Fall symposium
brings a variety of
speakers to campus.
I Pep band prepares
for this year’s foot
ball season. Chooses
"Sound of Music" for
home opener.
j Football wins South
Atlantic Conference
opener at Catawba.
REMINDER:
First home
football game
this Saturday.
THE
Pendulum
Volume XX, Number 3
Informing the Eton College Community
September 15, 1994
Brian Corrado/The Pendulum
I’ve deflated and I can’t get up!
Assistant coach Ann Lashley helps out women's basketball coach
Brenda Paul, after the air escaped out of the Rightin' Christian during
the Organizational Fair last Friday.
Student jumped in woods
Mary Kelli Bridges
Senior Reporter
An El on College student was
assaulted Saturday in wooded area
near the college, an Elon College
police report said.
Michael J. Seek, 20, Sigma
Phi, Greek Circle, said he was
walking in the woods between
Sheridan Place apartments and the
greek houses at about 3:30 a.m.
Someone tackled him from
behind. Seek said.
Seek said he kicked the per
son and ran.
He was not injured. “I was
pretty lucky,” he said.
Seek could not give police a
description of his attacker.
Jewish student leader calls theft
of religious books a hate crime
Mary Kelli Bridges
Senior Reporter
A Jewish student believes she
was a victim of a “hate crime”
when her dorm room was burglar
ized Sunday.
Elon College police are inves
tigating the break-in, but don’t be
lieve yet that it is a hate crime.
A charge card, $ 15, $300 worth
of medicine and eight “priceless”
religious books were stolen from
Jodi Pearlman’s West dormitory
room.
The books included seven Jew
ish cantorial and rabbinical books
hundreds of years old and a prayer
book, Pearlman said.
“They took a part of who I
am,” said the founder of Elon Hillel,
a Jewish student organization.
Last week was Rosh Hashanah,
the start of the Jewish New Year
and today is Yom Kippur, the Day
of Atonement. Pearlman said she
thinks the break-in was deliber
ately done on the holidays.
Pearlman said she thinks the
break-in was a “hate crime” be
cause a television, jewelry and text
books were left behind.”
Pearlman is not certain how
the room was entered. She said her
dorm door and her suitemates’ door
was locked, Pearlman’s suitemates
could not be reached for comment
Tuesday evening.
Pearlman said she reported the
incident to police and campus se
curity.
Director of Campus Security
Terry Creech did not return calls
Tuesday.
Police don’t have enough in
formation to call the incident a re
ligious or hate crime. Officer Mike
Stidham said.
Stidham could not recall any
religious or hate crimes at Elon
College that were reported to po
lice.
However, in 1991 a black stu
dent told college officials that a
Knight of the Ku Klux Klan card
was delivered to her Staley dorm
room.
Student Michael Russell ad
mitted slipping the card under
Latricia Moore’s door. On the card
was the message: “You have been
paid a social visit by the KKK.
Don’t make the next visit a busi
ness call.”
Russell’s punishment included
100 hours of community service,
banishment from Staley dormitory,
probation for the remainder of the
school term, and attending manda
tory alcohol meetings.
Pearlman said she doesn’t
know of anyone who would want to
break in to her room.
Pearlman said she wanted her
books back.
Special education programs offered for first time
Tonya Hubart
Photo Editor
Undergraduate and graduate
programs in special-education are
being offered for the first time this
fall by Elon College.
The graduate program offers a
master’s degree in special-educa
tion with a specialty in learning
disabilities or behaviorally/emo-
tionally handicapped, which are the
highest demand categories, said
Judy Howard, an assistant profes
sor of education and the program’s
coordinator.
The master’s program is open
to students who meet Elon’s ad
mission requirements for graduate
programs and who already have a
recognized teaching license,
Howard said.
The undergraduate program
offers a bachelor’s degree in spe
cial-education with a specializa
tion in learning disabilities, Howard
said.
“Our primary reasons for go
ing into this area is responding to a
real need of public schools for ad
ditional qualified special-education
teachers,” said Gerald Dillashaw,
dean of the college’s Division of
Education, Health, Physical Edu
cation and Leisure/Sport Manage
ment.
An Alamance County School
Systems official called the short
age “critical.”
“There’sjust not enough teach
ers available,” said Denise Morton,
the director of special children’s
programs for the Alamance County
School Systems.
She said her school system has
had two special-education teach
ing programs open for a long time.
“What we are having to do is
hire teachers outside of the special-
education field will agree to go
back to school,” Morton said.
In 1992, there were more than
350,000 special-education teach
ers employed to serve infants
through 21, according to Annual
Reports to Congress, U.S. Depart
ment of Education.
The number of states required
to provide services to students with
disabilities has increased annually
since 1978, resulting in special-
education being one of the fastest
growing occupations in the United
States, according to Occupational
Outlook Quarterly.
“Right now, special education
is where the jobs are,” said Howard,
who has a doctorate in special-edu
cation and taught it for 10 years.
The demand for special-edu
cation teachers is a result of a higher
turnover rate, fewer colleges and
universities offering the degree, and
See Education, Page 4.