A giant claw started tearing down the walls of O’Shaughnessy Hall at 7:30 a.m. Thursday to make way for the new Anderson Student Center.

“We’ll pull the exterior walls down, expose the bearing structure, and start taking the structure down,” Construction Manager Jim Brummer said. “That will take about a week to complete and then they’ll start hauling out the debris, which will take about another week.”

Some colleges around the country have decided to scrap their traditional yearbooks, blaming the age of Facebook and budget cuts.

The University of Virginia is the most recent school to join a growing group of colleges that no longer publish yearbooks as more students have decided to share memories through social networking.

Eleven women gathered at the South Campus grotto bridge Monday afternoon in honor of International Women’s Day. The event was one of many “Join Me at the Bridge” demonstrations sponsored by Women for Women International across the world. The peaceful gatherings are ways for men and women to bridge messages of hope to women in need.

The Undergraduate Student Government will give more than $88,000 to St. Thomas clubs and organizations this semester, as USG approved its spring budget allocations Sunday, March 7.

Among the top recipients of USG funding are HANA, the Rock Climbing Club, GMSA, SHINE and KUST.

With the American Cancer Society estimating that more than 1,500 people die each day from cancer, it is no wonder that students like senior Jennifer Nielsen and freshman Alexis Rodarmel want to find a cure any way possible. For them, Relay for Life provides that opportunity.

A little more than 100 St. Thomas students filled the OEC auditorium Friday night for the United for Haiti benefit. The event shared a message of “brotherhood, friendship and hope,” sophomore emcee Sarah Tinsman said.

KENOSHA WIS. – The No. 3-ranked men’s basketball team was upset Friday night 73-71 by No. 24-ranked Anderson University in the first round of the NCAA tournament at Carthage College in Kenosha, Wis.

The Anderson Athletic and Recreation Complex doesn’t open until August 2010, but TommieMedia was allowed inside Wednesday on a guided tour to check out the progress.

Athletic director Steve Fritz, who was on his fifth tour of the facility, said the new field house will be about twice as big as Coughlan Field House.

St. Thomas’ strong Catholic tradition adds to St. Paul’s strong Catholic community, but with St. Bernard’s high school fighting through financial woes and a continuous drop in enrollment, St. Paul may lose one of its long standing Catholic landmarks.

St. Bernard’s is located right off of Rice Street on West Rose Avenue, just about 7 miles from St. Thomas.

Twenty-six percent of American adults get news from their cell phones, according to a recent Pew Research Center study.

The statistic is part of a larger trend. More people are checking the news on their laptops or phones with Internet access, and the numbers of people watching traditional television broadcasts or reading print newspapers are dropping.

Decades worth of tradition are being tossed away by St. Thomas students this semester, and no one is doing a thing about it. In fact, St. Thomas actually approves of this historical overhaul.

Slowly but surely, the ever-present foam cups that have been a staple of St. Thomas eateries are becoming extinct in favor of a newer, more environmentally friendly model.

St. Thomas men’s and women’s basketball teams found out their NCAA playoff opponents Monday morning.

The men face Anderson University (Ind.) in Kenosha, Wis., in the opening round Friday as the women play Wisconsin-Whitewater Friday at Whitewater.

The men’s side of the bracket includes eight teams ranked in the top 25. No. 23 Anderson is 22-5 this year.

During a time of budget cuts, St. Thomas’ Opus College of Business and College of Arts and Sciences are hiring new faculty members. Some students think it’s a good decision for the school, while others are concerned about where money is being spent.

The Opus College of Business is hiring seven full-time faculty members to start next fall. But Christopher Puto, dean and chair of the Opus College of Business, said this isn’t anything new.

Make some room in the trophy case, because the women’s basketball team is coming back from the MIAC championship game with some hardware.

It took an overtime period to decide it, but St. Thomas is the new MIAC champion.

Residence Life released the plan for a new laundry program Wednesday that will pull revenue from students’ room and board rates in 2010 to update laundry facilities and improve sustainability throughout campus.

Residence Life Director Aaron Macke said the new laundry program will allow machine repairs and improve sustainability.