After suffering a second last-minute loss, the Irish do not need to learn how to win. U. Notre Dame simply needs to play “cleaner,” Irish coach Brian Kelly said in a press conference Tuesday.

“We’re all frustrated. We want to win football games,” Kelly said. “We need to play cleaner … They play hard. They played with great physical toughness. We played tough. We’ve got to play cleaner.”

By cleaner, Kelly was referring to Notre Dame’s three turnovers on Saturday, two inside the red zone, and defensive lapses that led to big plays for both Michigan and Michigan State in the past two weeks.

“It’s not not knowing how to win,” Kelly said. “It’s playing the game at a level that you don’t give up a 56-yard run or you don’t fumble the ball or turn it over in the red zone like we did twice.”

In the two losses, the Irish have given up four scores of 29 yards or longer, and turned the ball over three times in each game.

“We’ve got to make those plays,” Kelly said. “But you ask me why you see there’s light at the end of the tunnel, it’s those things we know that we can correct … They’re very correctable, but those are areas that we have to do a better job with, and those are the things that you can look back and go, hey, there’s some points that you left out there that would have made it a different game.”

Aside from the mistakes that led to those four long scores, Kelly said he has been pleased with the defense’s play, especially the effort shown going up against a Michigan State team that relies on the run.

“What I liked about our defense that will carry the day is they played tough when tough was required, and that’s what we’ve been preaching,” he said. “Be tough gentlemen.”

Those “tough gentlemen” took Saturday’s loss personally, Kelly said, and that fact encouraged him.

“This group, [losing] hurts,” he said. “They want to win, and that’s why for me we just kind of stick with what we’ve been talking about since day one, and that’s stay together.”

Jamoris Slaughter update

Junior safety Jamoris Slaughter sprained his ankle during the season-opener against Purdue. Slaughter missed the second half of that game, all of the game against Michigan and only played two plays against Michigan State.

But, this week’s depth chart has Slaughter listed as a starting safety, and Kelly said he would stand by that expectation.

“[Slaughter] moved around a lot better,” Kelly said after practice Tuesday. “I’m very confident, after watching him move around today, that we’re going to have him ready for Saturday.”

While Slaughter was sidelined &- along with fellow junior safety Dan McCarthy &- Notre Dame only had two healthy safeties. When sophomore Zeke Motta’s helmet was damaged Saturday, Slaughter was Notre Dame’s only option, Kelly said.

“Zeke had an equipment problem. Jamoris ran in the game without anybody putting him in the game,” Kelly said. “So he’s anxious to get back out there.”

U. Notre Dame students might wonder why the water from different campus drinking fountains may differ in taste. A drink of water from a drinking fountain in the Rock might taste quite differently than that from a fountain in DeBartolo or a residence hall.

Mike McCauslin, assistant director of the Risk Management and Safety Department (RMSD), the entity responsible for monitoring and sampling the University’s water supply, offered several explanations for the disparity in the taste of water from various drinking fountains.

“The taste of drinking fountain water depends on a variety of components,” McCauslin said. “Taste depends on the location of the well, the age of the pipe and the amount of time the water sits in the pipe.”

There are six wells serving the water system, all of which are located on the campus proper. The water is drawn from deep aquifers surrounded by substantial clay barriers that serve to protect the groundwater supply, according to the RMSD’s 2009 Annual Drinking Water Quality Report.

“The wells are high in minerals and, depending on the well, the iron and manganese levels can fluctuate,” McCauslin said. “When water sits in a pipe for an extended period of time, these minerals can precipitate out and cause this different taste.”

The change in taste may not please students, but McCauslin said it isn’t harmful.

“While these minerals might create an objectionable aesthetic in the water, they present no health concern and have no effect on the water quality,” McCauslin said.

RMSD carries out routine monitoring and sampling of water on campus for harmful contaminants and, together with Notre Dame’s Department of Facility Operations, has added filters on several drinking fountains &- all done just for aesthetic reasons.

According to Paul Kempf, director of utilities for the Office of Business Operations, his office works closely with RMSD to ensure the safety of campus drinking water.

“We don’t treat our water like most municipalities, which simply add chlorine,” Kempf said. “A lot of the research done on campus needs water without chlorine and we ensure quality by testing rather than adding chlorine.”

Water taste varies from individual to individual, particularly those with sensitive taste buds.

According to McCauslin, there is a step that students can take to improve the taste of water from the drinking fountains.

“Taste often depends on the frequency of use: the more you use the fountain, the better the water will taste,” McCauslin said. “Let the water run for 15 to 20 seconds and this should improve the taste.”

Sophomore Ryan Lynch has his preferences on where he gets his drinking water.

“I am not a big fan of some of the water fountains on campus and usually stock up on water bottles, but the ones in the dorms are alright and taste good,” Lynch said.

Others are not so willing to spend their money on bottled water.

“I try not to buy bottles of water so if the taste of the water from some fountains bothers me, I just get it from the dining hall,” senior Shannon Coyne said.

Five students received awards Sept. 14 during the annual accounting awards reception held in Stapleton Lounge in Le Mans Hall at Saint Mary’s College.

The students were recognized for their achievements within the accounting department at the College.

The awards were given to one junior and four seniors to recognize outstanding achievement in the principles of accounting, intermediate accounting, public accounting, accounting leadership and personal and corporate tax.

Junior Peggy Dobihal was the recipient of the Bridget Anderson/KPMG Award. Dobihal said the award was given to the student with the highest grade in both principles of financial accounting and principles of managerial accounting.

“I feel truly blessed that God has given me the intelligence necessary to succeed here at Saint Mary’s, and I am honored that I was chosen to receive this award,” Dobihal said.

Senior Betsy Reed received the PricewaterhouseCooper Award for accounting leadership.

According to Reed, she received the award due to her involvement on campus, within the Business and Economic Department and her strong grade point average (GPA).

“It was an honor to win an award and be in the presence of professors and their alumnae committed to academic success and who have been successful in their accounting careers,” Reed said.

In addition, senior Maureen Temchuk won the Deloitte Award.

Temchuk said the award was for the student who had the highest average grade in two semesters of intermediate accounting.

“It was a great honor to receive this award because it was a validation of all the hard work I put into both my major and the intermediate courses,” Temchuk said.

Senior Marianne Jones was awarded the Crow Horwath Award for the highest grades in personal and corporate tax.

“It was a really nice ceremony, and it was a great honor to receive an award from the accounting program,” Jones said.

Senior Amanda Gajor was the recipient of the Ernst & Young award.

Gajor said the award was for the student who was most likely to succeed in public accounting. The student who received the award was the most well rounded who performed well across the board in accounting classes.

“It was exciting to know that all the hard work I put in was recognized,” Gajor said.

She said the award pushes her to succeed.

“It gave me motivation,” Gajor said. “It makes me want to succeed more because I have people behind me believing in me.”

Though only a few students receive awards each year, the majority of the accounting students attend the reception, Jones said.

“The Saint Mary’s accounting awards ceremony is a great tradition,” Temchuk said. “It allows others to recognize those students who have gone above and beyond in their time at Saint Mary’s. The faculty is devoted to their students and love giving outstanding student achievement the opportunity to shine. It’s that devotion that makes our school such a special place.”

Starting Oct. 1, 2011, Northwestern U. will start having to share its “NU” moniker with a new in-conference foe – Nebraska. And that’s just the start of changes coming now that the Big Ten’s membership has moved even further from its name.

The addition, announced in June, boosts Big Ten membership to 12 schools, enough to satisfy NCAA requirements for a conference championship game for football.

“(Nebraska) is a strong university and obviously a tremendous brand when you look at sports across the board, including football, with multiple national championships, multiple Heisman trophy winners,” Northwestern Athletics Director Jim Phillips said. “They have similar values to our schools in the Big Ten. It’s a tremendous addition for us as a conference.”

It’s the first time that the Big Ten has expanded since it went beyond its namesake and added Penn State to the football schedule in 1993. Phillips said newcomer Nebraska could be just as strong for the conference.

But despite the addition, the conference has no plans to change its name, Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delanysaid. There is a new logo on the way, tentatively scheduled to be unveiled in December, he said.

Conference divided

The expansion means the Big Ten will be split into two divisions for football, a first in conference history. The winners of each division will meet in a championship game, starting with the 2011 season.

NU will join Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota and Nebraska. The other division features Illinois, Indiana, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue and Wisconsin. The names of the divisions have not yet been decided.

Delany and the athletic directors of the 12 member schools had three criteria for splitting the divisions, Delany said. Most importantly, they strived to make the divisions as equally competitive as possible. Next, they sought to preserve traditions and rivalry games. Finally, they considered geography, “but not to the extent that it would dilute” the other two, he said.

To ensure competitive balance, the directors looked at each school’s record over the past 17 years – dating back to when Penn State started Big Ten play.

The teams with the best records were Nebraska, Ohio State, Michigan and Penn State, Delany said. Next were Iowa and Wisconsin. NU fell in the bottom tier, joined by Illinois, Indiana, Michigan State, Minnesota and Purdue.

Phillips said the Wildcats were most closely paired with Michigan State, despite the fact that the schools were placed in the same division.

As for the geography, most of the schools in NU’s division are in the northwest, while most of the schools in the other division are in the southeast.

With the new divisions comes a new conference schedule, in which each school plays every other school in their division each year, in addition to three schools from the other division.

The directors gave each school one protected cross-division rivalry that will be played every year, preserving such traditional matchups as NU-Illinois and Michigan-Ohio State.

But while the Michigan-Ohio State game will be played on the last week of the season every year, the NU-Illinois game will be subject to random placement throughout the season.

Sophomore running back Arby Fields said “it would be cool” to play the game on the last week of the season.

“You know the other conferences, like UCLA and USC &- that’s what I’m used to &- you play it at the very end of the season,” he said. “It should be at the end of the season.”

While the 2011 matchup of NU and Illinois will be the conference opener for both schools, the Cats are scheduled to host the Illini for the teams’ last game of the conference slate in 2012.

League now ‘a lot harder’

NU catches something of a lucky break in beginning of the division schedule. Absent from the Wildcats’ schedule for the next two years are Ohio State and Wisconsin, two of the elite football programs of the conference.

Ohio State, currently ranked No. 2 in The Associated Press poll, has won the past five conference championships. Wisconsin, ranked No. 11, will likely return junior tailback and 2009 Big Ten Offensive Player of the Year John Clay as well as last year’s team-leader in receptions and receiving yards, junior Nick Toon.

While not having to play two top contenders for next year’s Big Ten championship might seem favorable, the junior quarterback Dan Persa said he would rather see how the Cats measure up against the conference’s best.

“I would like to get another shot at Ohio State,” said Persa, who last faced the Buckeyes during an ugly 45-10 home loss in 2008.

With Ohio State not on NU’s schedule the past two years and its continued absence for two more, Fields will never play against the Buckeyes unless the two teams meet in a conference championship game.

“That kind of sucks. We want to play those guys. You have your opportunity to go and compete and see where you’re at,” Fields said. “One of the reasons I wanted to come here was to play against Ohio State.”

While the Cats will not get their shots at the Buckeyes or Badgers the next two years, another powerhouse team, Nebraska, will become a regular part of the Cats’ schedule because they are in the same division.

“They’re a great team,” Persa said. “You find out how good you are when you play great teams like that. And Lincoln’s a special place. I’m looking forward to going there.”

Nebraska will enter the Big Ten after winning the Big 12 North Division last year and narrowly falling to Texas in the Big 12 title game. The Cornhuskers won three national titles in the 1990s and played in bowl games eight times over the past decade.

“This league just got a lot harder to win and a lot more difficult,” coach Pat Fitzgerald said of the addition.

NU will get its first crack at the Cornhuskers on Oct. 8 next year.

Financial impact unclear

Ultimately, the decision to add Nebraska did not come down to Phillips, Fitzgerald, or anyone in the athletic department, but rather the presidents of each member school, including NU president Morton Schapiro.

In an interview with THE DAILY in May, Schapiro said he took his role in the process very seriously because “a lot of people seem to think it’s extraordinarily important to the future of college sports in this country.”

Schapiro and the other presidents voted unanimously to add Nebraska, as well to approve the new divisions.

It’s believed that they chose the Cornhuskers partly because they were the Big 12 team most willing to join the Big Ten (an early media favorite, Missouri, ultimately committed to staying in the Big 12). Nebraska’s membership in the Association of American Universities was also considered; the Big Ten is the only conference in the country whose members are all also AAU members.

But nobody except for the college presidents know the exact thinking behind the pick.

Another mystery, for now, is the ultimate financial impact of Nebraska’s addition. While it’s obvious that the move will noticeably increase revenue, the specifics are not yet clear, Phillips said.

Delany said he hopes the expansion as well as the creation of a conference championship game will increase the appeal of the Big Ten.

“It’s going to create a lot of new interest and I wouldn’t be surprised to see both the people who watch us on TV go up in number as well as the people who come to our games,” Delany said. “I think it’s a better product as a result of Nebraska being in the Big Ten.”

And if expansion is such a positive, are more teams on the way? Maybe, but not now, Delany said at Big Ten Media Day in August.

“We’ll pause, but we’re not necessarily turning our backs on expansion,” he said. “We said we wanted to study it for twelve to 18 months, when we’re only about six months into that study.”

Three walk-ons earn athletic scholarships for 2010-11 academic year

Senior long snapper John Henry Pace, junior defensive lineman Andrew Struckmeyer and junior cornerback Ricky Weina, all three walk-ons, have been awarded athletic scholarships for the 2010-11 academic year, according to a news release Tuesday from the Northwestern Athletics Department.

Pace, in his second year as a long-snapper, and Weina, a backup cornerback, have both received significant playing time, while Struckmeyer has excelled as a practice squad player.

The two juniors and senior join a history of former walk-on players at NU, including former wide receiver Zeke Markshausen, who earned All-Big Ten honors last year after leading the team with 91 receptions, and junior running back Jacob Schmidt, who has seen significant playing time this year.

Senior Corbin Bryant named to Good Works Team for off-field activity

The Northwestern Athletics Department announced Tuesday that senior defensive tackle Corbin Bryant was named to the Allstate American Football Coaches Association Good Works Team.

Bryant and 10 others were selected out of a field of 112 nominees.

The award complements what has been a career year on the field thus far for Bryant. He has compiled three-and-a-half tackles for loss, a forced fumble and an interception in just three games.

Bryant, who has already graduated and is now pursuing postgraduate studies, is one of four Big Ten athletes to make the team. He’s a three-time Academic All-Big Ten winner, the president of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc., and has volunteered with numerous organizations, including Dance Marathon and Evanston Special Olympics.

On a team level, Bryant is one of four captains and is also a two-year member of NU’s 10-player Leadership Council.

This marks the fifth straight year a Wildcat has been named to the team, as Bryant joins Andrew Brewer (2009), Eric Peterman (2008), Adam Kadela (2007) and Joel Howells (2006).

The movies at After Hours Movie Rentals aren’t for rent anymore.

Neon sale prices adorn thousands of films on the walls of the independent movie rental store at 915 Foster St., which plans to close the second week of October.

After Hours is the latest in a stream of Evanston movie rental stores that have closed in the last few years, including Blockbuster and Cat’s Corner Video in Norris University Center.

These store closures demonstrate more of a national trend than a reflection of Evanston’s economic climate, said Marty Lyons, Evanston’s interim community and economic development director.

Corporate companies such as Blockbuster and Movie Gallery have closed stores nationwide as they try to compete against Redbox, a company offering movie rentals from vending machines, as well as Hulu and Netflix

Competition from Netflix and Redbox did not provoke the store’s upcoming close-out, After Hours co-owner Charlie Albin said.

“We totally knew what we were up against,” he said. “It has to do with operational costs.”

Despite the closures of local and corporate stores, video stores still survive in Evanston.

Video Adventure, 631 Chicago Ave., opened more than 20 years ago in Evanston and stays afloat by making its movie selection as diverse as possible, employee Sean Messer said.

The store stocks foreign films and other items requested by customers, Messer said.

“Being a specialty store helps a great deal,” he said.

After Hours, which opened in 2007, also maintained a customer base due to its wide variety of titles, Albin said.

“It’s like a movie museum,” Albin said. “We’re geared toward whoever comes in.”

Longtime customer and Evanston resident Drew McMahon said he is disappointed by the closure.

“I like the selection,” he said. “Where else would I find (movies like) Battle Royale?”

However, subscribing to Netflix can sometimes be a better option. Weinberg freshman Natalia Zaldivar said she signed up for Netflix last month.

“I did it partly because the video store by my house was closing,” Zaldivar said. “I also thought it would be good for college.”

While movie streaming from Netflix can play a role in drawing away customers from movie rental stores, not everyone likes the newer services.

“We have customers who have Netflix coming in here,” he said, mentioning that Netflix users rent TV series from the store. “It’s like crack &- people don’t want to wait to watch the next episode.”

The turning point in Northwestern U.’s 30-13 triumph over Rice on Saturday came towards the end of the first half.

With the Owls backed up to their own nine-yard line, quarterback Trevor Cook, in for Nick Fanuzzi, tried to throw quickly to his left. Senior linebacker Quentin Davie stepped in front, picked it off, and ran it into the end zone to put the Wildcats ahead 13-0.

“It was a great feeling,” Davie said. “All I saw in front of me was the end zone.”

The interception marked Davie’s third of the season, after recording just one pick in his first three seasons at NU.

“He’s disciplined in his drop plans,” coach Pat Fitzgerald said. “He’s right where he’s supposed to be.”

And according to Davie, a little pressure from the defensive line hasn’t hurt.

“My defensive line is getting pressure on the quarterback and he’s having to make quick decisions,” Davie said. “I’m 6’4”, so I know he sees me. It’s my defensive line that makes him get rid of it quick.”

As Davie points out, the defensive line has made direct as well as indirect contributions to interceptions. The veteran linebacker points to a play late in the fourth quarter against Rice when senior defensive tackle Corbin Bryant tipped a ball into the air and sophomore safety Hunter Bates picked it off.

NU’s pressure has improved over the course of the season, and it’s no coincidence that the number of takeaways has increased as well.

In fact, the correlation between quarterback pressure and interceptions has been oddly precise. In the season opener versus Vanderbilt, the team recorded just one sack and one interception. Against Illinois State, NU took down the quarterback three times and hauled in three picks. And in Saturday’s game, the Cats notched two sacks and two interceptions.

In that home opener against Illinois State, NU recorded eight quarterback hurries, including three from sophomore defensive end Quentin Williams. Three of the team’s hurries led directly to interceptions.

The Cats have also forced three fumbles.

“We’ve gotten good pressure,” Fitzgerald said. “On the three picks this year, we hit the quarterback or got in his face and forced him to make a move.”

Several Wildcats are looking to break personal records this season. Junior defensive end Vince Browne is on pace for a career year with three sacks, four quarterback hurries and five tackles for losses so far. With three and a half tackles for losses, Bryant is also well on his way to breaking last year’s mark. And junior defensive tackle Jack DiNardo has impressed, posting three tackles for loss in his first season as a starter.

The stellar defense has helped motivate the offense. After the defense dominated the first half for NU, the offense rebounded from a sluggish start and put up 17 points in the second half.

“They were playing their butts off,” sophomore offensive guard Brian Mulroe said. “They were playing awesome. When they score, you know we love them scoring, but we need to be the ones scoring.”

The Mortar Board chapter at the U. Nebraska-Lincoln, known as the Black Masque chapter, received the Golden Torch Award for its service throughout the 2009-2010 school year. The group was nominated and then chosen by a panel of national volunteers appointed by the Mortar Board president. The award is given to chapters that distinguish themselves by going above and beyond the norm in fulfilling Mortar Board ideals.

– Kim Buckley, kimbuckley@dailynebraskan.com

Community Service:

Mortar Board is a national honor society that recognizes college seniors for their achievements. The organization stresses three ideals: scholarship, leadership and service.

The UNL chapter was one of 22 across the nation to receive the Golden Torch Award.

There are 228 Mortar Board chapters in the United States.

The group was presented with the award at the 2010 Mortar Board National Conference held in Chicago.

The panel was impressed by the amount of service the chapter completed during the previous year, said Alicia Notestone, communications manager at the Mortar Board national headquarters in Columbus, Ohio.

“I don’t think I could name an event they weren’t in,” she said.

Some of the events UNL’s 2009-2010 chapter participated in include Relay for Life, the Big Event and a wheelchair basketball tournament.

The current president of the Black Masque chapter, Corey Drvol, gave credit to the previous members of the chapter.

“It’s something we get to live up to and strive for this year,” said Drvol, a senior education and human sciences major.

As one of the three ideals of Mortar Board, service is something the members of the Black Masque chapter value.

“It gives us an opportunity to use what we’ve been given and give back to other students,” Drvol said.

The Mortar Board organization was founded in 1918 and the UNL chapter was chartered in 1921. The UNL chapter has 24 members this year.

Future Plans:

This year the chapter will be paired up with an elementary school for a reading buddy program. The members are also looking into creating new programs.

The Black Masque chapter will participate in a traditional gavel exchange with the University of Missouri-Columbia’s Friars chapter on Oct. 30.

At the UNL-Mizzou football game, the two chapters will meet on the field at half-time and exchange a gavel that the Friars chapter received when UNL played on their field. The Black Masque chapter will be wearing black masks and robes.

This might be the last exchange  with the Friars because UNL will be moving into the Big Ten Conference.

Some colleges and universities, including Rutgers U. and Penn State U., are reaching out to former students who left school before completing a degree. Offering academic forgiveness programs, the schools allow students to erase their previous GPA and start over with a clean slate.

Earl Hawkey, director of the U. of Nebraska-Lincoln’s Registration and Records, said UNL offers similar programs. However, unlike other universities’ programs which only offer academic forgiveness to returning dropouts, UNL’s program allows any student to reset their GPA.

“Some programs are based on the fact that a student has to leave before they can gain access to academic forgiveness. They have to be gone a certain amount of time first. The period varies. It can be eight or nine years, or just one or two,” Hawkey said. “The other type of program, which is what we have here, doesn’t require students to be gone for any length of time.”

Hawkey points to two programs in particular that returning UNL students with low grade point averages can take advantage of. The first is called academic bankruptcy. It allows a student to declare up to two terms as “bankrupt,” so all courses and credits in those terms are taken out of the GPA equation and do not count toward a degree requirement. The courses do still appear on the transcript, but are marked as academically bankrupt.

In order to qualify for this a student must either complete 15 credit hours with at least a 3.0 GPA, or 30 hours with at least a 2.5 GPA after the bankrupt semester.

Hawkey said this option is useful for students who had one or two bad semesters, but expect to do better.

“It’s a policy where a student needs to show that their performance in the term they want to bankrupt is not consistent with their abilities,” he said.

Another option Hawkey mentioned is repeating a course. If a student takes a course and gets a grade lower than a C, that student may retake the course for a higher grade. The original grade still appears on the transcript, but is taken out of the GPA calculation. There is no limit to the number of times a student may repeat courses.

Sean Kenney is one student who plans to take advantage of these programs to raise his GPA. A former general studies major, he dropped out of UNL after his freshman year and plans to return in the spring semester of 2011. He said he thinks UNL’s repeat policy is just as useful to him as the academic forgiveness programs of other universities’ would be.

“The classes that make my GPA lower are classes I’m planning to retake anyway for my degree,” he said.

He hopes to use the option of repeating courses to help raise his GPA, which will have several benefits for him.

“I screwed around for my first year and my parents told me they wouldn’t fund screwing around,” Kenney said. “I’m going back this spring semester with my own money. If I get my GPA up above a 3.0, my parents will pay for the rest.”

News of massive accounting fraud at HealthSouth broke in the spring of 2003. Headlines nationwide called attention to the billions in fraud and Securities and Exchange Commission investigations of top management. Two and a half years later, HealthSouth’s first chief financial officer, Aaron Beam, headed to prison for felony. This wasn’t how the story was supposed to go and Beam made sure that this was also not the end of the story.

“I will only be remembered as a felon, as the guy who cooked the books at HealthSouth,” Beam said Tuesday in a speech to students of the U. Nebraska-Lincoln College of Business Administration.

Beam co-founded HealthSouth, which would grow to be the nation’s largest provider of outpatient surgery and rehabilitative services, the largest company in Alabama and a Fortune 500 company.

With success came pressure; Beam compared this to a sports team when talking Tuesday at the Lied Center for Performing Arts. After a team wins its first five games, fans aren’t satisfied. They want the team to win all the games. In the business world, Wall Street and investors always wants good numbers, especially once a company is public (selling shares of ownership to new investors).

To please Wall Street, HealthSouth took a dangerous path that started with changing accounting numbers legally, but in ways that did not follow good accounting principles. This behavior was corrosive and unethical, Beam said, but at the time he didn’t look at it that way. He could live with the decisions he was making.

“Money will change you,” Beam said.

In 1996, HealthSouth faced the realization that there was no accounting trick that could create the revenue Wall Street wanted. Former CEO Richard Scrushy told Beam and his chief accountant that reporting bad numbers was not an option.  They made the decision to cook the books by creating false revenue and assets.

“I convinced myself that it’d be a one-time problem … it seemed like the better option because stock prices would stay up, investors wouldn’t get hurt and we wouldn’t do it a second time,” Beam said. “I almost immediately knew I had made a terrible mistake.”

Beam quickly went downhill. He couldn’t sleep. He began to drink more than he should and he didn’t like to go to work. As HealthSouth continued to cook its books, he knew he had to get out. After four financial quarters, he left.

“I didn’t want to keep doing the fraud,” Beam said. “My overall reason wasn’t for my overall financial benefit. I did it to please my boss, investors and Wall Street. That became very hollow because I couldn’t take any pleasure achieving criminal goals.”

He retired to southern Alabama and after selling his stock in HealthSouth, he bought 25 acres of land where he and his wife were going to build their ultimate retirement home, complete with a football field in the backyard.

At first, Beam jumped every time the phone or doorbell rang, sure that it was the FBI. As the years went by, he stopped worrying. He figured the fraud at HealthSouth had ended.

In March 2003, his life changed. He saw the evening news out of Birmingham, Ala. that a massive accounting fraud had been discovered at HealthSouth in the billions.

“My knees buckled. I couldn’t believe it. I was shocked. I had let myself believe the fraud had stopped. I knew my life wouldn’t be fun,” he said.

Beam turned himself in to the federal government and told them what he knew of the fraud.

He quickly learned that he could go to jail for up to 30 years and be fined massive amounts as he faced mounting legal fees. His wealth began to disappear. He no longer received retirement checks from HealthSouth. In his first meeting with his attorney, he signed over $100,000.

In Beam’s estimation, the scandal was the second biggest news story in the history of Birmingham. Day after day, it was front-page news. One morning he bought a newspaper and the clerk looked down at the paper and said, “That’s you, isn’t it?”

Beam replied, “Yes, that’s me.”

Ultimately, Beam pled guilty and was sentenced to three months in federal prison along with fines, monetary forfeiture and probation. Beam doesn’t know why he got such a light sentence compared to others involved.

“I feel like if I was objective, I’d think, ‘he didn’t get enough time,’ but I’m human, I didn’t volunteer to go to prison for any extra time,” Beam said. “Would it have served any purpose for me to serve longer? I don’t think so.”

Beam went to a federal minimum security prison.

“It’s humiliating and embarrassing to your family. You lose what you learned all your life, your freedoms.  You have no rights,” Beam said.  “I can’t imagine what it would have been like to be there for three or four years.”

After prison, Beam went to community college, got a degree in turf management and started a lawn mowing business. He’s working on trying to save enough money to re-retire. At his wife’s suggestion, he began speaking and sharing his story with others.

“I think others can learn from his story about the price someone has to pay for making the wrong decision,” said Janice Lawrence, an associate professor in the school of accountancy and director of the Business Ethics Program.

The College of Business Administration has brought in an ethics speaker in each year since 1998.

Stephen Busch, a sophomore management major, said he learned that ethics play a bigger role in the business world than he had realized.

“Greed and unethical business behavior was bigger than HealthSouth. It’s a massive problem throughout the fabric of the business culture,” Beam said. “I really hope that I will be a little message in the back of (the students’) heads all through their business careers, and when they are asked to commit fraud, they will remember my speech and it will be the tipping point to do the right thing.”