fan to get the steam out."

Students showed a positive attitude to the competition and used their initiative to reduce power, she says.

They were encouraged to use blankets when cold, turn off lights when not in use, and even to cook their two-minute noodles in bulk instead of in single portions.

Victoria University students' association wellbeing and sustainability officer Rory Lenihan-Ikin says the competition is a great way for first-year students to learn sustainable energy-saving habits before they move into flats.

One senior resident went around on the weekend turning off lights after the students had gone out to town.

Paterson says the heads of the residences have been positive about the competition, which she hopes to roll out to most Victoria University halls next year.

The money saved by the students willThe turbulent decade of the 1980s began with financial calamity in several sectors of the United States economy, from automaking to agriculture. The rural Midwest experienced its worst economic decline since the Depression years. Thousands of farmers lost their operations, and the small rural communities that serve agriculture often changed from prosperous business centers to struggling villages with many empty buildings and boarded-up storefronts along their main streets. Families in Troubled Times examines the plight of several hundred rural families who have lived through these difficult years. The participants in the Iowa Youth and Families Project, the subjects of the present study, include farmers, people from small towns, and those who lost farms and other businesses as a result of the \