Category: Campus life

When Mark Werth moved into the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Ogg Hall dormitory as a freshman in 1965, everything was new: the beds, the closets, the fluorescent lighting and the rotary phone in each room.
A large sculpture has been installed in the common area in front of the new Ogg Hall dormitory at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

University of Wisconsin-Madison student Kelly Eickert (left) talks with her roommate, Jessica Zahn, in their new Ogg Hall dorm room. The rooms in the new dormitory complex are wider and deeper than the rooms in the old, 13-story Ogg Hall, which is undergoing demolition.

Werth helped build Ogg’s raucous reputation from scratch, pulling fire alarms and lobbing water balloons.

Early Monday morning, a fire erupted inside a fraternity house on UW-Whitewater’s campus. All 10 students inside got out safely because the house dog started barking.

All are staying with friends.

On Saturday, a fire at an apartment complex on Carroll Street in Madison sent UW-Madison students onto the streets.

MADISON, Wis. â?? Old Ogg Hall at University of Wisconsin-Madison, home to thousands of students for more than 40 years, is coming down.

But memories are surfacing, in part because of a Wisconsin Alumni Association blog that invites former residents to tell their stories. Dozens of alumni have posted on the site. Topics include: â??The night someone dropped a boulder down the trash chute…â?? and â??The Fire.â??
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Demolitions crews started ripping down the old hall last week. A new version of Ogg opened this fall across the street, with larger rooms, shared bathrooms and air conditioning.

Early Saturday morning an apartment fire on North Carroll Street left more than 30 peopleâ??most UW-Madison studentsâ??homeless after Madison firefighters spent several minutes battling the flames.

Several UW-Madison student organizations will be able to re-apply for eligibility to receive university funding the Associated Students of Madisonâ??s Student Judiciary.ruled Friday.

According to the ruling, ASMâ??s Student Services Finance Committee misinterpreted bylaw criteria when it denied funding to groups earlier this semester and must re-evaluate any group that was previously denied funding based solely on the bylaw.

Fire investigators have returned to the scene of an apartment fire downtown, still trying to determine the cause of the blaze that forced about 30 UW students to seek other accomodations since early Saturday morning.

The blaze at 505 N. Carroll Street caused about $206,000 in damages. Thirteen Madison Fire Department units responded to the two-alarm blaze, which started in a sixth-floor apartment of the seven-story building.

The Associated Students of Madisonâ??s Student Judiciary issued a ruling Friday in response to the Roman Catholic Foundation of the University of Wisconsinâ??s appeal in hopes of receiving student segregated fees.

JANESVILLE, Wis. â?? A 58-year-old Whitewater man has been charged with stalking the 20-year-old East Troy woman who represents the stateâ??s county fairs.

Joseph G. Schraeder reportedly asked Sheri Nelson to be his â??first ladyâ? in June at the Walworth County Diary Breakfast and told her was planning their wedding for a year later, according to a criminal complaint.

Nelson is a former Walworth County Fairest of the Fair and the 2007 Wisconsin Fairest of the Fair. The University of Wisconsin-Madison student helps promote Wisconsinâ??s county fairs.

A fire early Saturday morning has caused hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage to a Madison apartment building, which was home to a number of UW students.

Witnesses reported flames shooting from the building in the 500 block of North Carroll Street around five o’clock Saturday morning. No one was injured, but about 30 people have been displaced.

A fire captain on the scene says most, if not all, of the residents go to the U-W.

The UW System Board of Regents discussed the emerging College Portrait initiative Thursday, highlighting a feature that would measure how much students learn between their freshman and senior years in college.

The University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents heard a presentation Thursday about how information from each campus will be collected and compiled with the intention of improving accountability.

Thousands of parents will have a chance to participate in the University of Wisconsin experience this weekend, as a part of the Wisconsin Alumni Associationâ??s First Year Parentsâ?? Weekend 2007.

It’s about knowing how to take care of yourself to avoid ever having to tell a story like this…

“I tried to leave but he was so much stronger than I was,” says Abby, a rape survivor. “He was much bigger than I was. I tried going out the fire escape because it was on the 3rd floor and I tried to leave the bedroom door. I just couldn’t get out.”

Abby says she was raped during the Mifflin Street block party last year. The path she took to find herself in danger is one that sometimes can be avoided if you know how to guard your safety.

From a swanky tapas bar to a gloriously carnivorous Brazilian grill, the recent additions to the roster of Madisonâ??s downtown restaurants are very exciting for many University of Wisconsin students. However, one restaurant opening that will surely have the greatest impact on these individuals is last Sundayâ??s grand opening of Rhetaâ??s at Chadbourne Residential Collegeâ??s newly redesigned dining hall.

A search-and-screen committee named three finalists for the University of Wisconsinâ??s Vice Provost for Diversity and Climate Wednesday.

Madison: As the Director of Admisssions, Rob Seltzer spends a lot of time staring at his computer, trying to decide if the resume on his screen is good enough for the University of Wisconsin.

“His test scores are somewhat lower than our freshman class average, which would be a little bit of concern to me,” says Seltzer, looking at one prospective student’s applications.

Seltzer says while the admissions process isn’t an exact science, it’s also not a mystery. They’ve gone as far as producing a fact sheet. “We do a lot of myth busting.”

MADISON, Wis. — A University of Wisconsin Board of Regents committee is discussing changing policies for spending student segregated fees, but some students said they are concerned the changes might take away their power to decide where the money goes.

Two major points of contention for students are whether money can be spent paying non-university staff working with organizations and if it can go toward rent for organization space off campus, WISC-TV reported.

Union directors and UW police said Tuesday they would collaborate with students to streamline union event policies, in response to complaints police unfairly cancelled several social fraternity events this semester.

UW Police are investigating a suspended UW-Madison student who wrote potentially threatening e-mails to UW-Madison English department faculty last week and issued a poster Monday to alert faculty in Helen C. White Hall.

The University of Wisconsin Alliance for Programming Equality and UW Police Department reached an agreement Tuesday to open communication about safety in planning Union events.

Jeopardy! producers and UW-Madison officials announced Thursday that UW-Madison will host the 2008 Jeopardy! College Championship April 11 and 12.

Students from across the nation will gather on the University of Wisconsin campus this weekend to discuss strategies for combating national and world hunger and homelessness.

This Big Ten university will be home of the Jeopardy College Championship 2008.

What is University of Wisconsin?

MADISON, Wis. — Authorities said that behavior is changing at Madison’s annual Halloween party on State Street and that property damage and arrests are at the lowest point in years.

This year, WISC-TV was given a firsthand, behind-the-scenes look from the police transport area, which is set up outside State Street during Freakfest, to the arrest processing center where over-rowdy revelers are cited and released or sent to detox or sometimes to jail.

Police said that behavior at the Halloween party is changing year-to-year but they said if partiers cause trouble, they will be arrested.

The Wisconsin Student Public Interest Research Group, a UW-Madison student organization, launched the Residence Hall Energy Competition Thursday, to challenge UW-Madison housing residents to conserve energy as part of WISPIRGâ??s Big Red Go Green campaign.

A team of University of Wisconsin mechanical engineering students received funding to develop a zero-emission electric snowmobile, the group announced Wednesday.

The University of Wisconsin announced Wednesday an alumnus will be giving a series of lectures on campus and in the Madison area during November, marking the debut of a new program by the Wisconsin Alumni Association.

After missing a meeting with a University of Wisconsin student group Tuesday, the UW Police Department said they had intended to attend the meeting but were unable due to a prior commitment.

When political science professor Jon Pevehouse told his students he was leaving the University of Wisconsin last spring, one student said his departure was a â??huge lossâ? to the school.

House Republican Tom Petri of Fond du Lac, long an advocate of reforming a federal student-loan program, introduced a bill Wednesday that he says would cut costs to taxpayers and let students reap the benefits.

At issue is whats called the Federal Family Education Loan Program. It lets private lenders make student loans at interest rates determined by a formula set by the government. In the end, the return to lenders is generous while the government guarantees almost all loans, relieving lenders of most risk, Petri said.

Former Madison Mayor and UW-Madison alumnus Paul Soglin addressed UW-Madison students about turning passions into careers Tuesday at an event hosted by the Career Development Association.

The Madison chapter of Teach for America said they have set an ambitious, but not unreachable goal for the University of Wisconsin this fall.

With University of Wisconsin students deciding on their classes for the spring semester in the upcoming weeks, Stephen Friedman hopes each of them checks one of his sites before making their selections.

University of Wisconsin police failed to attend a meeting Tuesday to discuss future planning of Union events, after a September incident sparked a local fraternity to accuse the department of racial profiling.

The fatal fire at a North Carolina beach house Sunday appears to fit a tragic pattern that has claimed the lives of college students across the nation.

In a study published last year, USA TODAY identified a pattern of risk that leaves college students vulnerable to the dangers of fire.

Halloween isn’t what it used to be on State Street in Madison, Wisconsin.

Last Sunday, the main gathering point for the university town’s annual Halloween bash saw a throng of heavily boozed cross-dressers, walking food products and pop-culture oddities slowly crawling about at almost 1:30 Sunday morning, closing time here.

But Molly Kelley, a junior at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, pointed at the large unpopulated gaps of littered concrete from a balcony overlooking the seven block stretch. “Two years ago this place was packed like sardines,” she says. “You couldn’t move. Either you got run over by [police] horses or climbed on light poles.”