Heard on the Hill: KU students offer to mow your lawn; parents warned against alcoholic whipped cream ‘whipahol’; KUMC nursing professor earns recognition

Your daily roundup of news, notes and links from around Kansas University.

• Want your lawn mowed? Have another chore or volunteer opportunity that KU students can help with?

Kris Velasco, a KU sophomore from Wamego, is helping organize “The Big Event,” a day — March 31 — when KU students say “thanks” to the Lawrence community.

That’s in return, essentially, for putting up with crazy college students all the time, Velasco said.

Velasco stressed that the offer stands for the entire community — not just those in need of assistance because of economic or health factors. He said community organizations like schools and nursing homes should feel free to request assistance, too.

He said he’s hopeful that more than 2,000 KU students will be out working in the community that day. It’s modeled after a similar event at Texas A&M University.

So, in upcoming editions of the Lawrence Journal-World, his group intends to buy ads (huzzah!) with job request forms for interested parties to fill out. Just fill one out, and drop it in the mailbox.

Or you can e-mail your requests to thebigevent@ku.edu.

• Move over Four Loko. Hello, Whipped Lightning.

The so-called “whipahol” is a hit with students. KU’s Office of the Vice Provost for Student Success wants to make sure parents are aware of the dangers of the 36-proof sweet cream. They included a tidbit about the product in a regular parents’ newsletter.

KU is worried students can easily lose track of how much alcohol they’re consuming while topping coffees, martinis and who knows what else with the stuff.

In a rather strange frequently asked questions page on the product’s website, I learned all about this new product, including tips on how to operate an aerosol can so that I can “make sure [I] enjoy every ounce.”

And also that, since it’s not marketed as a food product, no one has bothered to count how many calories are in it, and the Food and Drug Administration hasn’t raised a stink about that. That makes no sense to me — as I’ve seen calorie counts on just about everything, including things that are a far cry from “food.” But hey, what do I know?

Perhaps this new (well, at least newly canned and marketed) form of alcohol could be the next target for the FDA after its bout against caffeinated beverages? Time will tell…

• A Heard on the Hill tip of the cap to Carol Smith, a KU Medical Center professor of nursing, who is a very nice person and one of the first people I interviewed after taking this job. And she also was recently inducted into the American Academy of Nursing as one of the 2010 fellows.

The story I remember about her is one an associate dean relayed to me. The administrator spotted Smith walking through the hallway with a bouquet of long-stemmed roses, and asked what they were for.

They were for a celebration that grant funding had come through — each member of her team got a rose and a public thank you for his or her efforts. Good stuff.

• If KU students are looking for something to do, I could use about 50 of them to help me clean my desk. Send me a tip on organizational skills or anything else for Heard on the Hill at ahyland@ljworld.com.