a little more. If you give more, you get more and people are more apt to become your customer.”

For Eva Wheelock, Cat Shaubach and Jim Lilly, paranormal investigators with Para FBI, the event wasn’t about displaying how common, sometimes cheap, electronics could be used to investigate some of the mysteries that go bump in the night.

“We are ghost hunters,” Wheelock said. “We go into residents or where anybody wants our help or just wants to find out what’s going on. We use a lot of equipment and that’s why we’re here today to show how we have taken equipment from other applications and other fields and adapted them to our needs.”

Shaubach demonstrated the motion detectors, infrared digital cameras and ultra-sensitive sound microphones, the group uses.

“This infrared helps us to take the pictures without the flash and without hurting the picture,” Shaubach said. “Basically, it’s all to provide as many ways to measure the environment we can in a paranormal investigation.”

Lilly said the biggest misconception the public has about paranormal investigation involves the motives of the investigators.

“The impressions is we’re actually out there trying to prove something we think is there as opposed to we’re out there collecting evidence to discount what we see as paranormal investigators,” Lilly said. “We try to explain phenomena by natural means. When we get to paranormal that’s when we can’t explain it naturally, and that’s why we have so much equipment.”

“Is it a great day to be a Roadrunner?! Come on!” Metro President Stephen Jordan shouted to the crowd of 1,615 graduation candidates at the May 16 Spring Commencement Ceremony.

Na'im Ali McKee, who studied marketing, cheers as he crosses the stage to receive his diploma at Metro's commencement ceremony May 16 at Auraria Field. This year 1,615 students represented the class of 2010, a 27 percent increase from 2009. It was also the first time the ceremony was held outside and on campus. Photo by Steve Anderson

Jordan’s question was directed to the eager students in caps and gowns in front of him, but the cheering response was twice as loud from the jubilant gathering of faculty, friends and family surrounding the class of 2010 on all sides of the Auraria Athletic Fields.

“Today, we break from tradition by holding our first-ever outdoor commencement ceremony,” Jordan said, smiling in the sunshine. “And what a gorgeous day to do it!”

The outside ceremony didn’t set the only precedent that day. The headcount of spring graduation candidates marked a 27-percent increase in the number of graduates from 2009.

The 2010 commencement marks another landmark in Metro’s history.

“We also mark the start of Metropolitan State College of Denver’s celebration of its 45 anniversary,” Jordan said.

Jordan said he took the personal stories of Metro students as the muse for his commencement address.

“I’m inspired by mother and daughter first generation graduates, Veronica and Angelica Franco,” he said.

Veronica, a hospitality, tourism and events major, received her diploma alongside Angelica, who majored in Chicana/o studies. The two commuted together from Pueblo as they pursued their degrees.

Many of the graduation candidates knew that the sunshine of commencement would not match the cloudy forecast for employment in the worst recession since the Great Depression.

However, that’s not the case for Metro track star Anthony Luna, the NCAA Division II 2009 National Champion in the Men’s Indoor/Outdoor 800-meter run; he’s already lined up employment for at least the next two years.

“Anthony is now going to train for 2012 Summer Olympics to be held in London,” Jordan said.

Luna said the location of graduation, on the athletic fields of Auraria, was special to him because that’s where he did his college training.

“I remember being 19, having a new child and not knowing what to do,” Luna said. “Metro State really helped me find my way. I’ve had five great years here.”

Bridget Braun, recipient of the 2010 President’s Award, advised the freshly minted Metro alumni to follow the Dr. Seuss classic, “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!”: “Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You’re off to Great Places!
You’re off and away!”

Braun, a German major, said these words reflect why she and the other students had persevered to graduation.

“Today is our day,” Braun said. “It is time to celebrate this achievement. Whether we celebrate with friends or family members, this is a day that should be remembered for the rest of our lives.”

Braun wore a gray cord recognizing her involvement in Metro’s honors program and a silver and blue cord signifying her graduation as magna cum laude (with great praise) for a cumulative grade point average of 3.65 or above.

After the ceremony, Carlos Valdivia-Luna gathered with his extended family to snap a few quick photos in his cap and gown before leaving campus to celebrate.

“I love Metro and Metro has been good to me,” Valdivia-Luna said.

Valdivia-Luna, a technical communications major, has overcome a language barrier to earn his diploma; he didn’t know English when came to the U.S. from Mexico in 2000.

“The ceremony was very good,” he said. “I liked the words of President Jordan. They were very motivating.”

Erik Skelton was also happy with how Metro conducted commencement, but he was happier just to be graduating.

“I thought it went very well; all of the speeches were great,” Skelton said. “It’s been a heck of a ride, and I’ve enjoyed my time here.”

Skelton, who studied business management for four years at Metro, plans on being a police officer after he receives his degree.

Eric Peterson, president of the Metro Alumni Association, told the graduates that commencement would not mark the end of their involvement with the college.

“You will miss this place,” Peterson said. “It may not be tomorrow, but it will definitely happen, and you will want to come back.”

Peterson reminded the crowd that alumni played a pivotal role in bringing master’s-level programs to Metro and securing funding for the new science building. And there would be more work to do in the future, he added.

“Our voices as alumni and our contributions make a difference,” he said. “Please stay connected.”

But they hoped their voices would be heard someplace warmer: Arizona.

Students from Metro, CCD and UCD marched from Auraria to the steps of the state Capitol to show solidarity with students across Colorado and the nation April 29 to protest Arizona Senate Bill 1070. The legislation was signed a week earlier by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer to strengthen state enforcement of immigration laws.

“[The bill] represents another tool for our state to use as we work to solve a crisis we did not create and the federal governments has refused to fix: the crisis caused by illegal immigration and Arizona’s porous border,” Brewer said.

Metro student Richard Paris, 26, yells passionately in response to a speaker at a large student protest at the State Capitol Building April 30 in Denver. Hundreds of students walked out of high schools and colleges around Denver starting at about noon and converged at the Capitol by 3:30 p.m. Photo by Leah Millis

The Auraria students met with several hundred high school and middle school students from Denver Public Schools at the Capitol to hear speakers from Padres Unidos Jovenes Unidos, an organization pushing for comprehensive immigration reform.

Victor Galvan, a CCD freshman who worked with Padres Unidos Jovenes Unidos to organize the Auraria march, said the protest was organized because the Arizona bill will lead to racial profiling of Hispanic people in Arizona.

“We saw that Arizona was trying to pass this bill, and it snuck up on us like no other,” Galvan said. “In one week, we heard it had passed through the Senate, and then the next week it passed the House. The undocumented population is fleeing Arizona in fear that they will be deported.”

Galvan said police will have no choice but to profile people by race during traffic stops and routine arrests because the majority will be Spanish-speaking.

“They’re supposed to be looking for undocumented immigrants, but what does an undocumented immigrant look like?” he said. “A large part of the Spanish-speaking community won’t report crimes to the police because they will be afraid they will be forced to show identification, and this, in turn, will further hurt the community.”

UCD recording arts student Jordan Duran said he attended protests in 2006 while he was in high school but he didn’t really know much about the details of immigration reform.

“When I came to Auraria, I learned that if students work hard, they can accomplish a lot,” Duran said. “I’m part of this march so more students can get the opportunities I received.”

Galvan agreed that previous efforts at reform offered many lessons for the current push to change the process for U.S. citizenship.

CCD freshman Victor Galvan, 19, leads chants April 30 as hundreds of high school and college students march with him down Speer Boulevard toward the Colorado State Capitol. Galvan is a coordinator and a organizer for Political Active Ztudents, an Auraria advocacy group. Photo by Leah Millis

“We saw a huge push for comprehensive immigration reform in 2006, but there was no organization afterward,” Galvan said. “I feel that in the last four years we have learned from that experience. We are more organized and we are utilizing more techniques to get people involved.”

At the Auraria flagpole gathering, Galvan warned protesters to be on the look-out for members of the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps, a group advocating for an increase of border security through volunteer patrols, civil protest, demonstration and political lobbying.

“We expect Minutemen to be there. They were there in 2006, trying to antagonize us,” Galvan told the crowd. “Our biggest tool to overcome their attempts is to lock arms-in-arms as we march. Remember, this is a peaceful protest.”

At the Capitol, members of the Colorado State Patrol patrolled on bicycles, but there was no sign of counter-protest.

State Trooper E.P. Padilla said if there were Minutemen at the Capitol, he hadn’t seen them.

“The rally was very peaceful,” Padilla said. “Everyone acted responsibly.”

The contingency plan to keep higher education institutions accessible and affordable has been all but passed by the Colorado Senate.

Senate Bill 10-03, Higher Education Flexibility, is sponsored by Majority Leader John Morse, D-Colorado Springs, and Minority Leader Josh Penry, R-Grand Junction.

The bill is the proposed solution for higher education to be able to compensate for large decreases in state funding. And the sponsors are confident the proposal will be passed by the legislature.

“If it were to fail — which it won’t — then we don’t have a contingency plan and we will be going on hope and prayer,” Morse said.

Morse said an analysis of next year’s budget, put together by legislative council, shows approximately $600 million will need to be cut from the general fund, a large chunk of which would come from higher education.

“It is reasonable to plan for the possibility that we would have to take 50 percent of that cut from higher education, about $300 million,” Morse said.

Higher education as a whole receives approximately $600 million in funding from the state. It is also an area of the budget that is not constitutionally protected from cuts.

“We are talking about keeping together a system of higher education. That doesn’t happen for free,” Morse said.

There are only four sources of funding for higher education; tuition, philanthropic, state and federal, Morse said. Tuition is the only revenue stream that has not dried up with the economic downturn.

Under the new legislation, schools would be allowed to increase tuition rates by 9 percent without any additional approval from the state. If an institution wanted, or needed, to raise their tuition more than 9 percent, they would be required to submit a proposal to the Colorado Commission on Higher Education, outlining how the additional revenue would be used.

The proposal would also be required to outline how the school would insure that the increase would not limit the access or affordability to low and middle-income students.

Another provision in the bill takes away the requirement for schools to set aside 20 percent of a tuition increase for financial aid.

Morse said even with the removal of the 20 percent provision, the plans schools will submit to CCHE will ensure students are still given the financial aid they need.

“If we have to raise tuition, how can we make sure, those who really can’t pay the increase, really don’t have to,” Morse said.

Frank Waterous, a senior policy analyst for the Bell Policy Center, said the nonpartisan organization reluctantly supports the legislation.

“We see this as the lesser of two policy evils,” Waterous said. “Putting the financial burden on families and students is not a winning strategy.”

A five-year sunset clause was added to the tuition flexibility piece of the bill, something Waterous said he sees as the legislature acknowledging this is a short-term solution to bridging the funding gap.

The acceptance of the 9 percent raise is also troubling to Waterous.

“For many years, 9 percent was a reluctantly reached ceiling. It is still a big increase, and we hope there will be more discussion,” he said.

Penry maintains market forces will ultimately discourage schools from utilizing large tuition increases.

“Ultimately, students vote with their feet. If a college or university gets too far out of whack in pushing tuition increases, they will put themselves at a significant competitive disadvantage to the school that manages their tuition increases more thoughtful,” Penry said.

The bill was passed on second reading in the Senate May 4 and is scheduled for a third and final reading May 5. The bill will then go to the house and if it passed there, to Gov. Bill Ritter to be signed into law.

Ft. Hays State University, located in Kansas, and Metro have signed a deal guaranteeing all qualified business graduates expedited admission to Ft. Hays’ MBA program. Metro will be implementing limited master’s degree programs in Fall 2010, but an MBA is not on the list.

“The new agreement with Metro, which also believes in the accessibility of higher education, will help their business graduates advance in their careers with a minimum delay between the undergraduate degree and beginning their work on their MBAs,” Ft. Hays President Edward H. Hammond said in a news release.

The fast-track admission is for all business graduates, past and present. All previous graduates from Metro’s business program are grandfathered into the agreement.

Ft. Hays offers their MBA program online and on-campus. Tom Gaschler, director of the Denver office, said the tuition rate is very reasonable for the program.

An MBA from Ft. Hays costs approximately $12,000, half the cost of the program at Regis or University of Denver, Gaschler said.

Tim Carroll, assistant director of media relations for Metro said the agreement marks an effort for Metro to provide as many options as possible for graduating students.

“These types of agreements are driven to fulfill the diverse needs of our students,” Carroll said.

Carroll said the agreement was put into motion in March 2009 and the presidents have been working on the details.

Metro President Stephen Jordan has known Hammond for more than 16 years, Carroll said.

The signing ceremony was postponed twice due to inclement weather.

Gaschler said this is the first agreement between the two schools, but there are conversations being held about potential future agreements.

Ft. Hays has a strong alumni base in Colorado, with more than 25,000 living in the state.

And although there is no clear incentive for those alumni to chose Metro if they decide to return to higher education, Carroll said he hopes they will tap into what the college has to offer.

President ends term, welcomes replacement

With the results of the April student government assembly election (and all of the delays and technical hitches that plagued it) neatly filed into the archives, the Metro SGA turns its attention to a new session under new leadership.

But for Andrew Bateman, who served two years as student president, one year as vice president and one year as senator, the SGA chapter in his life comes to a close. Despite four years with the SGA, Bateman actually cites recent events as the accomplishment that brings him the most pride.

“I think it happened a couple of weeks ago when we received permission to register a paid legislative advocate for the students of Metro State,” Bateman said. “It is a battle I have been fighting since I became president. We fought legislators and lawyers, but with patience and perseverance, we prevailed. It is all too fitting that fulfilling that vision was one of my last acts.”

He said his experiences provided him with a lot of advice he could offer President-elect Sammantha O’Brien, most of which he plans to share privately. But he did warn about the dangers of letting extracurricular activities consume too much time and energy.

“She should make her job a high priority, but not the only priority, she must keep focused on her classes first and foremost,” he said.

O’Brien, who currently serves as the SGA director of administration and finance, has been critical of Bateman’s leadership.

“We used student money to buy new furniture, new televisions, to repaint the office and to go on expensive, luxurious retreats,” O’Brien said during the April 8 presidential candidate election. “Our internal management fails time and again to communicate.”

Although Katie Beals was appointed to an interim position on the student senate by Bateman, this appointment did not lead to a favorable impression of the president’s leadership style.

“My experience as a senator has been strained at best,” Beals said. “Andrew has never been open to ideas, suggestions, or feedback from the senators because ‘we aren’t in the office and couldn’t possibly know what goes on.’”

Beals said Bateman has apologized for any “real or preconceived hostility” but she still found his behavior off-putting.

“Andrew threatens to veto most ideas put forward unless he is involved or has written it himself. In addition, I have had a few heated conversations with Andrew in which he insults my general intelligence and my knowledge of SGA,” she said. “I have personally had no pleasant interactions with Andrew and find him to be aggressive and a failure of a leader.”

Other members of SGA were more guarded in their impressions of Bateman.

“I can say that I honestly hope Andrew has left a footprint on the SGA that others will not only strive to fill but to grow further,” former Director of Public Relations Amanda Splitt said. “He may not have always handled things as many people around him may have wanted, or even expected; however he did take risks and his heart was in the right place. The next SGA president has more to learn from him then they may give him credit for.”

Speaker of the Senate Hashim Coates said he had heard stories before he joined the SGA about how difficult Bateman was to work with.

“But after working with him for over a year, I was able to form my own opinion,” Coates said. “Not only did I find him to be difficult to work with on ideas outside of his (he does have good ideas at times); I found him to be manipulative, deceitful, selfish, underhanded and, at times, he throws tantrums like a child.”

Coates said Bateman would have been a decent president if he had been more sincere and honest while also being less controlling.

“There is definitely room and a need for growth for Mr. Bateman,” Coates said. “I know this may come off harsh, but I find that there are few students that give honest feedback.”

Student Trustee Kailei Higginson said Bateman has received enough press during his time as SGA president.

“In so much as The Metropolitan is the paper of record, time and effort should be spent on covering what students want rather than giving a goodbye hug and kiss to the outgoing SGA president,” Higginson said.

Bateman said during his time as president, the SGA has delivered more of what the students have wanted.

“We have moved from being a reactionary body, responding primarily to the requests of the college, to a proactive body, fighting for the needs of the students, both on campus and off,” Bateman said.

Bateman said he has no intention of attempting to influence the direction of the SGA but he will be happy to provide counsel if needed.

“With the encouragement of my department chair and other trusted voices, I have decided to pursue a graduate degree and career in public policy,” he said. “What shape that will take, only time will tell.”

The speaker for the event, Metro speech communication professor Karen Lollar, discussed how all of the business ideas nesting in the minds of the audience could benefit from proper social networking etiquette.

Karen Lollar talks to students about social networking April 29 in Sigi's Cabaret. Photo by Chancey Bush

“Everybody is talking about networks, but networks are not a new phenomenon,” Lollar said. “Facebook and MySpace did not create the idea of networking. Social network analysis was around long before those online sites. Networking is something smart entrepreneurs, smart business leaders have been doing forever.”

Lollar, who holds a degree in business administration, focused her presentation on simple rules for face-to-face interaction that can help build a career or start a business.

Amanda Beard, president of the Metro Collegiate Entrepreneurship Organization, said Lollar was invited to speak so that students could collect some of tips for a successful business.

“The CEO club is here to help gather resources for business startup,” Beard said. “We fill in the gaps with whatever major you are in.”

“Each one of us is connected to about 250 people,” Lollar said. “Try to figure out the number of connections we have in this room. There might be some redundancy because some of us know each other so we might have some overlap. But we have a lot of connections right here in this room.”

Lollar encouraged the audience to keep a watchful eye for business opportunities wherever they go.

“Maybe the people down at the Starbucks, where you go and stand in line for 20 minutes to get your cup of coffee, but you get familiar with the people who are there at the same time, maybe you form a little network because you talk about what you’re doing,” Lollar said.

During the presentation, Lollar modeled a business introduction with Metro student Jesse Altum.

“Hi, Jesse, I’m Karen Lollar. Nice to meet you. That was a nice, firm handshake,” she said. “We don’t want an overly aggressive handshake where somebody says ‘oh, no!’ But we want it to be firm.”

Altum said he attended the event to refine his networking skills for building his engineering software business and his clothing design company.

“There were a lot of good ideas,” Altum said.

For more information about the Metro CEO, visit www.metroceo.org.

Additional reporting by Ben Wiebesiek

According to Detective Jason Mollendor, Auraria Police has made no arrests and has minimal witness information. Mollendor said they are attempting to find one possible witness described as being a white female, 18-21 years old, approximately 5 feet 5 inches tall with blond hair in a pony tail and wearing a blue, plaid shirt.

A Denver Police Officer leaves the women's bathroom where a gun accidentally discharged earlier this morning in South Classroom at Auraria Campus in Denver. Photo by Leah Millis

According to Chief John Mackey of Auraria Campus Police, the incident was initially reported as a bomb going off after students heard a loud explosion in the hallway. After arriving on scene, Auraria Police closed off the women’s bathroom and confirmed that the shot was an accidental discharge after inspecting the evidence. South Classroom was not put on lockdown because Auraria Police believed there was no further threat.

According to the Timely Notification Bulletin for Auraria Campus, at 10:13 am, the handgun was discharged from one of the stalls in the women’s restroom, hitting the drywall four inches above the floor.

Auraria Police Officer Peet pauses outside the women's bathroom where a gun accidentally discharged earlier this morning while talking to fellow officers in South Classroom at Auraria Campus in Denver. Photo by Leah Millis

Jackie Stewart, a junior at Metropolitan State College, said that when she heard the sound from the gun shot she didn’t believe that it was a gun that had been fired because other students in her class were not alarmed.

“There wasn’t anybody running around and nobody was screaming,” Stewart said. “That’s why we didn’t think it was a gun shot; it didn’t sound harsh enough”

Chief Mackey reported that one girl, who was in another stall, in the women’s restroom, was hit by plaster that shattered when the bullet was lodged into the wall and another student was hit in the ankle, by plaster, when walking past the stall; but there are no real injuries.

The bathroom was reopened by noon after the Auraria Campus Maintenance Facilities fixed the damage left by the bullet.

Auraria Campus does not allow concealed weapons on campus and if the suspect is found, she will be facing consequences through her attending school and may also face municipal charges.

“Unfortunately, from time to time, there will be weapons on campus,” Mackey said.

Two Denver Police Officers walk through the Plaza Building in search of a female student who discharged a gun earlier this morning in South Classroom at Auraria Campus in Denver. Photo by Leah Millis

Auraria Campus sent out an emergency alert via text message informing students and faculty of the incident, stating the discharge from the gun was accidental and that there were not further threats.

Detective Mollendor urges anyone with information about the incident, or any suspicious behavior to report it to the Auraria Campus Police Department.

B-cycle is a program that allows the people of Denver to rent a bicycle instead of walking to work or driving their car. There are 50 stations in Denver that house 500 state-of-the-art bicycles.

“The B-cycle bikes have cruiser style frames and feature either three or eight speeds, lights for night riding, and a front basket that can hold up to 30 pounds of cargo,” Denver B-cycle employee Parry Burnap said. “The bikes are also equipped with a data-tracking system that records mileage, calculates the calories burned each ride and even analyzes carbon offsets. B-cycles are brilliant, state-of-the-art Internet and digital technology.”

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper attributed the B-cycle starting point to a similar plan from the 2008 Democratic National Convention. The DNC program titled Free Wheeling, recorded more than 6,500 instances of bike sharing. Free Wheeling riders traveled more than 26,000 miles in five days.

“I think that for that legacy to get transformed into a large-scale program, it is a tremendous benefit,” Hickenlooper said.

With hundreds of bicyclists and spectators in attendance, Hickenlooper introduced the B-cycle program April 22 at the Denver Civic Center.

“This is the first day of a revolution,” Hickenlooper said. “[Denver residents] are already perfectly and naturally situated. We have 300 days of sunshine and 350 miles of bike paths.”

Hickenlooper cut the ribbon on the B-cycle program that will lead the way to a future with “less pollution, less cars, less traffic and healthier lifestyles,” B-cycle President Bob Burns said.

With 50 B-cycle stations across Denver, one location is still not on the map. AHEC was approached in the fall of 2009 by B-cycle with an offer to have a location on campus.

“The campus executives were very supportive of the proposal,” AHEC Campus Planner Jill Jennings Golich said. “They decided against it because there was no real possible way of having a station on campus at that time.”

Graphic courtesy of Denver B-cycle LLC.

Jennings Golich said there were a lot of safety issues to consider. “With the no-ride laws on campus and Colfax right on the other side of the light rail station it just wasn’t safe to have a station there,” she said.

Even though there isn’t a station on campus, two stations are relatively close. One is located at the Pepsi Center and the other is at Speer Boulevard and Lawrence Street.

“B-cycle represents a great opportunity for the city of Denver to expand mobility options and we hope that the campus will be a part of a future phase,” Jennings Golich said.

At the induction ceremony of B-cycle in front of the Wellington E. Webb Municipal Office Building, Hickenlooper stressed the importance of lowering carbon emissions and volatile organic compounds as well as the need for exercise. He said it may take a while for people to get used to the program and for people to start using B-cycle on a regular basis.

“We need you all to go out there and fan the fires of revolution,” Hickenlooper said.

Even though the “fires of revolution” have made their way past Auraria, many students and faculty members remain positive.

“I wouldn’t use it because I commute here, but I think it would be great for students that live downtown,” Metro student Kyle Danaher said.

Jonny 5, emcee of the Denver band, Flobots, donned a bike helmet at the downtown event, which he described as a cultural milestone.

“We are talking about a culture shift and that is why today is so exciting,” he said. “Culture shifts happen in small steps and they involve the community.”

Campus Sustainability Director Andy Pattison said AHEC chose not to enroll in the B-cycle program because it would have caused an increase in student tuition at Metro, UCD and CCD.

“We were disappointed that we couldn’t figure out all the space and legality issues, but we’re confident that we will get a bike share program sometime in the future,” Pattison said.

College administrators hoped to have graduate program approval after an April 19 meeting of a 26-member council in Chicago responsible for reviewing college courses.

The Institutional Actions Council, the decision making body of the Higher Learning Commission, did not address Metro programs in the meeting agenda because there wasn’t time to review an April 9 report from the Colorado Department of Education.

The HLC, an independent corporation and accreditation body of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, sent a three-member team Feb. 1 to assess Metro’s proposed graduate programs.

Based on the results of the site visit, a recommendation for accreditation will be passed on to Institutional Actions Council, which will meet again June 14.

Accreditation from the HLC, which reviews degree-granting education institutions in a 19-state region spanning Arizona to West Virginia, is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. A failure to secure HLC accreditation would affect the employability of Metro graduates.

Andrew Lootens-White, vice president for accreditation relations with the HLC, said there was not a set schedule for approval of Metro’s graduate-level programs, but Metro was approaching each step appropriately.

“From my perspective, the college has been very responsible about the timelines and working with the different organizations involved, but sometimes there are just issues synchronizing the timelines,” Lootens-White said. “We had everything in place but we had to wait for official state approval to move forward. We need that finalized before we can take action.”

He said Metro administrators have worked to avoid building up unreasonable expectations from prospective graduate students.

“We wouldn’t want students to get caught in the lurch in the rare occasion that their program doesn’t get approval,” Lootens-White said.

The graduate program initiative has already cleared two other hurdles within the last 12 months. In May 2009, Gov. Bill Ritter signed House Bill 1295 allowing Metro to “offer master’s degree programs that address the needs of its urban service area.”

Then, at a Nov. 4 meeting, the Metro Board of Trustees, the governing body of the college, approved the three master’s degree programs to be offered.

Despite the delays, Metro spokeswoman Cathy Lucas said the college is still on track to launch the accounting and teacher education programs in fall 2010 and the social work program in fall 2011.

This year’s event featured short video segments on the theme of the “Impact of Involvement” from 20 students and faculty discussing their personal experiences working inside and alongside Metro classrooms.

Metro President Stephen Jordan also spoke in a video message to congratulate the award winners on their contributions and hard work.

“My career today is about being involved at a local level and seeing how powerful that involvement can be in changing people’s lives,” he said.

Jordan said he couldn’t attend the event because he was in Indianapolis for a Division II college presidents’ meeting.

The ceremony was organized into six sections for awards for student organizations, student employees, student athletes, community volunteers, overall leadership and awards by class standing.

The Metro Political Science Association won for educational event of the year for the group’s time, involvement and organization of the 2010 Model Arab League, which allowed students to experience the choices and conflicts facing leaders of Middle Eastern nations.

Dean Wilson won for student employee of the year for what was described in his nomination as his “trustworthy, thorough and insightful” work at the office of student aid.

Paul Benevides won the student involvement and leadership award for his social work with Kairos Prison Ministry mentoring prison inmates and ex-offenders with the transition and integration back into society.

“The college experience is not only about receiving an education and learning, but it is also about becoming aware of who you are,” Benevides said. “It’s about defining who you are and achieving your potential. More importantly, it’s a time of growing and stretching yourself and when you do that, you take lead of your life thus becoming a leader for yourself and others.”

Benevides said the award ceremony was a way for leadership efforts to be recognized and praised by peers, colleagues and other leaders.

Contributions on Metro sports teams were also recognized with Amy Watanabe winning female student athlete of the year for her role on the volleyball team. Patrick Laughlin was presented with the male student athlete of the year for his leadership on the Metro soccer team.

Phi Sigma Sigma won student organization of the year for the sorority’s improved retention of new members and its work with the National Kidney Foundation.

“System failure.” “Perfect storm.” “Plagued with glitches.” “Deeply frustrating and regrettable.”

These were some of the phrases used to describe the April 9–16 outage of the Metro e-mail system — and that was how college officials felt about the situation. Across Auraria and throughout the extended campus, Metro students, staff and faculty voiced anger, impatience and confusion on technical problems that plunged one of the college’s main lines of communication into darkness. As the Metro Division of Information Technology investigates errors that transformed a planned weekend upgrade into a frantic week of troubleshooting, questions remain regarding the timing, scale and impact of the e-mail outage.

To read professor reactions, click here: Blackout angers Metro professors

To read comment submissions and results from The Metropolitan survey, click here: I.T. outage survey

Emergency workers toiled through the night April 14 to reunite Metro students, staff and faculty with their missing e-mails.

To read comment submissions and results from The Metropolitan survey, click here: “I.T. outage surveyXXStaff members with the Metro Division of Information Technology, working with consultants from SunGard Data Systems, Inc., completed a migration of all Metro e-mail accounts to new software.

Interim Vice President of Information Technology Steve Beaty said the transfer of e-mail accounts was part of a planned outage for the college computer networks and included an upgrade for MetroConnect. However, the e-mail outage lasted several days longer than expected due to technical issues.

“To get everybody’s e-mail back up, we spent the night inputting 20,000 student e-mail accounts into [Google’s] Gmail, by hand,” Beaty said.

Director of IT Infrastructure Services Joseph Lamers said any large-scale integration of new software could run into glitches.

“We’ve had people here around the clock since Friday afternoon (April 9),” Beck said. “The integration of the e-mail system upgrade and the MetroConnect upgrade, and this is not an excuse, if it isn’t the most complicated thing we have going, it’s pretty close.”

In an April 19 letter, Metro President Stephen Jordan apologized for the impact the outage had on the ability of faculty and staff to work and to communicate effectively.

“I want to make sure that everyone understands that the time planned for the April 9-12 outage was the only time frame the college’s academic calendar would allow the system to be down without impacting course registration and other college online business,” Jordan wrote in the letter.

Graphic by Drew Jaynes

Jordan accepted responsibility for the decision on when to start the system upgrade; a decision he made after discussions with the college’s vice presidents about the anticipated impact of the outage.

“Over the last six weeks, we communicated the planned outage through (the electronic bulletin service) @Metro, personal announcements, e-mails and in many meetings throughout the campus,” Jordan said.

Director of IT Application Services Rick Beck said Metro had been planning the upgrades for more than a year, but the college had difficulties securing the necessary contracts with outside vendors.

“There was a misunderstanding with the state purchasing office,” Beck said. “They thought we were trying to work around the rules they have for soliciting bids from contractors. But it was just a misunderstanding because Metro was following the rules all along.”

Once the confusion was cleared up, the project was pushed back from the 2009 Thanksgiving break timeline the IT department division originally planned on, he said.

In an April 15 e-mail to college instructors, Metro Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Vicki Golich called on faculty members to work patiently with students to finish coursework despite the week’s e-mail outage.

“Likewise, you may have e-mailed an assignment that [students] couldn’t/didn’t receive, and therefore couldn’t/didn’t complete,” Golich wrote in the e-mail.

Jordan praised the IT Division for working 24 hours a day, seven days a week to correct the e-mail problem.

“I want to thank IT for their hard work during this critical time,” Jordan said. “Even Google was ‘shocked’ that IT was able to create 50,000 new e-mail accounts in such a short amount of time. In fact, Google asked if they could share our success story through Twitter.”

After a long week troubleshooting the e-mail outage, Beaty was looking forward to upcoming IT projects involving smaller degrees of uncertainty.

“The focus is going to shift back to things like supporting the academic labs and updating [Microsoft] Internet Explorer on the computers,” Beaty said.

Metro teachers are “outraged” over the loss of their primary mode of communication and many have already experienced academic consequences.

As the extended outage continues, more professors are nervous they will not be able to contact students through their old e-mail accounts, which have not been fully synced with the new e-mail system.

In a survey given to faculty by The Metropolitan, numerous respondents said they have lost archived e-mail, missed critical conference calls and experienced delays in their old system, which they continue to use.

Faculty members have also stated confusion and frustration about the timing of the e-mail upgrade with some calling the delay “embarrassing” and damaging to Metro’s reputation.

Metro’s Information Technology Division does not have an expected date for completing the e-mail merger. Of the 94 faculty members who responded the question of how they reacted to the loss of communication in their classroom, the top three chosen responses included handing out printed material, using personal e-mail and postponing lectures and assignments. Others used the Blackboard Vista system and only two professors stated they cancelled class.

Not all faculty and staff members are satisfied with the written apology issued by Metro President Stephen Jordan.

A professor, who chose to be unnamed, said the apology shows a disregard for the teachers’ regular workloads, time and effort.

Multiple professors out of the 79 who responded with their personal experiences said they want a full explanation of what happened and to see accountability in the administration.

When asked how the faculty has adapted to the communication loss, Accounting Chair Rick Crosser said, “I don’t think it’s adapting; I think it’s just tolerating.”

Crosser said his faculty remains resilient to the communication loss, but he said he has received only a few e-mails from his students.

“It seems like someone has missed the ball here,” Crosser said. “People are pretty frustrated about this.”

Crosser’s colleague, Doug Laufer, said it was disappointing that some of his students missed work opportunities and caused “professionally-awkward” situations. A student in his class who applied for summer employment could not concretely know if the employer had contacted him back because of the e-mail malfunction.

“I think students are getting less information than faculty,” Laufer said.

Laufer said he empathizes with the IT department for doing their jobs as quickly as possible, but believes administrators are out of touch with what matters for students and faculty.

English Department Chair Cindy Carlson said in an e-mail: “Let us say it has been spectacularly difficult and remains so well into the second week.”

Department of Health Professions Chair Nancy Shanks said in an e-mail: “This continues to be a disaster for us, we continue to not have access to what we need to do our jobs and we are all wasting tons of time trying to figure out where to look for things and what has been missed in the last 11 days.”

Adjunct Biology Professor Amanda Hannah said her frustration did not come from accessing her e-mail, but from losing MetroConnect-posted documents. Hannah said she used her Microsoft Outlook e-mail because it was quicker and did not expire after a long period of time.

“You have to have a plan B,” Hannah said. “[As a professor] you’re almost trained to anticipate any technological difficulty.”

Some faculty members are still unsure which e-mail system works completely and continue to use their old e-mail accounts. The IT department encourages teachers to use their old accounts to access previous information and start using the new accounts to continue e-mail.

The files that have been lost will continue to migrate into the Exchange accounts.