Campus briefs
De Saisset opens three new exhibits
The de Saisset museum began displaying three exhibits earlier this week, all of which will be shown until Dec. 13.
"The Hapa Project" is artist Kip Fulbeck's project on the term "Hapa," which comes from the Hawaiian word for half and used to be considered derogatory.
With Fulbeck's help, it now is a term of pride for those of mixed descent who are part Pacific Islander or Asian. His exhibit includes photographs of Hapas, as well as their answers to the question "What are you?"
A reception with Fulbeck will take place Nov. 7.
Hank Willis Thomas and Kambui Olujimi worked together to create "Winter in America," a stop-motion animation video that uses G.I. Joe action figures to depict the 2000 murder of Thomas's cousin, Songha Thomas Willis.
Thomas and Olujimi used an interview with Todd Rose, the primary witness in the case, and notes written by the victim's mother, Leslie Willis, to create the narrative for the film. Still photographs will be exhibited with the film for the first time ever.
San Francisco artist Evri Kwong's exhibit, "Just Pretend Everything is OK," will also be featured at de Saisset.
"I want people to come away with something that gets under their skin -- something that will get them thinking," Kwong said on the Santa Clara Web site about his exhibit.
"Things are happening in our society that are unacceptable. The big problem is that they keep on happening," he added.
His pieces are inspired by current events and work to "confront our country's deliberate ignorance" through examination of topics like consumerism, racism and sexism.
The exhibit will be shown at American University in Washington, D.C. after its debut at Santa Clara.
Ethics discussion questions obligation to vote
Hours before the two vice presidential candidates, Gov. Sarah Palin and Sen. Joe Biden begin their debate, students and faculty will question whether citizens of the United States have an obligation to vote.
The electoral college does not allow for a single vote to change the outcome of an election, so does that mean each individual vote is not important? Today's Ethics at Noon will discuss these questions and more when philosophy professor Scott LeBarge leads the debate in Kennedy Commons.
GroupWise undergoing upgrades
Information technology is in the midst of improvements to the campus e-mail system.
GroupWise accounts used to hold about 50 megabytes each. After the upgrades have been completed, each student should be able to hold 250 megabytes in his or her inbox.
In addition to the increase is storage, the default settings will change on students' accounts, Todd Schmitzer, manager of networkings and telecommunications wrote in an e-mail to the Santa Clara community.
These changes include sent e-mails no longer automatically storing, and the default view for e-mails changing from text view to HTML.
From staff reports. E-mail news@thesantaclara.com.