Mirror - Vol. 15, No. 05 - October 11, 1990

              The
FairfieldMRRORV Volume 15, No. 5 Thursday, October 11, 1990 The Image Of Fairfield
"Experience Appalachia" Highlights
Talents Of Visiting Craftsmen
Emily Okenquist
Staff Writer
Patchwork quilts, corn-shuck
dolls, and the sounds of a
five-string dulcimer filled the
Campus Center this past weekend
as Fairfield University hosted the
15th annual "Experience Ap-palachia"
Festival. More than 100
craftsmen and musicians, mostly
from Kentucky, West Virginia,
Tennessee, and North Carolina
spent Saturday and Sunday selling
their handmade work and sharing
their culture with visitors.
"This is such a good cause
- a chance to do something for
others," said Michael O'Rourke,
chairman of the festival and board
memberofAppalachia Volunteers,
Inc. (AVI). ■
While interested customers
looked on, artisans at various
booths worked on many of the
items to be sold, including large
wooden reindeers for Christmas
and jewelry made from pressed
flowers.
A woman demonstrated her tal-ent
in pottery-making, while an-other
finished stitching her quilt.
"My husband and I make
all these earrings," said one
woman, displaying her enamel
jewelry.
Sponsored by AVI, which
was founded in 1970 by Reverend
Bill Sangiovanni of Notre Dame
High School, this fair raises the
A craftsperson displays her wares at the recent
festival.
Experience Appalachia" photo: Jen Sutton
money which many of the crafts-men
depend on to live.
"They use their crafts as a
source of income," said John Sulli-van,
president of the board of AVI
and manager of video communica-tions
for General Electric. "This is
not just a hobby."
"The festival is unique in
that 100 percent of the proceeds
from sales go directly to the
craftspeople," said O'Rourke.
In addition to the crafts,
performers from North Carolina,
including the internationally
known Bannerman Family danc-ers
and the Stony Creek Boys
musicians entertained guests.
Urging audience participation in
the traditional Appalachian dances,
one performer said, "We've got a
whole dance floor here if anyone
would like to waltz!"
"The fair is a cultural expe-rience
for everyone," said Sulli-van,
as members from the Fairfield
community opened their homes for
the weekend to the Appalachian
artisans and volunteers.
"It's a great education for
everybody. North meets South,"
said O'Rourke.
AVI operates the Appala-chian
House in Darien, as well as
displaying crafts at the yearly fes-tival
, which is "the only fair of its
kind in New England," said Sulli-van.
"We appreciate the quality
of their beautiful work, and they
look forward to coming here for
the festival," said O'Rourke.
Increased Outpouring of Donors
Puts Blood Drive Over the Top
Debra De Shong
Staff Writer
Circle K topped last year's
Blood Drive record by 98 produc-tive
pints in last week's drive. The
drive collected 298 productive
pints falling just two pints short of
the 300 pint goal. The number of
donors reached 335.
Chairperson Susan Liuzza
attributed the success of the drive
to the amount of publicity used to
spread the word on campus. Post-ers
were hung and volunteers went
door-to-door in the residence halls
to get donors.
Circle K also received a lot
of support from some Resident
Advisors who made this into a
floor program and Seilers offered
free pizza and soda to the floor that
had the highest number of donors.
"We sent letters to all fac-ulty,
administrators and staff and
we received a big response. Many
were very busy and we couldn't fit
them into the schedule, but we
were very happy to receive this
support from them," Liuzza said.
This year marked the big-gest
response from the faculty,
according to Liuzza.
Fairfield's biannual Blood
Drives are the major supplier of
the area Red Cross and important
contributors to the hospitals of
Connecticut.
"1 gave blood for the first
time last year and I was nervous. A
few people fainted around me, but
it hasn't stopped me from giving
again," said sophomore Erin Kent.
the wait was too long at some points
and people did not have the time to
wait.
She hopes to train some
student nurses for this job by the
Volunteers were comprised
of Circle K members, nursing stu-dents
and Red Cross volunteers.
"It was a great experience
and it was nice to know that even
mmr m im WMmmmmm
Some nail biting went on at Circle K's recently sponsored blood drive. photo: Farzan Saleem
"Just knowing that my blood
can help up to five people made me
come back," she added.
Red Cross representative,
Arlene Carlson, who helped organ-ize
the drive, brought many Red
Cross volunteers to the drive.
However, coverage was low at the
health history interviews conducted
before the donors gave blood.
Carlson believed more blood
could have been collectedbecause
next drive.
"We did not have a hard
time finding student volunteers,
and as a matter of fact, we had so
many people walking in on Tues-day
wanting to help that we were
actually over-staffed later in the
day," said Liuzza.
"In the first hour on Tues-day,
we had such a flood of donors
that we needed all of the people we
had."
though nursing is not my field, I
can still participate and make a
difference," said sophomore Lau-rie
McQuade, a volunteer nurse's
aid.
"This drive was exceedingly
successful and we would have done
even better if we had four more
beds," Carlson said.
Carlson hopes to add more
beds for the upcoming February
blood drive.
Fairfield
Ranks Fifth
in U.S.
News and
World Report
Survey
Christina Hennessy
News Editor
Fairfield Unviersityjumped
from sixth to fifth this year in the
U.S. News and World Report's
ranking of the Top Regional Col-leges
and Universities for their
America's Best Colleges annual
survey, beating other northern
schools such as Providence Col-lege
and Manhatten College.
Over 1,000 four-year col-leges
and universities were in-cluded
in this survey. The schools
were divided into 14 groups cate-gorized
by location, size, range of
programs, types ofdegrees offered
and dollar amount of campus re-search.
The Top 10 Regional
Colleges and Universities
(North Region)
1. Villanova University
2. Worcester Polytechnic
Institute
3. Alfred University
4. Rutgers, State U. of New
Jersey-Camden
5. Fairfield University
6. Providence College
7. Manhatten College
8. Trenton State College
9. SUNY College at Potsdam
10. University of Scranton
Five attributes were consid-ered
for the final ranking, among
them reputation, and faculty and
financial resources.
The number of students that
went on to graduate measured stu-dent
satisfaction.
The University's climb
began three years ago, coming in
eighth in the magazines survey of
the top comprehensive universi-ties
of the east and seventh two
years ago.
"Through the combination
of statistics and reputation, U.S.
News and World Report continues
to move Fairfield up," said Murray
Farber, director ofpublic relations.
"The one thing that jumps
out at me when I look at the rank-ings,
is how young of a school we
are," he added.
The academic reputation of
the schools are based less on aca-demic
quality than the reputation
to open doors after graduation for
both graduate education and em-ployment.
"I think the school's reputa-tion
is getting better and eventu-ally
Fairfield could pull ahead and
move to first place," said Brian
Hayes, a junior.
Villanova University
topped the division that included
Fairfield, followed by Worcester
Polytechnic Institute, Alfred Uni-versity
and Rutgers State Univer-sity
at Camden, N.J.
continued on p. 2