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page 2
Wednesday March 3,1999
The Official Campus Newspaper
Volume 3 No. 2
Trustees vote to consider NCAA change
GWU considers Division I move
Carla Catoe
Pilot news editor
Move over Wingate.
Gardner-Webb could soon be
looking for a new rival. The
university Board of Trustees
has given its approval to con
sider moving from classifica
tion as NCAA Division II to
NCAA Division I.
This move will mean that
Gardner-Webb will no longer
be a part of NCAA Division
II’s South Atlantic Conference
(SAC).
If all goes well in finding a
new athletic conference affilia
tion, and settling implementa
tion plans and facility and bud
get issues, Gardner-Webb will
be able to announce the plans
this fall. Currently, GWU is
short just ten scholarships of
being eligible for classification
as a Division I school.
President Christopher
White believes that the re-clas
sification will effect more than
just the athletics program.
“The impact of Division I
status on Gardner-Webb would
be felt throughout our universi
ty. The quality of life at our
insfitution would improve in all
facets, from academics to facil
ities to athletics,” said White.
Gardner-Webb is already
experiencing changes in the
Athletics
Department
with the addi
tion of three
new sports
for the 1999-
2000 school
year. The new sports will be
men’s and women’s track and
field and women’s swimming.
GWU Athletic Director,
Chuck Burch, said the move
will add to the prestige of the
school. “It brings you a tremen
dous amount of exposure. The
Big South conference had at
least one basketball game on
regional television and the
“The quality of life at our
institution would improve in
all facets, from academics to
facilities to athletics.” '
championship game on nation
al television.
“The change to Division I
would also impact our academ
ic requirements. An incoming
athlete with a 2.0 g.p.a. would
have to score at least 1,010 on
the SAT compared to the 820
required now for Division II,”
said Burch.
Two conferences have been
suggested as possiblifies
for GWU to align with.
The first is the Big South
which currently has eight
members: Charleston
Southern, Coastal
Carolina, Elon, High
Point, Liberty, UNC Asheville,
Radford and Winthrop. The
second is the Southern
Conference which currently,
has 12 member schools and is
considered less of a possibility
by some observers.
Despite traumatic escape ten years ago, she returns to minister
GWU student returns home to Vietnam
Carla Catoe
Pilot news editor
“I felt like I was escaping
all over again,” said Hanh Tran,
recalling the boat ride she took
while she was in Vietnam in
late January. Tran and her fam
ily escaped from the Vietcong
by boat about ten years ago.
“It was
scary. When
we tried to
escape the first
time, we were
caught by the
Vietcong and
we had to stay
in jail for two
months. The
second time we
successfully
escaped to a
refugee camp
in Thailand,”
said Tran.
Tran has lived with a pas
sion in her heart since then to
return to her native country to
help the people there.
“I’ve always wanted to go,
so when my brother told me
“I prayed and
prayed about it.
I asked my
brother and he
said sometimes
you have to take
a risk for the
Lord.”
about a medical mission trip
that he was going on to
Vietnam that needed one more
nurse, I thought, ‘Are you kid
ding?’ It turned out that I would
have to leave for the trip the
day after classes started here,”
said Tran.
After much prayer and
thought, Tran decided to take
the sacrifice
for the glory
of God.
“I prayed
and prayed
about it. I
asked my
brother and he
said some
times you
have to take a
risk for the
Lord. After
that, I decided
to go,” said
Tran.
Tran left on January 14
with 18 other volunteer medical
workers and translators to
spend 20 days in Vietnam. Tran
was one of only two college
students who went on the trip
Hanh Tran (c) assists Dr. Jim Hoover (r)
back since fleeing the country ten years c
along with doctors, nurses, pre-
scription-filers, helpers and a
photographer.
“We went to five different
clinics including a blind home,
a nursing home, and an orphan
Photo courtesy Han Tran
in Viet nam with medical missions. Tran spent 20 days in Vietnam, her first time
'.go with her family.
age. I translated for the doctors
and got to do some nursing
work too. I didn’t really want to
do the interpreting at first, but it
allowed me to work with Dr.
Jim Hoover, an awesome
Christian doctor.,” said Tran.
With this team, thousands
of lives were touched by the
love of God.
See Vietnam page 5