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Runners go all the way in marathon
USC students participated in Sunday’s 21st annual Los Angeles Marathon.
By LESLIE ANNE JONES
Staff Writer
Knees and feet throb, hips feel like they're about to give out and nipples bleed when clothes chafe the skin.
These are just a few of the things a handful of USC students withstood Sunday while running the 26.2-mile Los
AnydM Marathu»<
For some, running just one miie seemed like an arduous task before joining the USC Marathon Team.
Completing a marathon is no mere athletic feat. Doctors recommend that beginners run no more than one marathon per year because of the tax it puts on the body.
When Pankaj Mishra, a graduate student studying electrical engineering, joined the marathon team three years ago, he had never even heard of cross-country running. Mishra's running experience was limited to the running required in cricket, which he had played often at home in India.
"That's it, enough stupidity," Mishra said he thought to himself on the 23rd mile of his first Los Angeles Marathon. He said it was horrible and decided he was done with it at the end of the day.
But two weeks later Mishra was back and running. Sunday was his third Los Angeles Marathon and his fifth marathon overall. Training |ust I see Marathon oage 10
Student Newspaper of the University of Southern California Since 1912
INSIDE
March 21, 2006
After squeaking past USF,
67-65, the Women of Troy face a dominant Duke Blue Devils team tonight in Norfolk, Va. 20
Vol. CXLVIII, No. 40
Experts validate student arrest
USC student Ben McAlister caught in a sting operation
By SARAH SPRINGER
Staff Writer
Since a USC student was arrested Feb. 19 in Laguna Beach on suspicion of attempted lewd acts with a minor, more light has been shed on the method used to arrest him.
was arrested Feb. 19 when by Perverted-Justice.com.
Benjamin Paul McAlister, a 21-year-old fourth-year architecture student, was caught in a sting operation by Perverted-Justice.com, a Web site designed to expose sex offenders and bring them to authorities.
McAlister was caught participating in a sexually explicit conversation
with an adult posing as a 13-year-old girl. He agreed to meet with the purported minor two hours after they began speaking, said Xavier Von Erck, founder of Perverted-Justice. com.
Susan Schroeder, Orange County deputy district attorney, said McAlister arrived at a Laguna Beach home owned by Perverted-Justice. com volunteers and was arrested.
McAlister was one of 13 people
arrested in the sting operation on Feb. 19, where adult volunteers from the Web site posed as 12- and 13-year-old girls in chat rooms to catch adults who solicit young girls for sex.
Von Erck said the men caught that night were the first to act and were also aware of the proposed minors’ ages and what they looked like after the volunteers showed them I see Arraat. page 3 I
Tradition. Members of the Iranian Graduate Students Association passed out fliers and had a traditional Haft Seen table on Trousdale Parkway Monday morning to celebrate Nowruz, the Iranian or Persian new year, which lasts for 12 days and is celebrated in Iran, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan and Tajikistan.
Students celebrate Nowruz, traditional Iranian new year
The holiday, based on the vernal or spring equinox, began at 10:25 a.nu The new year's celebration will last for 12 days.
By JULIA WONG
Contributing Writer
Students from Iran, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan and Tajikistan celebrated Nowruz, the Iranian or Persian New Year, Monday at a booth on Trousdale Parkway.
Organized by the Iranian Graduate
Students Association, the festivities marked the beginning of Nowruz's 12-day celebration. The start of Nowruz is determined by the spring equinox, which marks the beginning of spring.
The celebrations included a table set with Haft Seen. In Iranian, Haft is seven and Seen is S. Haft Seen is seven items that begin with the letter S and
relate to the seven creations and the seven immortals that protect those creations.
“We have apples, a mirror, the holy book, flowers and coins on the table," said Arash Malakan, a Ph.D. student studying civil engineering.
Malakan said the items are usually symbols of luck and the rejuvenation of nature.
Soraya Taghavi, a first-year Ph.D. student in electrical engineering, came from Iran two years ago. She
said the IGSA's Haft Seen table was similar to the traditional set-up in Iran.
“Usually family and relatives sit around the Haft Seen table together at the beginning of the new year but I can’t do that with them (this year) because I’m here,” she said.
Officers of the IGSA as well as other Iranian students counted down to 10:25 a.m., the official start of Nowruz. After the new year, peo-l see Nowruz. page 11
INDEX
New ‘The Godfather' video game resurrects Marlon Brando as Vito Corleone. 7
Left-turn signals are the answer for Los Angeles'traffic woes. 4
News Digest-----3	Lifestyle--------7
Upcoming	2	Classifieds-----12
Opinions........4	Sports..........20
WEATHER
Today: Morning showers. High 61. tow 44. Tomorrow: High 68. low 51
AP scores, success not synonymous
Harvard surveyed more than 8,000 college students over a 13-year period.
By CHAU TU
Contributing Writer
Advanced Placement science exam scores are not good indicators of what grades students will get in corresponding college science courses, according to a study conducted by Harvard University and the University of Virginia.
"What we found is that when vou
get all the students with reported 5’s (on their AP science exams), they didn't all get A’s. About half of them
did," said Robert Tai. assistant director of science education at Virginia
AP classes are promoted to be as rigorous as a college course and AP test scores are considered to be a good indication of the grades students would receive in a college course.
The study started in 1992 and surveyed about 8.500 students enrolled in introductory college science courses at four-year colleges and universities across the nation
Students were asked to recall	AlUfik
their high school science class expe-	l|Ulvll
riences during their college science	Fact
course. Tai said.
He conducted the study with	-♦
Philip Sadler, a professor at Harvard	only about
“If students are in	their college half of stu-
chemistry class, they	have proba-	dents who got
bly thought about their high school	5 s on their
chemistry class and maybe even	AP science
looked at their notes." Tai said. 'If	tests got As	in
they are ever going to remember	corresponding
something from their	experiences	entry level col
from high school, they're probably lege science doing it right there.”	courses.
I see karat page 10 I