The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 83, No. 23, Ed. 1 Friday, March 22, 1996 Page: 1 of 16
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1
VOLUME 83,
Tl UNIVERSITY
MARCH 22,1996%
Sorting things out after the fall
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Hanszen College-sophomore Mike Kass and Sid Riffardson College junior Courtney Knuepper
perform in the Rice Players production Attar the Fall.
Funds will be used to set up visiting professorship
Kathleen Fisher
Stciff Wnirr
In what is possibly the largest one-time
cash donation ever given from a corporation
to a private research university, Texas Instru-
ments announced its donation of $7 million to
Rice on Tuesday. The contribution opens the
door for continued technological advances
and growth for the Computational and Electri-
cal Engineering Department,
The donation will provide for a permanent
visiting professorship in information technol-
ogy and will support graduate fellowships and
research projects in the areas of signal pro-
cessing, telecommunications and information
technology. A smaller share of the funds will
go toward building a wing of the Computa-
tional Engineering Building now being con-
structed. This wing, which will be named for
TI, will be dedicated to digital signal process-
ing (DSP) research.
President Malcolm Gillis said, "The event
that we commemorate today is a defining
moment not just in the history of Rice Univer-
sity but also in the future of Rice I Iniversily "
J. Robert Jump, chair of the Electrical Engi-
neering Department, said, "We are pleased
and delighted He said the fellowships and
support of graduate students will foster inter-
actions with industry and more specifically.
TI.
One of today's most progressive semicon
duetor technologies, DSP chips are said to be
revolutionizing products such as compact
discs, entertainment systems, laptop compui
ers and cellular phones. They are also used in
several other applications including speech
processing and multimedia on computer net-
works. TI is the world's leading DSP supplier
with over 20,000 customers worldwide.
Rice professors and students have been
instrumental In shaping the past and future of
DSP technology. Approximately 140 TI em-
ployees are Rice alumni. In 1983, Rice faculty
members Sidney Burrus, director of the Com
ptiter and Information Technology Institute,
and Thomas Parks agreed to write books on
DSP chips.
Several other Rice faculty have aided re-
SEE GRANT PAGf 9
Felisa Yang
(ViHi'.v Eillltil
Cheating at Rice is on the
decline, according to a 1995
survey conducted by Rutgers
University Professor Don
McCabe, On the overall scale,
cheating increased on cam-
puses with honor codes and
decreased on campuses with-
out.
Members of the Honor
Council were happy with the
results.
"(The Honor Council is 1
very pleased." Carolyn Gill,
chair of the Honor Council,
said "It's something to be very
proud of — that, even com-
pared to other schools, there's
less cheating at Rice It proves
that the system works-"
MeCabe's study was a fol-
low-up to a survey he con-
ducted in 1990. Last year, he
sent surveys to students from
31 "highly selective colleges,"
14 of which have honor codes,
including Rice.
The survey shows that in
1995, 30 percent of students
at schools*with honor codes
reported cheating, up from 24
percent. Of the students from
non-honor code schools. 45
percent reported .cheating,
versus 47 percent in 1990.
hi answer to the question,
"How often do you think cheat-
ing during tests/examina-
tionsoccurson your campus,"
44 percent answered "very sel-
dom," versus 58 percent in
1995. Eighty-eight percent
127.2% increase in black student enrollment is largest in the nation
Lindsey Schechter
Stuff Writer
Due to enhanced recruit-
ing efforts, there was a signifi-
cant increase in the number
of black students who enrolled
at Rice in 1995. The number
jumped from 28 students in
1994 to 64 in 1995, an increase
of 127.2 percent. Blacks now
make up 10 percent of the
freshman class rather than 4 A
percent like in the previous
year. According to The Jour-
nal of Blacks in Higher Educa
tion. Rice had the highest per-
centage increase in black en-
rollment between 1994 and
15)95 compared to the other
top-25 universities listed in the
U.S^Nem and World Report,
trie increase in enrollment
coincides with an increase in
thenumbrrotblaek.Hispamr
and Native American appli-
cants last year and in the num-
ber of offer* of admission
made to these applicants.
Dean of Admission Rich-
ard Stabell said, "We concen-
trated on increasing the num-
bers [because] the year be-
fore we had a disappointingly
small number of minority stu-
dents, specifically blacks."
Stabell said, "IAdmission]
visited schools which had a
high minority population, we
did a larger direct mail pro-
gram, and we inaugurated the
special recruiting program
called Vision." He said more
black athletes were also ac-
cepted, and Rice's financial aid
program and new black
alumni organization in Hous-
ton attracted many students.
' Hie Office of Admission
hopes to continue to improve
•minority recruitment. As part
of this effort this year,
*Tamara Siler was chosen to
fHithe newly rn^ted fnrsttkm
of coordinator of minority re-
cruitment.
Director of Admission Julie
Browning'said she hopes that
the numbers will continue to
increase although she thinks
Rice is getting close to provid-
ing an "experience that is re-
flective of the world students
go to."
Both Stabell and Brown-
ing insist that under-
represented minorities are
treated t he same way as other
applicants in the admissions
process. "It seems to me [that I
affirmative action, at least
torn a quota point of view,
doesn't exist in a sense that
1hei*e are protected categories
in the applicant pool, On the
other hand, if seeking diver
sity is affirmative action, yes
we practice affirmative ac-
tion," Stabell said.
With all applicants, the
Office of Admission looks for
people who have valuable
qualities- to - -effer-Rtee and
takes special consideration of
the obstacles they have had
to face. A student's abilitv to
overcome obstacles in the past
usually indicates that he or
she will handle the rigors of
college successfully.
Browning said minorities
more often have to deal with
obstacles like biased stan-
dardized tests, poorly funded
high schools and a lack of
incentive from family and
community to attend college.
She points to high retention
rates of minorities as a sign
that they have been making
good decisions. She is further
substantiated by small differ-
ences in the grade point aver
ages of minority and non-mi
nority students, which is usu-
ally around half a grade point.
These considerations,
however, cause a significant
difference in the admissions
statistics for undefre-
presented minorities. The av-
erage SAT score of black and
Hispanic nonathletes in recent
years has been about 180
SEE ADMISSION PAGE 9
(HI
Here are the results for the 1996 Spring Elections held
on March 19:
Honor Council at-large representatives:
George Hatoun
Michael Munson
Packy Saunders
Unlvwalty Council student representatives:
Travis Hopp
John Strickland
_/■: . -- ■ - . . '• f: ' . \ '
Michael cwu
Todd Konkel
Abeb Stafford
Hema Thskar
: ■ ' ■ ■ : '
Sammy thi Owl:
David Gordon
Robert Guerra
Al Suarez
* No one was elected to the position of University Court
junior representative, so a fourth position on that body
was opened up i* an enlarge p^ie^-Ae**es<dMW*
election was uncontested.
' >■
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said, that they had never seen
another student client on a
test or examination in 1995,
whereas only 83 percent said
the same in 1990.
Rice students also showed
more willingness to report
Honor Council policy viola-
tions and reported that they
would be less willing to help
another student cheat. Forty-
nine percent of Rice students
surveyed said they would re-
port a student they saw cheat-
ing, versus only 10 percent <>f
the non-honor code sample
Overall, Rice students
seemed to believe in the work-
ability of the honor code. The
survey also included open
ended questions about cheat
irrgon campus and evaluations
SEE CHEfiTlf/G PAGE 9
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Klein, Charles & Rao, Vivek. The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 83, No. 23, Ed. 1 Friday, March 22, 1996, newspaper, March 22, 1996; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth246536/m1/1/: accessed May 21, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.