The committee to rename Cedar Hall — formerly Dunn Hall — delivered the final list of names to University of Oregon President Michael Schill on Wednesday.

The names were announced in the university’s official blog on Wednesday afternoon. Schill said candidates should be individuals who made significant contributions to UO or the state of Oregon; someone who had fought for justice and equality of Black people in Oregon along with a number of other requirements.

• One of the four candidates is a woman, Nellie Franklin, who was the first African-American woman to graduate from UO. She graduated with a degree in music in 1932.
• Derrick Bell came to UO from Harvard Law. He was president of the UO School of Law from 1980-1985. The law school has a lecture series named after the former president.
• DeNorval Unthank Jr. was the first African-American to graduate from the School of Architecture and Allied Arts. After graduating, Unthank Jr. worked on several projects in Eugene-Springfield, notably McKenzie Hall, the Lane County Courthouse and Kennedy Junior High School.
• DeNorval Unthank Sr. is the fourth candidate. While he was not associated with UO specifically, he was a prominent figure in the civil rights movement in Portland. At one time, he was the only Black doctor in the Portland area.

Frederic Dunn was a Grand Cyclops of the Ku Klux Klan, prompting the charge from Schill that the hall’s namesake be someone who fought for Black equality in a state stained by racism.

Schill is expected to bring a final name to the Board of Trustees in June.

**A previous version of this story said that President Schill narrowed the list to four candidates. The committee selected the final four candidates. The story has been updated to reflect the change.

The post Final four candidates for Dunn Hall renaming announced appeared first on Emerald Media.

Around 150 students gathered in the EMU Amphitheater in the Sunday sun. Men donned high heels and everyone danced to Beyoncé.

Alpha Chi Omega hosted the third annual In Her Shoes event to raise awareness about sexual assault and domestic violence. Participants walked a mile around the University of Oregon campus, finishing their trek at the AXO house where snacks for everyone and resources for survivors were available.

“High heels are no fun to walk in,” Sage Asher, Vice President of philanthropy for AXO said, “so while we are walking, it is kind of a reminder to start talking about the issue.”

AXO supports sexual assault and domestic violence awareness as its main cause, Asher said. In Her Shoes is a national event; however, AXO has put its own spin on the event over the last three years, giving all the proceeds to Womenspace, a local domestic violence service organization. Asher said the event raised over $1,000.

Alpha Chi Omega hosted the third annual In Her Shoes event on Sunday. (Christopher Trotchie/Emerald)

Before the walk began, Kasia Mlynski a staff attorney for the domestic violence clinic on campus addressed the crowd. She reminded everyone that this event was to raise awareness for anyone who sees the walk, not just people taking part.

“I hope it accomplishes awareness,” Mlynski said. “A lot of people think, ‘That’s not me. I don’t know someone in a domestic violence situation. That hasn’t impacted my life,’ when the reality is, it absolutely has […] the statistics prove that most likely, someone in your inner circle has been affected by domestic violence.”

Women wearing heels is a common sight; seeing men in them isn’t.

The one mile walk started in the EMU amphitheater and finished at the AXO house. (Christopher Trotchie/Emerald)

“It’s painful; It’s rough,” Jake Ledbetter, a freshman and member of Delta Tau Delta said about his shoes. “It’s not easy to stand around in heels.”

Another member of DTD, Ryan Seibold, said he felt he was “born to wear these wedges.”

“It’s not everyday you see a bunch of guys walking around in wedges and high heels,” he said. “It’s something that people get to enjoy while also spreading a positive message.”

Mlynski said she was glad men were coming out to show support, but she hopes they remember the purpose of the event.

“I think it’s a great show and a great effort. I really hope they take a minute to reflect on why they are walking a mile in heels,” she said. “To really think about how hard it is to be a survivor in our community.”

The post In Her Shoes event sees women and men walking in heels to raise awareness about domestic violence, hosted by AXO appeared first on Emerald Media.

The nine federally recognized Native Tribes of Oregon and the University of Oregon signed a memorandum of understanding Friday afternoon in the university’s Many Nations Longhouse. UO and the tribes have been working on the understanding for the last three years.

“I believe this is a historic day for UO and native students across the state and abroad,” Austin Green from the Confederate Tribes of Warm Springs said about the understanding. “I really think this is a great step forward on behalf of education.”

Mitchell Lira, UO sophomore and NASU member and Michael Schill presented Chairman Austin Green of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs a Pendleton wool blanket at the event. The blanket had a patch commemorating the MOU sewn to it.

The memo is a symbolically significant achievement for everyone involved, UO President Michael Schill said. While the understanding doesn’t lay out any specific steps, it creates a framework for how the university and the tribes will continue to work together in the future.

Schill told the crowd of about 30 that he believed UO is the number one university Native students in Oregon consider. He hopes this understanding will cement that belief in Native students across the state.

Beginning in fall 2017, Native students will have a new academic residential community, or ARC, a service that other minority students and people of color have had for years.

“When I was in the dorms, I didn’t have it,” Mitchell Lira, a member of the Warm Springs tribe and sophomore at UO said about the new program. “I was the only person of color on my floor … I feel like if I had it I would have done a lot better.”

Memorandum of understanding signed by all nine federally recognized tribes of Oregon. (Christopher Trotchie/ Daily Emerald)

Lira said that coming to the university from the reservation was a big culture shock. He said having Native resident assistants and classes for Native students is a “big deal.”

A memorandum of understanding was last signed between the tribes and UO 12 years ago, when the tribes signed on to build the Many Nations Longhouse. That understanding took five years to complete.

“This is just a cog in the wheel,” Chief Warren Brainerd said. “We are building on things that were started years ago … I think it’s a great thing and going to help all Native people to get educated. And the better educated we are, the better it is for everybody.”

Chief Warren Brainerd of the Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua, Siuslaw receives a blanket at the ceremony. Chief Brainerd stood in for Chairman Mark Ingersoll, who was unable to attend the event.

Chief Brainerd said he is happy that a dialogue is opening between Native people and non-Native people and he’s happy to get his people’s story out.

“We’ve been here all the time; we are a part of the community, and we will always be a part of the community,” he said. Brainerd is happy to have a conversation, even if he knows that what he has to say is sometimes unpopular.

“We were here before you got here,” he said. “We’re here now and we’re part of a community, and we’ll probably be here after you’re gone.”

The U.S. Census Bureau and UO Office of Institutional Research don’t report numbers of Native Americans specifically. Native Americans and Native Alaskans made up 1.8 percent of the population in Oregon in 2015 and 0.6 percent of students at UO in fall 2016.

Native students are not represented in large numbers on campus but are hopeful for the future.

UO President Michael Schill was gifted a blanket and a hand-beaded medallion by members of the delegation that attended the event. (Christopher Trotchie/ Daily Emerald)

“It makes me happy, and it’s good to see that it’s coming to play,” Lira said. “It’s something that has been talked about for a long time but it’s never happened, so it’s good that it’s finally making progress toward this and listening to what we have to say as Native people.”

Christopher Trotchie contributed reporting.

Follow Max on Twitter: @Max_Thornberry

The post University signs understanding with Native tribes appeared first on Emerald Media.

The International Student Association is hosting a carnival and giving away cotton candy in front of Knight Library. The carnival is part of I-Week.

“We wanted to do something fun that would get everybody instantly

ISA is giving away cotton candy in front of Knight Library. (Max Thornberry/Emerald)

involved,” Derek Bishop, director of International Week said. “We thought a carnival was good because, in the middle of the day, people would walk by and anybody could recognize what a carnival is and get involved.”

Students that want to enjoy the sun can play darts with velcro soccer balls and a giant inflatable dart board or jump in a bounce house.

Bishop said ISA has been working on I-Week since winter term. University of Oregon event services and local businesses have pitched-in to help out. ISA has raised more than $2,000 in sponsorships Bishop said.

International Week is designed to bridge the gap between domestic and international students. Both international and domestic events are teaching moments for students at UO, Bishop said.

“We’re trying to do cultural events and we feel that a carnival is a great cultural event for the U.S.,” Bishop said. “As much as we are doing things from around the world, we also want to bring the US into this too.”

The carnival is planned to run until 2 p.m.

The post Carnival offers international students taste of domestic culture appeared first on Emerald Media.

International Week kicked off with free small bubble tea in the EMU amphitheater. As soon as the table was set up, a line stretched into the 13th Avenue and University Street intersection.

Free bubble tea is the beginning of I-Week. (Max Thornberry/Emerald)

Every day this week, the International Student Association will host at least one event to “integrate international and domestic students,” Louyi Farestrand, president of the ISA, said.

“International students are [here] and deserve some recognition,” Farestrand said. The week works to help improve the relationship between international and domestic students he said.

Ione Gassner clutched her bubble tea and said that I-Week helps explain different cultures on the University of Oregon campus.

“I worked at a bubble tea store and I really like bubble tea,” Gassner said about why she came out Monday afternoon, “and it’s free, so why not?”

Gassner isn’t an international student but said she has lots of friends that are. She will also be attending the coffee hour on Friday evening.

Monday: Bubble Tea Giveaway, 12-2 p.m. EMU Amphitheater

Italian Pasta Cooking Class, 1-9 p.m. UO Catering Office

Tuesday: Active Challenge, 4-6 p.m. Turf Field 1

Wednesday: Carnival, 12-2 p.m. Memorial Quad

Salsa Dance Class, 7-8:30 p.m. Gerlinger 219

Thursday: Bubble Soccer, 4-6 p.m. Rec Court 1 and 2

Craft Center Workshop, 6:30-9 p.m. Ceramic Room of CC

Friday: Coffee Hour, 4-6 p.m. LLC Lawn

Movie Night, 7-9 p.m. Mills Center

Saturday: I-Night, 6-8 p.m. EMU Ballroom

The post International Student Association gives away bubble tea appeared first on Emerald Media.

Kneeling on a plank to protect her jeans from the muddy grass, Adriana Austin scrawls a message of hope for survivors of sexual assault. The Solidarity Project offers students at the University of Oregon a chance to do the same.

Adriana Austin shares her message with sexual assault survivors. (Max Thornberry/ Emerald)

“I stopped by because I think there’s not a lot of recognition for sexual assault victims,” Austin, a freshman at UO said. “I thought it was cool because it’s on campus and everyone can see it.”

Students walking down 13th Avenue, between Condon and Chapman halls, will notice a large 8-by-12 foot wall covered in colorful messages. Arise, a community organization based in Eugene started the Solidarity Project last year and it has garnered a positive response.

“We are providing people an opportunity to come and express words of encouragement,” Joseph Washburn, a project facilitator said. “We’re engaging with people in conversation and asking them, ‘If [you] could say one thing to a survivor of sexual assault, what would that be?”

Arise hopes that if students have a chance to write their own message to survivors, more conversation about sexual assault can take place.

“It’s unfortunately a kind of hush-hush thing in our society,” Jeffrey Spadey, another facilitator said. “Even though it’s happening so much, no one wants to talk about it. It’s one of those things everyone wants to talk about but no one knows how.”

The project is helping facilitate a conversation at UO and Washburn said about a dozen other universities want to join the conversation.

Students and faculty who want to participate have until Friday evening to add their messages to the wall.

Free pizza will be handed out during a spoken word session Thursday afternoon at 2 p.m.

Follow Max Thornberry on Twitter @Max_Thornberry .

The post The Solidarity Project starts conversations about sexual assault appeared first on Emerald Media.

The University of Oregon has the third best special education program in the country, according to U.S. News and World Report. Following 14 years of unsung fame, top universities are starting to sit up and take notice.

On April 13, a task force from Stanford University landed in Eugene to pick the brains of the engineers of UO’s program. Stanford doesn’t currently have a special education program. UO was high on their list of universities to visit while they attempt to build one.

“As we talked to other peer institutions, the name has come up over and over again,” Olivia Crawford, director of special projects and strategic initiatives at the Stanford graduate school of education said. “That this is a place where exciting research is happening, where great training is occurring.”

Wendy Machalicek is proud of the reputation Special Education training programs at UO has earned. (Courtesy of Univeristy of Oregon)

Wendy Machalicek, associate professor and graduate program director at UO, says research and education have set UO apart.

“Historically the program has been built on faculty doing research,” Machalicek said. Those faculty doing cutting-edge research are also the ones teaching classes.

UO offers a range of programs for budding special education teachers. Graduate students can choose between two different licensing programs and a highly rated Ph.D. program. For undergraduates, the school of education offers major and minor degrees, along with a 4+1 program which awards a bachelor’s degree and a teaching certificate.

Small classes allow students to learn to teach with a hands on approach. (Andy Field/Emerald)

Professors at UO are perfecting programs that are being used nationwide. Positive behavior and interventions support (PBIS) research has touched over 23,000 students nationwide. PBIS research focuses on equity and diversity in classrooms while addressing challenging behavior.

UO’s center for teaching and learning is changing the way math and reading are taught, while new bilingual faculty are improving language learning for children with special needs.

The size of UO’s special education faculty impressed Stanford. Not how large, but how small it is. One of the first questions asked was how UO has managed to build its program with such a small faculty.

Research has been productive because professors have the option to “buy out” of courses Machalicek said. This buying out means professors use grant money to reduce their teaching load so they can do research instead. Non-tenured faculty members are then brought in to pick up the slack. Those non-tenure track faculty have a historic and “integral” role in the success of UO’s special education program, Machalicek said.

While faculty work continues to pull UO up national rankings, students in the programs are developing crucial professional skills themselves.

Program Liaison Lisa Hellamn explained how graduate students move around throughout their program beginning in elementary schools and finishing with ages of their choice.

During their first term, students teach but don’t design their own curriculum. As they enter their second term, students begin designing and delivering their own curriculum to middle and high school students. By the end of the program, students decide where they want to teach––allowing them to focus on the field they plan to enter when they graduate.

This tiered approach exposes aspiring teachers to different levels of supervision and students. Because UO’s students move around so much, the school builds relationships with different schools , tailoring programs to meet student and school demands.

Kathleen Jungjohann is one of many important non-tenure track faculty in the College of Education. (Andy Field/Emerald)

The quality of students coming into and exiting UO’s program make them highly valuable during the current teacher shortage, Machalicek said. Even before they graduate, schools approach students, trying to hire them.

Despite its success, special education is worried about its future. The budget shortfall and its impact on the department is still unclear. Final cuts have not been made, but Machalicek says that losing non-tenure track faculty will make life harder.

“If we lose NTTF we will be hard pressed. It will be a learning curve for us,” Machalicek said. “Those of us who have been doing heavy loads of research might have to take on more. That leads to a shift in priorities and that’s a fear.”

Machalicek believes that any cuts are going to be in line with the mission of the university, but she hopes the program will receive the attention it deserves.

“We’re a gym at UO. We bring in a lot of federal funds and we train high quality teachers that are sought after in the state,” she said. “We are where everybody else wants to be. If the UO wants to continue to be known for that, it needs to be prioritized. There needs to be a commitment our programs.”

The post UO’s highly-ranked special education program sets example for other schools appeared first on Emerald Media.

About 100 students came out to see two white nationalists in front of the EMU on Thursday morning.

Jimmy Marr and an associate who only gave his first name, Chad, came to the University of Oregon campus to, “represent white nationalism in its true form and sense,” Chad said.

“We are not about genocide of any races or violence or harming any people,” Chad said.

Jack Melul rouses a crowd watching two white supremacists in front of the EMU. (Max Thornberry/Emerald)

Marr, whose twitter handle is GenocideJimmy, said that he was on campus as part of his journey to self-realization. Marr played bagpipes from the back of the truck. He said he was representing to people that he was Scottish and that it was impossible for a Scot to be a nazi.

Today, April 20, is the birthday of Adolf Hitler.

The presence of the white nationalists on campus caused a number of student tours to divert away from the EMU. Someone told Fiona De Los Rios, a sophomore, there were some neo-nazis hanging around the EMU and she should stay away. She said she had to come because of the current climate in Eugene.

“I have to be here,” she said. “I don’t think people feel safe on this campus anymore … I feel it’s not OK for people to just walk by when there’s neo-nazi stuff going on on campus.”

The crowd’s spirt was lifted when Jack Melul, a rabbi who runs Akiva on campus, danced in front of Chad, singing “The Jewish people are still alive,” in Hebrew.

“It felt amazing,” Melul said about the crowd joining him in singing. “That’s the way to fight. With happiness, with a smile, with singing.”

“For me, the biggest pride is to stand here and say, ‘the Jewish people are still alive,’” Melul said. “It’s an embarrassment to him. We’re still going, we’re still strong.”

Cooper Green contributed reporting to this article.

The post White nationalists visit UO; don’t find any support appeared first on Emerald Media.

The University of Oregon community can send a postcard to their president this week. United Academics, the faculty union, is running a postcard campaign, asking students, staff and faculty to fill out cards that will be passed on to UO President Michael Schill.

Every campus member has a card option. Undergraduate students are blue. Graduate students and employees are dark green. Non-tenure track instructional faculty are white while their research colleagues are beige. Tenured faculty have yellow cards to sign.

The goal of the campaign is to show Schill the campus stands in solidarity with its non-tenure track faculty members.

United Academics launched the campaign in response to Schill’s blog post in response to a story in the Emerald last week.

Schill’s post addressed the high proportion of non-tenure track faculty. The president said that he felt that he has failed to acknowledge the role that non-tenured faculty have played on campus. These campus members, Schill said, bring crucial skills and ideas to classrooms as well as help connect students to the professional world.

Schill also addressed the commitment UO has made to its non-tenure track faculty members.

University of Oregon President Michael Schill (Emerald Archive)

The first collective bargaining agreement struck between United Academics and the university included important steps for non-tenure track faculty. The first step in that agreement was converting a number of part-time adjunct jobs to career positions in that agreement.

Mike Urbancic, vice president for non-tenure track faculty affairs, said the postcards aren’t designed to be adversarial.

“The campaign is not designed to ratchet up some sort of competition, or to fight about different points,” Urbancic said, “but simply to raise awareness for something we think is a crucial point of how our campus is.”

According to Urbancic, UO can’t function without the work of non-tenure track faculty. The union fears that Schill doesn’t fully understand the work that non-tenured faculty are doing.

“Many of them have been here for decades,” Elizabeth Pellerito, a staff organizer for the union said. “They have been credentialed for decades … we are really just asking [the president] to learn more about who non-tenure track faculty are and respect what they do and the important role they play at the university.”

UO administration has floated the idea that the school will spend its money more effectively if tenured faculty teach more. Urbancic says this thinking is flawed.

“Any additional hour they’re spending working with their classes is an hour that they’re not spending with their research,” Urbancic said.

The union will be in front of the EMU Tuesday from 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. Students and faculty members who want to fill out a postcard after Tuesday can pick them up from the union office on 13th Avenue above Noodlehead.

United Academics sent Schill a letter Monday morning requesting a meeting with him and 30-40 non-tenure track faculty members. Pellerito says the purpose is to open a dialogue between the president and members of faculty. She said if the meeting happens, it will take place in early May. The union will present the postcards to Schill then.

The post Faculty union wants to open a dialogue with President Schill appeared first on Emerald Media.

Correction: A previous version of this story stated that 31 non-tenured faculty members in the College of Arts and Sciences were not renewed. The correct number is 21 non-tenured faculty members and 10 staff members.

Twenty-one non-tenured faculty members and 10 staff members in the College of Arts and Sciences were notified on Thursday that they won’t be hired back by the University of Oregon next year. This comes as no surprise as the university copes with budget deficits; however, some faculty members are concerned that administrators are valuing academic rankings over student success.  

The faculty cuts for the romance language department haven’t been finalized yet, and students and faculty are worried about the upcoming decision.

Full time instructors in romance languages teach three classes per term — representing roughly 60 students per term or 180 students a year. If five full-time romance language instructors are cut at the end of the year, the number initially handed down to the department, 900 seats will be unavailable for students trying to take language classes.

These changes are part of the university’s plan to improve UO’s status as Oregon’s flagship research institution.

(Kelly Kondo/Emerald)

According to Provost and Senior Vice President Scott Coltrane, a research institution’s focus is to train masters and Ph.D. students.

In 2008, enrollment at UO surged. Coltrane said this resulted in a short-term focus on hiring non-tenured faculty to accommodate the increase in underclassmen.

“What happened [during the surge] is we started looking more toward a teaching-intensive university instead of a research university,” Coltrane said. “So we are trying to find that balance.”

In order for the university to achieve its goal, budget cuts are trimming the number of non-tenured faculty across campus.

It is very difficult for the university to remove a tenured professor. This makes the College of Arts and Sciences budget difficult to cut because, according to CAS Dean W. Andrew Marcus, 96 percent of the CAS budget is allocated for personnel, meaning instructors are one of the only places to trim weight.

In February, United Academics, the union representing nearly all of the faculty on campus, announced that approximately 75 faculty members will be cut at the end of the year. UO President Michael Schill said the number was pulled out of thin air when he spoke to the Emerald last month, but said that some faculty member cuts were imminent.

The basis for cutting non-tenured faculty is to make room for more tenured faculty members down the line.

Tenured faculty — professors who have the security of a job until they retire, break the law or severely violate university policy — are responsible for conducting research and publishing their findings in addition to their teaching and service duties. Non-tenured faculty are hired either on 1- or 3-year contracts. Their duties are more narrowly focused on teaching and rarely include research or publishing obligations.

“The assumption is, for undergraduates, if you’re in the classroom with someone who is actually writing the books and doing the discoveries, then it’s going to be more enriching,” Coltrane said. “On a case-by-case basis that’s not always true, some of our very best instructors are non-tenure track faculty and they’re specialists in being instructors and they’re really good.”

Although these instructors may provide a better classroom experience for students, that experience doesn’t factor into how the school is ranked. Instead, rankings are based on the amount of patents the institution holds, what it discovers and how many grants it gets, according to Coltrane.

However, some faculty in the romance language department say that focusing on tenured faculty and rankings runs directly against the university’s mission statement to serve as a “comprehensive public research university committed to exceptional teaching, discovery and service.”

“We can’t afford to eliminate language programs or decrease the number of students who can get access to studying language in an environment in which globalization is so important, in which international understanding is so important,” said Gina Psaki, professor of Italian.

According to President Schill, the amount of money each department receives from the  university is determined by the number of credit hours the department serves. Because fewer students are enrolling in humanities courses, those departments are not earning as much revenue as they once did. The overall effect of the low enrollment is driving down the need for non-tenure track faculty.

For Schill, this seems inevitable.

“The nature of non-tenured faculty is that they are not here permanently. They are here year to year,” Schill said. “… there’s a hardship in that, which is you don’t know if you have a job or not, but that is the point of non-tenured faculty, is that they are meeting teaching needs that are not constant.”

Psaki, who holds tenure in the romance language department, has been at UO since 1989 and currently serves as the assistant department head of romance languages in addition to her research, publishing and teaching duties. According to her, the romance language department relies on many of the non-tenured faculty’s expertise in teaching introductory courses.

“I can teach first and second year languages,” Psaki said, “but I’m not very good at it. My colleagues who are non-tenure track faculty members … they have immense experience”

Despite the value some of these instructors may bring to their departments, they don’t fit into the university’s long-term plan.  

Amanda Powell is a non-tenured faculty member whose work compares to that of her tenure track colleagues. She is involved in research and publication as well as teaching upper division and graduate level language courses.

“Our teaching load is high. We are really dedicated to our classes,” said Powell, a senior lecturer II in Spanish. “It’s really disheartening to know that without regard to the quality of our teaching [or] the quality of our program, a number of positions are going to be cut purely on the basis of metrics.”

Schill’s new three-tiered budget model is supposed to rein in department spending by 2019 and bring UO’s balance of tenured and non-tenured faculty back into line with other research institutions.

Although this new model will help curb the budget and prevent future cuts, it doesn’t account for the instructors or classes that will disappear in the short term.

Increased interest in professional schools like business and journalism will mean more revenue is injected into those programs while less popular departments will face continued uncertainty.

“For me it remains the case that this is a comprehensive university,” Psaki said. “You can’t feed one division by starving others.”

The post Goodbye Instructor. Hello Research: Faculty cut to make room for research appeared first on Emerald Media.