Texas State Places 78 on Commissioner’s Honor Roll
Posted by Blake Doelle on July 2, 2008 at 4:56 pm • Print This Page • Share
Total is second-highest mark in Southland
FRISCO - Texas State placed 78 student-athletes on the Southland Conference Commissioner’s Spring Academic Honor Roll, league offices announced Wednesday.
Included on the list was a pair of SLC Student-Athletes. Joyce Ekworomadu was one of five Texas State women’s basketball players named to the honor roll while Paul Goldschmidt highlighted nine Bobcat baseball players selected.
Sam Houston State led all conference member institutions with 89 selections. Texas-Arlington placed 77 student-athletes on the list while a trio of SLC East schools also had at least 70 student-athletes as Central Arkansas claimed 74, Southeastern Louisiana 71 and McNeese State 70 people.
Northwestern State (65), Nicholls State (63) and UTSA (61) each pulled in over 60 members to the honor roll. Rounding out the league’s recipients were Lamar (56), Stephen F. Austin (53) and Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (41).
Presented by Capital One Bank, the honor roll recognizes student-athletes who competed in league championship sports during the spring semester and maintained a 3.0 grade point average while enrolled in a minimum of 12 hours. Each Southland university is responsible in selecting the student-athletes for the spring honor roll.
The complete list of Texas State student-athletes on the SLC Commissioner’s Spring Academic Honor Roll is:
Amanda Alvarado, Lainy Chafitz, Ashley Ellis, Mackenzie Farmer, Andrea Giraldo, Ali Gulida, Rabea Hartmann, Jennifer Nowland, Christine Brijalba, Amy Glazier, Linn Gustafsson, Trine Mortensen, Ben Campbell, Philip Krebsbach, Cole Lewis, Oscar Zetterwall, Leah Boatright, Kelsey Cammarata, Elizabeth Dennis, Lacey Duncan, Jenna Emery, Taylor Hall, Jill Kloesel, Alex Newton, Ashton Peters, Allyce Rother, Kristina Tello, Jetta Weinheimer, Jarrod Buddin, Nicholas Fowler, Jack Higginbotham, Matthew Novak, Daniel Schmidt, Kevin Schultz, Liat Anav, Courtney Baker, Heather Bullin, Tenley Determan, Brooklyn Dickson, Jannah Evans, Katie Evans, Samantha Evola, Alaysha Ford, Brooke Hewitt, Taylor Hubbard, Heather Martinez, Jiovanna Martinez, Lindsay Maxwell, Lauren McKenna, Amanda McKinney, Mary O’Connor, Sara Olayiwola, Erin Oliver, Whitney Perkins, Karissa Reiter, Veronica Rodriguez, Brittany Rosen, Kristina Viniar, Jamie Whiteside, Tyler Brundridge, Cody Gambill, Paul Goldschmidt, Steven Siers, Aaron Taylor, Ben Theriot, Zach Tritz, Steven Vidaurri, Adam Witek, Corey Jefferson, Jonathan Sloan, Gordon Taylor, Ryan White, Brooke DeGrate, Joyce Ekworomadu, Marie Moser, Chika Ofoegbu and Shandryn Trumble.
By CHRIS RILEY
Assistant Sports Information Director
Report on the Campus To Council conference
Posted by Blake Doelle on June 30, 2008 at 8:09 am • Print This Page • Share
I am pleased to be able to provide a report on the Campus To Council: Building University / City Relations conference that I attended several weeks ago. The conference was held in College Station, Texas. The location of this annual conference always seems to be held in a city with a large university and one that places a great deal of importance on a positive town and gown relationship. Last year it was held in Gainesville, Florida home of the University of Florida. The mayors of College Station and Gainesville both played a major role in attracting and planning of the conference and were eager to showcase the way they interact with the university administration and the students who live in their cities.One of the best outcomes of this years meeting was the fact that San Marcos and Texas State were represented extremely well. We had Councilmember Kim Porterfield and myself for the full conference and Mayor Narvaiz and City Manager Rick Menchaca for the first day. Also attending the full event were Assistant City Manager Collette Jamison, Assistant Police Chief Lisa Dvorak, Fire Marshall Ken Bell, San Marcos Police Officer Danny Arredondo, and our Student Liaison C.J. Morgan. It is valuable that these key individuals on our city government team were present to hear all the speakers.
The conference was held on the campus of Texas A&M which is an unbelievably large and sprawling campus and made our campus seem downright cozy and compact. It also made me pleased to realize that San Marcos is already a much more walkable and compact city than College Station, with the ability to become even more so. Our downtown core is something that stands out as another difference between the two cities. The percentage of multi-family and single family housing units is about the same in both cities at around 70%-30%.
The meetings were separated into categories such as: Branding & Tourism, Campus & Community Relations, City & University Planning, Community Services, Economic Development, Neighborhood Issues, and Safety & Security. The Keynote Speakers were the President of Prairie View A&M University and the President Emeritus of Texas A&M University-Commerce. One of these speeches focused on how the University President is perhaps the most important person who can make a difference in the town & gown relationship.
Some of the innovative programs being done in other cities that were spotlighted included: Community Liaison Positions that promoted positive interaction between students and non-students. One such program at Colorado State University is a CSU employee, and the city is invoiced twice a year for their share of the position costs.
Some cities had Neighborhood Services Offices, where issues of code compliance, community mediation, and building and zoning violations were reported and handled.
Many universities held quarterly meetings between the President and university administration members and the City Council and School Board members. All at one large table openly talking about issues, concerns, and ideas. We learned about different cities public nuisance ordinances and that some cities are partially reimbursed for law enforcement and require disclosure forms that Realtors must have signed when leasing or selling property. I also sat in a very encouraging session detailing how Texas A&M student government members actually visit the Aggies that receive a noise violation as well as the neighbor who made the complaint. It is called “The Visitation” and they worked directly with the Neighborhood Services Office in College Station. There was also a Neighborhood Integrity Plan put in place by many communities.
I am glad I attended again this year. I have made some valuable friendships with other elected officials and university staff members and learned from their experiences. I believe this will help our city council as we debate these ideas and determine how our city should evolve in the future as we work to produce better results. Building a relationship that members of the community and university would describe a very good takes a great deal of effort and an ongoing commitment and can’t be accomplished by the city or the university working alone.
By JOHN THOMAIDES
Council Member Place 6
Five Bobcats Scheduled To Compete For Berths Into Olympic Games
Posted by Blake Doelle on June 30, 2008 at 7:56 am • Print This Page • Share
Texas State University has five former track and field standouts competing in three different Olympic Trials competitions during the first two weeks of July. Mike Hazle and Abby Ruston will be competing in throwing events at the USA Olympic Trials on July 3-6.
Hazle, who is listed among the Top Five favorites, is scheduled to compete in the men’s javelin throw on July 3rd and 5th. Hazle enters the Olympic Trials with a career-best throw of 82.21 meters (269-8), and burst into the national limelight last year when he won a Silver Medal at the 2007 Pan American Games and posted a second-place finish at the 2007 USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships.
Hazel was the third Bobcat to compete in the Pan American Games, joining Scott Hennig and Roger Borbon. He also was the second Texas State male track and field athlete to qualify for the IAAF World Championships. The other was Edgar Baumann, who also threw the javelin from 1993-95.
While at Texas State, Hazle won the javelin throw at the 2002 Southland Conference Outdoor Championships and owns the third-longest throw in Bobcat track and field history with a mark of 72.05 meters (236-5). Hazle owns three of the Top 10 javelin throws in Texas State’s record books. He earned a bachelor’s degree in exercise and sports science and business, along with a Master’s degree in sports management at Texas State.
Ruston is scheduled to compete in the women’s shot put that begins on July 3 and concludes with the finals on July 5. Ruston also captured the national spotlight earlier this year when she qualified to compete at the IAAF World Indoor Championships after her second-place finish at the USA Indoor Championships with a mark of 18.03 meters (59-2). She was the top USA finisher at the World Indoor Championships with an 11th-place showing.
A native of San Antonio, Ruston earned All-American honors at both the NCAA Indoor and Outdoor Championships in 2007. She placed fifth in the shot put at the NCAA Indoor Championships with a mark of 16.61 meters at Fayetteville, Ark., before concluding her collegiate career with a second-place showing in the shot put at the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field meet with a mark of 17.44 meters (57′ 2 ¾”) on her fifth throw in Sacramento, Calif.
Liudmila Litvinova and Katya Kostetskaya will compete in the Russian Olympic Trials that are scheduled to begin on July 4 and Brigette Foster-Hylton is competing in the 100-meter hurdles at Jamaican Olympic Trials.
Litvinova posted the world’s ninth-fastest 400-meter time with 50.69 seconds on June 15 in Zhukovskiy, Russia. Last year, she anchored a Russian relay team that set a championship and meet record in the 4 x 400 meters relay with a time of 3:26.58 at the European Under-23 Championships in Debrecen, Hungary. She also won the 400 meters in 51.25 seconds, as she edged Russian teammates Olga Shulikova and Kseniya Zadorina in the process for a Russian medal sweep.
Litvinova was selected the 2007 Southland Conference indoor track and field Athlete of the Year after winning the champion 400 meter dash with a time of 55.27 seconds and was a member of Texas State’s 4×400-meter relay team that won seven gold medals during her four-year career at the Southland Conference Indoor and Outdoor Championships.
She also was an outstanding student at Texas State as she had a 3.77 grade point average as an accounting major with a 3.77 grade point average, and was a member of the Beta Sigma Gamma Honor Society for business students. She has been an annual Oak Farms Dairy Award winner during her career at Texas State, including a “Cream of the Crop” honoree in 2006 when she carried a 4.00 GPA.
Kostetskaya posted a second-place finish in the 800 meters at the 2007 World University Games with a time of 1:59.52. She was a two-time All-American in the 400-meter hurdles and 800 meters at Texas State. She set three school records with a pair of indoor records in the 400- and 800-meter runs, and the 400-meter hurdles mark outdoors. Kostetskaya also boasts the second-fastest indoor time in the 60-meter hurdles, while she holds second-best outdoor times in the 800 meters, 1000-meter hurdles and ranks fifth in the 400-meters outdoor.
The only hurdler with a faster time in the 100-meter hurdles at Texas State is Foster-Hylton, who set a school record of 13.13 seconds in 1998. Last year, Foster-Hylton posted her career-best 400-meter hurdles time of 53.81 in her second-place finish at the Grace Jackson meet in Kingston. She also ran the first leg on the runner-up relay team that had a time of 43.55 in the 4×100-meter relay at the 2007 Penn Relays. Foster-Hylton also has the second-fastest Jamaican time this year in the 100-meter hurdles with 12.56 seconds on May 9 at the Doha Super Grand Prix.
By RICK POULTER
Sports Information Director
Tide and time: Re-dating Caesar’s invasion of Britain
Posted by Blake Doelle on June 23, 2008 at 1:44 am • Print This Page • Share
Julius Caesar landed an invasion fleet on the shores of Britain in 55 B.C., expanding the boundaries of the so-called “Known World” and inadvertently sparking a dispute between historians and scientists for centuries to come.
Now, a team of astronomers from Texas State University-San Marcos has applied their unique brand of forensic astronomy to the enduring controversy surrounding the precise location of Caesar’s landfall, concluding that the historically accepted date for the event–Aug. 26-27, 55 B.C.–is incorrect. The Texas State team’s proposed new date of Aug. 22-23, 55 B.C., reconciles all the conflicting evidence and offers both sides of the debate some measure of vindication in the process.
Texas State physics professors Donald Olson and Russell Doescher, along with University Honors students Kellie N. Beicker and Amanda F. Gregory, publish their findings in the August 2008 edition of Sky & Telescope magazine, on newsstands now.
O Caesar, Where Art Thou?
“Most history books say Caesar’s landing date was Aug. 26-27 and he sailed to the northeast of Dover to land on an open beach near Walmer and Deal,” Olson said. “That cannot be correct. The afternoon tidal streams could not have carried his fleet to the northeast on that date.”
The origin of the debate, ironically, lies in the strongest historical evidence: Caesar’s first-hand account of the landing and ensuing campaign, which mentions the phase of the moon and chronicles in considerable detail information regarding time of day, landmarks and distances traveled once his fleet reached the famed white cliffs near present-day Dover. Caesar’s narrative describes how, once the winds and tides were favorable, the fleet sailed seven miles along the coast before finding a suitable beach to put ashore. Unfortunately, the actual direction the fleet sailed is one detail Caesar omitted, and in that single oversight lies the bone of contention.
Because of specific coastal and inland land formations referenced by Caesar, historians such as classics scholar Thomas Rice Holmes and archaeologist Charles Francis Christopher Hawkes have long maintained that the fleet sailed northeast along the British coast, coming ashore near the present-day town of Deal. The terrain to the southwest, they argue, simply does not match Caesar’s descriptions. On the other hand, men of science such as Astronomer Royal George Biddell Airy and Admiralty Manual of the Tides coauthor Harold Dreyer Warburg insisted a northeast voyage was impossible since at the historically accepted date and time of Caesar’s landing the tidal currents would be flowing strongly to the southwest–carrying the Roman fleet in the opposite direction from Deal.
Deal or No Deal?
The Texas State researchers traveled to Britain in August of 2007 to study the problem first-hand. In a fortuitous set of circumstances, the equinox and lunar cycle coincided to closely replicate the tidal conditions Caesar experienced–such an alignment wouldn’t occur again until 2140. Extensive on-site research including the collection of tide gauge data, GPS tracking in a freely-drifting boat and a host of other factors confirmed that the tidal currents indicated a landing site southwest of Dover, while the topographical evidence supported a Roman landing at Deal.
The first break in unraveling the mystery came via an obscure account of the landing by Valerius Maximus, a Roman writing in the 1st century A.D. In Valerius’ work Memorable Deeds and Sayings: Of Courage, he recounts one Roman soldier’s bravery as the tide was falling during the fleet’s landing. The tide, however, would be rising during the fleet’s landing if the date of Aug. 26-27, 55 B.C. were correct.
The second break came from historian Robin G. Collingwood, who in 1937 identified a probable transcription error in a sequence of dates relating to Caesar’s landing, essentially rendering one of the Roman numerals for four (IIII) instead of seven (VII) or even eight (VIII). Applying Collingwood’s revisions to Caesar’s landing changes the date to Aug. 22-23–and reconciles all the previously conflicting evidence.
“If that’s the case, then everything falls into place,” Olson said. “Three things fall into place: the topography matches the ancient descriptions; it matches with respect to the direction of the tidal streams; and it matches with respect to the water level.
“Our new result is, essentially, the old result–we’re taking the Roman fleet up to Deal and the open beach, but what you read in the history books, that it was Aug. 26-27, that cannot be correct,” he said. “The scientists were right about the tidal streams, and so were the historians about the landing site. With our new result, our new date, everything is reconciled.”
By JAYME BLASCHKE
University News Service
Goldschmidt named Student-Athlete of Year
Posted by Blake Doelle on June 17, 2008 at 4:26 pm • Print This Page • Share
Witek earns spot on first team as well
League officials released the 2008 Capital One Southland Conference All-Academic baseball teams today and Texas State Bobcat Paul Goldschmidt was named Student-Athlete of the year and Adam Witek earned first team honors.
Goldschmidt, a native of The Woodlands, Texas, adds the honor to his ever-growing accolades for his 2008 season performance. While on the field, Goldschmidt led the league in home runs (17), garnering this year’s SLC Hitter of the Year award, falling one round trip shy of tying Texas State’s single-season record.
While maintaining a 3.82 grade point average in finance, the sophomore ended the 2008 season in the top ten of eight offensive categories, ranking second in RBI (69) and total bases (157). Goldschmidt was also the lone sophomore awarded All-SLC first team honors.
Academically, Goldschmidt has been a Dean’s List recipient each semester of his collegiate career and was given the Oak Farms Academic Achievement award in 2006 and 2007.
Witek, a Schertz, Texas product, joins Goldschmidt on the All-Academic first team. Witek holds a 3.19 grade point average in agriculture business management and also earned the Oak Farms Dairy Academic Achievement award in 2005-2007. Witek started 51 games for the Bobcats in 2008 and stole 16-of-21 bases for an eighth-place standing in the league. Witek was selected to the All-Southland first team for his efforts at second base. He concluded the year with 75 hits that produces a .342 batting average.
The All-Academic first team fills out with UTSA’s Bradley Chovanec (pitcher), Ryan Rummel (infield) and Michael Rockett (outfield). Josh Black (pitcher) and Matt Schexnayder (catcher) from Southeastern Louisiana and Sam Houston State pair Todd Sebek (outfield) and Bobby Verbick (designated hitter) were each named to the team, as well as Northwestern State’s Mike Jaworski (infield) and A&M-Corpus Christi’s Paul Saville (outfield).
The Southland Conference baseball all-academic teams are voted on by the league’s head coaches, sports information baseball directors and compliance/academic office of each member institution. The criteria for consideration to the all-academic team is a minimum of 3.00cumulative grade point average throughout the semester prior to the sports championship. The nominees must have completed at least one full academic year at the nominating institution prior to the season in which the nomination occurs and participated in at least 50 percent of the team’s games in the position accredited to the nominee.
By AMBER ARTERBERRY
Assistant Sports Information Director
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