A TCU nursing educator has received an exclusive health profession award and plans to use it to TCU's advantage.Dr. Paulette Burns, director of the Harris School of Nursing, is one of 20 Fellows chosen by the Robert Wood Foundation in 2005 and said she hopes it will create more graduate opportunities for TCU nurses.

"I want to expand clinical and organizational skills at the doctoral level to match the health care needs of today," Burns said.

The screams of more than 300 fans filled the University Recreation Center's Special Events Gym on Tuesday night as the TCU volleyball team defeated local rival North Texas in three games.Sophomore outside hitter Talaya Whitfield led the charge for the Horned Frogs with 16 kills and junior middle blocker Anna Vaughn added four blocks to lead the team a 30-25 win in each game.

Sophomore middle blocker LeMeita Smith also added 12 kills for the Frogs.

There is more than one football team on TCU's campus.The intramural football season started Monday, and there are 87 men's, women's and co-rec teams signed up to play this year.

"This is the highest we have ever had," Cristie Carpenter, assistant director intramurals and sports clubs, said Tuesday. "Intramural football is the biggest sport we have in the fall."

Why are there so many people playing intramural football?

"It helps keep the competitive juices flowing," Charlie Spiegel, a sophomore finance major, said.

Is it just me, or are there some similarities between our Horned Frogs and the Dallas Cowboys? Because I'm a pretty big fan of both those teams, and, lately, the games on Sundays have seemed eerily familiar to what I saw the afternoon before.Especially this past weekend.

TCU against Brigham Young and the Cowboys against the 49ers were basically the same game.

In both instances, it was one storied team I like playing another storied team on the road.

In the matter of survival of the fittest, TCU prevailed - or at least according to one magazine.TCU students have leapt over common college obstacles such as pizza, alcohol, late night snacks and lack of sleep to beat out 648 other schools, becoming the 12th fittest college in the nation, according to the October issue of Men's Fitness magazine.

To some faculty members and students, the ranking makes sense.

"The bulk of students are doing what they have to do to stay healthy," said Trey Morrison, assistant director of fitness and wellness for campus recreation.

While NASA's plan to return to the moon is commendable, its methods lack the spirit of exploration and adventure, which characterized the original Apollo program - a true failure of the American spirit.NASA plans to launch its shuttle replacement and primary craft for lunar missions, the Crew Exploration Vehicle, in 2014. The CEV is a reusable craft that will take off atop a booster rocket and will land with retro-rockets and parachutes in much the same way as the Apollo capsules landed.

Once upon a time, a boy would ask a girl on an official date, she would dress up, he would bring flowers, and at the end of the night he could only hope for a kiss at the doorstep.Fast forward to 2005, and the overuse of instant messenger, Facebook.com and the ever-elusive text-message, and dating has been diminished to an event of the past.

Any conversations at all seem limited to surroundings involving a cocktail at Snookie's or beerpong at the nearest house party. Impressing a girl has ceased entirely.

TCU student-athletes and coaches have divided opinions over an increasing lack of women coaches in college athletics.As reported by The Chronicle of Higher Education, despite a growing number of female athletes, female coaches for women's sports have declined since Title IX became law in 1972. The federal legislation outlined a series of guidelines to provide equal opportunity for both women's and men's collegiate sports.