Entries for November 30, 2006

A statewide ban on affirmative action has focused University of Michigan students' attention on racial tensions on campus--and they're starting to fight back, with a diversity push from an unexpected player: the fraternity and sorority scene. Self-segregation long plagued fraternities and sororities, but they've now launched an "unprecedented" move to reverse that, the Michigan Daily reports. Last month, a historically black fraternity hosted a party with an integrated guest list, and this spring, historically black and Latino groups plan to join the majority-white ones in the school's Greek Week, the Daily reports. Michigan's vice president of the historically black National Pan-Hellenic Council told the paper that the affirmative action ban accelerated the efforts. "It's crunch time now, game time," he said.

An environmental plan at Southern Methodist University is saving its southwest Texas locale from 3 million pounds of pollution from power plants, according to the EPA. It's the equivalent of building a 390-acre forest, but this move just required switching energy sources to make at least 3 percent of the university's energy "green." SMU is the first large university in the Southwest to go green--and a student-led environmental campaign, launched last year, gets the credit for that, the Daily Campus reports.

The sleeping pill Ambien might be used as a date rape tool, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, the Diamondback reports. The University of Maryland has filled 140 prescriptions for the drug already this year, a university health services official told the paper.

Princeton University has pushed aside decades of mistrust to enter a deal with its eating clubs, which have long been the de facto dining halls for upperclassmen. The deal aims to make the clubs more financially accessible to all students by providing those who can't afford membership with financial aid of up to $2,000 a year. The new partnership shows Princeton has "yielded to pressure from students and alumni who refuse to relent in their support" of the clubs, writes the Daily Princetonian.

• University of Alabama football players were "shocked" by their coach's firing, the Crimson White reports .
• A movement of frustrated students that started at Howard University last year with a "Declaration of Student Frustration" has resuscitated itself, the Hilltop reports.
• A book about a fictional fraternity raises real-life issues of homophobia and racial tension, the Baylor Lariat reports.