ARCHERS MAY HELP CONTROL URBAN DEER POPULATION
More than a quarter-million archers are expected to head for the woods for Pennsylvania’s fall archery deer hunting season, which starts Saturday, September 30. An expert from the College of Agricultural Sciences says archery hunters can help control deer overpopulation in urban areas. "Overgrazing and deer/car accidents are major problems in urban areas, where rifle hunting is too dangerous. For those counties, bow hunting can be a safer, more efficient option for controlling the deer population," says wildlife expert Gary San Julian. Many high deer population areas are in urban areas such as Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, where archery has been a very usable tool to manage deer. San Julian says private property owners struggling with deer damage could invite bow hunters to hunt on their land. For more, go to the Pennsylvania Game Commission at http://www.pgc.state.pa.us. For more news from the College of Agricultural Sciences, go to http://aginfo.psu.edu. 

INDIVIDUALISM CAN CREATE CLASSROOM CLASH
By encouraging young adolescents to assert their own individual rights and preferences, U.S. middle schools can create a daily clash of wills between students and teacher, says Dr. Gerald K. Le Tendre, associate professor of education. "After puberty and, certainly after they have entered their teens, American young people are expected to clamor for more control over what they can do, say, wear and eat." This exercise in assertiveness can often run counter to adult expectations, with the result that discipline and rebellion against discipline dominate the lives of middle school teachers and students.

Le Tendre also found that in the United States, beliefs in the inherent instability of adolescents aggravate classroom tensions and prevent teachers from seeing themselves as effective agents of change. He is the author of "Learning to Be Adolescent: Growing Up in U.S. and Japanese Middle Schools," recently published by Yale University Press. On the Japanese schools, he says that teachers do everything they can to teach students to be responsive to others, including the school at large, and that classrooms can inhibit students, undermining their ability to choose for themselves. Le Tendre sees flaws in both systems. "Neither does an all around good job of giving adolescents chances to improve their skills at self-control and self-determination," he says. "Adolescents need opportunities, but with adult guidance, to practice making choices, controlling impulses and deciding when group demands conflict with individual beliefs." For more on this story by Paul Blaum, go to http://www.psu.edu/ur/2000/usjapaneseteens.html 

KELLYS GIVE $600,000 TO SUPPORT ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
George and Barbara Kelly of Palo Alto, Calif., have given $600,000 to the Department of English to establish three separate endowments in support of American literature. Because of the Kellys, Robert Pinsky, the United States Poet Laureate, will visit Penn State on Wednesday, October 4. Pinsky is the first poet laureate to visit the University, and is coming as the Dickinson Lecturer. In 1999, the Kellys established their first endowment with a $50,000 gift, creating the Emily Dickinson Lectureship in American Poetry. As the Kellys became more familiar with the English department, they established the George and Barbara Kelly English Endowment for Library Support with a gift of $50,000, as well as the George and Barbara Kelly Professorship in American Literature in the College of the Liberal Arts with a gift of $500,000. For more on this story, go to http://www.psu.edu/ur/2000/kellygift.html 

LAW STUDENTS HOLD PANEL ON FIREARMS IN SOCIETY
Penn State’s Dickinson School of Law will sponsor a panel discussion on issues related to firearms in society at 7 p.m. on Monday, October 2, in Trickett Hall on the Law School’s campus in Carlisle. The program will be moderated by Professors Geoffrey R. Scott and Nancy A. Welsh and is aimed at presenting diverse views about the role of firearms in our society. Panelists will include representatives of the Lehigh Valley Firearms Coalition, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Handgun Control, and lawyers on opposing sides of firearms control issues. Scott expressed the hope that the presentation will help to increase public understanding of issues relating to firearms in society. The program is sponsored by the Dickinson Public Interest Law Fund, a student group, as part of the nationwide observation of First Monday — the beginning of the United States Supreme Court’s annual term on the first Monday in October. For more on the law school, go to http://www.dsl.edu. 

MOLECULAR AND EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGIST NEI HONORED
The Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution has established an annual lecture in honor of Masatoshi Nei, the Evan Pugh Professor of Biology and director of the Institute of Molecular Evolutionary Genetics at Penn State. The first Masatoshi Nei Lecture was presented recently at Yale University by Wen-Hsiung Li, president of the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution, during its annual meeting. The lecture will continue in the form of a presidential address during future annual meetings. It was created to honor Nei’s contributions to the society and to the journal, Molecular Biology and Evolution, which has become one of the premier journals in its field. Nei is a co-founder of both the society and the journal, and served as the journal’s managing editor during its first ten years. For more on this story, go to http://www.science.psu.edu/alert/Nei9-2000.htm. 

SMALL TALK: THE EYES HAVE IT
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, school-age children should have annual eye exams. Fall is the ideal time for a child’s eye exam, because vision problems can quickly make learning a challenge.

"Small Talk" is a weekly column of safety and health information for parents and other caregivers for children. It is a community service of the Penn State Children’s Hospital, located at The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center in Hershey, Pa. Please direct any comments or questions to Patricia Millner, director of nursing at the Penn State Children’s Hospital, at mailto: