Month: December 2018

Until recently, southern Utah was far from any major professional sports franchises and far removed from the effects of professional sports on local sports culture.

Before the establishment of the Golden Knights NHL team, the closest professional sports franchise to southern Utah was the Utah Jazz in Salt Lake City. But with professional sports teams moving into nearby Las Vegas, a shift in sports culture in southern Utah is already on its way.

The early success of the Golden Knights, who reached the Stanley Cup final in their first year, garnered a bevy of attention locally and nationally, but hockey is not a desert sport, so it may take time for many southern Utahns to embrace them fully.

“Hockey has never been a southern Utah thing because of the heat, of course, but also because we haven’t had an NHL team close, and the biggest draw for hockey is seeing games in person,” said Andy Griffin, longtime southern Utah sports writer and broadcaster. “With the Golden Knights close, I believe the popularity of hockey will grow here. It will never be huge, but it will be bigger than it is, especially with ESPN Radio carrying many of their games.”

Some in the community have already taken to the team, however.

“Nothing better than top performing athletes screaming around the ice and engaging in full contact sports. It’s visceral, primal,” said Brady Killeen, a DSU alumnus and software developer from Alberta, Canada. “When you go to another city wearing a [Golden] Knights jersey people instantly know where you’re from. It’s an instant icebreaker whether they’re giving you a hard time, or also if they’re fans. That feeling of being on the map was never there before.”

For football fans in southern Utah, a long trip to Phoenix or Los Angeles is currently the quickest way to see an NFL game in-person. However, with the Raiders relocating to Las Vegas in the next two years, that is all about to change.

“Football is king in America, and we all have our favorite NFL team, and that is a big variant in the St. George area as we are not geographically close to any one team,” Griffin said. “There are a lot of Bronco and Cowboy fans here, but I think the Raiders will win over the hearts of many here, especially if the franchise embraces the southwestern heritage of the area. Of course, they need to get better than they have been lately.”

While part of the team’s popularity may be based on their success, some feel strongly we should embrace them straight away.

“Now that Vegas is getting more sports teams I think it’s important we funnel more money towards [evolving] them further and getting more teams,” said Tanner Griffiths, a freshman history major from St. George. “I want everyone to be able to experience the upbringing I had and be able to look up to professional players like Michael Vick, Ray Rice, and many other role models.”

But not everyone feels positively about the establishment of professional sports franchises so close to home.

“Team sports have a detrimental cultural impact on the players and anyone they interact with,” pest control specialist Dalin Gunter said.

Others still don’t understand it at all.

“I honestly don’t understand sports. I don’t like them, I don’t care for them,” said Madison Bidinger, a senior English major from Logan. “I don’t know why a fumble leads to a checkmate, or how someone does a lay up and that scores a goal. Those games are dangerous, idiotic, and against my motherly values. Because I have no background knowledge of sports, it makes me confused and angry and therefore my opinion has weight in the argument.”

Whatever the reaction, professional sports are having an effect on the sports culture in southern Utah, and that effect is likely only to grow as the Raiders settle in and the Golden Knights continue their tenure.

Purchasing textbooks at the start of a semester is inevitable. Often, required texts are expensive, motivating students to seek cheaper alternatives to buying the books they need.

According to the website for Dixie State University’s campus store, the textbook for cellular biology course 3550 is $122.50 brand new. Other texts on the website are similarly priced for new copies. Used books are available on the website and at the store, such as “Boxing Plato’s Shadow” ­­— a required text for Comm 2700 — which sells for $12.95.

Textbook manager Claudia West said the price of texts depends on what a professor orders from the publisher. She said if the ordered material requires an access code, the book must be sold at the publisher’s price. There is a new program DSU is implementing to aid students in purchasing textbooks, she said.

“What we are doing now is, any professor that is requiring an access code, we have now partnered with a number of publishers to do what’s called inclusive access,” West said. “That is where the price has been drastically reduced, the students would go to their Canvas account…where they would have access on their first day and their My Dixie [account] would be charged a course fee.”

Students asked about inclusive access weren’t aware of it, but they spoke of other ways they save on textbooks; one of those ways is by shopping online.

“I use Amazon and then I search for the cheapest book,” said Ryley Lyons, a freshman elementary education major from Salt Lake City. “They’re not always in, like, perfect condition, but I think I had six textbooks and they were, like, $175 in total versus $300.”

Shanna Gibb, a junior communication major from Stansbury Park, said she price checks her texts to see what her options are. She said she goes on Amazon, to the campus store and chegg.com to see who has the best price. The difference in price is between $5 and $10.

“My best luck is chegg.com where you just go [online and] rent it for the semester and then send it back,” Gibb said. “They don’t charge you shipping at all, you just go on and get it. Sometimes [the campus store] is cheaper to rent.”

A major reason books are so expensive now is due to publishers not having the ability to publish books in smaller quantities, West said. Twenty years ago, publishers were able to print 10,000 books, then print more as needed, she said. Today, publishers have to print all of the copies that have been ordered at once to compete with the availability that online companies like Amazon provide, making the cost go up, she said.

“Sometimes it’s nice to get used [books] because sometimes you can get [them from] students who [have] written in side notes, or different things in the textbook that I find helpful,” Gibb said.

Students can look at their schedule as early as two weeks before the semester begins, West said. This way, students can know in advance which text books they need and decide if they will need to take advantage of cheaper options or order new books from the campus store for delivery or pick up, she said.

There’s a stigma that younger generations spend far more time on their phones than older generations.

However, there was no definitive way to determine just how much time a user is spending on their phone. Enter iOS 12, and one of its several updated features: the Screen Time menu.

This feature, introduced on Sept. 17, breaks down how much time an iPhone user spends on their phone daily. In addition to that, it shows what apps they’re using the most through percentages. 

Hermione Maloney, a sophomore pre-med biology major from Albuquerque, New Mexico, said she definitely believes younger generations spend more time on their phones.

“The younger people grew up with this technology at their fingertips and adapt easier to the new technology,” Maloney said.

Maloney was surprised at how much time she actually spends on her phone. Before checking her Screen Time app, she believed she spent around three hours a day on her phone.

“I use it mostly for streaming and everyday use,” she said.

However, her screen time report said her average is between seven and eight hours of usage per day.

“I thought I was pretty good about not being on my phone,” Maloney said. “I was wrong.”

Drew Wilcox, director of the physical therapist assistant program,  said he thought he only spent around 15 hours a week on his phone. His app, on the other hand, reported he spent 19 hours and 25 minutes in the previous seven days.

Wilcox said he would expect younger generations and older generations’ usages to be about the same.

Maloney said Apple, and other large companies for that matter, market most of their products and advertisements toward younger generations, so it’s no surprise that younger generations use technology more.

Carla Navarette, a freshman mechanical engineering major from St. George, said she thinks younger generations spend more time on their phones, but marginally so.

Navarette said she expected to spend an average of two hours a day on her phone, but her report stated four hours. She said she was surprised at this difference.

Wilcox said he believes the rise of phones and students on their screens in the classroom is a good thing, depending on how students use it.

“I’ve personally seen students get distracted by social media and other games,” Wilcox said. “But there’s so many other good apps for students to use out there.”

Wilcox said he suggests students spend more time on educational and research apps. He said he personally recommends iOrtho and Grey’s Anatomy to his students.

Though most data suggests that Gen Z uses smartphones more than any other generation, there’s no denying that we’re living in a technology-dominated society. This addition of the Screen Time feature may help users take a step back and reexamine just how much time they’re spending on their smartphones.

Students often hear they should fill out course evaluations at the end of the semester to help gauge faculty performance and improve future classes, but many aren’t filling them out.

Michael Lacourse, provost and vice president of academic affairs, said it helps when students take their time to fill out the evaluations. The evaluations will not affect the students in the classes that semester, but will affect the students that take that course in the future, he said.

Curt Walker, chair of the university faculty review committee and professor of biology, said the course evaluations help professors when they apply for tenure or promotions.

Walker said in previous years there was a larger student return rate and more comments that helped him adjust his classes. He said he thinks that students should fill out course evaluations.

“So, when students say nobody looks at them that’s complete crap,” Walker said. “Believe me, I’ve looked at tens and thousands of them. People do look at them, absolutely.”

More people than professors look at the answers, he said. The answers can add to the professors’ portfolio, help them to be promoted, become tenured or even both in a few cases, he said.

Linda Rogers, associate professor of computer information systems, said the evaluations affect professors’ course prep work. She said the evaluations help professors change their classes for the better.

Only the faculty get the answers of the course evaluations, Walker said. He said after all the finals are done, he looks at the response for trends so he knows what he needs to improve on. He said he takes the comments seriously, and if several students ask for something like a quiz in-between tests, he would see how he could make it happen in his classes.

The answers area analyzed based on a few factors, which include the amount of evaluations returned, the number of students in the class, and the students’ bias, etc., he said.

Lacourse said he is not surprised that the numbers of responses have dropped because students just forget or do not want to fill them out.

In the fall of 2016 there were 10,655 course evaluations  returned from students. The number started to drop in the spring of 2017 with only 6,820 students filling them out. The summer of 2017 had 709 returned. The fall of 2017 there were 8,773. The spring of 2018 had even less with 8,199 responses. The summer of 2018 had a small increase compared to last summer with 759 returned. This fall’s evaluations will be counted after Dec. 9.

Rogers said that most students do not fill out their course evaluations and the response rate is getting lower. She said that she thinks students have a fear that the professor will know what the student said, but that the students should not feel that way.

“[The course evaluations] are anonymous,” Rogers said.

Maybe students need to remember or even know that it’s anonymous, she said. The evaluations go through a third party and students’ names are not included, so more students should fill them out, she said.

Lacourse said there are several ways to try and improve how the evaluations are done but that it is a work in progress right now.