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SG to tout Web site for teacher reviews BY COREY GARRIOTT THE GAMECOCK Student Government Presi dent Katie Dreiling will make good on a campaign promise to day by endorsing Teacher Reviews.com as USC’s official class rating site, she said. She will promote, the site with T shirts and stickers in front of the Russell House. “It was her No. 1 priority for the semester,” said Kristin Andreano, SG’s academic com mittee chairwoman. Andreano said Dreiling cam paigned to use SG money to cre ate a USC teacher ratings Web site. The site would have allowed USC students to post comments about professors’ performance for other students to see. “Freshmen aren’t very aware of who the teachers are. It would enable students to see the teach ing style of the teacher,” Andreano said. “It’s a tool to help out the students.” But SG couldn’t come up with t the funding and chose instead to endorse TeacherReviews.com. Because USC already sends a lot of traffic to the site — USC stu dents have posted the third-high est number of reviews — she said TeacherReviews.com was a logi cal choice. “SG has a limited budget,” Andreano said. “It was more cost-effective to endorse the site.” SG could not use the $200,000 it found in its bank account ear lier this year. The money came from student groups that did not use the mon ey SG gave them; forgotten, it built up for two years. Because the money could only be used for one-time spending pro jects, said Vice President Zachery Scott, SG used it all in a single om nibus bill. Second year media arts student Chris* Scott doesn’t use the site. “I use RateMyProfessors. com, he said. “I’ve never heard of TeacherReviews.com, but from what I hear, ratemyprofessors is the best available resource,” he said. And second-year business stu dent Reggie Price said the site sometimes ranks professors by how easy they are. “That’s the thing about TeacherReviews,” he said. “They match the easiest teacher with the biggest grade.” Second-year education student Heather Casey said she had sim ilar concerns. “The reviews were mixed,” she said. “It would either be an ‘A’ or an ‘F’.” But Andreano said she found the site s re views positive for the classes she takes. “Nothing but positive re views for the teachers,” she said. And Casey did find the site useful when shop ping for the right history class. “It’s good to see if the teachers are good,” she said. Price also said he had a good experience using the Web site last semester to find the best psy chology professor — “Well, not the best,” he said. “The easiest.” Comments on this story? E-mail gamecockudesk@hotmail.com “Freshmen aren’t very aware of who the teachers are. It would enable students to see the teaching style of the teacher.” KRISTIN ANDREANO SG ACADEMIC COMMITTEE CHAIRWOMAN SURFYOURSELF Check out the Web site SG is promoting at www.teacherreviews.com THE GAMECOCK Nobody covers USC better prop iv n u \s| A Scottish touch PHOTO BY MORGAN FORD/THE GAMECOCK Matt Davis, left, a graduate student in chemistry, and Pascal Reber, a graduate student in political science, practice playing the bagpipes on the Horseshoe on Thursday. Chemist CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Adams teaches chemistry at USC, but has taken this semester off to devote more time as director of the NanoCenter at USC. The goals of USC’s NanoCenter are to perform cutting-edge research in nanoscale science and technology, provide high-technology learning opportunities and to promote high-technology economic growth and development in South Carolina. “It’S a lot of work,” Adams said. “I enjoy the research, though." Adams has a passion for sci ence and nature. His office hous es an extensive collection of crys tals, which he has on display, and a collection of butterflies, some of which he caught himself, is mounted and framed on his walls. ine feiiow recognition is the second award Adams has received this year. Earlier, he received the Governor’s Award for Excellence in Science. “I have always wondered what makes the world work,” Adams said. He picked a pen up off his desk. “I take this pen and wonder, what is this made of?” Adams’ curiosity has brought him much success in the field of sci ence. He is one the “World’s Mo^ Cited Chemists,” ranking 383 j| 1,000 back in 1997, according to the Institute of Scientific Information. Adams will be presented with an official certificate and g0ld and-blue rosette pin at the annu al Fellows Forum in Seattle on Feb. 14. Comments on this story? E-mail gamecockudesk@hotmail.com STATE Plan diverts mental patients from ERs COLUMBIA (AP) - Hospitals are beginning to divert mentally ill patients from emergency rooms, but administrators say the new state effort won’t solve long-standing problems. Ten areas around the state are sharing in $1.8 million in state aid intended to reduce emergency room crowding caused by mental health pa tients as space shrinks at state run facilities and insurers spend less for their care. State Mental Health director George Gintoli hopes to halve the number of psychiatric pa tients, typically 50 to 60 a day, waiting for care at hospital emergency rooms statewide by mid-2004. House Democrats to go without leader COLUMBIA (AP) - House Minority Leader James Smith has started 11 weeks of military training at Fort Jackson and will miss the first week of the 2004 legislative session. The 36-year-old Smith is a captain in the South Carolina Army National Guard, where he is part of the 218th Brigade’s headquarters unit, based in Newberry. The GOP holds 73 seats in the House to 51 held by Democrats. The party lost control of the Senate nearly three years ago, giving Republicans control of the Statehouse for the first time since Reconstruction. With one vacant seat, Senate Republicans hold a 26-19 majority over Democrats. veteran cop round with marijuana NORTH CHARLESTON (AP) - A veteran of the police force who resigned after being involved in a controversial shooting has been charged with growing mar ijuana at his Berkeley County home. Sheriffs deputies arrested former Cpl. Anthony Youngblood and his wife, Melissa, on Friday. Berkeley County Sheriff Wayne Dewitt said seven marijuana plants worth $14,000 were found at the couple’s home. North Charleston police say they found missing police equip ment inside Youngblood’s home. Craig Martin Little, 18, was charged with second-degree bur glary and simple possession of marijuana after police say he left the garage of the house with in criminating evidence. Youngblood had been with the North Charleston department 10 years. NATION Measures suggest Episcopal split PITTSBURGH (AP) — Less than a week after the Episcopal Church USA consecrated its first openly gay bishop, three conser vative dioceses approved mea sures Saturday indicating the split in the church has widened. The Pittsburgh diocese ap proved an amendment aimed at allowing the diocese to ignore some of the national church’s policies. The amendment says the dio cese will prevail “in cases where the provisions of the constitution and canons of the Church of the Diocese of Pittsburgh speak to the con trary” or where resolutions of the Episcopal Church USA are found “to be contrary to the his toric faith and order of the one holy catholic and apostolic church.” Virginia’s strategies aid Malvo’s defense FAIRFAX, VA. (AP) - Defense lawyers finalizing their plans for trying to keep sniper suspect Lee Boyd Malvo out of Virginia’s death chamber have had an unlikely ally : the state. As the 18-year-old defendant goes on trial Monday in Chesapeake, prosecutors in nearby Virginia Beach have been trying to convince a jury there that fellow suspect John Allen Muhammad, 42, exerted such control over Malvo that Muhammad should be held re sponsible for the shootings that killed 10 and wounded three in the Washington area last fall. It’s a theme that will be re peated at Malvo’s trial—by the defense. Malvo’s lawyers plan to argue that he is innocent by rea son of insanity. Hungarian official praises rock music CLEVELAND (AP) - Rock mu sic played lead in giving Hungarian baby boomers the re solve to bring down their com munist state, says one of those reformers who today is a gov ernment official. Andras Simonyi, Hungary’s ambassador to the United States, spent an hour Saturday night discussing the impact of Western songs on Eastern European politics before an in vitation-only audience of 250 at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Simonyi, 51, was a devoted fan of the Beatles, Cream, Traffic and Jimi Hendrix when their re leases weren’t officially permit ted in Hungary. Records and tapes sometimes were smuggled in or recorded from fo&ign ra dio broadcasts. WORLD Insurgency could del^ constitution BAGHDAD, IRAQ (AP) - A se nior Iraqi official warne^ Sunday that the escalating an^B American insurgency may delay work on the country’s new con stitution, slowing steps toward the U.S. administration’s goal of . Iraq’s Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told reporters he expected the interim Iraqi government to meet a U.N. Security Council deadline of Dec. 15 for submitting a timetable for a new Iraqi con stitution and national elections. “However, those timetables depend on the security situation, and if the security deteriorates, we will not be able to adhere to such commitments,” Zebari saicl after a meeting with Spani^^ft Foreign Minister Ana Palacio^^ Israel approves prisoner exchange JERUSALEM (AP) - Israel’s Cabinet narrowly approved a prisoner swap with Hezbollah after eight hours of anguished debate Sunday, overriding warnings that the deal could sig nal weakness and encourage more kidnappings of Israelis. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon lobbied hard for the swap, which excludes Israel’s most fa mous missing serviceman, Air Force navigator Ron Arad, wl^^ was shot down over Lebanon years ago. The vote was one of Sharon’s toughest leadership tests in three years. Under the deal, about 400 Palestinians and several dozen prisoners from Lebanon, Syria, Morocco, Sudan and Libya will be released in exchange for Israeli businessman Elhanan Tannenbaum and the bodies of three Israeli soldiers. Guatemalans brave long lines to vote GUATEMALA CITY (AP) - Guatemalans waited in long lines Sunday to vote in the sec ond presidential election since peace accords were signed sev en years ago, participating ii^fe tense poll that will decide t^^ future of a former dictator ac cused of human rights abuses and criticized by the U.S. government. Fears of violence were fueled i when a top aide of center-left I presidential candidate Alvaro 1 Colom was shot in the leg and | hand outside his home the night before voting. There were scattered reports of problems during Sunday’s bal loting. The election is only the second>since 1996 peace accdrds ended 36 years of civil war.