CONTENTS Texting While Driving Dangerous, Illegal
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www.belmontvision.com The student newspaper of Belmont University Vol. 59, No. 7 March 25, 2010 CONTENTS Texting while driving dangerous, illegal ..................... 2 12 South chic, cool, funky neighborhood ................ 10 Spring has sprung ................................................... 2 Rites of Spring ..................................................... 11 Entrepreneurship students ‘niche building’ ............... 2 ‘Rejection’ spurs Tyler James’s success ................... 11 Belmont unveils ‘Vision 2015’ ................................. 3 Showcasing country .............................................. 12 Preachin’, prayin’, singin’ ........................................ 4 Concert for Haiti ................................................... 12 Lance Conzett: Fighting ‘apathetic activism’ .............. 5 Nashville’s smallest art gallery ............................... 13 Erin Carson: To delete or not to delete music ............. 5 Consistency baseball team’s goal ............................ 14 ‘Green acres is the place to be’ ................................ 6 Tony Cross resigns after 26 years............................ 15 Picking favorites: the stuff of our stories ................... 6 Change on the horizon for March Madness .............. 16 Loveless Café’s legacy built on biscuits ..................... 7 Pierce Greenberg: Show me the money ................... 16 65* places to eat in Nashville ............................... 8-9 Page 2 The Belmont Vision, March 25, 2010 Spring has sprung After what seems like the worst winter in Middle Tennessee since the infamous 1994 ice storm, spring has finally arrived in Nash- ville. With highs in the 60s on Mar. 19, five Belmont students decided to celebrate the warm weather in style. Jonathan Ander- son, Matt Wright, Greg Privett, Tim Head and Josh Helton (pictured from left) stripped down to shorts for a dip in the fountain outside Curb Event Center. Spring official- ly began with the vernal equinox on Mar. 20. In typical Nashville fashion, the Midstate enjoyed a brief reprieve from the cold on Saturday before plunging into the mid-40s for an inauspicious start to the season. photo by Lance conzett Texting while driving a serious distraction By Julie Kenny That’s not surprising given that research shows that an Staff writer average American teenagaer receives mroe than 2,200 text Everyone knows it’s illegal to drink and drive, but The statistics are scary enough messages a month. texting while driving is twice as dangerous and is illegal in So, what’s going to stop this from becoming so main- 20 states, including Tennessee. for the states to ban texting while stream as, for example, eating and driving? Meg Tully, a According to a study conducted at the University of driving, making it illegal for junior at Belmont, believes it’s a matter of personal respon- Utah, a driver with an alcohol level of .08—legally drunk in sibility and doesn’t send text messages when she’s driving. most states—is four times more likely to crash than a driver a driver to read or write a text “It’s not even that it’s illegal because people are going to who is not impaired. The risk for someone texting? That message while behind the wheel. do it anyway. I just don’t want to get distracted,” Tully said. person is eight times more likely to have an accident. In addition to promoting a sense of responsibility among The statistics are scary enough for the states to ban drivers, parents and older adults can set good examples by texting while driving, making it illegal for a driver to read tions were issued at the hospital. not using their cell phones to send emails or messages while or write a text message while behind the wheel. The law, “As an example, THP responded to an injury crash in driving. passed in Tennessee in July 2009, carries a fine of $50 Montgomery County in which a passenger vehicle rear- Passengers can assist by writing and replying to for each violation, but no points are added to the driver’s ended a truck. The driver was involved in texting at the time messages that can’t wait, although that sense of urgency has record. of the crash,” Browning said. “The driver was transported come with the technology. Still, the law is difficult to enforce. An officer must to Gateway Hospital for head injuries and cited for texting AT&T Mobility announced this month a safety campaign witness the driver using a cell phone and be confident that while driving.” with a tagline that reads, “Txting & Driving … It Can they aren’t dialing a phone number or searching for one in As texting continues to increase in popularity, espe- Wait.” While they are targeting teens and younger drivers, their address book. cially among teens and young adults, so will the number of the company said the message that “no text is worth dying It’s for this reason that Tennessee Highway Patrol has accidents caused by it. A study by the Pew Research Center over” is for everyone. issued only 25 citations statewide this year, according to found that one in four American teens of driving age say To strengthen the message, AT&T said its campaign will Mike Browning, director of public affairs for Tennessee’s they have texted while driving, and half of all teens ages 12 include text messages that people sent or received before Department of Safety. Unfortunately, many of those cita- to 17 say they’ve been a passenger while a driver has texted. they were in a serious accident or killed Entrepreneurs recognized Belmont has been named one of “five schools for neurship (USASBE) named the Center for Entre- entrepreneurs” by Fortune Magazine for its Entre- preneurship as the National Model Undergraduate preneurship and Social Entrepreneurship programs. Program for excellence in entrepreneurship educa- The magazine chose Belmont for standing out among tion. more than 2,000 schools in the United States that Belmont’s Social Entrepreneurship major centers teach entrepreneurship. on the emerging business field that tackles social Fortune said Belmont was a “case study in problems and unmet community needs via entrepre- niche building,” citing the Social Entrepreneurship neurial principles. In addition to inter-disciplinary program as the first of its kind in the country. coursework, Social Entrepreneurship majors The other four universities featured were Indiana complete a 225-hour internship during their junior University in Bloomington, Ind.; University of Texas year with a nonprofit or social entrepreneur, in Austin; St. Louis University in St. Louis; and Earlier in March, Belmont Entrepreneurship Babson College in Wellesley, Mass. students led by Jose Gonzalez were named finalists Belmont offers programs in entrepreneurship and in the Dell Social Innovation Competition for their social entrepreneurship through two centers – the project Guatemalan Honey Cooperative for Economic Center for Entrepreneurship and the Center for Social Development. Entrepreneurship and Service-Learning. The students will now go on to the next phase of The Center for Entrepreneurship was named as the competition for a chance to win $50,000 to imple- one of the Top 25 Undergraduate Entrepreneurship ment their proposed social need project, which would Programs in the country by Entrepreneur magazine support a venture that manages the production and and the Princeton Review. Additionally, the United commercialization of fair trade honey for small-scale States Association for Small Business and Entrepre- farmers in Guatemala. The Belmont Vision, March 25, 2010 Page 3 ‘Vision 2015’ outlines Belmont’s future By Lance Conzett increasing class sizes due to the influx of students. It also Vision Editor Vision 2015 points out that Belmont’s reliance on adjunct professors, as While most students were away from campus on spring opposed to full staff, is much higher than the university’s The full Vision 2015 document details several break, Belmont unveiled Vision 2015, a document laying out peers in the U.S. News & World Report top schools list. areas where Belmont will attempt to improve Belmont’s next five years of growth and development. Vision 2015 also touches on diversity on campus, a point over the next five years. The following repre- The three-page document outlines Belmont’s intentions that Fisher has been particularly vocal about in recent years. sents some of the proposed efforts, quoted from to further establish itself on the national stage after 10 years “I’m still not satisfied with that number,” said Fisher, the plan: of significant growth. referring to student ethnic and racial diversity numbers The plan is divided into 10 broad components, including during the student Q&A. According to statistics shown Engage Students in Transformative Learning enrollment growth, cultural competency, cost control and during Fisher’s presentation, student diversity lies at 597, or • The liberal arts and Belmont’s nationally building a world-class learning environment. According to 11 percent of the student body, in 2010. recognized general education program will the document, Belmont aspires to be “Nashville’s Univer- Fisher revealed that the university hired Derek Young, continue to be strengthened and will serve sity” by engaging with and serving the community on a who previously served as director of outreach for Cracker as the heart of the university. scale that is “unmatched by any other institution of higher Barrel and as executive director of 100 Black Men of education.” Middle Tennessee, to help the university develop a plan for • We will become the best in the world at Notably, the document includes plans to increase the creating a more diverse environment on campus. The 2015 engaging our students in service learning, student population from last fall’s 5,424 to 7,000 over the internships, and community service as our next five years. In order to house the increased student students match their purpose, gifts and body, Belmont intends to “continue to aggressively upgrade “I don’t know if I have the talents to world needs. facilities,” including new residential space, development of capacity in my DNA to talk a “mall/plaza” and adding 1,000 parking spaces to compen- Spiritual Development sate for added traffic.