Herbert's Struggle

This is an essay of mine that was published in Southeastern's "The Pick" (Fall 2009).

http://www.selu.edu/acad_research/programs/writing_center/pick/backissue/volume38/assets/wells.pdf

Relay for Life of South Tangipahoa

Track team revs up for new season

*Published on The Lion's Roar http://www.lionsroarnews.com/campus-blog/track-team-revs-up-for-new-season-1.1825882?MMode=true 

Southeastern can’t host official track meets because the track at Strawberry Stadium isn’t regulation size, but on Saturday, Dec. 4, an inter-squad meet was held.

Events scheduled for the men and women were the 60-meter dash, 60-meter hurdles, 300-meter dash, 800-meter dash, 4-by-400 meter relay, long jump, high jump and triple jump. Some of the pole vaulters competed on Dec. 3 in Tickfaw, La.

Sophomore Brandon Daniels leaps into the pit.

Head Coach Sean Brady gave the performances an overall grade of B plus. After the meet he said his mood level was high because of what he saw in the athletes.

He wasn’t the only one in high spirits. Sophomore Abram Taylor was a redshirt freshman last season and is ready to get moving this year. He said, “I thought the meet went well and it was very good for the team to get the competitive juices flowing.”

Tamra Grayson, a junior transfer from New Mexico Junior College, won the women’s 300-meter dash and was the second leg on the winning women’s 4-by-400 meter relay.

Grayson said, “I felt pretty good and just tried to stay focused before and during the race – that was my goal. As a team I think it gave us a good chance to see where we are and know what we need to work on so when we go to a meet we’ll be ready to roll.”

Even the spectators had a great time, and the 4-by-400 meter relay seemed to be a hit.

“I really enjoyed it,” Toshia Jackson said. “I liked watching the girls 4-by-4 running against some of the men, and I liked the high jump.”

Former runner Tya Carodine said, “I had a lot of fun. I was happy it wasn’t cold this time. We had an inter-squad meet two years ago and it was freezing outside, so the nice weather was a pleasant surprise! The 4-by-4 was probably my favorite race because a few coaches and former athletes made a team of their own. It was nice catching up with friends – a very enjoyable day out at the track!”

Some athletes weren’t as pleased with the way the meet turned out for them. Freshman Alicia Noel said she felt she could have done better but thought the meet was successful in finding out where everyone is at this point in their training.

Domonique Morley, a sophomore from Nassau, Bahamas, thought she had a moderate performance. She said, “I’m not practicing with the team. I don’t have anyone to push me since I’m working out by myself. I’m not pleased, but I feel that I did okay.”

Morley’s amateurism wasn’t completed with the NCAA, so she’s ineligible this semester.

A new track is currently under construction and scheduled to be complete in the spring of 2011. It will be NCAA certified eight-lane track so that the Lions and Lady Lions may host meets and even go in rotation to host the conference meet.

Southeastern’s first official track meet is on Jan. 15 at Louisiana State University.

Website I designed for the Bamboo Room

Bamboo Room site

Beginner's Photojournalism Portfolio

Southeastern gem: Equipment Checkout

HAMMOND, La. - A valuable resource may be lying idle, and every student has already paid for it.

Equipment checkout, a system headed by Clarissa Schiro-Sampey that allows students to rent equipment for educational purposes, is supported by the $65 technology fee included in tuition.

Some students have never heard of the service.

Brooke Barone, a communication major, said, “I had not heard about equipment checkout until I had a class this past semester in photojournalism. I wish I would have known prior to my last semester because I would have taken advantage of this offer at Southeastern. I think it is useful and great for students who cannot afford to buy a nice camera.”

A faculty sponsor is needed to take advantage of equipment checkout. This just means that a professor will reply to the email from Student Productivity Services confirming that the equipment is being used for his or her class.

Login to fill out the short application using the same password used for Blackboard, Webmail, etc. Equipment can be kept for seven days. After receiving the second email from SPS (the first one confirms receipt of the application), bring a university ID card to Tinsley Hall Room 102 to pick up the requested equipment and be responsible.

Equipment available for rental include laptops, digital cameras, digital video camera recorders, video cameras, projectors and tripods.

The type of laptops are Dell Latitude E5400, Dell Latitude D510, Dell Inspiron 4150 and Dell Inspiron 5150; the digital cameras include Canon PowerShot Pro 1 and Canon EOS 10D; the digital video camera recorder is a Sony HDD DCR-SR42; the video camera is a Sony VHS DCR-PC120; and the two projectors are InFocus LP120 and InFocus LP425Z.

Public relations major Christopher McKinley knew about the service. He said, “I was aware that equipment checkout was available. I’ve never used it for any of my classes, but I know that it is an incredible resource that needs to be advertised more since we’ve paid for it.”

Tya Carodine, a kinesiology major, shares McKinley’s view on advertising Equipment Checkout. She said, “Although I did know about the laptop and camera rentals, I forgot about it because it’s not advertised around campus and a lot of people don’t know about it so it’s not the topic of many conversations. I’ll probably remember now and will most likely take advantage of it in the near future.”

Schiro-Sampey and her office gets the word out about equipment checkout in a variety of ways. There is a button on Southeastern’s homepage, an important notices link on the Webmail login screen, information in the freshman packet and articles in the Lion’s Roar. Department heads are supposed to inform teachers who then tell students, and word of mouth helps spread the word. Also, Student Government Association represents SPS because of the technology fee.

Schiro-Sampey keeps SPS running smoothly. She attended Southeastern and graduated in 1987 and 1997. She started working at the university in 1998 and created equipment checkout in the fall of 2001 with the help of two German students. It started as a paper and pencil system, but WEquip was developed in 2004 to make the system technology-based.

Faculty members are not allowed to use the equipment in SPS because students pay the technology fee, but the Center for Faculty Excellence has a similarly run system.

Budget cuts force departments to merge

HAMMOND, La. - Although few things have the ability to sober one up like a hit to the wallet, the reality of the university’s financial condition has become even more tangible for some students and faculty.

President John Crain decided to combine the Department of Foreign Languages with the Department of Communication to offset expenses caused by budget cuts to higher education. The new department is headed by Dr. Lucia Harrison, former department head of the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures.

The potential created by the decision was immediately recognized by some people.

"I believe it will ultimately make the communication department stronger, giving us a more global/international perspective,” said Dr. Suzette Bryan, former interim department head of the Department of Communication. “We should be a good fit.”

While members of both departments are excited for the opportunity to work together, the excitement of some members of the foreign language department - which experienced much loss - was overshadowed in the beginning.

Harrison said, “My initial reaction was disappointment and distress because of the loss of our French and French Education majors, its consequences for our students and the termination of three outstanding internationally-recognized colleagues.”

Senior communication major Heather Gonzales learned about the change over the summer when she tried to go to the communication department's main office, and it wasn't there.

Gonzales said, "It threw me off - the place they sent me was foreign language's office. I was caught off-guard and didn't understand what happened or why. I'm not upset, but I'm concerned about foreign languages. I'd freak out if it were us."

Many people hear about the percentage of funds and the large amount of money cut. Increases in tuition, housing and other fees at the university have signified Southeastern’s state, but now majors are being done away with.

"It was inevitable, and I cannot think of a nicer group of people with whom to merge,” said Dr. Cheryll Javaherian, an associate Spanish professor. “But the news was overshadowed with the shock, anger and grief I experienced over the loss of our French major-field programs and of three tenured colleagues.”

"I do not think I will ever comprehend this decision," Javaherian said. "It is like a bad, recurrent dream, and I empathize deeply with my friends and colleagues and their students who have suffered much. This being said, I think we have a great group of faculty - creative, industrious, resilient and dedicated to helping each other succeed in this venture with Dr. Harrison at the helm."

Some students and faculty thought it was unusual to combine the two departments, but it appears that unifying communication and foreign languages departments is an action undertaken by many universities.

Harrison realizes the success this unity can lead to, and she is armed with the favor, support and vigor of her faculty and dean. Still, she knows that there is a lot of work to be done.

"The challenge for me is to create a new culture for the department that reflects its unique strengths,” Harrison said.

Harrison’s goals - with the help of the faculty - are to give rise to a new mission for the department and be intentional about its priorities. She said some ideas are to have programs that consist of the study of a language in conjunction with media and translation, translation and interpreting, management studies or international development studies. Team teaching is also a prospect.

Current French majors have until May 2011 to complete their French courses and until 2012 to finish the other subjects in their curriculum.

Students raise $9,000 in two days for Parking Lot Babies

*PUBLISHED ON UPI.COM

Southeastern Louisiana student Zachary Boudreaux wrote the state-winning play Parking Lot Babies and was looking forward to going to regionals when he learned that the university couldn’t fund the trip.

Amanda Klipsch, the play’s scenic designer, said when she found out she experienced a “defeated, oh-no-there’s-no-way-we-can-possibly-not-go but determined” feeling.

That determination compelled the students to go after what they believed in, and they weren’t the only ones who believed. People who had seen the show and were confident in both the students and the play wanted them to compete. Family, friends and people in the community wrote checks for whatever was needed, such as food, gas and hotel stay.

Some donors weren’t even asked for money. They decided to contribute after learning what happened. Even in this economy, it took about a day and a half to pocket $9,000.

“We wanted to go together or not at all,” Klipsch said.

Play director James Winter was amazed by this. “We weren’t even supposed to be there, and we went there and won the whole thing,” he said. “That’s pretty incredible.”

Besides Winter, all the design, cast and crew members were students, and there isn’t even a theatre major at the university. The regional festival was held at Amarillo College in Amarillo, Texas. After winning the state festival last fall, Southeastern defeated seven other regions to win regionals.

“To make it to nationals, all elements have to be excellent,” acting and technical professor Steve Schepker pointed out. “The production as a whole can’t be weak in one area. That’s what I’m most proud of. And it was all students – a 22-year-old and a 19-year-old were doing set and lighting with no faculty help. That’s impressive. When I was their age, I couldn’t have done what they did.”

Parking Lot Babies was birthed in 2008. In October Boudreaux brought the first draft of his play to Winter. It was the first play he had ever written, and he wanted feedback. Winter recalled instantly liking the play. They gathered actors to read and workshop it because he thought it was sincere and genuine, and he wasn’t alone in being captivated.

Sixteen months later the play was honored as the best in the region by the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival. The awards were as follows: Zachary Boudreaux for original playwriting, Amanda Klipsch for graphic design and publicity, Southeastern Louisiana University for Parking Lot Babies and Southeastern Louisiana University for support for original playwriting.

Parking Lot Babies can be seen March 10-13 at 7:30 p.m. in D. Vickers hall. Tickets are free for Southeastern students with a school ID and $6 for the public.

Link to story on UPIU.com
Link to story on WAFB.com
Link to story on CollegeTownBlog.com
Link to story on NOLA.com

Layouts I contributed to in Quark

Director page for Southeastern's 2010 Study Abroad magazine (design by Genny "Kati" Chastain, Brooke Garig and me)

Food page for Southeastern's 2010 Study Abroad magazine (vision and content by Brooke Garig; Quark and Photoshop work by me)

Layouts I designed in Quark

Table of Contents page for Southeastern's 2010 Study Abroad magazine

Content and design by me (story in the 2010 Study Abroad magazine)

Olympian Erica Bartolina perseveres for pole vault dreams

While overcoming her injury last summer, one of Olympian Erica Bartolina’s goals was to get back to the performance level she was at last year during outdoors. Currently she’s staying healthy and near the conclusion of fall training, and she said she feels that she’s a better pole vaulter now than she was last year. The journey to get in this position to medal at high-level meets has been a tough one though.



Bartolina started enjoying pole vaulting in high school because it made her feel like she could achieve and accomplish something, but there have been times when she hasn’t liked it as much. In 2005, she landed on her back during a run away from the pit. Healing physically took a while, but that paled in comparison to her mental recovery.

“I got to the point that year where I just couldn’t pole vault,” Bartolina said. “I got tired of trying to try, so basically I said, ‘Okay I quit for the rest of this season because if I don’t quit now, I won’t ever like it again.’ ”

That was in June. Bartolina said it was a hard time because she didn’t want to do it then, and she was just hoping that she would want to do it again later.

“It was scary because I wanted to get away from this thing that I’m supposed to love,” she said. “But I think everyone needs to get away from things a little bit when it’s really important to them, especially if it’s getting too stressful or too emotional. Give it a little break, and then you can see it in perspective better.”

Everything worked out well because Hurrican Katrina hit shortly after, and it would’ve been hard to be focused on pole vaulting during that time. Bartolina resumed training in October.

In 2008 before she made the Olympic team, Bartolina thought that year may be her last year of competition.

“You know I was 28,” she said. “I’d been pole vaulting for half my life. I thought, "How long are you gonna do this thing?" I was chasing a dream.”

Though in the back of her mind, Bartolina was thinking 2008 may be her last year as a professional pole vaulter, she was committed to having a good season. She didn’t get distracted by where she’d move on to if she retired, and that focus made all the difference. She improved her height by six inches and made the Olympic team, and everything changed.

In the midst of those changes, Bartolina overlooked an important part of her competition. Usually every fall, she gives herself the option to choose not to pole vault. That way she doesn’t have to if she doesn’t want to. But when she has made the decision, she’s committed for the year.

She didn’t do that last fall because she was on top of the world. Then she got hurt in January, and questions like “Do I even wanna be pole vaulting?” sneaked in. Bartolina believes part of that was because she broke her routine.

“I could’ve ended on going to the Olympics and having a good year, and move on,” she said. “That would’ve been okay, but I didn’t give myself the option, and I think in the spring I was like, ‘Here I am injured. I can’t compete. What am I doing?’ ”

Bartolina went through the process of asking herself if she wanted to move on. Her answer was no, so she followed the plan to get well.

This year has been similar to her year when Hurricane Katrina hit because she hasn’t been competing at all or training hard. Everything worked out well for her like in that year, too. Her husband and coach, Michael Bartolina, had back surgery, and she needed to take care of him. They were also able to build their pole vault facility. Those things wouldn’t have happened like they did had she been focused on pole vaulting.

“Everything happens for a reason,” Bartolina said. “God arranged things. Since I’m not competing, all this other stuff happened. And they were all things that needed to happen.”

Now her husband is healing, the pole vault club is going well and Bartolina is preparing to begin indoor competition and work toward the rest of her goals.

Link to story on NOLA.com

Olympian Erica Bartolina vaulting

Erica Bartolina

Olympian Erica Bartolina: a day in the life

What good is it to have goals and make plans if there are no intentional daily decisions to make them a reality?

Erica Bartolina pole vaulted for the United States in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, and she has many new targets – the biggest is the 2012 Olympics in London. Every day she chooses behaviors that advance her ambitions. One of the biggest things is remembering why she has these aspirations in the first place.

“I like pole vaulting,” Bartolina said. “I like the fact that you always have something you can work on, you know? You’re always striving for a little bit more. Your technique is never perfect, so you can always be a little bit better. And as long as you can always be a little bit better, you can always jump higher – and that’s more fun.”

Since a day starts the night before, Bartolina places high importance on getting nine hours of sleep. That calls for being purposeful and actually going to bed, but she knows it’s worth it when at 7 a.m. she voluntarily wakes up instead of reluctantly waking to the sound of an alarm clock.

In the morning she eats breakfast and has coffee. Breakfast is usually oatmeal with blueberries, a bagel with peanut putter and jelly or Quaker Oat Squares. It’s pretty consistent so she’ll know when she will get hungry again and so she’ll be sure to have enough carbohydrates to get through her workout.

As far as her diet goes, the athlete doesn’t count calories or limit herself excessively. She just eats healthy and takes in plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables. The key is leaving the unhealthy food at the grocery store.

“I try not to buy stuff that’s a temptation for me because if it’s in my house, I’ll eat it,” Bartolina said. “I don’t have that much self control. As long as I don’t have bad stuff in the house, then pretty much everything is healthy. I can eat as much of it as I want, and life is good.”

Her husband and coach, Michael Bartolina, doesn’t eat as healthy as she does. She just buys things he likes that she doesn’t really care about.

She tries not to plan anything in between breakfast and training. That way she’s not rushed and can use the time for mental preparation, whether it’s praying, meditating, journaling, doing relaxation exercises or visualizing.

Bartolina has a four-hour time frame for her workout. She may not train the entire time, but that leaves room for things related to training like treatment on the foot that she injured and ice baths. Her workout consists of a 45-minute warm-up that includes hurdle mobility, dynamic flexibility and sprint drills. The warm-up isn’t just to get ready to work out, it’s a workout in itself that maintains core strength and helps hip flexor muscles among other things.

Her warm-up is done every day. Then she does a sprint, stadium or tire pull workout. General strength exercises like pushups, sit-ups and lunge walks are also a big part of her workout. She doesn’t do a lot of weights so she won’t get bulky. Squats and power cleans two to three days a week are about all she does in the weight room.

Bartolina has added a few more things to keep her foot strong, but other than that her training days are consistent. She trains on four-week cycles where she works up harder every week for three weeks, and the fourth week is a rest week. She’ll go through December for fall training. During competition, she does half as much, but she just has to maintain the work she has already put in.

For lunch, Bartolina typically eats a sandwich with turkey breast, tomato, lettuce and other toppings. “I make good fat sandwiches with all the good stuff on it,” she said.

In the afternoons, she has personal training clients. She started about four years ago when she casually helped people who asked for help. She enjoys helping people be healthy.

Bartolina coaches her pole vault club Sunday afternoons and Monday and Wednesday nights. She and her husband have a new facility at their house now, so they’re no longer leasing a warehouse.

Dinner is whatever she feels like cooking, but she takes the time to prepare food. “I like to cook,” she said. “I’m not a fancy cook. I’m not a chef, but I like to cook food that tastes good. It may not look pretty, but it tastes good.”

Bartolina realizes what happens in the next couple of months carries a lot of weight and will affect her long-term goals. She said she wants to jump well at the early college meets so that she will be able to go back to the bigger professional meets.

Link to story on NOLA.com

Erica Bartolina coaching

Erica Bartolina practicing

Bartolina revamps thinking

[HAMMOND] – Olympian Erica Bartolina has high hopes for her pole vault performances this upcoming season, and her mental strength will determine if she proves successful.

Bartolina battled an injury this year, but the thing that holds her back most aside from that is belief in herself.

“One of the things that I really need to work on is just expecting more of myself,” she said, giving her psychological and physical goals equal importance.

“It’s hard to say that,” Bartolina revealed. “People look at me and say, ‘How can you expect more? You’re an Olympian,’ and it’s like yeah I almost did that on accident because I didn’t really believe it.”

It wasn’t until she was in the middle of finals at the 2008 Olympic Trials that Bartolina thought she could make the team. She saw that girls were already out, and she was still competing, focused and jumping well. Even then, the thought of going to the Olympics only became real when it was likely that she would actually go.

“I’ve always been just a little behind and not really expecting as much out of myself as I really should,” Bartolina said.

The first time the athlete ever thought going to the Olympics might be possible for her was in 2004 when she qualified for the Olympic trials. That was two years after she graduated from Texas A&M and made school history in pole vault. She had already decided to make an effort at being a professional pole vaulter.

Bartolina tries to balance high goals with realism in her goal-setting. She gives herself a bigger frame of time than Michael Bartolina, her coach and husband, would. She has the goal of improving another six inches but doesn’t think doing it in December is practical.

“Now my coach might say, ‘She can do it today if she just went out and did it,’” Bartolina joked.

She and her coach have to be on the same page. They’re a team, and he helps her a lot. They also collaborate on aspirations. Bartolina usually sees the target in the distance, while her coach’s vision is more immediate.

She has learned that if she expects more, she’ll accomplish more. She doesn’t want to limit herself and underachieve.

Bartolina executes several exercises to adjust her thinking and focus, which is necessary in pole vaulting.

She doesn’t plan things before training in the morning so she’s not rushed and can prepare mentally. She does relaxation exercises, meditations, visualizations and journaling. It requires a lot of effort and self control since it’s not what she’s best at, and she could be doing other things instead.

Bartolina knows this works though. She recalled a time when exhibiting mental toughness paid off. One of the Golden League meets in Brussels following the Olympics was a big test.

She was by herself and had pulled a muscle in her back a few days earlier. The conditions were less than favorable: it was 55 degrees and raining. Opening height would’ve been a personal record for her earlier that year, and she was competing against the top eight pole vaulters in the world.

Failure was a clear option, but Bartolina had other plans.

“I just didn’t give myself the choice,” she said. Instead, she engaged in positive self talk. “It’s cold and rainy, and you hurt. And it doesn’t matter. Go clear a bar.” And she did.

Now her most immediate goal is to place in the top two in the U.S. National Indoor Championships in February to qualify for the World Indoor Championships in Doha, Qatar in March. She said that would give her a lot of confidence going into outdoors.

Link to story on NOLA.com

Bartolina fights for future

[HAMMOND] – Erica Bartolina pole vaulted in the Summer Olympics and hopes to represent the United States again in the 2012 Summer Olympics, but a few obstacles stand in the way on her road to London, England.

Bartolina experienced a huge setback after the greatest year of her career. Following a plateau in her performances due to injuries, she bettered her personal best of 14 feet 5.25 inches by nearly six inches with a vault of 14 feet 11 inches to make the U.S. team and compete in Beijing. That was last year. This year she can’t jump at all.

Before her first indoor meet last February, Bartolina injured the posterior tibial tendon in her right foot during practice. It’s the tendon that runs down the inside of the leg and into the arch. “I was halfway down the runway and just felt a little clench. You know one of those things when you didn’t think it was any big deal, and it turned out to be one of the biggest deals ever,” she said.

That little clench changed her year. After getting treatment from a trainer and unsuccessfully trying to vault, Bartolina visited an orthopedist. He put her in a walking boot with orthotics for four weeks, and she had to limit movement her foot for three additional weeks. Recovery took longer than she initially thought. The injury ended her indoor season.

The outdoor season was still in sight though, and she planned to compete in the World Outdoor Championships in Berlin in August. But in May when she attempted to restart training and use her foot, Bartolina realized the healing process had just begun. Her foot would get swollen and stay that way if she did too much on it. Any activity had to be done gradually.

“I remember the first time I ran on it. It was like a mile of walking half of it and slowly jogging the other half. That was when I was really like wow I have a long way to go,” Bartolina said. She decided she wouldn’t compete at all this year. While it was a hard decision to make, she did not want to underperform.

“If I can’t go out and be good, there’s no sense in me going out and jumping,” Bartolina said.

Her foot has gotten stronger. She will have it assessed by a foot specialist soon and possibly get more supportive training orthotics. It’s no longer injured, but there could be damage if she isn’t careful. Bartolina continues to ice her foot and get treatment, but currently most of the work to strengthen her foot is done during training.

Now her goals are directed toward the 2011 World Outdoor Championships in Korea and the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. Her target height is 15 feet 5 inches. That six-inch improvement on her personal best would put her in position to medal in those meets. But that is in the distant future. She has more immediate concerns.

Bartolina has no mark this season. Next year she wants to get back to where she was last year at 14 feet 11 inches. This will be difficult. Staying healthy and judging how far she can or cannot go on her foot only makes it more difficult.

Her first goal is to place in the top two in the U.S. National Indoor Championships in February to qualify for the World Indoor Championships in Doha, Qatar in March. Accomplishing this would make all her other goals a lot easier to achieve, like placing in the top three again in the National Outdoor Championships. “That would really make me feel like I’m back in it, I’m good to go and I’m going to go compete with the best,” Bartolina said.

She also wants to vault high enough indoors to get invited to the big outdoor meets. That way she’ll have the chance to accumulate points and have a shot at making it to the World Athletics Final. Cities are still bidding to host the meet, but the top eight or nine scorers from each event in the big meets are invited.

Accomplishing these goals will take consistency, another one of Bartolina’s objectives. “I’d love to go out and not have a meet below 14’6 next year. That would be awesome to me. That would really make me feel like I’m one of those top few, but we’ll see how it goes.”

Link to story on NOLA.com