Students disturbed by loud construction next to dormitory

KUTZTOWN, Dec. 4—Sentiments about early-morning noise due to construction are divided among residents of Kutztown University's Deatrick Hall, depending on the side a student resides.

The construction of the residential complex next to 600 student residence hall ranges from an un-interfering occurrence to major nuisance depending on what side of the building the student is. Students living in rooms facing the interior of campus hear very little in comparison to students facing the exterior, whose windows are right above the site. “Its right outside my window,” freshman Business major Samantha Goldenburg, whose room is facing the construction, says with obvious annoyance. “I hate it,” says sophomore Art Education major Will Greider echoing her sentiment, whose first floor residence also faces construction. “It wakes me up every morning. They should hold off until at least 10:30[a.m.].”

Construction has been progressing since early October, and generally starts around 7 a.m., according to students in Deatrick. “They’re up early,” says freshman Engineering major John Linn. Jennifer Leo, freshman Special Education major, also remarked about it starting early. “I hear it when I wake up at 7:30 a.m.,” says the Leo, whose room faces construction. “Its really a nuisance hearing it in the morning and all day long.” Students are also saying that the construction can be distracting when trying to do schoolwork in their dormitory.

Linn, whose room is on the opposite side of construction, says it only bothers him when workers drop something, then the loud clang wakes him. Freshman Electronic Media major Travis Harley also says that the construction doesn’t really bother him. He says that he sometimes hears loud booms in his DMZ oriented room in the morning, but is otherwise unaffected.

Similar events are happening at other colleges as well. The College of Charleston, in Charleston, S.C., was petitioned by the Student Government Association to halt construction on campus during finals week, according to MSNBC, but the administration refused citing large costs as the reason. Instead, they offered ear plugs to affected students.

In the same fashion, university president Dr. F Javier Cevallos said Monday that KU will also buy and deliver ear plugs to the residence halls. The Facilities department also issued a statement saying they could not delay the start of construction until 10 a.m. because their work day is designed to maximize usable daylight hours and a delay would remove approximately 2 hours. This, says Facilities, would compromise the start of excavation for the new residence, and would further strain an already tight construction schedule. Facilities also said that they are already struggling to keep the schedule due to the amount of rock that must be excavated.

Sandy Muth, a custodian in Beck hall, commented that the noise was extremely loud in the beginning of the semester when construction was behind her hall. The excavation of the rock merited several complaints from students about the distraction it caused and the early hour, she says.

This does, however, seem to be a problem that affects a very low percentage of students. Construction noise just seems to affect residents of Deatrick who reside in the back of the hall where the construction is.

There's Something in the Watercolor

KUTZTOWN, Nov 27--“Various Watercolors,” in the Bears Den Art Gallery can be described with two words: bold and detailed. Andrew Kish III clearly has a meticulous streak that allows his watercolors to nearly come alive on the walls.

The exhibit is characterized by bold colors, like the deep orange in “Made in the U.S.” which depicts a chained gate. The piece uses various shades of orange and brown to show a rusting gate that has been chained shut in the sunset. Junior Speech Communication major Josh McKee said that it looks like there is dirt and disorder outside the gate, while inside is the freshly swept concrete of America.

The exhibit also contains meticulous detail, such as the individually painted bricks in “Bedroom Window.” The piece is simple, showing just the side window of a brick house. However, it has a great deal of depth, and the quiet appearance captures the viewer and moves the eye around the work.

“Winter Storage,” depicts the front of a barn with a second floor residence. It has a three-dimensional character that gives it the appearance of separately tiered pieces of paper on a single sheet. Viewed from far away, this piece looks like it has physical depth, the illusion of which does not dissipate until it is inspected from just inches away.

Sophomore Psychology major Kelly Henitz said, “I think its amazing how much detail he got out of watercolor.” Henitz’s favorite piece is “Made in the U.S.,” saying, “you can even see the rust.” McKee noted that even the threads on the screw are easily distinguishable.

Sophomore French Education major Jona Werkheiser noted the bold perspectives that Kish took, such as in “American Parkway.” The piece views a telephone pole from the perspective of a person looking directly up at it standing at the base. “Its one of those things you always look at,” said Werkheiser, “but it’s a new perspective to look at it. Its something you wouldn’t think would be art, but it is.”

Werkheiser’s favorite piece is “Old Bones,” a piece with interweaving tree branches entering from the left set against the sky. “I just really like how its set against the sky,” Werkheiser says. “I like the way the sky looks.” Werkheiser went on to note the bright colors in “Made in the U.S.,” and the usual association of chain link with darker and drabber colors.

McKee said that his favorite piece is “Jersey Stairwell,” saying that it “you can see each individual stone, the cracks in the plaster, and you really get the feeling your in the stairway.” McKee noted that from a distance, the piece appears to have the resolution of a photograph.

Freshman Communication Design major Geoff Reynolds agrees adding, “If you can get the details to where it looks like a photograph, that’s a good thing.” Reynolds inspected the watercolors for over fifteen minutes noting the quality, detail, and amount of work that went in to individual segments of the pieces. Reynolds was particularly impressed by the individually painted bricks in “Bedroom Window,” saying that such a feat “takes a lot of time to do.” His favorite piece was also “Jersey Stairwell,” because “you can see where the water leaked into the window [of the stairwell] and dried over time. It has the appearance that there actually was water there.”

Reynolds also noted that the composition is unique for a college student. Reynolds feels that Kish made a bold move in composition by breaking away from traditional are patterns and using a more modern approach. He says that such composition is rare among students because they still exist, to some degree, in the confines of their class art projects.

Victims of Eating Disorder tell Story

KUTZTOWN, Nov. 21—“The appearance is glamorized, but the disorder is stigmatized,” says Cheryl Birchard, a graduate assistant at Kutztown University’s Women’s Center, “and that’s what makes this very complicated.”

Sarah Landstrom (not her real name), 23, is 5’8” and 130 lbs and has struggled with bulimia since she was 16. When asked how it started, Landstrom replied, “I worked at a health food store and learned more about healthy eating, but then I became so focused on what was good and bad food that I was afraid to eat any food. I just became more and more obsessed.” Another factor, Landstrom reports is, “I had an anorexic friend in high school, and I thought that if she wanted to be thinner that bad, then maybe I should too.”

Normally, Landstrom eats “maybe an apple, or a cup of soup.” “On a bad day, I might not even eat at all,” she says. “It’s very stressful, I don’t have any energy and I don’t feel like I can go anywhere or do anything, and it just gets more frustrating.”

This contrasts with Kaylin Wesley (not her real name), 19, who is 5’3” and 102 lbs. She reports that, “If I eat just one chip, I will drink a lot of water and go throw it up. I will throw that one chip up.” Wesley has been bulimic since she was 16. She says it began when she and a friend decided to just lose weight. However, Wesley has faired better than her friend, who was hospitalized six times in two years.

According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders - Fourth Edition (DSM-IV), an eating disorder (ED) is “characterized by severe disturbances in eating behavior.” There are two specific diagnoses, Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia Nervosa. Anorexia is typically characterized by self-starvation and excessive weight loss, bulimia by a binge and purge cycle of eating, whether through vomiting, excessive exercise, or use of laxatives. An estimated 7% of Americans are affected by EDs, according to the National Institute of Mental Health.

Landstrom, according to the DSM-IV, has Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (ED-NOS). This is a third category, and is the catch-all for people that do not meet every specification outlined for anorexia or bulimia in the DSM-IV. This includes people with binge-eating disorders or those who meet all the requirements of anorexia or bulimia but are still a normal weight.

Wesley reports that having an ED is very emotionally taxing. “I get emotional about it sometimes. Not that I can’t lose weight, but because I’m not losing it fast enough. I’ll cry if I feel fat.” But it can also be a source of dealing with stress. “If I get in a fight or if I’m really stressed,” says Landstrom, “then I’ll make myself sick.” Wesley says that “having just one person you are really close with really helps a lot. When one of you just wants to give in, you can support each other.”

When asked her goals, Wesley replies, “I really like the movie Nightmare before Christmas. I want to look like Jack. I will do whatever it takes,” she says forcefully. “It involves a lot more than sitting around and not eating. You have to set goals and know how much you wanna lose. It’s more active than people think. And it takes a lot of self control.” Wesley has set a goal of being 95 lbs by Christmas and then moving into the 80s.

Wesley and Landstrom agree their EDs are primarily internally driven, but they compare themselves to other girls too. “I look at pictures of people like Mary Kate [Olsen] and I want to look like that,” says Wesley. “I just see their perfect features and imagine them on my body. It may sound stupid, but you can call it ‘thinspiration.’” Wesley is also afraid of being fat. “I know that I’m not obese, but I’m fatter than I want to be. I’m disgusted by fat, I don’t want it on me, or in me, or anywhere near me.”

Landstrom cites family problems as a contribution to her ED. She says her parents are going through a divorce, and affirms that her ED is a way of dealing with the stress.

When asked about getting nasty comments, Landstrom recalls one incident where she received a birthday card covered in pictures of donuts thrown all over it with a caption that read “This is what happens when it all goes to your hips,” from her aunt. Landstrom recalls, “My boyfriend looked at her and said, ‘Wow. That’s a really insensitive card.’ And I thought it was pretty insensitive too.”

She also gets comments from friends who know of her disorder. “My one friend said to me ‘I’ll get you a pie for your birthday… wait, you do eat pie, don’t you?’ And people make comments at family functions and just expect me to constantly eat healthy food, so it doesn’t really make me think of getting any better,” adding that it just draws her attention more to what she is eating.

Wesley, on the other hand, says “When people say that I’m too skinny, I take it as a compliment,” adding that her mother, aunt, and boyfriend’s boss just say she looks disgusting. Wesley also says that she gets occasional comments such as “go eat a sandwich.” “I’d go eat a sandwich,” Wesley replies, “but do you have any idea how much that would set me back? I eat a piece of bread and I can’t eat for three days.”

Landstrom says she doesn’t have a minimum weight limit, but hopes she will be better before she gets to that point. Wesley states she hasn’t set a limit yet, saying, “I feel like I’m more in control than my ED is.” She says she wants to merely keep her body functioning. “If you can see my ribcage,” she says, “that’s what I want. If I can wear kid’s clothes, that’s what I want.” When asked if she was afraid of dying, she answered passionately and immediately, “I won’t.”

Grace Hill, Women’s Center Coordinator, says EDs are very complicated disorders. She says they are very personal, and how it begins or the ideology that sustains it varies according to the person. Birchard says, “The only common thing that really ties it together is the definition in the DSM.” Hill adds that people with EDs commonly have a distorted body image as well.

According to Hill, EDs “affect your teeth, hair, skin, and your insides.” The long term affects vary with how quickly the ED is identified and treated, according to the Eating Problems Service, based in the United Kingdom. In victims of anorexia, their organs will begin to consume themselves for energy as starvation progresses, with the liver and intestines being affected first, followed by the heart and kidneys. Other side effects include a significantly increased risk of osteoporosis, heart failure, and loss of sex drive. Victims of bulimia frequently have damage to the esophagus and increased tooth decay, they can loss the ability to produce a bowel movement without laxatives, and can have organ problems related to fluctuating potassium levels.

“Recovery isn’t just a physical thing,” Hill says. “A lot of it is mental. It requires a change in thinking and visualization of yourself. Its more than just forcing someone to eat.” Further adding that it’s something that has the appearance of choice, but victims often feel powerless confused when they attempt recovery. “When you’re in recovery,” Hill says, “they try to get you to realize that you do have a choice, and you can choose to get better if you really want to.”

Student Leader Loses Underpants

KUTZTOWN, Sept. 19—A pair of red and black women’s underwear was found on the floor after a Student Government Board (SGB) meeting Tuesday, according to SGB officials.

The owner of the underwear was freshman New Student Representative, Samantha Dennis. According to Justin McCleary, she was seen “scooting around” in her seat trying to put on a pair of pants just prior to seeing the underwear. When asked for comment, McCleary simply responded, “That’s weird.”

According to Dan Craig, Treasurer, Dennis lost her underpants in the middle segment of the meeting. “She knew she lost them,” Craig said, “because she was trying to cover them with her feet.” When asked for comment, other executive board members refused.

A report was made to Student Union Building Manager, Brandon Gething, about the incident. “Its just really random,” Gething said as he picked up the underwear with a pen and threw it in a trash can.

Dennis claims that she did not take off her underpants during the meeting. She reported shortly after the event that she had grabbed the first pair of pants she saw in her dorm room because she was running late and they must have contained the underwear in a pant leg. “I pushed in my chair at the end of the meeting and saw them there. At this point I had two options, just walk away or pick them up really fast. In retrospect, I should have just picked them up.”

This type of event is not new to Dennis. She reports that she has frequent bad luck with undergarments. “I also left a bra in Chemistry lab, and a bra fell out of my backpack in another class just last week.” Dennis now refers to herself as the “underwear pervert.”