Category: Campus life

As UW-Madison students return to campus for the spring semester and head out to restock the homefront supplies, here’s a tip: don’t forget the soap.

A young Minnesota man was undoubtedly happy when his Gophers won a hard-fought 1-0 victory over the University of Wisconsin men’s hockey team on Jan. 13 at the Kohl Center. But a felony charge of battery to a police officer probably dampened his spirits quickly.

Ryan T. Hartwell, 19, of the Minneapolis suburb of Lakeville, was charged with both the felony count and a misdemeanor of obstructing an officer after a wild chase through the Kohl Center hallways in which his running style was said to be like a football player and it took several officers and fans to finally stop him.

A look at the experiences of three UW-Milwaukee freshmen.

A single-car crash in in the Town of Blue Mounds kills a father and his daughter. It happened just before midnight Friday on North Road near Mt. Horeb.

According to the Dane County Sheriff’s Department, the driver of the car, 21-year-old Euricky Eduardo Tanuwidjaja of Madison, was traveling south on North Road when he lost control and struck a tree.

Tanuwidgaga and his 19-year-old front-seat passenger, Ian Santosa, received minor injuries and were treated at UW Hospital.

UW System admission policies are under scrutiny after the Board of Regents postponed a decision to enforce the UW-Madison comprehensive admission process presented by UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley in December 2006.

For the first time in over 20 years, UW-Madison is not the top-producing institution for Peace Corps volunteers.

The University of Washington, with 110 alumni volunteers, narrowly gained the top position over UW-Madison, which had 106 alumni participants. UW-Madison still holds the No. 2 overall ranking, with 2,764 alumni serving since 1961.

For many students, winter break was spent visiting family and friends, but for one UW-Madison student, the break brought heroism.

While backpacking in New Mexico, UW-Madison junior Peter Kottke and his older brother Albert rescued a woman in the Gila National Forest who had been alone for approximately five weeks.

Just days before the fall semester ended, Madison police arrested Antonio L. Pope for the two campus sexual assaults that took place only weeks earlier.

The criminal complaint filed against Pope details the charges against him in the Nov. 29 and Dec. 9 sexual assaults.

A successful career in student leadership at Michigan State University just might lead to a dean of students position at the University of Wisconsin for Timothy Gordon.

As tuition costs continue to rise and college becomes less and less affordable for many students, the debate over the increasing influx of out-of-state students accepted into the University of Wisconsin remains a hot issue.

After a reported rise in textbook thefts on the University of Wisconsin campus, city officials have proposed an ordinance that would require used bookstores to participate in a crime prevention effort.

Concerns about higher education costs in the state rose earlier this month, as the University of Wisconsin slipped 10 spots in a nationwide survey on college affordability.

Capt. Kevin Kryst, a 2001 graduate of the University of Wisconsin, became the first UW alumnus to die in the Iraq war when he was killed in combat in the Al Anbar province Dec. 18.

Madison police believe they have caught the man who sexually assaulted two University of Wisconsin students on or near campus late last semester.

The University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents has come under close scrutiny in recent weeks for considering allowing race as a factor in admissions decisions at all UW System schools.

As the U.S. occupation of Iraq nears four years and President Bush promotes a so-called surge of troops to quell the Iraqi resistance and civil war, others want a surge toward peace that doesn’t involve more troops.

One of those others is Paul Pryse, a University of Wisconsin-Madison junior journalism major. Pryse, 20, is a member of the UW-Madison branch of the Campus Antiwar Network and is an elected member of CAN’s national coordinating committee.

He says he got involved in CAN “because I suspected from the beginning that this was a war based on lies, and I turned out to be right.”

At 5:15 a.m., the streets of the UW–Madison campus are silent and deserted. Most typical students have gone to bed a few hours earlier, and won’t wake until their first class sometime around 9 a.m. However, in a few dorm rooms and apartments, members of the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps are stirring. They will be showered, dressed, and at the Shell, one of the campus workout facilities, for training by 6:15 a.m. sharp.
Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, this is the routine of UW students who have chosen to dedicate their time to the Army, Navy, Marines or Air Force. At the UW, some students will not only earn their undergraduate degree, but be proficient in land navigation, how to drive a Humvee, and how to aim and shoot a rifle.

Madison, Wis. – Technology-based businesses and other companies hoping to connect with student intern programs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are invited to attend the Jan. 23 luncheon meeting of the Wisconsin Innovation Network in Madison.

WASHINGTON – According to my daughter Joanna, a college student, the world is divided into three basic categories: friends, “Facebook friends,” and everybody else.

I’m trying to get a handle on this. From what I can tell, Facebook friends are not friends in the same way that her pals are friends. In fact, Facebook might well be changing the nature of relationships, making them both more intrusive and yet somehow less intimate at the same time.

For the first time in more than two decades, UW- Madison is not the top- producer of Peace Corps volunteers.

UW-Madison had 106 alumni serve in the program last year – up from 104 last year – but was edged out for the No. 1 spot by the University of Washington in Seattle, which had 110 alumni participating, up from 102 last year.

MADISON, Wis. — After proudly holding the title for 20 years, the University of Wisconsin-Madison is no longer the No. 1 school in the country for recruiting Peace Corps volunteers.

The University of Washington grabbed the top spot with just four volunteers more than UW-Madison.

Washington had 110 volunteers compared to UW-Madison’s 106.

MADISON, Wis. — A University of Wisconsin-Madison student credited with helping save a woman’s life in the New Mexico mountains is being called a hero, but he said it was just a matter of good timing.

Peter Kottke, 20, and his brother Albert were on their annual backpacking trip in New Mexico when they stumbled upon a woman missing for five weeks.

Kottke said he and his brother were looking forward to a third trip into the wilderness, and said they never thought they would come back heroes.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – A faint sound made Peter and Albert Kottke stop and look around as they hiked out of the Gila Wilderness at the end of backpacking trip.A figure moved on the other side of the Gila River. As it drew closer, the University of Wisconsin-Madison junior and his older brother saw a woman, hunched over and moving slowly.

The Kottkes crossed the river to find Carolyn Dorn, 52, who had been alone in the Gila National Forest for five weeks after becoming trapped on the wrong side of the rain- and snow-swollen river. The search for her had been called off two weeks ago.

(Peter Kottke is a junior majoring in geological engineering at UW-Madison.)

Jason Carlos Gonzalez, 22, is being honored for his volunteer work at two fire departments and at Big Brothers Big Sisters of Wisconsin. Although he is putting himself through college at UW- Madison, Gonzalez said he has been given many opportunities throughout his life so it’s always been his priority to give back.

Aside from shows on community-sponsored WORT- FM (89.9) and UW-Madison’s WSUM-FM (91.7), hip-hop now will be aired only on occasion by pop station Z104.

What were two concrete slabs Monday are now on their way to being single-family homes.Twenty University of Wisconsin-Madison students and local volunteers spent the week in what they call a blitz, constructing two Habitat for Humanity homes in Palatka.

In Madison, hip-hop has had a hard time gaining prominence. In the 1980s, groups such as the GeneRations and Home Boys Only brought the first wave of break dance to town. Since then, the popularity of break dance and hip-hop has moved in waves as skilled artists have entered and exited the scene. Still, there has never been the kind of support for break dance here as there has been elsewhere.

“Madison’s hip-hop/break-dance scene is small compared to other hip-hop scenes in the Midwest,” said Jonathan Truong, president of the University of Wisconsinââ?¬â??Madison Break Dance Club (UWMBC).

A UW student and his brother are being credited with saving a woman who had been missing for weeks.

Peter Kottke, a UW-Madison junior was backpacking with his brother in New Mexico., when they heard a faint sound that turned out to be 52-year-old Carolyn Dorn.

No applicant to UW-Madison has ever lost a slot to another because of race, Chancellor John Wiley says.
If two equally qualified candidates apply, both get in, Wiley told the Legislative Council’s Special Committee on Affirmative Action at a hearing Thursday.

The late television news anchor Mike McKinney, retired jewelers and philanthropists Irwin and Robert Goodman and retired East High School principal Milt McPike lead the list of recipients of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. awards from Madison and Dane County.

Eight recipients will be honored Monday in ceremonies at the 22nd annual city-county observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day at the Overture Center’s Capitol Theater, beginning at 6 p.m.

(Also among the recipients is UW-Madison student Jason Gonzales.)

Textbooks are becoming a hot commodity on the UW- Madison campus.
Madison City Council President Austin King, 8th District, says the theft of textbooks reached a new high last semester, with the increasingly expensive volumes resold to local bookstores for cash.

Compared with last year’s rankings, some institutions leapfrogged into the top 20 and others dropped to lower positions.

For instance, Georgia Institute of Technology moved up 17 places, to number 13, by improving retention and graduation rates and beefing up financial aid. The University of Illinois fell 22 places by raising tuition and cutting need-based aid in half. The University of Wisconsin-Madison also slashed need-based aid and dropped from number 15 to number 25.

Professional violinist Aasheeta Parikh-Dimick remembers when she wasn’t so enthralled with her music.
“My mom has a story about my bad practice habits when I was young,” she recalled. “Apparently she caught me with a book I had placed on the music stand – I was reading while playing, figuring that if Mom heard the violin, she would think I was practicing. My music stand was moved to the kitchen after that!”