Brown and White Vol. 116 No. 26

              the brown and white lehigh university's student newspaper founded in 1894 vol 116 no 26 friday january 23 2009 all the lehigh news first study abroad still popular despite cost by martina russial enrollment in study abroad programs may be declining on the national scale due to the current eco nomic environment but lehigh has not seen any real decline in interest the study abroad office said of the 151 students that applied for study abroad programs 17 people have dropped out and only half of those students said they couldn't go because of the current state of the economy neil mcgurty director of the study abroad office said there is some evidence that sug gests students are choosing shorter study abroad programs or ones that require less traveling mcgurty said students that may have chosen to go on a wild trip to sub-saharan africa are now going to places like canada and latin america mc gurty said the study abroad office offers 160 approved programs in 60 countries every year on every continent except antarctica mcgurty said the winter session programs in costa rica and spain both had high er numbers than last year and did remarkably well mcgurty said lehigh provides faculty-run winter and summer programs that can last from 10 days to a few weeks mc gurty said mcgurty said the enrollment for study abroad has stayed relatively constant in recent years last year in the spring 148 stu dents enrolled in study abroad pro grams and 137 actually went abroad and this year 151 students applied for the spring program and 134 went abroad mcgurty said there is no real decrease in interest for established programs at lehigh and some are already full he said one possible reason for the slight decrease in numbers is that the popu lar florence and rome programs are not being offered this year which would generally enroll 25 to 30 stu dents mcgurty said some students do pick programs based on cost mcgurty said the office is waiting to see if lower-priced programs will attract more students if there is a clump of drop-outs we know we have a problem he said the cost of traditional semester study abroad programs is the same celebrating creating history b&wphoto by henry weinberger lehigh's celebration of martin luther king jr coincided with the inauguration of barack obama as the 44th president of the united states see page 3 for details on the week-long remembrance of the civil rights leader and see page 4 for students accounts of the inauguration new chapters offer alternative greek life by allison rolish lehigh will welcome its first two non residential fraternities delta chi and pi kappa alpha as part of the greek com munity this spring we are excited said tim wilkin son director of fraternity and sorority affairs we think bringing new options to lehigh only enhances the current greek experience while non-residential fraternities are new to lehigh who has a more tradi tional greek community these types of chapters are common in the northeast wilkinson said the two fraternities were chosen by lehigh's greek expansion committee earlier this academic year in october after being narrowed down to five finalists the other finalists included phi delta theta zeta psi and pi lambda phi fraternities wilkinson said the committee was looking for a balance of alumni sup port an organized and experienced international headquarters experience with non-residential chapters a detailed expansion plan and an understanding of lehigh's accreditation process and strengthening greek life plans all five of the finalists are great fraternities michelle m rebholz a greek life coordinator said but the expansion committee felt that pi kappa alpha and delta chi would be the best suited for success at this time the office of fraternity and sorority affairs is working to raise awareness of the new fraternities across campus they will be sponsoring two informa tion sessions during the week of jan 26 rebholz said these sessions will be very general and focus more on what it means to be a founding father of a fraternity and how the colonization process works rebolz said the fraternities will have representa tives on campus starting feb 14 who will be stationed at the student centers they will solicit names of non-affiliated men from faculty staff alumni student organizations sororities athletic teams and more rebholz said the most common technique used by new groups is to reach out to men who have not found the current fraterni ty experience for them wilkinson said wilkinson said both delta chi and pi kappa alpha will have professional staff members on campus for six weeks to help promote the chapters organize recruitment and assist in the initial orga nization stages these staff members will work in conjunction with local alumni from each chapter bob buckheit 09 president of the interfraternity council said existing fraternities are happy to welcome and expand greek life over the past ten years lehigh has local diner forced to close for casino traffic by matt stayman a surge of development in south side bethlehem has prompted the state govern ment to close down ginny's luncheonette a popular diner located at 129 w third street in order to clear the way for a new road the road will aim to ease traffic conges tion in the area which is expected to see more traffic after the opening of the sands casino resort in may irene halkias and her son frank halkias said they received a phone call on friday jan 9 directing them to pack up and move out by monday after they had owned and operated ginny's for over 20 years the family was notified of the pennsyl vania department of transportation's inten tions to claim its property citing eminent do main about a year ago frank halkias said however he and his family were surprised when they were not given the 20-to-30 day notification they had expected the family spent 12 hours on sunday packing their things to meet the monday deadline he said the compensation offered by the state only matched the price that irene halkias had paid for the property over 20 years ago frank halkias said of course i don't think it's fair at all he said the family has hired an attorney to fight for better compensation he said according to lehigh economics profes sor thomas hyclak the construction of the casino is one of several factors that have influenced the eminent domain imposed by penndot hyclak who recently served on a com mittee that studied development-related concerns said the closure of ginny's was probably due in large part to pre-existing traffic problems the city's plans to direct traffic to and from the casino will be centered mostly on route 78 hyclak said of even greater significance to bethlehem's traffic concerns will be the sale of large lots by the lehigh valley industrial park which owns much of the property between the casino and route 78 he said hyclak said the increased traffic and an influx of tourists caused by the casino are not likely to have much of a positive impact on local businesses the businesses on third and fourth streets could benefit from more traffic or they could have a hard time getting custom ers if people can't find a parking space hy clak said but they won't gain direct benefit from the casino casinos are structured to capture spending there's very little trickle down effect the effects on the halkias business have been anything but minimal there's a bigger story here in my opin see greek page 2 see ginny's page 2 see abroad page 3 seniors look to w women's basketball check online for the future hosts lafayette breaking news page 5 page 12 thebrownandwhite.com