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WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY23, 2005 ......n,.,., ,,--.-'. Errors confound mail system • USC postal officials | blame US. mail system for late deliveries By WES WOLFE THE GAMECOCK USC postal services personnel say late mail delivery results from flaws within the greater postal system, not from any particular fault of the USC branch. The problem, Assistant Postal Services Director Garland Jackson said, is random mistakes within the federal postal system. “There’s rejly no rhyme or reason to how the date -— to how it’s delayed within the system,’ Jackson said. “Things may come in the next day, and some days it may be a week to come in, or it gets hung up, or it gets | missorted or misdirected to another location.” When letters and packages arrive in the central USC processing facility, they are sorted and carted to the Russell House for distribution among student mailboxes. On Friday, according to Interim Postal Services Director Scott Reynolds, all student mail reached its destination by 10:30 a.m. Reynolds said the US Postal Service claims a 94 percent success rate delivering mail in three days. T I III airport and it off-loads. But if it’s coming from a small town in South Carolina it travels by truck to wherever.” Reynolds agreed that mail that comes from further away can arrive faster than in-state parcels. “That’s the irony of the thing. Sometimes you’ll get stuff from New \r _ I JdLIUUU dUUtU that mail within the state should be delivered by the next day, but that such prompt delivery may be an impossible goal, since it has to travel by In most cases you’re going to find that out of-state material arrives quicker than in-state. GARLAND JACKSON ASSISTANT POSTAL SERVICES DIRECTOR quicker,” Reynolds said. There are several problems that could cause mail to be late to student P.O. boxes beyond ■ normal transportation road. “In most cases you’re going to find that out-of-state material arrives quicker than in-state,” Jackson said. “Say, for instance if stuff coming in from New York coming into Columbia goes direct from airport to time. ror instance, the person sending the mail could fail to address it properly, leaving an incomplete post office box number or the wrong zip code. “A lot of the problem is that parents and relatives and friends, when they’re writing to students on campus a lot of times, do not put the exact address,” Jackson said. “So if they don’t address it T400 Greene St., a student P.O. Box’ — with that on it — it can be confusing and get misdirected. Some of it goes into the city instead of coming here to us.” One piece of mail took nine days to get from Aiken to USC. The issue was the way it was addressed, Jackson said. “Obviously whoever wrote this put the post office box on the bottom and when they zipped this it may have read that zip as the five digits instead of the 29225.” Still, sometimes the mail will arrive late, even when everything is supposed to work like clockwork. “Here’s one — six days from Plantation, Fla., and it’s absolutely right,” Reynolds said. “It has the right zip, the P.O. box numbers, everything’s correct on it, but it took six days to come from Florida.” Comments on this story? E-mail gamecockneivs@gtvm.se. edu NORA ELKIN/THE GAMECOCK Ryan Herald, a third-year economics student, checks his mailbox in the Russell House post office. A GOOD CAUSE _ CHRIS LIVINGSTON/THE GAMECOCK First-year chemical engineering student Chris Robbins gives a blood sample to determine his compatability in the Delta Zeta sponsored bone marrow drive. Robbins is accompanied by DZ member Shannon Murphy, a second-year exercise student. The drive drew 325 for testing. Marrow drive draws 325 Delta Zeta sorority\ American Red Cross unite to help student By JON TURNER NEWS EDITOR More than 300 students gave blood Tuesday for marrow tests, surprising members of the American Red Cross and Delta Zeta sorority who arranged and operated the drive on behalf of third-year psychology student Caroline Terry, who suffers from leukemia. Terry needs a marrow transplant to finally rid herself of the leukemia driven into remission by heavy chemotherapy, but first she must find a donor, a daunting task when the chances of an individual match are about one in 20,000. Organizers had only planned for about 100 tests Tuesday, and they quickly found themselves swamped with hundreds of volunteers. Students lounged about the third floor of the Russell House for as long as two hours, killing time III TUI#* l#K»lll> . during the peak of participation. The drive received so many volunteers that it ran out of supplies, forcing it to close an hour and a half early. “It was hard to turn people away,” said Christi Woodham, a fourth-year cardiovascular technology student and DZ member. Woodham said the turnout had been encouraging and that DZ would probably organize another drive mid-March. “It was good,” she said. “We’re extremely tired and worn out, but we’re happy to have had so many people.” Third-year English student and DZ member Amber Cheek said she had never anticipated such support from the USC student body. “We didn’t have snough brochures,” she said. “We had to go back to the American Red Cross to get more brochures. And we ran out of supplies. We had to get more supplies. Juice. We ran out sf juice. We ran out of everything, and we -were just constantly running around, trying to piece things together.” . Cheek said Cocky had played a major role in the drive’s success, literally pulling students in off the street for testing. “People don’t care as long as Cocky is there,” she said. “He helped us a lot, and then Dr. Sorensen actually showed up, and people wondered, ‘What’s going on, why is Dr. Sorensen at that table?”’ The drive eventually tested 325 people and accepted about $200 in donations. The testing was expensive, though. The American Red Cross pays for some, but it enforces a strict one-to-one minority-to-Caucasian ratio. Only about 100 of the 325 people tested were minorities, leaving DZ with bills of $65 for each of the 125 disproportionate tests. Any donations they can collect will go toward paying those costs. Third-year business student Katie Brennan was among the students who volunteered to be tested Tuesday. “I give blood a lot, and I know it’s a one-in-a-million chance, but wouldn’t it be cool if I were a match?” she asked. Brennan said she had never met Terry, but that she was happy to help out any way she could. Terry, a third-year psychology student, finished a light dose of chemotherapy Wednesday as preparation for a possible marrow transplant. She said people had been calling her all day. “It makes me happy,” she said. Comments on this story ? E-mail gamecocknews@giDm.sc.edu Officials ponder USC honor code By TAYLOR SMITH STAFF WRITER USC officials are working to discourage cheating with a new, legally binding, academic honor code. Dennis Pruitt, vice president for student affairs, is collaborating with several experts on academic integrity to develop an academic honor code for USC that would be enforced by university officials and students alike. “The leap from (the current system) to the honor code could be substantial,” Pruitt said. i ■ .. 1 “And we need to work on being sure that faculty and students want that or a modified version.” Schools like West Point and the U.S. Naval Academy have historic honor codes, Pruitt said, and if there are violations, then expulsion follows shortly thereafter. “The problem is that even places with well-known honor codes like the Naval Academy and West Point have dealt with scandals,” Pruitt said. “So there are a lot of things to look out for.” USC already has a social ♦ Please see CODE, page 4 .. "■. " i DEAN DIALOGUE NICK ESARES/THE GAMECOCK Mary Ann Parsons, dean of the nursing school, looks at a promotional brochure for the college’s program. Parsons to leave with confidence By TAYLOR SMITH STAFF WRITER After leading the College of Nursing for almost 15 years, Mary Ann Parsons will soon be leaving, but she has faith that the university will find a talented successor. As Dean of the College of Nursing, Parsons has seen increased attendance, collapsing budgets and three university presidents since 1990, but she believes -- ■ » the creation of the South Carolina Health Sciences division will benefit the college more than any other change. “There was a lot of hard work and creativity in the ’90s,” Parsons said. “We faced a lot of budget cuts, so that was tough, but we have gotten here.” The new dean will face some challenges, Parson said, including filling some ♦ Please see PARSONS, page 4 i«* mig iooui. - ♦ THE MIX When Irish eyes are crying The sober depiction of Irish life, ‘Dancing at Lughnasa,’ will open Friday at Longstreet Theatre. Page 10 ♦ SPORTS Once, Trice, three times a Gamecock The Gamecock explores the other half of Rocky Trice, a junior forward on the men’s basketball team. Page 13 INDEX Comics & Crossword..12 Classifieds..15 Horoscopes.12 Letters to the Editor..9 Online Poll..9 Police Report..2 < . .. .www. daily gamecock. Cbm.■! .t