Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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The MU Journey Empowers Students to Excel at Methodist by DR. BEN HANCOCK The Methodist University Journey has been underway for a full semester and our Monarchs have been busy on the four Journey pathways, Leadership Development, Community Engagement, Global Education and Undergraduate Research and Creativity. It seems like there is something happening every day that relates to the MU Journey. This morning, a Community Engagement project was completed at Operation Inasmuch, when students from the MU chapter of the American Marketing Association and the Resort Management Club, along with Sodexo, provided and served breakfast at the shelter. This is third time that students have managed this Community Engagement project. Leadership Development In September, the Leadership Program partnered with Fayetteville's Lafayette Society to host a distinguished visitor, Professor Marc Leepson, to speak on the leadership qualities of General Lafayette to commemorate the general's birthday. In November, the Lura S. Tally Center for Leadership Development sponsored the first speaker in the new Expert in Residence Lecture series. Major General Rodney O. Anderson (Ret.) spent the day on campus and spoke about leadership to several gatherings of students and community members. Also in November, students in the "Empower" residence halls participated in a series of discussions about leadership as displayed in three feature films, accompanied by lots of snacks, of course. This coming semester, freshmen and sophomores who are interested in being considered as Leadership Fellows will be submitting applications to be Leadership Fellows candidates. Community Engagement The Pine Forest High School (PFHS) Mentoring Project brought 150 PFHS upperclassmen to campus Nov. 30 as part of the year-long program, which has brought together 25 MU students to mentor these PFHS mentors who are in turn mentoring ninth-grade students at the high school. The students participated in a moderated panel discussion with MU students and had lunch on campus. Other ongoing or completed student projects from the Center for Community Engagement include Stop Hunger Now, assisting the Bicycle Man program, a regional salary-comparison survey project, a logo-design project for Fayetteville Urban Ministries, a rebranding project for the Fayetteville Regional Chamber and the Peace One Day Project with the Rotary Club. Students also recently completed a voter-registration project, where 45 students devoted 84 hours of work for the registration drive. Global Education Over winter break, nine students will travel with campus ministry on a mission trip to Haiti, where they will visit the St. Joseph Home for Boys and work with orphans and on construction projects. The week-long service project is one of several short Study and Service Abroad trips planned for MU students. The spring semester is Study Abroad's busy season, as students will take advantage of spring-break trips to Guatemala and an international tourism class' cruise that will visit Mexico, Honduras and Guatemala. In the late spring, Study Abroad trips are being planned for England, Scotland and possibly Sweden and Spain. Undergraduate Research and Creativity I traveled to Duke University recently to support presentations by 22 MU students at the 8th Annual State of North Carolina Undergraduate Research and Creativity Symposium Nov. 17. The students represented the university very well, and we had one of the largest groups participating in the event. Methodist University will hold its Second Annual Undergraduate Research and Creativity Symposium April 17, and I am looking forward to seeing many of the unique and interesting projects that our students will present. The Center for Undergraduate Research and Creativity is also in the process of developing a fellows program, which students will be able to apply for. In closing, I would like to congratulate each student who will graduate this Saturday, Dec. 15. I send you and your families my best wishes, and hope you will stay in touch with your classmates, friends, and faculty members as you embark on new adventures. Indeed, every Monarch has a journey, and I can't wait DR. BEN HANCOCK, President, Methodist to see where the MU Journey University. COMMENTS? Editor@upancomwill take us in 2013. ingweekly.com. No Controversy About Voter ID by JOHN HOOD Quarterly published a study by Oakland University political scientists Roger Larocca One of the first bills the North Carolina General Assembly will enact next year, and John Klemanski that examined several different election-law changes, including and that new Gov. Pat McCrory will sign, will establish a photo ID requirement to voter ID, same-day voter registration, no-excuse absentee voting and early voting. vote in North Carolina. It will pass quickly because it is uncontroversial. Using data from the 2000, 2004, and 2008 presidential elections, they found Yes, I know that left-wing activists and the news media consider voter ID laws that same-day registration and no-excuse absentee balloting resulted in higher voter to be controversial. But the public doesn't agree. Clear majorities of Republicans, turnout, all other things being held equal. Early voting actually resulted in lower Democrats, and unaffiliated respondents have consistently supported such turnout, for reasons best explained and analyzed another day (I find them at least identification requirements in public opinion polls. Back in August, for example, plausible). As for voter ID, the authors wrote, "... we find no evidence to suggest three-quarters of respondents in a Washington Post poll said they favored a policy that that voter identification regulations are associated with lower "required to show official, government-issued photo identification turnout among any age cohort in any of our three elections." If — such as a driver's license — when they cast ballots." anything, there is a small positive effect on turnout. Few public policies enjoy such broad support. Popularity Those on both sides of the issue ought to ponder the available doesn't make something true or wise, of course. But if something research. If you think that requiring voters to show identification is overwhelmingly popular, it is odd to label it controversial, at will disenfranchise large numbers of citizens who would otherwise least in a political sense. cast legitimate ballots, the research findings are inconsistent with Furthermore, the U.S. Supreme Court has recently ruled your thesis. However, if you think that requiring voters to show that photo ID requirements do not violate equal protection ID will deter large numbers of non-citizens or felons who would or other constitutional provisions, as long as those who lack driver's licenses are provided an alternative means of obtaining Voter ID requirements are an insurance policy otherwise cast fraudulent ballots, the same research findings are the necessary identification at public expense. The election-eve against the possibility that an extremely close inconsistent with your thesis, as well. Realistically, voter ID requirements are an insurance policy legal challenges to ID laws in several states succeeded only when election might be stolen by voter fraud. against the possibility that an extremely close election might be plaintiffs argued that there wasn't enough time to implement stolen by voter fraud. Keep in mind that because we run so many them properly before balloting — a problem that won't affect federal, state, and local elections in North Carolina, "extremely close" elections policies adopted more than a year before the next general election. are not exactly unheard of. In the 2012 cycle, only a few hundred votes separated My own view is that a photo ID requirement, if administered properly, is a victorious U.S. Rep. Mike McIntyre from David Rouzer in the 7th District. A state reasonable safeguard against the unlikely — but not unprecedented — event that senate race was settled by two dozen votes. certain kinds of voter fraud might tip the outcome of an election. To the extent that The public overwhelmingly believes that taking out either proponents or opponents of voter ID predict it will have large-scale effects such an insurance policy makes sense. The governor and on voting, however, they are making unwarranted claims. There appears to be no legislature are about to do it. empirical basis for them. JOHN HOOD, Contributing Writer. Somehow I suspect the Keep in mind that while North Carolina has no requirement, many other states COMMENTS? editor@upandcominelectoral system will survive and countries do. Scholars have studied their effects on voting. Most have found gweekly.com the "controversy." nothing of consequence. In March 2011, for example, State Politics & Policy WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM DECEMBER 12-18, 2012 UCW 17