the Valley Forge The Student Newspaper of Rock Valley College 01.28.2014 / vol. 54, no. 5 News Features Opinions Reviews Sports INDEX By Brandon Lee News Editor On the evening of Jan- uary 22, the Rock Valley College Foundation held a reception for former RVC president Dr. Jack Becherer. According to Pamela Owens, executive director of the RVC Foundation, the event was to honor Becher- er and to commemorate his time at Rock Valley Col- lege. Along with the reception, the RVC Foundation has set up an endowed scholarship in Becherer’s name for RVC students. Held in the lobby of the ERC, tables, food, and drinks were set up for those attending. Invited to the event were RVC faculty and staff, community lead- ers, major donors to the Foundation, and local pol- iticians. Students were not invited to attend, but many had to pass through the line of well-wishers to get to the library. Among the many things presented to Becherer and his wife, Janna, were flow- ers and a certificate of ap- preciation from Student Life and the Student Gov- ernment Association. Becherer joined the col- lege in 2004 and has since expanded both the campus and its connections within the community. Expansions have start- ed on CL1 and plans for other on-campus build- ings are under way. Rela- tions with area high schools have strengthened and en- rollment of dual credit and Running Start students has increased under his tenure. Despite Becherer’s con- tract being extended to July 1 st , Becherer resigned as president on January 10th. Mike Mastroianni, who has been the Vice President of Career and Technical Edu- cation and worked alongside Becherer for the last nine years, will serve as Interim President until the Presiden- tial Search Committee finds a replacement. The RVC Foundation holds reception for former RVC President By Brandon Lee News Editor Dr. Beth Ingle gave a lecture titled “Shameful Flight: The British Partition of India” to a crowd of about 30 in the Student Center Atrium on Jan- uary 21st. The lecture focused on the process, the peo- ple involved, and the people affected by the cre- ation of the border that separates India and Pak- istan. The countries were divided based on reli- gious population majority, with Pakistan being established for Muslims and India established for Hindus and Sikhs. Involved in the independence from British rule and later planning of the partition and governing of the newly independent nations were Mahatma Gandhi, Jawahartal Nehru, Muhammed Ali Jin- nah, and Lord Louis Mountbatten. Gandhi, one of the more famous figures, sought Indian independence alongside Jawa- harlal Nehru, who served as India’s first prime minister. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who original- ly argued for Hindu-Muslim unity eventually re- versed his course and began campaigning for a Muslim state and became Pakistan’s first Gover - nor-General. Lord Louis Mountbatten, the last viceroy of the India, oversaw the partition and had final say on any plans put into action. Years later Mountbatten would admit to handling the parti- tion poorly and is famously quoted as saying “I fucked it up.” Ingle shared reports of 12 million people dis- placed because of the partition, whether they were Muslims traveling to Pakistan from India or Hindus traveling to India from Pakistan. Among those anywhere from one to two million people were killed by violence, disease, or hunger. Listening to Ingle’s lecture was RVC profes- sor Kanwall Prashar, who mentored Ingle and according to her was paramount in developing an appreciation for Indian history. After Ingle’s lecture Prashar was invited to the mic and shared multiple stories about his time as a 10 year old boy living during the partition. He said, “I saw all this happen.” One of the stories he shared was of his brother saving and hiding a muslim boy who was fleeing a group of Hindus and Sikh who had killed the boys family. After the lecture many people approached Dr. Ingle and thanked her for the speech, most mentioned that many of the facts presented had never been taught in American schools. While the partition is often taught the widespread fear and killing was often glossed over or never men- tioned at all. Ingle summed up her goals of the lecture when she said, “When you open yourself up to something new, wonderful things can happen.” The British Partition of India From left to right: Monserrate Zepeda, Student Life Director Rick Daniels, Spencer Haydary, Renee Stohl, Sarah Castiglioni, Holly Stohl, Dr. Jack Becherer, Lety Aguire, Jonathan Kullens, Thomas Nicol, Jocelyn James Photo by Brandon Lee
Transcript
the Valley Forge
The Student Newspaper of Rock Valley College 01.28.2014 / vol. 54, no. 5
NewsFeaturesOpinionsReviews
SportsIND
EX
By Brandon LeeNews Editor
On the evening of Jan-uary 22, the Rock Valley College Foundation held a reception for former RVC president Dr. Jack Becherer.
According to Pamela Owens, executive director of the RVC Foundation, the event was to honor Becher-er and to commemorate his
time at Rock Valley Col-lege.
Along with the reception, the RVC Foundation has set up an endowed scholarship in Becherer’s name for RVC students.
Held in the lobby of the ERC, tables, food, and drinks were set up for those attending. Invited to the event were RVC faculty and staff, community lead-ers, major donors to the
Foundation, and local pol-iticians. Students were not invited to attend, but many had to pass through the line of well-wishers to get to the library.
Among the many things presented to Becherer and his wife, Janna, were flow-ers and a certificate of ap-preciation from Student Life and the Student Gov-ernment Association.
Becherer joined the col-lege in 2004 and has since expanded both the campus and its connections within the community.
Expansions have start-ed on CL1 and plans for other on-campus build-ings are under way. Rela-tions with area high schools have strengthened and en-rollment of dual credit and Running Start students has increased under his tenure.
Despite Becherer’s con-tract being extended to July 1st, Becherer resigned as president on January 10th. Mike Mastroianni, who has been the Vice President of Career and Technical Edu-cation and worked alongside Becherer for the last nine years, will serve as Interim President until the Presiden-tial Search Committee finds a replacement.
The RVC Foundation holds reception for former RVC President
By Brandon LeeNews Editor
Dr. Beth Ingle gave a lecture titled “Shameful Flight: The British Partition of India” to a crowd of about 30 in the Student Center Atrium on Jan-uary 21st.
The lecture focused on the process, the peo-ple involved, and the people affected by the cre-ation of the border that separates India and Pak-istan. The countries were divided based on reli-gious population majority, with Pakistan being established for Muslims and India established for Hindus and Sikhs.
Involved in the independence from British rule and later planning of the partition and governing of the newly independent nations were Mahatma Gandhi, Jawahartal Nehru, Muhammed Ali Jin-nah, and Lord Louis Mountbatten.
Gandhi, one of the more famous figures, sought Indian independence alongside Jawa-harlal Nehru, who served as India’s first prime minister. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who original-ly argued for Hindu-Muslim unity eventually re-versed his course and began campaigning for a Muslim state and became Pakistan’s first Gover-nor-General.
Lord Louis Mountbatten, the last viceroy of the India, oversaw the partition and had final say on any plans put into action. Years later Mountbatten would admit to handling the parti-tion poorly and is famously quoted as saying “I fucked it up.”
Ingle shared reports of 12 million people dis-placed because of the partition, whether they were Muslims traveling to Pakistan from India or Hindus traveling to India from Pakistan. Among those anywhere from one to two million people were killed by violence, disease, or hunger.
Listening to Ingle’s lecture was RVC profes-sor Kanwall Prashar, who mentored Ingle and according to her was paramount in developing an appreciation for Indian history.
After Ingle’s lecture Prashar was invited to the mic and shared multiple stories about his time as a 10 year old boy living during the partition. He said, “I saw all this happen.” One of the stories he shared was of his brother saving and hiding a muslim boy who was fleeing a group of Hindus and Sikh who had killed the boys family.
After the lecture many people approached Dr. Ingle and thanked her for the speech, most mentioned that many of the facts presented had never been taught in American schools. While the partition is often taught the widespread fear and killing was often glossed over or never men-tioned at all.
Ingle summed up her goals of the lecture when she said, “When you open yourself up to something new, wonderful things can happen.”
The British Partition of India
From left to right: Monserrate Zepeda, Student Life Director Rick Daniels, Spencer Haydary, Renee Stohl, Sarah Castiglioni, Holly Stohl, Dr. Jack Becherer, Lety Aguire, Jonathan Kullens, Thomas Nicol, Jocelyn James
Photo by Brandon Lee
It’s that
time of year again when Dr.
Bob Schilf, psychology professor at RVC, will
be collecting paper valentines to be sent to vets over seas.
In order to participate, students, faculty, and staff must pur-
chase a box of 32 valentines (or more) and label each one “To: My
Friend” (or some variation) and “From: Your name.”. Please, drop them
off at Schilf’s office, located in office G05B in the basement of CL2.
Collections have already begun and will end Wednesday, February 5th,
at 3:00 PM.Dr. Schilf has done this for the last 11 years. Each year
the amount of cards purchased increases.
Valentines for Vets
Valentines Day
by Shannon DoyleEditor-in-Chief
Third century Roman Emperor Claudi-us II decided that single men made better soldiers then those married with children. This gave him the idea to outlaw marriage for young men, his future army.
Now, to the rescue, in comes a chris-tian priest who realizes that this decree is not fair and he makes the decision to defy Claudius II and secretly marry the young men. The priest, Valentine, is now an enemy of the emperor and his death is eminent.
One legend claims that while in prison, after curing his jailer's daughter of blind-ness, he and the daughter fell in love. It is alleged that before his death, he wrote to her and signed it “From your Valentine.”
It is in recognition of either his death or burial that the middle of February is cel-ebrated.
February, in ancient Rome, was consid-ered the beginning of spring and a time for purification, Lupercalia. Members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would start the festival by sacrificing a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification.
They would do this at a sacred cave where they believed that while Romulus and Remus were infants, the founders of Rome, they were taken care of by a lupa, she-wolf.
The priests would then cut strips out of the goats hide and dip it in the sacri-ficial blood. Taking to the streets, they would slap the hides against the fields of crops and the women. Because the women
believed this would make them more fer-tile, they welcomed the slap.
Later in the day, their names were thrown into an urn for the bachelors of the city to pick from. The woman would then spend a year with the lucky bachelor. Often times this ended in Marriage.
Eventually, February 14th was declared St. Valentine's day, the urn was discarded, and the Roman “lottery” system was out-lawed.
France and England, during the Middle Ages, believed that February 14th started the birds' mating season, and thus support-ed the idea that it should be a day of ro-mance.
From Your Valentine!
courtesy of jefafernandez.blogspot.com
opinions
The Valley Forge 01.28.2014 / vol. 54, no. 5Award-Winning Student Newspaper of Rock Valley College
EDITORIAL BOARD
Shannon Doyle, Editor in Chief Rebecca Denham, Encore/Features Editor
Movies: we have all at-tended them at some point in our lives. Some go once, twice or even three times a week. But with the high prices of tickets and con-cessions, I wonder how fre-quently normal attendees go to see the newest show.
I went to see Lone Sur-vivor and was truly aston-ished by how many peo-ple were at the concession stand. Knowing how ridic-ulously overpriced their choices are, I would think that many people would not pay for them since they al-ready have to pay for the ever increasing ticket price.
Unfortunately, you can’t bring your own food in for some reason. I truly can-not understand why. It’s like their trying to burn a hole in your pocket by forbidding you to bring in your own reasonably priced snacks and forcing you to buy their outrageously priced ones.
Then if you choose to buy food or drinks, once it’s gone, you may get the urge for more and then you have to get up and refill it caus-ing you to miss some of the movie and there’s no pause or rewind button so you are missing out.
An issue that I cannot stress enough is when some-one’s phone goes off. Peo-ple, AMC theatres play a 3
minute video about turn-ing your phone off! Do the words “SILENCE YOUR CELL PHONES NOW” not mean anything to you? Not only is it very distracting to people around you, but it gives off the notion that you don’t have any regard for a courtesy that is like the “Golden Rule” of movie theatres.
Another nuisance when it comes to attending a show are the lines and the seat-ing. But I honestly think that these issues are rare, depending on the movie that are out. The Avengers, Hunger Games, or any of the Twilight movies are just examples of where I would think this issue would come
into play because of their immense popularity.
Standing in a mile-long line is annoying to anyone, but when you have to deal with sneaky people who try to weasel their way into line and make the wait even lon-ger can seriously be a pain.
When you get inside there may not be a good place to sit. People prefer to sit where they can see the screen best, but when those seats run out everyone else is pretty screwed. Middle and higher seats are usually the first to go and the clos-er you are to the screen the harder it is to see the whole thing.
There are people who don’t have enough courtesy
to not talk during the movie. Ok, I get that there is always a point in the movie where you need to say some-thing, but when you carry on a loud conversation with someone that is where there needs to be a cutoff point. Thank god for the ushers who can get those people out of there if they become too much of a distraction.
Reasons like these may explain why I am not a fre-quent movie goer and prefer to watch movies in the com-fort of my home with the convenience of Netflix.
Movie theaters not worth the cost
By Rebecca DenhamStaff Writer
Riddle me this, Rock Valley College students: why on Earth would a gathering be held in one of the most populated and traversed buildings on campus, during prime af-ternoon class time, if it was meant to be an exclu-sive event?
This is in reference to the farewell reception held for our former president, Dr. Jack Becherer (see News article), which was held in the ERC lobby.
Now, think of the lobby - not very spacious, is it? Surely not spacious enough to hold a dozen small tables for standing room, two buffet style ta-bles filled with treats, a handful of catering assis-tants to manage said buf-fet tables, a pianist (play-ing classical music to set the mood), approximate-ly 50 of Becherer’s adoring fans, who formed a line coiling around the whole perimeter of the lobby, and Becherer himself, stand-ing less than ten feet away from the doors to the li-brary.
The strain on the situ-ation was incredibly ap-parent when this black tie event was sprinkled with youth dressed in pajama pants, awkwardly shuf-fling through the back-grounds of elegant photo-graphs of the lovely presi-dent.
And it was damn near impossible to not photo bomb Becherer, seeing as how he was blocking stu-dents from entering the li-brary or passing through without almost bumping into him.
The jarring disjunction became even more appar-ent when students began treating themselves to the buffet style goodies.
I was “caught” by a coor-dinator of the event (who’s name I did not catch) while trying to scoop myself a dish of caramel popcorn.
“These treats aren’t re-ally for students,” she stat-ed. “Go ahead and take the popcorn, but these aren’t meant for students.”
Well, I never. Why tan-talize the generic poor col-lege students with deli-cacies such as popcorn, cookies, brownies, cheese
platters, and crab cakes? What cruelty is this?
After conversing with students who congregate at the couches on both sides of the ERC lobby, I learned that they, too, had been hastily shooed away from the elegancy of the gala event.
With a triumphant pile of embossed paper plates and crumbs in the cen-ter table of the couches, Rock Valley student, Ga-briel Hughes stated “I took seven of those crab cakes, and I did NOT feel bad about it!”
The situation escalat-ed to a point where cam-pus police officers were called to guard the pre-cious baked goods and fin-ger foods.
The irony of this whole fiasco was that part of the reception was in acknowl-edgment of an endowed scholarship for Rock Val-ley Students, in Becherer’s name.
If this is the way our ad-ministrators treat the stu-dent body, said scholarship is most likely no more than a table of intangible crab cakes.
The Valley Forge 01.28.2014 / vol. 54, no. 5Award-Winning Student Newspaper of Rock Valley College
09.11.2012 / vol. 53, no. X1
By Matt Schupbach Staff Writer
The Rockford Dance Company has recently bro-ken away from the mun-dane, and has entered into a new era of creativity.
January 18th, 2014 was the premiere of the Rock-ford Dance Company’s original Which Witch is Which. There were five performances spread out through the evenings of January 18th and 19th.
Which Witch is Which won a place in the dance companies history with its witty comedy and spell-binding charisma that will captivate audiences of all ages. It is an original dance-theater production for children by Mathew Keefe and Stephen F. Vrtol III.
However, this is not the sole brainchild of Keefe and Vrtol. The dancers created it as well. I had a chance at the conclusion of the 7:00 PM show to chat with dancer Anna Gib-bons. She stated that this was a joy to perform in, and that “there will most definitely be a second debut later on in the year.”
The play itself was con-structed in an unusu-al method: according to Bailey Duffield, “devel-oping my character was a unique experience. I got to take my own characteris-tics and put them into my character, making it an-other part of me. It was re-freshing to create some-thing new, something one of a kind.”
This hybrid play has set the bar high for Rockford entertainment; it will be a real treat to see what other gems the Rockford Dance Company will create in their upcoming season.
Which Witch is Which?
By Rebecca DenhamSerial Dater
While not all dates are genuinely disastrous, many have potentially di-sastrous circumstances. And these are the dates you must watch out for, because the potential can either equate to awkward silences, rifts in relation-ships further down the road, or immediate creepi-ness that lingers long after the date is over.
For example, a date I was invited to not too long
ago had the potential to be great fun, but rather ended up a devastation.
We first met up at Star-bucks – he was late, which was fine. It gave me more time to decide which leg I wanted crossed over the other (it makes a differ-ence). When he arrived, we purchased our coffee and sat down to a conver-sation. But the conversa-tion went more like him tearing his cup sleeve to shreds, and me laughing at his nervousness. Laugh-ing is a mean word, more like smirking. It wasn’t au-dible.
Just when I thought the awkwardness could esca-late no further, it was shat-tered by a young woman who knew my date. The small talk ensued between them and was over quickly, as she left with her skinny-tall-caramel-mocha-no-whip-steamed-frappe with two straws and no sleeve
(or something like that). His best friend’s wife, he explained. For he was five years to my senior, with friends who had already settled down.
Ironically, we then drove to Laser Quest. Two thoughts arose simultane-ously when we pulled up to the establishment. One: oh, how sweet, he’s a child at heart. And two: oh God, he’s going to assault me in the arena.
Fret not, readers, for as he was anticipating a rave comprised of two peo-ple, I was reveling in the idea that I was Vin Diesel in The Chronicles of Rid-dick. He led me into the dark room with his hand on the small of my back, but as soon as the count-down started for the begin-ning of the match, I sprint-ed away in a most likely very unattractive fashion. For the next twenty min-utes, I dodged, ducked,
tucked, rolled, and broke every single one of Laser Quest’s rules, with the ex-ception of physical contact with another player. He never saw me; I obliterat-ed him.
He then bought me two more games, with the same result. I admire his persistence, though it was entirely futile.
So, the resounding les-son to take from this is: gentleman, don’t take a young woman who enjoys mortal combat more than she should on a date where guerilla warfare could be tactfully employed. And ladies, don’t fall so easi-ly for the gentleman who takes you to a dark room with loud electronic music and black lights. Most likely, it’s not a good idea.
Social graces of a serial dater
By Rebecca DenhamStaff Writer
As I pull onto campus for my first day of class, as well as Rock Valley’s first day back open after winter break, I ponder what conundrums await me – surely they will be present.
I head for the ERC parking lot and to my dis-may (though truthfully, I expected it), I find cars parked in the most unor-ganized fashion.
Parking lines have no jurisdiction here, in the frozen tundra of the com-munity college parking lots.
I am taking a stand against the students that choose to take up two parking spaces by land-ing there vehicle direct-ly on top of a line, stu-dents that pull their car too far forward, bridging the yellow line in front of them and hindering any-one else from parking in
front of them, and stu-dents who choose to just park crooked, slanted, randomly, stupidly, and ridiculously.
These students should be fined, immediately, for keeping others from finding a legitimate park-ing spot. Overnight park-ing lands car owners with a five dollar fine at RVC, why not add to the rev-enue of Rock Valley’s campus?
I say this is reason-able as it will help stim-ulate the natural order of a parking lot. If students do not pay their minis-cule fine for their irre-sponsible parking hab-its, then they will face the next form of punishment – being strung up by their toes and forcing them to listen to a lesson on trigo-nometry. That seems rea-sonable to me.
Parking mayhem at Rock Valley College
4
The Valley Forge
reviews
The Valley Forge 01.28.2014 / vol. 54, no. 5Award-Winning Student Newspaper of Rock Valley College
By Devin SeversonStaff Writer
The Wizard of Oz is a classic tale of a young girl named Doro-thy living in Kansas with her Aun-tie Em, Uncle Henry, and Henry’s three farm hands. Along with her small dog Toto, Dorothy is trans-ported by a tornado to a strange and wondrous world, Oz, of tiny people called Munchkins, witch-es, talking trees and other strange creatures.
The Rock Valley theater per-formers put on a splendid ren-dition of this one of a kind tale, nearly mirroring the original play and novel, complete with a family troupe and their children, the Gar-ner’s, who play the Munchkins and flying monkeys.
Included in this production was a live dog named Minnie trained to act as Toto! (Even though she had a few accidents on the stage and forgot some of her cues to bark, she still did a great job!)
The actors played the roles as-signed to them perfectly and soared beyond expectation for a
college performance. They ad-opted accents reminiscent of the award winning film actors. Dor-othy, played by Christina Wheel-er, gave off that perfect innocence Dorothy was known for and made the character come to life.
The special effects were phe-nomenal for a college level play, as large projection screens, hand painted by Andrea Bechert, were set up on the stage. The screens displayed the whimsical effects of the land of Oz, such as Glenda the Good Witch of the North’s magi-cal bubble, and the smoke that the evil Wicked Witch of the West ap-peared from. The stage rotated for various dramatic effects.
The actors and actresses make up was a spark of brilliance, from the rosy cheeks of the Munchkin folk, to Alfaba’s venomous green skin - it was of silver screen quali-ty and beauty.
The actors completed the audi-ence experience. Diana Gardner, in particular, brought an air of le-gitimacy to the play. Her portray-al of Miss Gultch and the Wick-ed Witch of the West was perfect.
Her ability to throw her voice, to bring it to such high pitch, mir-rored the diabolical laugh from the movie. She gave a breath tak-ing performance. It was as if she was molded for this part.
Raymond Fanara, an actor play-ing the parts of both farm-hand Hickory and the Tin Man, gave a great performance. His dedication to both his performance and his role could not be daunted, even by a costume malfunction. Despite a dangling nose and a breastplate that came unstrapped, Fanara con-tinued his performance without so much as a blink.
Nelson Gutierrez, who played both farm-hand Hunk and the Scarecrow, gave a splendid dance number when the Scarecrow was first introduced. Even possibly causing himself some bruising from his jumping and tumbling in true dedication to his role. Gutir-rez’s only flaw is his inability to carry a tune even if he had a buck-et to hold it in. In the end, his ex-ceptional acting more than made up for the singing
The actor who played farm-hand Zeke and the Cowardly Lion, Don Stein, captured the timid es-sence of the character, with the desire to be brave, as well as por-traying the tell-tale Cowardly Lion voice that millions have fall-en in love with without flaw. For a moment, it seemed that the actor that originally played the Lion in the film was on stage.
Many people like to compare performances such as this one to their big screen counter parts, and
usually end up sorely disap-pointed in one or the other, but this show was exceptional all around, and
the actors from the award-win-ning film would have been proud of how these young actors and ac-tresses were dedication to this story and their roles. Every last actor, seasoned and inexperienced gave the audience a show to re-member.
I’m looking forward to seeing more of them in the future and also what producer and director Mike Webb has in store for the next time around.
The Wizard of Oz
By Christopher Neira Staff Writer
Anchorman 2: The Leg-end Continues centers on the character Ron Burgun-dy, an anchorman from San Diego played by Will Ferrell. The movie deals with the struggles and achievements Burgundy goes through while trying
to get back on top after los-ing his job to his wife and restarting his career at a new 24-hour news station in New York.
My expectations were not very high for this film, expecting it to be no dif-ferent from the first. How-ever, the movie blew me away.
This film was hilarious from the start to finish with everything from big name celebrities such as Will Smith and Jim Carrey, to shark fights, to explosions, and, of course, reading the news. The comedy was ev-erywhere.
This movie is rated PG-13 but, personally, I do not recommend this movie to be seen by younger viewers, this is an adult movie made with the same type of humor in mind.
“Anchorman 2 is one of the funniest movies of the year,” says critic Richard Roper in an article in the Chicago Sun Times.
“I could watch them do this forever,” said Peter Traves critic for Rolling Stone magazine.
It has been nearly a de-cade since the first An-chorman movie hit theatres grossing $28.5 million in its opening weekend and $85.2 million overall in theaters.
Anchorman 2 has shat-tered that by grossing $40 million in its opening weekend and an overall $101 million so far. With this film still in theatres however, the overall num-ber will continue to rise.
I highly recommend see-ing this hilarious comedy that displays Will Ferrell at
his best. If you like mov-ies that will make you not stop laughing, as well as a hilarious plot, then An-chorman 2 is the movie for you.
There was not one point during the movie where it was not. Hearing the other audience member’s laugh-ter as well told me that it was a movie everyone en-joyed.
Released by Paramount Pictures, Anchorman 2 has gotten a lot of positive pub-licity from fans and critics alike. Displaying Ferrel at his best, I highly recom-mend this non-stop laugh-out-loud comedy.
courtesy of colider.com
Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues
The Valley Forge student newspaper is looking for submissions from Rock Valley College students. Please send your opinions, reviews and
Voices, Rock Valley College’s Arts and Literary Maga-zine, seeks submissions of art, photography, poetry, and prose from students, alumni, staff, and faculty. All work is judged anonymously. For work previously pub-lished by Voices, and information on submitting your own to the magazine, please visit rvcvoices.com.
This semester’s deadline is MARCH 18.
The currently enrolled student winners in each cat-egory get a $100 prize.
EARLY BIRD PRIZE: $25 awarded to one randomly select-ed winner from all correctly submitted entries from students, alumni, staff, and faculty by MARCH 4.
Send any questions to Professor David Pink, at [email protected], or call him at (815) 921-3321.
Voices call for submissions for spring 2014
Presentation topics include » Academic Highlights » Introduction to Student Services » Transfer Admission & Financial Aid Overview » Student Panel
You will also have the opportunity to meet our faculty and take a walking tour of our beautiful 65-acre campus in Naperville’s Historic District.
To learn more about North Central College’s Visit Day program and to register, visit northcentralcollege.edu/transfer or call 630-637-5800.
North Central College/10”x8”/Rock Valley College
TO regISTer, CAll630-637-5800Or VISITnorthcentralcollege.edu/transfer
HeRe’s wHat we HaVe plaNNed foR you:
North CeNtral College Naperville, il
JOIN uS FOr Our
transfer Visit daysaturday, february 15, 2014
10x8_rock valley college_refuel.indd_winter.indd 1 1/10/2014 3:04:16 PM
The Valley Forge 02.19.2013 / vol. 53, no. 6Award-Winning Student Newspaper of Rock Valley College
By Damien PittsSports Editor
On January 18th 2014 my mother was given the worst birth-day present of her nat-ural life when the Rock Valley Men’s basket-ball team lost their first home game of the season, falling to Tri-ton College 85-83. As mentioned before the men were a perfect 9-0 on their home floor until this evening.
Down 41 to 39 at halftime, only the sec-ond time the team has faced a deficit at the half on their home court this year. The men really struggled with the size of Tri-tons’ #0, 6’9” center Donovan Smith.
The Golden Eagles are playing without their own center #32 6’7” center Jack Har-rison who suffered a fracture in his lower wrist.
“Jack will return,” said Eagles assistant coach Evan Lavery in a recent interview. “Of course we miss a pres-ence like Jack’s. He is a smart, tough kid who plays hard defensively
and at 6’7” 235 pounds he still has enough agility to rotate to help on pick and roll play.” Lavery adds, “He doesn’t try to do too much offensively.”
This means that Har-rison is selective in his shot taking, thus rais-ing his percentage of shot making. The team is more than capable without Jack Harrison, with his brother Sam holding things down in his brothers’ absence. At 6’6” Sam has the length but is more of a finesse player sort of like Pau Gasol, while Jack is more like a David Lee or David West type, rebound-ing, setting screens and protecting the paint. #32 adds toughness to the team physically and mentally and his loss is a sizable one.
Furthermore I had a chance to talk to #2 L.T. Davis, the Gold-en Eagles point guard who made an errant pass in the waning sec-onds of the game. Late in the game the Gold-en Eagles had pulled ahead by 3 and looked to be on the verge of pulling away when
Davis looked to be fouled on an inbound play by a Triton guard who scored.
A missed bucket by RVC and a three by Triton and we were down 2 with about 20 seconds. Inexplicably two Triton guards mis-handled the ball, seem-ingly letting the ball (and game) slip right into the hands of the home team.
With 8.5 seconds re-maining and down 2 Davis brought the ball across half court. Now I am no official but as Davis crossed the half court line he was twice bumped by the oppos-ing guard, no doubt both “bumps” were fouls, with each send-ing Davis off his orig-inal course. The ref-erees though made no call. The play, designed to “give me (Davis) the option to take the shot myself or drive and pass to #11 Frank Cimino (who had made his previous three 3 pointers) for a 3” (point attempt). After the two initial bumps a team-mate set a hard screen for Davis who drove to his left, right into the
length of that Triton defense.
Attempting a jump stop Davis commit-ted a basic rule that he is aware of “Do not jump into the air be-fore passing.” Doing so you have no option but to pass the ball even if that man is covered be-cause if you come back down with the ball it is a turnover (the ball goes to the other team). This was the deciding play of the game as, after jumping, Davis’ pass went into the arms of a Triton defender.
“I was tweakin’,” meaning his adrenaline was pumping so hard that his body or mind was moving faster than
the other “it won’t hap-pen again.”
With the absence of their own center, #32 Jack Harrison, and the off game of their lead scorer, Jared Mayes, the Golden Eagles just fell short of victory.
True to his word, Davis and the men bounced back to win their last two games. The most recent was an 88-81 win over Jo-liet on their home court to boost their overall record to 17-4.
Keep your heads up men, know that you are some of the best coaches and players this school has seen in a long time.
Home court heartache
Photographers!—SEE YOUR PHOTOS HERE!The Valley Forge student newspaper is looking for photographers to shoot college games.
