Police arrest UC students, some boys raid both parents’ wardrobe, and science kids get invited to the White House.
TUITION TURMOIL — With the economy still playing havoc with education budgets, many state universities are raising tuition: In California, in fact, leaders raised the cost of college by 32 percent recently. California students were less than pleased. In fact, 2,000 students protested for two days, clashing with riot police, crashing through barricades and briefly taking over a building on the UCLA campus. Police arrested 20 students and the students eventually relinquished the building. But many were still pretty upset. “Some of my friends won’t be here next quarter,” says Veronic Hernandez, a student at UC Riverside. “Before it was a question of how smart you were. Now, it’s do you have enough money to pay for school.” The state’s education officials, however, say there’s not much they can do. “When you have no money, you have no money,” says University of California President Mark Yudof. (Time)
IF THE PANTS FIT … — Back in the day (so Grandpa might say, anyway), men would buy their clothes in the men’s section of the local department store, and the women would buy their clothes in the women’s section. But members of today’s fashion-forward generation would rather not be sewn into such traditional garb. Youth workers might see some of their male teens wearing pants pilfered from Mom’s closet, not Dad’s. Are such teens rebelling against traditional sexual expectations? Well, maybe. But many simply want to stand out and look good, and blending fashion from both sides of the gender aisle is, for many youth, a promising way to do just that. “Every line should be unisex,” says Audrey Reynolds. “A good piece of clothing is a good piece of clothing no matter who was meant to wear it in the first place.” (New York Times)
WORLD OF GAMECRAFT — Five years ago, the massively multiplayer online game World of Warcraft came online and changed our conception of gaming forever. When Jeff Kaplan, WoW’s original game director, was asked when he knew the game was a success, Kaplan said, ” … about 20 minutes after the game went live, where we went, ‘Oh crap, we need to get 50 more servers right now!'” WoW and other MMO games now account for 15 percent of all time spent playing games in the United States and Europe, with the average gamer spending 5.5 hours playing online. About two-thirds of MMO players, to perhaps no-one’s grand surprise, are male. (Time, IndustryGamers)
QUOTE: “If you win the NCAA championships, you come to the White House. Well, if you’re a young person and you’ve produced the best experiment or design, the best hardware or software, you ought to be recognized for that achievement too. Scientists and engineers ought to stand side by side with athletes and entertainers as role models, and here at the White House, we’re going to lead by example. We’re going to show people how cool science can be.” — President Barack Obama, announcing that the White House would start holding an annual science fair. (New York Times)
