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The

Northwest Missourian

Thursday, April 24, 2014

80,000
78,000

76,000
74,000

78,468
births in
Mo. of
college
class of
2014

76,005
class of
2015

72,000
70,000

1991

1992

V89 | N28

Halt of Booth dean

search causes yet
another roadblock

5,664 fewer
potential students
7.21% decrease
from 199195
75,146
class of
2016

1993

73,279
class of
2017

BRANDON ZENNER
News Editor | @brandonzenner

72,804
class of
2018

1994

1995
GRAPHIC BY WES ROCKWOOD | NW MISSOURIAN

Northwest decreased enrollment caused by falling birth rates, graduates

BRANDON ZENNER

News Editor | @brandonzenner

Northwest and other universities across Missouri are working to reach graduation and enrollment goals set by the Department of Higher Education. Missouris Big Goal, asks for 60 percent of
adults to receive a certificate or degree by 2025.
In order to do so, Northwest must recruit more
students out of high school to wear the green and
white.
Beverly Schenkel, dean of enrollment management, says Northwest is doing exactly that.
Her data shows that submitted applications increased three or four percent from 2013.
Were real happy with the growth that were
going to have going into this fall, Schenkel said.
In a lot of regions where we recruit, the number
of high school graduates are declining.
According to the DHE, Northwests student enrollment for Fall 2013 was 5,482. Though
Northwest saw a 3 percent decrease since 2012,

vice president of student affairs Matt Baker says

its not because of recruitment; its about the number of students graduating high school.
The number of people graduating high school
in the last three years has decreased more than in
the last 10 years, Baker said. A lot of the decrease
is because of birth rates.
According to the Department of Health and
Human Services, birth rates decreased each year
from 1991 to 1997. In 1990, the birth rate began to
decline from 16.7 births per 1,000 people to 14.5 in
1997. While there are slight increases in the following years, rates continued to decrease to the
current rate, which hovers around 13.
Northwest has adjusted to fewer students
going to college efficiently, however. The University decided to close the doors to Dieterich Hall in
2013, a move Baker said saved around $100,000.
The University will close the doors to Phillips Hall
in fall 2014 for the same reasons. With the rising
cost of college, Baker says Northwest had to become innovative with its
recruitment strategy.

Becoming innovative also meant a new recruitment strategy. Within the last two years, the
University began working with the higher education consulting firm Noel-Levitz to plan improvements for its marketing and recruitment strategies. Since then, Northwest has launched a more
recruitment-friendly website, which has already
shown qualitative success, Baker said.
They came in and helped us analyze our own
goals, where we want to be and what are our opportunities, he said. The conventional wisdom
in higher ed is its cheaper to keep a student here
than it is to recruit them here.
Schenkel and Baker both believe the switch
has led to more collaboration between student
affairs, support services and enrollment management and are confident the move will lead to more
success.
Its a very good sign that were able to grow,
Schenkel said, it shows that students see value in
the Northwest education, the majors were offering and their ability to be successful here.

Three years.
Students and faculty in the
Booth College have spent nearly that
amount of time without their main
source of leadership and guidance as
the University again halted its search
for a permanent dean.
Head to the employment opportunities page on Northwests website,
and you will find an opening for the
soon-to-be vacant provost position.
After nearly three years, no listing
pops up for the Dean of the Melvin
D. and Valorie G. Booth College of
Business and Professional Studies,
however. The Booth College houses
students studying business, agricultural students, communications and
mass media.
The dean oversees all the different departments and helps set
the course for the way the department is going to go, said Cody Uhing, student senate president. What
students see in the classroom comes
from a teacher who needs leadership
from the dean. Its important to students on a higher level that they really
dont think about initially.
The position of Dean of the
Booth College became vacant in 2011
when then Dean Thomas Billesbach
announced his retirement, at which
time Greg Haddock, Northwests
vice provost and dean of the graduate
school, was named acting dean.
My thought process in this
whole thing was that theyre going
to find the best person for the job. If
that takes a year, if it takes two years,
so be it, said Matt Walker, department chair for communication and
mass media. As far as a timeline
goes, its not something you kind of
just rush into.
Stephen Ludwig, chair of the
department of business, was part of
the search committee in fall 2012 and

SEE PROVOST | A7

Curious condition creates colorful college career

1 in 27
1:3
40%

LAUREN MCCOY

AAsst. News Editor | @McCoy014

Pocahontas may be able to feel the forest and paint with all the colors of of the
wind, but senior Liz Christie can read with
all the hues of the rainbow.
The way I understand it, its when the
brain interprets two different senses and
switches them or connects them in some
way, Christie explained. I see colors with
my letters.
What started as a puzzling frustration
turned into an interesting diagnosis when
Christie learned she had a condition known
as synesthesia. Although Christie sees print
in black and white, she sees colors when she
tries to comprehend the text.
Some people with synesthesia can hear
colors or taste sounds, depending on their
variation of the disorder. Documented cases
range from being able to describe the scent
of a white wine as an aquamarine breeze
to the ability to create dishes that taste like
hope or condolence.
Christie said she feels differently based
on each color she sees. Due to what she calls
the personality of the letters, she struggles
with spelling because she spells words how
they feel to her as opposed to their standard
spelling.

The personality of colors also once

came off the page for Christe in another
form as well: music.
Christie came to Northwest with a love
for music and began her college career in
that department. This especially appealed
to her because, before an earth-shattering
confrontation with a professor, Christie
could see colors when she heard music.
When I could hear sounds with my colors, it depended on the type of energy the
song was giving off, and then I could interpret it based off of that, she said.
But the neon notes ended for Christie
after a professor in her music major told her
she would never be a teacher due to her disability.
She told me I wasnt going to be a
teacher because I was going to make them
challenged in the field of spelling, Christie
said.
For her, this was the last straw in a long
line of put-downs from someone she looked
up to, and it extinguished her musical passion. After this traumatizing experience,
Christie made the switch to education where
the professors words continue to haunt her.
That has stuck with me the entire time
Ive tried to become a teacher, especially
when Im in front of kids, Christie said.
Theyre going to point out what Im doing

have a type of
synesthsia

ratio of male to
female

synesthetes have
relatives with
synesthesia

wrong; theyre very inquisitive and blunt,

and theyll tell you.
The harsh experience had a silver lining
though: another fiery drive emerged from
the ashes of her love for music.
When I talk to people about it, theyre
really interested in it, she said. I dont
want to be ashamed of it; my mother was
ashamed of her dyslexia, and she still is, but
Im an open book. You can ask me anything.
After changing her major to education,
Christie encountered another tipping point
in the form of a bulletin board in the classroom of a Horace Mann Lab School teacher.

SEE SYNESTHESIA | A7

SHAWNA KINGSTON | NW MISSOURIAN

Senior Liz Christie demonstrated an example of how her brain

interprets letters into colors before she can understand them.

Cambridge University study reveals dangers behind day time napping

RYAN EDWARDS

Missourian Reporter| @RyanaldoEdwards

A 13-year study published in the

American Journal of Epidemiology
revealed that if you are taking naps
during the day, your life is going to be
much shorter.
The study suggests that naps were
linked to an increased risk of people
dying from respiratory diseases such
as Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary
Disease. COPD is a progressive disease making it hard to breathe.
Researchers at Cambridge University studied the habits of over
16,000 men and women in Britain,

and what they found was startling.

A third of the participants in the
study died before they reached the age
of 65, and the connection was their
sleepy habits during the day.
Further studies are needed before
any recommendations can be made,
the researchers, from the University of
Cambridge, wrote in the May issue of
the American Journal of Epidemiology. Excessive daytime napping might
be a useful marker of underlying
health risks, particularly respiratory
problems, especially among those 65
years of age or younger.
The studies show that sleep is an
essential, not an optional, part of your

day. According to the American College Health Association, if you dont

get enough sleep during the night, you
are prone to take more naps during
the day.
Jennifer Kennymore, health educator at the Wellness Center, says that
the length of a good nights sleep is
different for everybody.
The recommendations that I
have seen are that people should get
anywhere between seven and nine
hours of sleep a night, Kennymore
said. It also really depends on the individual, as well.
Besides the risk of shorter longevity, other recent studies show if

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depressed state of mind.

Aveilino Verceles, assistant professor at the University of
Maryland School of Medicine said
in an April 2013 article published by
WebMD that sleep can cause mood
swings.
Sleep and mood affect each other, Verceles said. Its not uncommon
for people who dont get enough sleep
to be depressed or for people who are
depressed not to sleep well enough.
So before forgoing sleep in hopes
of a daytime slumber, keep in mind
you very well could be taking years off
of your life, one nap at a time.

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you force yourself to stay awake either

cramming for midterms or partying
friends, it can eventually take its toll
on your health and learning.
The ACHA says lack of sleep can
cause the thinking processes to slow
down, problems remembering new
information, slower reaction times
(this most important for drivers), and
it can also lead to faulty decisionmaking, also lead to people taking
more risks.
People have also reported that the
lack of sleep can cause them to be irritable and cranky when they cant get
enough sleep, and many have reported that the lack of sleep can lead to a

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