Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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University of South Carolina FRinAV nFPFMRFR R OflflR Vol.97,No.50 www.dailygamecock.com I l\IL/rM, L/L-V^L.IVI ULfA U, Z.VJVJO Since 1908 Caroling at Carolina PHOTO BY MORGAN FORD/THE GAMECOCK Higher Harmony sings at the tree-lighting ceremony on the Horseshoe on Wednesday night. Sexual orientation added to policy USC spokesman says university president has added protection for gays to nondiscrimination clause BY KEVIN FELLNER THE GAMECOCK USC President Andrew Sorensen and other administra tion officials have decided to add sexual orientation to the univer sity’s nondiscrimination policy. Sorensen and the university’s administrative council, com prised of USC’s six vice presi dents, General Counsel Terry Parham, Equal Opportunity Programs Director Bobby Gist and other top-level officials, de cided to change the policy last month and have it take effect im mediately for all USC campuses. “I think Dr. Sorensen felt it was just time to move ahead with this,” USC spokesman Russ McKinney said. “I think he felt it had been considered long enough and thoroughly enough that it warranted action.” McKinney said Sorensen didn’t publicly announce the change because he felt it was mostly ceremonial and that the university has always been op posed to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation but has never forbidden it in its poli cies and procedures. The new policy states an indi vidual can’t be discriminated against based on his or her sex ual orientation in matters of “ed ucational or employment oppor tunitiSs or decisions on the basis of personal characteristics that are not relevant to an individu al’s abilities, qualifications or job performance.” But the plan doesn’t apply to the university’s relationship with other agencies, such as the feder al or state governments, which have their own nondiscrimina tion policies, in matters includ ing benefit and retirement plans administered by those agencies. Colt Broome, a third-year ad vertising student and president of USC’s Bisexual, Gay and Lesbian Alliance, applauded the decision but said it still doesn’t eliminate discrimination as a whole. “I think it’s important to make the point to accept sexual orien tation as a form of diversity,” Broome said. McKinney said support of a sexual-orientation provision in the discrimination policy has been present on campus for at least five years and played a role in Sorensen’s decision. “I think it certainly had some bearing,” McKinney said about public opinion on campus. “I think any good college president, and especially President Sorensen, values the opinion of the university family.” Sorensen faced questions about his stance on the proposed policy change since his arrival at USC in July 2002. In March, he promised a group of students gathered at the Russell House that he would communicate with university employees and stu dents about the issue. Third-year public relations student and former BGLA vice president Michael Mazzell said he thinks the new policy is a ma jor change for the university’s character. “With the new president and a new outlook on the university, it’s definitely good news to re ceive,” Mazzell said. Both Broome and Mazzell Said they think the policy change re flects a growing acceptance of gays in society. McKinney stressed that the university doesn’t have a histo ry of discriminating based on sexual orientation and that the policy was changed to make practicing nondiscrimination official. Administrators agree that the policy is conceptually similar to policies already held by more than 500 universities nationwide, McKinney said. Furman University and the College of Charleston have sexual orienta tion listed in their nondiscrimi nation policies. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecockudesk@hotfnail.com School of Law might announce new dean today ^BY KEVIN FELLNER THE GAMECOCK USC administrators said an announcement naming the new dean of the School of Law is like ly to be made sometime this morning. While there is no word yet on whom the university will choose, administrators say it is sure to be one of the three finalists named on Oct. 24: C. Peter Goplerud III, dean of the Drake University Law School; Burnele Powell, dean of the University of Missouri-Kansas City Law School; and Rodney J. Uphoff, as sociate dean for academic affairs ^it the University of Missouri Columbia Law School. Columbia attorney Frank Mood has been serving as inter im dean since May, when he re placed retiring dean John Montgomery. The university was courting Bob Hillman from the University of California-Davis in the spring when he withdrew his name from candidacy shortly after being of fered the position in April. The law school then restarted the search. The dean search committee members and Interim Dean Frank Mood wouldn’t comment on the search. The university has yet to fill . the position despite more than two years of searching. After hav ing filled two vice-president posi tions earlier this year, adminis trators have said naming a new dean would allow for more lead ership and a stronger vision for the law school and university as a whole. Law school officials also now have to worry about local compe tition, with a private law school scheduled to open in Charleston next fall. USC Law School saw its assis tant dean of admissions, John Benfield, resign in October to take a job at the Charleston Law School. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecockudesk@hotmail.com Lending a hand Stephen Fastenav, left, a first-year engineering student, and Clemson alumnus Eddi Arecco donated cans to play poker Thursday night during an RHA fund-raiser at Top of Carolina. City threatens to charge residents parking on grass BY JON TURNER THE GAMECOCK As the result of the compli ance deadline of city ordinance 2003-021, finalized in April, some Columbia residents were sur prised to find warning notices from the city clipped to their windshields threatening costly citations. Jason Fant, a resident of the 1851 Blossom St. apartment com plex, home to several USC stu dents, was outraged at notices served to residents there. “I think that sucks,” he said, “I’d be kind of pissed off to pay that much of a fine.” He said he pays his bills and that “I should be able to park where I want to park.” But Fant said he wasn’t going to worry about the possibility of being ticketed. “It’s supposed to be a space, but I don’t know,” he said, “I’ll see if I get a ticket. If I do I’ll just bill my f—ing landlord.” The letter issued by the city recommends that landlords “make alternate arrangements” for residents of noncompliant buildings. Fortunately, in Fant’s case, his landlord was on top of things. Renee Pruitt, working in property management and real estate for Landmark Resources, said the main problem with up dating Fant’s complex stemmed from coordinating the residents. “At one time, the owner had gravel there, but over time it’s gotten packed down,” she said. “The problem is not so much get ting gravel hauled into the prop erty; there’s just limited space to park. What I’ve had trouble with is just coordinating time to park with a time to bring in gravel. “We’ve had the gravel dumped today, so we’re in com pliance now. What I had to do was call one of the city employ ees doing the inspection and ask for the extension. So basically she gave me a week to come into compliance.” Compliance, says Marc Mylott, city zoning administra tor, is all the city really wants. ♦ PARKING, SEE PAGE 5 Index Comics and Crossword 9 Classifieds 12 Horoscopes_ 9 Letters to the Editor 6 Online Poll 6 Police Report 4 Weather TODAY High 55 Low 37 SATURDAY High 53 Low 29 iMMH -—^ In This Issue ♦ NEWS USC students buckle down for finals. Page 4 ♦ VIEWPOINTS Charles Tomlinson reflects on his tenure at The Gamecock. Page 6 ♦ THE MIX Relive the mayhem of 2003, yet another whirlwind year in entertainment. Page 7 ♦ SPORTS The USC men’s basketball team, after improving to 7-0, takes on Clemson on Saturday. Page 10 Virus hits campus via AOL Instant Messenger BY JUSTIN CHAPPELL THE GAMECOCK A computer virus swept across USC’s campus Thursday afternoon by planting unautho rized links in AOL Instant Messenger profiles and direct ing users to a Web site that au tomatically downloaded the virus. The virus, Win32.Alphx. Worm, inserted misleading text links into AIM profiles and spread to other users after they clicked the link, which had seem mammmmmmmmmmamm ingly harmless names like “RealPHX.com,” “TalkStocks. net" or “BuddyPictures.net.” Once the virus w^s downloaded to a computer, it altered preset home pages and installed porno graphic links in the navigation bar. USC Network Security Engineer Russell Kaiser said the virus operates through a hole in the Windows Internet Explorer browser that allowed the virus to install harmful code on comput ers visiting the Web sites. Clicking a buddy’s link is sec ond nature for most students be cause AOL Instant Messenger serves as a common communi cation platform on college campuses. “I didn’t know it was a virus when I clicked on it,” said Kimberly Hartig, third-year man agement student and victim of the virus. Hartig said the virus deceived her because it appeared as a link in a friend’s profile that read, “I can’t believe I found (user’s name)’s picture here.” The virus personalized the text and changed the user’s name for each person who viewed it. The word “here” then linked to pornographic Web sites. While the virus does not ap pear to do any internal damage to a computer, fourth-year account ing student Andrew Christopher was outraged when his sister downloaded the virus and porno graphic images appeared on her computer screen. “Her young, virgin mind was corrupted by this devastating and ♦ AIM, SEE PAGE 2