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Show Thursday, March 25, 1999 4 - The Daily Utah Chronicle any good at rowing but the oar started rowing itself to the opposite shore and back. The Aesthetics were the most MIDDLE EAST continued from page i decided to row over and help him across. He soon discovered he was not scrupulous of the people. Every story of a Khalif includes an incident of an Aesthetic breaking into the Caliphal palaces and denouncing the Khalif. With this understanding of the people and the culture of early Baghdad, Cooperson hoped to make reading early literature a better experience. He does not want people to feel distant and disembodied from the literature. His research is to be published in the fall to help students and casual readers understand the basis and stage for early Middle Eastern texts. Navajos Create Anagram to Train Youth in Traditional Healing Ceremonies Despite Debate, AmeriCops Still 40,000 Volunteers Strong By Gayle Horwitz (DC BUREAU) WASHINGTON This year, a class of 40,000 Amcri-Corp- s members will serve the nation, tackling problems like poverty, illiteracy and urban decay in their own backyards and beyond. Established under the National and Community Service Trust Act of 1993, Amcri-Corp- s and two other service programs, Learn and Serve America and the National Senior Service Corps, operate under the auspices of the Corporation for National Service. AmcriCorps recruits young people for service by rewarding them with e Amcrimoney for education. about workers receive $600 a Corps month to cover living expenses roughly the equivalent of a minimum-wag- e job in exchange for a year's community service. After completing 10 months of work, members are given a $4,725 grant for college tuition or past debts for college, trade or vocational school. Part-tim- e members earn about half of the service stipend and grant for 900 hours of service. Since its inception, the AmcriCorps initiative has drawn its share of friends and foes. Initially hailed by Clinton as a chance for students to "change Full-tim- Ten-To- America forever and for the better," the program soon came under attack by fiscally conservative opponents who wanted to slash Clinton's suggested funding plan by millions of dollars. Over the years, a number of legislators have supported ending the program altogether, most notably former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, who told Newsweek in 1995 that he was, "totally, unequivocally opposed to national service." That same year, a study commissioned by the IBM Foundation, the Charles A. Dana Foundation and the James Irvine Foundation found that every federal dollar invested in AmcriCorps results in $1.60 to $2.60 or more in direct measurable benefits to AmcriCorps members and the communities they serve. Even so, last month, Rep. Todd .) Tiahrt introduced the AmcriCorps Program Elimination Act to the floor, by 37 of his peers. "Legislators must decide if it is more important to allow working families keep more ofthc money they earn in their pockets or fund wasteful like AmcriCorps," bureaucracies Tiahrt said in a press release. "You cannot have it both ways. I will decide in favor of the men and women of Main Street, the fields of Kansas and the factory floors every time." Far from the partisan political debate though, many AmcriCorps members say their service makes a difference, both in their own lives and in the lives of those they serve. "What we do helps to revitalize the community," said Shafkat Anwar, a sophomore at the George Washington University, where he organizes an after-schotutoring program for D.C. elementary school students. As part of the Learn and Serve program, Anwar devotes 20 hours each week to the program as a part-tim- e AmcriCorps member, along with his e student responsibilities as a majoring in human services. This year, he has already recruited 30 tutors to assist twice as many youngsters striving to reach a reading level appropriate to their age. "You really see the result of what you are doing," he said. "Seeing the kids achieve is extremely fulfilling." The 14 members at Anwar's GW base work jointly with the nine members at nearby Howard University. Together, the students join with existing nonprofit organizations to strengthen programs and services. Maureen McVeigh, a GW senior majoring in international affairs, it works for a housing orga ol full-tim- non-prof- nization called Manna. "In the community development office where I work, we are trying to promote the young people's place in the community," she said. Her office's upcoming programs will show the chilfamilies dren of mostly how to focus on the resources around them and get involved in community development. Both Anwar and McVeigh agree low-inco- that one of the best parts of their AmcriCorps experience has been meeting people with similar goals, especially the other members with whom they meet once a week to discuss the progress of each program. The biggest challenge, they said, is time management. "It's easy to get wrapped up in work," said your AmcriCorps McVeigh, "You have to remember that you have other responsibilities as well." Students say, without a moment's hesitation, that it's worth the challenges. "Lots of people want to volunteer, but they don't realize the amount of planning that goes into every volunteer experience," he said. "That's where we come in to plan activities which will allow people to go out and help." Telescope Reaches Top of Mountain at U. Arizona n Sean Mclachlan Arizona Daily Wildcat (U. Arizona) TUCSON, Ariz. University of Arizona astronomers and engineers heaved a sigh of relief Tuesday as a flatbed truck carrying the new mirror for the Multiple Mirror Telescope reached the summit of Mount Hopkins after a trek up a narrow, winding mountain road. "It's a nasty road with hairpin turns.. .one of the most hairy drives you can imagine," said Chris Impey, a Uni hair-raisin- versity of Arizona astronomy professor. The truck carrying the mirror crawled up the road at three to four miles an hour, carefully negotiating turns that often face sheer cliffs. Parts of the road are unpaved and lack 10-t- guardrails. The mirror is part of a $20 million upgrade for the observatory sponsored by the Smithsonian Institution and the University of Arizona. The new mirror will replace the six smaller ones in use since the facility opened in 6.5-mct- cr 1979. The original mirrors, when used together, formed the equivalent of a 4.5- - meter mirror. The new mirror will have more than twice the light gathering capacity of the previous ones, Impey said. Impeyv'who studies distant galaxies and quasars, said astronomers want telescopes that can gather as much light as possible to make faint objects more visible. Astronomy professor Marcia Rickc, who studies the infrared emissions of celestial objects, says the improvements would be especially important for her research. Ricke is looking forward to using the telescope's infrared spectrometer with the new mirror. Construction and delivery delays for the new mirror meant that the spectrometer had to be fitted onto the old er multiple mirrors. Since it was not designed for a for them, stray light decreased performance, Rickc said. With the new mirror, the spectrometer will be as much as 400 percent more efficient, she said. "It's going to be fabulous," she said. The mirror will be lifted into the telescope on Thursday, said Smithsonian spokesman Dan Brocious. After it is in place, Brocious said, the mirror will be coated with a reflective aluminum surface. A dome will be fixed over the mirror and aluminum bars inside will be jolted with an electric current. As electricity arcs between the bars, they will give off a fine mist of metal and coat the mirror's surface with a layer of aluminum that is one single molecule thick. UNIVERSITY OF UTAH NICK AND HELEN PAPANIKOLAS SCHOLARSHIP APPLICATION LASER50FT DEADLINE EXTENSION Monday, April 5, 1999 hair removal systems "Hello Laser...Good-by-e Razor" Requirements: Completed and signed application preferably typed. A supplementary sheet for the "additional information" No MoreWaxing, Electrolysis, Shaving, or Plucking. One Time Multiple Treatments Gift Certificates Available & Credit Cards Accepted Packages Available Provo 801.374.1414 331 1 N. University Ave. Long-Lastin- g Affordable Pain Free Safe Salt Lake City 801.474.1414 5200 S. Highland Dr. required. U of U transcript, including Winter 1998: must have at least 30 U of U hours. Transfer work must also include your "Summary of Transfer Credit." This is available from the Transcripts Office, 250,SSB.. Two letters of recommendation. It is the responsibility of the student to ensure these letters are forwarded to Ethnic Studies. Students are not eligible for a scholarship unless they are matriculated at the University of Utah and plan to comacaplete 12 units for each semester of the 1999-200- 0 demic year. RETURN THE COMPLETED APPLICATION BY DEADLINE OF MONDAY, APRIL 5, 1999 TO THE ETHNIC STUDIES PROGRAM OFFICE. 112 CARLSON HALL FOR INFORMATION CALL 6 581-520- By Alisa Backwood Associated Press Writer PHOENIX For years, the wind, water, earth and sacred traditions were all the Navajos believed they needed to effectively prevent illness and heal themselves spiritually and physically. That was before the development of western medical technology, before the number of Navajo medicine men began to decline and before young Navajos began to discredit their own traditions. Now, through a pilot project aimed at training young people in traditional Navajo healing methods, the Navajo Nation hopes to revive the health care system they say works best for them and save the ceremonies on the verge of extinction. The Navajo Traditional Apprenticeship Program, implemented in December, chose seven applicants to train with traditional ceremonial practitionersalso known as medicine men and take on the closely guarded knowledge handed down only through family and clan members. The survival of the medicine man is vital if the Navajo language and culture arc to survive, said Alfred Yazzie, a Navajo language instructor at Arizona State University. "Medicine men are, for the most' part, the people who hold all the teachings and spiritual aspects of the community," Yazzie said. "They still hold a lot of the history undocumented history." That makes learning the ceremonies a difficult and lengthy process. Depending on the ceremonies learned, training can take up to 10 years. And because ceremonies are not taped or written down, they must be learned orally. As an incentive, the program awards a monthly $300 stipend to apprentices and to teaching practitioners. It like much, but time to seem may not teach the traditional ceremonies is running out. Eddie Tso, the program's director, said six traditional ceremonies are almost extinct and will be the primary focus in the apprentice program. Not many Navajos with the knowledge remain, he said. "If we don't do anything about it and look back in 20 years there won't be any ceremonies left," Tso said. There are about 34 traditional ceremonies left in all, Tso said, only a handful of medicine men left to perform them and a growing population of Navajos. The Navajo Nation sprawls across remote areas of Arizona, Utah and New Mexico. "When there are fewer doctors, how are you going to maintain a balance of wellness?" Tso said. "The Navajo people still rely on these ceremonies today for their health care and their mental care as well." Supporters of the program are hoping to boost the number of medicine men, despite an apparent lack of interest from Navajo youth some think resulted from the integration of western ideas. Yazzie said Navajo ceremonies were condemned in the past by western educational and religious communities. "A lot of young people didn't see the need to follow in those footsteps (of Navajo ceremonies) because they were told they were no longer needed." That has caused young Navajos stray from the community's tradition$350 al healing methods, said state Sen. Jack Jackson, also a Navajo. "(Western education) made us that our of life was inferior," Jackson said. way "Our ceremony was classified as superstitious, taboo. Therefore our younger people sort of look down on ashamed of our way of life these ceremonies." The solution, Jackson says, is for the state to treat the Navajo health care system equal to western medical healthcare. |