Several students voiced their opinions at the town hall meetings hosted by SGA. Photo by Tony Heath. Some students dissatisfied with wellness center vote

Anthony Pickett/Staff Writer 

The wellness center referendum passed with an overwhelming 74% majority earlier this month, but some students are still unsatisfied with the results and the SGA’s “vote yes” campaign.

Braxton Harris, the SGA president, said that the SGA has been involved in the project for quite some time.

“Talks really began two years ago when several students said that there wasn’t much to do, so we supported the initiative,” he said. 

Lakecia Harris, AUM’s Director of Student Life, said it was natural for the SGA to lead the “vote yes” campaign.

“[The SGA] is the official voice of the students, so they were most likely to lead the charge for the wellness center,” she said.

Some students, however, believed that the SGA’s sponsorship of the “vote yes” campaign left one side of the debate unrepresented.

“[The ‘vote yes’ campaign] made people aware, but at the same time I think it was really one-sided.  It was like the 92 and 96 elections when MTV was doing ‘Rock the Vote.’ They were saying 'go out and vote, go vote,' but in the end it was only Clinton supporters,” said Franklin Thomas, a theatre major at AUM.

Thomas said he doesn’t support the referendum because he doesn’t think the building was worth the money, and he doesn’t want to pay for something he won’t be able to enjoy.

“It seems a little ridiculous to spend all this money to build this wellness center that is not going to be used.  We have enough facilities, like the gym, that already go unused.  Plus, I’m not going to be here when it's finished; I’ll be leaving when they are breaking ground,” he said. 

Other students echoed these sentiments.

A graduate student, who chose to remain anonymous, wrote an email which was forwarded school wide by Lakecia Harris.

In the email he said that the country’s economic situation would invariably cause tuition increases, but AUM didn’t need to add additional burdens, such as the wellness center cost, to student budgets.  He said that the wellness center wasn’t worth it and that there were cheaper ways to get fit.

“If you are a Freshman and this referendum passes, over your remaining time at AUM you will be forced to pay over $1,000 in additional fees. If you are wanting a less expensive way to keep yourself healthy, most of the commercial gyms in the Montgomery area, offer memberships for less than $20 per month.  So if you joined a gym today, during your remaining time at AUM you would spend less than what you will spend if this referendum passes and you would be able to receive benefit [sic] from you spending today!” he wrote.

The email was a response from a controversial email Lakecia Harris had sent out the day prior, in which she encouraged students to vote yes.

The email was controversial because it prompted some students to believe that the administration was trying to influence student votes.

“There was a concern that administrators might be trying to get students to vote yes, but that wasn’t the case,” said Lakecia Harris. 

Braxton agreed.

“I believe the email Lakecia sent was with good intentions.  She was trying to let people know that there was time to vote and to encourage them to. By no means do I think she was trying to sway anyone.  I regret that … students might think that,” he said.

Franklin, however, disagreed. 

“The campus is endorsing the wellness center, so [the email] makes the whole thing seem a little unfair.”

He said in the end the email was a non-issue.

“I don’t think it should have been addressed at all [in the email], but it didn’t hurt anyone.  There was no harm,” he said.

Braxton said that students can still contribute suggestions for the wellness center.

“If there are any ideas or suggestions that students feel should be included in the wellness center plan, then contact me,” he said.

“Lt. Dan from Forrest Gump.”-Nick Martin, 24, Biology/Pre-Med

“Corrections officer.”-Samantha Norris, 19, Psychology

 “Racist baby.”-Franklin Byrd Thomas, 25, Theatre

“Abby, the gothic girl, from NCIS.”-Candace Dyer, 19, Pre-health/Biology

“A Hippie.”-Christina Forshay, 19, Pre-Pharmacy 

“Witch.”-Lovely Varghese, Liberal Arts and Science

Students celebrate the arrival fall at the Harvest Moon Festival in the mid-80s.Harvest Moon festival to make a comeback this November

Christine Kneidinger/ Editor-in-Chief

The Harvest Moon Festival, an AUM tradition that fizzled out in the early 90s, is set to make its comeback on campus the first Saturday in November in the field behind the library tower. 

The festival dates back to October of 1978, where musicians from the band Harmony could be seen in their hot pants belting the blues for members of the audience as students lined up to skydive with the Auburn Skydiving club.

Originally sponsored by the SGA and local radio station Y-102, the event was a popular tradition in which students and faculty would come out to celebrate the arrival of fall in the late 70s, 80s and early 90s with music, dunking booths and food. 

The resurrection of the Harvest Moon Festival is the brainchild of Kathy Mitchell, Interim Director of Student Life. “I want to see AUM have some traditions that we can remember and hold on to. We have lost all of them. We lost the Harvest Moon Festival, we lost Mardi Gras, we had lost everything except for Homecoming that we can claim as a tradition," she said. 

Mitchell, who attended some of the first Harvest Moon Festivals herself in the early 80s, plans to do this every year. “I want to see us get back some of the things that were really fun and that we can go ahead and mark the dates and start planning for. The festival is something we can give back to the community, since we don’t do that anymore.”

Mitchell isn't the only administrator who was present at the Harvest Moon Festival in its heyday. Chancellor Veres, who attended the festival as a student in the 80s, remembers the festival as "an exciting outdoor event that had an old-styled carnival atmosphere."

The women of Zeta Tau Alpha hosted a jail booth each year, where one could pay 25 cents to capture and jail whomever they chose. Another longstanding tradition was the dunking booth, where students would line up to dunk their professors. Chancellor Veres recalls that the professors targeted were oftentimes the most popular, and the most unpopular on campus. 

The Office of Student Life plans to make this years event very similar to those of years past. While they will not be able to host a skydiving adventure or a dunking booth, the $13,000 budget will allow the event to feature several similar attractions to bring out the masses. 

The festival will host three regional bands throughout the day. Rolling in the Hay, a renegade bluegrass band, will take the stage at 11 a.m., followed by Groove Factor, a hip-hop band from Atlanta at 12:45 p.m. The last band to hit the stage will be Eleven, an 80s tribute band hailing from Alabama. 

Festival goers are encouraged to bring blankets, lawn chairs and their pets as they enjoy the performances. Coolers will also be allowed into the event. 

If homemade snacks from a cooler aren't your thing, there will vendors on location. The vendors at the festival will be Moe's Southwest Grill, Boomer-T's Barbeque, Papa Johns Pizza and Sims Snow Balls. American Humanics and Baptist Campus Ministries will be selling beverages and cotton candy to fundraise for their organizations. All vendors will be cash only. 

For entertainment, there will be inflatables, corn hole games, a hay maze, video game stations and face painting.

The 1982 festival saw 1,800 participants at the event. While this years crowd is expected to be a little under 1,000, Mitchell said that through extensive planning, the festival should increase in popularity as the years go by. "This is something that we plan to do every year, and will it only get better as time goes on," she said. "As soon as the festival is over this year, we will immediately turn around and start planning for next year." 

The Office of Student Life is still seeking volunteers, if interested, contact Lakecia Harris at lharri18@aum.edu

Band schedule: 

Rolling in the Hay (11 a.m.- 12:30 p.m.)

Groove Factor (12:45- 2:15)

Eleven (2:30- 4 p.m.)

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Teresa Edwards has Purell dispensers positioned all through her house in Overland Park, Kan. She makes her two young sons slather on the gel whenever they get home from school.

She would have made them wear the face masks she bought, if the things had fit properly. Now she's shopping for child-size versions.

"I was and I still am freaked out by swine flu," Edwards said.

So are millions of other worried people.

They're buying up face masks and sanitizing hand gels, hoping to stave off the H1N1 flu virus.

Demand from consumers and health care providers is creating nationwide shortages of these products and raising concerns that people may be putting too much faith in some flu countermeasures.

The Food and Drug Administration recently warned consumers to use extreme care when buying any products online that claim to prevent or treat swine flu.

"I think a lot of people want to feel like they're doing something to protect their family and themselves. It may give them a false sense of security," said Shawn Mueller, infection prevention and control manager at University of Kansas Hospital.

She recommends such basic measures as covering coughs and sneezes, washing hands frequently and staying home when you're ill.

Hand sanitizers are a good bet, Mueller said. They can kill flu viruses and make a good substitute for hand washing.

But the kinds of masks often used by the general public are only effective at stopping the sneezes of someone who is already sick. They are unlikely to keep people wearing them from catching the flu, she said.

"A normal, walking-around human doesn't need one," Mueller said.

Effective or not, swine flu avoidance measures have spread as rapidly as the virus.

Drugstores have moved their mask displays to prominent end-of-the-aisle positions.

Discount stores such as Target are advertising masks and hand sanitizers among their "flu essentials."

Hospitals are placing hand gel dispensers in their lobbies for visitors who come to see vulnerable patients. Doctors are handing out masks in waiting rooms.

The U.S. Army has even started issuing hand gel to new recruits in basic training, olive-drab bottles that fit neatly into a shoulder pocket.

Edwards' younger son, Anthony, 6, has asthma and allergies that make him vulnerable to flu and other respiratory infections.

"Any little virus he gets turns into pneumonia overnight," she said.

So Anthony and his older brother, Jeramieh, 9, are getting a lot of experience with hand gel dispensers.

Edwards went shopping for masks after eight of Jeramieh's classmates were out sick recently.

"If he picks up anything, he'll bring it home to Anthony. It's too much of a risk," she said.

Hand sanitizer sales have been tracking upward along with the nation's growing anxiety about swine flu.

People bought more than $129 million worth in the year ending Oct. 4. That is 29 percent more than the year before, according to Information Resources Inc., a Chicago market research firm that follows most mass merchandise outlets, except Wal-Mart.

Recently, sales have skyrocketed. In September alone, spending on hand sanitizers was 177 percent higher than a year earlier.

That is putting a strain on supply.

"Despite making huge investments to increase our capacity — running our plants 24/7 and increasing our staff — we are unable to keep up with the unprecedented demand," Mark Lerner, the president of Gojo Industries, which manufactures Purell for hospitals and other institutions, said in a recent statement.

Lerner warned against stockpiling the gel: "Stockpiling could cause an actual shortage, which, in turn, could threaten public health."

Some kinds of masks also are in short supply.

It is still possible to get surgical masks, the kind of lightweight, inexpensive masks many people buy.

If you have the flu, wearing one of these masks will help protect your family from your coughs and sneezes.

Doctors' offices and emergency rooms may ask you to put one on if you arrive with flu symptoms.

"If I were ill and the doctor suspects I have influenza, that would be an appropriate time for me to wear a mask," said Mueller of KU Hospital. "It's to protect others from me."

But these masks generally are too porous and their edges too leaky to offer real protection against catching the flu.

The kind of mask that does keep out the flu is called a respirator and has a filtering rating of N95 from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.

These disposable masks are an important protection for health care providers who deal every day with lots of patients with infectious diseases.

But manufacturers haven't been able to make them fast enough to keep up with demand, said J.P. Sankpill, president of U.S. Safety, a Lenexa, Kan.-based manufacturer and supplier of protective equipment.

Sankpill's factory in Lenexa makes air purifying respirators with replaceable filters. They afford the same protection as disposable respirators but are designed for repeated use. U.S. Safety also sells regular N95 respirators from other manufacturers.

"As it stands right now, there are lots of hospitals running out or that have run out of N95 respirators," Sankpill said.

The federal government had estimated in 2007 that billions more of these disposable masks would be needed during a pandemic, but it hasn't done anything to help manufacturers build up their production capacity, Sankpill said.

"This has been a known issue for two years at least, and for now it's too late (to increase the supply)," he said.

For the average person, N95 respirators may be protective overkill.

They're more expensive than surgical masks and can be unpleasant to wear for any length of time.

"Some folks have been wearing them all day or whenever they go out, and they're uncomfortable and they get hot," Mueller said.

To be effective, an N95 respirator has to be fitted properly so it is sealed on the face. That's not a job for amateurs.

When hospital workers are issued respirators, they go through a "fit test" that can take 20 minutes or longer.

After a worker dons the respirator, a hood is placed over his or her head. Chemicals with strong sweet or bitter tastes are squirted under the hood.

If the worker can detect the chemicals, it means the respirator isn't well sealed.

"The odds of the general public being fit-tested are slim to none," Sankpill said.

Health care providers can make better use of the limited supplies of respirators, he said.

"I'm not going to tell you not to get N95 respirators. You're trying to protect your family," Sankpill said.

"All I'm saying is, don't get any more than you need, and if you get them, use them."

Edwards' sons definitely will use any respirator masks she gets for them.

"If I found masks that work, I would have them wear them in public and in school," she said.

Finally, the recession is over.

What? You hadn't heard?

Of course it's over. The Dow busting through 10,000 has become ho-hum. Wall Street is nearly back to normal, with bankers going from taking taxpayer handouts to taking obscene bonuses.

Closer to home, Yahoo is yelling "Yippee" at quarterly profit that tripled, though they are less excited about falling revenue. Apple executives suffered back strain hauling back to Cupertino the fruits of what they are calling their most profitable quarter ever.

So, why so glum? Aren't you listening to Silicon Valley business leaders? They're all but kissing the Great Recession goodbye.

"We believe the worst of the recession is behind us," Google CEO Eric Schmidt said recently while announcing his company's record $1.64 billion take for the quarter.

"We think there is a good chance we will look back and see the tipping point occurred in the fourth quarter" was Cisco Systems CEO John Chambers' assessment, despite a disappointing quarter in which the company made only $1.1 billion.

CEO Paul Otellini's take on his chip-making company's $1.9 billion profit? "Intel's strong third-quarter results underscore that computing is essential to people's lives, proving the importance of technology innovation in leading an economic recovery."

That's right. Economic recovery. Happy days are here again.

So, why aren't you smiling?

Yes, there is the other side of the ledger. Unemployment in Silicon Valley is stubbornly stuck near 12 percent. Despite all the chipper talk of a turnaround, the area lost 2,700 jobs last month. Wages nationwide are on a pace to fall their furthest in any year since 1991, primarily because employers are cutting pay and hours.

It's almost as if Silicon Valley is a land of two economies. There is Planet Tech Behemoth, where the companies designing the future are beginning to feel the reassuring warmth of an economic thaw. And then there is chilly Planet Hosed, where exist inhabitants who have been looking for jobs for months and months.

"From my perspective, from a personal standpoint, we're still in the recession," says Ken Won, who was laid off from his senior marketing job at SGI in February. These days the San Carlos man is looking for work and tending to his jobsuccessstories.com Web site, which he launched to spread optimism and tips among the unemployed.

The Great Recession has turned us all into amateur economists, so we know joblessness is a lagging indicator. Companies begin to turn around first through new efficiencies. They make more money by spending less. Productivity rises, then output and sales, until demand can no longer be met. Then it's time to hire.

But all that blah-blah-blah doesn't do a lot for those who've been looking for work for months. They dwell on Planet Hosed where they've given up dinners out and movies, where they've given up everything but hope. They peer off into space at Planet Tech Behemoth, where those who have hung onto their jobs load their oversize Costco carts with oversize TVs and over-accessorized espresso makers.

"They say save for six months," says Lianne Avila, who's been out of work for nine. "That six months is long past."

But she is operating on the lagging-indicator theory. Surely, record earnings, or any earnings at all, will trickle down to those who need them most.

"I think it just takes time," says Avila, a former corporate saleswoman from Daly City. "People kind of expect changes overnight, and just from hearing different people speak, I don't think that's how it works."

No, it takes time. Maybe two months, maybe four, maybe more.

But there is no reason to think that better times are not eventually coming to Planet Hosed. And when they finally arrive, we can all join the party.

CHICAGO — Motorola and Verizon Wireless on Wednesday unveiled the Droid, a smart phone that will test whether the companies can use software from Google to chip away at the dominance of Apple's iPhone.

The Droid, a svelte slider with a full keyboard and an expansive touch screen, will be available at Verizon Wireless on Nov. 6 for $199.99 after a $100 mail-in rebate. Customers have to sign up for a two-year contract and data plan.

Success of the new phone, which is being launched in a competitive holiday season, is crucial for Motorola, where co-Chief Executive Officer Sanjay Jha has placed a heavy bet on Android to turn around the company's mobile devices business.

The Droid is the first phone with Android 2.0, the newest version of Google's operating platform, and is also Verizon Wireless' first Android device. The carrier announced a partnership with Google this month, pledging to co-develop phones and other gadgets using Android software. Like Apple's App Store, Google's Android Market offers thousands of applications that can customize a phone to perform functions such as search for reviews of local businesses, download podcasts and connect with social networks.

"What this phone does is it gives us the answer to what customers want in an open platform," said Marni Walden, Verizon Wireless' president of the Midwest area.

Motorola conceived of the Droid and brought the design to Verizon Wireless about a year ago, when Jha was making the rounds at carriers to bolster the phone maker's turnaround strategy, said Melissa Gardner, Motorola'svice president of product marketing.

Walden said Verizon Wireless' belief in the new phone's potential was a driving factor in the company's decision to embrace Android.

"Everyone believed it was the right operating system," Walden said. "There was an executive-level belief at all three companies that the customer experience had to be the best."

According to Motorola and Verizon Wireless, the Droid's screen has twice the resolution of the iPhone and is large enough so users can look at a full Web page without needing to pan back and forth. The Droid comes with a 5-megapixel camera and flash so it can take photos at night, one feature that Verizon Wireless is touting as another advantage over the iPhone.

Iqbal Arshad, vice president and general manager of the product innovation group in Motorola's mobile devices business, said the company developed a special power management chip that makes the phone more efficient in its battery use. The chip can sense light levels and adjust the display as necessary and can tweak processing speeds depending on what the phone is doing.

"Right from the get-go, all three companies wanted to push the envelope," Arshad said. "Everyone came in with a pretty open mind and decided to create a really compelling product."

Newspaper journalist Diana Sugg with her Ingram Lecture plaque. Photo by Jasmine Jamison. Two top journalists speak at AUM

Desiree Taylor/ Entertainment Editor

AUM had the honor of hearing two journalists this week, Pulitzer Prize winner Diana K. Sugg from the Baltimore Sun, and NBC News-Atlanta Bureau correspondent Janet Shamlian. Both women gave their personal thoughts on the “death spiral” of the news industry and its core values.

Sugg suggests that 85 percent of news comes from American newspapers, and that finding “what matters”—integrity, truth, and heart—is important.

“Today we need journalists that have a soul. As a reporter, you’re part social worker, part detective and part anthropologist wrapped into one,” says Suggs in her story-teller like voice. “When you go into this crazy world, remember what matters. Nothing is more important than understanding people and the world.”

Sugg and Shamlian say reporting is their passion. Both women acknowledged how the industry has changed, and how its reprogramming leaves some uncertainty.

“We have 800 community and specialty websites and blogs now,” says Suggs. Journalism has lost 14,000 jobs and 45 percent of advertising has dwindled. A lot of my friends and colleagues have lost their jobs and aren’t going back to journalism because of lack of jobs. No one really knows what’s going to happen in the future.”

Shamlian speaks of the broadcast industry in the same way. “Things are changing, and this business is so fickle. There’s even talk of the New York Times charging for its content. Correspondents twitter, blog, and even make their own videos now. I bring my office with me,” says the quick witted and humorous personality as she shows something that looks similar to a makeup bag. “I pull out my microphone and my recorder, and record in the plane’s bathroom or at home. I need this job for the health insurance—I have five kids!"

Despite downturn in the industry—like some newspaper content dropping from one hundred stories a day to only forty—both women are hopeful about the future of the news, suggesting jobs are still available. Open-mindedness and getting up to speed about what’s out there in technology is key.

Shamlian and Suggs give tips on how students can be successful in the field. Both stress the importance that persistence is key.

“Don’t take no for an answer,” says Shamlian. “Keep knocking on doors until you get what you want.”

“Get stories right and in context. Follow your gut instinct,” says Suggs. "Be humble. Write the story because people are hungry for news, and they will thank you for them later”.

Janet Shamlian currently lives in Texas with her military husband and five children. She graduated from the University of Missouri School of Journalism, and worked in 2004 as a freelance writer and correspondent for MSNBC and NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams.

Diana K. Sugg is a married mother of four who worked for The Baltimore Sun. She attended Villanova University and won a Pulitzer Prize in 2003 for her series of medical stories on stillborns.

President Barack Obama signs into law into law the National Defense Authorization Act for FY2010 at the White House, in the East Room, October 28, 2009 in Washington, DC. (Olivier Douliery/Abaca Press/MCT)

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama on Wednesday signed the first major piece of federal gay rights legislation, a milestone that activists compared to the passage of 1960s civil rights legislation empowering blacks.

The new law adds acts of violence against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people to the list of federal hate crimes. Gay rights activists voiced hope that the Obama administration would advance more issues, including legislation to bar workplace discrimination, allow military service and recognize same-sex marriages.

Congress passed the hate crimes protections as an unlikely amendment to this year's Defense Authorization Act. In a signing ceremony in the White House East Room, Obama said that the gay rights protections represented a "long-awaited change" that would protect people who are victimized because of "who they love ... or who they are."

Legislation barring firms from firing employees on the basis of their sexual orientation could win passage in the House of Representatives by year's end, gay rights advocates said. More than half of U.S. states currently allow employers such freedom.

Obama has promised to push Congress to repeal the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy that prohibits being openly gay while serving. A Senate panel is expected to hold a hearing on that issue next month, and legislation could be debated next year.

Gay rights activists also hope for repeal next year of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which would give federal legitimacy to gay marriages recorded in states that allow them.

The amendment signed into law Wednesday was named partly for Matthew Shepard, a 21-year-old student at the University of Wyoming who died after a 1998 beating targeting him because he was gay, and whose parents were instrumental in leading the fight for such legislation. The law also was named for James Byrd Jr., a black Texas man dragged to his death in a racially motivated killing the same year.

The measure also extends protections to those attacked because of their gender or disability.

Federal hate crimes law already covers race, religion and national origin. The new law strengthened it substantially, however, by removing a requirement that a victim must have been participating at the time of the assault in some federally protected activity, such as voting, for it to apply.

Matthew Shepard's parents joined Obama for the ceremony, as did the family of the late Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts, who until his death in August was deeply involved in pushing the legislation.

The Shepards' fight took a decade. With recent elections adding more lawmakers who are supportive of gay rights, by 2007 the Congress had sufficient votes to pass the legislation, but then-President George W. Bushindicated that he'd veto it.

Obama, campaigning last year, promised to sign it.

Judy Shepard issued a statement saying that she and her husband, Dennis, "are incredibly grateful to Congress and the president for taking this step forward on behalf of hate crime victims and their families, especially given the continuing attacks on people simply for living their lives openly and honestly."

She also called on Americans to look beyond legislation and work in their own lives to advance acceptance of gays.

Critics of the legislation, including several Republican congressional leaders, argued that an attack against another person is an attack, regardless of motivation, and that no special categories are appropriate.

Many also voiced concerns about "thought police" and fears that the new legal protections could curb free speech if those who oppose gay rights fear they could somehow be prosecuted for publicly voicing their thoughts. But the law punishes acts — not thoughts.

Gay rights advocates said that the legislation will enable the Justice Department to step in when states can't or won't, and will make extra federal money and resources available to local law enforcement officials who need help preventing or prosecuting such attacks.

They also predicted that it would affect American society in a meaningful way.

"It sends a number of messages across America: that hate will not be tolerated, that this Congress and administration value all Americans," said Joe Solmonese, the president of the Human Rights Campaign, the largest gay rights advocacy group.

Malcolm Lazin, the founder of another advocacy group, Equality Forum, said the legislative progress comes at a time when reported violence against gays is on the rise. Last year, he said, 29 gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender Americans were killed because of their sexual orientation, and that since Shepard's death, more than 16,000 hate crimes have been reported.

"This is really the first federal gay rights bill," Lazin said. "So it is a literally historic moment. This is America acknowledging homophobia as a social problem."

Lazin, who helped organize a demonstration outside the White House on Wednesday calling for more protections, said the legislation "really is the beginning of a process of addressing homophobia in our schools, our communities, our culture. We learned from the black civil rights movement: In 1964, there was the Civil Rights Act, but that didn't mean it ended violence or created equality. It was the beginning of a process that's ongoing. That's how we view the Matthew Shepard Act."

———

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

Nearly a million and a half angry Facebook users are protesting recent changes to the Web site. The leader of the furious online mob? A smiling eighth-grader from Apex, N.C., who wears his baseball cap backwards and likes to play FarmVille.

His parents were not aware of this.

"He's doing what on Facebook?" asked Jonathan Woodlief's father when a McClatchy Newspapers reporter called their home near Raleigh, N.C., on Tuesday night.

Then David Woodlief and his wife, Claire, got Jonathan, 14, out of bed. He came downstairs and explained just how he happened to become the leader of one of the fastest-growing viral movements online. The group was booming by more than 100 new members a minute on Wednesday.

Adding a twist, Jonathan just happens to be a dead-ringer for Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, another social media whiz kid, who is only 11 years older than Jonathan.

Jonathan is the administrator of the Facebook group CHANGE FACEBOOK BACK TO NORMAL!!, which has exploded over the past six days in response to unpopular changes the site made to its News Feed feature. The feed now shows only those friends Facebook deems "important" to you.

Maybe innocence helps a cause. Jonathan added a note to the side of the group page that reads:

``Lets try and get 10,000,000 people to join! :)''

Jonathan did not start the group, but joined it a day after it was started because he dislikes the changes. Poking around on the page, he noticed that the group had no administrator, the person who configures the page, allows posts, and makes rules for the group.

Believing in the cause — and perhaps sensing an opportunity — "I clicked a button to make myself the admin, and that was it," he says.

Since then he has been inundated with messages and friend requests from around the world.

"We had no idea," David Woodlief said after the situation became more clear. "He's a smart kid."

Actress Phadra Foster and director Niel Seibel rehearse for next months performances. Photo by Tony Heath. "Lysistrata" to hit AUM stage early November

Ian MacIssac/ Assistant Editor

Written by the Greek master of Old Comedy, "Lysistrata" details the protest of numerous young women in ancient Greece who attempt to end the Peloponnesian War by withholding sex from their warrior husbands, hoping that their longing for intimacy will force them to stop fighting.

However, AUM’s visionary director, Neil Seibel, has updated the play, setting his version in 1969, during the height of the Vietnam War, instead of in the fifth century. The AUMnibus sat down to talk with Seibel during rehearsals Monday night. “I wanted to bring it closer to something the students could relate to, something they were familiar with,” he said.

On the surface, "Lysistrata" seems like a strange pick for AUM; most of the plays our theatre produces are more modern dramas, such as "Of Mice and Men" and "Death of a Salesman," and so an ancient Greek comedy by a writer so ancient that few of his texts remain is a bit of an outlier. Why did AUM pick "Lysistrata?" “I wanted to change the game up a little bit, and give the students something they would be a little less familiar with,” Seibel said.

“Also, it was just practical; Lysistrata is heavy on female characters, and we have more females compared to males than ever before here at AUM. So, I wanted to pick something that wouldn’t force me to be super-competitive when it came to who got what role. We have a great ensemble cast with this play.”

According to Seibel, practices have been going very well, with few hitches, and the actors are steadily improving. The set is complete: an ancient Greek acropolis, decorated in tye-dye and peace signs, with the floor of the stage a swirl of bright, happy colors with a yin-yang in the middle.

“I wanted to bring a mix of the original play, with the Acropolis, as well as a dose of the sixties, with the tye-dye and the peace signs, and really just see if I could blend them together well, and I think I did," he said.

"Lysistrata’s" opening night is Thursday, Nov. 5 at 7:30 p.m.

Other performances include:

Friday, Nov. 6 at 7:30 p.m.

Saturday, Nov. 7 at 7:30 p.m.

Friday, Nov. 13 at 7:30 p.m.

 Saturday, Nov 14 at 7:30 p.m.

Sunday, Nov. 15 at 2 p.m