February 27, 2015 Vol. 90, No. 15
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NEWS
@HUStudentPubs April 25,The 2014 Facebook: Link Vol. 89, No. 18
online at thelink.harding.edu
SPORTS
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FEATURES
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LIFESTYLE
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online at thelink.harding.edu
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NEWS
Searcy, Ark., 72149
GAC renovation plans closer to becoming reality @HUStudentPubs Facebook: The Link
OPINIONS
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OPINIONS
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SPORTS
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FEATURES
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CAMPUS LIFE
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Searcy, Ark., 72149
courtesy of the Office of the President
In the next year and a half, the Ganus Athletic Center will undergo $4 million of renovations, including a new two-story weight room with free weights, selectorized weights and cardio equipment. The gym will be re-floored with four basketball courts and two volleyball courts and receive new basketball goals and partitioning curtains. A suspended track will go around the main gym area at the second floor level. The construction will tentatively begin in November 2015 and be completed in August 2016. The Rhodes Field House will also undergo a $2 million update, which will add 13,000 square feet, including a practice court, new entrance and weight room. For more details and renderings of both the GAC and the Rhodes, visit thelink.harding.edu.
Looking back Students plan to spend break in service on integration By Paige McNeilly Student Writer
By Cole Mokry News Editor
In light of Black History Month, Chancellor Emeritus Clifton Ganus discussed his recollection of Harding’s integration and the events that transpired. Harding integrated in 1963, six years after the National Guard was called in to desegregate Central High School in Little Rock. Dr. George mden -- was Henry Benson president at the time, and Ganus said Benson’s decision to delay integration was largely due to financial reasons. According to Ganus, who became president in 1965, Benson was afraid people would stop sending their children and their donations to the school if it was integrated. After pressure from students and faculty alike, Harding was integrated in 1963 and Ganus said they never looked back. English professor Heath Carpenter, who is working towards a Ph.D. in heritage studies with a concentration in Southern culture, said there is not a simple answer to why Harding integrated when it did. “I’m against the idea that there is a tidy, easy glance back at the past,” Carpenter said. “I like to look at the role the students and faculty played in standing up for what they believed in. (Racism) almost wasn’t even a conscious decision back then, it just permeated southern culture. It wasn’t eloquently thought about, it just was. Until they were confronted with it and said, ‘Wait a minute, why are things this way?’That happens when kids come to college; they push boundaries.” In 1957, a group of students began a petition to then-president Benson calling for integration, signed by 854 of the 1,276 students and 92 faculty and staff members. Benson presented the petition
Spring Sing, page 2A
to the Board of Trustees, but it took a few more years before integration took place. “Students and professors clearly grappled with this issue,” Carpenter said. “They would have come from backgrounds that were not racially progressive, but these people were clearly spiritually influenced to do something that their culture wasn’t pushing them to do. As a Harding alum, that’s something that makes me proud, and I still see that in my students today: they grapple with important issues, often times counter-cultural ones.” Ganus said the university accepted and gave financial assistance to black students starting in 1963, and the attitudes of students and faculty were generally positive. “When we integrated in 1963, we had three black students and they were basically well-accepted,” Ganus said. “Not by everybody; you’ll always have die-hards. Anytime you have change, you’ll have people for it and against it.” Ganus said there were no acts of violence, no broken windows and no incidences of civil disobedience on campus throughout the civil rights movement. Tensions did not come to a head on Harding’s campus until 1969, he said. “After the integration, there was a period of euphoria when we generally accepted it all,” Ganus said. “It was a little bit later when it got worse with the assassinations of Malcolm X in 1965 and Martin Luther King, Jr. (in 1968). Things were good at first, then they got worse because of the bad feelings from the shootings.” Ganus said he received a phone call from a parent of a student threatening to send their son a gun so he could “take care of the Negro problem himself.” SEE RACE, PAGE 2A
Harding students have a long history of opting out of typical spring break plans to instead embark on journeys that lead them to impoverished dirt-road communities in foreign countries and under-developed urban areas in the U.S. Junior Katie Mitchell will travel to the City of Children in Ensenada, Mexico, for the fourth time and her third spring break trip. Mitchell said that sometimes the reward is greater than expected. “As many times as I have been on this trip, I continually hope to bring them comfort and a promise of Jesus, but they
always seem to return that promise and comfort,”Mitchell said.“I always feel more blessed than I think I have blessed them.” The City of Children takes in children from broken homes and bad situations. The team will spend their time building relationships with the children while hosting a VBS. The 42-person team will also do relief work in a small village outside of the city called El Zorillo. Foreign mission trips are not the only ones offered by the Spring Break Missions Office. Nine of the 18 spring break mission trips this year are domestic campaigns, including one to Arlington Church of Christ in Knoxville, Tenn.
“I would much rather get out and serve and do good things instead of sitting at home watching Netflix,” sophomore Kendall Wallace said. The Knoxville team will work on tasks that include packing and handing out food to the homeless. “I hope to bring a little joy while also getting to know their lives and the struggles they face every day,” Wallace said. Spring break missions are sometimes met with skepticism because of the short length of trips. Mitchell believes that people should go regardless. “Jesus will rejoice with us no matter the length of the mission,” Mitchell said.
GRANT SCHOL | The Bison
Junior Tyler Thomas sleds down the hill on the side of the Benson Auditorium on a folding table on Monday, Feb. 16, the first snow day of the year. President Bruce McLarty makes all the final decisions about canceling or delaying school due to weather.
Making snow day decisions By Alexis Hosticka Editor-in-Chief
In the last two weeks, President Bruce McLarty has called off school three times and implemented a delayed schedule once. Despite the consecutive three and four-day weekends, students have still taken to Twitter to plead for more time off. “Twitter campaigns have no impact on whether or not we have school,”McLarty said, laughing. “Twitter for me, it’s fun. It’s a way to deal with what could be frustrations of a snow day and to push out information. I can laugh about how frustrating (the weather) is and enjoy students’ creativity. I’ve learned that the
favorite number of snow days is ‘one more.’” McLarty makes the official decision about implementing a delay or canceling school anytime there is bad weather. If he is out of town, Vice President David Collins makes the call. “I try not to make a call based off of a forecast,”McLarty said. “Each of the calls this year has been a little different. Sometimes it’s concern about faculty getting in safely but (Monday) it was sidewalks and everything around campus.” According to Craig Russell, head of the Department of Public Safety, the university uses Everbridge Emergency Notification system to alert students about closings and
delays. He said some students have issues with receiving the messages multiple times in multiple forms of communication, but this can be stopped by simply confirming the receipt of the first message. “We send out messages by telephone, texting and email,” Russell said. “If you respond, you typically won’t get anymore unless there’s a second, new message.” If McLarty cannot make the call the night before, he and others come to campus early in the morning on the day of to check the conditions. For example, on Monday, Russell said that he was on campus at 5:30 a.m. “I was up on the steps of the Benson and I see this
Board Games, page 4B
New York Fashion Week, page 3B
Looking for a good way to spend your Saturday afternoon? Check out some board game picks.
One senior had the opportunity to experience high fashion in the big city.
bundled up figure and it was Dr. McLarty,”Russell said.“He does a wonderful job. Most students wouldn’t know that he was here that early, but I think it’s pretty neat.” After winter weather, the physical resource department is ready to clean up campus and make it safe. According to head of the department, Danny Deramus, the snow team salts the sidewalks, shovels snow, and does whatever they can to make campus safe. “If people can get (to school) that’s fine but we have to have it safe around campus for kids to walk,” Deramus said. “So that’s what we concentrate on at that point is to have clear access on routes and keep the ice off as best we can.”
Student rapper, page 3B