Students are recycling with hopes of winning FLEX Dollars and pizza.

Residence Life and Facilities Management are working together to run a recycling contest that began Nov. 1 and ends Dec. 12.

Joan Schmidt, the associate director of Residence Life, said each of the 22 residence halls have been divided into pairs of teams.

The residents of the winning pair will receive $15 of Campus Dining Flex Dollars. Further, one floor in the East Quad, South Quad, North Quad and The Towers complexes will win a pizza party.

“Everyone is participating because it’s the right thing to do,” Schmidt said. “The rewards just get people’s attention.”

Schmidt said the halls were paired to help keep the contest fair because some halls already were recycling more than others.

The contest runs in two parts. The departments are using the first three weeks to determine how many pounds of material per resident each hall recycles.

The second part measures how much each hall increased recycling.

Lindsay Allen, associate director of media relations, said Fabiano and Celani Halls led during the first few weeks.

The two halls recycled 1.46 tons and averaged 6.56 pounds per resident, an increase of 1.96 pounds per resident since the end of October.

Robinson and Calkins Halls are second at a .54 pound increase per resident, and Thorpe and Sweeney Halls held third with a .53 pound increase.

Jay Kahn, director of Facilities Operations, said the purpose of the contest is to raise recycling awareness for the university’s participation in the national “Recyclemania” contest in January.

Kahn said the university recycled 456 tons in 2007, and has already recycled 432 tons this year.

“Stay tuned – I think we’ll go over 500 tons,” Kahn said.

The university produced 187 tons of solid waste and recycled another 57 tons in October, a total of 244 tons, Kahn said.

This means the university is recycling 23 percent of its total waste, 11 percent lower than the national average, Kahn said.

“We’re doing well,” Kahn said. “We’re doing better than we had been. But there’s always room for improvement.”

Kahn said he feels a good goal for the university would be to recycle 40 percent of its waste.

He said this is the first time the university has held the recycling contest, though it has participated in “Recyclemania” in previous years.

Kahn is optimistic about the contest’s impact on the university.

“The students we’re seeing at the university right now are more aware of the environment than four years ago,” Kahn said.

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Michael Sutton said to students Monday night that despite the stereotype, not all homeless people are lazy.

“There are a number of reasons to be in a shelter,” he said.

Students gathered Monday in Warriner Mall for a candlelight vigil for the homeless to kick off Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week.

The vigil, hosted by Covenant House Michigan where Sutton stays, a non-profit organization based in Detroit, was to raise awareness about homeless youth.

“I want people to realize the importance of the community coming together and acknowledging this kind of thing,” said Melissa Golpe, public relations and marketing director for Covenant House Michigan.

Golpe spoke about the organization’s efforts, and estimated that the organization has helped about 32,000 people.

“We’re giving them the tools to become independent,” Golpe said.

The organization assists both homeless and at-risk youth 13 to 22 years old.

Golpe said youths are provided with counseling, food, leads on job opportunities and mentoring. In the case of dropouts, this can even include help getting a high school diploma.

The organization runs an emergency shelter and also provides a two-year transitional living program for 18 to 22-year-olds.

As the candles were lit, the stories of several homeless youths were read, as well as several poems on the subject.

Sutton also spoke at the event as someone who has experienced homelessness.

“I have so many friends who don’t even have anything,” Sutton said.

Sutton said he is the father of two children, and had been evicted from his house after losing his job.

UPS fired him because he no longer had a driver’s license and could not deliver packages, Sutton said.

Golpe said Covenant House Michigan receives most of its funding through donations, but also receives some grants.

Sutton joked that he appreciated everyone in attendance at the vigil being out in the cold weather freezing like him.

“Homelessness is not something to look down on; it’s something to look up on and do something about,” he said.

Covenant House Michigan will be accepting new and used clothing donations at the Volunteer Center in the lower level of the Bovee University Center until Saturday.

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The festival is sponsored by the Alpha Psi Omega theatrical fraternity.

The event will feature two plays: “Perfect Little Angel,” by Interlochen sophomore Aaron Wineman, and “The Revolution of Policies and Practices by Artie Dallas,” by Portland senior Andrew Lewis.

The festival grew out of the playwright contest that the fraternity holds every spring and fall, said Eric Sprott, a Bruce Crossing senior.

Contest winners are eligible to submit proposals to have their plays produced the following semester, Sprott said. Sprott is the director of Lewis’ play, and said Charlevoix senior Will Barret is directing Wineman’s.

Lewis is an English major but said he has acted in four theater productions, with “Asparagus” being his latest performance. He began working with Sprott during the summer when his plans with another director fell through.

Sprott said that this is his first time directing a play that will be performed for a public audience.

“My show is fairly light and prop intensive,” Sprott said.

He estimated that the fraternity has spent several hundred dollars on the festival.

Sprott said that the casting for the plays was done at the same time as three other productions.

“The others had first dibs,” Sprott said. But that doesn’t make it any worse. You just have to be creative.”

Lewis said he knew the fraternity held the festival each year, and when he got the idea for a play, he entered the playwright contest to have it produced.

The play went through two small rewrites over the summer, expanding the themes, Lewis said.

Lewis said the play was inspired by books he read for a contemporary literature class.

“The events in the play are based on true events,” Lewis said.

He explained that his play is a dark comedy about an everyday character coming into an absurd business environment, unraveling the mysteries of a book from which the play draws its name.

“It was really weird watching people acting out what I wrote,” Lewis said. “But they seem to really understand what I was going for.”

Sprott said that the event will run about an hour and a half. “Perfect Little Angel” will be a half-hour long, followed by a short intermission before Lewis’ play, which will be 50 minutes long.

“We’re hoping for 50 people each night,” Sprott said.

He said the theater would accommodate up to 81 people.

Tickets for the performance will be sold for $2 at the door.

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CMU Police, the Mount Pleasant Police Department and the local State Police Post 33 all said that patrol cars are too vital to safety to let prices affect much business.

CMU Police Chief Stan Dinius said gas for the CMU patrol cars is paid for out of a set budget, and gas for the cars is purchased without tax.

“We still try to do as many patrols as we can,” Dinius said.

Dinius said CMU Police keeps two patrol cars on call, and if there are more officers on shift, they may be put on foot or bike patrols.

“We have to try to reduce our gas cost every year,” Dinius said.

The foot and bike patrols are meant to help keep patrol coverage up while reducing car mileage, though Dinius said that these alternative patrols would have to be reduced as the weather gets worse.

Dinius said gas prices do not affect how CMU Police chooses its patrol routes.

“We try to vary them all the time anyway,” he said. “We don’t want someone figuring out where we’ll be.”

MPPD Capt. Glenn Feldhauser said MPPD is trying to use more fuel-efficient vehicles to reduce the department’s fleet cost.

“Our fleet is the major expense, but it’s important,” Feldhauser said.

Feldhauser said the department purchased a Dodge Charger to see if it would get better gas mileage, but estimated it gets only a difference of two miles to the gallon compared with the departments’ other vehicles.

MPPD is also looking into using motorcycles to reduce fleet cost without sacrificing patrol coverage, and is presenting the idea to the City Commission.

Feldhauser said police have also stopped idling their cars as much, which keeps the electronic equipment inside charged.

Feldhauser said the department has its own gas supply, paid for this year with an $18,000 budget.

Sgt. Del Putnam said the State Police usually does not have to worry about gas prices.

“All of our purchasing of gas comes out of a state debit card,” Putnam said. “So the cost comes out of the state coffers.”

The State Police posts project a budget based on average mileage per year, which usually stays about the same, Putnam said.

“Our amount of coverage is down because we simply don’t have the bodies,” Putnam said.

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Presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain are scheduled to hold the first of three presidential debates at 9 p.m. Friday at the University of Mississippi.

The candidates are scheduled to discuss issues of foreign policy and national security. The debate will be aired on CBS affiliate WNEM-TV and NBC affiliate WEYI-TV.

However, McCain announced Wednesday that he may not attend the debate, saying he is suspending his campaign to work on solving the economic crisis on Wall Street.

Obama said he will also return to Washington, but has rejected McCain’s request to delay the debate Friday.

Chris Owens, a political science assistant professor, said that the topic was picked before the economic crisis, it is likely the economy will still be worked into the debate.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if they start with the global economy and work from there to Wall Street,” Owens said.

Owens also expects Obama to stress that he opposed the war in Iraq.

Owens said it is important to watch how the candidates handle themselves.

“A lot of times debates are more about how candidates react to questions than the debates themselves,” Owens said.

Owens said a good debater is concise and easy to understand, and that is a problem for Obama’s long answers.

On the other hand, Owens said, McCain is known for his temper, and Owens is interested in seeing whether Obama will attempt to provoke him.

Brad Helber, a Kenton senior, said he is more interested in the economy than foreign policy, but that he probably will still watch the debate.

“I don’t really have anything else planned on Friday,” Helber said.

Helber said he wants to know how the candidates will handle foreign hostilities.

“Diplomacy first or just send in the soldiers?” Helber said.

The second debate will be Oct. 7 at Belmont University in Tennessee, using a town hall-format in which citizens will ask the candidates questions.

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Make a Pitch, a contest run by CMU’s LaBelle Entrepreneurial Center, is a part of the College of Business Administration, will be held at 5 p.m. Thursday in Grawn Hall Room 100.

Associate Director of LEC and a previous judge for the event, Charles Burke said accounting professor James Damitio came up with the event to help students from all academic areas come up with and discuss new ideas.

“This is his baby,” Burke said.

Make a Pitch is held twice each semester, and the 20 participants are usually watched by an audience of up to 50 people, he said.

“For everyone presenting, we usually have someone curious, or a friend (attending),” Burke said.

Guidelines for presentations describe the areas judges will be focusing on, such as target customers and the enterprise’s competitor. Presentations may also explain manufacturing method, distribution, sales and marketing, overhead and profits, though participants are warned they will not have enough time to fully address each topic.

“The concept is an elevator pitch,” Burke said.

He said an elevator pitch is selling an idea to a person in the time it would take to ride an elevator.

Livonia junior Emily Turbiak said participating in Make A Pitch helps students become more proficient at public speaking. Turbiak won first place in March with a designer handbag idea.

“It was very nerve-racking,” Turbiak said.

However, she said the experience gave her confidence with public speaking, and that after the contest it became easier to give the presentation.

Burke said participants are not allowed to use props in their presentation in an effort to help the contest move from presentation to presentation, and to keep it fair for enterprises that do not have options for interesting props.

Turbiak said she had notecards to help her during her presentation, but she found it was easier to simply glance at them.

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