Longview News-Journal from Longview, Texas • Page 50

2E Longview News-Journal, Sunday, May 16, 2004 Weekly U.S. oil, gas rig count up by nine Engineering gas, 157 were looking for oil and one was listed as miscella neous, Houston-based Baker Hughes reported Friday. Of the major producing states, Wyoming increased by HOUSTON (AP)-The number of rigs actively exploring for oil and natural gas in the United States rose by nine this week to 1,162. Of the rigs running nationwide, 1,004 were exploring for seven and Texas by two. New TV Station Longview-based news and other sales personnel will be added later.

Hurley has about 21 years in engineering program's advisory board. Having more female engineers isn't completely replacing the drop-off in white men going into engineering, however. And overall, women still make up only about 12 percent of the engineering work force. "Women still have a long way to go," said Margaret Ashlda, director of university relations for IBM Corp. The gains have been primarily around the edges, and increases may be slowing, she said.

The percentage of women getting doctorates has inched up to about 17 percent. But for the past five years, the percentage of women receiving master's degrees has remained around 22 percent, and those receiving bachelor's degrees has hovered around 20 percent, according to annual surveys by the American Society for Engineering Education. William Wulf, president of the National Academy of Engineering, had no answer for why the extensive efforts haven't foundation so they can more easily enter management later in their careers. "We want to develop a capacity for leadership," she said. Domenico Grasso, Smith's dean of engineering, said students also are forced to confront issues of social relevance early and often.

In their first course, engineering students must design an educational tool that could be used in the local public schools. Another course, also open to non-engineering majors, examines the Brooklyn Bridge and Eiffel Tower from artistic, social and cultural perspectives as well as construction design. Bartell said she got hooked on engineering because of that real-world connection. She said the broader approach didn't seem to stint the technical side of learning. "Every time I went home to Texas, I'd quiz my male friends who went to the big engineering schools to see if I was getting everything they were," she said.

Her conclusion: "Everything and then some." resulted in greater gains for women, but he suggested engineers need to promote the field's creative aspects and banish the "dead-wrong stereotype of a nerd working on something without social relevance." "Lord knows we do a lot of things in engineering that are not welcoming to women, and we can work on those," Wulf said. "But people have to want to be an engineer first." However, Wulf added that schools including Smith are trying broader approaches to teaching engineering. "Maybe we have to look at something new," Wulf said. Instead of devoting their first two years to math, Smith students are introduced early to problem solving, exposed to a variety of engineering disciplines and encouraged even required to take courses outside the technical fields. The specialization that normally comes in the junior and senior years is left to graduate school.

Smith's president, Carol T. Christ, said the program aims to give women a wider From rage IE Tyler, will move In June to a new studio at 2211 ESE Loop 323 in Tyler. Hurley said a studio and sales office will be opened in Longview during the first quarter of 2005. The local studio will allow coverage of live events from Longview instead of taping and bringing ItbacktoTyJer. Phillip Vallenti, an account executive, Is the only KYTX employee based In Longview at this time.

Hurley said From Page IE fcssors nationwide. But some believe the professors' attitude is much more important than their sex. "The women who come to us are well prepared and win most of the top honors, but still you have to be encouraging," said Joseph Monroe, dean of engineering at North Carolina which prides itself on its long history of producing black engineers. About 43 percent of this year's 147 graduating seniors are women. "It's just a warm, open atmosphere," said Maranda McBride, who recently completed her doctorate in industrial engineering at North Carolina after spending several years working in industry.

To industry the issue goes beyond simple equity. "If you are going to design and sell a product you need the different perspective women bring," said Andy Acho, director of environmental outreach and strategy for the Ford Motor Co. and chairman of the Smith Graduates the television business In 1986, he organized and built NBC stations KETK and KLSB in Tyler and Nacogdoches. I le sold these stations to Max Media In 1997, but remained with the stations until 2000. Hurley was vice president and general manager of Tyler's ABC affiliate, KLTV, from 1983 to 1906.

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The first is an index fund, which will track a particular index, for the most part protecting you from the ongoing scandals in fund management and pretty much guaranteeing average performance. Don't snort Most active fund managers don't beat the averages over a period of years. The list of low-cost providers includes Vanguard, TIAA-CREF and T.Rowe Price. Open a Roth IRA No kidding. If your graduate has earned income, you can make a gift in that amount up to $3,000 to an individual retirement account A Roth IRA is preferable because qualified withdrawals are tax -free.

Not just tax-deferred but entirely free. From Page IE Choose a Planner." Buy stocks or mutual funds. Finding a trustworthy investment adviser and signing up for one's first account is frightening to many people. If you want your youngsters to be investors, help them over the initial hump. Among stocks, some families like to buy shares in the companies their kids work for.

You might make a similar gift Most advisers think that's putting too many eggs in one basket, but the motivation might be important A mutual fund is probably a better idea, because it provides diversification and the assumption that somebody is watching over the eggs. Two possibilities come to The tax break can be immense. "Savings accrued in one's 20s can become an invaluable part of retirement because it can take advantage of compound interest for 40 years or more," said Joshua Weber, a financial adviser with Morgan Stanley in Atlanta. Would your son or daughter be content to leave the money there for many years, or even for many hours? It's a good question, best answered by the people who reared the kid. Show them the money.

If they're adults, maybe you should just trust them. On the other hand, you might want to package the check with some sort of motivational device. That might be a card suggesting that the money should help with starting a savings or investment account paying grad school tuition or whatever. Another possibility is linking the check to an appointment with that financial planner you hired. Yet another gambit is to tuck the check into a good book about personal finance.

You could consider the Idiot's Guide or Dummies series, an old reliable such as Jane Bryant Quinn's "Making the Most of Your Money," or a book directed in particular to young people. Books for beginners include "Get a Financial Life," by Beth Kcblincr and "The Green Magazine Guide to Personal Finance," byKenKurson. Jim MeClaln 3549 Gilmer Road Longview. TX 75604 A recipient of Federated's Top Life Premium Award has achieved something special. Membership is reserved for Federated marketing representatives 7 i.

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Parle 8q. Owatonna, MN 650SO (607) 455-6200 INTERNET: www.ladaraladinauranca.com "Raisin' The Roof 2004 benefiting Longview Habitat for Humanity From Page IE mission and local regulators to defray many of their regulatory burdens by charging extra. But nowhere in the rules does it say that the companies should recover their costs through a surcharge to the basic price of service. Unfortunately, the rules also don't force them to include the fees with the advertised price. Beyond a general requirement under federal law that such fees be "just and reasonable," there Is no specific cap.

Likewise, the FCC does not closely monitor many of the fees or the expenses they purport to recoup. Instead, they have left it up to companies, arguing that consumers will comparison shop and pun-Lsh those carriers with excessive fees. Not surprisingly, then, nearly every major wired and wireless phone company has exploited these vagaries to boost their prices without having to raise their advertised rates. And since all the companies have imposed these stealth price hikes, the market forces regulators expected to contain them have proven negligible. Most troubling is the new breed of fees rolled out by all the major cell phone companies to defray the costs of complying with the federal rule allowing subscribers to switch service providers without losing their phone numbers.

On Thursday, the FCC reported that more than 2 million people had switched carriers since the rules took effect in late November. The wireless companies, which are each collecting from $10 million to $25 million a month in surcharges, clearly incurred some expense in upgrading their computer systems and operations to handle the new process. Verizon Wireless and Cingular Wireless estimated their set-up costs at more than $50 million. But assertions by all the carriers that they've spent hundreds of millions more remain undocumented and questionable. Verizon and T-Mobile, for example, opened new faculties to focus on processing requests to move phone numbers to and from their companies.

But the hundreds of new employees hired to staff such centers are also essentially selling the company's product, and presumably spend considerable time either luring new business or trying to dissuade potential defectors. The costs for these new centers, therefore, largely involve basic marketing expenses brought on by a change in the industry rules. In the case of Verizon and T-Mobile, big winners under the new rules, their subscribers are being asked to shoulder the burden for an effective marketing campaign. Regardless of whether the new wireless and DSL surcharges are appropriate, the was a Special thanks to our Sponsors sSsTEXAS BANK AND THUS! BUILDERS ABC Printing All Service Window Door Hibernia Bank Longview News-Journal Merritt Tool Panel Truss of Texas, Inc. LeTourneau Inc.

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