Warren J. Schor dies of Swine Flu
Warren J. Schor died of complications from H1N1 swine flu at Cayuga Medical Center on September 11, 2009. The sophomore was attending Cornell University to study economics and management in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Schor was hospitalized since September 3rd after being admitted with flu symptoms; the presence of swine was diagnosed one day before Schor died. Schor lived in a fraternity house on campus.
Untitled photo, Facebook, May 22, 2008
Schor’s family has created an In memory of Warren Schor website with photographs; there are also several Facebook groups in his memory: Warren Schor RIP We Love You and In loving memory of Warren J. Schor.
At least 520 students at Cornell have reported flu-like symptoms. For more information about swine flu at Cornell, please see CU and the Flu.
Ithaca in Recession: Shops closed at Ithaca Mall
I was just at the Ithaca Mall this weekend buying school supplies, and I noticed that in the span of a short year, almost a dozen shops had been shuttered, including famed Abercrombie and Fitch. Ithaca (formerly Pyramid) Mall appears to be downsizing at a faster rate than the already-tanking US economy. It’s hard for me to estimate how much has changed in the more than a year since I was last there, but I got an impression of sadness and decay:
A website Dead Malls has an entry (from 2004) for Pyramid Mall:
IN the late 90’s much change took place inside the walls of Pyramid Mall, due, for the most part, to the changing retail scene nationally, as well as regionally. All three of the original anchors of the mall closed, due to Chapter 11 (Ames, which bought out Hills, and Montgomery Ward), or mismanagement of the company (JC Penney). However, due to the mall’s location, the needs of big box stores to expand into the smaller markets, and the inability of developers in the Ithaca area to get any large scale power centers built, Pyramid was able to benefit.
No job? Sue your University!
There’s a fascinating story of a recent alumnus who is suing her college because she hasn’t found a job after three months of hunting (in this recession and terrible job environment). In Alumna sues college because she hasn’t found a job, CNN details how Trina Thompson, a student with a 2.7 GPA, is suing New York’s Monroe College for $72,000 because “they have not tried hard enough to help me.”
She suggested that Monroe’s Office of Career Advancement shows preferential treatment to students with excellent grades. “They favor more toward students that got a 4.0. They help them more out with the job placement,” she said. iReport.com: “Don’t sue your alma mater”
Asked whether she would advise other college graduates facing job woes to sue their alma maters, Thompson said yes. “It doesn’t make any sense: They went to school for four years, and then they come out working at McDonald’s and Payless. That’s not what they planned.”
It probably doesn’t help that she got poor marks in an undergraduate degree in Business Administration, a degree like an MBA but without the years of work experience that usually precede it. Reviews for the college, which we’ve never heard of, are appalling:
- “As long as you can walk into the building and could sign a loan, receive financial aid, or pay up front they will accept you.”
- “… all they talk about in the hallways, bathroom, and even class is they BABY DADDY DRAMA.”
- “Monroe College is a mediocre school. Very similar to community college.”
The institution is a private, for-profit, college with 4,361 full-time students, 71% female, charging on average $9,000 / yr tuition. The school has a statistically skewed diversity profile, with 52% Hispanic, 42% African-American, 1% Asian, and 1% Caucasian. The graduation rate is 54%, and the acceptance rate a startling 61%. There’s no listing of the average SAT score of incoming freshmen (a bad sign), and a warning that “Monroe understands that for many students the SAT may not be a good indication of a student’s academic aptitude” is another red flag. We can interpolate from their minimum requirements for a presidential scholarship of an 1800 on the SAT (about the 80th percentile) that few of their students are objective academic achievers.
In a recession where qualified, experienced workers are being laid off, it takes a massive ego and sense of millennial over-entitlement to give up your job hunt after just three months and blame the college for your poor GPA and lack of marketable skills.
