Brown and White Vol. 114 No. 1

              the brown and white lehigh university's student newspaper founded in 1894 vol 114 no 1 tuesday september 5 2006 all the lehigh news first hogan sentenced to state jail by madelyn king assistant news editor former class of 2008 president greg hogan was sentenced on aug 17 to 22 months to 10 years in jail for robbing an allentown wachovia bank in december 2005 president judge william h platt recommended hogan serve his sentence at pine grove a state correctional facil ity for offenders under 21 but he ended up at graterford prison pennsylvania's largest maximum security prison john waldron hogan's lawyer said he would have preferred a county jail not a state facility when sentencing platt said he did not accept that hogan was made insane by his gambling problems the trauma he said that hogan put the bank's tellers through was too much to go unpunished there is a penalty to be paid for crimes of this sort he said waldron said hogan is anxious but strong-willed and looking forward to being paroled as quickly as possible he wants to help prevent others from reaching the point he did waldron said hopefully he can help oth ers choose a different course hogan's family has already taken steps to make others aware of the dangers of gambling hogan's father the rev gregory hogan sr spoke at a forum about online gambling held at desales university on wednesday i am here to bring to you encouragement first be college kids don't let the easy path shortcut your dreams hogan sr said if you are involved with the dangerous activities like internet gambling or drug use please stop it and ask for help - for your dreams sake for your future's sake hogan sr also encouraged colleges to take action for dealing with situations such as illegal gambling as a parent i would like to be able to call a univer sity and say my son has a problem we've already had an intervention we've already tried counseling could you block his student code from accessing the site ho gan sr said sharon basso associate vice provost and dean of stu dents said she agrees gambling in excess is a dangerous habit our goal as an institution is to assist students in de veloping the skills to make the best decisions possi ble in all areas of their lives basso said the office of student affairs has posted information on issues such as gambling excessive shopping and exces sive internet use on the university counseling and psy chological services web site in addition psychologists are available to do out reach programs or work with students individually on any issues basso said stacy shook 08 said she agrees the university should do something to handle the gambling issue on campus i never thought that gambling was a big problem at lehigh shook said but what happened with hogan was an eye opener for a lot of people magazines rank lehigh among top universities by nicole nigro assistant news editor in national polls lehigh continues to rank as a top university u.s news & world report's 2007 america's best colleges survey ranked lehigh as no 33 among 126 top universities businessweek magazine also named lehigh's college of business and economics no 18 of undergraduate business programs last year u.s news & world report rated le high as no 32 this is the first year lehigh ranked in the businessweek magazine lehigh improved since the 2006 u.s news sur vey in several categories moving from no 37 to 30 in retention rate 20 to 16 in classes with fewer than 20 students 36 to 32 in student selectivity and 41 to 36 for students in the top 10 percent of their high school class according to the survey lehigh also remains no 8 in the nation for alumni giving no 32 for graduation rate no 36 for average standardized test score and no 28 in the nation for best value sharon basso associate vice provost and dean of students said she was happy with the survey results but was more concerned with the students opinion of lehigh than a survey's opinion i believe lehigh is very pleased to continue to be ranked among the top national research univer sities by u.s news & world report basso said but i think the quality of a lehigh education is best measured by its students success academi cally and personally rather than external ranking agencies or polls tom hyclak interim dean of the college of university welcomes president gast b&wphoto by doug moquet president gast her husband brad askins and their children rebecca and david hold a lehigh flag at a freshmen rally held at taylor gymnasium gast is lehigh's 13th president firm hired to study campus diversity by lauren rieders assistant news editor to assess the climate for diversity on campus lehigh hired national consulting firm rankin & associ ates to speak with members of the campus community and distribute surveys to undergraduate and gradu ate students staff faculty and admin istrators to provide an analysis and action plan for increasing diversity the idea for the campus climate survey was prompted by concerns about small numbers of black and hispanic students who are recruited but underrepresented at lehigh jean soderlund deputy provost for fac ulty affairs said soderlund said the climate as sessment will provide data about participants personal experi ences at lehigh perceptions of institutional climate and actions re see ranking page 3 see diversity page 2 see story on page 6 south side starters opens page 9 odpiipt hogan from lehigh to graterford prison bw.lehigh.edu lafayette student brings dynamite stick bon plane see story on page 7