by Sarah McGee | Mar 28, 2015 | News Slider
On Friday night, Lipscomb students stepped back in time for the second annual Full Moon Festival in the Student Activities Center. Organized by social clubs Theta Psi and Delta Omega, the fifties-themed dance raised awareness for Lipscomb’s drug and alcohol policy, providing students with a fun, drug and alcohol-free environment. “We’re doing a fifties theme each year,” said Delta Omega president Makenzie Kanyuh. “It will always stay that way, but we plan on constantly changing around the overall theme.” This year’s theme had a classic movie twist. The dance floor showcased posters for classic films like “Gone With the Wind” and “East of Eden.” The event was bustling with students dressed in ’50s and ’60s clothing. Popular elements of the evening included an ice cream float station, a photo booth and a live band. The clubs began planning the dance at the beginning of the spring semester, but the actual set up for the Full Moon Festival didn’t begin until Friday morning. “I had the roots set from last year, but it was a lot of work,” said Theta Psi social coordinator Cody LaRochelle. “I couldn’t have done it without the help from everybody.” Proceeds from the festival went to Good Spread, a peanut butter company that donates food to malnourished...
by Sarah McGee | Mar 19, 2015 | News Slider
Junior graphic design major Scott Coffey gets to combine his love of art, writing and math in an unusual way. “The first real board game that I bought was Settlers of Catan, and that was in high school,” Coffey said. “Ever since then, I’ve really loved playing and making games.” Coffey has created multiple board game prototypes with creative premises. One game is called Cat Fight, which is set up like a reality show, and the goal is to get the most fame in the end. Another game is named The End, where the players try to be the first to end the world. Coffey also receives college credit for his board game designs in his independent study in the graphic design major. His most recent development is Quiver — a game that came from an idea he had while studying abroad in England in 2013. “Everyone in the game is an archer, and the goal is to score the most points in an archery contest,” Coffey said. In the comical game, players have to shoot past different obstacles, and each obstacle gives the players a different amount of points. Coffey is designing the entire game himself and said he wants to develop it so that it can be sold to a publisher. This process includes creating the rules, play testing and designing the artwork. “I’m hoping to get the deck of cards for the game professionally printed so that I can possibly take it to a publisher,” Coffey said. The game has 108 cards in the deck, and there are 75 unique illustrations on the cards. One card...
by Sarah McGee | Mar 7, 2015 | News Slider
Ready or not, Singarama has come to a close for 2015. Ready or Not was also the group that stole the show this year, winning the Singarama Sweepstakes Award Saturday night in Collins Alumni Auditorium. “We started working on the show before Christmas break,” script writer Craig Harwell said. “It has been a gradual process working out the kinks of everything, and we’re so pleased with how everything worked out. We feel like our script, music and dancing really came together in an amazing way, and that we told a great message to the crowd.” The story of Ready or Not was centered around Caroline, a girl who was getting prepared to move to New York to attend NYU. She was unsure if she was ready, along the worry of her father not ready to let her go. Despite winning, the show had some setbacks during its preparation phase. “Our original actor who played the father broke his back last week, so we randomly brought in someone completely new,” director Anne-Claire Smith said. “It took us forever, but we worked so hard these past couple days and it has for sure been proven since we won.” “Ready” consisted of the social clubs Phi Sigma, Sigma Iota Delta and friends. Among the group of friends was IDEAL student A.T. Banks. The IDEAL program has become an important feature on campus, and one that was made even more clear during the IDEAL tribute at Singarama. In between every show, a tribute video for the IDEAL program played, accompanied by the voices of the hosts and hostesses. It was shown to honor the students and...
by Sarah McGee | Feb 26, 2015 | News Slider
The lists of websites being blocked on Lipscomb’s Internet server are growing, and students are beginning to notice the change. Some links that are shown on Facebook are going through to a blocked website domain. Even the occasional link to sites like BuzzFeed lead students to a blocked domain screen. “I understand why they block some websites — for example when I’m trying to stream stuff — but I find it really frustrating when I go onto Facebook and try to look at links that friends post and it takes me to a blocked website,” junior Sandra Cronin said. Junior Scott Coffey said that Lipscomb is blocking some of the news sites he checks. “Some websites that I personally use that Lipscomb may block are some LGBT news sites and some streaming sites that can host copyrighted content,” Coffey said. Director of information security and infrastructure Dave Wagner explained how Lipscomb chooses to filter the Internet. Websites are broken down into 59 different categories. Lipscomb picks five out of the 59 as being the most important. Each site is broken down further by the material that it hosts. Websites that feature anything related to alcohol, drugs, gambling, hate/discrimination and pornography are automatically blocked from the server. Other categories are blocked under suspicion of containing advertising-supported software, malicious software and file sharing. Those sites are blocked in order to keep students’ computers and the Lipscomb server from being contaminated with viruses. “I think that it’s good and it definitely keeps with Lipscomb’s policy on everything when it comes to keeping up a good Christian environment,” Coffey said. “However, I do think...
by Sarah McGee | Feb 11, 2015 | News Slider
Tax season is coming up, and it affects people of all ages, including college students. Not all students know how the process works. “It was my first time doing taxes at all, and so I didn’t understand that I actually had to do them,” freshman Sarah Johnson said. “I thought it was going to be a straight forward process, but it wasn’t as cut and dry as I wanted it to be.” Other students aren’t given the chance to file due to employers simply looking over them and having them give their forms to their parents. “In my current job, my boss emails our W-2 forms,” freshman Heather McPherson said. “I asked him the other day what to do with my W-2 form, and he said just give it to your mom and she’ll take care of it.” Because filing taxes can get confusing for students, Charles Frasier from the College of Business shared a few tips for tax season. Frasier is an accounting teacher at Lipscomb, and worked as a tax accountant. “The first thing to keep in mind is what is the deadline,” Frasier said. “I think most people know that it’s April 15th. It might also be interesting to know that if for some reason you’re unable to file your return by April 15th, there is a form to file where you can get an automatic extension of your return.” Once employees apply to have an extension, they have six months to file the tax return form. Students have the option of filling out a physical form or an online form. Students also need to know...
