North Texas Daily (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 92, No. 34, Ed. 1 Wednesday, October 22, 2008 Page: 2 of 8
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Page 2 Wednesday, October 22,2008
o
News
Hailey Persinger & Matt Goodman
News Editors
managing_editors@yahoo.com
New Bill o érs bene it hikes, new stipends
By Kerry Solan
Intern
A 64-year-old bill just had
a face-lift, and it means more
money for more than 600 NT
students.
Housing stipends, book
and supply stipends and more
money for tuition are benefits
of the new Post-9/11 Veterans
Educational Assistance Act of
2008 or "New GI Bill" passed by
Congress in June.
"This is a great benefit," said
Bobby Lothringer, NT assis-
tant registrar. "This should
help a number of veterans who
might not have been able to go
to school before."
The original GI Bill, signed
into law by President Franklin
D. Roosevelt in 1944, has evolved
into a program that provides
up to 36 months of education
benefits to eligible veterans for
college, vocational courses and
job training.
Under this program,
dependent spouses or chil-
dren of disabled veterans
qualify. According to the NT
Registrar's Office, 462 veterans
are receiving Veterans Affairs
benefits for the fall term, and
an additional 143 are receiving
transferred benefits — an
increase of 6.32 percent from
fall 2007 and an increase of 20
percent since fall 2004.
The benefit boost was the
project of Virginia Sen. Jim
Webb, a first-year senator and
Vietnam veteran.
"We began with the simple
concept that those who have
been serving since 9/11 should
have the same opportunity for
a first-class educational future
as those who served during
World War II," Webb said. "I
would like to emphasize that
this is not simply an expansion
of veterans' educational bene-
fits. This is a new program, a
deserved program."
Under the current system
of benefits, veterans who had
"opted in" for the Montgomery
GI Bill Benefits while on active
duty would receive a flat rate for
their education based on their
contributions into the system,
which maxes out at $1,321 a
month for full-time enrollment.
This money which is paid to the
students and not the school, was
given to the student contingent
upon enrollment verification.
If the eligible student elects
to receive the new benefits,
the bill will provide tuition up
to the most expensive for full-
time undergraduate students
charged by the "public insti-
tution of higher education"
in the state in which they are
enrolled.
Based on 2008 in-state
tuition rates, the anticipated
annual tuition payment rate for
2009 will be more than $6,000.
NT's rate comes in just under
$7,000.
Qualifying students will
also be paid a monthly
housing stipend equal to the
monthly basic allowance for
housing for a sergeant with
dependents. A committee site
for the Department of Defense
listed the current basic allow-
ance for housing payment for
a sergeant with dependents in
Denton as $1,196 a month.
Additionally students eligible
under the bill will have addi-
tional money for textbooks
— a lump sum payment the
first month of each semester
will help with books, supplies,
equipment and other educa-
tional fees for that semester.
However, this new GI Bill
may not be the best option for
all veterans. Those pursuing
a post-graduate degree or an
online degree may benefit more
from the current Military GI
Bill.
Lothringer and VA officials
said the new system will be
much more complicated, as
schools will be calculating
different rates for every recip-
ient based on a sliding scale of
how long they served, how much
they contributed to the GI Bill
and the number of hours they
are enrolled.
"There are still a lot of details
to be worked out before next
August," said Lothringer. "I'm
looking forward to getting the
details to communicate to GI
Bill-eligible students."
Denton, N campus smoking bans don 't deter students
By Carolyn Brown
Intern
It's a breezy Tuesday morning
as mathematics junior Amir Ali
takes a drag of his midmorning
Marlboro and gazes out from
under the awning at the
Language Building.
He's sitting in one of the
few enclosed spaces at NT
where smoking is not banned
— the official campus policy
prohibits smoking in all dorms
and mandates that smokers
need to be 20 feet away from
any building before they light
up.
But these bans, including
those that "most places" in
Denton have, have failed to
curb Ali's habit.
"It's like, whatever," he said.
"I've never really thought about
quitting because of them."
Chapter four, Article 14 of
Denton's code of ordinances
details prohibitions on
smoking throughout the city.
It states that "any retail estab-
lishment serving the general
public" must ban smoking in
its enclosed areas. Other abso-
lute bans include city-owned
buildings, movie theaters,
libraries and museums.
Bars or establishments that
make "more than 70 percent
of their annual gross sales"
from selling alcoholic bever-
ages do not have to designate
nonsmoking areas, though
they must post "conspicuous"
signs to alert customers of the
fact. Although restaurants
in Denton have the choice to
maintain separate smoking
and nonsmoking areas, some
opt for a total ban to simplify
matters.
For instance, hospitality
management senior Lauren
Dawson works at the Gaylord
Texan, a luxury resort hotel
in Grapevine that prohibits
smoking everywhere but in
its cigar bar. She said that
even with the ban, customers
routinely flout the rules.
"People complain and light
up, and then we have to call
security," he said.
Opponents say that the bans
hurt businesses by driving
away smoking customers.
However, John Hornsby,
general manager of the Club
at Gateway Center, said that
Photo by Khai Ha/Staff Photographer
Economics senior Hunter Nelson takes a puff of his cigarette. In accordance with
NT rules, students must stay at least 20 feet away from a building to smoke.
smoke in enclosed spaces.
This increases their chances
of developing heart disease by
25 percent to 30 percent, with
an increase of 20 percent to 30
percent in lung cancer risk,
according to the report.
Currently, only 20.8 percent
of all adults smoke cigarettes in
the United States, according to
the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention.
In addition to restricting
smoking, the university has
created programs to help
students stop smoking. The
Psychology Clinic began the
"Put an End to Smoking! No
if's, ands or butts!" program
two weeks ago. The program
uses a group treatment format
to help smokers, said Lisa
Hathaway, who is in charge
of the program.
"It's a really good environ-
ment because you're there
with people who are going
through the same thing you
are," Hathaway said.
However, only two people
have joined the group, and
neither are NT students, she
said.
Hathaway said that students
often wait to quit smoking
because they believe they can
always do so later.
"But the longer students
wait, the harder it is to quit,"
she said.
this is not necessarily the case,
citing his own experience as a
restaurant owner.
"There was an uproar for a
small period of time, but the
overall net effect was zero,"
Hornsby said. "As a former
restaurant owner, I like the
smoking ban because it made
things easy. Dividing it into
two sections never really
worked that well."
Concerns about the effects of
secondhand smoke are having
an impact on the smoking
policies of American busi-
nesses, thus fueling a trend
of stricter smoking rules such
as NT's complete indoor ban,
he said.
According to the Surgeon
General's 2006 report, 126
million nonsmoking Americans
regularly inhale secondhand
Correction
A mistake was made in Tuesday's front page story titled
"Students approve fees for athletics, stadium." Nikeeta Slade
and Tyesha Best were not elected as spring 2009 senators
for the Student Government Association. To clarify, the
senators listed were only those elected last week and do
not represent the entire spring 2009 Senate.
The Make Tailgating Yours Campaign serves to foster healthy growth in the tailgating traditions
surrounding athletic events in a way that stimulates student ownership and school pride.
So,
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The tailgating atmosphere is electrically charged with fans celebrating the upcoming Mean Green
game. Some fans chose to include alcohol in their pre-game celebrations. The Make Tailgating
Yours Campaign reminds all fans that the legal drinking age is 21. Providing alcohol to anyone
under 21 is illegal. TABC officers are present and ticketing for underage drinking and providing
alcohol to minors. Students receiving a citation will also receive a referral to the Center for
Student Rights and Responsibilities for further disciplinary action.
Some drinking games and drinking paraphernalia (kegs, beer bongs) are not conducive to the fan
and family-friendly atmosphere promoted at tailgating, and will be asked to be removed if
brought into the tailgating area.
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You can elect to leave trash in a plastic trash bag in your area, and it will be picked up by UNT
Facilities. However, any trash you leave laying on the grounds will not be picked up and will
require additional janitorial service later. Bagging up your trash for easy disposa! helps to keep
student fees low. Take pride in a clean, and green, UNT campus.
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The real action is inside the stadium at game time. Follow your
fellow Mean Green fans into the stadium thiry minutes before
kickoff to get the best seats and enjoy the camaraderie before the
game begins! Attending games helps build a community and will
help you feel more in touch with your faculty, staff, peers, and
the spirit of success that UNT embodies.
Go Mean Green!
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North Texas Daily (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 92, No. 34, Ed. 1 Wednesday, October 22, 2008, newspaper, October 22, 2008; Denton, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth145625/m1/2/: accessed April 23, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Special Collections.