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Show Wednesday, December 1, 2010 GRADUATION - FALL 2010 Cancer, then U.S. Army WSU student overcomes disease to join U.S. Army A test of faith for students English class in Muslim garb look for WSU reactions By Thomas Alberts sr. news reporter 1 The Signpost By Andrew Choffel a&e editor 17?7e Signpost Cadet Micah Krishnan passed the finish line Monday for his last physical fitness test for Weber State University's ROTC program. Sweaty and panting, the 23-year-old college student showed nothing but excitement. After all, a 2-mile run is nothing compared to cancer. In September of 2009, Krishnan noticed a lump on the side of his throat. After a visit to his doctor, the lump turned out to be the size of a small tangerine, and was growing into his throat. Doctors diagnosed Krishnan in October with Hodgkin's lymphoma, a cancer that attacks the body's lymph nodes. Well into the ROTC program and almost ready to graduate, the cancer barricaded Krishnan from his Army dreams. According to Krishnan, the National Guard unit he belongs to told him he could no longer commission. But for a student with a cumulative 3.96 in WSU's nursing program, failure to complete his commissioning process was not an option. After consulting with his superiors, the process began to start cutting the red tape. Krishnan studied from his couch, and his grades didn't skip a beat. Despite the chemotherapy's toll on his body taking nine days to recover to just 50 percent normal, Krishnan even found time to work a parttime job. "Chemo's not cheap," he said. The Army gave Krishnan a leave of absence, a noncommittal time off to regain his health and strength. The National Guard even offered him the chance to obtain an honorable discharge before his term of service was up. Yet for Krishnan, a discharge was never an option. Weber State University ROTC cadet Micah Krishnan stands in uniform. Krishnan battled cancer before returning to full participation in WSU's ROTC program. "I worked pretty hard to get halfway there; stopping was just out of the question," he said. Krishnan doesn't take all the credit. He states that many of his professors and ROTC cadres one of those people. According helped get him back into the to Krishnan, McVeigh went to bat game. for him. McVeigh wrote letters of Lt. Colonel McVeigh, WSU's See Army page 8 ROTC battalion commander, was Courtney Pascua-Stallings and Jessica Moller walked through the Shepherd Union Building at Weber State University dressed in black and with their heads wrapped in hijabs. As they walked, they did their best to smile and appear as open as possible. Yet from the cold silence to the stares they got while walking through the bookstore, Moller and Pascua-Stallings were in the most crowded place on campus and couldn't have felt more alone. Students from professor Debi Sheridan's English class began a discussion throughout the semester on discrimination. After watching videos on Youtube.com that showed women dressed as Muslims being discriminated against, they decided to hold their own experiment in Ogden. Pascua-Stallings and Moller dressed up as Muslim women and went into the Shepherd Union Building, and later to the Newgate Mall in downtown Ogden on Veterans Day, when many people would be at the mall, to see how others would treat them based on how they looked. Accompanying them were other students from the class who came to observe and document what they witnessed. On Tuesday at noon, Sheridan and her students gave a presentation in the Shepherd Union Ballroom A to discuss and answer questions on what happened to them. All of them said that they expected to receive different treatment while dressed in their costumes, but were still See Test page 8 Graduation speaker former NSA adviser Ogden local who went on to advise presidents speaks to graduates By Eric Jensen managing editor I The Signpost Dec. 10 will mark Weber State University's 136th commencement ceremony. Ogden native Lt. Gen. Brent Scowcroft, USAF (Ret.) will deliver the commencement address, and will be awarded an honorary Doctor of Humanities degree. Every semester, commencement speakers are selected after a rigorous process that invofves multiple groups from the campus and community. "There were nominations throughout the community," said Marsha Richter, an assistant to WSU President Ann Millner. "There were nominations from faculty, staff and students in our campus community. We received a myriad of nominations. There is an honorary degree and commencement speaker advisory committee that meets and reviews all of the nominations. The committee is representative of faculty, staff, students, alumni, the community, trustees and administrators." See NSA page 8 SOURCE: WWW.DEFENSE.GOV WSU commencement speaker and former NSA adviser Lt. Gen. Brent Scowcroft speaks with Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates at a State Department award cer?mony on Oct. 16, 2009. |