Silence golden for UNLV senior

Thursday, Jan. 19, 2006 | 7:45 a.m.

UNLV senior Nick Hurd obviously wants to be a millionaire and may even be one -- but until this spring, he's the only one who knows.

Although the hotel management major cannot confirm or deny his financial status until his appearance on "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" airs in June, Hurd did say he was "satisfied" with his performance.

Hurd, 24, auditioned for the show in UNLV's Moyer Student Union last spring by completing a general knowledge test. He said he prepared for his appearance by reading trivia books and playing the game online.

"My friends have always said that I'm a stockpile of useless knowledge, so hopefully it will amount to something," Hurd said prior to his taping last week.

Finding five friends to call for the "phone a friend" lifeline that the game show offers contestants who need help with a question proved to be difficult, Hurd said.

"They are afraid to get the question wrong," Hurd said.

UNLV President Carol Harter offered to serve as one of the people if a literature question came up (she has a doctorate in English with a focus on William Faulkner), but Hurd said he was too intimidated to take her up on it. He did put UNLV history professor and Sun columnist Hal Rothman on his list.

Hurd was originally scheduled to appear on the show's college edition in May, but he got bumped because of time constraints. He still got to compete on a regular show.

"Millionaire" paid for Hurd and his girlfriend to fly to Orlando, Fla., put them up in a Disney resort for two nights and took them and the other college contestants on a private tour of several theme parks, Hurd said.

"Millionaire" did not give him any tips on what to study.

"They don't help you at all," Hurd said. "It's pretty much your general knowledge and what you've accumulated throughout your life."

Bickering lawyers be gone.

UNLV's Boyd School of Law is hosting a public seminar Friday on how lawyers typically negotiate with each other compared with how they should negotiate.

Andrea Schneider, a nationally renowned scholar in conflict resolution and negotiations from Marquette University Law School, will "shatter" many of the "myths" about how lawyers negotiate and offer examples of best practices, Dean Richard Morgan said.

She will specifically look at how adversarial attorneys are with each other and how honest they are.

The law school prides itself on training students to resolve conflicts without always taking cases to trial, Morgan said. U.S. News and World Report ranked UNLV's Saltman Center for Conflict Resolution as the 15th best in the nation last spring.

The public seminar begins at 12:30 p.m. in Room 102 of the law school.

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Community College of Southern Nevada students needing remedial help and those with limited English are more likely to return to school from one semester to the next than other students, according to the college.

First-time degree seekers, students who have not declared majors and those attending part time are less likely to return.

President Richard Carpenter requested the data to see what factors affect enrollment so that the college can try to improve student success.

The data showed 72.2 percent of academically underprepared students enrolled in fall 2003 enrolled again in spring 2004, compared with 60.7 percent of the general student body. And 51.4 percent of underprepared students returned the following fall, compared with 42.5 percent of students overall.

Also, 58.9 percent of limited English students continued from fall to spring and 53.2 percent returned the following fall.

It is perplexing why students who need more help would fare better than the general population, Carpenter said, adding that the college needs to figure out what it is doing right with those students and apply the same principles to the others.

The college also is looking at how multiple factors can work against a student, Carpenter said. For instance, past data show that about 15 percent of black males attending school part time without declaring a major will continue from fall to spring semester.

The college has spent the last year revising its student service division to help increase the number of students continuing from semester to semester and to increase the number of students who successfully complete their courses.

Both rates are currently dismal, Carpenter told professors last week at his spring convocation address.

Christina Littlefield can be reached at 259-8813 or at clittle@ lasvegassun.com.