In the week following Halloween, a new business opened on Union Street and Ohio University President Roderick McDavis met with Graduate Student Senate. Here’s more information on those stories, along with other top news from the past week.
O’Bleness and Martzolff
O’Bleness House and Martzolff House will be torn down in summer 2017.
Fenzel House may also be demolished, but no decision has been made yet depending on if more beds are needed.
The estimated budget for the project is $2.5 million. If Fenzel House is not demolished, the budget will decrease to $1.8 million.
The demolition of O’Bleness and Martzolff will be part of the second phase of OU’s Back South demolition project. Cady House, Foster House and Brough House were torn down over the summer.
Graduate Student Senate
At Tuesday’s Graduate Student Senate Meeting, McDavis addressed numerous issues, including September’s graffiti wall images.
“While I’m all about freedom of speech, some of the things that appeared on the wall were right on the border of totally offensive,” McDavis said.
McDavis also discussed the issue of graduate student income, saying the law prevents graduate students from working more than 20 hours per week and that the university does its best to be transparent about mandatory fees in letters to prospective students.
“If there are letters that fail to make this statement, let us know about it and we’ll make the change,” McDavis said.
Credit Union
A storefront for OU Credit Union will have its grand opening ceremony Friday at the new location on Union Street.
Laura Pratt, marketing manager of OU Credit Union, said the new location utilizes new technology to improve services such as opening new accounts, applying for loans and setting up meetings with investment centers.
“It allows efficiency and security for a member and the credit unions,” Pratt said. “Because it is a narrow space, an open teller line wouldn’t have that privacy. … There’s a whole bunch of options for the customer.”
The idea to open a storefront came after the 2014 Union Street fire, which gave OU Credit Union staff the ability to design a space from the ground up.
Viral
A bizarre string of events led to an OU's student’s trip to the World Series going viral.
R. Damian Nance, a professor of geological studies, noticed one of his students, Charlie Winovich, swiped into class one day, but was not present at the end of the class.
Nance emailed Winovich about the situation, and Winovich responded with a picture of him and his brother at Progressive Field during game one of the World Series games between the Chicago Cubs and the Cleveland Indians
Nance responded once more, pardoning Winovich from any repercussions and calling his excuse for missing class “impeccable.”
Winovich tweeted the email exchange and received more than 4,000 shares. The incident was also covered by ESPN, Yahoo! and Fox 8 News.
