On the side of Shannon Karl’s desk sits her laptop and constantly buzzing cell phone. Out front lies a stack of stiffly thought out applications that carry a heavy significance.

Karl, in her first year as head coach of the VCU field hockey team, has implemented a new process when it comes to choosing captains.

First, players must fill out the application, which lists grade point average, people they look up to, and goals among many other criteria. Then they must sit in front of an eight-person committee explaining why they are fit for the role, with a video camera recording in front of them.

This among many techniques goes along with the changes Karl has made since the departure of former head coach Kelly McQuade, who stepped down unexpectedly last November. Karl, who admits she’s not a morning person, has also instrumented early practice times before the crack of dawn.

“We’re moving in a new and fresh direction where we kind of promote the term ‘Action,’” Karl said. “Where we don’t talk about it anymore, we do it.”

Lacking pure leadership last season, the field hockey team suffered a 5-13 season, and won just two games in the CAA, failing to qualify for the conference tournament. Associate Head Coach Laura Baker, who returns to VCU after formerly coaching and playing for the school, said the team is headed back in the right direction.

“One of the biggest things I’ve noticed change is that we have a focus and a idea of where we’re going now,” she said.

In 2010 the Rams revived a once dormant program by recording the team’s second winning season since 1993 and reached the CAA Tournament for the first time since 2003. They were led by a pair of Dutch seniors, Marle and Flore, who combined for 41 goals and 112 points in their four years of eligibility. One year following a setback season in 2011, Karl and company are seeking the same kind of leadership.

“I think it’s a difference in terms of the girls buying in,” Baker said. “The biggest one obviously is more control and organization.”

Setting out on the recruiting trail is nothing new for Karl and Baker, who’ve accounted for nearly 100 percent of the recruiting load in years past. Karl’s staff has penned four incoming recruits for 2012 and is on the hunt for 2013. Athletic Director Norwood Teague approved a trip for Karl and Baker to travel to recruit overseas in a couple of months for the first time in the program’s history. All prior recruiting had been done in the United States or through a recruiting service.

“When you’re a non-revenue making sport like field hockey, to have such backing from your athletic director and your senior woman administrator and associate athletic director it really makes you feel like you have purpose,” Karl said. “And you want to fight for them and they want to fight for you and that’s a special feeling.”

Karl admits she has a lot to learn as the head of the program. And recovering from a less than stellar season will be no easy task. But just over three months on the job, she’s up for the challenge.

“I’ve always wanted to be a head coach,” Karl said. “I’m really excited to be here I can’t think of a better place to be.”

From CAA hoops fans to even the national media, college hoops junkies are rampantly atwitter recently when it comes to discussing how many bids the CAA deserves into this year’s NCAA Tournament.

Some hoops prognosticators say they will get no at-large bids, some say they will get one or two, and there’s even some that are holding out hope for three.

Just like last season, the movement by CAA fans and advocates has transcended into a hash-tag movement on Twitter in which the person denotes how many bids they think the conference should get. The movement is one which is generally endorsed by The CT Sports as hash-tag movements are awesome.

So, have at it, Ram Nation and the greater CAA nation at large: Vote in our poll and tell us how many bids you think the CAA deserves into the NCAA Tournament this season? That as opposed to how many they ultimately will get.

House bills 1, 62 and 462 have all been criticized by opponents, saying they will limit women's access to abortions in the state of Virginia. Fairfax County reported the most abortions in the state, with 2,407. Richmond came in second and Virginia Beach was third, with 2,161 abortions reported during 2010. Infographic by Ying Cheng.

Midway through the legislative session, House Republicans say they’re still focused on jobs, education, government reform and public safety – and they dispute Democratic charges that they’re pushing a “social issues” agenda.

Members of the House Republican Caucus discussed their priorities after “crossover day,” the deadline for each legislative chamber to act on its own bills.

“Of 603 bills passed in the House, over 42 percent have dealt with issues of jobs, education, government reform and safety,” said House Speaker William Howell of Fredericksburg. “These are the four main points of the Republican Party.”

Democrats have accused Republicans of being obsessed with social issues such as restricting abortion and gay rights and expanding gun rights. They point to measures such as House Bill 1, which would grant “personhood” rights to a fertilized egg at the moment of conception. Some critics say HB 1 could outlaw abortion and even some contraceptive methods, but the bill’s proponents disagree.

No state has passed such a law. Since 2008, Republicans in Colorado and Mississippi have pushed for similar “personhood” bills, but they failed.

HB 1, sponsored by Delegate Bob Marshall, R-Manassas, now heads to the Senate. If the personhood bill becomes law, it would essentially criminalize all abortions in Virginia, opponents say. They worry that the law also would affect women’s access to regular contraceptive measures such as intrauterine devices and the morning-after pill.

Sen. Donald McEachin, D-Richmond, said at a press conference Thursday that he believes the personhood bill is “absolutely an attack on contraceptives.”

“Republicans want to reserve the right to decide what should be considered a contraceptive in Virginia,” said McEachin, who chairs the Senate Democratic Caucus.

“It makes me wonder if the Republicans’ real intent is to prevent access to contraceptives, to continue to blur lines and eventually for them to make all family decisions for Virginians.”

Speakers at the press conference also criticized House Bill 462, which would require every woman undergoing an abortion to first submit to an ultrasound. The bill says the woman must be given an opportunity to view the ultrasound image of her fetus before the abortion.

Under the legislation, if the heartbeat cannot be detected, as is often the case early in a pregnancy, the woman would be subjected to a trans-vaginal probe.

“House Bill 462 basically puts government inside a woman’s body, and government has absolutely no business there,” said Delegate Charnielle Herring, D-Alexandria.

“These two bills (HB 1 and HB 462) represent an attack on women the likes of which we have never seen in our modern era, telling women what they must do with their bodies and forcing an invasive medical procedure onto a person who is exercising their constitutional right, is the epitome of big government,” she said.

The House passed HB 462 on a 63-36 vote on Tuesday.

By a similar margin, delegates also have passed HB 62, which would prohibit state-funded abortions for low-income women even if the child they are carrying would have totally incapacitating deformities or impairments.

Katherine Grennier, a spokesperson for the local chapter of the ACLU, said HB 62 discriminates against impoverished Virginians.

“It would restrict access for very poor women, resulting in a system where only wealthy women can access the full range of health care services in the face of a devastating pre-natal diagnosis,” Grennier said.

She said this is “absolutely no way to treat a woman who is facing a medical crisis. No woman plans to have an abortion, but if she needs one, every woman deserves the chance to make the best decision for her circumstances.”

At a press conference Wednesday, House Republicans acknowledged that bills involving social issues have received
a lot of press coverage and commentary. But they said those bills are a small part of the GOP agenda.

“I think the proof in the pudding is in the fact that less than 2.5 percent of bills introduced by Republicans have been social issues,” Howell said.

GOP leaders displayed a pie chart showing that only 2.2 percent of the bills approved by the House concerned social issues. In contrast:

• 42.3 percent concerned education, government reform, public safety and jobs.
• 12.3 percent involved judicial issues.
• 10.8 percent address local matters.
• The rest concerned transportation, energy, the environment, health care, veterans and other issues.

“We have approved important measures that will spur economic growth, streamline our government and improve the quality of education in Virginia. And we have accomplished this by administering the legislative process fairly and transparently, allowing bills to be presented and discussed by the senators in full committee,” said Senate Majority Leader Thomas Norment of Williamsburg.

The Senate approved several components of Gov. Bob McDonnell’s agenda, including his call to reduce and streamline the state’s boards and commissions. It also passed measures aimed at spurring economic development and creating jobs.

“The wide range of bills that were considered and approved is particularly impressive,” said Sen. Ryan McDougle of Mechanicsville, who chairs the Senate Republican Caucus.

“Bills on jobs and economic development, education, public safety, government reform, health care and veterans’ affairs have all been approved by the Senate and are headed to the House. We are on track to have one of the most productive sessions in recent memory.”

Each house now will take up legislation passed by the other chamber. Moreover, the General Assembly must turn its attention to crafting a state budget for the 2012-14 biennium.

This year’s General Assembly session is scheduled to end March 10.

The West Grace Street South dorms are scheduled to open by Aug. 1.

With the West Grace Street South residence hall nearing completion, VCU is set to break ground on the West Grace Street North dorm in the next few weeks.

The design, construction and cost for the dorm were approved by the board of visitors last week. The project will add an additional 379 beds for on-campus housing and have a global education focus on the first floor, Brian Ohlinger, assistant director of Facilities Management, said.

Like West Grace Street South, West Grace Street North is a design-build, which means a contractor and an architect are hired as a team by the university to save money. The new project will have a different contractor than West Grace Street South, Ohlinger said.

West Grace Street South is expected to be finished in July and be ready for occupancy by Aug. 1, Ohlinger said. The 162,000-square-foot apartment-style dorm for sophomores will host the ASPiRE program and could be expanded in the future.

“We’ve designed the current buildings in a way that would allow us to expand should we ever acquire the Sahara restaurant,” Ohlinger said. “We’ve thought about the future, and if we do (acquire it), we can add on to either the deck or the housing.”

The university was not willing to pay what Ohlinger called a “ridiculous amount” of money to buy the property prior to the building of West Grace Street South and the Laurel Street Parking Deck. It would have been “irresponsible” to buy it at the owner’s asking price, he said.

After West Grace Street South is completed, the 300 block of Shafer Street will reopen, and half of the 200 block will be closed until West Grace Street North is completed, Ohlinger said. Both the alley by Barnes and Noble and the parking garage entrance will still be accessible.

Across campus, the growing steel skeleton of the University Learning Center looms over Floyd and Linden streets.

The first floor of the academic building will be the site of the largest lecture hall on campus, designed to seat 400 students. The second floor will have a number of smaller lecture halls that are designed for class sizes of 80 or more students, Ohlinger said.

The University Learning Center will be completed by summer 2013 and will house the university's largest lecture hall, the School of Social Work and The Center for Teaching Excellence.

The School of Social Work will move from the Raleigh Building to occupy the third floor. The top floor will be the Center for Teaching Excellence, which is a part of the University College. The University Learning Center is scheduled for completion by the summer of 2013, according to the Master Site Plan.

Associate vice provost and dean of students Reuban Rodriguez said the $44 million academic building will be equipped with the latest technology.

“A lot of in-class learning experiences are focused on or driven by technology,” Rodriguez said. “We’re making sure the new building has what’s needed and available to continue to enhance the classroom experience.”

Despite the construction site’s close proximity to Cabell Library and Harris Hall, Rodriguez and Ohlinger said there have not been any complaints about noise or pollution.

“With the erection of the steel, there really won’t be lots of noise … that’s really disruptive,” Ohlinger said. “There will always be some background noise going on, but it will be pretty minimal.”

Photos by Amber-Lynn Taber

As technology continues to play a vital role in education, VCU Libraries are taking another step to link the two together with the introduction of an experimental loan program of iPads, Nooks and Kindles.

Currently, laptops are the number one item that patrons borrow from VCU Libraries, but now there are 27 Nook Color e-readers, 24 Kindles and 20 iPads available for rental through the new program.

The loan program is part of VCU Libraries’ ongoing and constant work to improve public services and better meet the needs of its students.

The program is designed to expose students to different popular technologies. The popularity of e-books has evolved, and e-books are becoming more and more of a focus of the collection of titles at Cabell, with currently about half a million available.

Through the new e-readers, students will have access to materials that are not currently available in the print collection.

Popular fiction novels like Suzanne Collins’ “Hunger Games” trilogy and Stieg Larsson’s “Millennium” trilogy will be available, but there is also an extensive amount of works including essays from philosophers, political documents like the Constitution and Declaration of Independence and religious texts.

Teresa Doherty, head circulation and information services and access librarian, expects that students will soon have their own mobile-reading devices and the library will concentrate on providing content to the students which can be accessed by these devices.

Two VCU police officers participate in a Spanish class taught by Spanish professor Anita Nadal (not pictured). Nadal said she focuses on role-playing exercises to help teach conversational Spanish.

For some VCU police officers, breaking language barriers is all in a day’s work.

Ten members of the VCU Police Department are taking a conversational Spanish-speaking course that aims to help them in their communication with the VCU area’s Spanish-speaking residents.

“I think it is great for the officers that are taking the class because it gives them the ability to communicate better with Spanish-speaking people that they may come in contact with,” police Chief John Venuti said. “Taking the course was a lot of fun, it was interesting.”

According to the 2010 Census, about 6.4 percent, or 469,303 of Virginians, speak Spanish at home. In Richmond, the 2010 Census reported 6.3 percent of the population was Hispanic, though surrounding counties, like Henrico, have experienced a large increase in their Hispanic population in the past few years. In Richmond, about 9.6 percent of people reported speaking a language other than English at home.

The class meets every Tuesday and is offered as a one-credit course through the VCU Division of Community Engagement. Anita Nadal, a Spanish professor in the School of World Studies who also works for the division, said the class is specialized for the officers in it.

“These classes are for people who already have a profession,” Nadal said. “They just need some basic phrases to better serve their profession.”

The class is taught in a manner that encourages involvement and recreating situations officers may run into on the job. Nadal said she emphasizes on role-play and conversation. She said that it is “never a class where writing on the board and paper is the focus.”

Sgt. Nicole Dailey, who took the course last spring and pushed for it to happen again this semester, said she would like to see the entire force take a course like this.

“The course is designed to give the everyday police officer a working knowledge of Spanish,” Dailey said. “The material is presented in such a way that you walk out on day one with the ability to at least say ‘Hello,’ “‘Good Afternoon’ and ‘Do you need help?’ Those sayings are almost always how we start our conversations in the police world,” Dailey said.

The program has been used several times in the past at multiple agencies. Currently, Nadal is teaching a similar course with the Richmond Fire Department. In the past she has taught the Virginia Eye Institute, Wachovia (now Wells Fargo), and the Grace and Holy Trinity Episcopal Church.

Dailey said she would like to see other languages pursued by the department in the school because of the diversity that exists on campus.

“As everyone knows, VCU is a very diverse environment,” Dailey said. “In order to serve the community to the best of its potential, VCUPD must make sure it has people on staff who can communicate with the faculty, student (and) staff.”

However, some officers are finding the course useful even out of police scenarios.

“I signed up to take the class because (the) lady that helps keep our building clean speaks only Spanish,” Venuti said. “I took the class so that I could communicate a little better and easier with her each day as I would ask her if she wanted a cup of coffee and how she was doing.”

Photos by Amber-Lynn Taber

In an open garage on Main Street, a contingent of artists has come together to provide a workspace for other artists in the area.

Founded by two VCU graduates and two Alfred University graduates, Studio Two Three was created for artists who needed studio space but were no longer able to use school facilities.

“After college, there is really nowhere to work,” said founder and VCU graduate Ashley Hawkins.  “At first, it was just to have a space, but now we have a community.”

Studio Two Three started four years ago as an entirely volunteer-run organization. They achieved nonprofit status one year ago and are currently pursuing donations and grants.

“Even though we are nonprofit, we need to make ends meet and we want to encourage growth and invite the public,” said co-founder and VCU graduate Sarah Watson-Moore.

Studio Two Three offers studio space and equipment for artists working in screen printing, relief printing, etching and plate lithography.

Studio space can be rented on an hourly or monthly basis. Renters are given 24-hour access to the studio.

“We need renters who are motivated individuals,” Watson-Moore said.

Storage lockers and flat files are provided for those renting on a monthly basis. Chemicals, like the emulsions needed for etching, are also provided by Studio Two Three, but the artist must bring all other supplies that they may need, such as paints and screens. Screens can also be stored in the studio.

Studio Two Three offers free workshops for the public the second Saturday of every month. Most recently, the workshops have included salt etching, T-shirt silk screening and printing Valentine’s Day cards.

“We’re trying to focus more on education,” Watson-Moore said.

“We all have our own mediums that we are fluent in, so we teach each other and help each other out,” said fellow founder Tyler Dawkins.

Studio Two Three held an open house this past Friday. The goal was to invite the public in to see the studio and to show off their newly finished gallery.

“The open house gave us a small goal to get the space ready,” Watson-Moore said.

Studio Two Three’s gallery space in the back of the studio has openings the first Friday of every month. They hope to focus the gallery primarily on print makers but are open to other mediums.

Currently, Studio Two Three is in what they referred to as “a rebranding period.”  They are creating a logo and typeface for the studio that will be used for their own advertising.

“We’re the only place in town that does this,” Watson-Moore said.

Photos by Amber-Lynn Taber

Image courtesy of VCU Dance

This past Thursday through Saturday, the VCU Department of Dance and Choreography celebrated its 30th anniversary season with its annual VCU Dance NOW event at Grace Street Theatre.

With a nearly full house in the already-compact theatre, the event featured seven new pieces choreographed by VCU Dance faculty, as well as one piece by a guest choreographer.

Performed by VCU Dance majors from freshman through senior level, each piece brought something different but equally powerful to the show, resulting in a cumulative layering of intensity as the evening advanced.

The night opened with “A Particularity of Place,” choreographed by Scott Putman, which explored the ideas of growth through the confrontation of the fear that results from major life changes, rather than becoming trapped in the more welcome comfort of familiar routines.

“It was a great experience to be in a show like this,” said sophomore Molly Rae Pearl, who was the first performer on stage in “Particularity.”

“For a while you just work on your own piece,” Pearl said. “Then you get to see how hard everyone else has worked, and how beautiful each piece is when they all come together, and you feel really honored to be a part of the whole show.”

A collaboration of video and dance filmed in different locations around Richmond, “Quorum” sought a syncretism between the opposing forces of humanity and nature against those of the mechanical and digital. The piece was choreographed by Robbie Kinter with the help of the featured performers, with film and original sound by kinetic imaging major John Dombroski.

“Bog Stories,” a six-dancer ensemble piece choreographed by Judith Steel, draws inspiration from and eerily reflects the poetry of W. B. Yeats, adapted and composed by Donnacha Dennehy with contemporary music group Crash Ensemble and the haunting soprano of Dawn Upsha.

Performers in Autumn Proctor’s contemplative “enLight” used an ambiguous powder, released at surprise intervals at the beginning of the piece, to create a mesmerizingly charged and mysterious atmosphere. After the powder settled on the floor, it became a canvas as performers danced patterns into its surface.

After the intermission, choreographer Martha Curtis addressed the idea of life changing events in her piece “Ephemera… we are forever changing,” in which a leader figure initiates a medley of different dances that ranged from playful to almost aggressive as the piece progressed. By the end of the performance, all the dancers had discarded an article of clothing that is perhaps a representation of things lost as a result of experiences gained.

This year VCU featured guest choreographer Rick McCullough, emphasizing the joint program between VCU Dance and the Richmond Ballet in which participants earn their degree by splitting their time between two years at the Richmond Ballet and two years completing their BFA at VCU.

Preceding “of this moment,” the closing piece of the show, was McCullough’s “The Clarity of Absence,” an eight-person dance conceived this past fall during his residency at VCU, including both VCU Dance Majors and Richmond Ballet trainees.

In Christian von Howard’s “of this moment,” a two-paneled wall set at an obtuse angle became integral to the choreography as dancers rebounded off of it and, in some cases, each other. The performers writhed under the effects of harsh lighting like bugs under a magnifying glass, setting an uncomfortable tone for the piece that would only intensify to the point of hostility as the piece played out. By the end of the performance, the dancers interactions with one another were verging on hostile in their manifestation of the emotional extremes of each performer.

For more information on the VCU Department of Dance and Choreography, including a calendar of this season’s performances and events, visit the department’s website at http://arts.vcu.edu/dance.

Photo courtesy of Commonwealth Comedy

A group of VCU students hoping to take the Internet by storm made their official debut this past Sunday, Feb. 19, with a string of less than flattering shots of Shafer Dining Court lasagna and pineapple chunks.

The video, titled “Welcome to Chafer Dining Hall,” goes on to feature sophomore journalism major Sam Roots in perhaps even less flattering extreme close-ups – stuffing his face, laughing with mouth agape and, later, both at once.

“Chafer Dining Hall,” the spoof-advertisement’s spokesman, played by cinema major Daniel Ardura, concludes: “If you’re here, you’re probably high,”

“Chafer” is the premiere production of Commonwealth Comedy, or “ComCom,” which makes its online home at CommonwealthComedy.com and which works in conjunction with the VCU Student Media Center. The group of VCU students that write, act and produce for Commonwealth Comedy include majors ranging from cinema, film and creative writing to journalism and public relations.

Junior print journalism major Trey McMillan, a Commonwealth Comedy member, said that the idea for their own online sketch-comedy series followed in the vein of such websites as CollegeHumor.com. Their creative process – working from a rough outline from which comedic material is improvised and “repackaged a hundred different ways,” according to McMillan – reflects some of the group’s cited influences, such as “Curb Your Enthusiasm” and “Arrested Development.”

“We really have so many ideas floating around (that) we really would hope to reach a bigger audience than just VCU,” McMillan said. “But they probably are our main demographic.”

“People are going to see things that are familiar to them,” he said, referring to locations and situations in future Commonwealth Comedy productions that reflect a Richmond/VCU backdrop.

As of Sunday’s release, Commonwealth Comedy’s only other publicly available video is a promotional short, which reimagines the group’s formation as a team-builder montage from an action movie. It concludes with an unflattering close-up of sophomore Roots engaging shirtless in intimate acts with himself.

McMillan said that at their outset, Commonwealth Comedy collectively preferred to advertise chiefly through word of mouth, as opposed to a more-involved Facebook or Twitter campaign, although the group maintains pages on both sites.

“The videos are going to tell us how people feel about us,” he said. “We don’t care if people come up to us and are like, Hey man, that was really funny.’ Like, if we have a million views, then … who cares, we have a million views. That’s how we judge our performance.”

As of press time Sunday night, the group’s two videos had nearly collected 400 views between them.

“Oh man, these guys are awesome!” one online comment read. “This made me so sad for all humans,” read another.

“We’re gonna be on Ellen by Monday,” McMillan predicted.

For more information and links to each of their videos, visit Commonwealth Comedy at CommonwealthComedy.com.

In addition to strikingly clean-looking versions of beloved VCU structures, this CT feature from August 1992 showcases a remarkable increase in CT design standards over the decade and a profoundly ‘90s activity list.