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WEBER STATE UNIVERSITY

VOL 84 ISSUE 30WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2013

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WSU softball overwhelms Snowpage 6

Ogden Mayor Mike Caldwell visits Weber State campus

Congress renegotiating debt ceiling to pay bills

PHOTO BY TONY POST | THE SIGNPOST

Ogden City Mayor Mike Caldwell spoke to Carol McNamara’s Leadership and the Political Life class on Tuesday about his professional experience before becoming mayor, his time spent as a communications student at Weber State University, and city projects that have been previously completed. He also em-phasized the potential Ogden City has for greater growth.

“We want people to get involved in the community and see it as a place of opportunity for them, rather than a place that they pass through,” Caldwell said. “And then when you look at the cultural events and athletic events and everything else, I think there’s a lot here for people to do . . . We want people to get involved. We can still do all of that here and be real proud of what happens in this community.”

New science center is a top state priority

‘It Gets Better Project’ tour perfoms in Ogden

BY JACOB VOCKLERcorrespondent | The Signpost

In a time when the federal government is shut down and econom-ic turmoil is all around, it is hard to stomach the idea of another economic meltdown. If Congress is not able to approve an increase on the debt limit by tomor-row, then the United States is in for another round of economic ca-tastrophe.

Tomorrow, the U.S. government will work under a deadline with pressure that few really understand. This is the deadline for Congress to raise the debt limit so the federal government can keep paying its bills.

The debate to raise the debt limit, or debt ceiling, has been going on for months. Howev-er, many people do not even know what it is all about. Even many stu-dents at Weber State University struggle to give an accurate de-scription of the debt ceiling.

“Government financ-es isn’t exactly my strong point,” said Joseph Faio-la, a WSU student. “I be-lieve it has something to do with the national debt and not letting it

pass a certain point.”

Gary John-son, associate

professor of po-litical science, said the debt limit is “the maximum amount that federal govern-ment has been approved to bor-row to pay for its promises. We need the mon-ey to pay for the things that we have promised. Raising the debt limit will allow us to pay for these things.”

The federal government has a responsibility to cover costs of programs such as social security and veterans benefits. When the federal government runs out of money for these types of bills, it needs to find a way to cover the difference.

“It would be like hav-ing your credit card which has a $2,500 limit on it, and the company says they are going to raise your limit,” John-son said. “Congress is saying that the limit they are willing to pay is about $16.7 trillion.”

The issue the govern-ment runs into is the

time it hit this limit. As of tomorrow, the gov-ernment will have met its spending limit, and now it is looking for an increase in its spending abilities.

The only problem is that raising the limit is not nearly as simple as calling a credit card company.

“Raising the debt ceiling is a vote by Con-gress to borrow the money needed to keep

See DEBT page 5 See BETTER page 5

The “It Gets Better Project” cast features members of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles. The choir performed Friday night in Ogden.

SOURCE: DIANE STERNt

BY ROSIE GERRISHasst. news editor | The Signpost

Weber State Univer-sity Cultural Affairs and Peery’s Egyptian The-ater presented the “It Gets Better Project” on Oct. 11, a musical pre-sentation by members of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles aimed at illustrating the social complexities that come with being a gay teen-ager.

Inspired by the It Gets Better video move-

ment popularized on YouTube, the produc-tion told the story of a teenage boy from a small town who felt os-tracized because of his sexuality.

The cast of the “It Gets Better Project” par-ticipated in several pan-els and events around the Ogden community prior to the closing per-formance in an effort to raise more awareness about the difficulties that come with a lack of understanding.

Sebastian Ojeda, a WSU pre-med student in attendance at the performance, heard about it through WSU’s Gay-Straight Alliance and thought it would be fun.

“I just want to be ex-posed to a more open culture,” Ojeda said. “Maybe some of that energy can rub off on me.”

Each member of the cast told of their own

An artist’s rendering shows the bird’s-eye view of the southern face of the new Tracy Hall Science Center.

SOURCE: CHARLES WIGHT

BY RAYCHEL JOHNSONeditor-in-chief | The Signpost

Ranking No. 1 on both the Utah State Building Board recommendation list and the State Board of Regents’ state-funded cap-ital development projects, Weber State University’s new science center is a top priority.

Built in 1969, WSU’s current science lab build-ing is no stranger to the limelight. Talks of leveling the unsound structure began several years ago, and it has been on the Board of Regents’ plate since 2011.

Although being highly ranked on both of these lists doesn’t guarantee the building breaking ground this year or next, it means the project will have a better chance of receiv-ing full funding from the Utah Legislature in the upcoming 2014 session.

Generally, projects won’t see the planning money and building money in the same year, and the entire process

could take longer than six years.

Pamela Silberman, director of communica-tions for the Utah Board of Regents, said WSU’s need for a new science building was highly ranked on the board’s list because planning fund-ing for the building had already been approved.

“Obviously, it is very difficult to teach state-of-the-art science education in an outdated building,” she said, mentioning that a new science building is important to WSU’s growth as a universi-

ty. “It’s dangerous and outdated, and so I think those are reasons why it’s been highly prioritized by the Board of Regents.”

Silberman also said the board tries to recognize the high priority of higher education buildings and the impact they have on students and faculty.

“STEM is a big priority, so science, technology, engineering and math education is a big prior-ity for the Board of Re-gents, as well as the state as a whole,” Silberman

See BUILDING page 5

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WSUSA to present Project LEAD, Leaders of TomorrowBY ROSIE GERRISHasst. news editor | The Signpost

The Weber State Uni-versity Student Associa-tion will present Project LEAD 2013: Leaders of Tomorrow, the second annual leadership con-ference aimed at help-ing WSU students be-come better leaders. The event will span Oct. 17 and 18, beginning tomorrow afternoon at 3:30 p.m. Registration is still available in the Stu-dent Involvement and Leadership Office for $40.

The conference will feature keynote speaker Brad Barton, who will present a speech specif-ically designed for WSU leaders after a discus-sion about issues facing leaders at the univer-sity with student senate president Brady Harris.

“I am excited for what his presentation will bring to students at the conference,” Har-ris said. “Brad won’t just be presenting a keynote that’s been given over and over; he will be pre-senting a keynote that is

specifically targeted to-wards students here at Weber State . . . I believe we will all walk away with a newfound con-fidence and inspiration after his presentation and workshops.”

LEAD team direc-tor Sam Howe said he believes this confer-ence will reach out to all students who come, whether they hold lead-ership positions at the university or not.

“I think a lot of peo-ple are afraid of the word ‘leader,’ just be-cause they’re not com-fortable with leading . . . but anybody can be a leader. That’s why we’re trying to reach out to a lot of different people, to help them realize . . . they can be a positive influence in a group or in other aspects of their lives.”

Tessa Diamond, lead-ership vice president in the WSUSA, said she be-lieves the event will be both educational and entertaining.

“I think our biggest goal is that we help stu-dents lead with confi-

dence, and that we help them to come and have fun, and that’s what leadership is — it’s just not nerdy,” Diamond said. “It’s cool to be a leader. I guess if every-thing was to go perfectly, I’d want people to walk out the doors cheering and saying like, ‘Wooo, this is so cool!’”

Emerging Leader di-rector David Robles agreed, saying he thinks the conference will touch the lives of all who attend.

“As a leadership team, we believe that learning and developing should be implemented in a great atmosphere, with a whole load of inspi-rational people, which is why we invite every-one to come. We are all leaders and we have all inspired someone or something in different ways. Project LEAD is about finding those tal-ents to implement them throughout a person’s whole life. Everyone is a leader of tomorrow!”

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BUILDING continued from front

DEBT continued from front

BETTER continued from front

said. “Good facilities are extremely important to attracting and retaining good faculty, as well as providing high-quality education to our stu-dents.”

Beating out 29 other capital development projects, with seven of these being buildings for other higher education institutions, the State Building Board ranked WSU’s science lab build-ing as “this year’s highest need.”

According to Jim Red-door, the State Building Board manager, several components and a rank-ing system come into play when the board cre-ates its list of top-priority projects each July.

“There’s five criteria used to determine this, and each board mem-ber scores each proj-ect,” Reddoor said. He explained that a scor-ing matrix is used to create the final ranking list based off of all the scores. “Weber State’s project, based on all the scoring criteria we had, came out as the No. 1 Building Board recom-mendation for the year.”

The State Building Board can only make recommendations to the legislature, but typically, the legislature follows through with the board’s list.

Reddoor said some projects stay on the list for several years, due to how the needs change with funding. The entire board traveled to the sci-

ence lab in August and received a tour.

“We didn’t receive as-bestos poisoning that anyone knows of,” Red-door joked. “We’re ex-cited to see this need addressed for the state and the students of We-ber State. I think it’s an attribute for the true need that’s up there, and once legislature funds it, it will be a great addition to the college and uni-versity.”

WSU President Charles Wight spear-headed this project when he was brand-new to the job. He met with legislatures in February earlier this year to plead the science lab’s case for funding and received a $3.5 million budget for surveying and design.

“We have done all the programming and part of the design for the building this year, using part of the $3.5 million,” he said, mentioning that in the past, planning money is a signal of the legislature’s commit-ment to completing a project in a timely man-ner.

issues of the debt ceiling not being raised.

“There is nobody that says there is anything good about this,” she said. “The consequenc-es in not raising the debt limit would be de-fault. This would mean a downgraded credit rat-ing and higher interest on future lending.”

Such a downgrade in credit rating would then spring a domino effect that would eventually hurt everyone.

“If this does not get resolved in a timely manner, the higher in-terest rates for the gov-ernment would mean higher interest rates for

“There are really four steps to this, and we have only been through two of them,” said Wight, but he also said he is confident WSU will re-ceive the funding this next year. “It’s happen-ing with all deliberate speed, and we just have to make sure that every-thing falls into place and that we actually get the money this year.”

He also addressed the fact that WSU has a single science building, while other top universi-ties in Utah have dozens of labs and centers for math and science educa-tion on their campuses.

“On this campus, a new science laboratory building is the only way that we can push science education forward,” Wight said. “If we are go-ing to participate at all in science education in the future, we must have this building.”

The name of the new science lab building was finalized just within the last two weeks, accord-ing to Wight. The science center will be named after Tracy Hall, an inventor, director of research and professor who was a rela-tive to the building’s main donors, Alan Hall and his cousin David, who was Tracy’s son. The Alan E. Hall Foundation and Da-vid Hall have pledged a $5 million donation toward the construction of the center.

Wight said the con-struction plan for the new center is to demol-ish buildings 3 and 4 and build the new science building, which may take a few years, and then turn the current science building into a temporary parking lot.

An artist’s rendering shows a bird’s-eye view of the eastern face of the new Tracy Hall Science Center.

SOURCE: CHARLES WIGHT

the consumers,” Geide-Stevenson said, “as well as slow down the rate of growth in the economy. This means slower re-covery than we are see-ing now.”

If the federal gov-ernment is not able to come to an agreement and Geide-Stevenson’s predictions come true, then everyone is in for a tough time. Interest rates on home, car and student loans can go up, and job growth in the economy will slow down.

the government going,” Johnson said.

In order for Con-gress to approve more borrowing to meet the government’s needs, an agreement will need to be made in Congress. Both the House of Rep-resentatives and the Senate must approve the borrowing by to-morrow’s deadline.

With such a close deadline, the reality of the government de-faulting on its respon-sibilities is realistic.Doris Geide-Stevenson, department chair and professor of econom-ics at WSU, said there is wide concern about the

house when he was 16 years old for being gay. Drew Tablak went to a Christian university and attempted a ‘gay

conversion.’ All of the cast added their stories of growing up and com-ing out between scenes to add to the storyline.

Brigham Young Univer-sity student and Under-standing Same-Gender Attraction member Jenna Hawkins, who was fea-tured in BYU’s USGA It Gets Better video, spoke about her experience as a gay member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

“Going (to BYU) taught me that I could be Mormon and gay . . . It was better than I ex-pected. Way, way bet-ter.”

A panel allowing community members to ask questions of the performers followed the performance. Many ex-pressed interest about getting more involved in their communities or starting their own gay-straight alliances.

“Be out. Be proud of it,” said cast mem-ber Tod Mackofsky. “Be who you are. Don’t shy away.”

stories growing up, and how they were received by their friends and family. Tyler Houston was kicked out of his