LED madness!
Eric Downing
Web editor and fun page coordinator
LSC kicks other Vermont College's asses in the race for getting LEDs. Eat our dust!
Many members of the Lyndon State College community might not realize that the school has become a leader in the green revolution.
When the college installed LED lights in the Vail parking lot, the pool and both of the gyms, it became the first college in the state of Vermont to do so. LSC is also one of the first colleges to get the lights nationwide. Now the school is getting calls from places such as George Washington University.
Some staff at LSC were quite eager for the school to get the lights. Tom Archer, director of physical plant, said that the VSC Director of Facilities, Richard Ethier, Wayne Hamilton, and he drove nine hours to Connecticut to look at the lights. Seeing the lights in real life helped them make the decision to get LED lights installed at LSC.
The lights were purchased through a company called BetaLED. The school installed 21 light poles in the Vail parking lot, 16 lights each in the Bole gym and swimming pool and 36 lights in the Stannard gym. They replaced the metal halide lights the gyms and pool used to have.
Archer said that before installing the LEDs in the Stannard gym, the lighting was too poor to be legal for NCAA play. Now, the lighting in there exceeds the standard.
“They’re styling,” Archer said about the new lights. “They have zero night sky.”
“Night sky” refers to how much light pollution spills into the area above the lights. With the old lights, a hazy orange glow could be seen above the Vail parking lot even from miles away. Led lights don’t have this problem, mostly because they produce clear light.
Archer said that the community is “super happy” about the new lights, citing that he got at least three phone calls and other statements from the surrounding community already about the difference seen from outside the school.
In addition to the visual advantages of the LEDs, they have some more important features as well. They are much more energy efficient than the old lights, requiring between one-half to two-thirds less energy. This means that the college will save a little on the energy bill.
LEDs also tend to last much longer, with an expected live expectancy of at least 20 years. High pressure sodium, which is what the lights in the parking lot used to be, have a typical life expectancy of little more than a year.
UPDATE: Archer said that the school already has a 10% savings on its energy bill for the last two months as compared to last year.
The new building will be very energy efficient, but it won’t sacrifice functionality to that end.
Eric Downing
Web editor and fun page coordinator
The new Met department may be greener than Vail, but not so green that study is hindered.
Imagine a meteorology student looking out the window to see what the clouds outside are doing and only seeing a large white shade.
That might have been the case if changes weren’t made to the design of the new building being constructed in Vail. The diagram printed on the front page of The Critic earlier this semester is no longer accurate. The large white shades hanging over the windows haven’t made it to the final design, as it became evident that it would be difficult for meteorology students to look out the windows to study cloud formations.
The shades were originally designed to keep sunlight from overheating the building in the warmer months. Tom Archer, director of physical plant at Lyndon State College, as well as a board member of the sustainability committee said that the new building is being specifically designed to be “greener” than the existing buildings on campus.
Archer listed off a few of the features to expect in the new building, including water-saving faucets, LED lights, and having heat be piped over from Vail’s boiler in the milder months of April and May.
“All these things will help,” Archer said, referring to the reduction of LSC’s carbon footprint.
Having a certain degree of efficiency will allow LSC to shoot for a “silver” certification with the Green Building Rating System™ Leadership Environment Energy and Design, or LEED. LEED is, as stated on the U.S. Green Building Council’s website, usgbc.org: “a third-party certification program and the nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings.”
A building can earn a certain number of points toward a credit, which is divided into different colors such as gold or platinum. That building earns points based on certain criteria that it meets.
“I know we can get silver,” Archer said.
It actually costs money to become certified. This is coupled with needing to pay an architect more to work harder to ensure that the building meets the requirements. The benefits for acquiring this certification includes energy savings and better public relations as people knowing for sure that the building is as efficient as claimed.
LEED certification has another more indirect benefit. Efficiency Vermont gives credits toward measures taken to green up.
Archer said he’d even like to see some solar panels on campus, although pointing out that they wouldn’t be able to provide much energy.
“Payback is not initially great, but it’s a great educational tool,” he said.
Asked to be an adult: treated like a child
Catherine Story
Managing Editor
Our managing editor grinds her axe. Whose head is on the chopping block? Thankfully not mine this time.
Independence is a relative term in a civilized society. Here at LSC independence is relatively limited.
When my parents and older sibling described college life it was labeled as a time of experimentation and exploration. College is a time to make decisions, good and bad.
Here at LSC students are not treated like young adults who can make decisions for themselves.
The halls of dorms and academic buildings are littered with bulletin boards plastered with big bubbly letters telling students about the next magician or some generic
alcohol awareness study
Perhaps it’s a holiday and there’s a party in the student center where students can grab a handful of snacks and paint a pumpkin.
As a teenager I babysat and many of the crafts and educational activities I have witnessed on this campus remind me of the games I would play with the 4 and 7-year olds that I spent my summers watching. These games were dull then and seven years later I am still not interested.
The effort to involve LSC students is admirable but it is being tackled with the wrong intentions.
On-campus students are supposed to be able to turn to their RAs for help when they are feeling stressed out or uncomfortable. The idea is a peer-to-peer support system. Unfortunately resident assistants are not students just like everyone else. They are not allowed to be.
Resident assistants are nervous and understandably. They can lose their job and have to pay for their living expenses if they are in the presence of students breaking rules. If an RA wants to have a drink they need to request the time off in advance. These are not good examples of mature students acting responsibly on their own. This is just another image of students following the many rules to get through the LSC experience.
If any student is feeling stressed out on campus they could just stop in at their resident assistants room. Here they will see a student who in exchange for free housing has given up the college experience replacing it with mandatory time in their room and consistent badgering by resident hall directors about not redecorating those childish bulletin boards every week or month or however often they put new construction paper on that wall that no one looks at.
Actually don’t bother walking over to your RAs room. You can ask them next time they knock on your door and come into your cubicle of privacy because of possible bottles clanking. They are only there to make sure you’re not doing anything illegal like making too much noise or drinking anywhere but in your bed. Because we all know that’s a healthy way to introduce young adults to alcohol. You can only drink in the privacy of your bedroom.
Not everyone here at LSC can drink legally, this is the justification for sending the of-age to his or her semi-private room. Why must we shelter our younger students from the life that they are so desperately trying to experience?
Peer leaders and INT classes carry first year students who are treated like sheltered children as opposed to young adults striking out on their own. There is nothing more degrading than having to pay for a class that tells you how to be an independent adult in a place where you’re not allowed to try it for yourself.
So my point is, step back and let the student body of Lyndon State College act like a body of college students. Maybe if they were treated like adults they would act like adults and participate in and create clubs and activities that they are interested in as opposed to trying so hard to get off campus and tune themselves out of campus activities.
Holiday Treats: The Naughty and Nice
Brittany LaPlume
Special to the Critic
How to avoid packing on extra pounds over the holidays.
With the holiday seasons approaching, many of us have been hitting the gym and watching what we’re eating hoping to avoid gaining those extra pounds.
This is great! But how will you hold up when the tantalizing fragrance of spices, pumpkin and flaky, buttery pie crust wafts through the air as Mom bakes her famous pumpkin pie? There goes all your self-control right out the window.
Good news, you don’t need to give up all your favorite treats this holiday season. Here are some tips and tricks to help you figure out which of your favorites belong on the Nice List and which are banned to the Naughty List.
The first thing you need to learn about is fats. There are four kinds of fats: monounsaturated fats, polyunsaturated fats, saturated fats and trans fats. If your favorite has only monounsaturated or polyunsaturated fats then put them right on the Nice list. Monounsaturated fats and polyunsaturated fats are the good ones. If your treat only has saturated fat, be careful. Some saturated fat is okay, but too much of a good thing can be bad. Now, foods which contain trans fats go straight to the Naughty List. Watch out for those trans fats that come from partial hydrogenation of vegetable oil.
How will you know if your favorite holiday snack contains trans fat? Just look at the ingredients. If the ingredients have “partially hydrogenated” anywhere in it kiss that treat good bye. It is officially on the Naughty List.
Luckily many companies have done us the favor of labeling their foods with visible “0g trans fat” signs right on their packaging. Careful though, it turns out that even with those labels the foods that claim to have 0 grams of trans fat can actually have up to 0.4 g of trans fat per serving.
While that small amount does not seem like a big deal think of how many servings of those foods you might eat in a day or even a week. That’s when the grams of trans fat begin to add up. To determine if the food really is trans fat free, just check the ingredients and look for that two-word warning, partially hydrogenated.
So why are trans fats so bad? They can be dangerous to your health. A 1% increase in your daily calorie intake of trans fats increases your chances of developing coronary artery disease by 50%!
Those are scary numbers, especially around the holiday season when it’s so tempting to eat all those foods that are loaded with trans fats.
Because of this huge risk, some places, like the state of California, have completely banned the use of trans fat in prepared food. This means that if you eat at a restaurant, bar or snack shack in CA, you’ll never have to worry about trans fats.
Now let’s go over the Naughty and Nice Lists:
Nice List
Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups
Turkey (no skin)
Twizzlers
Cranberry Sauce
Squash
Hard Candies
Candy Apples
Dark Chocolate
Oreos
Naughty List
Snickers – 0.2 g trans fat
Sarah Lee Pumpkin Pie – 7 g trans fat
Mrs. Smith’s Apple Pie – 4 g trans fat
Caramel Popcorn Balls – 3.7 g trans fat
Ritz Crackers – Contains Partially Hydrogenated Soybean Oil
Pillsbury Rolls – 3.2 g trans fat
Pillsbury Cinnamon Buns – 2.0 g trans fat
Some alternatives to those Naughty List items:
Pumpkin and Apple Pie – Make a homemade pumpkin pie and find a recipe that does not have shortening in the pie crust. If the recipe calls for margarine, see if you can substitute oil.
Rolls and Cinnamon Buns – Make homemade rolls and cinnamon buns with a recipe that calls for oil.
So now that you have your Naughty and Nice Lists, enjoy this holiday season, but don’t go overboard with the foods on the Nice List. Remember, there can be too much of a good thing. Happy Holidays from the Exercise Science Department!
Difficult to move
Sam Monroe
Special to the Critic
Mobility on campus is a problem for some. And the elevators are out of date.
Do you think getting up and down the hills on campus is difficult? Try doing it on crutches or in a wheelchair.
After a hockey game a few weeks ago I found myself on crutches. What is it like living on campus while on crutches? Well, it is not fun. None of the Stonehenge residence halls have elevators and therefore, it makes it difficult to get up and down inside the dorms. Luckily I live on the first floor, however not all students are that lucky.
Going across campus now takes longer than it did before and getting up and down some of the hills takes a good amount of upper body strength. However, it could be much worse at a larger school.
There are elevators in both VAIL and LAC, making it easier to get from floor to floor and class to class. However, the elevator in VAIL and the elevator going from the theatre lobby to the classrooms upstairs both have one thing in common. The expiration dates on the certificates in both of them are April 28, 2008. That was nearly seven months ago. The elevator in LAC isn’t set to expire until early in 2009.
There are also ramps and handicap entrances attached to every building on campus. This makes it easy for students who have been injured to get around and get to classes and other events.
Professor Alison Lathrop was recently in a wheel chair on campus, because of tendinitis in her heels. However, she was able to get up for short periods of time and walk short distances. She attempted to keep her wheelchair just in her lab so it would make it easier to move around.
“I was always able to get where I needed to go,” she said, making sure to mention that some times she needed to get up and walk. She also mentioned that the front doors in the theater lobby are very heavy and the doors in the hallway leading to the science wing are also heavy and difficult to open and would be harder for someone permanently handicapped. She said she wouldn’t be surprised to see doors that open with the push of a button on the LSC campus in the distant future.
Lathrop said she had to make sure that she thought ahead each morning and make sure she got all her Xerox copying done in one trip to VAIL. She also said the hardest spot to move around was the outdoor hallway connecting VAIL to the science wing.
When asked if she was concerned about the expired certificates in some of the elevators she responded with “I didn’t notice,” however, she did add, “that would be concerning.”
“I was delighted with how helpful everyone was, and that I was given a temporary handicap sticker. A little concerned about getting in to some doors,” Lathrop said of her overall experience.
Delicious Snack Bole
Ben Holbrook
Critic Editor
Rita Bole's new snack shop makes money for the Leadership Recognition Committee.
If you have noticed more students going into Rita Bole on Mondays and Wednesdays then it is probably due to the new “snack bole” which is located in the main lobby of RBC.
Nate Rossett, advisor to the Leadership and Recognition Committee, started the snack bole this year in an effort to raise money for the committee.
“We’re not a club so we needed a way to make money,” Rosseti said. “This kitchen never gets used except by people in the student services office.”
Not only is everything priced very cheaply at the snack bole, all of the money that is made goes towards student awards which are given at the end of the year.
“We buy everything in bulk so we are able to sell chips for 50 cents and still make a profit,” Rossett said.
Before the snack bole was incorporated as a fundraiser for the Leadership Recognition Committee, the committee used the school’s printers to make paper certificates and they were unable to assist student life with the cost of the recognition banquet at the end of the year, Rossetti said.
The snack bole provides a cheap and convenient opportunity to grab something to eat when your schedule doesn’t permit a trip to the dining hall or the lines at the snack bar are too long.
It’s really convenient because we live in the building,” John Chetwynd, television studies major, said.
“It’s also really convenient because if you’ve been procrastinating, you can grab a hotdog and go back to doing homework,” Dave Kendall, mathematics major, said. Kendall was taking advantage of the snack bole’s meal deal, which gets you a hotdog, a drink and a bag of chips for $2.
The only problem that Rosseti has encountered so far with the snack bole is the lack of help to run it.
“Finding people to work is a problem because everybody who works here is a volunteer,” Rossetti said. “Aramark will use this space (RBC kitchen) when there are events going on in the conference room,” Rossetti said, “but we don’t have any problems because our stuff isn’t in the way since they bring their own equipment.”
The snack bole’s selection is continually expanding because students are more than welcome to suggest any items that aren’t on the menu, Rossetti said.
The snack bole will still be open next year although the days may change due to people’s schedules, Rossetti said.
Phonathon
Heather Poginy
Special to the Critic
Phonathon brings in the big bucks--and old stories.
Work-study-paid students gear up Sunday through Thursday nights at the Alumni House to raise money for Lyndon State College’s Phonathon for the Annual Fund.
The students sit from 6 p.m. until 9 p.m. at individual desks in the Alumni House. These desks serve as “calling stations” in which they phone alumni of the college.
Because the school has the records of every alumni that goes through its doors, the callers generally have an easy time contacting them. However, some are entirely “unreachable,” with no phone number, address, or any other contact information.
Thayer Newport, a senior at Lyndon, is in her third year working for the Phonathon. She helps to supervise the callers when Hannah Manley, the director of alumni relations and development, cannot be there.
“Talking to alumni is actually quite fun sometimes,” Newport says, “You can really hear some interesting stories.” She recalled a story one alumna told when she was living in the original Vail mansion, when the alumna’s house mother scared them by making each resident believe the Vail tower was haunted.
The purpose of the phone calls to the alumni are about more than raising money. Students keep in contact with the alumni to keep them in touch with the college, and to give them the scoop of what’s happening at LSC. However, students always ask for a pledge to the college at the end of a phone call.
There’s always something in it for the students, though. The callers receive “Incentive Points” for each call made. For example, if they receive a pledge of over $500, they receive 10 points. If they manage to convince the alumnus or alumna to donate for the first time or to increase the amount of their pledge from the year before, they receive one point. Even an email address or other personal information about the alumnus gets them points.
At the end of their efforts, whichever caller has the most points gets a cash bonus determined by their supervisor.
“I can usually get sixty or a hundred points in one night,” Newport said, “We really compete, it definitely does motivate the callers.”
Alumni might pledge from $5 to over a $1000. The money is used for scholarships for students, improvements of the buildings and grounds and it also helps improve faculty through professional development. With the college’s economic downfall, every penny helps.
“Your adrenaline really pumps when you get those big donations,” Newport said. “It makes [calling] really worthwhile.”
With the Phonathon only having been in session for a couple of weeks, the students have already raised $15,000. Each night, they raise between $500 to a couple thousand dollars.
This year, thanks to a challenge grant, when an alumni raises their pledge from the previous year, or when a new donor hits the list, their pledges are matched by the grant, so their pledges are doubled. Also, pledges made over $365, a dollar a day for a year, will be matched by the challenge grant.
Money donated by the alumni goes directly to the Annual Fund, which is a generic fund, but alumni do have the option to specify if they want to send their money to specific programs, endowments or departments at the college.
Facebook virus
Derika Downing
Critic Staff
Warning email from Dente explained.
If you checked your email this week, you probably received an email from LSC’s IT Director Mike Dente, announcing that IT is, “blocking all messages from the Facebook website to our email server,” explaining that, “a virus is spreading [by] using Facebook email sending a link to a malicious video containing a Trojan.” If so, you may have wondered exactly what this virus does and how it was discovered.
“I actually received one of the messages,” Dente said, “It looked suspicious, so I did a search on Facebook viruses and there were a couple of different articles. Over the last few months, there’ve been a few of these viruses, but we’ve never been hit by one until now.”
When asked what the virus does and how it operates, Dente explained that, “it contains malware, so it tries to take over your computer. It installs programs, like SpyWare, which can bring the computer to a crawl. It uses your Facebook friends to mail it to other people,” Dente said.
When asked how many students had been affected by the virus, Dente said, “only two or three students have been affected, that we know of. We’ve blocked around a hundred emails that were infected when it happened,” noting that Facebook sends about “a hundred legitimate messages an hour, so I guess that’s why the virus is so effective.”
Dente wants to assure the LSC community, “our virus protection on campus will stop it from infecting LSC computers.” In the meantime, however, it is probably best not to open any unfamiliar links on your email.”
Rotaract Club
Josiah Stewart
Critic Staff
Little known club teaches about community services.
Lyndon State College shows its good will this holiday season through the Rotaract club; one of LSC’s least known clubs.
“The Rotary is a group of business minded individuals who support good will, community services, and professional and ethical business practices,” Curtis Mathewson, President of the LSC Rotaract chapter, said. The club is sponsored by the Lyndon Rotary, and is primarily focused on helping the community, and teaching leadership and business ethics.
The LSC Rotaract club has already started its holiday food drives for the semester. “Right now we have a holiday food drive on the LSC campus that we hope to generate some food for those in need this holiday. All the proceeds are going to go to the Lyndon Food Pantry,” Mathewson said.
Although the club is not very well known at LSC, it is officially recognized by the student government.
Mathewson said that the club’s main goals are to establish their leaders and start generating some publicity on campus, “We also want to have a successful holiday food drive. Our year long goals, however, are a bit more ambitious; we hope to drive even more publicity, and maybe host a few other events on campus.”
The club currently has about 12 members, and Mathewson is hoping that students take the initiative and join up. They are looking for people between the ages of 18 and 30 who are interested in helping out the community.
“We don’t have a whole lot of people involved yet. Right now we only have about 10 to 12 people that show up at our meetings, and so far they have been very helpful, and we have gotten a lot done with the amount of people that we have,” Mathewson said.
The club’s food drive boxes can be seen around campus and have already started to accumulate a little food. The food drive was started the second week of November and will run until the last week of the semester, “We have not generated a lot of food yet; many people don’t even know what is going on. A lot of people may have seen the boxes but, not a lot of publicity has gone out yet,” Mathewson said.
The Lyndon Rotary meets in Lyndonville around the same time that the LSC club does every week, Mathewson said, and they are willing to help the club out in any way they can.
“They are actually our sponsors; they are the reason why we exist, and they help us with advice. We can go to them and find out what we can do to further our service to the community. They invite us to their meetings where we get to see what the actual rotary does on a weekly basis.”
Mathewson urges students who wish to sign up to contact him or to stop by HAC 108 at noon on Wednesdays to attend the club’s weekly meetings.
Why is registration so early?
Sebastion C. Lury
Special to the Critic
Possibly so students don't have to stress about it when finals week rolls around.
Lyndon State College is amid the process of registering students for Spring 2009 classes.
Registration at LSC for classes in the Spring 2009 semester began on Oct. 27, 2008. It will be suspended on December 1. The process is scheduled early as it helps to relieve some stress for students.
“[Students] can get it done before finals,” says Deb Hale, LSC’s registrar. “It relieves some stress,” Hale says that if a student no longer has to worry about registering for classes, they have more time to study for finals.
Another issue that this registration avoids is a potential lack of communication between students and their advisers. Hale says that between semesters, advisers—like students—have time off. This occasionally causes issues when students realize during the break that they need to register, but they cannot access their advisers.
John Kascenska, associate dean of academic affairs, says that registering by Dec. 1 is beneficial for everyone involved. Kascenska says that this provides an opportunity for any issues—ranging from accounts on hold to canceled classes—to be addressed and corrected before classes begin in the spring. He also says that the goal is that students, advisers, and faculty alike can go home between semesters knowing what classes will run and what they need to do to further prepare themselves.
Kascenska says that this is the first year that LSC has established a date, specifically December 1, as an end date. Other Vermont State Colleges have similar registration periods.
Castleton State College’s registration process is November 10 to the 21. Johnson State College has a more complicated system: their primary registration process is November 10 through the 14 and is credit driven, meaning that seniors can register first, followed by juniors, and eventually working toward freshmen. This allows for seniors to be ensured of classes that they need for graduation.
LSC’s registration process ends on December 1 and it is widely recommended that students meet with their advisers to register.