The impending merger of Augusta State and Georgia Health Sci-

ences universities will have unex-pected effects on student smokers.

Gina Thurman, the acting assistant vice president for stu-dent services and assistant dean of students, addressed Augusta State’s Student Government As-sociation Friday and informed them that the administration of the new university has decided to extend GHSU’s tobacco ban to the Walton Way campus after the universities merge. GHSU went tobacco-free in 2007, Thurman said, and many other Georgia uni-versities, including Emory Uni-versity and Armstrong Atlantic University, have adopted similar policies.

GHSU even offered assis-tance to help those addicted to to-bacco, she said.

“When they went tobacco-free, they provided classes, kits to help you quit, different resources, counseling, treatment options to help those that wanted to quit do so,” Thurman said. “They’ve had some good results with that; they’ve seen some positive chang-es since then. The idea is that (the administration) would kind of in-troduce the policy for one year to give those people that do smoke that want an opportunity to try to quit or to come up with some other alternatives a year to do so because, obviously, if you smoke, quitting smoking is not going to be something you do overnight. It’s going to be a process.”

The current plan is to intro-duce the ban in November 2013, coinciding with the American Cancer Society’s Great Ameri-can Smokeout campaign, Thur-man said. Then the policy will be gradually implemented over the course of the academic year. The tobacco-free policy is set to take full effect in the fall of 2014.

Carol Rychly, the vice presi-dent for academic affairs at Au-gusta State, said a survey of Augusta State faculty, staff and students showed some level of support of a potential ban, but Thurman mentioned that she had received complaints that the sur-vey itself seemed biased in a way

that would skew results in favor of the ban.

SGA President Andrew Phil-lips said he anticipates an unfavor-able reaction to the ban because of lingering resentment over the merger and the new university’s name.

Students must delay their ceremonial graduation walk an extra semester.

Katherine Sweeney, the registrar and director of admissions at Augusta State Uni-versity, said students who finish courses in the summer of 2013 can get their degrees but can-not walk with students in the May commence-ment ceremony. Sweeney said the decision was made because of limited space.

“Next May, we will be one consolidated university, and we will have over 9,000 stu-dents,” Sweeney said. “So it was really the physical location issue and the sheer number of people we are trying to accommodate that drove that decision.”

Sweeney said because Augusta State and Georgia Health Sciences University are coming together as one, the only venue that could hold all of the students and their families was the James Brown Arena, which seats up to 8,500 people. Despite the number of seats, Sweeney said both schools individually overcrowd the venue.

However, the schools have tried to come up with a plan to control seating, she said.

“They are going to limit the number of tick-ets that each graduate receives,” Sweeney said. “There will be a lottery system where if you don’t need all of your tickets, you can turn them back in and somebody who needs extra tickets can go request extra tickets.”

With more students graduating at one time, Sweeney said a group was put together to ex-amine what would be the best option to accom-modate everybody in the James Brown Arena. She said they determined their best option was

to only allow students who finished all their classes during the spring semester to participate in the May graduation ceremony. While space was the main reason for the decision, there were other factors involved.

“The new university will have its first com-mencement in May,” said Carol Rychly, the vice president for academic affairs at Augusta State. “The thought was that it would be really cool to have everybody who is graduating graduate and participate in one ceremony.”

Rychly said the plan is to see how the com-mencement ceremony works out.

Some of the students, though, said they are not happy about the idea.

“I don’t like the decision,” said Jordan Pruner, a senior double major in political sci-ence and French at Augusta State. “If you fin-ish in the summer because you needed maybe one or two classes, it’s closer to May than De-cember. They should just go ahead and let them walk in May.”

While this will be a first for summer stu-dents, they are not the only students who have to wait for commencement. Rychly said stu-dents who finish in the fall semester do not get to march until the spring of next year. She said students who finish in the fall are a bigger group than students who finish in the summer. While there has always been a gap, Rychly said it only applied for the students who finished in the fall.

The university is trying to make changes to fix this gap in the future, she said.

“The plan is to have two graduations a year from here on out,” Rychly said. “In the recent history, we just had the one (graduation) in May and so we will have another graduation in De-cember.”

By RON HICKERSONchief reporter

AUGUSTA STATE UNIVERSITY

VOLUME 55, ISSUE 5 TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2012www.asubellringer.com

New bus and new features added to the Jaguar Express shuttle service.

NEWS | PAGE 2 ARTS & LIFE | PAGE 6 SPORTS | PAGE 11Doubles partners advance to semifinals at ITA Southeast

Regional Championship.Zombies take over downtown Augusta, Ga., in the

third annual Zombie Walk.follow us

@BellRinger_Newslike us

on facebook

By JILLIAN HOBDAY news editor

Early voting dates change for Georgians

The duration for early voting is being cut by more than half, and although the change was

for economic reasons, negative byproducts are evident as the issue of voter fraud and voter regulation captivates the nation prior to this year’s election.

Georgia House Bill 92 changed in-person voting from 45 days to 21 days. The bill took effect on July 1, 2011 and in-cludes a mandatory Saturday, which takes place on Oct. 27 for all counties in Georgia. The bill’s intent was to address complaints from smaller counties that do not have the money to maintain an open polling place for 45 days, according to Georgia Secre-tary of State Brian Kemp. However, as the issue of voter fraud remains in the media, there is a concern that a shorter early voting period hinders the ability to vote for some people.

“This is part of a bigger movement to make it harder to vote, and people who are critical of that movement say it’s for du-bious reasons,” said Kathleen Searles, an assistant professor of political science. “It excludes some people that those in power may not want to vote, and when you think about it that way, it makes you want to question the motive (behind the bill).”

Searles agreed that the bill’s intent to reduce spending sounds legitimate, but whether it’s significant enough to make it harder for people to vote is in question. Research proves early voting appeals to African-Americans and the elderly, “his-torically disenfranchised” segments of the population, Searles said.

“(Early voting) boosts people’s mo-rale about the system,” she said. “When you make it easier for people to get in-volved and they feel like the system is helping them be involved, it makes people feel better about the way government is working... Giving more people the oppor-

SPECIAL TO THE BELL RINGEROn the morning of Tuesday, Oct. 9, countless “Save the A” signs were staked in front of the house of Ricardo Azziz, the president of Georgia Health Sciences University. The “Save the A” campaign initiative is to keep “Augusta” in the name of the new merged university, currently set to be named Georgia Regents University.

By KARL FRAZIERsenior reporter

Summer graduates prohibitted to ‘walk’ in May graduation as result of merger

see SMOKING on PAGE 3

Wiki page connects faculty and students through the Internet

By LEIGH BEESONcopy editor

Tobacco ban to be implemented in fall of 2014

One website is bringing Augusta State University students, staff and faculty

together to work collaboratively on projects around campus.

The Oak is an online program known as a “wiki” located on the Au-gusta State website. Maureen Akins, the assistant director for instructional services at Information Technology Services (ITS) and the functional ad-ministrator of the site, defined a wiki as “a web-based collaborate tool.” She said people can post pages, attach files, make comments on those pages and edit pages on a wiki.

As an example, Akins cited the most famous wiki: Wikipedia. The website became an encyclopedia writ-ten by multiple members that could be edited by people who were experts on a particular topic, but the site required regular maintenance after people be-gan posting incorrect information. Yet the site brought a lot of awareness to the potential of wikis.

“Wikipedia didn’t start it, but it’s the most well-known,” Akins said. “It kind of brought everything to the at-tention of people. The need to collab-orate has been around for quite some time and the web makes it easy to do it from multiple locations.”

Lance Stuckey, the instructional technology specialist at ITS, agreed. As a user of The Oak, he said using a wiki creates a knowledge base for its users and being online provides an-other advantage.

“You can get that information whether you’re on campus, off cam-pus or you’re overseas,” he said. “If you can log into the wiki, you can ac-cess the information.”

Akins said ITS launched the site when the desire to “collaborate” be-gan showing up on the Augusta State campus.

“We chose to develop this wiki in response to faculty members who said that they wanted a way for students to be able to edit each others’ work quickly and easily,” she said. “So the wiki allows you to do that. You can create a page and anyone with the ap-propriate permission can do the edit-ing.”

Akins said professors wanted a place that students could go to work on group projects and be able to track what each person has added.

“If you put up something that I discover is incorrect and you’ve de-stroyed my work, I can go back and restore that to a prior version,” she said. “If you had a group report and

By KARL FRAZIER senior reporter

New program aims to improve Georgia college retention rates

With the full support of the governor, Georgia colleges implemented a new pro-

gram to increase graduation rates.Carol Rychly, the vice president for

academic affairs at Augusta State Univer-sity, said Complete College Georgia was started to help students finish college.

“Each school (in Georgia) was asked to devise a plan to address the need for the state to have more people who have post-secondary education,” Rychly said. “So it’s a federal initiative and then a state ini-tiative and then an individual unit.”

Rychly said the program comes from Complete College America. Started in 2009, Complete College America’s goal is to work with states to significantly increase the number of Americans with quality ca-reer certificates or college degrees. While

see COLLEGE on PAGE 3

A student stubs out a cigarette in front of the the Jaguar Student Activities Center.ABIGAIL BLANKENSHIP | THE BELL RINGER ARCHIVES

see VOTING on PAGE 3

see OAK on PAGE 2

Oct. 15-26 Mon.- Fri. 8:30 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

Board of Elections Office

Oct. 279:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.

Oct. 29 - Nov. 2 Mon. - Fri. 8:30 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.

Board of Elections OfficeHenry Brigham Community Center

Warren Road Community Center

Richmond Co.Early Voting Info

see GRADUATION on PAGE 3

A new addition to Augusta State University’s department of chemistry and physics is already making an impact on campus.

Grant Thompson, an instruc-tor who recently got his doctorate in astrophysics from the University of Kentucky, started the Look Up at Night, Augusta (LUNA) series in an attempt to share his passion for science.

“I love science, I love astron-omy (and) I want others to also appreciate it,” Thompson said. “I really initiated this whole event just to promote science.”

Thompson said he has an event set up for each month through De-cember and a different speaker will be lecturing at each event.

“We always start off with a lecture aimed at everybody above 8; (it’s) easy to understand, learn some science, (and) have fun at the same time,” Thompson said. “Af-terwards, after the lecture, we have the telescope set up so people can look at the stars.”

The lecture in September was done by Thompson himself, who is also the host of every event. For the October lecture, he said Merle Parker, an adjunct instructor of physics and astronomy, gave the lecture. In November, the series will have an out of town guest.

“Next month I have someone

from NASA coming up,” Thomp-son said. “This guy was in charge of the international space station. Whatever went up, he had to OK.”

The instructor said that not only do people get to have a bet-ter understanding of astronomy through the lecture, but they also get hands-on astronomy experi-ence by using the telescopes.

Murray Macnamara, a sopho-more physics major, said she helps Thompson with the series by set-ting up the telescopes and also as-sists people while they use the in-struments.

Macnamara, who is also an as-tronomy lab assistant, said her love of the subject drew her to the series.

“The first time was amazing,” she said. “So many people showed up and so many people cycling through all of the telescopes.”

Thomas Crute, the head of the Department of Chemistry and Physics and a professor of chemis-try, said he was also very pleased with the turnout of the first event.

“We counted the better order of 150 people out there and it was students, it was faculty, it was staff, it was neighborhood people, it was parents with kids,” Crute said. “It was really nice to see such a large diversity of people that were com-ing, and it reminded me that astron-omy really has an impact on nearly everybody.”

The department chair said that the audience was very vocal in asking questions and engaging

in conversations about not ony the moon but a variety of astronomical topics.

“Among the many people that I did talk to it was all smiles; they were loving it,” Crute said. “They were impressed with the presen-tation Dr. Thompson gave and they were impressed with looking through the telescopes and seeing things first-hand.”

Crute explained that the de-partment attempts to do different events that can reach out not only faculty and staff but to the commu-nity as well.

“We’ve always been inter-ested in various outreaches in the department,” he said. “Sometimes it is astronomy outreach, which

the LUNA series is, sometimes it is outreach specifically to school groups that have come in to do chemistry as well as physics, so it varies.”

As for the LUNA series, both Crute and Thompson said they hope to see the event continue to expand and strike people’s interest.

“I hope that the series can help not only the university to better ap-preciate the role of science in their lives and the curiosity,” Crute said, “but also engage the community and help them recognize that sci-ence impacts their lives and that this university is a resource that is part of the community and we’d like to reach out to them.”

Jaguar Express shuttle buses will ex-perience new changes after the merger is complete.

In the spring of 2013, Augusta State University will install new GPS systems on all buses, in addition to running a tran-sit bus between campuses, according to Karl Munschy, the director of business services. To address better communica-tion between the two merged campuses, the new GPS feature will allow students to plan accordingly and be on time for class.

“We are looking at a new Wi-Fi and GPS system that will allow passengers to view the location of the buses through a new mobile suite on their smart phone,” he said. “We are also implementing a larger transit bus. (There are) no plans to increase student transportation fees, even with the GPS system. We will take care of most of the campus need.”

Horizon Transportation, which sup-plies the buses and drivers for Jaguar Ex-press, has partnered with Augusta State

since 2009. The shuttles transport stu-dents from Christenberry Field House to the main campus on Walton Way and to and from University Village. This service also helps reduce the number of cars that need to park on campus, which everyone benefits from, Munschy said.

Students can take the bus as early as 7 a.m. until the latest class releases on campus, said Ben McClattie, who has been driving an Augusta State shuttle for four years.

One shuttle has 30 passenger seats and is handicap accessible, another bus seats 24 passengers and the larger buses have 32 seats, McClattie said. To address students’ needs and to attract more stu-dents to utilize the shuttle service, televi-sion monitors that function as a bulletin board have been installed on the buses.

A new route between the Walton Way and the downtown site will begin in January. The duration for one trip will be around 30 minutes within the Augusta State campus and 12 minutes to the cam-pus downtown, he said.

On Oct. 8, Al Harris, the CEO of

Due to rising costs from energy use, Augusta State University has become an eco-friendly environment.

Bill Sealy, an electri-cian at Augusta State, said the Energy Reduction Pro-gram was started because of a shortage on cash.

“I think the reason they started it was because the government had (taken) a lot of money out of the bud-get,” Sealy said. “(The gov-ernment) wanted us to save money by doing energy savings.”

Sealy said the Energy Reduction Program be-gan in 2008. Since then, Sealy said they have kept adding things to the list. Some of the utilities being reduced are electricity wa-ter and natural gas. While some faculty members did not agree with the change, Sealy said most of the fac-ulty was onboard.

“I think it’s a good idea,” said Brittney Addi-son, the facility reservations coordinator at Augusta State. “It is good for the en-vironment; it is good for the economy, considering that (America) is not in a good state right now. I think it is a good thing to save costs in any form or fashion.”

One of the steps they are taking to conserve ener-gy is turning off the air con-ditioners at night. Before the program was started, Sealy said the air condition-ers would run all day and night. Now, Sealy said they shut off the air conditioners at night once all of the class-es are finished. At 5 a.m., they turn the air condition-ers back on as the janitors and other faculty members come in. Sealy said another way they save energy is by turning off lights when no one is using them.

Sealy said they are try-ing something different in the science building

PAGE 2 TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2012

www.asubellringer.com

NEWS

The voice of Augusta State University

EDITORIAL STAFFadviser

MATTHEW BOSISIOmbosisio@aug.edu

editor-in-chiefTRAVIS HIGHFIELDthighfie@aug.edu

copy editorLEIGH BEESON

kbeeson1@aug.edu

news editorJILLIAN HOBDAY

jhobday2@gmail.com

arts & life editorKRISTIN HAWKINSkhutchi2@aug.edu

sports editorJOHN-MICHAEL GARNER

jgarner6@aug.edu

chief reporterRON HICKERSONrhickers@aug.edu

production managerKELSEY DONNELLY

kelseydonne@gmail.com

production assistantJACQUELYN PABON

jpabon@aug.edu

senior reporterKARL FRAZIER

TAMIKA LAMPKIN

staff writersNIKKI SKINNER

FARRELL BROWN

contributorsJACKIE FRANCISCOMICAH HERRIMAN

MINDY WADLEYSHELLEY-ANN WILLIAMS

circulation managerTREY UNDERWOOD

zildjianman08@gmail.com

advertising managerHANNAH FOERSTER

hannahrosefoerster@gmail.com

web masterSI-LONG CHEN

schen1@aug.edu

is publishedby ASU students.

Direct advertising inquiries to:Marie Pierce,

National Sales ManagerMedia Mate

mpierce@mymediamate.com

Address all correspondence to:The Bell Ringer2500 Walton Way Augusta, Ga 30904

706-737-1600www.asubellringer.com

editorial policy Letters to the editor must be accom-panied by the author’s name, phone

number and email address. All columns and letters to the editor are the opinion of the author. The views expressed in the Editorial section do not necessar-

ily express those of The Bell Ringer, a designated public forum.

corrections policyWe strive to bring you accurately re-ported news. If you wish to report an

error, please provide your name, phone number and a detailed description of the

error and the necessary correction.

PRINTERAiken Standard

326 Rutland Dr. NWP.O. Box 456

Aiken, SC. 29802

By SI-LONG CHENweb master

see ENERGY on PAGE 3

OAKCONTINUED from PAGE 1

SI-LONG CHEN | STAFFThe new Jaguar Express bus comes with a 24-hour review camera, wheelchair ramp and under seat storage, and it can accommodate up to 54 passengers.

Revamping the Jag busSchool saves money and lessens carbon footprint by reducing energy use By KARL FRAZIERsenior reporter

see SHUTTLE on PAGE 3

By KRISTIN HAWKINSarts & life editor

PHOTO BY NASAAttendees of the LUNA Series will be able to see planets like Jupiter, which is seen in October, through telescopes provided by the chemistry and physics department.

LUNA series brings stars, planets closer to community

everyone was sending out a Mi-crosoft Word document, it be-comes difficult to know who did what and to be able to fix some-thing if something goes wrong.”

But the site has also prov-en to be useful for faculty and staff members. Akins said the wiki is an easy way of getting in touch with other faculty and staff members and a secure way of sharing files because each page can have different levels of access. She said the site is a kind of virtual meeting place, reminiscent of an old presence in Augusta State’s history.

In honor of that history, Akins said the wiki was named The Oak after the Arsenal Oak.

Max Brown, the grounds supervisor with the Physical

Plant, said the oak was an old white oak that was estimated to be around 250 years old be-fore it was cut down in 2004 because a disease was eating at the tree. The disease would have caused the oak’s branches to fall, so it was removed for safety reasons. But at its peak,

the oak served as a gathering place on campus.

“There were some seating areas around the tree for people to enjoy the shade and the beau-ty of the tree, pretty much, all year around,” Brown said. “You could say that it was a gathering point because it was definitely

the most prominent feature on campus as a living structure.”

Because the wiki serves as a virtual meeting place, Akins said the team involved in put-ting it together thought the name would be appropriate.

Yet, as an online meeting place, the wiki has not received a lot of attention. Akins at-tributed this lack of attention to new projects in ITS. She said the site was launched 1 ½ years ago but ITS staff mem-bers have been busy with the recent shift to Augusta State’s new learning management sys-tem, Desire2Learn, as well as addressing issues pertaining to the merger between Augusta State and Georgia Health Sci-ences University. Because of these two things, the wiki has become a less prominent proj-ect, she said.

JILLIAN HOBDAY | STAFF

khutchi2@aug.edu

rhickers@aug.edu

 Energy  Reduction  Program  initiatives:  -­‐     Turn  off  air  conditioners  at  night  

-­‐ Turn  off  water  heaters  in  Science  Building  -­‐ Reduce  hours  Christmas  tree  lights  are  on  -­‐ Turn  off  some  exterior  lights  after  midnight  -­‐ Consolidate  extracurricular  events  into  fewer  buildings  -­‐ Turn  off  un-­‐used  lights  in  buildings  at  night  -­‐ Remove  light  bulbs  in  areas  where  less  light  is  needed  

Energy Reduction Program initiatives:

- Turn off air conditions at night- Turn off water heaters in science building- Reduce hours Christmas tree lights are on- Turn off some exterior lights after midnight- Consolidate extracurricular events into fewer buildings- Turn off unused lights in buildings at night- Remove light bulbs in areas where less light is needed

“Anything that we’re changing and (GHSU is) staying the same is viewed (negatively), even though they clearly didn’t always have a tobacco-free campus,” Phillips said. “I think it’s moving forward that they took it on before we did. I mean, this could have happened had we not consolidated.”

But he said he understands the policy is controversial.

“Obviously, if you’re a smok-er and this is one place you can’t smoke, it’s going to suck,” Phillips said. “I think that a lot of students have been walking through smoke on the way to class – really it’s just a haze – and I think that they would benefit from not necessarily being around that. The policy isn’t saying you can’t smoke; it’s just saying you can’t smoke here.”

Although Phillips said the ban might have occurred regardless, Rych-ly said the ban is definitely connected to the merger of the universities.

“One of the things that happen-ing with the consolidation is it gives every policy that we have there tends to be a similar policy or something on both campuses that addresses the same issue,” she said. “So whenever we run into policies that don’t exact-ly match, it does force us to look at those things and say what would be a

recommendation.”That recommendation extends

the ban from GHSU throughout the rest of the campus of the new uni-versity. The policy bans all forms of tobacco, including chewing tobacco and electronic cigarettes, Rychly said.

“I’ve never been a smoker, so it’s very easy for me to say we should do this,” she said. “But on the other hand, I think we should be sensitive to people who do smoke. We know that smoking is not a good thing for the person who smokes, and we also know it’s not a good thing for the people around them.”

As GHSU did in 2007, the new university will offer classes and pro-vide resources to those who wish to quit using tobacco products, Thur-man said. She said the administra-tion wants the SGA to champion the policy, but several senators voiced their discontentment with the ban during the afternoon meeting.

Phillips said the policy will go into effect regardless of student support, echoing Thurman’s previous state-ment.

“At this point the only thing that is set in stone is that we’re going tobacco-free,” Thurman said. “The timeline has just been a suggestion. Nothing else has been approved at (this) point, just that it has been rec-ommended that the new campus be tobacco-free at some point.”

An associate professor at Augusta State University is working to bring attention to local freshwater research.

Rick Pukis, an associate professor of communications, was chosen by the Southeastern Natural Science Academy (SNSA) to direct and edit an informational film highlighting the major components of SNSA’s research in the wetlands and rivers around the area.

Bob Young, the president and CEO of SNSA, said he came to Augusta State with the idea of making a film that focused on the research aspect of the organization.

“We have a couple of videos that talk about Phinizy Swamp Nature Park and the broader mission of the Southeastern Natu-ral Sciences Academy,” Young said. “But we don’t have anything that tells the story of the research that we are doing day in and day out on the Savannah River basin and the wetlands.”

The organization’s research focuses on Limnology, which is the study of fresh wa-ter. Young said for the past six years, SNSA has been testing and monitoring the Savan-nah River from below Thurmond Dam all the way to Interstate 95 in Savannah, Ga.

“We’ve got technology that we put in the river that actually collects this data, and we provide an analysis of that data to the industries and utilities of the Augusta area that are dependent on the river for their waste water discharges,” Young said. “We also consult with public and private entities on the construction and remediation of wet-lands.”

With a background in television and cinema, Young said it was very important to him to get students in the communications department involved in creating the film.

“I always thought a picture was worth a thousand words,” Young said. “And mov-ing pictures are much better than still pic-tures. It just seemed like something natural to do so that we can fill that gap here.”

Young said he then decided to contact the communications department in order to

get the film rolling. Young and Oscar Flight, the vice president for research at SNSA, compiled background information and re-search for Pukis to create his masterpiece.

“They gave me a folder of information, and I read through everything and digested it,” Pukis said. “And I put together a script hoping I could give them what they wanted. Bob Young, Oscar Flight and myself put to-gether what they wanted.”

Young said he wanted Pukis to use his creativity but also explain the research to the viewer as simply as possible.

“When you are talking about science, it’s a pretty dry subject,” Young said. “And scientists tend to talk in a language that most of us don’t speak on a day to day basis. So the message to Rick (Pukis) was, let’s put something together that a layman could understand and walk away after watching this for three minutes and say, ‘I know what you’re doing at the academy.’”

With the script completed, Pukis has now entered the filming and audio tracking phases of the project. Pukis said Young has also helped with recording the audio for the film. When all the components are collected for the film, Pukis said he would like some of his students to get involved with the edit-ing process.

“This semester I am teaching an After Effects class called Digital Techniques for Television and Cinema,” Pukis said. “What we do in the class is that students learn to use two applications: Photoshop and After Effects. I’m hoping that the students can help out on this video project. With the skills that they learn, they can actually help me put together this research educational outreach video.”

Jason Moak, a senior scientist at SNSA, said he is happy to finally have a video that focuses on the work they do.

“We think we do good work and impor-tant work,” Moak said. “Anytime there is a chance for us to get the news out there, it’s important because we are a nonprofit and we depend on private donations. The more people who know about the work we do, the easier it is for us to raise money.”

THE BELL RINGER PAGE 3

www.asubellringer.com

kbeeson1@aug.edu

kfrazie9@aug.edu

EnergyCONTINUED from PAGE 2

Professor makes film about research at Phinizy

By JACQUELYN PABONproduction assistant

CONTRIBUTED BY SOUTHEASTERN NATURAL SCIENCES ACADEMYJason Moak explains how to set a fish trap to former Augusta State researcher Ali Hunnicut.

the number of students attending college has doubled since 1970, the completion rate has not changed. Ry-chly said the idea of Complete College Georgia came from the Georgia Board of Regents.

“In March or April, the (BOR) invited us to a meeting,” Rychly said. “All state schools in the system are involved in the Complete College Georgia plan.”

Because of the lower rate of post-secondary edu-cation, Rychly said, Gov. Nathan Neal is behind Com-plete College Georgia in an effort to create a well-edu-cated work force and bring new businesses to the state. Because of the merger, Rychly said Augusta State had to work with Georgia Health Sciences University on the plan. They then sent the plan to the BOR in order to get its approval. Because the plan was so good, Rychly said, it was used as a model for the other schools.

Rychly said the plan has four goals. One of its first initiatives is to support the military. Rychly said mem-bers of the military have to deal with many rules and regulations pertaining to what help they can receive fi-nancially. She said the goal of the plan is to provide the kind of help military families need.

The second initiative focuses on bridging the tran-sition from secondary school into college. While high school students are allowed to take college courses now, Rychly said they are trying to better promote the process to high school students.

Another initiative looks at policies that may hinder students from getting into Augusta State.

The fourth initiative is to build up Augusta State’s enrichment programs, such as study abroad, undergraduate research programs and the honors program. She said some faculty members believe the program will be helpful to students.

“I believe Complete College Georgia will work,” said Katherine Sweeney, the registrar and director of admissions at Augusta State. “Nationally, graduation rates (have) fallen for a variety of rea-sons. I like that every school will now have a focus on graduation.”

Rychly said she wants students to have a better experience in college through these various initia-tives. She said she wants to work on Augusta State’s advising system to give students help when they are struggling in certain classes.

While helping students is an important factor, Rychly said there is also another reason she likes this program.

“We will report back on the progress,” Rychly said. “I think it is one of the neat things that has hap-pened in education. When we do these initiatives, we are keeping track of what difference the program makes.”

Rychly said they will keep reporting back over a three-year period. Rychly said some results will be reported monthly while others will be reported af-ter the semester is finished. She said the program is geared toward the undergraduate students.

“I think this is good practice,” Rychly said. “This is what we want to be doing at Augusta State.”

The Complete College Georgia program will begin in the fall of 2013.

CollegeCONTINUED from PAGE 1

Horizon Transportation, brought the new transit bus to campus and provided a demonstration to Munschy. According to Harris, the new bus includes a 24-hour review camera, wheelchair ramp, under-seat storage and first-aid kit. The bus can hold up to 34 passengers on seats and 20 more standing. Horizon Transportation is also planning to install a security camera inside and outside of the bus.

With the old and the new buses, Jaguar Express will continue to address the needs of campus commu-nity, Munschy said. The buses transport deans, athletes, study abroad students, professors, custodians and many others.

“I’m really proud of our provider,” Munschy said. “Horizon does a great job. It has made our shuttle sys-tem successful. This partnership makes the system run very well and is appreciated by all the passengers.”

Horizon Transportation will operate the new shut-tle in January and will continue to work with the new university until June 30, 2013, or longer, said Harris.

ShuttleCONTINUED from PAGE 2

kfrazie9@aug.edu

schen1@aug.edu

“We are cutting the hot water heaters off,” Sealy said. “We cut them off at night, on the week-ends and when nothing is scheduled over there.”

Depending on the results, Sealy said he is thinking of testing the other buildings, to see if turning off the hot water heater would benefit all of them. While many of the reduction programs are happening now, there is one they want to start dur-ing the holidays.

“This year we might cut the Christmas tree lights back a couple of hours,” Sealy said. “Who is looking at a Christmas tree after midnight?”

Like the lights and air conditioner, Sealy said they would cut the Christmas tree back on in the morning. Sealy said they are also saving energy in things people don’t notice. They are putting en-ergy efficient lights in the emergency phones on campus. Instead of using hyaline lamps, Sealy said they use a florescent light that is blue. They put a photocell in the phone to turn off the light dur-ing the day. Sealy said he is also putting up clocks that control the exterior and interior lighting to run through a wireless network that he controls.

Since the program started, Augusta State has seen good results both financially and naturally, said Steve Zimmerman, the assistant director of physical plant at Augusta State.

“It has helped the overall budget cuts and helped bring in more money,” said Zimmerman said. “It is good for not polluting as much. It is a win-win situation.”

Sealy said the unofficial goal is to get the en-ergy costs down to $1 per square foot of building. They are halfway to reaching their goal. While most of the buildings are eco-friendly, Sealy said the warehouse buildings are not. But, he said, he is working to change that and more energy-savings will be around in the future.

SmokingCONTINUED from PAGE 1

jpabon@aug.edu

tunity to vote might make them feel more trusting of officials.”

Kemp agreed early voting gives voters flexibility in casting their ballots, but he said there is a larger group of people early voting appeals to and even the decreased amount of days is still perhaps too long.

“(Early voting) gives vot-ers more options to make sure they have the ability to cast their vote in the upcoming election,” Kemp said. “Certainly working Georgians who may not be able to get off work election Tues-day may find they have an eas-ier time to vote during the three weeks of early voting. Three weeks is a long time. If some-body wants to vote six weeks before the election they can do it by absentee ballot.”

Those who may not have a ride to the polling precincts, are too sick or too old to stand in long lines and those who have already decided also use early voting, Searles said.

Despite being relatively new, early voting has had a sig-nificant impact on Richmond County, said Lynn Bailey, the di-rector of the Richmond County Board of Elections. She said ap-proximately half the votes cast-

ed in the 2008 election were cast during the early voting period. Despite the shorter time period, she said she does not foresee a change in voter turnout.

“Either we will be crazy busy on those 21 days or we will have more people voting on election day to compensate for the shortening of days,” she said. “I think voter turnout will be what it’s going to be – people are going to vote whether they choose to vote early or on elec-tion day. I suspect early voting will continue to be a very popu-lar choice for voters.”

Although Kemp and Bai-ley both said they think the de-creased number of days will not have an effect on voter turnout, Searles suggested otherwise.

“I’m guessing that most people in the state of Georgia do not know that the length of time was shortened,” she said. “If that’s the case, then it’s going to make it much more difficult for people to vote... You think you would keep it the way it is and continue to make it easier.”

Early voting began Oct. 15 and individuals can find more information on early voting and their personalized voter infor-mation by visiting the “My Voter Page” on the Georgia Secretary of State website.

CompleteCONTINUED from PAGE 1

PHOTO BY AUGUSTAGA.GOVjhobday2@gmail.com

@BRingerSports@BellRinger_News

Check out an article about the new dean of

the College of Education, Cindi Chance.

FOLLOW US

kfrazie9@aug.edu

GraduationCONTINUED from PAGE1

www.asubellringer.com

Rychly said the December 2013 graduation will be held in the Bell Auditorium and the oth-ers in the James Brown Arena. Rychly said there is a committee that is negotiating and finding venues that the school can use in the future.

Despite negative reactions from the chang-es, Rychly said she understands the importance of students walking across the stage.

“I marched every time I got one of my de-grees,” Rychly said. “My whole family was there. It meant a lot to me to have them there.”

PAGE 4 TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2012

the opinion pages: a public forumwww.asubellringer.com

editorial

Letters to the editor must be accompanied by the author’s email address. All columns and letters to the editor are the opinion of the author. The views expressed in the opinion section do not necessarily express those of The Bell Ringer,

a designated public forum. Anything submitted to The Bell Ringer is open to be edited or rejected. However, The Bell Ringer staff gives all opinions a fair chance to be heard.

All letters will be edited for grammar and style. If you would like to contribute a column or a

letter to the editor, send an email to:

bellringerproduction@gmail.com

editorial policy do you have an opinion

on things at ASU?if so, email us

atbellringerproduction@gmail.com

Though the possibility still looms that we may never see it again, it’s heartwarming to see the Augusta State University “A” dotting the streets of Augusta, Ga., as the com-munity throws its support behind the emblem.

Yet instead of taking the voice of the community into consideration, the Board of Regents asserts that it will not revisit the naming of the “New U,” and that’s troubling.

For the first time in a long time, the entire city is backing a single idea – keeping “Augusta” in the name of the merged university – and it seems to be a losing effort. But isn’t it beau-tiful?

If we ever had any doubt that Augusta supports its universities, we should now disabuse ourselves of that notion.

Save the A signs now stretch from Washington Road to Wrights-boro Road, from Richmond County to Columbia County, from your neighbor’s front yard to Ricardo Azziz’s. Not to mention the countless Save the A bumper stickers that now grace the rears of vehicles all across the greater Augusta area.

Augusta may not carry the dis-tinction of being a “college town,” but the Save the A campaign has definitely shown that this town has a sweet spot for its colleges. Why the BOR does not wish to capitalize on that concept baffles us at The Bell Ringer.

We mentioned in the Aug. 21 is-sue of The Bell Ringer that in order for the “New U” to grow it will need community support. We would argue that the more than 5,000 signatures on Save the A’s online petition is more than enough evidence that the community supports the “New U,” just not the atrocious name that we are stuck with.

It all stems from pride. Augusta supports the “New U” because it is proud of what the two universities have accomplished up to this point. We are proud to be home to the state’s public medical research university, proud to produce the two-time Divi-sion I men’s golf national champion-ship team and proud to be the start-ing point of university presidents, professional athletes and everyone in between. And the best part is that as we continue to grow and reach new heights, our achievements reflect the city we live in, our home: Augusta.

The city of Augusta has been there with us through thick and thin, and don’t you think that we, the “New U,” owe it to the city to include “Augusta” in the name of the merged institution? Community support is a beautiful thing, BOR. Do you know what it’s like without it? Are you will-ing to lose it over something as sim-ple, yet as important, as a name? The city is begging for your help, and we don’t think they will return the favor when you inevitably end up begging for its help down the road.

In defense of the ‘A’

Search for beauty: Inspired by the wire“There is a degree of danger in

searching for beauty, but the danger is outweighed by the discovery.”

RON HICKERSONchief reporter

rhickers@aug.edu

Imagine standing on the edge of one of the Twin Towers - one foot on the ledge, the other on a tightrope stretching to the second tower.

Holding a balance beam and armed with concentration, you step out onto the tightrope – leaving behind your anchor to the safe, tangible world to walk on thin air more than 1,000 feet above the ground. This is exactly what Philippe Petit did Aug. 7, 1974, after he illegally strung up a tightrope between the Twin Tow-ers and then proceeded to walk the line shortly after 7 a.m. that Wednesday as World Trade Cen-ter employees began pouring into the towers to start their workdays. He crossed the rope eight times, spending 45 minutes walking the fine line.

I was first acquainted with Petit’s accomplishment in 2008 when I bought the documentary “Man on Wire,” which told the story of his journey from Paris to New York to stage this incredible act. I was astonished by Petit’s sto-

ry and his drive and have watched the film numerous times since then. I never thought that I would get to see him in person, but that expectation was shattered as the Augusta State University campus hosted Petit for a lecture as part of the Westobou Festival.

At the event, Petit told the audience his story about coordi-nating his famous tightrope act: planning a way to set up a line that would span the towers and set-ting it up under cover of darkness, all the while avoiding security guards. But when he was asked why he did it, Petit replied that there was no real rhyme or reason to his actions. He did it as a show of beauty. To him, the beauty of walking on air made people pause before wading through the mun-dane.

His lecture rekindled my search for beauty. I love beauty and look for ways to incorporate it in my life, whether it’s through art, literature, language, music or nature. To me, beauty and truth are intertwined and are absolutely

essential. Yet searching for beauty proves to be like walking my own tightrope as I look for a reason to step away from my terrestrial an-chor point in the mundane and al-low myself to glide on thin air. It’s overwhelming, but it absolutely restores my sanity.

At the event, someone asked Petit if the thought ever crossed his mind that he could fall from his walk between the towers. He responded by saying when he first arrived in America speaking very little English and told people his plan, he only really learned to pro-nounce the word “walk.” It never occurred to him to pronounce the word “fall.” He acknowledged that the action was dangerous, but there was something more impor-tant driving him.

“I am not interested in the risk,” Petit said. “I am interested in the beauty.”

I hope that will be my attitude as well. I think there is a degree of danger in searching for beauty, but the danger is outweighed by the discovery.

Dear Editor,

Folks, I read in the newspaper in June that the Board of Regents ap-proved a $3.5 million raise for four college presidents in the state of Georgia. I thought the State of Georgia was on a budget.

No, folks, I don’t have any problems with them getting a raise; however, I work at Augusta State University’s Physical Plant and haven’t had a raise since July 2009.

I wrote the BOR a letter June 15 requesting each employee in the Physi-cal Plant that makes $30,000 a year or less get a $5,000 raise in salary. I re-ceived a nice letter back from the BOR on June 20 saying in so many words that the BOR couldn’t give Physical Plant employees a raise because of de-clining state tax revenue.

I asked myself a question: How is anyone getting a raise if that is the an-swer? The only answer I could think of is the rich get richer and the working man gets nothing.

Georgia Health Sciences Univesrity just paid out $45,000 for a commit-tee to change a name. If the BOR has the last say on the name, then the BOR could have saved $45,000 and given the Physical Plant employees a raise out of that money.

I wrote the BOR another letter on June 28 saying that I disagreed with their decision, for which I didn’t receive an answer back.

Now folks, I believe right is right and wrong is wrong.

The BOR could have given a $2.5 million raise to the four university presidents and taken the other $1 million to give the Physical Plant a raise. Or, when BOR elected chancellor Huckaby and paid him $369,000 a year, they could have cut the budget and paid him $269,000 year and given the Physical Plant a raise.

I’ll never understand why a decision like this was made, except to say the rich get richer and the working man gets nothing.

Folks, I love my job here at Augusta State and the staff and students. Out of all the years I have worked, this is the second best job I have had; I worked for Georgia Theatre Company for 5 years.

Sincerely,

Donald MillerPhysical Plantdmille14@aug.edu

Dear Editor,

I am writing to take issue with the opinion piece by Leigh Beeson in the Sept. 18 issue of The Bell Ringer.

In her column titled “Please don’t vote: An urgent plea to my uninformed peers,” Beeson gen-erously offers to do us, her peers, “a favor” by informing us of the relevant issues in the upcoming presidential election. She states that it’s not that she doesn’t respect our opinion but then goes on to explain the various ways in which she does not respect our opinions.

Her three main concerns are Medicare and Medicaid reform, the economy and abortion. All admittedly important issues that are difficult for the majority of people to fully understand, not just we who are Beeson’s “ignorant” and blissfully unaware” peers. Unfortunately, her column does not go on to shed light on any of the aforementioned issues.

The statement that “Medicare and Medicaid need to be reformed” is one that I believe the vast majority of Americans of all ideological leanings can agree upon. The point of contention is how? Beeson’s implication that Medicare recipients should not expect access to a doctor’s services since they “didn’t pay for it” is insulting to everyone in this country, employer and employee, who contribute payroll taxes to the system over lifetimes of hard work. We did (or will, depending on age) pay for that, Beeson.

On the issue of the economy, Beeson cites the recent Gallup Poll surveyed satisfaction in the US. “Satisfaction” being an admittedly nebulous concept, she interprets this data as somehow representative of the state of the US economy, though a quick glance at the USD Index might have yielded less murky results. In any case, the Gallup satisfaction survey shows (and Beeson acknowl-edges this in her column) that the overall satisfaction of Americans is the highest it’s been in years.

How Beeson can look at a 19 percent one year increase (gallup.com) in the number of people who say they are satisfied with the way things are going in the US and extrapolate that somehow this means the economy is in the toilet is creative manipulation of data at its best.

Finally and most distressingly, on the issue of abortion and a woman’s right to choose, Beeson dangles a portion of truth out there but then fails to elaborate on the meaning. She reports that the various news outlets have characterized President Barack Obama’s stance on abortion as “extreme-ly liberal,” which is correct; however, the statement about “partial birth abortions and born alive acts, which require treatment for infants of botched abortion attempts” just sort of flops out there in a vague way, with no background information or clarification. In fact, when President Obama was Senator Obama from Illinois in 2001, his arguments against these issues was about the language of the law. Being a former Constitutional professor, Obama correctly pointed out that the 14th amend-ment already protected children from being killed, so if the law deemed a child who survived a late-term labor-induced abortion had a right to live, then “this would be an anti-abortion statute.”

It’s about the language in the bill, Beeson, not denying medical treatment to living children.

Before we had the Voting Rights Act in 1965, many Southern states had elaborate voter registration procedures which were often referred to as “literacy tests” but were in fact just hoops that African-American, Latino and Native American voters (read: Democrats) had to jump through in order to exercise their constitutional right to vote. The condescending tone of Beeson’s article makes me wonder if she longs for the days when only the “smart folks” like her got to vote (read: white, land owners who controlled everything, including the flow of truthful information).

I would like to challenge my fellow students: please arm yourself with the truth, don’t form strong opinions on things you don’t fully understand (make an effort to understand them), don’t just vote for personalities or race and don’t just take as fact everything you see in print (even if it’s in your own school newspaper). Think for yourselves, but please DO participate in the greatest politi-cal experiment the world has ever seen. Please DO vote!

Sincerely,

Roberta J. Markevitchrmarkevi@aug.edu

Letters to the Editor“The rich get richer and the working man gets nothing.”

“Participate in the greatest political experiment the world has ever seen.”

Although the campus swimming pool is no longer in use, it was once in full swing.

According to the Augusta Chron-icle archives, the swimming pool on Augusta State University was built as a part of campus expansion. Augusta State, known at that time as Augusta College, had just gotten the approval from the Board of Regents to build a fine arts center on the campus. In 1966, Augusta College got approval from the board to build the pool as well. The school gave the contract to R. B. Wright Construction Co., and the cost of build-ing it was $266,000. It was to be com-pleted by July of the following year.

However, by July of 1967, the pool was not yet finished. Accord-ing to an article in The Bell Ringer,

the school had to postpone opening the pool for five weeks. The pool was officially opened in January 1968 and was used for a physical education class. Students had to take the class as a school requirement.

“I remember it used to be a require-ment when I went to school here,” said Steve Zimmerman, the assistant direc-tor of physical plant at Augusta State. “I took my swimming classes there.”

Although the pool was used for teaching students, non-students were allowed to use the facilities as well. Zimmerman said faculty members could go to the pool after hours and swim if they wanted to. He added that he would occasionally go there after work and thoroughly enjoyed using the pool. They also had hours for students from the then Medical College of Georgia to come and use it as well. The pool facilities also housed showers and a locker room.

The facil-ity was used by the Augusta State swim team. The swim team was started in 1971. The team was known as the Aqua-Jaguars. According to The Bell Ring-er archives their first head coach was Tom Pepper. The teams’ first victory was against DeKalb College. By next season, the Aqua-Jaguars finished the season (13-0) and par-ticipated in the NAIA tournament. In 1972, players Mark Darling and Jim Claffey were invited to participate in national tournament. At one time, the swim team was just as popular as the Augusta State men’s basket-

ball team.The archives also stated that by 1997, the pool started having problems. Once the pool started hav-ing problems, it gradually fell apart.

“A sonogram was done of the pool’s aluminum shell,” said Therese Rosier, the former assistant vice president for plant operations. “We were losing more water than usual.”

Due to the corrosion of the Earth’s material on the backside of the pool, it was wearing down the shell making it thin. Ten years later, the pool had been corroded further. Because of the corro-sion, the pool had several tiny leaks that caused 3,000 to 4,000 gallons of water to seep out on a nightly basis. The uni-versity realized it could not realign the pool because it would have cost too much money. In November 2007, the university officially closed the facility.

However, there could have been another reason the pool was closed. according to an article from The Bell Ringer Archives, in October 2007, Gov. Sonny Purdue asked the state to cut back on water consump-tion by 10 to 15 percent because of the water crises of 2007 in Georgia. Before the water crises occurred in 2007, Augusta State used on average 60 million gallons of water a year.

Zimmerman said he doesn’t know what the university plans to do with pool facility in the future.

THE BELL RINGER PAGE 5

www.asubellringer.com

ARTS & LIFE

CCCCCC

Forgotten but not lost: Chronicling Augusta State’s history

By KARL FRAZIERsenior reporter

Diving into the past: ASU’S POOLHOUSE

The Augusta College men’s swim team, the Aqua Jags, crowd onto the on the diving platform for a team photo at the pool house.

1974 | THE BELL RINGER ARCHIVES

Members of the New Hope Wor-ship Center and First Baptist Church of Augusta dedicate their Saturday afternoons

to serving the less fortunate through the New Hope Bridge Ministry that takes place under the Calhoun Expressway Bridge at 15th Street.

Its mission is “to feed, to clothe and to min-ister the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the inner-city poor and the homeless,” said Roger Gardner, the pastor and founder of the Bridge Ministry.

Each Saturday begins with setup, which includes the band, congregation and children’s area. From there, volunteers are gathered and assigned to different positions then service begins with prayer and music. Before the ser-mon, meals are packaged and served to adults and children by volunteers in the Planet Hope food truck. If available, clothes are given to those in need after the sermon, Gardner explained.

The inspiration for the outreach ministry came from the impact of the original Bridge Ministry in Nashville, founded by Southern gos-pel singer Candy Christmas in 2004, he said.

“She came to our church and present-ed to the church that the Lord had called her off the stages of Nashville as a gospel sing-er to minister to the poor,” Gardner said.

The process of establishing the min-istry consisted of getting the permits and securing the location, going to the right authorities, and prayer, Gardner said. How-ever, there was an even bigger obstacle.

“Wisdom – knowing how to start and what to do,” he said. “We started very small with only a handful of volunteers and some pick-up trucks and an old bread truck.”

Gardner said he and the volun-teers persevered, finally holding the Bridge Ministry’s first service in 2007.

“The first service was the first Saturday in January of 2007,” Gardner said. “The weather was miserable, and we probably had about 40 participants.”

From their experiences, New Hope was able to prepare First Baptist for when it took on its own Saturdays beginning June 25, 2011.

“We prepared from September of 2010 through June of 2011,” said Byron Brown, an ordained deacon and leader of the First Baptist volunteers. “So, (we had) about nine months of preparation. We were well prepared for it. (We prepared with) prayer and in planning.”

According to Brown, he heard about the Bridge Ministry more than four years ago from an old Bible study acquain-tance with whom he met for breakfast.

“When we finished the meal, he said he had to go to the Bridge Ministry,” he said. “So, I followed up with him and found out about it.”

As a result of certain life factors, he said he was pointed in the direction of “serv-ing the poor and the oppressed” and despite being unfamiliar with New Hope, he said he found enough common ground through this mission to get First Baptist involved.

“There’s a lot of division in Christianity

today between churches and between denomi-nations,” Brown said. “There are a lot of walls that have been erected by man. We oppose that, and we come together and worship as one de-nomination and that is believers in Jesus Christ.”

With the added help, the Bridge has been able to increase its services.

“If you didn’t know which church was lead-ing, you wouldn’t know (the difference) from Saturday to Saturday,” Brown said. “We follow the same schedule, the same plan and the same outline. We’ve just been able to double the effort because of picking up the in-between Saturdays.”

An effort that some would say is making a significant impact in the lives of the less fortunate.

“People come to know Christ and they receive hope where there’s hopelessness, and the greatest thing is that they receive love,” said Gardner. “We care and we want to help them meet their needs. We want to give them a hand up and not just a handout.”

This attitude inspired some of the inner-city poor and homeless to participate with helping the less fortunate overseas. A group of men from the local Salvation Army began offering what they could after finding out about New Hope’s efforts to provide help for people in other countries, said Donna Marella, a volunteer with the Bridge.

So far, their offerings have helped establish 22 churches in countries such as China, India and Africa, as well as helping a girl in India who was used in human trafficking, Marella said.

“When I see people touched by God, those are memorable moments,” said Bill Thomp-son, a volunteer who has been involved with the Bridge from its beginning. “Just being able to encourage people and pray with them [and] see them overcome hang-ups and troubles.”

Thompson said that his experience has “fleshed out” his perspective on poverty to where he has a deeper understanding of its reality.

“We should have a heart to extend our-selves to those that are suffering more,” he said. “That is the responsibility of the community and the church, not the government. That’s one of the big lies and deceptions that we’ve had.”

Valerie Davis, a volunteer and member of New Hope, said her experience made her real-ize that many people are unaware of the amount of homelessness in the community and not being involved allows them to ignore these situations.

Gardner said this may be why the ministry faces such a challenge when recruiting volunteers.

“We always need volunteers, we always need money and we always need prayer,” he said.

Another major challenge is spreading the word of the Bridge Ministry’s resources and help to the poor and homeless, Thompson said.

The ministry remains optimistic about the future with hopes of building a dream center, especially to house, train and disciple homeless women and children as well as help with work and social skills, Gardner said.

As the ministry moves forward, Gardner said there are things volunteers need to be aware of.

“I want them to be aware that this is a church,” Gardner said. “This is not an event; this is a place that we meet with the Lord every Saturday. It’s a battleground. It’s not a training ground. We fight for lives.”

Churches reach outto homeless under bridge

By SHELLEY-ANN WILLIAMS contributor

swilli99@aug.edu

kfrazi9@aug.edu

Pastor Roger Gardener preaches his message to the Bridge Ministry’s congregation and its volunteers underneath the Calhoun Expressway Bridge durring one of its Saturday services.

SHELLEY-ANN WILLIAMS | CONTRIBUTOR

And Action! Students

enrolled in both of As-

sociate Professor Rick Pu-kis’ Intro to Filmmaking classes took on the role of amateur filmmakers af-ter making their first films with a Super 8 camera.

Pukis said he added this group project as a new element for the class. In the past, he said, he would lecture about the differ-ences between digital and analog film technology, but this semester he wanted to take a different approach.

“I thought, ‘You know what? Wouldn’t it be great to actually have the stu-dents make a film on film instead of just talking about it and showing the differ-ences?’” the professor said.

Pukis said he came across a Super 8 camera in a small camera store in Aiken, S.C., and bought it for the communications de-partment. The camera uses 8-millimeter film that has sprockets on one side that the camera catches and pulls in the reel. Instead of digital-

ly recognizing an image, the film inside the camera un-dergoes a chemical process, starting when it is exposed to light, to make the image, creating a different aes-thetic than a digital camera.

The project had several constraints to making the two three-minute films, Pu-kis said. After coming up with a concept and writing a script and a list of scenes for the films, it had to be shot during one class period us-ing only one roll of Super 8 film. All class members had to be involved in the films, whether they were in front of or behind the camera.

Pukis said the stu-dents also had to find other ways to edit the film be-cause digital editing would not be available to them.

“They had to try to find a creative way to do that,” Pukis said. “I wanted a complete film

made in the camera in-stead of posting it digitally”

To execute this proj-ect, Pukis said he had stu-dents volunteer in each of his classes to be the direc-tors, assistant directors and cinematographers as well as people to check for continuity errors. Every-one else had to be an actor or an extra in front of the camera. In her first class, Alexandra Rivas, a commu-nication major, volunteered for the director’s position.

Rivas said she has al-ways had a desire to direct and has been making films ever since she was able to get her hands on a cam-era. Rivas said, to her, the project did not seem like a challenge but rather as a desire. However, she went on to say there was a lot of work that went into the class’s three minute film.

“There was a lot of preproduction involved,” Rivas said. “If you were on the production side – not in front of the camera – you had to spend more time outside of class prepping for it. I was at school a lot at 8 o’clock in the morning or rewriting the script with the assistant director or go-ing with the cinematogra-

pher to scout out locations.”She said the biggest chal-

lenge was cultivating excite-ment for the project among her other classmates that were not a part of the crew.

“You knew that the rest of the students you were working with had the same interest as you when it comes to filming,” Rivas said. “When you have a group of people working on a film with the same drive, it really makes the collaboration a lot better and a lot more fun. You’re not battling or bump-ing heads with someone.”

The director in Pu-kis’ other class, Dylan Smith, a television and cinema major, agreed.

“When you’re not with a group of people whose job this is – when you’re not getting paid – you’re only going to have so many stu-dents… who actually really want to do this and get the

job done and really want to create something,” he said.

Smith said he had a lot of experience making films in high school and even di-rected his own short film in the past, but his passion for filmmaking has only in-creased while studying at Augusta State University. He said he had a great expe-rience working on this group project and having a great crew to help him and a coop-erative group of students in his film. He also said he was really excited to work with an actual Super 8 camera.

“Besides the cool fac-tor, it’s a challenge, and I think any amateur filmmaker should at least once have to work with film to be a well-rounded filmmaker,” he said.

As for filming in a linear fashion, both of the direc-tors had different reactions. Rivas said, to her, linear filming was nothing new because she was used to filming that way when she first started making movies.

“That seemed more normal to me than filming two different scenes at two different times and film-ing them all at once, which is how most people do it in editing,” she said. “Plus, you’re excited because it gives more element of sur-prise, like unwrapping a gift at the end, because you have no idea how it will turn out. That lack of control makes it a little bit more exciting.”

Yet, the communica-tions major said, the idea of having a film com-pletely made without any editing was daunting.

“We weren’t going to be splicing any of the film,” Smith said. “We weren’t going to be stop-ping and rewinding it in the camera. It had to be shot-for-shot perfect in the camera. That proved to be a challenge in and of itself.”

In all of the production, Pukis said he hopes the class members will see the aes-thetically-pleasing quality of the actual celluloid film. As an avid lover of film, it’s no secret that Pukis pre-fers the analog and maybe this group project will let students see why firsthand.

“And hopefully, they’ll say, ‘Wow! It looks so gorgeous!’” Pukis said. “I’m hoping they’ll see the aesthetic quality of film versus digital as so much more inviting.”

Pukis said he got the reaction he wanted from the student after displaying their films on a projector. After seeing the films, the students said they were impressed by the color and the texture of the films from the celluloid.

By RON HICKERSONchief reporter

rhickers@aug.edu

RON HICKERSON | STAFF

Students film a scene with Super 8 film in their Intro to Filming class.

S U P E R 8

Students get hands-on experience with

BRAINS!Moaning zombies

swarmed First Friday in downtown Augusta, Ga., Oct.

5. The third annual Zombie Walk of Augus-ta kicked off the Halloween holiday season with its family-friendly zombie flash mob.

Every First Friday of October, zombie-lovers of all ages dress up in their personal versions of zombies and imitate the living dead as they slug down the busiest street downtown. This year, zom-bies gathered in Springfield Vil-lage Park around sunset in prepara-tion for the walk.

Bryce Craps, the founder of the annual event, said he got his idea to have the event several years ago from his travels.

“I went to a zombie walk in North Carolina with my sister-in-law and her fam-ily; I thought that would be some-thing fun that I could bring back home with me,” Craps said. “Af-ter going to that, I decided to look into it more and decided to start one here.”

Three years later, the event’s flesh-eat-ing guests have multiplied, Craps said. From the first year with only 200 participants, Craps said, the numbers keep growing.

“The second year we had around 500, and this year we had 900,” Craps said. “At any given point downtown this year, there were probably 1,000 people dressed up as zombies. A lot of people showed up and didn’t even go to the walk; they just showed up dressed up.”

And some of the vicious-zombie make-up was from a local tattoo and piercing shop that offered zombie makeup on the street. Wrenn Daly, a piercer at First Amendment Tattoo, painted full-facial zombie makeup

on paying customers. For $5, Daly used liq-uid latex, fake blood and facial paint to trans-form her customers into the walking dead.

“This is actually the first year I’ve done it there and by myself,” Daly said. “The other two years I got together with the other piercers and tattoo artists at their shops and we all did makeup. We like to do stuff that’s fun and lets the community know that tat-tooed people aren’t as bad as they think.”

Daly and her 6-year-old daughter, Ka-lei Smith, attend the zombie walk every

year. Daly said her daughter likes to pretend she’s afraid when really she enjoys the thrill.

“I’ve been watching zom-bie stuff forever,” Daly said. “ I am a sucker for a B-rated zombie film. Kalei has been watching them with me since she was a baby.”

Daly said she believes zom-bies are the best type of monsters.

“I’ve just al-ways loved them,” Daly said. “They are the only horror characters that can’t really be romanti-cized. Everything else just gets turned into something soft-er. Zombies, though,

they are always dis-gustingly horrible.”

And they were. The streets were filled

with zombies of all kinds: hospital patients, brides and several occupational type zombies.

Mike Lepp, a senior television and cinema major, has participated in all three zombie walks. He said he was an office-worker zombie and dressed up in a tie and a tattered button-up shirt while clutching bloody office reports.

“Everyone is in great spirits,” Lepp said. “They do creative costumes, and it’s such a great way to kick off Halloween season. Aside from the blood, it’s such a fun thing to bring kids to. I saw plenty that had a blast.”

Craps said he will continue to host the event next year, but because of the grow-ing numbers of participant,s he will look for a larger venue to gather before the walk.

PAGE 6 TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2012

www.asubellringer.com

Rick Davis, the as-sistant chair of the Department of Com-munications and Pro-

fessional Writing, has written and will perform in “Beware What You Ask Of a Fairy,” the opening production of Storyland Theatre’s 25th season.

Davis teaches many com-munications and English classes, but something that students may not know about him is he is an ac-complished playwright whose plays have been produced on stages all over the country from New York City to Los Angeles.

Davis said in addition to writing plays he also directs and performs. Davis has been writing plays for 20 years, and in that time has authored 38 works not limited to children’s the-atre. His children’s plays include his own adaptations of popular fairy tales and some completely original tales.

“Children are a wonder-ful audience,” Davis said.

Many of Davis’ scripts are used by Storyland Theatre, a performing arts group. According to Davis, Sto-ryland Theatre began performing for children at the Grover C. Maxwell Performing Arts Theatre with Execu-

tive Director Barbara Feldman until 2005. Its performances now take place in the Imperial Theatre on Broad Street in downtown Augusta, Ga.

Storyland’s repertoire of plays are locally-written, origi-nal pieces with a majority of them having been penned by Davis.

“He is a wonderful play-wright,” Feldman said. “His children’s plays are excellent.”

Kerri Bridges, a junior com-munications major, has performed with Storyland before; howev-er, “Beware What You Ask of a Fairy” will be her first time per-forming in one of Davis’ plays.

“The most exciting thing about being in a Storyland production is walking out onto the stage in front of the kids for the first time,” Bridges said. “Rick’s play ‘Beware What You Ask of a Fairy’ is a very cute and clever show with a re-ally great message for all ages.”

Most of the plays performed by Storyland are fairy tales that everyone knows with a little new life breathed into them, Davis said. Characters are added and plots are fleshed out to give the tales more length and allow them to adapt ef-fortlessly to the stage, he said.

“Beware What You Ask Of A Fairy,” Storyland’s next perfor-

mance, is a completely original story by Davis. With original music by Susan Reese Burgess and lyr-ics by Davis, the play is all choreo-graphed by Georgia Cunningham.

Bridges said the story is about a mother’s plot to make a deal with an evil fairy to keep her daughter from marrying the man she loves. In the process of fulfilling her deal with a fairy from the dark side, Mr. Moroso, she meets three very dif-ferent looking fairies who show her you shouldn’t judge based on ap-pearances and to be careful what you wish for because once a wish is spoken it can’t be taken back.

“This play, I want to teach a little lesson,” Davis said. “Nobody’s per-fect and you shouldn’t cast stones at other people, and once you say some-thing, it’s said. You can’t unsay it.”

The cast list includes two star-crossed lovers, Maureen and Sean, played by Elizabeth Canas and Mi-chael Fortino, respectively. The per-fect villains include the mother, Mrs. Finnerty, played by Barbara Feldman, and Mr. Moroso, played by local radio host Austin Rhodes. The three good fairies are played by Beth Blalock, Kerri Bridges and Tiffany Bridges. There is also a cameo appearance by Davis as Richard the Lion Heart.

By JACQUELYN PABONproduction assistant

The

Shaunah Walton , a zombie dressed in a prom dress, traveled from Aiken, S. C., to attend the walk.

jpabon@aug.edu

JACQUELYN PABON | STAFF

Nadine Palmer and “Berg” moaned as they lurk around the Springfield Village Park .

From München to Augusta

One local restaurant brings Augusta a taste of Bavar-ian culture every year.

Villa Europa, a Ger-man and French cuisine restaurant, be-gan its Oktoberfest event Oct. 14. The event lasts for five nights and is held in honor of the German festival. Villa Eu-ropa began hosting this event in 1976. Unlike Germany, their event actually takes place in the month of October.

“Oktoberfest began as a celebration of the Mad King Ludwig II of Bavaria to his wife, Therese,” said Patricia Schaf-fer, the co-owner of Villa Europa. “It was also a celebration of the harvest; it was so popular it became an annual event. Lat-er, it became a celebration of the harvest as well as a type of anniversary present.”

Oktoberfest began in September of 1865 in Bavaria, Germany and ran into the first week of October. Legends and folklores say the festival was moved from

October to September because of the snowy weather. The snow would water down the beer, Schaffer said. Now, Okto-berfest is primarily a Bavarian tradition.

In preparation for this event, the restaurant takes all of its furniture out and rearranges it for festival-style seat-ing, with everything decorated in the Bavarian blue and white. During the event the employees dress up in leder-hosen, the traditional German attire.

“Sometimes it’s hard to tell the differ-ence between the guest and someone who works here because people really get into the spirit of Oktoberfest,” Schaffer said.

Along with all of the physical changes, Villa Europa makes other changes during the event as well in-cluding the addition of some spe-cialty items to the menu, she said.

“We have a broader menu then you’re going to see at any other Ok-toberfest in the world,” Schaffer said. “Because we hold our event indoors, our (celebration) is very unique in that everything is prepared in our kitchen. You will see traditional Oktoberfest items as well as regional cuisine from my mother’s part of Germany. She is the one who prepares all of our specials.”

During the event, the restaurant has live traditional German music, party

games and regional cuisine. Schaffer said the musicians have traveled for the past 15 years from New Braunfels, Texas. While the band is playing many customers get up and dance.

“We have a tradition called the polonaise where the customers get in a big train and make their way around the restaurant,” Peggy Schaf-fer said. “The customers love when the line goes through the kitchen.”

The food menu is not the only menu that changes. Their beverage selection also changes for the event in order to give the customers a full German experience.

“During the event we serve Ok-toberfest style beers such as Samuel Adams,” said Patricia Schaffer. “We also have two beers that are actu-ally served in the tent in Bavaria dur-ing their Oktoberfest celebration.”

In true Oktoberfest tradition, Villa Eu-ropa highlights authentic German beers.

The official Oktoberfest beer of the event is Spaten Oktoberfest, Schaffer said.

The bar will be stocked with three German draft beers as well as a vari-ety of bottled beers. They will further their drink selection by serving 30 dif-ferent type of Schnapps. For those who cannot handle the taste of Ger-many, they will also offer the American beer Bud Light, Patricia Schaffer said.

“Oktoberfest is like on big beer fest,” said Sean Wilcox, 22, of Augusta, Ga. “It’s a great place for people to come have a good time and enjoy good beer.”

Shaffer said the event will also include the iconic drinking glass shaped as a boot.

“In tradition, you’re supposed to pass the boot of beer around the ta-ble,” Peggy Schaffer said. “It’s not supposed to be individually drunk out of but passed around the table. To-wards the end of the beer, if it splash-es in your face, you are supposed to buy the next boot for the table.”

Oktoberfest at Villa Europa is a good event for Augustans to attend, Wilcox said, especially since it is the only one that takes place in this area.

“Oktoberfest is really a thank you to our guests for supporting us year around,” Patricia Schaffer said.

By NIKKI SKINNER staff writer

nskinner@aug.edu

Patricia Schaffer, the co-owner of Villa Europa, pops open a bottle of beer while wearing lederhosen. TRAVIS HIGHFIELD | STAFF

Performing arts group celebrates 25 yearsBy JACKIE FRANCISCO contributor

jfranci3@aug.eduAssociate Professor Rick Davis, who is also the assistant chair of the communications department, reads through his students’ papers in his office.

dead risedowntown

JACQUELYN PABON | STAFF

JACKIE FRANCISCO | CONTRIBUTOR

THE BELL RINGER PAGE 7

www.asubellringer.com

START geTTing moRe ouT of college.

START geTTing moRe ouT of life.

START geTTing moRe ouT of you.

START EARNING RESPECT.

START SHAPING YOUR FUTURE.

START PUSHING YOURSELF.

START MOTIVATING OTHERS.

Start growing.

START STRong.Sm

©2008. Paid for by the united States Army. All rights reserved.

There’s strong. Then there’s Army Strong. Enroll in Army ROTC atAugusta State University to complement your education with thetraining, experience and skills needed to make you a leader. ArmyROTC also offers an opportunity to compete for scholarships thatcan pay up to full-tuition and a monthly stipend to help pay for youreducation. And when you graduate, you will have an edge in life asan Army Officer and a leader. All it takes is enrolling in MSL101.To get started, contact us at (855) 276-9516.

ASK ABOUT OUR LEADERSHIP AND SCHOLARSHIP OPPORTUNITIES! For more information, contact James Sherrill at jsherrill@aug.edu, (706) 667-4795, 

(855) 276-9516 or visit us on campus in Galloway Hall.

From München

It was Oct. 31, 2009, and Wes Sims was with a friend checking out a property he was con-

sidering purchasing: the Goo-dale Inn on Sand Bar Ferry Road.

The two men knew the house was empty, Sims said, but they could hear noises that sounded as if they were not alone. Suddenly, Sims felt a cold sensation come over him and felt all the hairs on

his body stand up. Sims ran out of the house immediately, his partner not far behind. As they stood on the front lawn of the property, the men looked up to see the figure of a small child looking down at them from the third-story window.

Rachelle Moran, a certified parapsychologist and director of the South Coast Paranormal Society, said such incidents aren’t as isolat-ed as most people think. With para-normal phenomena occurring even within popular Augusta, Ga., attrac-tions such as the Sibley Mill, Lucky 7 Tattoo and downtown theaters.

“We have done investigations at the Miller Theatre in downtown Augusta and also at the Impe-rial Theatre, both of which had reports of seeing people in the balconies, in rooms that people don’t use anymore, dressing rooms and things like that,” Moran said.

Moran explained that a haunt-ing, or paranormal energy, can manifest itself in many ways: shadows, full-bodied apparitions, noises such as footsteps or laughter and even distinctive smells. When

Sims contacted the South Coast Paranormal Society to investigate the activity on the property of the Goodale Inn, which was built in 1799, Moran said she observed many of these manifestations inside the house, including a fleeting but intense smell of lemons in the foyer.

“That property is definitely haunted,” Moran asserted. “We know that it is haunted by a child and a woman, possibly the original owners, but we know that there is a child there and a woman there.”

The evidence observed at the Goodale Inn by the South Coast Paranormal Society includes the sounds of doors slamming, a little girl playing on the stairs and an apparition of a woman wearing a white dress visible from the sec-ond-floor window. Moran said all hauntings are the result of leftover energy from previous life forms.

“Energy doesn’t die,” Mo-ran said. “It doesn’t necessarily go away either. Energy can mani-fest in any form. Energy feeds off of energy, and it all depends on how much energy is present.”

Another haunting occurred in a CSRA apartment complex. The victim of the haunting, who asked to remain anonymous, is a former resident of Augusta who worked for the apartments she was living in at the time of the haunting. She stated that her belongings were be-ing moved around unexplainably, doors were being locked when no one was in the apartment, toi-let paper was being torn to shreds and fingerprints were appearing in her lotion and peanut butter jars.

“I thought a maintenance man was coming in, so I checked all that,” the victim said. “I changed my locks three times. I even bought a motion sensor camera. It shows me going out the door, but it never shows me coming back in, and then it was shut off.”

She even felt the physical sen-sation of someone patting her leg and the straightening of the covers over her shoulder at night. Even-tually, she called a medium who confirmed that the presence of a little girl and an older man were both present in the apartment.

Despite her belief that her apart-ment was haunted, the woman said

multiple times that she is a spiritual person of the Christian faith and that she would pray for protection from the spirits in her apartment.

“I think there was a portal in that apartment, which is like an opening to the spirit world ap-parently,” she said. “I try not to get into all that because there are too many questions. I don’t want to invite anything into my life.”

This unintentional invitation of spirits into people’s lives ac-counts for most demonic haunting cases, Moran said. Usually, they are invited accidentally by people who engage in Wiccan rituals or utilize Ouija boards without be-ing aware of the consequences their activities may provoke.

Demonic cases may result in more severe manifestations, such as bite marks appearing on people’s bodies or the malicious movement of household objects. Moran said they are also more difficult to get rid of because de-monic cases converge on indi-viduals rather than on locations.

While Sims said the major-ity of the paranormal phenom-ena he witnessed at the Goo-dale Inn seemed to be friendly enough, one incident jarred his memory as possibly malicious.

Sims and three other people were walking upstairs toward a door leading to the main level. He said just as his friend started to open the door, they heard “the loudest bang ever hit the floor right outside that door; it was louder than you could stomp.”

Sims said there was a fu-ton in the room beyond the door.

“It didn’t fall over,” he said. “It didn’t move. I picked the fu-ton up about three feet in the air and dropped it, and when it hit the ground, that’s the sound we heard. I stomped my feet as hard as I can and it was nowhere near as loud as that sound. Some-thing picked that futon up.”

The restoration of the Goo-dale house is an ongoing project, and Sims said he hopes to open a museum where brave people may one day have the opportunity to spend the night in a haunted house.

By MINDY WADLEYcontributor

mindyawadley@gmail.com

Bands’ efforts help student in time of need

By MINDY WADLEYcontributor

Group attempts

mindyawadley@gmail.com

Billy Daugherty lies inside a morgue drawer at the Waverly Hills Sanitorium .

As tragic as it is, the cliches we often use to describe a sense of understanding to

life’s mysteries can carry a weighty truth. A penny saved really is a penny earned. You really shouldn’t count your chickens before they hatch. And yes, unfortunately, bad things often do happen to good people.

Donnie Watson is a junior Eng-lish major at Augusta State Univer-sity, and I’ve been fortunate to know through mutual friends and classes for about a year and a half. Around campus, I always observe him laugh-ing with a group of friends, always with an insightful contribution to conversation. He’s also been an extremely helpful classmate, fill-ing me in on what I missed in class without me even having to ask.

Unfortunately, Donnie re-cently lost his father, who passed away Sept. 29. His absence from class was markedly noticeable for a couple of weeks. As difficult as these days have no doubt been, he has since returned to school, demon-strating his dedication to education.

Many of Donnie’s friends have joined together to organize a benefit show featuring Augusta’s pop-punk band Veara to help him and his sister with funeral and hospital costs. The show will take place Thursday, at Sec-tor 7G, with doors opening at 5 p.m.

Donnie said he was resistant to accept donations at first, but after the costs ended up being higher than what his family could cover, his friends Kane Taylor, Nicole Wilgus and Nick Mitcham organized the show anyway.

“I can’t adequately express how comforting it is to have friends that will do that, even with-out your consent,” Donnie said.

Bradley Wyrosdick, the lead singer of Veara, said the members of the band has been friends with Don-nie for many years. He said they were glad to be able to help him and his family in their time of need.

“Donnie is such a fun-loving, goofy guy with a huge heart,” Wyros-dick said. “He’s kind of an unpredict-able guy when it comes to either being shy or outgoing and loud, but he loves everything he does in his life. He’s a really heartfelt, passionate person.”

Veara has a new album coming out in early 2013 on Epitaph Records. Wyrosdick said the band is eager to put it’s music to use since it has brought them all together as friends.

“When you get to use music for a good cause, to help out people, it’s a re-ally awesome thing,” Wyrosdick said.

Donnie will also be performing at the show. He is the front man for Mudbrute a hardcore band whose unreserved lyrics ensure an emotion-ally intense performance at even the most mundane of times. Donnie said given the circumstances, this perfor-mance will be particularly cathartic.

The show’s lineup will include Bryan Kerr (bassist from Veara) play-ing an acoustic set, Thieves in Law, Off the Crowns, Omit, Mudbrute, and Veara. The show is free and donations to the Watson family are welcome.

to contact deceased

CONTRIBUTED BY RACHELLE MORAN

Around Town

DOWN1. Local festivities to celebrate the UGA-USC rivalry at the Savannah River border.3. Augusta State’s _________ will be repurposed, and instead students will have to exercise at the GHSU campus.6. The brain-devouring living dead who recently wreaked havoc in downtown Augusta.9. “The Arsenal ___” is a treasured Augusta State tree that was removed because of disease in 2004.

ACROSS2. Men’s golfer who came to Augusta State by way of Thailand. 4. Look Up at Night, Augusta5. Atlanta’s NFL team that is currently undefeated.7. A German celebration during the fall season that highlights tasty food and dark

beer.8. A popular food truck that recently obtained a space on the GHSU campus.10. A local restaurant that caters to late-night customers and is located next to Firehouse on Broad Street.

PAGE 8 TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2012

comics:

Be a part of

Y O U Rn e w s p a p e r

and send your drawings to

Draw comics in your free time?

bellringerproduction@gmail.com

Q u e e n Pillowtop Mattress

Set$150

762-444-7615

NEWIn this Issue...

1

2

3 4

5

6

7

8

9

10

F U N D R A I S I N G

S H A K E

L O G O S

W E S T A B O U

M O N D A Y

I SH

P

JAMA

PRE

TI

E

C

D

BLUE

IR

N

AN

S C A

Oct. 2 Issue Solved

entertain yourself

9

10

6

7

8

32

1

4 5

THE FOX BOX “FOX” SI-LONG CHENweb master

With the support of his teammates and coach, one golfer said he hopes to take his skills to another level.

Meechai Padung, a native of Bangkok, said he started playing golf when he was 4 years old. He was introduced to the game of golf by his sib-lings.

“I have four older brothers and they all play golf,” Padung said. “It was just a family thing. I guess that pushed me into it.”

At the age of 9, Padung and his brothers moved from Thailand and settled in Augus-ta, Ga. While there, he worked

at the golf academy at Jones Creek. When he was 13, Pa-dung moved to Bradenton, Fla., and went to the David Leadbet-ter Golf Academy during his high school years. Padung said it was easy choosing to come to Augusta State with the school having back-to-back national championships in 2010 and 2011 on its resume.

“It made sense for me to come to Augusta (State) be-cause they have a great golf program,” Padung said. “(The

university) has a great practice facility. It was a place where I could stay down and focus on golf.”

Kevin McPherson, the head coach of the men’s golf team at Augusta State, said it did not take much recruiting to bring Padung to Augusta State. Because the Thai import had lived in Augusta earlier, McPherson did not have to take him on a tour around the city.

The coach said he was im-pressed with Padung’s intan-

gible qualities.“During the recruiting pro-

cess, I knew that he was a ma-ture kid,” McPherson said. “He had been on his own for several years, and it made the transition easier to come to Augusta.”

Padung said his broth-ers help him out from time to time, but he mostly lives by himself and is used to being in-dependent. Padung has enjoyed the way the golf team and the coach have embraced him.

THE BELL RINGER PAGE 9

www.asubellringer.com

NEW

SPORTSAsian golfer determined to show his skillsBy KARL FRAZIERsenior reporter

The men’s cross country team ran to a second-place finish at the Jaguar Invita-tional at Blanchard Woods Park in Evans, Ga., Oct. 5.

Adam Ward, the head coach of the women’s and men’s cross country teams at Augusta State, said he was satisfied with the perfor-mance of the men’s team.

“I thought that we did well,” Ward said. “We came out of (the Invitational) with a very convincing second place.”

Since 2007, Ward said the Jaguars have hosted the Invitational at Blanchard Woods Park. The Jaguars fin-ished this year’s Invitational with a combined time of 2:13:13.65, behind the win-ner, Georgia State. Because of its status as a Division I team, Ward said Georgia State was supposed to win and had the motivation to win this year after the Jags won last year’s Invitational.

“We beat them last year, so it’s a little bit of a grudge match,” Ward said. “They are a talented group, and I would not take anything

away from them.”Augusta State also post-

ed individual success. Senior Jaiden Brandt finished sec-ond, behind Georgia State’s Austin Boetje, with a time of 25:39.71 in the men’s 8K

race. The other top three finishers for the Jags were Dustin Ross (sixth), Jordan Herbert (seventh) and Josh Stockton (10th). Brandt said his time was a personal best for him.

“I feel pretty good,” Brandt said. “We have worked really hard. This sea-son, all summer, we worked and we trained.”

While the men’s cross country team finished strong, the women’s team suffered some setbacks. The Lady Jag-uars were unable to register a team score. Ward said the women’s team was depleted and had a certain member of the team been able to run, the Jags would have been able to

put together a strong perfor-mance.

The Georgia State wom-en’s team finished first, with a perfect score for the second straight year in the women’s 6K race. Katherine Showal-ter, from Georgia State, won with a time of 23:09.52. The Panthers took the top six spots.

However, the Lady Jag-uars did experience some success. Sophomore Jessica Carpenter finished in seventh place with a time of 25:13.02.

“It feels pretty good,” Carpenter said. “I am pret-ty happy with my perfor-mance.”

Ward said he is proud that at least one of his run-

ners from both teams was able to place in the top 10.

Ward said things are looking up for the cross country teams. He plans to rebuild the women’s team through recruiting and feels the men’s team has a core of good runners. However, the team must plan for the Peach Belt Conference Champion-ships on Saturday in Monte-vallo, Ala. Ward plans take it easy in preparation for the conference championships.

“Right now, the team is going to get a lot of rest and touch up on some things” Ward said. “We have gotten all the fitness we are going to have. It’s really just mainte-nance at this point and just keeping folks healthy.”

The men’s team will go into the conference champi-onship as defending champs. Brandt said the Jaguars are hoping to repeat as confer-ence champions. The top three teams from the con-ference go onto the NCAA Southeast Regionals which will be held in Charlotte, N.C., on Nov. 3. The top three teams from the Region-als qualify for the NCAA Championships, in Joplin, Mo., Nov. 20. Since the be-ginning of the season, Brandt said the team’s goal was to make it to nationals.

Jaguars take second on their home courseBy KARL FRAZIERsenior reporter

kfrazie9@aug.edu

Members of the Augusta State men’s cross country team pose for a group photograph after the team finished in second place of the Jaguar Invitational at Blanchard Woods Park in Evans, Ga.

KARL FRAZIER | STAFF

“He had been on his own for several years, and it made the transition easier to come to Augusta.”

- Augusta State head coach Kevin McPherson

see PADUNG on PAGE 10

JOHN-MICHAEL GARNERsports editor

Braves add to history of

chokesTurner Field should be bulldozed.Oh, sure, the home park of the Atlanta Braves

is a perfectly enjoyable place to take in a ma-jor league baseball game. I have plenty of fond memories of going to games there with friends and family. There’s not a bad seat in the house, and the atmosphere is always jovial.

But the place should be leveled into oblivion. Why? Because the Braves absolutely, positively cannot win there when it matters.

Earlier this month, the Braves, a team with a long and inglorious history of choking, authored another doozy of a collapse, falling 6-3 at home to the St. Louis in the National League’s one-game wild-card playoff after committing three egregious errors and allowing four unearned runs. The top defensive team in the Senior Cir-cuit during the regular season came undone under the playoff lights, an all-too-familiar storyline for tormented Braves fans.

The loss dropped Atlanta to an absurd 0-9 all time in the postseason when facing elimination at Turner Field. Since defeating the New York Mets in the 1999 National League Championship Series, the Braves are 5-16 overall in postseason games at home.

The Braves’ record of postseason futility at The Ted does not even take into account the fact that the team was swept at home by the Philadel-phia Phillies to close out the 2011 regular season and complete the worst tank-job in NL history, as Atlanta came from 10.5 games ahead of the Cardinals with five weeks remaining to miss the playoffs by one game.

The latest chapter in the Braves’ hefty book of collapses may have been one of the most ag-gravating. Atlanta scored the game’s first two runs on a homer by backup catcher David Ross and had the game’s hottest pitcher, Kris Medlen, who had not lost a start since May 23, 2010, on the mound. The stars seemed to be aligning for the Braves to end years of frustration. Instead, that frustration just became exacerbated as Atlan-ta fell to pieces in the middle innings of the game.

It was a sadly fitting end to the legendary career of third baseman Chipper Jones, who led his team to the playoffs 13 times only to watch an opposing team celebrate on his home field in October in nine of those seasons. Jones commit-ted the first of the three Atlanta errors, leading to three Cardinal runs in the fourth inning.

A popular trope among outside sports fans says that the Braves cannot win the big games on their home turf because of lukewarm fan sup-port. Atlanta has long been viewed as a bad sports town because of the Braves’ failure to sell out nu-merous playoff games in the late 1990s and early 2000s, but after so many years of watching their team fail to get the job done when it counted, who could really blame the fans for not wearing out the turnstiles in October when they have become so accustomed to heartbreak?

When the Braves went from worst to first in the 1991 season, the city of Atlanta supported the team with a fervor rarely seen before or since. But fans can only deal with so much anguish before they become disillusioned with a franchise. If the Braves want their fans to pack the stadium ev-ery night, they need to stop reliably letting them down every time they dare to get their hopes up.

The reputation of Braves fans took a further hit during the loss to the Cardinals when fans threw trash onto the playing field after a dubi-ous infield-fly ruling short-circuited a potential Braves rally in the eighth inning.

The outburst was misdirected anger. As aw-ful as the call was, Braves fans were already in a nasty mood after watching their team play de-fense like a beer-league softball squad, sabotag-ing a 94-win regular season in one frustrating night and continuing the Atlanta legacy of post-season debacles.

Braves fans are sick of being tortured in the postseason, whether it’s by their team or umpires. (The names Kent Hrbek and Eric Gregg produce chills for longtime Braves fans.) And it’s not just the hometown baseball team that wilts un-der the bright lights. The Falcons have lost their last four playoff games dating back to 2005 and the Hawks have never made it beyond the second round of the postseason in 45 years since moving from St. Louis.

Atlanta fans are starved for playoff success and tired of being beaten down by their teams, and while that doesn’t justify their behavior dur-ing the St. Louis game, it does explain why it took place.

The names on the Braves roster have changed over the last two decades, but the playoff chokes have remained a constant. Something has to change, but what?

Moving away from the house of horrors known as Turner Field would be a start.

Bitter end to another successful Atlanta season

A former super-star football player at Georgia spent his Saturday signing au-tographs and eating chicken in Augusta, Ga.

David Greene, the starting quarterback for the Bulldogs from 2001 until 2004, vis-ited the Chick-fil-A on 3066 Washington Road on Saturday for a meet-and-greet with fans. Greene was a standout player who started beginning in his redshirt-freshman year until he gradu-ated in 2004. In 2002, he led Georgia to its first SEC Champion-ship win since 1982, and in that 30-3 vic-tory over Arkansas, he was named the Most Valuable Player, ac-cording to SEC re-cords. At the end of that season, Greene also quarterbacked his team to a win over Florida State in the Sugar Bowl. When he finished his career at Georgia, he held the NCAA all-time record most wins by a college quarterback.

Greene was drafted in 2005 by the Seattle Seahawks

and bounced around to three other NFL teams, the New Eng-land Patriots, the Kan-sas City Chiefs and the Indianapolis Colts, before retiring in 2009. Greene said he now works for a bro-kerage firm near At-lanta called Seacrest Partners. He is mar-ried with two sons and lives in Grayson, Ga. Even though Greene’s NFL career sputtered out, he still remains a hero in the eyes of the Bulldog faithful.

While waiting for Greene to appear, the restaurant filled up fast. Many fathers brought their sons who had no idea who Greene was but were as eager to talk to him as anybody else sim-ply because of his col-legiate career. Lawton Hill, 9, summed up the excitement when asked if he was ready to see Greene.

“I’ve been waiting all week,” he said.

Greene had a foot-ball-related reason for being in Augusta as he was running a youth football camp at Au-gusta Christian School earlier in the after-

noon. Everett Sports Marketing sponsored an MVP Camp, which was a success as close to 50 young athletes competed and learned from Greene, the for-mer quarterback said.

MVP Camps is a non-profit organiza-tion that hosts ath-letic camps through-out the Atlanta area. They have top athletes host their camps and partner with differ-ent organizations to give young athletes the opportunity to fine tune their skills

without forking up an expensive bill. Ra-chel Rudolf, the Ev-erett Sports Marketing event director, said Greene got along great with the youngsters and was an ideal host for the MVP Camps event.

Chick-fil-A spon-sored the youth camp by providing lunch for Greene and the ath-letes involved. John Powell, the owner of the Chick-fil-A on Washington Road, said the camp wanted Chick-fil-A for lunch

and in turn decided to have an autograph ses-sion to show their ap-preciation.

“I’ve watched him play numerous years,” Powell said of Greene. “I don’t have anything for him to sign, but I’ll get a picture with him.”

Rudolf shared her excitement in partner-ing with Chick-fil-A.

“This is a great set up,” she said. “We have Georgia fans ev-erywhere and Georgia stuff everywhere.”

Former quarterback visits Augusta to give back to local youthsBy MICAH HERRIMANcontributor

Former Georgia Bulldogs quarterback David Greene, who now works for a brokerage firm outside of Atlanta, poses with a young fan during Greene’s autograph session at a Washington Road Chick-fil-A restaurant Saturday.

MICAH HERRIMAN | CONTRIBUTOR

see GREENE on PAGE 11 jgarner6@aug.edu

Georgia Bulldog and South Carolina Gamecock fans gathered on neutral territory Oct. 5.

There they took part in friend-ly smack talk before their rival game as part of the annual Border Bash celebration.

“Border Bash began 19 years ago as just a small gathering of the Bulldog Club members,” said Joe Stevens, the owner of Glue Stick Music. “Then they added the South Carolina fan club. Every year the event continues to grow; we now average anywhere from 9,000 to 10,000 people.”

The event has everything from food, music, different ven-dors, as well as the cheerlead-ers and mascots from both of the teams. The whole atmosphere is

family oriented; the cheerleaders and mascots really make it even more enjoyable for the children, said Josh Gonya, 32, of Augusta.

“I feel like this year there was a much better layout than they have had in the past,” said Bo Blanchard, 30, from Waynesboro, Ga. “It’s very family oriented, and the fact that it starts earlier in the afternoon gives it more of a fami-ly-friendly atmosphere.”

Not only is it a family-friend-ly event but it is pet-friendly as well. People are able to bring out their pets and dress them up with the rest of the family. It is a great way for fans who can’t get to a game to get a piece of that tailgat-ing experience, Stevens said.

“It’s great getting together with my friends and family,” Go-nya said. “It is like its own tailgate party. The only thing I had miss-

ing was my grill.”The Border Bash takes place

in the Augusta Common, though there have been attempts to move it to different locations in the past. It always seems to find its way back to the river area, which is truly the border for the two teams. This makes the Common the per-fect location for this event, Ste-vens said.

“It really is a great place for everyone to get together,” Blanchard said. ”Everyone can come out and root on their team in a non-hostile environment.”

Border Bash is primarily a Georgia-South Carolina event. Occasionally, one may see other teams represented while there. There may not be many but other fans do come out wearing their colors, Blanchard said.

“I hope that as the event

continues to grow, they keep it a family-oriented experience,” he said. “Otherwise it just becomes another drunken fest.”

Even with it being located downtown, it is still an event for all ages. Like most events that take place after a certain time, the num-ber of children begins to dwindle and the atmosphere changes the later it gets. The crown tends to get a little more rowdy, though for the most part it remains a function for all ages to enjoy, Stevens said.

The great thing about Border Bash, Stevens said, is that even though it is two rival teams com-ing out to show their spirit, they are both coming and helping raise money for a good cause.

“The Border Bash is a foun-dation whose mission is to raise money for children’s charities in the CSRA,” he said. “The

money is raised and then later in the month of December they an-nounce what charities will be re-ceiving the money for the year.”

According to the event’s of-ficial website, over the past three years it has raised a total of $63,167. In all since it has raised around $600,000. The money is raised from the event itself as well as a Border Bash golf tournament, which takes place the same day as the event and begins at noon. Up to 30 teams of four are able to par-ticipate, and the tournament takes place at the River Golf Club in North Augusta, S.C.

Donating to the tourna-ment are organizations such as the Make-A-Wish Foundation, YMCA, Miracle Field, Boys & Girls Club, and Youth Challenge at Fort Gordon.

www.asubellringer.com

PAGE 10 TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2012

@BRingerSports

Follow us on Twitter

Keep up with Jaguar sports online at:

www.asubellringer.com

The Bell Ringer’s College Football

Top 101. Alabama (6-0)Tide made it look easy in win over Missouri.

2. Oregon (6-0)Ducks not likely to be challenged until Nov. 3 at USC.

3. Kansas State (6-0)Miracle-worker Bill Snyder has Wildcats back in title contention.

4. Florida (6-0)Got through a tricky road test at Vanderbilt to run SEC mark to 5-0.

5. LSU (6-1)Used physical running game to knock South Carolina from unbeaten ranks.

6. South Carolina (6-1)Wrap up brutal three-game stretch with trip to Florida this week.

7. Notre Dame (6-0)Controversial goal-line stand against Stanford keeps Irish perfect.

8. Oklahoma (4-1)Dominant win over Texas has Sooners back in the top 10.

9. Oregon State (5-0)Beavers have quietly put together an impressive resume.

10. USC (5-1)Trojans have rattled off three straight wins since upset loss to Stanford.

Despite the Georgia Bull-dogs’ fall from the top five teams in the BCS after their loss to South Carolina, both the Dawgs and the Atlanta Falcons have had favorable starts to the 2012 sea-son.

Atlanta’s undefeated season under the leadership of quarter-back Matt Ryan has Falcons fans optimistic of a Super Bowl ap-pearance. This is the first time in the team’s history that they have had a 6-0 record. Ryan, or “Matty Ice,” as he is referred to

by fans, has shown his strength this season in fourth-quarter play, helping his quarterback rating steadily climb and earning him the honor of NFC Offensive Play-er of the Month for September. With a more aggressive defense under Mike Nolan, the new de-fensive coordinator, the Falcons have maintained a wide margin of lead over the other teams in the NFC South.

The Bulldogs started out the season 5-0, giving fans a promis-ing vision of clinching the SEC East. After the loss to South Carolina, that may seem a lofty

Football teams in Georgia off to promising startsBy MINDY WADLEYcontributor

“Buying tickets isn’t a ne-cessity, it’s a luxury item.”

Those are the words of Au-gusta State sophomore DeVante Fanning, a Philadelphia Eagles fan, and they reflect the new at-titude of today’s average sports fan. A recent drop in live sport-ing event attendance can be explained by an old American saying: Why buy the milk when you can get the cow for free?”

“Sports interaction as a fan is cheaper and more prominent at home than at the event itself,” said Augusta State sophomore Jalen Jackson, a Boston Celtics fan. “A sports fan follows their team even if they aren’t literally following them.”

An article on the USA To-day website reports that NFL ticket sales have dropped ev-ery season since 2007, when the recession began. An article on Forbes.com reports that the NBA’s new ticket buyers are just barely enough to cover for those who have decided to stop

buying tickets. This is evidence that there are more and more people deciding to either stay at home or go to local bars and restaurants to watch sporting events.

“It‘s more fun at home,” said Miami Heat fan and Au-gusta State sophomore Brandon Maston. “You don’t have to fol-low any societal rules.”

With professional sports leagues putting more and more games on network television, not to mention creating their own networks altogether, it looks as if the big leagues are catering to the “stay-at-home-fan.” Outside of NBC Sports Network and the many affili-ates of ESPN and Fox Sports, there is now NBA TV, NFL Network, MLB Network, NHL TV, SPEED and Golf Channel. There are also cable companies offering various packages for extra channels so that sports fans can watch every game of their favorite sport’s season.

“Watching games at res-taurants and bars are the best competitive environment,” said Jade Stewart, a Pittsburgh

Steelers fan. “The action never dies because one side will al-ways be cheering while the other is upset. And the food is always a plus.”

In this day and time, sports bars and pubs are all over the place, Stewart said. There are also many regional and national restaurant chains, such as T.G.I. Friday’s, Applebee’s and Ruby Tuesday, that show whatever game is played on the local sports carrier channels as well as regional and national restau-

rant chains specifically dedi-cated to sports fans gathering for these events, such as Buf-falo Wild Wings, Carolina Ale House and Wild Wing Cafe.

“You’re not restricted to a seat where you have to look through people,” said Augusta State sophomore Justin Lewis, an Atlanta Falcons fan. “Half of the time you are looking at the big screen at the game which shows the same angle on free TV.”

Fans do not need tickets to enjoy gamesBy FARRELL BROWNstaff writer

BORDER BASH

By NIKKI SKINNERstaff writer

nskinner@aug.edu

MINDY WADLEY | CONTRIBUTOR

Atlanta Falcons fans tailgate outside of the Georgia Dome in Atlanta before a game against their NFC South rival the Carolina Panthers on Sept. 30, 2012.

VS

Annual meeting draws college football fans to Augusta

BORDER BASH

NIKKI SKINNER | STAFFPatrons at the Carolina Ale House in Augusta, Ga., enjoy a football game.

see FALCONS on PAGE 11

46-17-2 all-time record vs. South

Carolina

15 - Longest unbeaten streak for

Georgia in the series

Three consecutive victories over Georgia for the first time in school history following 35-7 win over the Bulldogs on Oct. 6

52-13 - Aggregate score of South Carolina’s last two wins over Georgia in Columbia, S.C.

“They have been great,” Padung said. “I think we get along pretty well. They are pretty accepting. I ask them for advice quite frequently, and they point me in the right direction.”

McPherson said he likes the steady skill set Padung brings to the team.

“He plays what I call boring golf,” McPherson said. “He hits a lot of fair-ways; he hits a lot of greens and two-putts around the course. He does not really get himself in trouble on the course. If you can play boring golf, you are usually pretty good.”

To build his confidence, McPherson

installed Padung as the No. 1 player on the team in the last tournament. McPher-son said he believes in Padung talents and wants him to play to compete to win. Over-all, he said Padung has done well adapting to the college atmosphere.

Padung is a freshman at Augusta State and has yet to pick a major. However, he has a clear ambition for his future: He wants to become a professional golfer. He said he loves getting paid for a sport that he enjoys.

Upon graduation, Padung said he plans to stay in the states.

“I love it here,” Padung said. “I enjoy being in the states. It is a fantastic place to

set your life together and move forward.”This year, the Jags are trying to fight

their way back to national prominence. The team last played in the Brickyard Collegiate Championships in Macon, Ga., where they finished in seventh place. Though their early-season record is below .500, McPherson said the team is headed in the right direction. The NCAA cham-pionships will be held at the Crab Apple Course in Atlanta next spring. McPherson said it would be like having a home-field advantage for Padung and the Jags if they were able to advance to that far.

PadungCONTINUED from PAGE 9

fbrown19@aug.edu

kfrazie9@aug.edu

A doubles team from Augusta State made the semifinals of the ITA Southeast Regional Championship but ultimately lost to conference-dominating Armstrong Atlantic Sept. 24.

Victor Cabellos and Victor Gui-maraes, both experienced members of the Augusta State men’s tennis team, competed in singles and dou-bles matches at the Palmetto Ten-nis Center in Sumter, S.C. The duo whipped rival USC Aiken in the round of 32 by a score of 8-2, solidi-fying the Jaguars’ spot in the Sweet Sixteen, according to Joey Warren, Augusta State’s athletic media rela-tions director.

North Georgia proved a tougher opponent, but the doubles team edged

out a 9-8 win, Warren said. Cabellos and Guimaraes went on to trounce Francis Marion 8-4 in the quarterfi-nals but couldn’t defeat Armstrong Atlantic, losing 8-1 to the team that would ultimately win the final.

Cabellos said Armstrong Atlan-tic always proves a tough opponent.

“They dominate everything – singles, doubles, men’s, women’s,” Cabellos said.

Although he said he was pleased with how far he and his teammate got in the tournament, Guimaraes said he wished he had performed better.

“I didn’t play that well in the beginning of the game,” he said. “I was kind of nervous… We got set points, and then we couldn’t close the game. But in this one, I didn’t play that well in the beginning. I got my serve broken, (and) with that, it’s very hard to keep the same pace as them. So they just played better than us. I didn’t play that well; I could be more competitive. I was very upset about it, but I hope at the next one, we can do better.”

Cabellos and Guimaraes also had strong showings in the singles of the tournament, making it to the round of 64 and the Sweet Sixteen, respectively, Warren said.

While neither player expressed a preference, Guimaraes said players have to stay sharp from beginning to end in doubles matches whereas in singles players have a longer period to acclimate to their opponents’ play-

ing styles. “(In) singles, we can play best

of three sets,” Guimaraes said. “(In) doubles, you just play one set to eight games. So if you don’t start very well in the beginning and the other doubles (team) breaks your serve, it’s very hard to get back into the game. Be-cause it’s very fast, there is no room for mistakes, especially at that level.”

Michael McGrath, the head coach of Augusta State’s men’s and women’s tennis teams, agreed that playing doubles requires a complete-ly different mindset than singles, and he said he knows the difference first-hand from his years playing both at Belmont Abbey.

“You find that the top teams in the country have good chemistry to-gether,” he explained. “They com-plement each other, and they cover up each other’s weaknesses very well. In singles, it’s just you and the other

guy. No one’s in your way. (In) dou-bles, it takes some cooperation.”

Cabellos and Guimaraes have played together for three years, their coach said, and that time together has helped each of them fully understand how the other plays.

Cabellos credited his partner with giving him the confidence to perform well, and Guimaraes said the same of Cabellos.

“My first and second fall I lost in the first round, but I didn’t play with Victor (Cabellos then),” Guimaraes said. “This is the first one that we played together, and we made it to the semis.”

He further said he doesn’t have any desire to play with a different partner, saying he wants to play with Cabellos until the end of his college career.

The bond between Cabellos and Guimaraes isn’t unique to their part-nership. Cabellos said the whole men’s tennis team is closely knit and that he feels more connected to his team now than he did in previous years.

“It was more like a family,” Ca-bellos said. “When we were playing – I’m talking about my feelings my first semester (I played) – with my personal games, it was like, ‘I won.’ I wasn’t thinking that much about the team... (Now) I have to win because my partner, my teammate lost, so I have to do it for the team, not just for me.”

That focus on performing well

for the team will be incredibly impor-tant this year, McGrath said. Coming off the winningest season in Augusta State tennis history, McGrath said he has high expectations of the men’s team despite the graduation of several key players from last season’s team.

“We lost (our Nos.) 1, 2 and 6, and it’s tough to replace that,” Mc-Grath said. “We’re younger, but we’ve got some talent that we can hopefully make another run. I think the core that we had last year is back, with the two Victors who made it to the semis and Jan (Labas) is a senior, I’m expecting him to step up. He’ll probably go to the one spot, maybe two. We’re rebuilding, but we’ve re-cruited some real good talent.”

Guimaraes said he hopes the team’s impressive finish last season will inspire the team’s new members and returning players to push them-selves to play their best so the team can return to the National Champion-ship.

“We are going to be probably ranked top 10 in the nation,” Guima-raes said. “So everybody’s going to want to beat us since we made it to the nationals last year. We were the underdog last year, so this upcoming year for sure they’re going to (want) to beat us. We have to be well-pre-pared, (but) we can do it again.”

www.asubellringer.com

PAGE 11THE BELL RINGER

men’s golf

Oct. 20 Peach Belt Conference Championships at Montevallo, Ala.

(Montevallo Cross Country Course)

Oct. 27-28 Edwin Watts/Palmetto Intercollegiate at Cougar Point Golf Club

(Kiawah Island, S.C.)

u p c o m i n g s c h e d u l e

volleyball

men’s & women’scross country

Oct. 17 USC Aiken

Oct. 19 Clark Atlanta

Oct. 19 Queens (N.C.)

Oct. 20 Erskine

Oct. 23 Montevallo

Oct. 26 at Lander

women’s golf

Oct. 21-23 Isleworth Collegiate Invitational at Isleworth Country Club (Windermere, Fla.)

Oct. 29-30 Royal Oaks Intercollegiate at

Royal Oaks Country Club (Dallas)

ambition. However, last year’s season began with the Bulldogs starting 0-2, yet they still managed to represent the SEC East against LSU in the championship, and as fans of the SEC can attest, with the level of competition among teams in the conference, anything is possible.

Win or lose, fans turn out in droves to support both teams, with tailgating prior to the games a must for many fans. Athens and Atlanta offer two very different landscapes for tailgating, but the common goal for fans is to have a good time and get pumped up for a hopeful team victory, according to Megan Miller, a junior psychology and pre-med ma-jor at Georgia.

“It’s always so much fun because you can strike up a conversation with anybody,” Miller said. “You know you have something in common with all these people, just that you’re a Georgia fan.”

The rolling hills and numerous green lawns of the University of Georgia campus offer a multitude of tailgating areas. Fans drink to the Dawgs hours prior to kickoff in preparation for games, with dormitory quads a popular destination for many groups of stu-dent tailgaters.

Miller said she always tailgates along with her boyfriend’s fraternity at Myers Quad, where friends and strangers alike min-gle on game days.

The lack of space adjacent to the Geor-gia Dome provides more of a challenge to securing tailgating real estate. Tents line the few parking lots surrounding the dome, with barbecue grills sizzling and radios blasting as fans pour in from all directions, even emerg-ing from the MARTA station right beneath the Dome.

Julie Schian, a Falcons season ticket-holder, passed out hot dogs as her friends and family lounged directly behind their SUV parked in a lot full of fellow Falcons fans as well as a few Carolina Panthers fans before the Falcons went on to defeat the Panthers in a fourth-quarter victory Sept. 30. Falcons fans determined to celebrate before every home game, Schian said.

“We like hanging out and relaxing, drink-ing, listening to music,” Schian said. “We have season passes so we’re here every home game.”

FalconsCONTINUED from PAGE 10

Doubles team reaches semifinals of ITA RegionalsBy LEIGH BEESONcopy editor

LEIGH BEESON | STAFF

Victor Cabellos, who plays both singles and doubles as a player on the Augusta State men’s tennis team, lines up his shot to his doubles partner, Victor Guimaraes, at the Newman Tennis Center on Wrightsboro Road.

LEIGH BEESON | STAFFVictor Guimaraes, a semifinalist in the ITA Southeast Regionals doubles championship, prepares for the ball to drop on his side of the net during practice.

“They complement each other, and they cover up each other’s weaknesses.”

- Augusta State tennis coach Michael McGrath

Greene showed a great deal of grace and character while signing footballs and Georgia memorabilia. He posed for pictures with children as well as their parents who equally looked at the former Georgia star with marvel in their eyes.

“It’s fun,” Greene said. “I mean, it’s been eight years since I’ve played (at Georgia), and it’s amaz-ing that people continue to come out. It goes to show the Georgia fan base and how much they love their Dawgs.”

Greene also said his time away from football has given him a different perspective about his inter-actions with fans.

“I never thought about

it at those times, but ath-letes have such a platform,” he said. “We need to give back when we have an op-portunity. I had an opportu-nity to work with coaches and learn different things, and I would be cheating kids if I didn’t teach them what I learned.”

John Allen Whitlow, a student at Augusta State, said he was impressed with the way Greene conducts himself.

“He’s the same person you saw on Saturdays,” Whitlow said. “The genu-ineness that he showed to his fans all these years af-ter retiring shows some real character.”

MICAH HERRIMAN | CONTRIBUTORYoung Georgia fans show off memorobilia signed by David Greene.

GreeneCONTINUED from PAGE 9

“It’s been eight years since I’ve played (at Georgia), and it’s amazing that

people continue to come out.”- Former Georgia quarterback David Greene

mherrima@aug.edu

kbeeson1@aug.edu

mindyawadly@gmail.com

www.asubellringer.com

PAGE 12 TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2012

We Do What We Do,Because of You!

1National Coach Of The Year

Academic All-AmericanPeach Belt Conference Presidents’ Academic Award

2Men’s Golf National Championships

Women’s Golf Consecutive Division I NCAA Regional Appearances3

Men’s Basketball NCAA Tournament Elite Eight Appearances4

Men’s Tennis Reached First Final Four At NCAA Championships In 20125

Softball NCAA Regional Appearances In Last 6 Seasons6

Men’s Basketball All-Americans Since 20077

ASU Teams To Qualify For NCAA Postseason Play In 2011-128

Women’s Tennis NCAA Regional Appearances In Last 13 Seasons9

Men’s Basketball NCAA Tournament Appearances All-Time10

Men’s Tennis NCAA Regional Appearances Since 199811

All-Americans In Last Four Seasons12

Men’s Golf Division I NCAA Championships Appearances Since 199317

Men’s Golf Division I NCAA Regional Appearances Since 199328

Jaguar Teams To Earn A National Ranking Since 200838

Jaguar Teams To Qualify For NCAA Postseason Play In Last 6 Years97

ASU Student-Athletes Named To 2012 Peach Belt Conference’s Presidential Honor Roll106

ASU Student-Athletes Named To 2012 Athletic Director’s Honor Roll

thank You asu stuDents!We coulDn’t Do It WIthout You!

www.jaguarsroar.com