Water pipe bursts in
SouthridgeHall. 8
Coffee shop opens in
Ramsey Library. 4
UNCA to play Heels
Jill Young returns hkadlhe women's here. 5
soccer team. See story p,5.
Weekend Weather: Partly cloudy wifh o chance of afternoon showers. Highs in the 80s, lows in the 60s.
The Blue
Volume 24, Number 1
UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA AT ASHEVILLE
August 31, 1995
University campus takes on a new look for a new year
Library addition has
added bonuses for
students and faculty
Tracy Singleton
Staff Writer
UNCA’s Ramsey Library reopened its doors on
Aug. 18 after a $3.9 million, nine-month reno
vation process.
“There is a cost to opening a building on time,
and the cost was that we opened it without
everything being finished,” said Malcolm Blow
ers, University Librarian, “But it was open on the
first day of class.”
The library experienced some problems with
door locks and electrical wiring during the first
week of classes. According to Blowers, some areas
needed adjusting, detail work, and finishing
touches. The main staircase is also being fixed,
and some furniture is missing.
“It is still not finished. We are working on it,”
said Blowers.
According to Noel Jones, a library employee,
workers are still in the process of “laying down
carpets, moving around equipment, and getting
shelves in place.”
According to a UNCA news release, the main
floor of the library contains service desks, study
and lounge areas, periodicals, the reference desk
and collection, a cafe, and classroom and confer-
ence-room space. The ground floor houses the
media center. The upper story will hold most of
the books, along with special collections, archives,
and offices.
Blowers said the process of renovation began 11
years ago, when Chancellor Bill Highsmith asked
him to write a justification for the project. This
was the basis for requesting funding. The project
started last September, according to a UNCA
July 1996 proposed as
completion date for
gym construction
Renee Slaydon
Staff Writer
Photo by Marti Parson
Students returned this semester to find the newly renovated library nearly complete.
Renovations to UNCA’s Justice Health and
Fitness Center should be completed by J uly 1996,
and ready to open next fall. The new gymnasium,
which cost an estimated $5-2 million, will offer
several new accommodations to students and
faculty, according to Ron Reagan, director of
facilities planning.
“There’s going to be a multi-purpose room that
will house three basketball courts. Each court
will be lined off for tennis, badminton, and
volleyball,” said Reagan.
Other plans for the center include four new
racquetball courts, a large weight room, and
locker and laundry facilities. According to Tom
Hunnicutt, athletic director, one of the high
lights of the new gymnasium will be the elevated
indoor track.
“We’ll have the longest indoor track in the state
of North Carolina,” said Hunnicutt. The track
will enable UNCA to host intercollegiate and
high school indoor track meets.
Hunnicutt believes that by hosting high school
track meets in the new addition, prospective
students will get a better chance to visit UNCA
and see what it has to offer. " I think that will assist
in the overall university recruitment,” said
Hunnicutt.
Currently, the Justice Health and Fitness Cen
ter houses an indoor swimming pool, dance stu
dio, basketball court, and a weight room.
“We have a new weight room, and are hoping to
come up with enough money to put a complete
universal weight system in there,” said Hunnicutt.
LIBRARY continues on page 8
GYM continues on page 8
Computer meltdown causes delays during registration
Paul Buttles
Staff Writer
Students waiting in line to reg
ister on Aug.22 faced delays due
to a wiring problem which dis
abled the registration terminals
located on the first floor of
Lipinsky Hall and the business
office terminals in the lobby of
Karpen Hall.
“For students and staff it was a
very long day,” said Caroline
Miller, assistant vice chancellor
for enrollment management.
“We lost 45 minutes right at the
start, and so that backed up close
to 175 students. When you back
up that many people, it gets dif
ficult to recover from. We fried a
squirrel one year, and that backed
us up pretty badly when a trans
former blew, but we’ve had very
minimal computer problems in
the last several years.”
“The communication line from
Robinson Hall to Karpen Hall
went out on us,” said Kern Parker,
director of university comput
ing. “On Friday the line looked
fine, but we got there for our set
up on Tuesday morning and we
couldn’t get the terminals to com
municate. It took two hours to
get things started again.”
Parker said when the computer
center staff tried to get the Karpen
business terminals back on-line,
they inadvertently caused the
Lipinsky terminals to crash.
“That was just one of those bad
luck things that happen,” said
Parker.
The registration terminals in
Lipinsky Hall were down for 45
minutes, while the Karpen busi
ness terminals experienced a two-
hour outage.
“We were ready to go at 8 a.m.
but the computers never got up,”
saidjohn Neuse, director of busi
ness services. “Finally, around
10 a.m., we moved to a location
downstairs in one of the com
puter lab rooms, and went ahead
and took care of people down
there.”
At 2 p.m., business services per
sonnel were able to return up
stairs to their original registra
tion location, in the lobby of
Karpen Hall.
“It was really backed up, and I
felt really bad for my group,”
said Kim Walker, a student ori
entation leader. “They had to
wait outside, and it was really hot
out there.”
Walker said when she regis
tered as a freshman last year, it
only took her 20 minutes, but
that the group she led through
registration took tv.'o hours to
complete the process.
Many of the students register
ing were incoming freshmen liv^
ing on campus. They were placed
into orientation groups based on
their dormitory assignments, and
their registration appointments
were scheduled at 15-minute in
tervals.
“There were more people com
ing every 15 minutes, coming,
coming, coming, so it just kept
backing up,” said Josh Tan, a
student orientation leader. “We
got there at 1 p.m. and finished
at about 5 p.m.”
According to Tan, the registra
tion line in Lipinsky Hall
stretched down through the base
ment of the building, forcing
students to dodge in and out of
the line as they went from room
to room looking for courses that
weren’t already filled.
Brandon Bunn, a freshman bi
ology major, said that his group
became so weary of the orienta
tion process that they didn’t care
about the long delay.
“We just wanted to do it,” said
Bunn. “It didn’t matter how long
[it took]. We knew that was the
very last day [of orientation].”
Bunn said his group had been
unaware of the computer prob
lem, but thought the process was
overcrowded and understaffed.
Stephanie Skinner, a freshman,
said when she reached the lobby
of Karpen Hall, it was so crowded
that she and her group had to
join the line which had formed
outside the building.
“It was really hot,” said Skin
ner. “There was water outside,
but that was all.”
According to Miller, if students
aren’t cleared through the busi
ness office their class schedules
are canceled. Because of the long
delays and the other obligations
registering students faced, they
were allowed to pay their tuition
fees later in the day.
“We’ve had so many successful
registrations in a row,” said
Parker. “Sometimes you roll the
dice and things don’t go your
way."
"We are looking at our proce
dures," Parker said. "We test the
lines before we start registration,
but we’re going to make the test
a little bit more involved to make
really sure that the communica
tions are up."
Photo by Lat Ray
Students faced long lines in the hot sun due to registration computer problems.