Junior Days

OU Prospective Student Services invited high school juniors to experience college life April 23 and 30. Junior days is an annual event, in which students and their parents can tour the campus and attend information sessions. 

The event is to provide prospective students with a closer look at the University of Oklahoma and help them to be better prepared for the college application and scholarship search process. Prospective Student Services Assistant Director, and a main coordinator for the event, Stephanie Buettner says, "Junior Days allows them the opportunity to visit the campus and receive the information that will directly benefit them."

The popularity for Junior Days has increased as of lately so space is limited for students. "We want to provide personalized attention to the families visiting," says Buettner.  An average of 300 students for both of the days are scheduled to be admitted to attend. "We do not want them to feel overwhelmed," says Buettner, "we also want this to be the first of many visits to OU."

The University sends out promotional posters for the event to many high schools in Oklahoma and Texas. Invitations are also sent out to students who are members of the Prospective Student Services communication system. "Junior Days is open to all high school Juniors," says Buettner.

There will be many informational speakers at the event including representatives from all colleges, housing, and student life. "We are still in process of aligning some of the general information speakers," says Buettner.

Students are beginning to organize their college search process during their junior year of high school and Junior Days aids in pointing those students in the right direction. "We assist them in organizing their high school and community involvement, preparing a resume, and highlighting the opportunities available from the University of Oklahoma," says Buettner. 

OU sophomore Kenzie Kirk graduated from Enid High School in 2009, and attended the second Junior Days event in 2008. "I wasn't positive about OU until I attended Junior Days," says Kirk, "and I met my first college friend and got great information on scholarships at the event." 

Buettner assures that, "students will leave connected to the University, its staff, and students after Junior Days." 

The Pearl Project

Gaylord students spent their Valentine's day learning about the investigative journalistic perspective into the assassination of Daniel Pearl and the Pearl Project. The presentation was lead by former Wall Street Journal reporter Asra Q. Nomani, and Barbara Feinman Todd, the associate dean of journalism at Georgetown university. 

Nomani was a close friend and colleague of Pearl's from his days at the Wall Street Journal. She described him as being, "the guy everybody liked, every girl had a crush on, and every guy wanted to catch a beer with." She told the story of how daniel was lead into his captives arms as being very similar to when she was in Afganistan. 

The Pearl Project was a project at Georgetown University and the Center for Public Integrity that investigated Pearls murder that occurred in 2002. It included graduate and undergraduate students from a number of Georgetown majors. Students investigated the questions of who really killed pearl, and why they killed him. 

"We used a 6 cell format," Nomani said, "and we started with the 4 men that were charged for his murder." When they concluded their investigation almost 3 1/2 years later, 27 men were identified as having some involvement with Pearl's disappearance and murder. 

"On January 23, 2002, Daniel went off for an interview," Nomani quoted almost from memory. Pearl was in search of the true name and identity of Richard Reed, the shoe-bomber who was suspected as being a major facilitator for the terrorist attacks on 911. "He was lead straight into the arms of Omar Sheik, the mastermind behind his assassination," Nomani said. Through Amjad Hussain Farooqi, a man involved in trapping Pearl, Sheik was connected to the other men that were identified as being apart of the murder of Pearl. 

The Pearl Project was modeled after the Arizona Project, an investigative reporting project into the murder of Arizona Republic reporter Don Bolles. "To be successful we needed dedication and money, we had the first we just didn't have any money," said Todd. Nearly $363,000 was given by the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism, a non profit organization aimed at keeping investigative journalism alive.