Campus News Editor
BERKELEY, Calif. - A lopsided chocolate cake left in the University of California at Berkeley's math department aroused some suspicion recently.
The cake, adorned with a photo of former Berkeley math professor and alleged Unabomber Ted Kaczynski as well as newspaper clippings reading "Free Ted," was discovered Jan. 27.
An employee called campus police after tasting the cake's icing, but the bomb squad thoroughly investigated the confection and found no bomb.
Campus police Capt. Bill Foley told reporters that the cake was probably a harmless prank that was treated seriously in the publicity after Kaczynski's trial.
SALT LAKE CITY, - Two professors at the University of Utah are in trouble for citing the academic record of a student newspaper columnist.
Oct. 13, sophomore Brandon Winn, a columnist, ribbed a group of sports fans, writing, "The problem with these fans is that they are about as bright as parks and tourism majors."
Parks, recreation and tourism department chairman Gary Ellis and John Crossley, undergraduate director of the department, searched Winn's academic records and found what they thought was proof Winn was in no position to judge the "brightness" of parks and tourism majors.
"His own academic record is nothing to brag about," they wrote newspaper editor Robert A. Jones.
However, Jones recognized that the professors' searching Winn's records violated university policy and the federal Family Educational Right to Privacy Act.
"You abused your access (to student records) to look up Mr. Winn's academic records for no reason other than to humiliate him," Jones wrote the duo.
University officials said both professors had apologized for their mistake, and Crossley said he didn't know what they did was wrong.
Utah American Civil Liberties Union Director Carol Gnade said she had received calls from others at the school complaining about the lax security surrounding student records.
NEW YORK - A California man has pleaded guilty to selling pencils encoded with answers to graduate-school admissions tests.
Po Chieng Ma, who will likely be sentenced to five or six years in jail for conspiracy, obstruction of justice and jumping bail, distributed the pencils with every administration of the Graduate Record Examination, the Graduate Management Admissions Test and the Test of English as a Foreign Language.
Ma and his seven employees sold the pencils for up to $9,000 each, New York prosecutors said. He hired a team of professional test-takers to complete the exams in New York and then phone the answers back to California, where Ma used the three-hour time difference to doctor and distribute the pencils.
Last month, Ma escaped from the New York City courthouse in which he was tried and was arrested 14 hours later as he tried to escape to Canada.
College News Roundup briefs were collected from College Press Service reports.