With the new semester underway, leaders of Saint Mary’s Student Government Association (SGA) have begun their work for the academic year. Senior Terra Nelson, student body president, said in an email the planning for first-year student programming began over the summer.Nelson said she and student body vice president Olivia Allen, senior, wanted to get an early start of promoting community, the College’s core value for this year. Accordingly, they started with making changes to Belles Beginnings, the orientation programming for new Saint Mary’s students.“Our first order of business was helping to restructure Belles Beginnings,” she said. “Enhancing Belles Beginnings was something we were passionate about, and our community committee co-chairs worked hard this summer to make that come to life. … We believe that community is what makes Saint Mary’s home, and we want to welcome Belles with open arms,” Nelson said. “Through fostering a stronger community, we hope to increase college retention as well.”Another of Nelson and Allen’s planned initiatives is increasing transparency within SGA.“We plan on opening our Student Government Association weekly meetings to all students as to enhance College transparency,” Nelson said.With the recent hiring of a director for the Belles Against Violence Office (BAVO), Nelson said SGA looks forward to the two organizations working together.“We applaud the administration for taking action in hiring a new [BAVO] director,” Nelson said. “All SGA members met with the new director and were able to have a discussion about the safety of our students. … The safety and well-being of our students is one of our greatest concerns, and it is such a relief to have that [director] position filled.”Along with the student body president and vice president, other members of SGA have begun discussing future events.Junior Giavanna Paradiso, chair of SGA’s food committee and co-chair of the community committee said Nelson and Allen have encouraged the various committees to work together to host monthly events. Examples include programming centered on the beginning of school and holidays.“We’re planning a back to school brunch and a Thanksgiving event as well as some giveaways,” Paradiso said.She said SGA wants to make sure Saint Mary’s has plenty of options for students to be involved on campus, particularly given recent policy changes related to transport.“We want to keep people on campus as much as we can, especially because of the changes in transportation,” Paradiso said. “If you have to pay for your own transportation, that becomes costly.”Tags: Belles Beginnings, Community, saint mary’s, Student Government Association
The Spaniard has been linked with a number of clubs in recent weeks and the Latics’ relegation from the Premier League – despite also winning the FA Cup – has led to increased speculation about his future. Whelan said Thursday was ‘D-day’ for Martinez, but he remained hopeful that not only would the 39-year-old stay, but also agree a contract extension. “We have had a constructive meeting today and Roberto wants 24 hours to speak to his wife and decide what he wants to do,” he said. “He needs a bit of time, which I think is fair, and tomorrow we will know – it is decision day.” Martinez, who has 12 months left on his existing contract, has been one of the front-runners for the vacant Everton job following David Moyes’ move to Manchester United. However, Tony Pulis’ departure from Stoke on Tuesday would give him another Premier League option while confirmation Manuel Pellegrini and his coaching staff are leaving Malaga could raise the possibility of him returning to his homeland. But there is also a chance Martinez, who has previously turned down Aston Villa and was on Liverpool’s short-list to succeed Kenny Dalglish last summer, will remain at the DW Stadium and try to get the club back into the Premier League at the first attempt. “I told him exactly as I saw it: his future for the next two years lies with Wigan Athletic,” added Whelan. “If he wants to opt out of his contract and go then there is a bit of compensation to be paid but I hope that won’t be the case. “I hope he will extend his contract. As I see it there are two (Premier League) clubs available and does each club want him? “We are talking about Roberto for the whole of Europe. I am not sure which club or the other has approached him but I am sure the club which will approach him will be bigger than Wigan. I hope he stays but tomorrow I will be able to tell you.” Wigan manager Roberto Martinez is to decide his future in the next 24 hours, according to chairman Dave Whelan.
Press Association
The Balawaia Savannah Cranes which comprises of all teenagers headed by Kilina Avei (Team Manager), Golo Bola and Larry Gulu (coachs), Lindsay Bugana and Manu Doloku (trainers) with KRFL Rep Raga Gima was an initiative of KRFL President, Lega Kikima and KRFL Treasure, Vanua Garo.“It is very inspiring to see the young boys in their 20s’ playing in the team because the aim is to experience 9s’ football and build on it as they continue their Rugby League careers,” Kikima said. He added that this will be a good opportunity to expose boys to play against some well-known Central Rugby clubs like Rovanama, SSG Roosters and Poreporena Marlins.Kikima said the squad may look inexperienced, but he is certain they will put up a good challenge.Young guns were selected from their local league playoff in Kemabolo, Gabone and Bonanamo villages to compose the Savanah Crane team.The team also has a new jersey donated by Irau Tanu family as they gear up for the tournament this week.
DARMSTADT, GERMANY—After the Philae probe bounced its way to a tenuous, unanchored perch on a comet—a bittersweet victory for the European Space Agency (ESA) and its Rosetta mission—Fred Jansen cried in the control room. Hours later, Jansen, the Rosetta project manager at ESA’s European Space Research and Technology Centre in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, took himself to his hotel bar, bleary and hoarse. Colleagues asked to join him, but he brushed them off and drank two glasses of white wine alone. “I didn’t know you could feel this bad and be so happy at the same time,” he says. “Emotions are still running through my system in a way that is unbelievable.”Jansen had reason to feel joyful. Until last week, robots had landed on just six bodies: the moon, Venus, Mars, Saturn’s moon Titan, and the asteroids Eros and Itokawa. Philae had added another locale to the list: a comet. “It’s a great day,” said ESA Director General Jean-Jacques Dordain in a postlanding briefing. “Not only for ESA but, I think, for the world.” But it was not the perfect landing that Jansen and others had hoped for, against admittedly long odds. A series of glitches had doomed Philae to a short life and left its scientific harvest uncertain.On 12 November, the Rosetta comet orbiter dropped Philae from an altitude of 22.5 kilometers. It took about 7 hours for the washing machine–sized probe to drift to the surface of 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, a duck-shaped comet about 4 kilometers long. First came a big bounce, a sign that the comet’s black crust of dust, organic molecules, and ice is harder than thought. Philae rebounded at the speed of a slow walk. In the weak gravity, it reached a height of a kilometer and may have flown laterally another kilometer. After a second, smaller bounce, it finally came to awkward stop—tipped up on its side and sitting in the shadows of some sort of cliff wall, with scant sunlight to recharge its batteries.Sign up for our daily newsletterGet more great content like this delivered right to you!Country *AfghanistanAland IslandsAlbaniaAlgeriaAndorraAngolaAnguillaAntarcticaAntigua and BarbudaArgentinaArmeniaArubaAustraliaAustriaAzerbaijanBahamasBahrainBangladeshBarbadosBelarusBelgiumBelizeBeninBermudaBhutanBolivia, Plurinational State ofBonaire, Sint Eustatius and SabaBosnia and HerzegovinaBotswanaBouvet IslandBrazilBritish Indian Ocean TerritoryBrunei DarussalamBulgariaBurkina FasoBurundiCambodiaCameroonCanadaCape VerdeCayman IslandsCentral African RepublicChadChileChinaChristmas IslandCocos (Keeling) IslandsColombiaComorosCongoCongo, The Democratic Republic of theCook IslandsCosta RicaCote D’IvoireCroatiaCubaCuraçaoCyprusCzech RepublicDenmarkDjiboutiDominicaDominican RepublicEcuadorEgyptEl SalvadorEquatorial GuineaEritreaEstoniaEthiopiaFalkland Islands (Malvinas)Faroe IslandsFijiFinlandFranceFrench GuianaFrench PolynesiaFrench Southern TerritoriesGabonGambiaGeorgiaGermanyGhanaGibraltarGreeceGreenlandGrenadaGuadeloupeGuatemalaGuernseyGuineaGuinea-BissauGuyanaHaitiHeard Island and Mcdonald IslandsHoly See (Vatican City State)HondurasHong KongHungaryIcelandIndiaIndonesiaIran, Islamic Republic ofIraqIrelandIsle of ManIsraelItalyJamaicaJapanJerseyJordanKazakhstanKenyaKiribatiKorea, Democratic People’s Republic ofKorea, Republic ofKuwaitKyrgyzstanLao People’s Democratic RepublicLatviaLebanonLesothoLiberiaLibyan Arab JamahiriyaLiechtensteinLithuaniaLuxembourgMacaoMacedonia, The Former Yugoslav Republic ofMadagascarMalawiMalaysiaMaldivesMaliMaltaMartiniqueMauritaniaMauritiusMayotteMexicoMoldova, Republic ofMonacoMongoliaMontenegroMontserratMoroccoMozambiqueMyanmarNamibiaNauruNepalNetherlandsNew CaledoniaNew ZealandNicaraguaNigerNigeriaNiueNorfolk IslandNorwayOmanPakistanPalestinianPanamaPapua New GuineaParaguayPeruPhilippinesPitcairnPolandPortugalQatarReunionRomaniaRussian FederationRWANDASaint Barthélemy Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da CunhaSaint Kitts and NevisSaint LuciaSaint Martin (French part)Saint Pierre and MiquelonSaint Vincent and the GrenadinesSamoaSan MarinoSao Tome and PrincipeSaudi ArabiaSenegalSerbiaSeychellesSierra LeoneSingaporeSint Maarten (Dutch part)SlovakiaSloveniaSolomon IslandsSomaliaSouth AfricaSouth Georgia and the South Sandwich IslandsSouth SudanSpainSri LankaSudanSurinameSvalbard and Jan MayenSwazilandSwedenSwitzerlandSyrian Arab RepublicTaiwanTajikistanTanzania, United Republic ofThailandTimor-LesteTogoTokelauTongaTrinidad and TobagoTunisiaTurkeyTurkmenistanTurks and Caicos IslandsTuvaluUgandaUkraineUnited Arab EmiratesUnited KingdomUnited StatesUruguayUzbekistanVanuatuVenezuela, Bolivarian Republic ofVietnamVirgin Islands, BritishWallis and FutunaWestern SaharaYemenZambiaZimbabweI also wish to receive emails from AAAS/Science and Science advertisers, including information on products, services and special offers which may include but are not limited to news, careers information & upcoming events.Required fields are included by an asterisk(*)Scientists made the most of their new home. They tried to gather data from its 10 instruments for 57 hours, before the lander’s batteries were exhausted and it fell into hibernation. It could be many weeks before scientists understand what the lander data tell them about the formation and composition of 67P, which, like all comets, is a relatively pristine object that dates to the early days of the solar system.Just getting to 67P had been an immense challenge. Rosetta spent a decade after its 2004 launch wheeling through the solar system, traveling 6.5 billion kilometers before finally meeting up with its target in August. The long, intricate voyage has shown that ESA can manage a €1.4 billion mission with many moving parts and competing national interests. For example, Philae was built primarily by France and Germany, and its instruments were managed from control rooms in Toulouse, France, and Cologne, Germany—which in turn relayed instrument commands to Rosetta via ESA’s main control room in Darmstadt, Germany.The Rosetta orbiter will continue to orbit 67P for the next 13 months, monitoring the comet as it draws closer to the sun and ever more of its subsurface ice sublimes, or outgasses, driving jets of gas and dust. But the landing was always going to be the mission’s climax. It almost didn’t come to pass. Two days before the attempt, controllers had trouble turning on the lander. Then, the day before landing, engineers discovered that reverse thrusters, meant to keep Philae pinned to the surface after touchdown, were unlikely to work. Mission managers came within a hair’s breadth of postponing the landing. “You can imagine the four-letter words,” Jansen says. Deciding that a delay would solve nothing, managers went ahead with the attempt. The problems multiplied at touchdown: Not only did the reverse thrusters not thrust, but two harpoons meant to fasten the probe also failed to fire, leaving Philae to bounce across the comet into rugged terrain.With just 1.5 hours of daylight a day falling on Philae in its shadowed position, hopes for recharging its batteries were dim. The elation of landing quickly turned into a frantic effort to wring science from the limited time. Not all turned out well. A rod meant to measure heat flow broke while the lander was attempting to hammer it into the comet’s surprisingly tough surface. The shutters to another instrument—one that measures composition by bombarding materials with x-rays—did not open, so the instrument measured mostly the titanium and copper of the shutters. And the most sought-after result—an attempt to measure the composition of a subsurface sample obtained by a drill—did not come to pass. Fred Goesmann, principal investigator for one of two sample analysis instruments at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System in Göttingen, Germany, says the drill appeared to move down and up correctly. It also seemed to have delivered something to one of Goesmann’s ovens. His ovens duly heated up. But the data show nothing. “It’s indistinguishable from not having received a sample,” Goesmann says. He doesn’t know whether the problem was with the drilling or with his instrument.There are still plenty of data to be thankful for. Both sample analysis instruments were able to “sniff” the gases present near the surface. Goesmann says one of his sniffs—just after the big bounce—seems richer than the others, perhaps a sign that dust was stirred up by the landing and sucked into his machine. The other sample analysis instrument, called Ptolemy, used its last moments to analyze a sniff chamber that had been trapping and concentrating ambient gases. Ptolemy’s principal investigator, Ian Wright, of the Open University in Milton Keynes, U.K., hopes concentrations are high enough for researchers to measure rare isotopes of hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen. “We were pretty pleased at how things turned out,” he says.For Gerhard Schwehm, former project scientist for Rosetta, Philae was always going to be the cherry on top of a very big cake. The Rosetta orbiter remains entirely healthy and powerful, he says. Already, scientists are making significant findings. At a planetary science conference last week in Tucson, Arizona, members of the orbiter’s camera team presented images that showed arcs of dust emanating from jets—a finding that could help them understand the mechanisms of outgassing. A radar instrument, working in concert with a receiver on Philae, got data about the interior of the comet that could help unravel a major question: Does 67P have its duck head and body because two separate cometesimals came together? Or was 67P stretched and nearly broken apart—perhaps by a gravitational perturbation from the giant planet Jupiter?And ROSINA, a Rosetta instrument that uses spectrometers to measure gas abundances, has obtained a highly sought after result: the so-called deuterium-to-hydrogen ratio of water in the comet’s thin atmosphere, or coma. The measured value for 67P is much higher than the ratio in Earth’s oceans and higher than in other comets, says ROSINA principal investigator Kathrin Altwegg, of the University of Bern. Three years ago, the comet Hartley-2 was found to have a D-to-H ratio near that of Earth’s oceans—sparking interest in the notion that comet impacts delivered much of Earth’s water. Altwegg says the result for 67P could make asteroids the primary suspect again.In one of their last commands to Philae, controllers made the lander turn by 35° and lifted it up several centimeters, in hopes of putting Philae’s solar panels in a more favorable position. Goesmann says he is still optimistic that they will get to do science again with Philae. As 67P approaches the sun and the comet’s orientation changes, more light could reach its solar panels. He says the emotional roller coaster of last week is over for now, but not for good. “The battle’s over, we’re still alive,” Goesmann says. “Did we win? I don’t know.”To read more Rosetta coverage, visit our Rosetta collection page.