Hobey Baker Again.
Clarkson's hockey team once again had a leading contestant for the
Hobey Baker Award, collegiate hockey's equivalent of football's Heisman Trophy. Craig
Conroy, Potsdam native, and son of a Clarkson hockey star, Mike Conroy (1970-73), was
runner-up in the 1994 award competition. He came in second to Minnesota-Duluth's Chris
Marinucci. Earlier in the season, both Craig and Brian Mueller became the 26th and 27th
Clarkson hockey stars to be named as All-Americans, and the first in six years to achieve that
distinction.
In February 1995, Conroy was called up from the Montreal Canadiens Fredericton
affiliate to play with the Canadiens against the Hartford Whalers. By starting the game, this 23-
year-old rookie became Potsdam's first athlete to play NHL hockey. In his second professional
game, Craig scored a goal in the Canadiens 2-0 defeat of the New York Rangers.
Clarkson Olympians.
Diann Roffe-Steinrotter, wife of Clarkson soccer coach Willi
Steinrotter, captured the gold medal in the women's giant slalom race during the Winter
Olympics at Lillehammer, Norway. The first skier out of the gate, Diann finished in 1:22:15,
easily surpassing Russia's Svetlana Gladischeva, who was second at 1:22:44. Previously, Diann
won the silver medal at the Winter Olympics at Meribel, France, in 1992.
Todd Marchant, Clarkson junior, was selected for the US Olympic hockey team. After a
disappointing eighth-place finish for the team, Todd chose not to return to Clarkson, but
decided instead to skate professionally with the New York Rangers. He was sent to
Binghamton, a Ranger affiliate in the American Hockey League. He later was traded to the
Edmonton Oilers where he led the Cape Breton affiliate in scoring at the year's end.
BS in Three Years.
Students in the top 10 percent of their high school classes could save as
much as $25,000 by choosing to earn a bachelor's degree in three years at Clarkson. Announced
in fall 1994, this option became available to students entering in fall 1995.
Such students would earn 108 credits toward their degree by taking six courses for each
of the six semesters. The remaining 12 credits would come from a combination of advanced
placement (AP) credits achieved during high school (approximately 30 percent of Clarkson
students enter the University with AP credit), and special projects conducted over one or two
summer sessions.
This new option affects students only in the School of Business, the School of Science,
Liberal Studies, and Interdisciplinary Engineering and Management.
COMPEELAB.
Acronym for
COMP
uters in
E
ngineering and
E
ducation
LAB
oratory, this
new computer lab in Old Main W24 was funded by the National Science Foundation, and
included an IBM RISC/6000 server and networking of the lab's other machines. Ideally, it was a
room "where the participants could pursue anything that had to do with computers, engineering,
or education," and was made cozy. Stocked with all the necessities of a small conference room,
it contained a conference table, a coffee maker, a microwave, and a refrigerator.
This 27- by 14-foot lab emerged from an idea by Professors James Kane and Jeffrey
Layton of the MAE department. There, a small group of engineering students worked to
develop a program called "Interactive Stress Analysis" and an accompanying interactive
multimedia lecture series to teach engineering strength of materials.
