DIVERSITY CENTER SET TO OPEN
“The Burrow” – a space that will be home to Temple Student Government’s TUnity statement and where students can learn more about diversity – is set to have a soft opening next month.
Located at 2024-2028 N. Broad St., the furnished multi-room facility will offer a kitchen space, equipped with a coffee maker and refrigerator. It will offer plenty of seating, conference tables, rooms to work in, and a security desk. The huge outdoor area features a gazebo and plenty of trees.
Rhonda Brown, Temple’s associate vice president of the office of institutional diversity, equality, advocacy and leadership, said the space was needed in order for students to openly talk about tough topics concerning diversity.
“There has to be a place where people can have hard conversations,” Brown said.
Brown added that “The Burrow” was chosen as the name for the location because of Temple’s mascot.
“A burrow officially is an underground owl’s nest. Because we service [Temple] Owls, [the name] made sense,” she said.
Carmen Phelps, director of student engagement, said she expects the space to bring the diverse student body together.
“I’d really like to see it used as a place where students can do coalition building, work together, and collaborate,” Phelps said. “The point is for it to be a multifunctional space. We want to be able to measure the impact that all the programming will have on student development.”
Brown and Phelps said they hope to see President Theobald and the Board of Trustees among others at the official opening of the space, which will take place sometime after Spring Break.
-Sequoia Hall
STUDENTS REELING FROM FIRE
An electrical fire burned through 1534 N. 18th St., an off-campus apartment that housed several students, on the night of Jan. 16.
Evan Mallon, a senior visual art major with a concentration in illustration, found out via a voicemail from his roommate that his apartment sustained damage.
The three-floor building was drowned with smoke. The stairs were destroyed and windows were blown out.
Mallon and his roommate live on the second floor in the rear of the apartment. The fire has not affected his living space, unlike some of the other floors.
“You can’t really get in there as far as I can tell,” Mallon said. “I called the landlord’s daughter and she’s letting me in to go get stuff because I didn’t know I was going to be out of my house and home for a while.”
“I guess mine is one of the only habitable ones so far,” he added.
Michael McKelvey, a sophomore political science and environmental studies double major, said he was home taking a nap when the fire alarm woke him around 5 p.m.
“When I woke up there was fire coming out of the electrical sockets near the washer and dryer,” McKelvey said. “There was a lot of smoke coming out of the basement in the boiler room. We opened the door and there were some boxes that were on fire.”
McKelvey added that the fire department arrived minutes later.
The apartment’s landlord, who is currently not living in the United States, has been unavailable for the tenants to communicate with since the fire.
Because McKelvey said he doesn’t know how safe the house is, he and his three roommates have been in the process of finding a new living space.
“It’s pretty unsettling. I just don’t know how safe the house was,” he said. “There wasn’t a fire escape for the people upstairs and the stairs burned down. That’s kind of terrifying.”
-Emily Rolen
BOT APPROVES NEW DEPARTMENT
In public meetings on Thursday, Jan. 22, three committees of Temple’s Board of Trustees – Academic Affairs, Budget and Finance and Executive – announced and approved the creation of a new Department of Thoracic Medicine and Surgery in the School of Medicine.
The new department will consolidate three pre-existing sections in the Temple Lung Center and create three new sections – one for Pulmonary, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine, one for Thoracic Surgery, and one for Lung Transplants. Thirty doctors at Temple Hospital will be transferred to the new department, five of whom will also be receiving tenure.
The Board also approved a $25.8 million allocation to the creation of the new department.
“This will consolidate all of the doctors under one roof,” said Dr. Larry Kaiser, CEO of Temple’s Health System and dean of the Medical School. “It’s an advantage to have the [lung] surgeons and the transplant [doctors] all in one place.”
Dr. Kaiser cited the growth of the lung transplant program at Temple as the reason for the creation of the new department, and stated that the new department would also make treatment more efficient for patients.
“Patients just want to get their lung disease treated,” he said. “They don’t want to see multiple doctors in multiple places.”
-Christian Matozzo
CAWLEY REMOVED FROM BOARD
In his second day in office, Gov. Tom Wolf recalled more than two dozen of former Gov. Tom Corbett’s eleventh-hour appointments, including Jim Cawley, the former Lt. Gov. who served on Temple’s Board of Trustees as an ex-officio member during Corbett’s term.
Wolf spokesman Jeff Sheridan told the Inquirer that the action should not affect Wolf’s ability to govern, as he and the legislature face a $2.3 billion deficit.
“He is still confident he can work with both parties and move forward to fix the budget and better fund education,” Sheridan said. “He made it clear he did not appreciate the process – the midnight appointment. He said he was going to review it, he did, and took action.”
Wolf said in a statement that he made the decision because his “top priority as governor of Pennsylvania is to restore public trust in government.”
The move has already upset Republicans including Senate Majority Leader Jake Corman.
“The honeymoon is over,” Corman told the Inquirer. “He is not off to a flying start, for someone who said he was going to do things differently.”
Wolf’s office did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
-Steve Bohnel
SUSPECT NABBED FOR ROBBERIES
Temple Police have apprehended a suspect in connection with two Thursday robberies.
Executive Director of Campus Safety Services Charlie Leone said in an email Friday that 23-year-old Kareem Clancy of the 3200 block of Fox Street is being charged with two counts of robbery.
Leone said Clancy was armed with a pellet gun and approached a male student, taking his backpack which contained the student’s cell phone and wallet. There were no injuries.
Leone said the suspect was found with property from both complainants, and had attempted to discard the pellet gun, which he said was disguised to appear as a real pistol.
According to a TU Alert, the first robbery took place around 10:45 a.m. in the 1600 block of French Street, between Susquehanna Avenue and Diamond Street.
A Temple Police officer apprehended the suspect shortly after the second robbery of another student, which occurred at Carlisle and Jefferson streets shortly after the first, Leone said.
A TU Alert sent out around 2 p.m. indicated that the suspect had been apprehended.
Police are still searching for another suspect in connection with a robbery which took place around 7:40 p.m. Wednesday, when a male student was robbed near 18th and Arlington streets.
Leone said two men had approached a student in that robbery, and that one of them had a handgun.
The student in that incident surrendered his phone and wallet, but was not injured. The suspects then fled on foot east on Arlington Street, toward 17th Street.
-Lian Parsons
