tl19590601-000 "TOWER LIGHT Vo/. XI, No. 16 State Teachers College, Towson 4, Maryland June 1, 1959 Seniors Don Academic Garb Towson To Tolchester You have all heard of ""Sing Along with Mitch."" Now lets all sail along with T-T for Towson and T for Tolchester. There will be a day of enjoyment and relaxation for all. The dorm students will have box lunches packed for them but the day students will supply their own lunch. Baltimore Transit Company busses will take the students to the boat, at the foot of Broadway, leav-ing the college at 8:00 a.m. The boat will leave at 9 a.m. At Tolchester there will be swimming end amusement park facilities. There will be entertainment provided on the trip down and back including the reading of the Senior Last Will and Testament. Baltimore Transit busses will bring the students back to college where there will be a Jam Session, in the Student Centre, at 8:30 p.m. The Statesmen will furnish the music. The senior prophecies will be read and there will be skits put on by the student body. All faculty members and their families are invited to be guests of the Student Government Association for the trip. Outside guests must purchase a ticket for the nominal lee of one dollar. This is the first time All College Day has been held following exams and it is hoped that all faculty and students will plan to go on the trip. See you all there. Oh, when is it? Why June 3; that is the big day, mark it in red on your calendar. Campus Due For Improvement Among the planned improvement and renovations for the campus are the project of putting a curb and gutter along the sidewalk to the Student Centre to reduce the amount of water which collects there on rainy days, according to Mr. Karl J. Moser, Business Man-ager. Other improvement, planned for this summer, are steps at the north i entrance of Newell Hall and the widening of sidewalks. The wall be-tween rooms 8 and 9, which are Used as music rooms, will be sound- Proofed. Also, Mr. Moser explained that he hopes to have many of the blackboards resurfaced and the first floor of the Health Centre painted. Projects done each summer in-clude scrubbing and resurfacing the gymnasium and barracks floors and tniscellaneous painting and repair-ing in the dormitories. This summer, the Business Office kill also be working with the con- 'actors on the new Lida Lee Tall school building. OFFICIALS ELECTED In recent S.G.A. elections Ed Schumacher was elected president of the Student Government Associa-tion for the coming year. Ed is a graduate of Mt. St. Joseph High School in Baltimore. Here at Towson Ed has been Vice President of F.A.C., President of the Men's Resident Council, Sports Edi-tor of Tower Light, Sports Editor of Tower Echoes, and Member-At- Large of the S.G.A. Elected Vice President was Ar-lene Kates Ray, a graduate of Dun-dalk High School, and a member of the K-P Program. Here at Towson Arlene has been a member of FA.C., Women's Ath-letic Association, Women's Resident Council, Newman Club, and Social Chairman of the Student Govern- Ed. Schumaker ment Association. The Corresponding Secretary and Recording Secretary are Bobbie Wade and Winnie Balzer respec-tively. Bobbie has been a member of W.R.C. and F.A.C. here at Towson. Winnie has been a member of W.- A.A., F.A.C., and Rceording Secre-tary of S.G.A. this past year. Bill Kirby was elected treasure, Robin Swithers was elected Social Chairman, Danny Higgs Parliaman-tarian, and Sue Munacher National Students Association Coordinator. Members-at-Large for next year are Dave Stefansson, Judy Speer, and Carolyn Coakley. Congratulations from Tower Light. C.S.A. Attention The Committee on Financial Aid wishes to announce that a communi-cation from the Maryland Division Educational Committee of the United Daughters of the Confed-eracy has been received saying that a Robert E. Lee Scholarship is available to a needy and worthy student who is a lineal descendant of a Confederate veteran. Any stud-ent who fulfills these qualifications may apply to the Committee on Fi-nancial Aid. Application may be filled with Miss Nina Hughes, Chair-man of the Committee on Financial Aid. Towson's Inventor Classroom assignments have a way of mushrooming into something big for Ronald Sweany, senior at Towson State Teachers College. For example, Ronald was told to make a device that would aid stu-dents in remedial reading. So the Towson student invented an electric answer board composed of approxi-mately $25.00 worth of components and many hours of hard thinking and work. He has already sold his first an-swer board to Leith Walk Elemen-tary School where it is being used as an instructional aid. But he is currently demonstrating a larger and better one he recently com-pleted to students at the college, Ronald explained. Sweany used round plastic re-frigerator jars as fuse boxes, a rec-tangular metal cake pan which con-tains a bell, buzzer, and light bulbs, and numberless red and white wires, pieces of frosted glass, to name just a few. While presently set up to answer questions only in the area of pho-netics, the phenomenal contrivance can, with minor adjustments be made to answer questions covering any topic under the sun. The user of the answer board has only to connect, by means of clamps, 20 questions with corresponding an-swers written on 3 x 5 cards. Then a button is pressed and the machine flashes CORRECT or INCORRECT. As a further inventive touch a bell rings for a correct answer and a buzzer informs the user when he is wrong. To adapt the answer board for other fields of knowledge, it is only necessary to switch the 3 x 5 cards. Minor changes in the connections also eliminate the possibility of a student merely learning the loca-tions of the rght answers and not thinking out the question. A while back Ronald was told to make a visual aid to help elemen-tary school children learn mathe-matics. So he gathered together ply-wood, license plate caps, nails, pic-ture hanger hooks, furniture coas-ters and toggle bolts and created an adding machine that worked so well that many students and teachers have sugested that he patent it. Although there is a small plastic model on the market, Sweany's large machine was designed espe-cially for classroom use and has already been used and exhibited in Baltimore elementary schools. The only reason the young inventor hasn't had the machine patented is that it is simply too expensive. The Towson senior says that to use his machine a person simply dials the proper numbers on three dials, ones, tens, and hundreds, and the correct answer appears in the window above each dial. (Continued on Page 3) The annual Senior Investiture Convocation took place on Monday, May .25 in the Stephen's Hall Audi-torium at 10 a.m. After a procession by the Senior Class, The Reverend Mr. Menkel gave the Invocation and the audience followed by singing ""0 Beautiful For Spacious Skies."" The business-at-hand was actu-ally taken first in line, as Senior Class President, Mike De Vita, was invested in cap and gown by the College President, Dr. Earl T. Haw-kins. Seniors symbolically invested their academic robes by Dr. Earle 1'. Hawkins as he invests Michael DeVita, President of the Class. . . in This was followed by an acknowl-edgment of the honor by Mr. DeVita and a short speech reminiscing the past four years at Towson. Dean Kenneth A. Browne recog-nized Academic Honors for the var-ious members of the class and Mr. Edward Rubendall, adviser to the class, commended the 25 Seniors who were outstanding in service to the class during their four years here. The Towson Glee Club, under the direction of Miss Emma Weyforth, presented a short concert of two numbers . . . ""Hallelujah"" and ""I May Never Pass This Way Again."" (Several members of the class com-mented that these songs were most appropriate for a graduating class!) Next on the program was the pre-sentation of gifts by the Senior President. The class of 1959 left to the school a portable public-address system, which would have untold uses for outside events on campus in the next few years to come. Sam-uel Sharrow, President of the Alumni Association, welcomed the members of the class to the associ-ation. The guest speaker for the event was Dr. John Smith Lewis, a mem-ber of Towson's English Department. He spoke on: cited one purpose as that of making people more interesting as indivi-duals and life more interesting to individuals. Dr.Lerwis added that ""A cultured man is one who when he calls upon himself, finds some-one at home."" Old Grad's Graduating classes of the college ending in 4 and 9 and the Class of 1959 held their reunions from 2:00 to 3:30 on Alumni Day, May 23, 1959. Many other activities were held that day. After the reunions, Presi-dent and Mrs. Hawkins had a recep-tion for the alumni in the Student Centre from 4:00 to 5.30. Dinner was from 6:00 to 8:00 in Newell Hall and at 8:30 the Men's Chorus presented a musical program. At 9:30 an in-formal dance was held in the gym-nasium. The Class of 1959 was in-vited to attend the music program and the dance. During the dinner the class with the largest percentage of attend-ance received the Silver Cup which is awarded each year. Also, the alumnus who came the farthest re-ceived an award. For the second year, awards were presented to five alumni who had been outstanding in their chosen field of endeavor and had made significant contributions which have benefitted their community, state or nation. Last year the awards went to Dr. Lillian C. Compton, former President of Frostburg State Teach-ers College; Mrs. Grace A. Dorsey, Supervisor of Elementary schools, Maryland State Department of Edu-cation; Dr. M. Theresa Wiedfeld, past President of the State Teachers College at Towson; Dr. John H. Fischer, Superintendent of Public Instruction in Baltimore City; and Dr. Isadore Tuerk, Superintendent of Spring Grove Hospital. SUMMER COURSES OFFERED Lists of the courses to be offered in the coming summer. session may be picked up by interested students in the Dean of Instruction's Office. The courses cost ten dollars per credit hour. After seeing his adviser for permission to take summer courses, a student may register in the Registrars Office and pay his tuition in the Business Office be-tween May 12 and June 5. Courses in Science, Education, Health, History, English, Music, Ge-ography, Psychology, Mathematics and Art are being offered. These are open to all students and others who need credits or wish to ""The Purpose of Education"" and take extra credits. "