Layden's Lineup

By Jessica Wray

At the ripe age of 3, the only things greater than the smell of fresh cut grass and the freedom of the great outdoors is a good movie – Monster’s Inc. – and the vibrant color orange.

Layden Vaughn loves his trampoline. The small, one-person contraption rests in the living room, and his mom says he can’t get enough of it.

On Facebook, there’s a video of Layden – small snapshots of his personality shown in bouncy, chaotic energy that only toddlers know how to harness, and a cute, cheeky smile. He does this little dance, with his hands on his hips, his upper body waving back and forth to an unheard beat playing in his head.

In one part of the video, Layden cradles two handfuls of toys carefully, like every child does in the ever-frustrating process of having to move your toys to the perfect play spot. He hugs them close to his chest, the Monster’s Inc. action figures sticking out in all sorts of angles from his small hands.

He sets them down on the table, his perfect play spot.

But Layden doesn’t make any noises. He doesn’t bang them together in an unseen battle between Mike, the one-eyed monster, and the big, blue and purple-spotted Monster’s Inc. character.

Instead, they’re lined up carefully. In a perfect, neat little row.

Because, his mom says, Layden doesn’t play with toys. He never has.

At 12 months, she said, he was on track with other children his age physically, but wouldn’t talk, nor would he try too. High anxiety in social situations – even with family – gave her another reason to suspect something might be off about her little boy.

At 18 months, Layden’s line of toys began in earnest.

When Layden was almost 2-years-old, his mother, Rachelle Vaughn, 26, took him to a pediatrician, where the doctor put her in touch with First Steps, an Indiana program that works with very young children. They told Vaughn Layden had a sensory processing disorder – a disorder that effects how the nervous system takes in and decodes messages through the senses, and transmits to motor skills and appropriate behavior.

“They said that he qualified to have them work with him until he was 3,” Vaughn said. “They worked with him for a whole year. He had speech, occupational therapy, and developmental therapy.”

Each therapy session, she said, was once a week for an hour. She noticed improvement, but had always wondered if there was a different explanation for Layden’s problems.

“When he turned three, it was actually almost a year ago, it was at his big meeting,” Vaughn said. “(His therapists said) that he, without a doubt, had autism.”

One in every 88 American children are on the autism spectrum, autismspeaks.org says. Autism Spectrum Disorder, or ASD, is a general term for various complex developmental brain disorders. And on the Autism Society of Indiana webpage, they say the numbers are higher – “according to a new government report that found that 1 out of every 50 school-age children – roughly one on every school bus – has the condition,” the website says.

  According to autismspeaks.org, a website dedicated to the national advocacy and awareness for autism, says “these disorders are characterized, in varying degrees, by difficulties in social interaction, verbal and nonverbal communication and repetitive behaviors. They include autistic disorder, Rett syndrome, childhood disintegrative disorder, pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified , known as PDD-NOS, and Asperger syndrome.”  

Since Layden received a straightforward diagnosis from his therapists saying he has autism, it’s been an uphill battle for the Vaughn and her husband, who also have a 2-year-old son, Cooper.

The problem, she said, isn’t that there aren’t any programs for autistic children in her area, or that there isn’t anyone willing to help – it’s about finding ways to pay for treatment.

“He just recently got into ABA therapy. Before that, as soon as he turned 3 last fall, he started in developmental preschool, because we couldn’t get him into ABA therapy with our state insurance,” Vaughn said.

ABA therapy, or Applied Behavior Analysis, is a treatment commonly used for children with autism. Behavior analysis works with how learning takes place. A common tool used in ABA is positive reinforcement.

One exercise his therapist uses with Layden, Vaughn said, includes giving Layden a snack or a toy, and telling him he has to wait to pick it up or go to it.

“He’s up to 10 seconds,” Rachelle said.

And she was proud. For Layden, who is energetic and always moving, 10 seconds is a huge accomplishment.

But paying for this kind of treatment is pricey.

Vaughn said she called everyone. No one was willing to help her, she said. Their insurance company would tell them to call someone else, and then someone else again. It was a never ending circle of run-around phone calls.

So, she said, they had to get off state insurance, and they went with a private company instead.

Now they pay for insurance out-of-pocket. It’s what they need for Layden’s therapy, and to keep seeing him progress, she said.

And progress he has.

Franklin College student Morgan McClellan, a junior journalism major and Layden’s aunt, said Layden has made strides since starting his therapy.

When he eats, she said, he’ll take one bite of a chicken nugget, run around for a minute, and then come back to the table to take another bite.

But now, she said, “He’ll be able to sit at lunch for 25 minutes.”

And that’s not all.

For a child who wouldn’t speak, and didn’t seem to want to try a year and a half ago, Layden now says short, fragmented sentences, that he enunciates pretty well, Vaughn said.

“He has started talking. He communicates what he wants with words now,” Vaughn said.

And the shining moment for her, she said, was something many other parents take for granted.

“Love you, mom mom,” he said, in a clear voice, not disjointed or higher pitched like his broken speech had been previously.

It was his “I love you,” in the clear voice of Layden, something Vaughn had never heard before.

“I cried, and I held him for like an hour. I knew it was in there.””

The therapy has been working, she said, and she hopes more people come to understand what autism looks like, and know that it’s different for everybody.

“I don’t want to change who Layden is,” Vaughn said.

And McClellan agrees.

Him lining up his toys, she said, she thinks is his way to cope. It’s something that he’s figured out how to do on his own.

It’s not just autism awareness any more, it’s autism acceptance, and autism appreciation. You shouldn’t just be aware of it and try to fix it. Autism isn’t something that I believe anymore should be cured,” she said.

At the recent lecture given by Elaine Hall, “Parenting a child with special needs: A spiritual journey,” junior Natalie Miller asked Hall a question and addressed the crowd. Her insight into autism comes from a special relationship with the topic. Miller has autism.

“I feel that what’s between our ears and what’s inside our ribcage is more important than a doctor’s diagnosis,” she said.

She asked Hall, “How do you get neuro-typical people to try and enter your world?”

“I know my entire life I’ve had to look at the real world and I’m glad that I do have the insights that I have, but it’s my world and how I perceive things. And it’s like people treat it as if it doesn’t matter. No one takes the time to really try to see where I’m coming from. I can tell from how they’re talking, they’re wanting to get it over with. I feel this almost every single day, with even people I know care, and it hurts me. How do you get people to understand you when they’re not interested to begin with?”

In response, after a moment of silence, Hall said it’s time to “stop looking at the deficits, and start looking at the assets.”

It’s the things Layden does that people consider is autism that makes McClellan see his special gifts.

“You slowly figure out that all the things that they do that are autism, are the cute things they do. Things that you don’t want them to ever change. I think the most important thing to know is that for people who have autism, they shouldn’t be any different than who they are.”

Vaughn, McClellan, and their family have started a fundraiser as part of Autism Speak’s awareness campaign, a walk in Indianapolis June 15.

Those interested in donating, or learning a little bit about Layden and his family, can check out their Facebook page.

Their team is named Layden’s Lineup.

At 15

At 15, I found myself mostly alone.

High school was supposed to be the time my best friend and I would strike it big. We’d promised each other we’d grow old together, with houses next door and identical front porch swings. We’d make crude jokes back and forth from across our lawns, and be Godmothers to each of our children.

But after the first month of our freshman year, my best friend fell into a world that I would never follow her to.

Self-harm and alcohol use was something she did semi-frequently in junior high. But those were things I could overlook. I told myself I could help her get through that – or that she’d grow out of it by the time we hit high school. She went hit highs and lows I never got as a pre-teen, and became even more confusing later.

But at 14, she had started going to parties where cute guys would offer her pills, to make her feel bright and shiny and good about herself. She’d told me numerous times she’d woken up on a Friday with bruises she never remembered getting.

And no matter what I did, or who I told, nothing helped her.

Ever hang-out night became a lecture, or a conversation about how her actions were hurting herself. She didn’t want to hear it.

So that’s how I became isolated during one of the roughest parts of a person’s teenage years.

Dropping the ball

It was a 50/50 chance I ended up in J-1, the introduction to journalism class all students were required to take before they could join newspaper or yearbook. I had to choose an elective, and it was either J-1 or the introduction to broadcast.

I had always loved writing, so I threw my hands up in the air, and put it down as my elective choice.

But about four weeks into the class, I despised journalism and hated every single part of the course.

AP style was my worst nightmare. I didn’t understand any of the rules, and I couldn’t get why it was important at all. We would do worksheets upon worksheets with confusing questions, with multiple-choice answers that all looked the same.

I was so frustrated by the class that I would come home once or twice a week and cry.  I’m still up tight about my grades and GPA in college, but back then my grades were my life.

My mom told me if I was that upset by the class, then maybe it was time to drop it. She wasn’t happy that I was quitting, but she also understood the tears weren’t going to stop any time soon if I didn’t jump ship.

So I went to my guidance counselor and got an add/drop form. I had it filled out and signed. It was ready to go.

I just needed my teacher, Carmen Mann, to sign off on the sheet.

When I approached her after class, a bit distraught and uneasy about asking her to drop the class, she looked at me a bit astonished.

You want to drop? But why?

I just couldn’t get the material, I told her. I asked so many questions in class. Everything felt ambiguous and vague, and I always needed clarification. There wasn’t a class without me raising my hand five and six times with questions. My classmates were starting to get irritated and I was starting to feel like this just wasn’t for me. I kept running into a brick wall that wasn’t coming down any time soon.

Is it the fact that you ask so many questions that bothers you? She asked me, trying not to smile. At the time I didn’t know what she was getting at, but looking back now I know she was going somewhere with this line of questioning.

It was. I hated that I was the only one in class that seemed to not get anything. We hadn’t started writing yet either, and I could just imagine myself falling behind even more when we started that unit.

That is, until Ms. Mann gave me a little jolt of encouragement that up until that time, no other teacher had given me freshman year.

You ask questions, yes, but they’re good questions. You’ve got curiosity, which is what you need to be a journalist. You should really, really stick it out. I think you’re going to do great when we get to the writing part.

Coming from this teacher, I was floored. Ms. Mann was known to be hard on her students. In those few weeks of class she’d cussed in class – I’d never heard a teacher do that before. I couldn’t believe she’d said “shit” and “damn that” in front of children. She was strict and unforgiving with AP style mistakes.

She had bouncy blonde hair and a bright round face. She had a backbone of an attitude but an easy laugh. She was intimidating at the time, and I had been frightened to ask her about dropping her class.

I never thought she would or could see something special in me.

But she did, and that little bit of encouragement, to someone who had just lost her best friend, her sister in all but blood, did wonders for my soul.

So I stuck it out, and a week later, we began writing.

Writing

You could tell how much Ms. Mann loved writing by the way her face lit up, her voice got stronger and she could pound out writing notes to us like she had them memorized a decade earlier. 

She took the writing module of our class extremely seriously. We would take our notes by dictation -- she said this was the only way we'd learn to take notes quickly, and to learn what voice modulation sounds like in relation to how fast a person talks. She wouldn't repeat more than once, sometimes twice if you asked nicely, and she would never slow down.

Writing in that class was baptism by fire, and I was a newly charred believer. I loved every minute of class -- from the notes on how to ask questions and how to form a lead, to the strict, no-nonsense attitude of Ms. Mann's -- I was hooked.

I remember one exercise -- and I still have the worksheet -- that required my class to come up with questions relating to a hypothetical high school athletic team scandal. I thought, and thought, and was so excited to come up with what I would ask the mythical coach and principal.

We all took turns reading the questions out loud in class, and I was one of the last ones to go. I remember after reading mine, Ms. Mann looked at me proudly, and told the class if anyone ever needed ideas for questions, they should ask me.

It was the first time anyone had noticed me. And Ms. Mann was my new hero. She cared, and she thought I had potential. For someone pretty lost and lonely, that meant the world.

From then on, I would stay after class and talk with Ms. Mann about my work -- how to do better, what I could do for newspaper. I wanted to write, and keep writing until my fingers fell off. 

Ms. Mann was one of those teachers that knew how to take a flailing student and pick them up. She wasn't just our teacher, but she was a mentor, our psychologist. She was our friend. 

Budget agency says retiree health plan is over-funded

Franklin College Statehouse Bureau 

INDIANAPOLIS – The state has overpaid an employee benefit plan, budget agency directors told a House committee on Wednesday.

State Budget Agency Director Adam Horst and Deputy Budget Director Jon Vanator told the House Ways and Means Committee that, if things go as currently expected, the state retiree health benefits plan will a surplus of $49.8 million by the end of this fiscal year and $61 million by the end of fiscal year 2013.

The plan, started in state fiscal year 2008, is overfunded by 130 percent, according to the actuarial study. The government funded the plan 100 percent for every employee in order to prevent a liability, but the study showed that there may only be a 60 percent chance that any given employee will be eligible for the plan. Paying the full amount for every active employee has caused overfunding.

Part of the state’s recommendation is to pay the general fund part of the excess, by using the cigarette tax revenue that helps fund the plan, for fiscal years 2012 and 2013 only. The proposed percentage of the cigarette tax is 5.74 percent.

“Our method of recovering that excess would be to direct cigarette tax revenue, which is a portion of the funding that goes into the plan … to the general fund,” Vanator said. 

“Instead of transferring money from the fund balance and putting it in the general fund, we’re going to let $53.6 million of cigarette tax money go to the general fund instead of going into the plan. We’re turning off the faucet on the cigarette tax money, until we catch up.”

The Budget Agency’s proposal would fund the plan, actuarially, at 103 percent. Horst said that there still would be some cushion to the benefits plan.

Originally published on www.thefranklinonline.com

Union workers file into Statehouse to oppose bill

Franklin College Statehouse Bureau

INDIANAPOLIS – As union workers flooded the Statehouse on Wednesday, the line for the entrance spilled down the front steps.

Workers were there to attend the Senate committee meeting hearing on Senate Bill 333, which would eliminate project labor agreements.

Project labor agreements are collective bargaining agreements that require all employees and workers on government-funded projects, whether union or non-union, to establish set terms and conditions.

Tom O’Donnell, executive director of Quality Connection, an electrical union cooperative group, said that a project labor agreement “makes one big agreement for a job, which standardizes your starting times, overtime” and other job specifics.

“It makes no sense at all to pass this bill, when that’s … the standard way they’ve done business for the past 25 years, on the major projects in the city of Indianapolis, and the state for that matter,” O’Donnell said.

“And it’s like, when they do this kind of thing, all that does is invite inferior labor to come in and do jobs. You know what I’m talking about there – pay somebody little or nothing to come in without being highly skilled.”

Union worker Jim Crabb was one of many waiting to enter the Statehouse to oppose the bill.

“It would raise the cost of projects,” Crabb said. “PLA guarantees that it will be done on time, usually under budget. We just want them to know that we are concerned, and that we’ll come out in forces. This early in the year, it’s not going to stop here.”

Sen. Greg Walker, R-Columbus, sponsored the bill and said that he feels research is inconclusive to whether or not project labor agreements guarantees quality and efficiencies. He also said that he believes there are skilled and trained workers outside of unions.

“The research is indeterminate,” Walker said. “I have read a great deal that does not have me convinced that the taxpayer is going to get the lowest cost projects with a PLA in place, but I also recognize the economic reality that you get what you pay for. Price is not the only decision and is not the only factor.”


Originally published on www.thefranklinonline.com

Franklin Grads Make Their Mark

Franklin grads make their mark

Jessica Wray

October 1, 2010

Franklin College may be a small liberal arts school, but history shows there is nothing small about its graduates or their achievements.

Take the early 1920s for example. “Hoosier Hysteria” swept across Indiana and captured the attention of the nation. Basketball was the game to play, and Franklin was at the center of it.  


The Franklin Wonder Five basketball team originated at what is now known as Franklin Community High School, lead by coach Ernest “Griz” Wagner. Although the name alludes to there being only five players, in reality, each year the team had new members added.

One of the most well-known players, Robert “Fuzzy” Vandivier, played forward and helped lead the college team to the state championship. Vandivier graduated from Franklin College in 1926 and later became Franklin High School’s basketball coach and took a position as a history teacher.

As coach, he won three regional titles and took his team in 1939 to the state championship game.  The gymnasium at what used to be the old high school, and is now Franklin Community Middle School, was named Vandivier Gymnasium, after Vandivier.

The legend of the Wonder Five team and its graduates left an even more significant mark on both the high school and college athletic programs. The high school Grizzly Cubs and the college Grizzlies were named in honor of “Griz” Wagner and the success of his Wonder Five team.

Also, during college a friend of Vandivier’s and 1923 graduate was Roger Branigin. He was also a graduate of Franklin High School and was a cheerleader for the Wonder Five team during the season of their first state win. Branigin majored in French, Spanish and history at Franklin College, and was a member of the Phi Delta Theta fraternity. After graduation, he went to Harvard Law School. Branigin became a lawyer and later served in World War II. He ran for governor of Indiana, won in 1964 and served from 1965 to 1969. He ran for President in 1968 in the Democratic primary, but lost the nomination to Robert Kennedy.

Franklin College has a history of successful graduates, including Doritos inventor Arch West, class of 1936, but the graduates who work in the Franklin community today or have graduated recently haven’t dropped the ball on achievement.

College trustee John Auld, Jr. graduated from Franklin College in 1976 with degrees in journalism and history. While in college, some of the organizations Auld participated in included the newspaper, Sigma Alpha Epsilon and the Inter-fraternity Council.

He is now president of Franklin Insurance Agency, which is a local independent agency in Franklin. He is chairman for the Partnership for a Healthier Johnson County and president of the Johnson County Health Foundation.  

Auld said that it was in part the liberal arts education that contributed to the skills that he uses today in his career and the opportunities he had during college.

“I think it’s the fact that you get a strong liberal arts education, regardless of what your major is and it can apply in many, many different ways for all kinds of practical applications,” Auld said.

“The opportunities that I had, in leadership roles at the fraternity house are probably the most important, as far as life-long experiences and so forth and how to lead and accomplish things. At a social standpoint on campus, I had a number of very close relationships with professors that I think were important, and they taught you the value of a liberal arts education and the relationship issues you have at a small campus.”

Franklin College Time Study Project

Each day, about 110 Franklin College students open Angel, fill out their detailed time log for the day, and submit it to the drop box by 5 p.m.  For 14 days students followed this routine. 

Junior Hilary Hauguel, a math major, created a study to analyze student’s time management and behavior.  It all started with a question about which majors spent the most time on homework and studying.

According to Hauguel, she knew she spent a large amount of time doing homework as a math major and wondered how other areas of study compared.  In a conversation with assistant professor of mathematics Dr. Justin Gash, the idea to do a research study formulated.

At the beginning of the year, Hauguel sent a mass campus announcement for students who would be willing to participate in the survey.  Participants would receive $50, and would be required to fill out a time log each day.

Gash and associate professor and chair of English Dedaimia Whitney are co-advisers to Hauguel’s research project.  They helped Hauguel create and shape the template for the study.

“I made a template,” Hauguel said.  “I did it myself, so I would know what I was doing and what I was expecting them to do.  So I gave them an example of a couple days that I did, and gave them the template.”

Hauguel created an Angel page with drop boxes open from 5 a.m. to 5 p.m. for the participants to log their hours.  There are multiple statistics that Hauguel plans to extrapolate from the data, but she is focused on two categories.

“Basically there are 10 categories that I asked them to do,” Hauguel said.  “The most important is I wanted to know how much time they spend in class and how much time they do homework.”

The categories range from logging how much time they spend eating, participating in athletics, sleeping, being in class, doing homework, working, etc.  Hauguel also hopes to learn more about students’ sleeping habits and it’s possible affects, once she computes all of the data.

“We think that there’s going to be great interest in this,” Whitney said.  “And that we’ll find out some interesting things.”

Gash believes that the project will spark an interest on campus as well, and hopes other student’s can see by this project that undergraduates are capable of authentic research. 

“She has done something that people will care about,” Gash said.  “It’s going to matter to people.  She doesn’t have a Ph.D., she just had a really interesting question and a drive to investigate. “

Junior sociology major Heather Myers enjoyed participating in the study and taking the time to think about her daily schedule.

“I saw that I usually slept about the same amount of time, which I didn’t really think that I did that, or that I had a sleeping pattern,” Myers said.

Sophomore math major Matt Brems felt the study helped him to analyze how much time he spends involved in activities correlating to each category. 

“I can better manage my time and say, ‘should it really take me six hours to work on this assignment’ or something like that,” Brems said.  “So it’s useful for managing time and just learning for myself.  It’s a good way for us to quantify our priorities.”

The project is ongoing and according to Hauguel, will probably continue into next semester. 

Profile On: Zach Cruse - First Interview

Zachariah Cruse, 19-year-old sculpture major at Herron Art School, is a tall curly blond that has an absolute love for any kind of plain chicken dishes, and a deep-seated hatred for any vegetables or leafy greens.  He has a dry sense of humor and a laugh that makes his eyes squint.  He loves “The Office” and is a fan of Michael Scott.

When asked who or what he would have to have with him on a deserted island, Cruse smiled and mulled over his answer.  It took him a few minutes but he finally said, “Taylor, I’d have to bring Taylor.  He would probably help me survive.”

He jokingly talked about what he and his brother, Taylor Cruse, would do on the island to survive, like building a shelter and watching each other’s backs around the island natives.

“Wait!” Cruse said.  “Can I change my answer to a helicopter? What about a lifeboat?  Do those count?”

He thought over his response for a few more moments, clearly not satisfied with his answer.  He smiled, and I knew this answer should be a good one.

“I would bring wireless Internet and my laptop,” Cruse said.  “I could Google the Bible, talk to everyone I could not bring with me on the island, I could Google plans on how to build a raft and I could watch episodes of ‘The Office’ when I got bored.”

After a second of reveling in his newly thought out plan, Cruse hesitated, and then slapped his palm onto his forehead.

“Oh crap, I didn’t even think about the laptop dying.  I’m an idiot.”

That’s when he looked at me, face completely serious with a hopeful expression.

“Can I include a solar powered charger for my laptop?”

His family, when asked what they think we would need to take with him to survive on an island alone, his mom and brother said the same thing.

“He’d probably take his laptop.”

Profile On: Zach Cruse - The Bunk Beds

It was around 9:30 p.m., the show they were watching had just gone off, and it was time to go to sleep.  That’s when bedtime became playtime for Cruse and his brother.

The two boys, Cruse, who was about nine, and his brother Taylor Cruse, was about five, backed up to the corner of their living room, between the couch and the kitchen, and took off, racing to the other end of the house where their bedroom was located.

It was a competition, one they had participated in before, but races between the two siblings were serious business. 

At the time, the Cruse brothers had bunk beds made out of red steel tubing sections put together. The endgame of the race was to launch their selves onto the bottom bunk, reaching the bed first.

That was the plan until Zach Cruse jumped a little too high. 

Instead of landing on the soft mattress of his bed, he ran into the bottom part of the top bunk head-first.  Instead of a dive into comfort, he dove into steel bar. 

Both Cruse brothers say that he jumped too high, and hit the top bunk by accident.  The force of the blow caused Cruse to be knocked unconscious for a few minutes.

“When I came to, I was lying on my back on our bedroom floor.  Taylor was standing over me, and I reached for my head, to feel it where I hit, and it was wet.  I looked at my fingers and they were covered in blood.”

Cruse was numb from the pain.  He couldn’t really feel anything.  The only thing he felt was anger at Taylor.  He said it wasn’t reasonable, he just knew he was scared and he was mad at this brother. 

Cruse ran out of the room crying, heading straight for his parent’s bedroom.  His mother was on the phone, talking to his grandma. 

According to Cruse, when she looked over and saw him standing there, she said, “Oh my gosh! Zach’s bleeding, I’ve got to go!”  She hung up the phone and picked him up, running to the garage to put him in the van.  She called his grandma before they left, and went to the hospital.

“It was a big ordeal, and I had to get stitches,” Cruse said.  “I remember the next few weeks I would walk around with my eyes crossed, pretending to be Frankenstein, because I had the big stitches right across my forehead.”

Profile On: Zach Cruse - Building an Interest

“Star Wars changed my life,” Cruse said.

It began with a project that his friend sent him a link to.  The guy knew Cruse loved Star Wars, so he sent him a link to a website that discussed how to make lightsabers. 

That’s how it started.  He made lightsaber handles, and with each one he made, he would use different material to keep making it better.   He would research what materials to use and how to use them.

One day, when Cruse was about 15, he was browsing the Internet, and he saw a picture of a Master Chief helmet that was made of paper.  The Master Chief character is from the video game Halo, a game that Cruse enjoyed playing.  The paper helmet sparked an interest, so he decided to Google search the print out for making one of the helmets.

His first print out guide was two sizes to large, so he printed it out again.  The project intrigued him.  He saw what other people could do with the paper helmets, and knew he could do a better job.  It was a challenge.

After Cruse finished cutting, folding and shaping the paper helmet, he decided he didn’t like the look as much.  The shapes were blocky, and the parts of the helmet that were supposed to be smooth weren’t because of using flat paper.  Cruse wasn’t satisfied with that.  He decided to detail the project.

Cruse covered the entire helmet in sheets of plastic and auto body filler called Bondo.  He smoothed everything over to the right shape.  The sanding of all the hard and angular lines took a great deal of time.  Cruse spent about four to five hours a day on his project, for about three months before he finished.  Once he did smooth the helmet, that’s when he painted it.

The project was the first time he ever worked with electronics as well.  The character in the game had four small lights on either side of the helmet.  So to make it realistic, Cruse did the same.  He bought four LED lights with built-in resistors and wired them to batteries, before arranging them in the helmet.

“I consulted with my dad a lot,” Cruse said.  “I would ask him his opinions on building materials and how my plans would turn out.”

Cruse worked in his garage, on a workbench across from the garage door.  That’s where he would use the auto body filler, fiberglass resin and cans of spray paint.  His planning work took place in his kitchen, at the bar. 

He would spend time hunched over the bar, with a piece of his plans scattered to the right, and everything else sweeping out from that point across the surface.  He would tinker with this paper, and then move onto the next.  His tools and methodology were a bit haphazard, unorganized and scattered.  But that’s how he liked to work.

When Cruse finished his helmet, he posted it, like his other work, on the online community.  Cruse said they had an entire website devoted to the paper helmets. 

“The most anyone else had ever done at that point with the helmets was use auto body filler on them, but they would just essentially cover the helmets and sand it down a little bit,” Cruse said. 

The attention to detail on Cruse’s helmet was pretty high.  The response he received from the online users was more than Cruse expected.  He was the first person to take the craftsmanship to another level, and show that much detail and commitment to making the prop better.

After he displayed his helmet, showing his friends and family, he decided to post in on eBay. 

“I sold it for $350.”

The Master Chief helmet was one of the first projects that spurned Cruse on, pushing him to continue challenging himself.  By using electronics for the first time, it began his love affair with putting lighting and wiring in other projects, including building an LED light-up arc reactor from the movie Iron Man, and refurbishing an Xbox in the style of the Iron Man movie.

Through Star Wars Cruse found his love recreating props, and through his Master Chief helmet project, he realized he was phenomenal at it.  So did everyone else.

Profile On: Zach Cruse - The Meet-Cute

In February of this year, Zach Cruse had just come out of a stressful on again off again relationship with his previous girlfriend.  The relationship was a rollercoaster, and the hills and turns had Cruse shaken and disillusioned with relationships in general.  He was over the angst and the anxiety, and was ready to move on and put the whole ordeal behind him.

That was the plan at least, until a local church lock-in happened.

Cruse was in the process of repairing his friendship with his ex-girlfriend, so when she invited him, he said yes to attending their mutual friend’s church lock-in.  He was hoping to gain back civility and erase some of the awkwardness that had appeared between the two.

At the lock-in, the youth group banded together on teams to play broomball, which is a sport that Cruse says is essentially, “hockey, but you wear shoes instead of ice skates, and you hit a ball instead of a puck.”

Indiana’s temperature in February ranges from chilly to down right frigid.  That particular night was cold, although not bitterly so.  The ice rink was alive with chatter and laughter, which helped to keep the chill at bay.

Running on a large sheet of ice in tennis shoes is not one of the easiest activities to participate in.  It took a large amount of energy, and with each breath, the chill made your lungs tingle.  

After playing for a few hours, Cruse decided to take a break.  He felt dehydrated, and slightly sick, so he went to the small and kind of ancient looking concession stand to order a PowerAde. 

As he came back to the rink, he noticed a girl sitting by herself, watching the others slap the ball back and forth and clumsily run across the ice.

He knew her name was Jessica, not because he’d talked to her any, but because Lauren, the mutual friend, had talked about her before.  He slid onto the bench next to her, and she glanced over at him.

“Hi,” he said.  “Having fun?”

She smiled and answered, and from there they chatted for a few minutes about inconsequential things.  He asked if she wanted to take a drink of his orange PowerAde, and then he went back out onto the ice.  “Huh,” he thought to himself.  “She was nice, and kind of cute.”

Broomball continued, neither side ever really winning.  Cruse stayed with his friends, joking around and talking with his ex-girlfriend, trying to achieve his goal of patching things up.  As the night went on, Cruse got even more fatigued, while everyone else hit their second-wind.

The group moved into the sanctuary, when Cruse noticed Jessica again.  He spotted her curled up in a pew, sitting by herself, hugging a pillow and yawning wildly.  She was bundled up in Franklin College sweats, and her sweatshirt two sizes too big. 

For two hours they talked about everything.  Star Wars, Death Cab for Cutie, Star Trek and the Beatles.  They talked about college: her hopes that undergrad would be better than high school, his insisting that it wouldn’t be.  He talked about being homeschooled, his teachers and his projects.  She talked about her love of music.

About halfway through their conversation, Cruse though, “I wonder is she would ever want to hang out sometime?”  He was intrigued and a little bit curious about her.

Eventually the group moved out of the sanctuary, and by then, Cruse and his friends left the lock-in.  He had work early the next morning.

He didn’t get to say goodbye

Profile On: Zach Cruse - Worship Your Face Off

Cruse’s father, Clay Cruse, the youth minister and Terry Waggoner, the worship minister at his church, created a youth worship experience called WYFO, or Worship Your Face Off. 

Cruse invited me to observe their service and how the youth group interacted with each other.  His family is involved in the fundamentals and creation of the youth programs at Franklin Church of Christ, and their delivery.

We walked in and the first thing I noticed was the amount of people that Cruse talked to on the way into the sanctuary.  The congregation knew him, not only on a shallow, acquaintance level, but deeply and personally.

“Hey, Terry!” Cruse said, slinging his arm around the taller man’s shoulders and walking towards the sanctuary. 

The two guys had a brief conversation, but the connection was there.  Cruse was at home in the church and his face only became brighter with the people he ran into.

Once we entered the sanctuary where the other teens congregated, a few members of the grew immediately said hello.  Cruse was a little late, but the service hadn’t started yet.  A few minutes later, Clay Cruse hopped up on the stage and said, “Are you all ready to worship your faces off!”

That started the music.  The booming bass fell over the crowd and the lights were shut off.  The sanctuary was dark, but the group was bright and alive, Cruse being one of the brightest.  He was at ease and comfortable, nodding his head and swaying to the beat.  Every now and then I could hear him singing along to the songs.

His younger brother Matt came up beside him, and they joked around while the music was still playing.  His love for worship and his family combined into one.

“Do you like it so far?” Cruse asked me, still nodding to the beat.

“Yeah,” I said.  “I’m having fun.”

If anything, his smile grew wider.  You could tell he wanted people to share in his love of church.

“Good,” he grinned.

The music picked up and a faster, more energetic song began beating out of the speakers.  The band was in full swing and so was the youth group.   The lyrics were catchy and Cruse began bouncing on his heels.  When the word “run” was emphasized in the song, the  group took off.

One by one the students bolted from the mass huddled at the foot of the stage.

“Do you want to run?” Cruse asked me.

After that he took off.  The energy in the room was palpable.  Everyone was excited and pumped for the lesson to come.  Cruse came back to the group even more exuberant than before.  He was in his house of God and loving every minute of it.

The "Non-Date" Update

If anyone has read my blog regarding my wonderful "Non-Date" experience, I thought that it might be a good idea to do an update.

My "Non-Date" date, Zach Cruse, is now my boyfriend, and thanks to my amazing best friend Lauren, we're pretty much ecstatically happy together.  Cliche as it may be, it's definitely thanks to her.  Momma Lauren got it perfectly right, and her "love-tinglies" deserve all of the credit.  So to her, I say, thanks for caring enough to want me to be happy, and for setting me up with someone so amazing.  And to Zach, I say, thanks for being awesome, and not a creeper.  I would have felt bad if I had to use my pink can of pepper spray that night.

As for my prom date disaster, prom was really fun, but the date part didn't last.  That interest fizzled and died, and I think his interest in me fizzled sooner than I thought, or maybe wanted.

I think that everything happens for a reason, and that I've been extremely blessed to have a friend that truly cares and a boyfriend that exceeds any expectation I may have ever had for a relationship.  So to God, I pray thanks for the blessings You have bestowed upon me, and for the amazing people You have put in my life.

A Scene in My Life: The "Non-Date"

It was the end of June and the heat had anyone who stepped outside sweaty, red faced and sticky within minutes.  My air conditioner was broke, I was working seven and a half hours every day and I was more concerned with how I was going to pay for my mission trip to Arizona that ran at about $400 and how much a new A/C air compressor was going to hit my already feeble bank account.  For the first time since I was 15, dating was the last thing on my mind.

My best friend, a perky, tall blond, that always had her hair in a ponytail, and when she walked, it bounced.  Her bouncy ponytail described her personality to a tee.  She could be a bit pushy, and she always wanted her friends to be ecstatically happy.  As for me, she decided ecstatically happy would only come if I were seriously dating a good Christian boy that Momma Lauren would approve of.

After a disastrous prom date setup, I had pretty much lost all confidence in Lauren, so when she texted me that someone was interested, I rolled my eyes and calmly replied, “Really? Who?”  The text back was “Zach! Zach Cruse! Remember him from the lock-in?”

After that qualifier, “from the lock-in,” it hit me.  Zach was the guy I had talked to at 2 a.m.  I was running on very little sleep, and everyone else had been ridiculously hyper, but Zach and I weren’t.  We wound up talking for three hours about nothing specific; music, our love/hate relationship with Death Cab for Cutie, movies, our die-hard love affair with Star Wars and our disagreement on William Shatner Star Trek or the absolutely horrible (in my opinion) Next Generation.  That random conversation was what stuck out to me.  I couldn’t really remember details about what he looked like, so I did what any other curious 19 year old female would do: I Facebook stalked his pictures and scoped out his friends.

Zach seemed like an interesting guy, so I gave Lauren the thumbs up and the go ahead.  She gave him my number.  I think I was more worried about her forcing him to text me than if we would actually like me or not, and yes, she had forced texting on a guy before.  The prom fiasco was still vivid in my mind.

The first text came on July 1.  I was at work, sneaking my cell phone from my purse when I knew my boss wasn’t around. He was at his Grandma’s.  For five straight days I woke to a text and fell asleep to a text.  SMS messaging was the new pilot light for relationships in my life.  We clicked immediately, and I knew I wanted to see where we could go.

Five days later, Zach and I had our first “non-date.”  I agonized over what to wear. I still didn’t have my air fixed yet, and at a humid 95 degrees outside, I was worried I would show up at the bowling alley with melted make-up, sweat-stains under my arm pits and crazy hair that would make me seem like a Scary Spice Girl wannabe.  I was running late, per usual, and I was already nervous.  Dating wasn’t something I did very much in high school.  In all actuality, I hadn’t dated in two and a half years.  I got to the bowling alley and there he was.  He looked fairly harmless.  I was pretty for sure I could take him down if I needed to.  And then he smiled, and said hey, and I forgot about my little pink pepper spray bottle in my purse.  I smiled back, we bought two games of bowling, and immediately started conversation. 

It was like we had been friends for years before then.  We talked about church, our friends, school, and anything else that popped into our heads.  He made fun of my little dance moves after I tossed my bowling ball down the alley.  He laughed at the thud it made when I accidently lofted it.

The night wasn’t all about bowling though, it was about finding my way back to being social, to saying hey, I’m capable of going out on a “non-date” and surviving.  It was a liberating thought.  And I got a bonus out of the entire experience.

“Huh,” I thought to myself.  “I really like this one.”

A Scene in My Life: On Graduation Day

The first thing that ever stuck out to me about graduation day was my shoes.  I absolutely loved my dress.  It was white, to go under our white gowns, and it was perfectly cut to fit correctly in all the right places.  My hair looked good, for once, and I put in a little pearl clip to help hold my hair in place. 

The oddball to my entire outfit ensemble was the shoes though.  They were on loan from my mother because they were the only pair of white shoes that were sophisticated enough for graduation and fit to the point that they wouldn’t fly off when I attempted to walk.  The problem with these shoes was that they were white, but they weren’t a perfect white.  The color was off so slightly that you could just make out the difference.  To a perfectionist that slight difference was enough to drive me mad.  They were my only option, so I had to go with them, but I thought to myself, “This doesn’t bode well for the rest of graduation.”

The drive to my high school was hot and sticky.  I was in a hurry and I was nervous.  I was one of the first people to be walking in to the traditional graduation fanfare, and I was scared out of my mind that I would fall and trip over my stupid off-white shoes and slow down the entire procession.  It was a common fear among my classmates, but they were lucky enough to not have my sense of balance and coordination.  My fear was a legitimate one.

As I was rushing around to get into place I felt very disjointed from the celebrations going on around me.  I was still unbelievably nervous, but I no longer felt the gripping anxiety.  I smiled and took pictures with some of my good high school friends.  I smiled and took pictures with people I had talked to all of five times throughout high school.  The entire time I kept thinking, “I am not going to miss this place at all, or these people.”

Finally, it was time to take my place in line.  As a member of the top ten, I was able to sit in the front row, and I would be one of the first to receive my diplomas.  I was excited about this because it meant I could space out and daydream about going to dinner with my parents and stepbrother to my favorite restaurant.  I was ecstatic my stepbrother had made it, and I wanted to spend time with my family.  The ceremony felt like a formality.

Our row stood up and moved to the stage.  I felt my breath catch in my throat and my nerves came back full-force.  Although I felt fairly detached from the importance of the ceremony, I didn’t want to make a fool of myself in front of my family by tripping.  When my name was called, I took a deep breath and put one ugly shoe in front of the other, shook the hand of a school board member I didn’t particularly know, grasped my diploma, smiled and headed off the stage at a quick pace.  It was finally over.

The real highlight came when walking by the teacher section after receiving my diploma.  The moment I would never forget is my past instructors standing up to give me a hug as I walked by.

My newspaper adviser, as odd and funny as he is, stood up with a wide smile on his face, shook my hand, and said congratulations with more enthusiasm than I ever heard him use outside of discussing NPR. 

My advanced placement English literature teacher stood up and gave me a big hug.  She whispered, “Congratulations, JWray,” into my ear, and patted me on the shoulder as I drew away.

It was those two instances that made me value that graduation ceremony.  Aside from the fact that my family was there to see me, those two teachers made me realize that although I wouldn’t really miss my peers, or the academics, I would miss the people that I had come to know as my instructors.  The lessons and the values I was taught in and out of the classroom would be the building blocks I’d take with me to college.

That handshake and hug were my graduation ceremony.  The diploma, that I worked so hard to get, is lying at the bottom of a box somewhere right now.  What my instructors taught are still with me today. 

A Scene in My Life: The Move

For the first time that I could remember, I was packing up all of my stuff and moving.  My mom and stepdad had bought a house in town and we were in the process of packing up everything and moving it.  That was the day all of the heavy furniture was leaving.  That was also the day that I would see the rooms of my childhood house completely empty.

I remember my mother telling me that I didn’t have to help with the move.  She rolled her eyes and gave a little huff, “You might get in the way,” she said.  But I wouldn’t listen.  At fourteen, I thought I would be fine.  I could help, and I’d get to be in our home a little while longer.

The moving men came in and took out the heavy Amish oak furniture from my parent’s room first.  They broke down the headboard and wooden rails, carrying them down the stairs and into the bed of their enormous truck.  I stood by and watched as my mom flitted back and forth from room to room, carrying more boxes of small knick-knacks and books to our cars.

Next, the movers went to my room, strapping down my large maple vanity with two mirrors attached to a larger center one that would swing on their hinges and bang against the wood.  After moving that furniture piece, my pale, pink rose-colored wall looked empty.  They then came for my bed, metal bedrails clanking as they carried it down the stairs as well.  Mom and some of the movers carried out the headboard and the nightstand next. 

That’s when I lost it.

I was standing in the middle of the room, looking at the bare walls when I broke down.  The ugly white carpet with large Victorian roses that I had always hated was uncovered, stripped of my furniture and immature Beanie Baby stand.  I felt the inoffensive carpet was mocking me.  The pale pink walls were unadorned; certificates from elementary school had been taken down the weeks before, my ribbons from my two-year stint in gymnastics packed away.  My pictures of family and friends were in boxes, loaded into cars or already in the new house.  This room, with the hideous carpet and blank walls, wasn’t my room anymore.  It was somebody else’s.  Some other little girl would get to grow up in my room, play in my closet and lose her Barbie dolls somewhere in the corner of my room.

The beads that used to hang from my ceiling were no longer there.  They didn’t make the obnoxious “clank” sound when I walked by, or catch a strand of my hair.  I was crying softly at first, but the more I thought about everything that had happened in that house, in that room, it hit me: there weren’t going to be any more memories there.  After that, the sobs came.

My mom could hear me crying, and when she saw me, she said go to the bathroom.  We walked through her and my stepfather’s old room.  Everything was gone there, too.  The picture that hung above their bed, of a little girl playing in a creek, now hung somewhere in our new house.  And as I walked through their room to the back bathroom, I started crying even harder.  I’m not normally an overly emotional person, but the move hit me hard.  Someplace I had spent so much time, my sanctuary, my haven, was no longer mine to own.

I sat down in the bathroom and let it out.  My mother shut the door so I couldn’t see the empty bedroom beyond.  I couldn’t stop crying no matter how much I tried.  I heard the movers go through room after room taking all of the material objects that marked my history, my growth, out of my home and into some foreign living space that was about as personal and familiar as a hotel room.

After everything was out of the house, and the movers had left, and my home was no longer my home, but what we called “the old house,” my mom came and fetched me from the floor of the bathroom.  I was curled up into a little ball, a habit I revert back to when I’m really upset.  She told me it was done, and that it was time to go.  She let me cry a little bit more, which for my mom was a huge act of kindness and understanding.

I slowly uncurled myself, got up, and walked out of the bathroom door.  Once I saw the barren room again the tears began pouring.  I cried down the stairs and out the front door.  I cried in the car on the way to our new living area.

To this day, I still think of that house as my home.  Even after a lovely young couple, with a baby girl only about a year younger than I was when my parents first bought that house, moved in.  We’ve driven by it a couple of times.  The swing-set that my father built is still there, but the stack of wood for the fireplace is in a different place. 

The first time we drove by I couldn’t help but start crying.  After four years it’s still a sore topic, and one I try not to think about too much. 

Jeff Zeleny speaks at Franklin College

Photo: Jessica Wray

“I am not a witch,” was the first statement Jeff Zeleny, national political correspondent for The New York Times, made at his lecture on Oct. 12.

Zeleny’s statement emerged from the Tea Party Republican Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell and her ad stating, “I’m not a witch, I’m you.”  Zeleny kicked off his lecture with that to chuckles among the crowd.

Zeleny discussed in his lecture the importance of this year’s midterm elections, and the consequences that they might have on Capitol Hill and in the upcoming 2012 presidential election.

One of the main points that he emphasized is the House of Representative seats that are up for reelection this midterm and their importance in Congress.  Zeleny said that out of the approximate 75 seats up for reelection, the Republican Party only needs 39 to win back House majority. 

“It’s well attainable, they can come up with those 39 fairly easily, and perhaps a handful of them from here in Indiana,” Zeleny said.

One of the comments he also made was on the outlook of progress in national government for the United States, based on the increasing partisan division happening in Washington.

“At the end of all this, I think we’re probably heading towards a couple years of stalemate in Washington, and the outlook of that, I’m not too optimistic of the changes that will be done,” Zeleny said.

After discussing Congressional impacts, he also spoke on the emergence of Republican politicians who may be making a run for president in the 2012 elections.  Among national figures, Zeleny also mentioned two Indiana Republican leaders, Gov. Mitch Daniels and Rep. Mike Pence that he suspects might run.

Senior Franklin College student Matt Foreman said he enjoyed the lecture and found it to be informative. 

“For someone who spends a lot of time around politics, he was surprising neutral.  We all get enough partisan views floating around, so it’s refreshing,” Foreman said.

Students need more than test skills

In a press conference call with college and university student journalists, President Barack Obama discussed his administration’s work toward lowering the cost of higher education and strengthening the curriculum so graduates can compete in an international workforce.

One of the points Obama made was that one third of college stu- dents and approximately more than half of minority students fail to earn their college degree after enrolling in an institution.

High school’s main purpose is to prepare students for a higher educational system or the workforce. Public school systems have become so centered on standardized testing and its correlation to funding that it makes me wonder if America is losing the edge in critical thinking.

College preparation in critical thinking, problem solving and real- life application is difficult to transition to when high schools emphasize test-taking strategies over how to become a life-long learner.

Could lack of preparation be the cause for these failing rates? Even if the rates increase, will students be prepared to enter into this new workforce with strong international competitors? If for 12 years students have been mastering tests rather than the material, will four years in a higher education
system really be what breaks that cycle?

The beauty of a liberal arts education is the well-rounded back- ground that it gives students. It promotes the development of skills and knowledge outside intended areas of study. The narrow focus in high school on standardized test scores, and the pressure for students to learn how to take tests rather than master the material, diminishes the goal of preparing students in a similar fashion. If students are worried about scores, when will they absorb skills necessary in a career-focused world?

It starts with the government taking action to increase freedom of instructors to creatively shape their lesson plans. Yes, there need to be some standards nationally, and standardized assessments for higher education entrance, but the overwhelming amount of tests need to be cut.

I respect Obama’s plan to better prepare students for the workforce, but it needs to start much sooner than college. Our competitive issues do not lie solely with higher education institutions, but in elementary and secondary education school systems.

Preparation is the problem. If we can get back the outside-of-the-box thinking that America is supposedly known for, we can retain our position as number one in college graduates. By trying to compete with other countries in test scores, we have lost sight of America’s educational crowning- glory: critical thinking and analytical problem solving.

This story was first published on TheFranklinOnline.com
http://www.thefranklinonline.com/blog/forum/students_need_more_than_test_skills

ACLU speaker comes to Franklin College

Gilbert Holmes, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana, spoke to Franklin College students about the importance of understanding the Constitution and the Bill of Rights in relation to today’s society.

“I think it’s critical for anyone who wants to be a good citizen to understand the Constitution and the Bill of Rights,” Holmes said, “and doing so they learn about their own rights and they also learn about how that relates towards the community and helps them to make decisions in their lives.”

Holmes discussed multiple aspects of the ACLU in Indiana and some of the misconceptions people have regarding the work that they do.

In regards to the recent Texas preacher threatening to burn copies of the Qur’an, Holmes said he received a call from a distraught mother who wanted the ACLU to stop the preacher. The mother’s two sons are serving in Afghanistan, and she feared increased danger could be caused by the burning.

He said it was difficult to try to describe to the woman that the preacher had the freedom to do so, and the preacher was protected under Constitutional rights.

As far as the ACLU’s mission, Holmes described it as being very simple.

“To protect and defend the Constitutional rights guaranteed by the First Amendment, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights,” he said.

He also discussed that the ACLU is very prominent in litigation, which they are most known for. 

Holmes said they lack in advocacy, education and outreach, and especially toward trying to right the misconceptions that the general public may have regarding why the ACLU defends the people they do.

“There are people who think that the Constitution only applies to ‘me and not you’, or ‘my views, not yours,’” Holmes said.

Senior David Wesche attended the lecture and said Holmes’s presentation changed some of his preconceptions that ACLU helps people who should not be helped. Wesche said Holmes reminded him that it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that during the heat of an argument everyone has Constitutional rights.

“I think more people should have come because I think more people think the ACLU supports bad people,” Wesche said, “when in all actuality, you may not agree with what they’re doing, but they live in America.  The Constitution applies to every American, and that’s the way it goes.”

This story was first published on TheFranklinOnline.com
http://www.thefranklinonline.com/campus_news/article/holmes_speaks_of_importance_in_understanding_constitution_bill_of_rights