Students were welcomed with warm weather, loud music and high spirits at Spring Fling yesterday afternoon.

The outlook was positive for the upcoming weekend and Spring Fling coordinators said they expect a lot more students than last year because the carnival does not fall on Easter weekend.

Other universities from all over the country host carnivals to raise money, but the UA outnumbers them in every area, said Amanda Meaker, Spring Fling executive director. [Read article]

Jobs cut to stabilize budget, Livengood says

Eighteen Arizona Athletics employees were informed this week they would be laid off, effective June 30, because of the department's need to balance the annual budget.

Jim Livengood, director of Arizona Athletics, said four appointed personnel and 14 classified staff members were dismissed, a decision that will save the department roughly $800,000 to $850,000 when they balance their $32 to $33 million budget for the 2005-2006 fiscal year, which begins July 1. [Read article]

Students in the James E. Rogers College of Law announced their decision to secede from the Graduate and Professional Student Council yesterday, just days after students in the College of Medicine voted to also leave.

One hundred and seventy-four students participated in the collegewide election, with 92.5 percent voting to leave GPSC and seek further representation in the Associated Students of the University of Arizona. [Read article]

Last night in McKale Center, the Pride of Arizona pep band played for both teams - each featuring a mixture of players from the UA wheelchair basketball teams and the men's and women's basketball teams.

A crowd of about 4,000 turned out for the 22nd annual Lame for a Game fundraiser put on by the Disability Resource Center's Adaptive Athletics program.

Janet Olson, DRC event coordinator, said the event typically raises around $35,000 from the $5 ticket sales, but this year's may have brought in more due to raffle tickets sold at the game. [Read article]

Famed Nobel Peace Prize winner, author and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel will speak at the UA Sunday in a lecture about building unity and at a humanitarian dinner honoring President Peter Likins and businessman Donald Diamond.

Sponsored by the Center for Judaic Studies, the Jewish Federation of Southern Arizona and UApresents, the event marks the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camps in Europe, said Jennifer Fink of the Jewish Federation. [Read article]

A humanitarian crisis affecting more than 2 million people is raging in the Darfur region of western Sudan, where thousands of Sudanese have been killed and millions more have been displaced, which has a group of concerned UA students speaking out about the ongoing genocide to state and national representatives.

Known as the Concerned Students to Save Darfur, the non-partisan group sold green bracelets on the UA Mall yesterday and will again today to raise funds for the Darfur region and to educate students about the cause, said David Manthei, a member of the group. [Read article]

Potential undergraduate biology students take note: You don't have to go to medical school.

The final part of the annual Biology Career Services series took place last night to educate students about various job opportunities involving biology after graduation, which do not always require a medical degree.

Funded by a grant to the UA by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the event featured a panel of five different UA alumni who earned undergraduate degrees in the field of science and later took unique career paths. [Read article]

"He was the best pope we've ever had."
-Antonio Almada, a regional development junior, on the passing of
Pope John Paul II

"We can't rely on her to throw every God dang game for us."
-Mike Candrea, Arizona head softball coach, on junior ace Alicia Hollowell

"He's a cocky ass who whines a lot."
-Daniel Andrus, junior men's tennis player, about Stanford tennis player Phil Sheng

"Despite sincere and altruistic motivation, the legislative and executive branches of our government have acted in a manner demonstrably at odds with our Founding Fathers' blueprint for the governance of a free people - our Constitution."
-Stanley Birch, a conservative judge in Atlanta's federal appeals court, rebuking the president and Congress for behaving like "activist judges" in intervening in the Terri Schiavo case [Read article]