GARDNER-WEBB UNIVERSITY
November 19, 2009
Volume 13 No. 6
Serving the Gardner-Webb University community for more than 60 years
This Edition 20 Years: The Fall of the Berlin Wall
In campus news-
2009 Christmas Art Sale
offers great gifts from
local craftsmen.
See p. 2
— Photo Feature-
A day in the life of a
Gardner-Webb
Bulldog.
See p. 4
' In sports-
Men’s basketball
dominates oyer
Montreat. See p.3.
Women’s basketball
runs down
Winston-Salem State.
See p.3
Men’s soccer falls to
Winthrop. See p. 3
Women’s soccer proud
of their season. See p.3
Index
Weather,
Thursday Friday
Nov. 19 Nov. 20
High 67 High 66
Low 42 Low 45
AM mostly
showers sunny
Source: The Weather Channel
V
:
\ a, 7!
Photo by Cat McDonald
Students of German and French rush the faux Berlin Wall to tear it down in commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the
faii of the Wall on November 9,1989.
by Blake DuDonis
Pilot Editor
Imagine wantihg-to see a family mem
ber or fri^d that lives in California and de
ciding to drive out there to see them. Now
imagine when you get to Kansas, you are
stopped by guards at a huge wall and are
told to turn around or you would be shot
and killed.
Sound extreme?
Sadly, this was the actual case of the
people living in Germany between 1961
and 1989.
Built on August 13, 1961 by the com
munist of East Germany, the Berlin Wall
divided the country of Germany, going
straight through the capital city of Berlin.
The wall was built in an attempt to con
trol all people living in East Germany and
control they did. Anyone attempting to
cross into West Germany for freedom or
any other reason was shoot and killed, no
questions asked.
This extreme sounding situation was a
very real reality for Gardner-Webb profes
sor Dr. Ute Lahaie.
Lahaie grew up in the free West Germa
ny in a town outside of Hindenburg and she
remembers the Wall and its impact.
“The Wall actually went up one year af
ter I was bom, and it came down one year
after my daughter was bom, so in that sense
it is a personal reality. I grew up in a di
vided Germany,’’ Lahaie said.
The Berlin Wall stood as a symbol of
power over the people, and it was a sym
bol that Lahaie, like many others, thought
would never fall.
“Nobody of my generation actually be
lieved that it would ever come down,” said
Lahaie. “For us, the reality was a commu
nist East and a free Western Germany... it
just never feit like it would change.”
Fortunately for Germans, and all Euro
peans, that change did come. On November
9, 1989, the Wall came crashing down as
Germans from both sides mshed across the
now open space to find friends and families
that they were separated from so long ago.
On the 20th anniversary of the Wall’s
fall, Lahaie, a professor of both French and
German, thought it would be the perfect op
portunity to educate her classes on the Ber
lin Wall and its impact.
“For the younger generation... it just
was not a reality,” said Lahaie. “What was
important for the students to know was
who built it, who was the communist part
of Germany, and the key was to really keep
people in... to keep them from leaving to- .
wards Western Germany.”
Knowing that simple history lessons
can sometimes lose the interest of students,
Lahaie thought it would help if she made it
more personal to the students.
As part of a class assignment, students
in Lahaie’s French and German classes
were given a piece of paper on which they
were to design graffiti, a very common sight
on the Berlin Wall, and turn their graffiti in
for a grade.
Once finished with that, the students put
the paper on a cardboard box on which they
would all combine to build a Berlin Wall of
their own on the Quad of Gardner-Webb.
On November 9, the students gathered
outside behind the Dover Campus Center
around noon and began stacking their box
es. They also asked trivia questions to peo
ple walking by, offering a German pencil to
anyone who correctly answered a question.
Some of the questions included how
many inhabitants are in the Federal Re
public of Germany (82 million), who is the
chancellor of Germany (Angela Merkel),
and when was Gennany reunited (October
3, 1990).
After about two hours of trivia and
building the wall. Dr. Lahaie gave the okay
to then tear it down which the students did
emphatically.
Overall, Dr, Lahaie was extremely
pleased with the project and felt that they
had accomplished what they had set out to
do.
“The Wall is significant because it
shows that democracy does work,” said
Lahaie. “Those people, in a peaceful dem
onstration, showed that people can actually
move entire governments and, in this case,
entire walls. The people in the east actually
had the courage to demonstrate and go out
in masses even though they all risked their
lives each time for doing so,”
For more information on the Berlin
Wall and its history, you can visit www.dai-
lysoft.com/berlinwali, www.mauerfall09.
de/en/portal/peaceful-revolution, www.ber-
lintwitterwall.com or dailysoft.com/berlin-
wall/art/berlinewallart index01.htm.
GWU enrollment to be limited
by Molly Phipps
Pilot Staff Writer
Gardner-Webb University will soon
put into effect a new limit on the anlount
of undergraduate students enrolled at
the school at any one time. The change
is a result of increasing enrollment as
well as a continuing desire to carry on
the family atmosphere here at Gardner-
Webb, both concerns of its president.
Dr. Frank Bonner.
The new cap is set at 2,000 students,
a figure the administration has been de
ciding on for some time. Current under
graduate enrollment is . approximately
1600 students.
Dr. Jeff Tubbs, director of Research
and Planning, mentioned several signif
icant reasons for setting the cap: “We
want to increase our academic stand
ing,” said Dr. Tubbs. “We want to con
tinue to provide a growing environment
for our students.”
That means growth not only nu
merically, but also academically and
relationally. By placing a limit on the
number of students at the school, Gard
ner-Webb hopes to ensure the persis
tence’ of its community atmosphere.
Additionally, the academic progress of
the school and students could benefit, in
one way by maintaining small classes.
“We definitely want to keep the same
class sizes,” Dr, Tubbs said, referring
to the current student to teacher ratio
here, which stands on average at 13-1.
Another beneficial aspect would be
a more limited acceptance of students.
With the new rule, eventually, only the
'most academically prepared students
would gain acceptance to Gardner-
Webb.
Current requirements for admis
sion include: the student must have at
least an 830 on the SAT, must be in the
top half of his graduating class, and
must have a| least a 2.5 GPA, Refining
those requirements would increase the
school’^overall academics and, poten
tially, the overall retention rate.
Retention rates are based on the
number of first-year students who re
main enrolled until their second year.
The rate at Gardner-Webb has fluctu
ated for the past few years but is now
around 70%. For the past three years,
the rate was 72%, 76%, and 73%, re
spectively. The goal for' now is 80%,
with a hope to see it rise along with en
rollment.
“A slow, steady rate is better,” Dr.
Tubbs said.
The next advancement President
Bonner has in mind will hopefully
go hand-in-hand with enrollment: the
new Student Center, The goal here is
to make Gardner-Webb more attrac
tive to incoming students and current
students, which will in turn affect the
retention rate. It will also ease the bur
den of more students on the Cafeteria
here.
Dr. Tubbs summed up the feelings of
many in the Gardner-Webb community
in one statement; “We’re all excited
about the direction that Gardner-Webb
is going,” said Dr. Tubbs.