The Miscellany News

The Miscellany News September 17, 2009

Since 1866 | miscellanynews.com

Vassar College Poughkeepsie, NY

Volume CXLIII | Issue 2

VSA endorses new room entry policy Matthew Brock

F Kathleen Mehocic/The Miscellany News

The Multiracial/Biracial Student Association hosts its first meeting and ice cream social of the year in the ALANA Center. Many groups use the Center for planned events, but it is also a space for casual gatherings.

Student of color groups seek broader campus involvement Emma Carmichael Features Editor

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here aren’t many locked doors on Vassar’s campus. Most public halls remain open and unattended all night, and any savvy upperclassman can provide a secret window entrance for Taylor Hall, or a plan of attack to hold a Saturday night power-hour in Rocky. These are Vassar’s spaces, and students rightly treat them as such.

Still, Vassar students have become accustomed, over time, to some unofficial boundaries. Consider that building behind the Powerhouse Theater and a level above the Shiva Theater.

It’s by the ascending stairs on the walk to the Fitness Center or the Terrace Apartments. The door is likely unlocked. This is the ALANA (African American/Black, Latino, Asian/Asian American, Native American) Center.

This year, the student organizations

Affairs and is now the Associate Dean of the College. When he began work, the Intercultural Center, as it was then known, was located in the basement of Lathrop House. After students petitioned for a more accessible space, the College committed $650,000 to renovate the former coal bin building into the current Center. During the two years of planning and construction, the Center was in Blegen House.

“Since the beginning, the task has always been to balance these two goals,” said Pittman. “The Center must [be] a widely-used resource for the campus community and at the same time be a center that affirms the experience of students of color.”

Pittman and Tejeda, along with a number of student of color organization presidents and members, spoke to the Miscellany about their efforts to See ALANA on page 6

associated with the ALANA Center are working to open up that door and their meetings to a broader range of Vassar students. Student representatives voiced a commitment to making the Center a truly shared space, while still maintaining its mission to foster a safe environment for students of color. Jocelyn Tejeda, Associate Director of Campus Life and ALANA Programs, said that there is a “misconception” that white students are not welcome in the Center. “Students this year are really trying to be intentional about this being a welcoming place,” explained Tejeda, “while still really being mindful of the fact that it’s also a place that provides specific populations with important resources. But that has never meant that other student’s aren’t welcome.”

Edward Pittman ’82 was hired in 1990 as the Director of Multicultural

News Editor

urthering last year’s debate on the role of Campus Security in the residence halls, the Vassar Student Association (VSA) Council passed a new room entry proposal on Sept. 13 that will be added to the Student Handbook pending approval by the Committee on College Life. The policy would then be added into the guide provided by the Office of Residential Life. “[This new policy] should help with transparency in College regulations,” said VSA Vice President for Student Life Elizabeth Anderson ’11, who proposed the new changes.

“Hopefully, it will help new students to understand what’s expected of them.”

The proposal adds an entirely new section to the already existing policies and was drafted by former Vice President of Student Life Nate Silver ’10. The new policy went through a series of changes before it came before council. “We originally thought it should be a student rights and responsibilities but it ended up being a room entry policy…because it ended up being what can security do and what can it not to,” said Anderson.

According to Anderson, the proposal was difficult to draft because it had to accurately reflect the Security Department’s policy. “It just took a wile to get all the wording right and make sure everything was correct,” she said.

As it stands, room entry is covered under the Residential Facilities section of the Student Handbook.

The current policy allows security to use a master key to enter a student’s room “when students refuse to cooperate with a security guard, in the interest of health/safety issues or when pursuing an investigation.”

Given the somewhat ambiguous nature of the current regulation, the VSA has been in discussions for the

better part of two years on whether they should pass a proposal that would clarify the rules regarding room entry. The current proposal accomplishes this by elaborating on the policy in an added section of the Student Handbook.

The new policy specifies that Security or Residential Life personnel can enter a student’s room “only when repair or maintenance necessitate, and in the event of an emergency, such as fire, fire alarm, fire drill, immediate threat to life, a call for help, or what reasonably seems to be a dangerous situation.”

“It looks okay to me,” said Director of Security Don Marsala, “It’s pretty much what we do we do anyway. It’s a little clearer.”

However, according to Marsala, security only makes use of the master key “a few times a semester...

Most students are compliant. They don’t try to hassle security and vice versa.”

Director of Residential Life Luis Inoa said that he thought the new room entry policy would make a welcome addition to the Residential Life Guide. “The Residential Life Guide is there to provide greater clarification for policy.”

That said, Inoa felt that the VSA’s new proposal was unclear in that it does not explicitly mention policy violations.

“Words like ‘detrimental,’ ‘dangerous’ have a threshold. That threshold would be lower for [administrators],” said Inoa in reference to the fact that students and administrators have differing opinions on certain illicit activities.

“If Security smells marijuana, they have every reason to knock on that door; I don’t know if that was clear to students,” said Inoa.

The room entry proposal also gives Residential Life staff the right to inspect students’ rooms given 24 hours’ notice. However, Inoa said that for the most part, security See ROOM on page 3

For greater solidarity, faculty form chapter of AAUP Molly Turpin Senior Editor

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Inside this issue

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FEATURES

Economy website provides info, transparency

body is feeling under different kinds of pressures.”

Steerman attended the meetings of the new chapter in anticipation of changes that would come as a result of the financial crisis. “I felt that the college was going to have to make a number of very difficult and complicated decisions,” Steerman said, “and I was not sure that the existing faculty committees, the full faculty as a body, or the informal faculty club could adequately represent the concerns of the Vassar faculty.”

“I got involved because I was very concerned about the fear I saw developing among faculty and felt that the structural adjustments that were being proposed were creating a very silencing atmosphere, so I felt the faculty needed a place to talk,” said Robertson.

The idea of having a chapter is not at all new—Vassar previously had a See AAUP on page 6

14 ARTS

After Beirut, ViCE considers ticket distributions

Information from NY State Conference of AAUP

t the end of Spring 2009, constituencies across campus considered ways to become more inlolved in the decision-making process at the College. One group of faculty, for example, who were concerned with the nature of academic restructuring, began to organize a Vassar chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP).

The AAUP is a national organization dedicated to protecting academic freedom and faculty’s role in shared governance. While the national organization lobbies and creates policy guidelines, institutional chapters oversee their own college or university’s adherence to the organization’s guidelines.

The nascent chapter began with conversations in the Faculty Club, an informal group, and grew with a subsequent e-mail sent out to the faculty

body. Though the New York State Conference website, nysaaup.org, officially lists only eight members in the Vassar chapter, by the end of the spring, the list of interested faculty had grown to about 50 faculty members.

This semester, the group is working on formalizing bylaws and electing officials so that it might become an official chapter. The steering committee includes Visiting Associate Professor of English Karen Robertson, Associate Professor of Psychology Jannay Morrow, Professor of Music Michael Pisani and Professor of Drama and Film James Steerman.

“It’s amorphous at the moment,” said Robertson. “We are a group of concerned faculty who are getting together, but what’s interesting is it’s a variety of faculty; it’s not any particular group it has senior, junior, contingent faculty, older faculty, younger faculty—everybody—because every-

Chapter membership varies widely across the state. The AAUP requires very few faculty to constitue a chapter, but each can accomidate many.

20 SPORTS

A history of the 1970s change in College colors

Page 2

The Miscellany News

September 17, 2009

Editor in Chief Ruby Cramer Senior Editors Caitlin Halasz Molly Turpin

Scout MacEachron for The Miscellany News

Photo of the Week: The quidditch team practices on Saturday. The biggest tournament of the Quidditch season is the World Cup, held annually at Middlebury College.

Staff Editorial | Students must take advantage of open forums, opportunities for discussion L

ast fall—as with its peer institutions, Vassar began the daunting task of best coping with the economic downturn.

News of necessary cutbacks and our dwindling endowment became more frequent, as did the response from students, who— voicing their concerns through a variety of outlets—have been ever since making their opinions known to those most closely involved in decision-making processes. Thus far, every medium has been touched by student voices—from Facebook groups, to the pages of The Miscellany News, to forums with the senior officers of the College, to casual conversations in the Retreat, students have been active participants in dicussion.

This past Sunday, Sept. 13, however, the Board of Trustees hosted an open meeting—giving students a chance to hear from two trustees and ask questions of their own—and yet the event was poorly attended. We as a community missed an integral opportunity to speak directly to those directly involved in some of the most important decisions being made at the College this year. The open forum—which was run by Board Chair William Plapinger ’74 and Board member Sally Gordon ’82—was a followup to a forum held last May. As the May meeting was scheduled for the week following finals, only those staying on campus for senior week and Commencement were able to attend—many in the community were critical of the later scheduling of the event.

As expected, only about 30 students attended, but a number of faculty, staff and community members were also present.

Despite being scheduled at a time when no classes were in session, last Sunday’s forum had only about 40 people in attendance, which included students and very few faculty and staff members. The event was surely and undoubtedly well publicized; President Catharine Bond Hill sent multiple all-campus e-mails about the event and house and class presidents sent out reminders as well. The meeting was not scheduled during standard class time and although student conflicts are inevitable, the event was considered to be at a time convenient to most students.

Accessibility, then, can not explain the forum’s low attendance—but neither should student apathy; Vassar students have been—and continue to be—vocal about the College’s various responses to the economic crisis. The possible termination of two adjunct professors’ contracts in the English Department last December sparked widespread student and alumnae/i debate, and a meeting held by the English Majors’ Committee shortly after the cuts became public had 50 students in attendance despite being scheduled in the middle of study week.

As the College nears one year of coping with the setbacks of a financial crisis, student opinion has remained strong. This makes the lack of attendance at the Trustee meeting surprising and disappointing, as it was the ideal opportunity to talk with those directly involved with the current and future state of the College.

The Trustees couldn’t speak to all of the concerns that students have with the College, of course: the recent cut in Library hours, for example, had nothing to do with the Board. Plapinger

also explained at the opening of the forum that the Board has no involvement in individual financial aid cases. Nonetheless, Trustees could address student concerns about the way in which cuts are being made and about the future of the College, in addition to a host of more specific questions and complaints students have recently voiced in less public forums. One of the more pertinent questions asked at the forum was a direct query about how the Board actually operates. Plapinger was able to provide those in attendance with the kind of information about transparency that is most desired by students and the community.

We realize, though, that the attendance of the Trustee forum may not be completely indicative of the level of student interest in the way the College is being run. The Town Hall meetings run by President Hill and Dean of the College Chris Roellke have been fairly well-attended, despite their scheduled time on weekdays from 8 to 9 p.m. The first meeting—held for the Raymond and Strong Houses—had close to 50 students in attendance, and this Tuesday’s meeting for Davison and Josselyn Houses saw around 30 students along with the House Fellows and a staff member.

It is these events—along with the steady stream of letters to the Miscellany and casual conversations amongst students— that show that Vassar students clearly have opinions their College and how it can best deal with the tumultuous economic climate. While these are excellent ways to voice these opinions, The Miscellany News urges students to take advantage of rare opportunities like the one offered by the Board of Trustees last Sunday. These events grant us an opening for meaningful discussion with the most powerful decision-making bodies on campus, and it would be a grave mistake to let these opportunities go by largely missed.

—The Staff Editorial reflects the opinion of at least two-thirds of the 16-member Editorial Board.

Contributing Editors Chloe McConnell Elizabeth Pacheco

News Matthew Brock Jillian Scharr Opinions Angela Aiuto Kelly Shortridge Features Emma Carmichael Arts Erik Lorenzsonn Sports Lillian Reuman Online Elizabeth Jordan Design Eric Estes Copy Lila Teeters Photography Kathleen Mehocic Managing Eliza Hartley

Assistant Arts Carrie Hojnicki Assistant Copy Katharine Austin, Katie Cornish, Sarah Marco Columnists Martin Bergman Photographers Julianna Halpert

LETTERS POLICY The Miscellany News is Vassar College’s weekly open forum for discussion of campus, local and national issues, and welcomes letters and opinions submissions from all readers. Letters to the Editor should not exceed 450 words, and they usually respond to a particular item or debate from the previous week’s issue. Opinions articles are longer pieces, up to 800 words, and take the form of a longer column. No letter or opinions article may be printed anonymously. If you are interested in contributing, e-mail misc@vassar.edu or submit it online at miscellanynews.com.

ADVERTISING POLICY The Miscellany News (1) reserves the right to reject or edit any advertising copy at any time; (2) will not accept advertisements that promote discrimination on the basis of race, creed, color, sex or sexual orientation, nor will it accept advertisements of a political nature or advertisements that promote products or services illegal in the State of New York: (3) will print every advertisement with the word “advertisement” above it; (4) shall not be liable for failure to print, publish or circulate all or any portion of any issue if such a failure is the result of circumstances beyond the paper’s control.

CORRECTION In the article “Fall Sports Preview | Season offers promise, excitement” from the 9.10.09 issue of The Miscellany News, the byline was unintentionally omitted. The editors would like to apologize and credit Sports Editor Lillian Reuman with authoring the article.

EDITOR’S NOTE The Miscellany Editorial Board would like to note that while some have claimed that there are no longer “archives” of the Backpage online, these rumors are untrue; content from the old website, misc.vassar.edu, has remained untouched since the new site was created last fall, and Backpages from the 2008-2009 academic year can be found upon a search of miscellanynews.com

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

The Editorial Board holds weekly meetings every Sunday at 9 p.m. in the Rose Parlor. All members of the Vassar community interested in joining the newspaper’s staff or joining in a critique of the current issue are welcome.

The Miscellany News is not responsible for the views presented in the Opinions pages. The weekly staff editorial is the only article which reflects the opinion of the Editorial Board.

The Miscellany News is published weekly by the students of Vassar College. The Miscellany News office is located in College Center Room 303, Vassar College.

September 17, 2009

NEWS

Page 3

Two trustees make special visit to campus VSA relaunches website, boosts transparency

Matthew Brock News Editor

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Rose Hendricks

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Molly Turpin/The Miscellany News

hair of the Vassar Board of Trustees William Plapinger ’74 and Chair of the Board’s Academic Affairs Committee Sally Gordon ’82 addressed student concerns about Vassar and the economy during an open meeting held on the second floor of the Students’ Building on Sept. 13. At the last trustee forum in May, after most students had already returned home for the summer, Plapinger promised to hold a similar forum the this fall.

At the meeting, the two trustees began with opening remarks, during which Plapinger explained that though Vassar is in league with its peer institutions, in a number of ways “Vassar is more challenged than other institutions because of our size, the high staff-to-student ratio, the size of our aging physical plant, our low endowment-per-student ratio, as well as the growth in our staff.” “The economic crisis,” Plapinger continued, “has exposed cracks in the College’s foundation that were not fully evident before.”

Plapinger and Gordon, though, were optimistic that the financial climate is in fact improving—however slowly. In February, the College planned for a worst case scenario loss of 30 percent in the endowment; since the fiscal year’s end in June, however, the endowment had only fallen 18.1 percent at present.

Nate Silver ’10 asked if, with this unexpected change, students could expect to see projects or commitments—the planned Science Center being one example—reinvigorated throughout campus. “18.1 percent is clearly an improvement from 30 percent,” said Plapinger in response, “but it won’t have much effect on the day-to-day life at the College.”

“It means,” continued Plapinger, “that we will probably be in financial equilibrium one year earlier than we expected—sometime around 2015 instead of 2016. It doesn’t mean that happy days are here again,” he said.

The trustees went on to explain that much of Vassar’s loss was tempered by the Board’s fiscal planning. “Thanks to the Board’s foresight,” said Gordon, “we were thinking very strategically of how to set a responsible draw on our endowment.” Presently one-third of the College’s operating budget comes from the endowment.

“Then the world fell apart,” said Gordon of the 2008 global economic collapse, “and we had to adjust—not revolutionize—our thinking and our central goals. Our central goal, though, is always to ensure the health of the College in the long-term. This College won’t be healthy unless we do something now.

I’m terrifically proud to say that Vassar is not behaving precipitously or recklessly. We’re not abandoning ongoing projects, and we were not over-invested in equity.”

Chair of the Board William Plapinger ’74 and Chair of the Board’s Academics Committee Sally Gordon ’82 speak with students about financial issues affecting the College.

Two-thirds of Vassar’s budget goes towards employee compensation, so that is where principle cuts must be made. According to Plapinger, the Board’s goal is to cut 10 to 15 percent of the staff.

However, both Plapinger and Gordon assured the attendees that layoffs were to be used as a last resort and that the faculty would not suffer disproportionately. Because many faculty members have tenure, “you can’t cut faculty much,” Plapinger said.

A major worry students have about faculty reductions was that it would limit course offerings, but Plapinger assured the audience, “We have 1,200 courses in the curriculum, but we’re only cutting 60 sections—1,140 is a lot of classes for 2,400 students.”

Gordon concurred, but went on to say that cutting courses might actually end up benefiting the student body. “One of the things that really is true—it’s possible to have too small a number of people in classes,” said Gordon. “I was amazed to find out some courses had two people while others were oversubscribed,” she continued. Gordon went on to say that there is an equilibrium that has to be reached between the size of the faculty and the size of the student body. Plapinger also attempted to put an end to the myth that the financial crisis can only be mitigated by mass layoffs.

“To the extent we can, we have tried during the course of the summer to hurry voluntary retirements,” said Plapinger, emphasizing the fact

that the Board would prefer faculty to leave of their own volition instead of being laid off.

Unfortunately, because the administration cannot control which faculty members decide to retire, some departments may be hit harder than others by the cuts, explained Plapinger.

However, given that the endowment has not fallen as much as expected, the Board was able to avoid placing a cap on the number of tenured faculty members.

According to President Catharine Bond Hill, who was also present at the forum, the administration is looking to cut staff members in areas that will not affect students’ everyday lives.

However, she was declined to comment about which areas those would be.

Financial aid also emerged as a key concern at the forum. “We are committed to maintaining need-blind financial aid as long as we possibly can,” said Plapinger. However, given the recordhigh number of students receiving financial aid in the Class of 2013, as well as increased need among upperclassmen, “It’s hurting at the moment because it’s so much money,” Plapinger said.

Several students in attendance were forced to take leaves of absence because their families could no longer afford tuition. Plapinger and Gordon urged those students and any others who have trouble affording Vassar in these troubled financial times to contact the Office of Financial Aid. For students who missed this forum, there will be another held in October.

Vassar Librarian runs for county office Matthew Harvey

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Guest Reporter

assar’s own Gretchen Lieb, a Reference Librarian at the Thompson Memorial Library, is the Democratic candidate for Dutchess County Legislature in District 6. Her opponent is Republican incumbent Angela Flesland.

According to Lieb, her three main goals are to increase community activism on environmental issues, to revamp the criminal justice system and to pursue fiscal responsibility in the legislature.

Lieb’s political experience includes work on Representative John Hall’s 2006 campaign and work with the Poughkeepsie Farm Board.

The Vassar Democrats are rallying in support of Lieb; in an e-mailed statement, president Violet Edelman ’12 wrote that Lieb’s campaign “will be a focus this semester.” “[Vassar] makes up a community within a community,” Edelman wrote, positing that Lieb’s campaign will improve college relations with Poughkeepsie. She emphasized the Vassar Democrats’ support of Lieb’s advocacy for “our small businesses and family farms,” and her desire for “property tax relief for the staples of our community.”

Flesland, Lieb’s opponent, won her seat two years ago at the age of 21, while still a senior at Marist College, making her the youngest member of the Dutchess County Legislature. As such, one of her top priorities is to fight for the issues

important to young people in her district; she cites as an example her opposition of the “iTax,” a charge on Internet downloads.

According to Lieb, her work with the Farm Board played a large role in developing her appreciation for open space and agricultural growth in the Dutchess community, which has become part of her campaign platform. Lieb claims that this work has also made her especially aware of local environmental issues, such as the need to manage Poughkeepsie’s trash incinerator.

“Our solid waste facility is actually outsourced to Resource Recovery,” she explained.

“They manage the facility and hire people to do work.” The trouble, she continued, is that Resource Recovery is in danger of being bought out by Covanta Energy, a company which has received environmental violation fines amounting to more than $100,000 over the past year.

Lieb further explained that Coventa Energy was selected not on the basis of its environmental record, but rather based on its bid for the plant. “It’s a complex issue,” she said. “This is the kind of thing the legislature has to deal with—it’s the responsibility of the legislature to do research and ask questions and there really hasn’t been enough answers to questions from the executive office.”

Environmental issues are a large part of Flesland’s campaign. “I fought to strengthen the Hudson River Valley Greenway and was joined

with State Legislatures of both parties to successfully protect the Greenway, Environmental Protection Fund and Estuary Management Program,” she explained in an e-mailed statement. Flesland is also particularly proud of the Dutchess Rail Trail, a recently-opened county park for which she advocated in the Legislature and now frequently uses.

Lieb is also committed to an increase in public transportation and a reduction in proprety tax. Both changes would make it easier for lowincome families to live in the area and to keep their homes and support the growth of the community’s farmers markets and open spaces. In addition, beyond the mechanics of County Government, she feels that “collaborating and supporting the work our Congress is doing to bring that [Green Economy] here is another large role of the legislature.”

Lieb wishes to impress the importance of her concerns on County Executive Bill Steinhaus and his staff. Since the 2007 elections, the Democratic Party has held a majority in the county legislature, but not a large enough majority to prevent filibusters; Lieb intends to both strengthen the Democratic majority and replace Flesland, whom Lieb has called “a real rubber stamp for [Steinhaus].”

A graduate of Mills College, Lieb has a Master of Library Science from Simmons College. She has worked at Vassar for nine years, three of which she spent as a House Fellow.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

Guest Reporter

he Vassar Student Association (VSA) website, formerly a “repository of outdated information,” according to VSA Vice President for Operations Brian Farkas ’10, has been revamped this school year in order to become more useful to Vassar students.

Previously, the site had become a fossil in this modern age, as the design was not aesthetically conducive for displaying news updates. Therefore, students who wanted to be informed about ongoing issues on campus had to find another method of obtaining this information, such as speaking directly to a member of the VSA Council, a task which is often easier said than done.

Members of the VSA also felt that there was a disconnect between members of the Executive Board and other students because students rarely had chances to hear the Board speak about events and issues at Vassar or attend the weekly councils.

In light of Vassar’s economic struggle, “the VSA is making a strong effort to be transparent with the student body,” Farkas wrote in an e-mailed statement. “Updated technology is an important means to that end.”

“The old site was poorly formatted for frequent news updates,” continued Farkas.

“There was no place for a streaming series of stories.” Therefore, “visitors really had to look around to [find] links...the old site really hid some of the most important information deep into its pages.”

These issues became the catalysts that motivated the VSA to modernize the outdated site. Farkas and VSA Webmaster Eric Estes ’11 rehauled the site, retaining and reorganizing many of its aesthetics to improve its clarity. Over the summer, Farkas and Estes created a new platform more condusive to daily updates. With this new ability, VSA will be posting news stories as well as weekly video announcements, a takeoff of President Barack Obama’s weekly YouTube addresses. The Board members will focus these announcements on current issues at Vassar, with hopes that this will allow students to attach a name to the face and to get to know the VSA Executive Board. The first video is set to appear this week, stated Farkas in an e-mailed statement.

In addition to improving relations between students and the VSA, the new website also promises to forge new connections between students and the Poughkeepsie community. The old site had a section entitled “101 Things to do in Poughkeepsie,” which many ridiculed, because instead of the 101 promised activities, there were only 42. Furthermore, one of those activities was “ride the train to New York City,” an activity that could hardly be considered a “thing to do in Poughkeepsie.” In fact, many of the activities listed were not even located in Poughkeepsie, further undermining the section’s title.

Instead of coming up with 59 more activities to do in Poughkeepsie, the VSA board replaced this section with “Exploring the Hudson Valley: A Local Guide,” a section that is true to its name. The section is a synthesis of several existing resources at Vassar that describe the local area from a student’s perspective. It is conveniently broken up into four categories: attractions, dining, nature and shopping, each of which abounds with essential information for visiting any of the locations. Farkas gives the example, “If you knew you wanted to go to a museum on a weekend but weren’t quite sure what was available, you simply click ‘attractions’ and scroll through the list.” Questions such as, “How can I get there?” and “Is this a good place to bring my parents?” are answered in the attraction’s description, making this resource as useful as possible.

“The idea is to be transparent with the student body; they can see our faces, read our reports, and contact us with questions or concerns,” said Farkas.

Page 4

News Briefs Hit the Roof Several students were found on the roof of Jewett House on Aug. 31, and on the roof of Lathrop House on Sept. 13.

—Matthew Brock, News Editor

Cigarettes Kill

There was a fire in a cigarette receptacle near Main Circle on Sept. 1. There was a second fire in the cigarette disposal in front of the All Campus Dining Center. In the future, Security recommends that students do not throw lit cigarettes and paper into these receptacles.

—MB

Vassar Flasher

A student reported that someone was in the library exposing themselves on Sept. 4. The student did not report this incident until three hours after the fact, so the suspect had already fled the scene.

—MB

All Cracked Up

Someone threw a brick at the College Center’s window on Sept. 7. It appears that no one gained entry through the broken window, and nothing else was damaged. That same night, someone broke a window at the Weinberg Field Sports Pavilion, as well as an adjacent streetlight.

—MB

Car-nage

Someone climbed on top of a vehicle outside of Raymond House on Sept. 6 and began jumping up and down. The suspect gave the responding officer a fake driver’s license, then snatched it back. The staff member who owns the car did not want to contact the police as there was no major damage to the vehicle.

—MB

Party On

Security broke up unauthorized parties in the Town Houses on Aug. 29, Sept. 2, Sept. 3, Sept.

5 and Sept. 6. In the last party, Security found a full keg hidden in the woods, which was confiscated. Security also broke up parties in Josselyn House and Jewett House on Sept. 4 and Sept. 6, respectively.

—MB

Pot Shots

While returning from a concert on Sept. 4, a group of students reported that they were approached by four people in the residential quad.

One of these individuals put his arms around the students and attempted to sell them marijuana.

When the students refused to buy, another individual made physically and sexually threatening remarks. The students managed to escape into Raymond House, and the suspects were last seen heading to the North Lot. —MB

Sexual Assault On Sept. 9, an unknown individual groped two female students’ rear ends. The incidences were reported separately but occured within five minutes of each other, the first near Rockefeller Hall and the second in front of Lathrop House.

The latter student was able to give a partial description, confirming the culprit as male. On the evening of Sept. 14, a female student walking between the Aula and Noyes House reported that an individual matching the culprit’s description grabbed at her dress. Security has searched the campus, but not located suspects. They have been in contact with the Poughkeepsie Police.

—Jillian Scharr, News Editor

Hit and Run At 12:19 a.m. on Sept. 5, the Security Office responded to a report of noise-disturbance by non-students in the North Parking Lot. According to the incident report, when Security Officer Michael Phillips asked the group to present identification, they returned to their vehicle in an attempt to flee the scene. The driver, in what Security Director Donald Marsala described in a phone interview as an intentional attempt, ran into Phillips. Phillips was rushed to St. Francis Hospital and was later released. The car fled the scene, but Security was able to record the license plate number. City of Poughkeepsie Police Department has been able to connect the license number with the vehicle’s registered owner but has not yet found the culprits. Information regarding the suspects is part of an ongoing investigation.

—Caitlin Clevenger, Guest Reporter

NEWS September 17, 2009 Role of house officers in Regulation of room entry policy debated off-campus ROOM continued from page 1 only inspects rooms when students are away on break. Residential Life only partakes in the searches described when searching for furniture stolen from the residence halls’ Multipurpose Rooms, or in similar scenarios. At the Sept. 13 Council meeting, the most contentious issue of the debate was in the points under Section 21.01, which dealt with a situation where it is deemed necessary for security to inspect a room without the consent of the student.

According to the policy, “If a security officer is pursuing an investigation and a student refuses to cooperate, the security officer will begin procedures to enter the student’s room without permission. This procedure requires the security officer:” The first step the a security officer would take in this situation would be, “to identify him/herself and formally state the reason for requesting entry (e.g., suspicion of college regulation violation),” stated the proposal. In this casse the proposal also suggested the caveat that Security must “make efforts to have a house officer and/or the house fellow/administrator present when the room is entered.”

Many Council members intially found this problematic because they did not want to spend their Saturday nights “on call” for Security. “Would there have to be a house team member on duty?” asked Noyes House President Hannah Groch-Begley ’12. “I just don’t see how this would work.”

Anderson responded, explaining that the policy was not meant to be an added responsibility, but rather an added opportunity to act on behalf of a fellow student. “I did not mean for this to be an obligation,” said Anderson.

House Presidents on the Council were also concerned that being present during Security raids might foster hostility with their constituents.

“I don’t want to be forced into a situation where I’m watching my constituents get into trouble,” said Strong House President Laura Riker ’11.

Town House President Riley Greene ’10 concurred, adding “We’re supposed to foster non-authoritarian relationships with our constituents.”

Green continued, suggesting that Vassar

has student fellows rather than residential advisors for this very reason—House Team members are meant to serve a communitybuilding role rather than a disciplinary one.

Other Council members questioned the need for the House Advisor to be present, stating that it would be inconsiderate to wake them late in the evening and that, because they already serve a disciplinary role, they may not be the best advocates in front of security, in contrast to student house officers. VSA Vice President for Finance Scott Pascal ’10 assured the Council members that they would not be siding with security, per se, but would be acting as an advocate for the students if the opportunity happened to arise. “When I was on the Student Life Committee last year,” said Pascal at the meeting, “we saw this as a way for house team members to act on the student’s behalf, not as siding with security. This can add a measure of comfort for the student in question.”

“It’s good to have someone there who knows the regulation,” said Pascal, stating that this was one of the main reasons for the proposal.

Furthermore, according to VSA Vice President for Academics Stephanie DamonMoore ’11, this rule only applies if a house officer happens to be in the vicinity.

According to Marsala, security will always choose to contact the administrator on call instead of a student officer. “[Officers] always call the supervisor. Usually, when the supervisor goes to the scene the students comply, and if not then they call an administrator,” said Marsala. If the administrator cannot convince the students to open the door, then security will have to procure a master key.

Though the situation of a non-compliant student was the most contentious, the new policy also clarifies the right of security officers to provide routine inspections of student rooms.

“Inspections are held at reasonable times, in a manner that will least inconvenience residents. Students are notified at least 24 hours in advance of performing scheduled maintenance,” the policy states.

After some discussion and debate, the concerns of the House Presidents were largely assuaged by the Executive Board, and the proposal passed by a vote of 21-1.

events debated Jillian Scharr

A

News Editor

fter two weeks of discussion, the issue remains unresolved—at the weekly Vassar Student Association (VSA) Council meeting on Sept. 13 Council members once again tabled voting on a proposed addition to the VSA bylaws. The possible bylaw calls for organizations to submit “a form of Acknowledgement of an off-campus trip…a minimum of two weeks in advance of the planned trip,” as well as “signed statements of compliance.”

The form of Acknowledgement would be delivered to the VSA Vice President (VP) for Activities, who would “sign and file the form as a means of adequately recording and holding accountable groups and individuals representing the VSA and College off-campus.”

Section C defines this accountability by specifying prohibited behavior as “violations of College regulations, local, state and/or federal laws, lewd or inappropriate behavior and slanderous or defamatory remarks that jeopardize the integrity of the VSA or the College.”

“Failure to adhere to these regulations,” it reads, “[is] punishable by censure, decertification and/or a fine equaling 10 percent.”

Further, if organizations that have, in the past two years, violated the behavioral standards in Section C wish to apply for another overnight trip, their applications must be “reviewed by the Activities Committee in consultation with current organization leaders.” If the application is rejected, the application moves before the entire VSA Council, who will approve or deny the trip via a majority vote.

Opinions on the proposal varried widely.

“I don’t think it’s asking too much of organizations to submit the form,” said VSA VP for Operations Brian Farkas ’10 in Sunday’s meeting. “[This way] we can keep track and know who’s representing us.” Others on Council disagreed. Lucien Garo ’11, proxy for Jewett President Daryl Duran ’12, said, “I don’t see a need for an acknowledgement form. Virtually every single person at Vassar is intelligent enough to fill out a form that appears legitimate.” Discussion ended when Town Houses President Riley Greene ’10 proposed tabling the vote.

The proposed addition to the VSA bylaws will be discussed again and voted at the Council meeting this Sunday.

Mold found in Library during summer Matthew Harvey

T

Guest Reporter

he soaring central bastion, the shining brass rails and polished marble, the endless stacks of books: Together these make up the indefinable air that permeates the study halls and entryways of the Thompson Memorial Library. But this summer, that same library air came under attack from an invasion of mold.

A dehumidifier in room 39, which primarily houses volumes on the social sciences, stopped working during the sudden wave of heat and humidity that rolled in at the beginning of August, according to Vanessa Raditz ’12, who worked at the Library over the summer. Given the temperature—above 90 degrees every day for most of August­—and the humidity, which was aggravated by rain, the conditions “became just right for mold to bloom,” said Director of the Libraries Sabrina Pape. The Library houses almost half a million volumes, and many are stored in the subterranean ground floor, which echoes the upper levels in design but lacks ventilation from the open doorways and windows and constant air conditioning. Trapped below decks, the basement volumes are left to the mercy of their location.

The basement’s books are protected from moisture by a series of dehumidifiers, all of which are old and due for repair. In fact, had it not been for the cuts to the Library’s budget in response to the current economic crisis, they would have been replaced at some

point in the near future. Despite frequent checks for irregularities or damage, the malfunction went unnoticed for some time—long enough for the Library to develop a serious case of mold blooms. Fortunately, the blooms remained on the covers of the books, rather than spreading to the insides, so actual harm was fairly minimal.

The Library staff reacted by removing more than 800 books to the enormous food freezers in the All Campus Dining Center. There they were frozen, which “retarded the mold growth,” according to Pape. However, this process posed a danger to Library employees who had to wear face masks and gloves to protect themselves from the toxic spores.

Although the Library staff managed to slow the growth of mold in the initial 800 books, the situation in the Library basement was still critical. As long as the temperatures and humidity remained high, the mold would continue to spread into contiguous rooms and bookshelves.

The Library administration brought in an outside contractor, Preservation Librarian Karen Brown, to act as a consultant, and her resulting report stated that “the worst of the damage occurred in room 39, with some damage in 69 and 44.” Room 44 is the Library’s Congressional Records room. Thus, haste was called for in order to prevent injury to some of Vassar’s most precious documents.

The Library also developed a large scale plan to kill off the mold blooms still flourishing in the Library. Large, industrial dehu-

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

midifiers were brought in, paid for by Vassar’s Emergency Contingency Funds. Plastic sheeting was introduced to sections of the basement to partition rooms in order to prevent the spread of moisture. A battery of librarians and assistants checked the temperature and humidity of the basement regularly in order to track the return to normalcy, and, further, they made a permanent change in the conditions in the Library basement. “[Brown] wanted us to get the humidity down near 40 percent relative humidity, and it’s in the 50s right now,” said Pape, though she added, “There is no mold growth at the moment.”

The frozen books are still in the slow process of thawing and restoration, but they should be back on the shelves fairly soon, although the exact date is undetermined. In the meantime, Pape said that she feels that their absence won’t decrease the Library’s usefulness to students in the least. “It’s such a small percentage that it shouldn’t affect the classes,” she stated. “We’ll make every effort to get books for classes. We get things pretty quickly through interlibrary loan.”

“I think the staff responded to the current emergency quickly and sensibly, and that the actions taken were absolutely correct,” wrote Brown in her report. However, this crisis demonstrated the dangers of storing books in a Library built 105 years ago—the building itself, while beautiful, isn’t as cool, dry or safe as it might be. However, according to Library directorship, the Library’s basement has become a “top priority.”

September 17, 2009

FEATURES

Page 5

College increases economic transparency with website Emma Carmichael

W

Features Editor

economy.vassar.edu

hile the College took stock of the effects of the financial crisis, planning budget cuts in all sectors, members of the larger Vassar community tried to keep up with the changes.

Increased transparency was broadly called for, though the community struggled for the appropriate means. The College’s new economy website, launched late this summer, comes both as a response to calls for more information and the feeling on the part of the College that such a resource was the appropriate move.

Last spring, five Vassar students gathered in the hallway outside of President Catharine Bond Hill’s office and called a hunger strike, calling for protection for campus staff amidst a time of potential lay-offs and budget cuts.

The protest and sit-in were organized by a coalition of various student organizations, including the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicana/o de Aztlán (MEChA) de Vassar College, the Student Activist Union (SAU) and the Vassar Association of Class Activists (VACA), among others.

Their seven demands contained the caveat, “We demand financial transparency. Students, staff and faculty are perfectly able to, and will, partake in financial decision-making. We will be informed. All economic literature will be distributed electronically to our e-mails.”

Hill and other administrators met with the students on May 14 and 15—after they had gone about 80 hours without eating—and consented to a number of the group’s demands, with some variations. In a May 15 letter to the Vassar community, Hill wrote that the College would “[establish] a website where information about the college’s financial status is available.”

The website, economy.vassar.edu, is now up and running. It surveys a broad range of information related to the College and its finances, with pages titled “Financial Equilibrium,” “Endowment Basics,” “Planning” and “Budget Overview.” There is also a submission form for “Questions & Suggestions,” which can be sent in anonymously and will be reviewed by the Office of College Relations, which designed and produced the site content.

Tom Porcello, Associate Dean of Planning and Academic Affairs, said that administrative conversations about launching an economy site had been ongoing prior to the hunger strike.

The site’s quick development reflects the work of multiple groups that were meeting last year.

“We were aware...that other schools had begun to put some pages together,” said Porcello.

“But we wanted to have a more concrete sense of where the economy was headed and what the implications of that were going to be for Vassar.

In looking at other schools I also noticed that very few of them were putting together really comprehensive sites; there wasn’t a lot of contextual information. We felt that a site like this would be a much better site if it really had some significant thought behind it, so we waited until the impact of the financial situation became better known to us.”

“In part [because of the] conversations during the hunger strike last spring, the decision was made to have it absolutely finalized by the end of this summer,” explained Porcello. “In the sense of timing, the students had an influence, but there was already a sense that doing a site like this was the right thing to do.”

Royce Drake ’10 and Anastasia Hardin ’10 were leaders in last year’s protest and hunger strike. They said they felt that the site’s launch was evidence of the power of student activism.

“The website was one of our demands,” said Hardin. “We originally had asked for financial transparency, and President Hill said that wasn’t possible, so we asked that there be e-mails sent out and some kind of website where anybody could access the necessary information.”

The site was launched on Aug. 31. It offers thoughtful explanations for oft-used financial terms, as well as a wealth of visual aids. The page “Comparative Data,” for example, uses 13 graphs to compare data on Vassar’s student spending, faculty-student ratios and fossil fuel consumption with its peer institutions. On the “Endowment Basics” page, the site walks through the particulars of an endowment and then explains the current value of the school’s endowment, which lost 18 percent of its worth in the 2008-2009 fiscal year.

The site’s exhaustive details can prove worthwhile to the Vassar student who habitually skims over all-campus e-mails with updates on the economy or loses focus when technical terms pepper administrator speeches. Porcello acknowledged that the site’s encyclopedic content is in part a recognition that, financially, the College operates on a level that may not be in touch with its community’s understanding. “We assumed that there are people who will come to the site with all different levels of knowledge and understanding,” said Porcello.

Although both Drake and Hardin were enthusiastic about the site, they also offered criticism for what Drake called “Band-Aids, not cures” to protecting workers’ rights. Over the summer,

The new economy website provides comprehensive data regarding such issues as the endowment and compensation, though some argue that transparency could still be improved.

Drake served as a student representative on the Hardship Fund Committee. “I missed a lot of Hardship Fund meetings [this summer] because I was working full-time, and I couldn’t always take off work for four hours,” said Drake. “They also changed a lot of the times and the dates.

But I was there for the first five meetings or so, and it felt like the decisions about the Fund were being made above the committee. We were just doing numbers about how much to give [to] certain people. There wasn’t a lot of discussion about how the Fund should really operate.”

“I think the administration’s hope was that the Fund would help stop any organizing on the part of the students and faculty,” Hardin speculated. “But our hope is that the students, faculty and staff will come together and continue to organize. Because obviously, that one fund is not a solution to the larger issues we face.”

Porcello and administrators hope that the website shows the College’s commitment to financial transparency. “The College had been making efforts within the community to be as transparent as possible about what was going on and to be talking, in faculty meetings, in administrative forums and with students, [about] the kind of planning we’re doing around it,” he said. “But it was clear that those real-time situations don’t provide a permanent venue for people to learn and internalize and to react against the information at their own pace. So the other function of this website is to participate in that transparency process that we were all really

trying to work toward.” Both Drake and Hardin said that the website could prove to be a valuable resource for students and employees alike, especially in building continued support and organized efforts for workers’ rights at Vassar.

“Students need to know that the website is a product of student activism,” said Drake. “We really pushed for financial transparency last year, and [the] administrators pretty much said that wasn’t possible—so this was their response. It is helpful that students understand where money comes from, but we also need to continue to push for that transparency.”

“The administration is [also] appropriating the language that we used last semester about sticking to the mission statement and what Vassar’s really about,” added Hardin. “They’re using that language like they really had concern for the workers before, but it’s just important to remember that initially they really didn’t express care for these issues.”

So far this year, the College administration has been vocal about the inevitably of financial cuts, and the difficulty in making them. Porcello said he hopes that tension can be mitigated by making information more accessible. “We’re seeking to find a balance between really understanding and recognizing and responding to the concerns of people who are currently here, while acting responsibly for the concerns of people who will be here in the future,” said Porcello. “This is a moment of distress and of challenge, so a lot of the lines within the community are very clear.”

Purchasing Card program extended to departments, VSA Ruby Cramer

L

Editor in Chief

ast year, if a Vassar Student Association (VSA)-funded organization wanted to purchase supplies or services—if the Vassar Filmmakers wanted to buy a tripod, if the Debate Society wanted to buy a gavel or if the Investment Club wanted to buy a calculator—they would all complete and sign a Short Requisition Form and then visit the VSA Vice President for Finance to acquire his signature as well. Upon the completion of the form, the organization leader would deliver it to the Purchasing Department for a processing period of at least three days.

For orders under $2,000, the Purchasing Specialist would work on, approve, and physically place the purchase, filling out a form online, talking with a vendor and sometimes even bargaining for a lower price. To make the purchase itself, the Purchasing Specialist would use a Purchasing Office credit card, sometimes referred to as the Purchasing Card or the P-Card.

This year, however, the College has issued VSA VP for Finance Scott Pascal ’10 his own Purchasing Card, with which he can make orders directly online or over the phone without involving the Purchasing Specialist. Though the College has had a Purchasing Card program since 2001—with larger departments like Athletics, Biology and Buildings and Grounds holding their own cards—newly-available technology has enabled the College to extend the program to all departments on campus, including the VSA. “We have had a Purchasing Card program since 2001,” explained Assistant Director of Purchasing Alex Averin, “and it has definitely evolved since then. The VSA actually used to

have a Purchasing Card back in 2002, and after a trial run for a semester or so, we decided not to continue it because we did not have proper control over the expenses made in terms of who buys what and when and so forth.”

“That was seven years ago,” continued Averin. “Now, JPMorgan Chase—the company with whom we have the Purchasing Card—has provided us with technological enhancements and capabilities that weren’t available back then.”

Averin explained that the Purchasing Office now has a greater ability to monitor and manage expenses across campus online and in real time— and each Purchasing Card can have a different limit, monthly limit or per-transaction limit.

“They’re asking that in every department on campus there is someone with a P-Card and that they are responsible for making their own purchases up to $2,000,” explained Carol Jarvis, who served as Purchasing Specialist for the last three years before the position was eliminated this spring. “I think this will work fine for departments, but I don’t think that it’s in the best interest of the person in the VSA VP for Finance position to have that responsibility.”

Like Jarvis, some believe that the change would significantly increase the workload of the Vice President for Finance, since he would no longer simply be signing a Short Form, but would have to complete or help complete a vendor’s form online. Others worry that putting administrators’ work on unpaid students is unfair in principle. Last year’s Vice President for Finance Marcelo Buitron ’09 had some experience with the new system late last spring when it was first introduced. “The spring was a kind of hybrid system for us. I think that the

VP for Finance has a lot of work already,” said Buitron, who explained that in addition to overseeing purchasing orders, the Vice President for Finance also handles reimbursements, distributing petty cash, chairing the VSA Finance Committee and the regular responsibilities of any VSA Executive Board member.

“So this is definitely a heavier burden,” continued Buitron. “It’s not like this is nuclear science, but the problem is that it can be very timeconsuming. When I dealt with the Purchasing Card, organizations came, and we had to order the item online and type in the shipping address, billing address and card number. I think in the end it took at least six or seven minutes to process a purchase in my office hours. If you multiply that by the number of organizations, you can imagine how the time adds up,” said Buitron.

According to Jarvis, in March 2009, 38 credit card orders and 14 purchase orders were made; in April, 50 credit card orders and 46 purchase orders were made; and in May, 30 credit card orders and 33 purchase orders were made. Additionally, during this three-month period, there were 156 reimbursements that the VP for Finance would have had to approve as well.

Averin and Assistant Vice President for Budget & Planning David English explain, however, that while the kind of work has changed for the Vice President for Finance, the volume has not.

“The nature of work that the VP for Finance is doing has changed, but the volume has stayed the same,” insisted Averin. “Last year, if you needed to purchase something, you would go to the VP for Finance, he would say ‘yes’ or ‘no,’ sign your form and the next step for the student would be to come to the Purchasing Office,

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

where we would ask you to sit at a computer in the office and place the order. When you would get to the part where you punch in the credit card, we come and do only that part for you.”

“All we’re doing now,” continued Averin, “is directing the traffic to the VP for Finance, where the student will place the order and the VP will come in at the last minute and put in the P-Card number. Even last year, the organization still had to come to the VSA office to get a physical signature. The VP for Finance can keep the same policy by saying you have to physically come to me and place your order at the last step.”

English added that the College and the VSA may consider distributing ghost cards to larger organizations, so that they can responsibly handle their own purchases. “Our plan is that maybe in the future the VP for Finance can allocate other cards to organizations that have high budgets. That way, it would be easier to give them a card and say, ‘I want to see what you are going to buy, but you can go ahead and buy it yourself,’ which would save some time,” noted English.

Pascal explained that because the academic year is just beginning, he is still working to gage what works best for him. Pascal mentioned the possibility of installing a separate computer in the VSA office that organization leaders and treasurers could use to make orders—up until the final credit-card portion of the online form, where Pascal would have to step in.

“Maybe the College could consider the VP for Finance another assistant,” suggested Buitron.

“They don’t need to necessarily hire someone, but I do think that they’re going to need some extra help. Regardless, this semester will definitely be a good trial to see how things will go.”

FEATURES

Page 6

September 17, 2009

Professors form AAUP chapter ALANA hopes for more dialogue AAUP continued from page 1 chapter from the 1970s until the 1980s, though it gradually became inactive. The past chapter was most concerned with the College’s tenure cap policy, which dictated that only a certain percentage of faculty members in any department could be tenured. This led to a situation in which some faculty members were denied tenure despite qualifications.

After the College revoked this policy, active membership declined.

“I think what usually happens is that when faculty feel under threat, they organize, and then when they don’t feel under threat the organization dissipates,” said Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Faculty Policy and Conference Committee (FPCC) Steve Rock.

Whether this new chapter will dissipate in time, of course, remains to be seen, but much like the previous incarnation, the group has sprung from anxieties among faculty. Several of the faculty members involved in the chapter drafted a set of questions for the Board of Trustees when they visited campus in May. Though they did not get the opportunity to ask all questions, several faculty members did voice concerns.

These concerns included the perceived rapidity and drastic nature of decision-making by the College administration and the lack of consultation with faculty members prior to making cuts and restructuring. “When the College moved toward making a committee to make these decisions, they moved very quickly.”said Adjunct Associate Professor of English Judith Nichols. “I think that the faculty are going to become more deliberate in self-governance and staying involved.”

Dean of the Faculty Jonathan Chenette explained that faculty have representation in shared governance through such committees as the FPCC, which is made up of elected representatives from the faculty body. The Advisory Group for the Allocation of Faculty Resources, which does not make decisions, but makes recommendations to decisionmaking bodies, als includes representation from the FPCC.According to Rock, “It’s hard for me right now to imagine a way that the AAUP chapter could fit into the existing shared governance structures of the College in a formal way partly because it’s not clear to me what functions the chapter would perform that aren’t already being performed by faculty committees and other organizations within the College.”

According to the President of the New York State Conference of the AAUP and Professor of Chemistry at Adelphi University Stephen Goldberg, the AAUP chapter at Vassar will be an advocacy chapter rather than a collective bargaining chapter, which would amount to a professors’ union. Full-time professors cannot pursue unionization because of the Supreme Court’s 1980 Yeshiva Decision, which resulted in the definition of fulltime faculty members as management rather than labor and, therefore, prevented them from unionizing.

If it is not a formal part of shared governance, the AAUP’s role on a campus becomes more vague. The chapter will be a forum for faculty voices and issues, but it will also be a representative of the collective faculty voice to the administration. A chapter can decide on a spokesperson, who “can speak with a voice from the faculty independent of an individual speaking to the administration,” said Goldberg.

The chapter spokesperson can advocate

for both general and specific issues by making recommendations to the College and also by representing individual faculty members.

While Vassar’s shared governance is not about to be restructured by the AAUP, the organization functions as an observer of the existing shared governance. According to Goldberg, the AAUP works to ensure that “whatever relevant voice there is gets a fair share with it.”

The chapters draw the basis of their authority from the policy statements of the national organization. Each chapter reviews its institution’s adherence to the organization’s guidelines. The AAUP also keeps a list of censured colleges and universities, who have failed to comply either with AAUP guidelines or with the individual institutions’ rules. Like a black spot on the institution’s record, a censure from the AAUP negatively affects a college’s or university’s ability to attract new professors—an effect that neither administrators nor faculty desire.

“The main power the AAUP has as an organization, in most places, is a power to embarrass and power to publicize violations of AAUP guidelines or violations of an institution’s own policies,” said Rock. “My sense is that the College is by and large in compliance with the guidelines already, but you could imagine some situation in the future where I suppose there might be some question and the AAUP chapter could investigate.”

Despite the AAUP’s potential for an investigative role, most of the faculty involved do not view the chapter necessarily as an adversarial group, and the administration has so far been committed to following AAUP guidelines. “I have great respect for the AAUP’s efforts to support academic freedom and shared governance,” wrote Chenette in an e-mailed statement. “I consult AAUP guidelines regularly when questions arise about best practices in governance, faculty employment policies and review procedures.”

Though the emerging chapter has not yet become official and such drastic measures as an investigation or censure are as yet unlikely, as in the ’70s, the presence of such a group is an indicator of faculty unrest at an uncertain time in the College’s history. “I don’t know how large the chapter is going to be, so it’s a little difficult to know how much it means in terms of signaling, but, you know, the mere fact that enough faculty have been motivated to hold meetings and to re-organize the chapter—it means something, clearly,” said Rock.

The chapter met on Sept. 11 and plans to meet again on Sept. 25, when they will elect officials and vote on bylaws. According to Steerman, during their first meeting, the group discussed the formalities of becoming a chapter as well as beginning to discuss the stances they might take on certain issues. The chapter is also planning on hosting a lecture on Oct. 30 from AAUP Associate Secretary Richard Moser. The talk has been cosponsored by the American Culture and Africana Studies Programs, the Office of the Dean of the Faculty, and the Departments of Religion, Economics, Sociology, English, Philosophy, Earth Science and Geography, and French and Francophone Studies.

The extension of the AAUP to Vassar isone more example of a constituency demanding a greater voice in issues of restructuring. As the College continues to make cuts, the AAUP may become an active voice on campus, especially if its membership grows to encompass a larger portion of the Vassar faculty.

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ALANA continued from page 1 open up the Center to white students and to other students of color who may view their general body meetings or Center programming as “offlimits.” The administrators and student leaders unanimously and emphatically stated that the Center has been under-utilized and—perhaps for fear of being an unwanted presence—avoided by the majority of Vassar students, and all spoke to a strong desire to bridge that gap.

“There’s no exclusivity about the ALANA Center or its affiliated organizations,” said Bonnie Velez ’10, president of Poder Latino. “We’re here to provide a space on campus for the discussion of certain issues, and in no way do you have to pertain to the group that’s involved to be a part of that conversation. In Poder Latino, we view our interactions with other groups [of people] as affecting us. It’s not like we’re isolated and everything just happens to us. It’s mutually beneficial to have another voice or viewpoint present in the room.”

Marquise Hopson ’10 has been a member of the Black Students Union (BSU) since her freshman year and is now BSU president. She said that in August, the BSU executive board began e-mailing ideas about the upcoming school year.

“I made it explicit that I wanted to invite anybody who had an interest in coming,” said Hopson. “I wanted to create an environment that made people feel welcome and comfortable with being there and saying what they want to say.

The responses from my board members were really positive.”

BSU had its first general body meeting last Wednesday in the ALANA Center. There were about 40 students in attendance, and Hopson said that with about 10 non-black students,it was the most diverse group of students she had seen at a BSU meeting in her three years at Vassar.

Iris Xu ’11, president of the Asian Students Alliance (ASA), said that in addition to seeking new members of different backgrounds, the ASA hopes to collaborate more closely with other student of color organizations on campus.

“ASA is an organization for any person who is interested in Asian/Asian-American culture and issues,” said Xu. “This year, we are hoping to work closely with different departments who we think would be interested in our topics of discussions. We’re also encouraging our members and members of other student of color groups to see the commonalities in our missions and get more involved with each others’ groups.”

Still, other presidents of student organizations affiliated with the ALANA Center expressed dissatisfaction with their meeting or programming attendances in general, as well as with student response to their efforts at outreach.

Davene Daley ’10 and Kristine Bell ’11, co-presidents of the Caribbean Students Alliance (CSA), said that at the student activities fair on Sept. 6, students were hesitant to approach their table.

“Everyone would tell us, ‘No, I’m not Caribbean,’ and we’d say, ‘We don’t care!’” said Daley.

“We are putting our walls down by saying, ‘Come, we want you there.’ Sometimes I feel like it’s begging. It just takes some effort from both sides, but it seems as though no one wants to come out and see what our organization is about.”

Daley and Bell are both from Jamaica. They each said that coming to Vassar was a significant adjustment from their upbringing.

“I have so many friends at home in Jamaica who are white, Asian, Indian, all of these different ethnicities, and it doesn’t matter,” said Bell.

“So, I almost feel uncomfortable being in the ALANA Center and seeing just black or just Asian people. Because that’s not what I’m used to, either. It’s not that I didn’t expect it, but it was still something that I had to get used to.”

Adhira Mangalagiri ’11 is co-president of the South Asian Students Alliance (SASA). Mangalagiri expressed a similar culture shock upon arriving at Vassar from her international high school in Beijing, where white students were a minority.

“When I came into Vassar, I had no idea about the kind of struggles that the institution has had with race,” said Mangalagiri. “And I had no idea about the feeling you can get as a person of color, as a minority on a college campus. It was different for me as an international student, but I know Vassar students of color who have felt what they thought were personal attacks on their race.”

Both Mangalagiri and Bell said that they turned to the Center in times of transition and were able to find peers willing to provide guidance based

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

on their experiences. A few students, in addition to Pittman and Tejeda, speculated that that specific role of the Center—providing a “safe space” for students of color on campus—is what keeps white students from engaging in all that it has to offer. “There’s not a big ‘X’ sign on the door,” said Tejeda, laughing. “I would hope that all of my students think of me and of the Center as a resource for everyone on this campus.”

“The ‘safe’ component means that this is the space where we know that our culture is going to be the predominant one, and we know it will be respected,” explained Aya Fanny ’10, president of the African Students Union (ASU). “Here we can freely express all of our cultural differences that we sometimes feel are oppressed on other parts of the campus. But as long as [other students] come in with an open mind and are willing to listen and learn, anyone will be welcome.”

“I guess most white students feel that they shouldn’t be in the ALANA Center; that it’s not for them,” pondered Daley. “And they don’t want to feel uncomfortable or make anyone else uncomfortable, so they just leave.”

Still, many student leaders expressed the need for white students to feel the same kind of discomfort they said they feel on a day-to-day basis on the Vassar campus. The ALANA Center, they said, is one of the few places on campus where white students might experience that feeling.

“It’s wrong to call the Center an off-limits space,” said Fanny. “If that were the case, I’d be calling all of the Vassar campus an off-limits space. I have many classes where I’m the only person of color. That doesn’t make me feel like those places are off-limits; it makes me seek to understand people.”

“Maybe it’s intimidating for a white student to come into the Center, but it’s also intimidating for a student of color to come to Vassar from a background where [he or she has] only spoken to people of color,” mused Raymon Azcona ’12, a Latino student who is secretary of BSU this year. “It’s a challenge because it will make them feel uncomfortable. But that goes for any type of learning. If you’re not uncomfortable, then you’re not really grasping the learning.”

Dyana Boxley ’10, President of the Council of Black Seniors, shared that during an informal conversation at the Center last year, a female student told her peers that “99 percent of her day is spent feeling like an ‘other.’”

“She said that when she walks around campus, she feels like an other, and in class, she’s afraid to be herself,” said Boxley. “And then she walks into the ALANA Center and is herself. She feels like a person, instead of separate from herself. A lot of people don’t realize that it’s difficult to be in a primarily white space as a person of color.”

Kiese Laymon, Assistant Professor of English, often speaks at the ALANA Center and at events sponsored by student of color organizations. He hesitated to call Vassar a truly “white space.”

“Colleges like Vassar might be coded white, but I think there are too many people of color here who make the institution run—from the teachers to the people manicuring the lawns to the people making the food—for us to say this is a white space,” said Laymon. “The minute I say it’s a white space, I’m saying I’m a visitor. It raises the question of whether spaces are dictated just by numbers, or more by ethos and camaraderie.”

“If the Center is considered a safe space, then does that mean that other places are not safe?” said Pittman. “It’s discomforting to hear that dichotomy because it may in fact suggest that other spaces here are not affirming. It means that we have a lot of work to do.”

The student leaders suggest that that work begins with personal decisions. Azcona has felt his own stereotypes break down at Vassar, in part because of the support he’s received from upperclassmen at the ALANA Center. He recalled an incident last fall, when a white student made a comment about Azcona’s being waitlisted at Brown. Azcona thought he was alluding to his benefiting from affirmative action.

“Right after that conversation, I ran to the Center, and I just vented to someone,” recalled Azcona. “Thanks to that talk, I began to see it as a misunderstanding. I spoke with that student again, and that’s when my barriers started breaking down. I realized that maybe I need to start changing my own mentality toward white people. I had to start questioning my actions.”

For many students, the Center and its affiliated student organizations provide the See ALANA page 7

September 17, 2009

FEATURES

Page 7

Lytle-Rich, from barista to global coffee magnate Student of color groups A stress inclusion Kelly Stout

Guest Writer

nnie Lytle-Rich ’10 knows coffee. Sort of.

She spent the summer designing a business plan for an emerging coffee company in New York City, but when asked to fix the espresso machine at her office, she was useless. “They thought I had more knowledge than I did,” she says, pantomiming sheepishly fixing an espresso machine.

But she might be underselling herself. After all, in only three months, Lytle-Rich developed a plan to market the Italian Coffee Roaster Terzi to a posh New York City crowd. She set her own schedule and answered directly to Energy Transport Group International (ETG), a corporation that, this summer, chose importing Café Terzi as its pet project. Her job was to figure out how to market the brand and to advise the higher-ups on the feasibility of their ideas.

With raised eyebrows she mentions that at one point her boss suggested a concept bar offering “Coffee and Botox,” which is exactly what it sounds like. At times it was her job to “draw the line between dream and reality.”

Lytle-Rich scouted out locations in Manhattan, contacted roasters and worked with an Italian translator, (“Oh, it was no big deal.”) As it turned out, her boss didn’t know much about how a coffee company should be run—or coffee itself for that matter—so it became up to Lytle-Rich to give him feedback on the emerging business.

One begins to wonder what qualifies a 21-year-old history major to orchestrate an international business acquisition, but Lytle-Rich is a fairly special case.

Lytle-Rich is from Shelburne Falls, a town of 1,500 in rural Massachusetts, and she has been working for her parents’ coffee company since she can remember. Her family roasts its own coffee at Shelburne Falls Roasters, a company they have owned for almost 20 years. LytleRich started small, helping her parents paint the café and selling cookies outside the door.

“The employees hated me,” she says, recalling a time she chastised a member of the kitchen staff: “Did you egg-wash the scones? Because I can tell.” She was 10.

She helped her dad with the company’s financial planning and hawked Shelburne Falls coffee at the state fair. By the time she was in high school, Lytle-Rich worked 10 hours a week

Annie Lytle-Rich ’10 spent the summer developing and selling Cafe Terzi coffee in the United States. Her family also owns a coffee company in Shelburne, Mass. behind the counter, including the 5:30 a.m. shift on Sunday mornings.

Lytle-Rich also cites her Vassar education as a factor that prepared her for work at Shelburne Falls Roasters and Café Terzi. She recalls a time when her parents redesigned the menu at the café, (“It made no sense!”) and LytleRich used the skills she learned as a history major to reorganize the flow of the menu in a logical way.

Her skill aside, it’s obvious Lytle-Rich has an uncommon dedication to coffee. Lytle-Rich sees a strong parallel between Café Terzi’s beginnings and the evolution of her family’s business. Of course, one operated out of a Toyota pickup truck with broken doors, and the other has sectors in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. But Lytle-Rich can see the similarities, and that might be what makes her such an asset. She says, “Starting a business is like having a child. You have to really really care.” It’s clear Lytle-Rich really really cares.

Lytle-Rich’s tone oscillates between that of a proud country girl with hardworking parents and an international coffee baron. She’s animated and sits up straight.

She leans forward and makes unbroken eyecontact when she wants to make a point. One doesn’t get the sense that giving business advice to two Harvard MBAs this summer was at all challenging for her.

Lytle-Rich softens though, when the topic

turns to her emotional investment in her family’s business. For her, coffee has become “a physical manifestation of what [her] family stands for.” Shelburne Falls Roasters is a local business in every sense. Lytle-Rich and the company have grown up side by side, and her family has become a pillar of the Shelburne Falls community. “When you go into a coffee house in New York City, you’re not going to see a lot of construction workers,” she says. “[Shelburne Falls Roasters] is about responding to what the community wants,” she says. In New York City, “it’s all about the bean itself.”

Lytle-Rich is still working 20 hours a week for Café Terzi while she’s at Vassar, and when asked if she sees this as a career, she simply answers, “It’s tempting. I’m curious to see if [Café Terzi] is profitable.” Curious might be an understatement: Lytle-Rich has been offered a share in the ownership of the company and a career as a junior executive at ETG International. As to whether she’ll head home to take over the family business or take the job in Manhattan, she hesitates: “There’s a lot to consider.”

At the end of the interview, Lytle-Rich admits that she has to run. She has to head for the Library to work on financial projections for Café Terzi. As she’s heading out, she adds as an afterthought, “Hey, can you put in the article that I’m looking for an intern?” She laughs, “I really am.”

ALANA continued from page 6 community’s most potentially useful arenas for discussion. “There are a lot of people on campus who don’t talk about race, or when they do, they have their very specific views that they won’t let go of,” said Boxley.

“To get people into the Center, to talk about race and listen to other points of view, it would at least start a dialogue to better understand each other.”

“In the ALANA Center you can just be real,” said Velez. “The most fruitful conversations are when all sides are represented and you can still say, ‘No, I don’t feel that way.’ We talk so much around race in our classes. It’s a huge problem.

ALANA organizations put race right in the front.

We’re not tiptoeing around it or walking on eggshells; we’re saying, ‘This is what we experience in our lives.’”

“I would like students to talk more,” said Xu. “By ignoring or dismissing these issues that clearly exist, we are paralyzing ourselves, and it is only when we acknowledge these issues that we can begin to move forward.”

Engaging, of course, will take effort. Tejeda encouraged students to come check out the center on their own, and to consider joining an affiliated organization or attend a campus event.

“Just come in and walk around in there when no one’s in there,” suggested Assefash Makonnen ’12, vice president of the ASU. Both Daley and Bell also expressed hope that the Center’s events calendar would eventually be e-mailed to the entire campus community.

Pittman acknowledged that taking the step to cross the ALANA Center entrance might take more of a personal effort. “To be an ally, one has to ‘suspend’ himself to say, ‘I want to become a part of this initiative and support what you’re doing,’” he said. “It takes a level of engagement from students to be able to do that. But we’ve established a need for the Center. Now it’s a question of, how do we maximize its existence, both for students of color and for white students?

We’re beyond whether it should exist—I hope we are. Now that it’s here, and it’s going to be here, how can we make the best of it?”

Culinary tour reveals eccentricities of local heritage festivals Daniel Combs

F

Guest Reporter

oodies in search of the exotic, bizarre and delicious celebrated this past weekend as Poughkeepsie played host to three multi-day cultural festivals celebrating the food, drink, music and dance of Greece, Italy and Germany. I celebrated as well, perhaps a little too much.

The Greek Festival, now in its 30th year was held at the Kimisis Greek Orthodox Church on South Grand Street. I started my tour there on the evening of Friday, Sept. 11.

The festival’s music and dance numbers were clearly in the spirit of keeping the Greek tradition alive. But the unquestionable star of the festival was the spread of food being doled out by a line of smiling, convivial Greek women, including some familiar faces from around campus.

As I walked through one tent, a series of earthy, spicy and creamy scents filled my nose.

The hosts informed me that whether I was hankering for spinach-and-feta pie or the traditional moussaka, gyros and souvlaki, I could find all of the dense, flaky, buttery, homemade fare my heart desired.

“We make 99 percent of everything you can eat here,” said Dixie, the manager of the hot food section at the festival. “Everybody works together, and we all try to be happy together.

If you don’t work together, you cannot have a festival.”

The Greek Festival could easily be renamed the comfort food festival. Once I’d finished my calorie-loaded entrée, it was off to the pastry tent, where the first thing to assail me was not the sweet smell of honey, but an extensive list of seemingly unpronounceable dishes.

Should I go for the loukoumades, the kourambiedes, the galaktobouriko or the karidopitas, I wondered, before stepping up and boldly telling

the smiling lady that I wanted what seemed to be the most popular dish (“I’ll have the galaxyburrito!”).

Like the traditional and familiar baklava, this pastry was characterized by a flaky crust drizzled with warm honey. When I bit into it, however, a viscously saccharine and altogether wonderful inner ooze burst into my mouth and made me truly wish, from the bottom of my heart, that I had a Greek grandmother. Rich custard may not be for everyone, though. For those who may not be able to handle the über-density of the galaktobouriko, there are the loukoumades: balls of fried dough covered in powdered sugar, cinnamon and honey.

My culinary tour continued along the waterfront on Saturday, at the Italian Center on Mill Street. The Italian Festival is unique among this weekend’s three cultural events in that it didn’t begin as a fundraiser, but rather as a way to enliven the area around the waterfront.

Don Letterii started the festival 13 years ago.

“We wanted to do something for the downtown area and community,” Letterii told me. “And everyone loves Italian food, so it just made sense.”

There was pasta fagioli, a vegetarian’s meatless protein paradise, as well as a sausage-andpepper sandwich—a small, pungent mountain of spicy meat that I could smell from across the tent.

The real treats, however, were on opposite ends of the menu spectrum. Mussels marinara and fresh clams on one side, and enormous Sicilian-style pizza at the other. The pizza is only made once a year—specifically for the festival— and is served with toppings ranging from the ordinary mozzarella cheese to the savory white clam sauce.

Too much decadence cannot be kept all in

one place, I learned, and so the enormous Italian café and pastry tent was stationed on the other side of the festival grounds. As I waited in line for my cannoli, tiramisu or sfogliatelli— I couldn’t decide—I was entertained by Italian folk songs and dance from the bandstand.

As I approached the stand, I found myself unable to make a decision. So I asked station manager Sherry San Felice what I absolutely couldn’t leave without trying. She smiled knowingly. “All of the dishes are made by a [Culinary Institute of America] master pastry chef. If you can only try one, though, you should have the Italian ricotta cheesecake.”

The taste of ricotta lends itself extremely well to a cheesecake. Unlike a denser New Yorkstyle cheesecake, this dessert maintained a light, airy texture that preserved the sweet and tangy essence of any good cheesecake, while simultaneously making me guess at what made its nutty outside such a toothsome combination of crunchy, salty and sweet. (It turns out it’s pistachio).

While the Greek and Italian festivals provide visitors with enough food to satiate even the most ravenous of students, they both lacked a certain something that came through in force at the Germania Oktoberfest on Sunday: a good, cold beer.

The cloudy hefeweizen displayed the characteristic dry taste of cloves, while the Hofbräu House (brewed in Munich since the 14th century) was intertwined with bready, fruity flavors.

I deemed the Oktoberfest Bier “strong,” but a nearby drinker explained it this way: “It plays at robustness and it talks a big game, but really, it doesn’t follow through.”

What’s a good beer (or a big-talking beer), though, without some food to go along with it? In the food tent, I found what were billed as

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

“Traditional German Dinners.” These dinners, which included bratwurst and leberkäse and came with a side of sauerkraut and cold potato salad, can at best be described as flavorful.

A “Traditional German Dinner” includes something like a strange, pulverized meatloaf (leberkäse), described by festival enthusiast Zane Lujack ’10 as “a bologna cake with onions on top.”

I might have expected something inedible from a dish I had never heard of, but the bratwurst, a staple of Polish and German restaurants worldwide, displayed none of the characteristic sausage spiciness that I envisioned. Lujack was more explicit.

“It’s very crisp,” he said quizzically. “You can really feel your teeth snap through the exoskeleton into what you expect to be the inner prize, which turns out to be…well, not extremely flavorful.”

Strangely enough, this sentiment was echoed by some working at the festival. I asked Gabor Pattantyus, a dancer at the bandstand, to detail what made this food traditionally German, and he in turn condemned it as not matching up to what a “German wife” could do at home in a “proper kitchen.”

Sitting on a picnic bench, confused about the food but happy with the beer, I noticed two things: There was no one there under the age of 45, but there were the obligatory traditional German tunes of Neil Diamond and “God Bless America.” Strangeness and eccentricities aside, all three of these festivals supplied ample, interesting food and more than a few laughs. All three will return in force next year, so don’t miss the chance to give your taste buds something new to talk about as the leaves start to turn and the All Campus Dining Center starts to disappoint next fall.

OPINIONS

Page 8

Professionalism not worth cost of the Backpage Martin Bergman Arts Columnist

I

was not surprised when I opened my copy of the Miscellany last Thursday and found that the Backpage was gone.

I’ve read MadsVassarBlog, I’ve seen the Facebook group, and I’ve heard the rumors. But nevertheless, it came as a shock to me to see the final page of the paper filled with sports coverage rather than my beloved Backpage. I guess I was just wishing that it wasn’t true and that I’d magically stumble upon the same irreverent humor I’ve come to expect from the Backpage. I know I’m not the only person who feels this way and I’m sure there are others who can voice this opinion more eloquently than I can, but as a writer for The Miscellany News, I feel some sort of obligation to publish my concerns.

To put it simply, removing the Backpage is an act of cowardice. The Editorial Board of the Miscellany has castrated its paper, leaving nothing but stoic reporting and recycled opinions. This is what the Editorial Board wants, and I don’t blame them.

They’re trying to turn the paper into a reputable periodical—one that features strong journalism and mimics the national publications that they’d one day like to write for. It’s no coincidence that the Miscellany now looks more like The New York Times than ever. The members of the Editorial Board are ambitious, and if their old clips from this paper are their ticket to that dream job for The New Yorker, they want the Miscellany to look as respectable as possible.

I am not angry with the Editorial Board because of their intentions; their intentions are admirable. Like them, I want to be a writer too, and an improved Vassar newspaper only helps my chances in the competitive journalistic job market.

But I am angry because those intentions have left the Miscellany without its most challenging and courageous section. The Backpage wasn’t always funny, and it was never politically correct, but at least it had some chutzpah.

The Backpage was one of the only forums on campus that allowed its writers to actually make fun of all the hypocrisy that I feel inevitably springs from the liberal arts environment. For every incident of over-sensitive political correctness— and for every useless “forum” in which students and professors sit around and stroke their own egos—the Backpage was there, ready to ridicule Vassar for all its self-important, intellectual posturing.

Though the Backpage was stricken in an attempt to focus the paper more towards journalism, doing so is the least journalistic thing that the Editorial Board could have done. Journalism is printing something that will challenge people’s beliefs, even if it makes them mad. Journalism is printing something that makes people think, even if it makes them feel uncomfortable. Journalism is not silencing someone’s voice, just because that voice was brash and uncompromising.

I know I’m getting worked up over something of minimal importance, and I know that even if the editors of The Miscellany News decide to publish this tirade, very few people will actually read it. The reason I’m sending this to the Opinions page of the Miscellany is because I know that it’s one place where I can speak my mind freely in a relatively public forum.

With the Backpage gone, forums like these are dwindling in numbers at Vassar, and I would hate to see more forums follow suit. If anyone out there agrees with me, please write letters like this. I know it’s a lost cause, but at least this way we can say that we tried.

—Martin Bergman ’12 is an Arts columnist for The Miscellany News. He is not a member of the Editorial Board.

September 17, 2009

Backpage brought unique, diverse views to paper Alejandro Calcano

A

Guest Columnist

s most people now know, The Miscellany News has made the decision to no longer feature the Backpage. I find this troubling, and, while I know that many students agree with me, I am also aware that some students have received this news with a sigh of relief.

The explanation I have heard for the removal of the Backpage is that the page’s humor had throughout its decade or so of history been too offensive to justify its continuation.

Furthermore, the clarification the Miscellany offered in its latest issue—and their decision to expand the Opinions section in order to somehow offset the removal of the Backpage— fail to convince me. I am writing to appeal to everyone, both lovers and haters of the Backpage, to speak against this decision.

I believe that our society is slowly but perhaps surely moving towards an increasingly sanitized place, one in which the role an authoritarian government would usually play is actually replaced by societal pressures to conform, behave and express ourselves in certain pre-approved and non-offensive ways. We will—and in many respects, already do—selfcensor our views and (d)evolve into complacent, apathetic human beings.

While the picture I am painting is certainly extreme, I do so only to convey just how important this decision is to all of us. Some people might argue that whoever would like to continue the Backpage could do so online, or could print it separately from our newspaper. I argue that these solutions are insufficient and that the Backpage belongs within the pages of The Miscellany News. Our newspaper is an institution that is supposed to represent a broad spectrum of views within this school, and I find it dissapointing that the editorial board has decided to silence one of the few voices that dared to—if you will—“speak truth to power.” By this I mean that the Backpage was a tool used (yes, sometimes crudely) to slap us a couple of times in the face and remind us to come back down to earth. Humor is often cast

aside as flippant or unimportant; but humor and laughter sometimes have the ability to articulate a point more effectively than even the most well-written political essays. With the discontinuation of the Backpage, we would be losing a valuable resource that week after week reminded us of how silly we are, how pretentious we can sometimes be and what makes Vassar unique, as well as informing us of upcoming events.

The writers of the Backpage in the past have also been students, sometimes our friends, or people of whom we have heard. I strongly believe that their intention was never to directly hurt anyone or any group. In fact, here at Vas-

A voice that had strong views on a wide-ranging set of issues has been lost. sar I know no of no one who would deliberately try to unjure or offend another.

That said, people do not always say what you want to hear, but anyone or any group who is doing something in the public light does open themselves to fair criticism. In the end, who doesn’t want our actions—be that the fight for marriage equality or the first a capella concert of the semester—to generate a reaction? You can hate the messenger and still want the messenger to exist. You might not like what you’re hearing, but it will make you look at yourself with a critical gaze and change—or not change—accordingly.

While acknowledging the Backpage’s shortcomings, it is worth noting that there have been articles in the Miscellany that have been the subject of controversy. Still, the paper allows for new writers or guest columnists to express their opinions. The same argument

The Miscellany News is using to discontinue the Backpage could be made to eliminate guest writers in case their message cannot be fashioned into something that won’t create as much controversy. The paper has decided to discontinue the Backpage with little open debate, and I find that questionable.

People who have felt offended by the contents of the Backpage should by all means speak out and engage in lively, rational conversations with The Miscellany News and other students. I believe that there are people who—though they may have been offended by the content published on the Backpage—did not wish to see it just disappear.

Nevertheless, if the Backpage returns, it clearly needs to embrace some changes that will preserve its independence and candor and yet adjust to what a significant portion of the Vassar community consider to be adequate expressions of free speech. As means to this end, the Editor in Chief and the Backpage Editor could work more closely together to make certain that some kind of consensus is reached before publication.

Furthermore, readers’ suggestions and concerns could be adopted and dealt with more transparently. The writers of the Backpage would put their names next to their work, so people could more directly express their grievances. We are intelligent, rational people, and we can all come to an intelligent and rational agreement that makes everyone at least partially happy.

Diversity of peoples and opinions makes us all richer individuals. With the absence of the Backpage, a voice that had strong views on a wide-ranging set of issues has been lost.

I urge other students to consider what I have said and speak out. Last, but not least, let us remember that we are young, and so we are allowed to take some things, and ourselves, lightheartedly. Laugh at yourself, Vassar. The last thing the College needs is less humor.

—Alejandro Calcaño ’11 is the Class of 2011 President this year.

Vassar decision-making too opaque for students Thomas Clarke

T

Guest Columnist

he world has changed a lot since late 2006. Back then, Barack Obama was still insisting that he would not run for President in 2008. Back then, the Enron Corporation and Worldcom embezzlement incidents and the dot-com bust were still fresh in the world’s memory. Back then, the enrollment numbers for Vassar’s Computer Science Department were low, reflecting a societal wariness of fields with recent problems. Two years later, the administration announced that the Computer Science Department’s budget would be cut by about one-third—citing the fact that the Deparment’s enrollment had dropped, not from 2007 to 2008, but from 2005 to 2006.

Anybody who’s read a textbook from the mid-20th century can attest that information changes, particularly in disciplines with relatively new subfields. While it’s impossible to have a reference be up-to-date all the time (even online), we don’t mind because we understand that dated information has a dated context. If a National Aeronautics and Space Administration executive were to read a history textbook from 1967, conclude that the moon was still unvisited, and fund a moon mission based on this assumption, the executive would soon discover that they had acted on faulty data.

When a fact presented in a reference warrants major actions of any sort, it is a reasonable expectation that the fact would be cross-referenced to ensure its accuracy. If the executive, for example, had simply asked a coworker about the moon, the executive would have quickly realized the inaccuracy of the assumption. When the Computer Science Department’s low enrollment in fall of 2006 was cited in fall of 2008 as justification for cutting the program’s budget by one-third, the people making the decision violated this expectation.

Any one of the individuals responsible could have taken the two minutes necessary to examine the Computer Science Department’s

enrollment numbers in fall of 2008. If they had, the decision would certainly have been different—over the course of last year, the department’s enrollment numbers were the highest in its entire history. Sections of highlevel computer science classes were, with one exception, within one student of the usual minimum enrollment of five. Today, not a single computer science class has an enrollment less than 10. While introductory classes have a similar total enrollment between 2006 and 2008, there are fewer sections now, and insufficient lab space to accommodate this fact.

When I think about situations like this one, I can’t help but personally feel that the decision-making process at Vassar is a black box—its input and output are reported to the Vassar community, but there is a distinct lack of explanation for how the output is reached.

Even the very few explanations we do receive are uselessly clouded in public-relations speak and false tones of camaraderie between the Vassar community and the College administration. When the administration proudly boasted the creation of the Hardship Fund as a result of the decrease in summer programming, they glossed over the fact that the compromise they had reached required no concessions on their part, since the money was provided by the community. The administration had successfully ended the hunger strike without actually having to pay their employees. I felt that this decision process that led to this thoroughly irrelevant, but somehow announcement-worthy policy, was not explained in a satisfactory manner by any stretch of the imagination.

None of the governing bodies with jurisdiction over Poughkeepsie, N.Y., have this blackbox policy. The minutes from congressional hearings have been freely available since 1938 and available for purchase since 1924. Anybody who claims the decision-making ability to qualify for a position among the Vassar administration should be expected to provide a record of their meetings, or at least those meetings that produce important decisions.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

The mission statement of the College clearly states that “diversity of perspective is honored...in the College’s system of shared governance among all the constituencies of the institution.” If this is true, how are the students expected to honor a perspective that refuses to explain itself? The administration cannot ask us to assume good faith in unexplained decisions that may financially injure our fellow members of the Vassar community.

Likewise, it is hard to place faith in the mission statement’s prescribed “encouragement of excellence” when the College cuts the budget of small, quickly growing departments based on old data, without even bothering to check if it matches modern data. Computer Science would not be the same without Grace Murray Hopper ’28 and Winifred Asprey ’38, who both recognized it as a field where the women of Vassar had an opportunity to make their mark.

Now, as the world steps into the information age and towards a greater commitment to sympathy for class issues, Vassar has dropped the ball of progress that its founding in 1861 and conversion to co-education in 1969 have kept aloft for almost 150 years. It is time for the administration to be held accountable for their actions.

If the mission statement of the College is still taken into account, and thus if the purpose for our education is to be prepared to make decisions ourselves, then two things must be changed. First, the administration needs to present its decisions—and the minutes of the meetings involved—in an objective manner that accurately describes the implications of those decisions. We’re supposedly here to become the best and the brightest. Second, the administration needs to honor its claimed commitment to valuing diverse perspectives.

Diverse perspectives may mean opposing perspectives, and disagreement is no excuse for dismissal.

—Thomas Clarke ’11 is a computer science major and Treasurer of the Vassar Pagan Circle.

September 17, 2009

OPINIONS

Page 9

Overblown debates cloud real issues of health care reform Angela Aiuto

O

Opinions Editor

n Sept. 12, tens of thousands of people marched through Washington, D.C., to protest the growing power of the U.S. government, which has most recently been drafting legislation to reform our health care system. What were some of their main complaints? “Obama lies, grandma dies,” read some of the signs protesters carried throughout the streets. “Oust the Marxist usurper!” others said.

It’s funny, because my complaints about health care reform seem incredibly tame in comparison. “Strengthen the health insurance exchange by opening it to everyone!” Something about it isn’t quite as catchy as “Impeach the Muslim Marxist!”

The sad thing is that there are many aspects of current health care legislation that could be critiqued and improved upon, but these get ignored in the greater ideological debate of what is or isn’t socialism and what the role of government should be. In fact, these debates have clouded over the real issues at stake, such that many Americans who do try to engage the actual issues don’t even seem to be aware of what current legislation demands.

For example, my co-editor Kelly Shortridge seems to be under the impression that the government will impose price controls in order to achieve expanded coverage at lower costs (“Government-funded health care is not the cure-all solution,” 9.10.09). But price controls are very different from economies of scale. A price control is a government-imposed ceiling or floor for the price of a given product. In contrast, the idea behind economies of scale is that costs will decrease as a given good or service is produced on a larger scale. So rather than im-

posing prices on health care providers, the government will rather be hoping to lower prices through increased competition and greater efficiencies. This is the principle argument behind the public option and similarly the health insurance exchange.

But Shortridge raised another specter in her analysis of health care reform—one that is ultimately a much more popular and threatening argument against reform: rationing. Her basic argument is that expanding care to the entire citizenry will ultimately put a strain on resources, forcing some to delay or forgo medical treatment. What she failed to realize is that rationing happens every day already in every health care system regardless of structure, funding or manner of operation.

If you think about it, it’s quite logical. We live in a world of scarce resources, meaning that rationing will happen one way or another. It is simply a matter of how these resources are ultimately allocated. According to a survey conducted in April of 2009 by the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation, six in 10 Americans have a family member who has delayed or completely forgone medical care over the course of the past year due to cost. This is rationing, it just is not manifested in a form as explicit as, say, the long waiting times for elective procedures in Canada or Great Britain.

In fact, the rationing that takes place in America is much more sinister because it is so inequitable. Canada and the industrialized nations of Western Europe have all adopted some manner of universal health care that allows all citizens to receive a basic set of benefits. In contrast, coverage in the United States is determined largely by employment. Wealthier Americans with higher-paying jobs are accordingly more

likely to receive expansive health insurance coverage, while lower-income Americans are not so competitive, and therefore not so lucky.

Census figures back this up: In 2008, 24.5 percent of all citizens with an annual household income of less than $25,000 were uninsured; for households making over $75,000, this figure was only 8.2 percent.

What would you prefer: to have to wait four months for an elective surgery, or not to have the ability to get that surgery at all?

So when opponents of reform make the argument that government involvement in health care will result in rationing, they are being disingenuous. They don’t care about the act of rationing, per se; they just care about who gets what.

This is why nobody really makes a stink when thousands of uninsured Americans line up at the prospect of free medical treatment, as they did this past August in Inglewood, Calif. But should Congress try to help these uninsured Americans afford primary care and dental check-ups with a severely watered-down version of a singlepayer system, suddenly the government is out to euthanize your grandmother.

Of course, what kind of logic would you expect from somebody who thinks that allowing “the most poverty-stricken individuals” to be treated in emergency situations “when it counts,” is somehow a demonstration of some kind of compassion?

Here’s the thing: it isn’t compassionate. For anyone who believes that health care is a human right, our current system is cruel and inhumane.

But it’s more than that (and here is where I really try to appeal to the conservative audience)— it’s also expensive. Why should we pride ourselves on allowing the uninsured to receive treatment in emergency situations, particularly

Hyperbolic outbursts and arguments stymie effective discourse and debate Joshua Rosen

Guest Columnist

E

levating the political dialogue to a level befitting the intellectual abilities of persons of all political persuasions is a task we have to all take seriously. The “You lie!” incident of Sept. 9, where Representative Joe Wilson, a Republican from South Carolina’s Second District, interrupted the President’s speech on health care reform, interjecting “You lie!” when the President made the factually accurate claim that—as per the provisions of his health care bill—coverage will not be extended to illegal aliens.

I do not contend that Wilson’s outburst was not promptly apologized for, or that it was substantially different from other prominent outbursts of recent memory, but I do hope to draw from it; Wilson should serve as a warning to us—liberals and conservatives alike. Whatever our political persuasions, all sides have allowed more than their fair share of emotionalism to contaminate legitimate policy debates.

As a liberal Democrat for as long as I can remember, I, like many politically active young progressives, naively thought that the election of a Democratic president—coupled with a Democratic Congress—after the eight-year neoconservative run came to a close, would usher in a new era of political interaction. I will confess, sadly, that I was mistaken; we should have learned that conservatives are no less adept at political maneuvering than liberals were during the Bush years. More to the point, conservatives are much better at framing the debate in stark, them-versus-us terms than liberals are. A paramount example of this is the fracas that ensued over the “death panels” in President Obama’s health plan, during which—contrary to all fact and logic—conservatives brilliantly brought in emotion to poison a serious debate and make their political message without really addressing the facts and policy problems. Though a brilliant move from a political standpoint, it is a

highly contemptible way to practice politics. If there has to be politics played, let’s play it during the campaigning and pre-election jockeying for points in the polls, not during the time when we have to actually make policy.

In the interest of balance, I do want to mention the errors of “my side.” During the Bush years, the Bush-as-Hitler, -Saddam or -Osama motif was all too common. I will freely admit, I have made comparisons like this myself, and I hope any of my left-leaning compatriots can acknowledge their mistakes and commit to a more rational future. It serves no purpose to compare a democratically elected, removable leader, no matter if you disagree with his or her policies— barring extreme circumstances—to any sort of dictator. If we could please save the comparisons to dictators for when a leader actually becomes dictatorial or imperialistic, then the message would be much stronger—it is offensive to the victims of fascist, communist and theocratic oppression to compare legitimate leaders of the free world to their dictatorial opponents.

As a general rule, overly hyperbolic, emotional statements not only make policymaking difficult, but they make what is already an adversarial, bipolar process into a veritable emotional tornado, where provisions recommending end-of-life planning turn into “death panels” and otherwise obscure and stymie legitimate discussion and civil debate on serious issues that affect all of us.

If there is any lesson to be learned from Wilson’s gaffe, it is this: In our political discourse, we must be wary of incivility, as Wilson termed it in his statement of apology to Obama—for emotional outbursts are not amenable to the political process of a civil society.

As Americans, we can do better than soundbite politics. For the sake of solving our problems, let’s stay rational.

—Joshua Rosen ’12

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

when that treatment is likely to be costly to taxpayers? If taxpayers are going to be paying for the uninsured either way—which we are (and that goes for undocumented immigrants, too, despite what Congressman Joe Wilson of South Carolina wants you to think)—we could just as easily subsidize the necessary hundreds of dollars to run tests and provide medication, instead of footing the bill for the thousands (or tens of thousands) of dollars that emergency treatment often requires. This way, the diseases of the uninsured can be prevented or controlled, sparing them physical pain and the trip to the emergency room, and sparing us our wallets.

So despite wishful thinking from conservatives, health care for all doesn’t necessarily mean that costs must increase or that quality must suffer; it simply means that we must come up with smart reforms. And that entails throwing away ideological arguments and stereotypes about how much power government should have, whether the private sector is more efficient, or whether undocumented immigrants deserve subsidized coverage.

These arguments only hurt the legislative process by diverting attention away from issues that will actually affect Americans on a personal level, like the need for comprehensive coverage and containing rising health care costs. Members of the Congress and their constituents should instead make a real effort to educate themselves on what will actually work in order to reach the best consensus possible.

—Angela Aiuto ’11 is the Opinions Editor. This year, she and Opinions Editor Kelly Shortridge ’12 are maintaing an alternating column called “Point, Counterpoint,” in which they engage one another in conversation.

OPINIONS

Page 10

Letter: Reichman’s Dr. George Tiller column offensive E

very year I’ve gone to this school, I’ve grown to understand more about what racism, sexism and classism actually are. Political correctness has grown so rampant here that not only does the Backpage of The Miscellany News get cut because it was too much for our sensitive community to handle, but an article by Ben Reichman (“Threats to community are intolerable,” 9.10.09) that repeatedly uses the blanket statement “white males” to describe anti-abortion radicals, despite race having nothing to do with this killing, is passed off with little outrage.

Unless I misunderstood, Reichman’s argument seems to be this: Abortionists were murdered, he points out, by white men. Also, Dr. George Tiller was fighting against “sexist, racist and classist... elements of our society.” Reichman shifts, apparently without using the clutch, to the second half of his argument, which is that since white men oppress minorities, we shouldn’t be surprised when the warriors and champions fighting against this oppression fall at the hands of assassins.

Mr. Reichman: Tiller was an abortion doctor, at best. At worst, Tiller was an abortion doctor who performed controversial and sometimes sketchy procedures. Now, I’m pro-choice, no fan of the rich and I certainly do not condone racist and sexist behavior. But George Tiller was not fighting against the “exoticizing of women,” nor was in any way comparable to those individuals who actually fought against sexism, racism and classism. You seriously believe that Tiller is in some way comparable to Susan B. Anthony and the women’s rights movement? You think Tiller’s work was anything like Martin Luther King Jr.’s?

Because that is what you seem to imply with your statements, and it is shameful. Not only does it water down the struggles of those who did fight for the rights of all, but it draws battle lines in a culture war that needs to end, lest more fall as victims of extremist thought.

Furthermore, let’s go back to the beginning of Mr. Reichman’s article. He listed instances where abortionists were murdered and then said, “In each of these cases, white men asserted their authority to rob children of their fathers and wives of their husbands...” Mr. Reichman, though the numbers are admittedly skewed because of racial profiling, there are currently more African-Americans than whites in jail for criminal offences. If I cherry-pick a couple of occasions where black males committed murders, and were to follow that with the statement, “In each of these cases, black men asserted their authority to rob children of their fathers and wives of their husbands,” what would the reader’s reaction be?

I’d predict the reader’s reaction would be that this is a racist statement, because it is. It implies that because of their race, these black men were compelled to commit these crimes. That’s racism.

But a statement including the phrase “white men” is not considered racist and elicits little outrage.

And saying that “every sign has on Vassar campus has ‘white’ and ‘rich’ etched into it” does little service to the cause of ending racism, classism and sexism. Instead, it does nothing more than imply that our school is no better than segregated toilets in the 1950s South—despite the fact that nonwhites comprise fully one-third of our incoming class (that’s more representation than in our country), and 11 percent of that class is composed of international students.

The point is, Mr. Reichman, that white men are not the enemy. Racists are the enemy, whether they’re whites hating blacks, blacks hating whites or even whites imagining that simply because their skin color matches those of the men who replaced their grey Confederate uniforms with white hoods, that they’re part of an evil, all-encompassing system of hatred and oppression.

There are social evils, there are abuses of the system and there is indeed racism in the world.

But when asked how we could get rid of racism in this country, Morgan Freeman said, “How are we going to get rid of racism? Stop talking about it!”

Freeman, in my opinion, goes a little too far, but the core of what he says still holds true. Stop lumping everyone into your groups “us” and “them,” and stop using race, class and sex to define that cleavage. It’s racist, classist and sexist—and it’s also what you claim to be fighting against.

—Steve Keller ’11

September 17, 2009

Letter: Prior art experience should be considered I

n the 9.10.09 issue of The Miscellany News there was an article that reported on the current state of the Studio Art prerequisite that is necessary before enrolling in higher level studio art courses at Vassar (“Students and faculty debate studio art prerequisite”).

The topic is controversial, to say the least.

Many students have exhibited frustration at having to take the year-long course before taking courses in other areas of the visual arts; the Art Department responds by saying that basic drawing is the building block upon which the visual arts are constructed, and that what is taught in Art 102-103 is useful and necessary in order to continue. Since the beginning of my freshman year at Vassar in 2006, I have felt similar frustration with this prerequisite, though for different reasons. While I do find that the prerequisite is unfair, I agree with the art faculty in saying that basic drawing is an important skill. The problem? Students cannot place out of basic drawing.

As Lindsey Payson ’11 said in last week’s article, some students come to Vassar with years of experience in the arts. I count myself among that number. While I hate to say “my father is such-and-such” or something of that nature, I grew up in a family of artists. My dad teaches drawing at Philadelphia University and has taught at many other schools. My mother is an artist and works at the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts in Philadelphia. The knowledge and experience of my parents has certainly helped me in my art education, but was by no means necessary for the artistic development of a young person, it was just an “added bonus.” In high school I went through a rigorous visual art curriculum

that would prepare anyone for higher-level art courses, regardless of parentage. Frankly, my basic drawing in tenth grade was far more advanced, structured and helpful than any single lesson of Art 102-103 at Vassar. Not everyone had a comparable experience in high school, but many Vassar students do have strong art backgrounds.

As a freshman at Vassar, I was told that students were not able to place out of the basic drawing requirement. Evaluation would be too subjective, and the Art Department wanted to make sure that everyone started out with the same basic skill set. This still strikes me as odd. In the language departments, students can place out of introductory level courses by presentation of an advanced placement test score or by taking Vassar’s own placement tests (which are, for what it’s worth, elementary). Why can’t a student place out of Art 102103? I could present a portfolio to the department for review. Or the department could sit me down with a pencil in front of a still life, give me an hour, and evaluate my drawing. It would be that simple. My drawings from tenth grade are more than enough to place me out— far out—of basic drawing. And I know this is the same case for many students, as I have shared my grievances with others in the same position.

Besides the fact that it is illogical and unfair that students can’t place out of drawing, Vassar should consider the cost to families. With tuition at $41,000, the cost of a course per semester is several thousand dollars. Double this for the year-long requirement, and families are required to pay upwards of $7,000 to $9,000 for Art 102-103, depending on the breakdown

of tuition costs (I’m no economist, but regardless of the actual figure, it goes without saying that a course at Vassar is expensive). This is money that is wasted for the more advanced drawing students, as it is used for courses which are both redundant and a regression of several years of art classes for students who could otherwise place out.

As I wrote above, I do agree with the art faculty that basic drawing skills are necessary for higher level art classes. Rules of perspective, proportion, tone, value, etc. are crucial to the visual arts and should be required for beginning artists. For others, it is simply repetitive to require the instruction of these skills for two semesters. A simple portfolio review can affirm that yes, Student A knows three-point perspective. Yes, Student B knows proportions. The refusal to administer such a review, however, is more than unfair—it is theft.

I did not enjoy Art 102-103, and because it was neither challenging or instructive for me, I didn’t try, and even then I still did well. It was a waste of time, energy, money and knowledge, which is unfortunate. Taking these classes is the biggest regret of my Vassar career thus far.

As a senior, I have not taken a single art class since Art 102-103, as I became so disenchanted with the department. My hope in writing this is that other students and faculty members will begin to think—really think—about the repercussions of this ridiculous requirement.

Perhaps for the class of 2014, or even 2013, two semesters worth of instruction will not have to go to waste.

—Jared Berenholz ’10

Letter: Pro-life advocates also center for targets L

ast Friday morning, 63-year-old James Pouillon was gunned down while protesting abortion in front of Owosso High School in Michigan—a gesture of speech well within his First Amendment rights. The suspect is James Harlan Drake, a 33-year-old male who is currently being detained for James Poullion’s murder, another “grudge”-type murder (to use the term of County prosecutor Randy Colbry), and the intent to commit a third. It was “the fact that he was outside the high school with his signs in front of children going to school,” said Assistant Prosecutor Sara Edwards, commenting on the motive of Drake, who was evidently offended at Pouillon’s legitimate prolife protest.

For all those who knew him, James Pouillon was an outspoken defender of the pro-life cause in his community, despite being abused on many occasions by some who disagreed with him. Elizabeth Maine of Owosso recalled, “He’s had things thrown at him. He’s been screamed at. He’s been spat at.” In response to his death, many notable pro-life advocates have publicly endorsed Pouillon.

“In the ’50s and ’60s, people lost their lives to secure the civil rights of those victimized by discrimination. Now, James Pouillon has lost his life in the civil rights cause of the 21st century, the struggle to protect the right to life of every single person, born and unborn” stated Dr. Alveda King, the niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Pastoral Associate of Priests for Life.

If I assented to the logic put forth by Benjamin Reichman in his article in last week’s issue about the death of Dr. George Tiller (“Threats to community are intolerable,” 9.10.09), I could declare how the unjustifiable murder of James Poullion was not the work of “crazed fanatics or any other fringe sounding group easily declared blameworthy.

The true culprits—and the ones who always get off scot-free—are ourselves.” I could point out the irrationality of those who value a woman’s right to an abortion to be more fundamental than the right to life of an adult human who was practicing his rights of free speech as a pro-lifer, and beg the question as was done.

I could argue how we at Vassar “assert the importance of our own comfort and luxury over the fundamental needs of others, and each time we do this, the less privileged members of society,” a category under which, de-

spite providing no real argument, Reichman neglects to include unborn children, “have more of a right to do just that.” If we at Vassar cannot critique the intolerance and disrespect for human life that is so pervasive in our society, how then can we be surprised when people are killed in the very act of practicing their fundamental rights?

The analogy is clear: If Vassar is to blame for the fault of Dr. Tiller’s death, then it would seem that Vassar is equally to blame for the death of James Pouillon as he, like Dr. Tiller, articulated his idea of social justice in a legal fashion and was killed for it. If we must eradicate, as is implied, the social evils that led Scott Roeder to kill George Tiller, we must also be obligated to eradicate the social evils that led to the death of James Pouillon.

But what are these social evils? In Reichman’s article, we are told that Dr. Tiller was standing up against these given social evils.

Hence, to dissent against abortion, and necessarily to the practices of Dr. Tiller, is to stand for the perpetuation of social evils; hence, James Pouillon was himself a part of these social evils. But James Pouillon’s death is also collectively our fault for not adequately standing up to the social evils that killed him—even though he himself was perpetuating social evils by speaking out against the noble work of Dr. Tiller.

Furthermore, to eliminate the social ills that doomed Tiller would be to silence people like James Pouillon, who disagreed openly with Tiller. Similarly, to eliminate the social evils that caused the death of James Pouillon would be to eliminate abortion, for it was inherently his anti-abortion stance that resulted in his death.

At this point, it should be evident the fallacy in the logic: An application such effectively wipes out any idea of social evils or social justice because everybody is seemingly both; to speak out for or against abortion is to perpetuate social evils if somebody gets killed because of it.

Above, for the sake of argument, I held the actions of James Pouillon and Dr. Tiller on an equivalent moral level—they were both acting in a legal fashion.

However, despite the illogical nature of his argument as a whole, Reichman’s greatest error is to apparently assume the work of Dr. Tiller as a social good, as though the right to control her body unquestionably justifies a

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

woman having an abortion.

Perhaps the best, but certainly the foremost way to evaluate the actions of Dr. Tiller is to describe exactly what he did. However, the gruesome nature of both the dilation and extraction procedure (D&X, better known as partial birth abortion, a procedure banned in 2003), as well as the currently used dilation and evacuation procedure (D&E) prevent me, for the sake of common decency, from providing such a description; there is no way to narrate such acts without invoking the horrid and repugnant image of human carnage. This fact alone attests to the inherent callousness and barbarity of late-term abortion. For anyone who is inclined to acquaint themselves with such methods of abortion, the information is readily available.

I understand that many people who are reading this article are pro-choice, and you are entitled to your opinion. However, I urge you to evaluate the extent of which you accept the idea of choice.

Do you believe in a woman’s right to choose to the point where a viable baby can be pulled halfway out of his or her mother’s womb and then aborted in a most abhorrent fashion? If so, why does the idea of choice not extend to when the child is still attached to the umbilical cord outside the womb? How much different would the procedure be? How much different would the child be?

If you identify as pro-choice but condemn the work of Dr. Tiller, ask yourself what does the right to choose mean if a woman can have an abortion in some cases, but not in others?

If the right to choose is relative, why is it not relative to the most fundamental right in society- the right to life of another human being? Why is it that we do not ascribe the actual right to life to all actually living and distinct human lives?

To be frank, what type of world do we wish to raise our children in: a society that fights to protect human life, or a society who believes it has the right to destroy it? It is the former that James Pouillon died for. May he, like Dr. Tiller, rest in peace. I close then with a quote by the late James Pouillon from a 1995 interview: “Killing is wrong. Stop killing the abortionist.

Stop killing the nurses. Stop killing the receptionists. Stop killing the babies. Killing is not the answer.”

—Joe Coniglio ’12

OPINIONS Campaign finance law should be upheld September 17, 2009

Andrea Worby

T

Guest Columnist

his past Wednesday, Sept. 8, the Supreme Court heard rearguments on a case that will potentially wipe out over one hundred years of campaign finance reform.

Citizens United v. Federal Elections Committee (FEC) centers around the government’s role in controlling the financing of electoral campaigns, more specifically, their role in reigning in corporate spending and influence in the election process. The original case, Citizens United v. Federal Elections Committee (FEC), appeared before the court on March 24th, 2009, as the producers of Hillary: The Movie used the film to challenge the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002—more commonly known as the McCain-Feingold Law, after its creators, Senators John McCain and Russell Feingold. This comparatively narrow argument focused on the issue of corporate financing of elections and backing of campaign ads.

Hillary: The Movie, produced by the conservative advocacy group Citizens United, is available on DVD and appeared very briefly in theaters during the 2008 presidential primary campaign. Its main goal was to change or sway the voters’ opinions of then-Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, an operation strategically undertaken as its release, along with the producers’ quest for cable television screenings, was scheduled on the eve of the primary race. According to the McCain-Feingold Law, labor unions and for-profit corporations are banned from using their treasury finds to contribute to “electioneering communications.” Electioneering communications refers to radio or television advertising that clearly make

reference to a candidate or group of candidates within 30 days of a primary election and 60 days of a general election. Before this case was brought to the high court, a federal court in Washington ruled unanimously that the movie was clearly a form of campaign electioneering, for its purpose was undeniably “to inform the electorate that Clinton is unfit for office.” This ruling forced Citizens United to add a tag line to the movie disclosing the corporation as its backer, publicly disclose all other financial backers and was forbidden to explicitly support a particular candidate.

Scott Nelson, who represents McCain and Feingold, says that “there’s no prohibition on running any kind of political advertising, it’s just a question of how it’s funded.” The Supreme Court has upheld the barring of such use of general treasury funds of corporations, reasoning that these funds belong to all shareholders, while the electioneering might not reflect everyone’s views, and that the unlimited and undisclosed backing of elections by corporations corrupts our political system. To this, the Supreme Court adds that corporations can and should create separate political action committees that collect and publicly report individual campaign contributions.

On Sept. 8, the original attack on the McCain-Feingold Law by the Citizens United case transformed into a much broader attack on the use of corporate treasury funds for campaign contributions, a prohibition upheld for over 100 years by the Supreme Court since the first federal law banning corporate campaign contributions was passed by former President Theodore Roosevelt in 1907. Instead of easily ruling on narrow grounds put forth by prec-

edents such as McConnell v. FEC of 2003 (which upheld McCain-Feingold) or Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce of 1990 (which upheld a state ban on corporate independent spending for or against candidates), the court is questioning whether or not to overrule both precedents. This is an audacious move that ignores their policy of interpreting federal statutes to avoid broad constitutional questions.

If the high court rules in favor of Citizens United (which it most likely will), it will be ignoring decades of protections against the excessive influence of corporations, creating a ruling that fetishizes corporate free speech rights and undermines the structure of our election system. I call this ruling probable because the only major change in the court between the precedential campaign finance rulings and now is the addition of Justice Samuel A. Alito, which created a radically conservative majority willing to untie the purse strings of our nation’s wealthiest and greediest corporations. This outcome will make it legal for corporations (ahem, bankers, health care industries, oil and gas companies...) to buy their way into Congress, using their wealth to keep good friends in office and attack their foes.

In the mission statement found on its web site, Citizens United boldly asserts that it is “dedicated to restoring our government to citizen’s control.” But please ask yourself, Citizens United, would the ramifications of this case really put government back in the hands of the people, or will our country’s future rest in the purses of corporations?

Page 11

What would you want Vassar’s school colors to be?

“I’m alright with pink and gray. It’s classic.”

Henry Sigall ’11

“Plaid because everyone wears plaid here.”

Zac Joseph ’13

—Andrea Worby ’12 is the President of Democracy Matters, the Vassar chapter of the non-partisan national organization.

Investors profit on unethical insurance Nik Trkulja

W

Guest Columnist

hat if I told you could make some money if another person died? No, there are no strings attached, and there is nothing illegal going on. It’s just a matter of betting on when someone will die. Well, if you were on Wall Street, right about now you would be quite excited.

The basic idea is to cash in on future life insurance payouts from people who are willing to sell their policies today. So imagine there is a person, let’s call him Paul, who has a life insurance policy valued at $2 million and who pays around $50,000 a year for that policy. Paul is old and sick, and for some reason he needs money now, so he goes to a life settlement company and sells his life insurance policy to them for $200,000 right now. Now, that life settlement firm pays his premium every year until he dies and then collects the $2 million upon his death. If Paul lives another six years that means the firm gets $1.4 million out of the deal; if he lives just four years, though, they get $1.6 million, so the quicker he dies the better their payoff is. This is where Wall Street investment banks want to step in. Banks are now looking to buy out life settlement companies and existing life settlements, bundle lots of the life insurance policies together in a process called securitization and then sell them off to investors like bonds. These investment funds, the largest of which are usually pension funds, ironically enough, would then be locked in a system where investors are betting on how quickly people like Paul would die so that they could get the highest returns.

The plan sounds like something straight out of a horror movie, and in many ways it is. Its sole purpose is to prey on the sick, the elderly and the less affluent amongst us­—people whose life expectancy is short and who need money immediately due to medical expenses, current employment situations or any other number of reasons.

These people would become fantastic prey for those obsessed with profits, and in the United States there are huge profits to be had. Of the $26 trillion worth of health insurance policies in the United States, mar-

ket analysts predict that up to $500 billion worth would be sold through the scheme.

A market that huge is extremely attractive to investment banks, which are looking for a new way to make money following the collapse of the mortgage securities market.

But unlike with residential mortgages, this particular scheme carries a number of very serious risks for our society.

Just imagine what influence special interest groups lobbying for Wall Street on this issue could have. Suddenly things like euthanasia could get serious support, as investors look for ways to increase potential returns on their investments. Stem cell research could suddenly find yet another major lobby group opposing it, and of course health insurance reform could be all but buried and forgotten. Furthermore, costs associated with health insurance could also see a rise due to pressure from Wall Street as it tries to find new “clientele.” Not to mention that life insurance premiums would obviously go up as life insurance firms suddenly have more pressure to pay, while payouts for life settlements decrease as banks try to cover the new cost.

Before I get carried away, though, it is important to note that all of these scenarios are of course hypothetical. But the potential for danger must be clear to everyone. Mixing the unrelenting drive for profits with people’s lives could have dire consequences for us all. If rich and powerful people have something to gain from the sick, poor and old dying then it’s not too unreasonable to assume that they’ll try to exert some sort of pressure to see their profits are made. After all, what’s there to stop them? Especially if you consider that they were allowed to bet on these people’s lives in the first place.

However, I can’t help but see the Wall Street side of the argument as well. The potential profits are huge, and right now, in this state of recession, these are profits our economy needs. You also need to consider that any one of us could also invest in these securities, as could our pension funds and school districts, for example. Thus the chances of the profit spreading and permeating through our society are very high, as was the case with profit from mortgage se-

curities before the market collapse. Theoretically the majority stands to gain, even if it is just in a monetary sense.

Furthermore, none of these ideas are illegal. Life settlements companies have existed for a while; the only thing is that their operations have been mostly small scale.

For us to suddenly start caring and fighting against them would be quite hypocritical considering our years of silence and disregard. And the potential ramifications to society are only a danger if the constituents of this country allow special interest to overpower their voices.

There are obvious dangers to the scheme, but there are also massive profits that could be enjoyed by all. What the net result ends up being is unclear, and it’s a risk some are willing to take, while others, quite frankly, aren’t. But that’s all this discussion really is—a cost-benefit analysis, as is every other discussion that involves Wall Street. Because Wall Street isn’t designed to take into account social benefits and costs, just risks and potential profits to investors.

The real issue here is not whether there is something wrong with Wall Street or its drive for money, but rather whether there is something wrong with our society. It says a lot about us if the old, sick and poor only come up in conversation when we are trying to make money off of their deaths, and it says a lot more about our social protection schemes if these people are in such a conversation in the first place. It’s not life insurance or people trying to cash in on it that are the problem, but rather the lack of a safety net that allows for such a situation in the first place. If people had affordable health insurance there wouldn’t be as large a need for life settlement cash. If health care services were better, low life expectancies would be rarer, and if we effectively protected those most in need against predators, this would never be an issue. These are the issues that we need to sort out as a society, and they transcend the financial and political realms. But instead our indifference is what created this story to start with, and until we decide to change, we can all apathetically sit back and bet money on when people like Paul will finally croak.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

“Let’s make more ambiguous, useless changes.

Red and silver.”

Miles Schmertzler ’12 and Cassandra Dreher ’12

“Rainbow because of our commitment to diversity” Gabriela Espin ’11

“Color is a social construct.

Whatever.”

Adam Murphy ’09 “Blue and silver because those are Ravenclaw colors, and Vassar is a smart school.”

Karrie Grobben and Deirdre McKeown, exchange students — Angela Aiuto and Kelly Shortridge, Opinions Editors

Page 12

VSA athletics proposal threatens College mission Evan Waldron

Guest Columnist

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et’s begin with a quick summation of the facts, shall we? Recently the VSA passed a proposal that advocating students participating in varsity sports receive academic credit for their hard work. Though no one can deny that athletes put in a great deal of time and effort, allowing academic credit for sports undermines the academic integrity of Vassar College.

What is the reasoning behind giving varsity athletes credit? Well, if you participate in a varsity sport, managing a full course load of difficult classes so that you can graduate in four years tends to be a bit daunting. Luckily, dedicated athletes can now get a freebie half credit allowing for a lighter load. This doesn’t make sense. If you can’t manage a sport, the solution is to quit the team and concentrate on academics. That’s the reason we’re all here. Sports come second. Vassar is an NCAA Division III school.

This means we don’t give out sports scholarships and that everyone who competes in a sport does so by choice rather than from fear they might lose their tuition. Students at Vassar play a sport because they love it. Even if you need to quit the team in to maintain your grades, you can still be involved in a sport—examination of the course catalogue will reveal that we offer a multitude of athletics classes.

Another threat posed by the recently passed proposal is that it’s the thin end of the wedge for other members of the Vassar community to argue that they deserve credit for their non-athletic endeavors. Anyone who can prove they put in just as much or more work in an activity involving Vassar than the average varsity athlete—and we all know that there are plenty of you who fit this criteria—could make the argument that they deserve credit as well. How can the administration deny these just as worthy individuals credit without looking like complete hypocrites?

A large part of the argument used to put the proposal through was that students who participate in Drama Department shows, Music Ensembles and so on. receive credit for their participation. However, students actually major in these subjects, intending them as careers. Is there anyone truly majoring in a sport?

Academics are Vassar’s primary concern.

That is what this school was built upon, what we are recognized for and it’s what has kept us going since the 19th century. By allowing varsity athletes to take the easy route to graduating with a Vassar degree by counting non-academic pursuits as something they are not, then we have delivered an insult to the tradition of academic pursuit at Vassar as well as those who have, now do and will follow this tradition in years to come

Letter: Keller too general, vague I

take issue with the conclusion of Steve Keller’s Sept. 10 opinion column (“Republicans confuse patriotism, greed,” 9.10.09). He wrote, “We can get a first class health care system in this country. The only thing standing in the way is ignorance and greed.” Keller mistakenly treats all opponents of the current health care reform proposal as a single entity motivated by greed and ignorance. In reality, many opponents are working and middle-class people who believe that increased government involvement in health care will compromise the quality of service. Moreover, plenty of educated and thoughtful people have outlined the reasons they oppose the current proposal. If Keller had consulted newspaper and journal articles rather than merely watch brief news segments, perhaps he would appreciate this. In any debate as contentious as health care it is tempting to stereotype those who disagree with us. This, however, hampers any attempt at constructive dialogue.

I invite Keller to put name calling aside in the spirit of true moderation.

—Conor Kenney ’11

OPINIONS September 17, 2009 Budget for NASA must remain a priority Max Fagin

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Guest Columnist

n these times of economic hardship, we as a nation tend to turn away from external affairs, and focus on more pressing domestic issues, like health care and the economy. But we as a people must not lose sight of the important events that take place outside of this nation’s borders. I am referring of course to the U.S. space program. I want to try to convince you that, even in the face of a spiraling federal deficit, a space program is something that we as taxpayers should be willing to support. Whether you’re a liberal or conservative, an active and fertile space program is something from which we all stand to benefit.

Unfortunately, things are not going too well for the U.S. space program at present.

In May of 2009, President Obama convened a panel to evaluate the status of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) manned space flight program and make budget recommendations for the duration of Obama’s presidency. Last week, the panel (informally known as the Augustine Commission) released a summary of their recommendations.

The summary opens with the ominous statement: “The U.S. human spaceflight program appears to be on an unstable trajectory. It is perpetuating the perilous practice of pursuing goals that do not match allocated resources.”

In short, the Augustine Commission arrived at the conclusion that unless Congress is prepared to provide a substantial increase in budget, NASA’s manned spaceflight program will be unable to continue to function at its current level, and some major programs are going to get the axe.

This could not have come at worse time for NASA. Funding for the 25-year-old space shuttle program is only available for three more flights. The shuttle’s replacement, the Ares V, is several years behind schedule after having a significant amount of its funding diverted to other programs and will not be flight ready for at least five years.

No bucks, no Buck Rodgers is the general sentiment of the Augustine Report. In the

upcoming months, Congress is going to have to make a decision about whether or not to grant NASA the funds it needs. I think you (and by extension, your representative in Congress) should support such a budget increase. It has become a talking point among anti-space advocates that the money spent on NASA would be better spent on terrestrial pursuits. But how much money does NASA actually spend?

Rockets are expensive toys no doubt, but the actual price tag is really a drop in the bucket.Over the last fiscal year, NASA accounted for only 0.5 percent of government spending—a mere $17.2 billion. Some Ivy League universities have endowments more substantial that that.

And yet with this budget, NASA has funded dozens of the most productive science labs in the world, as well as a fleet of three space

Even in times of hardship, we must keep pushing for the stars. shuttles and more than 50 percent of the tab for the International Space Station. In addition, this funding includes the phenomenal accomplishments of the unmanned space program, which at last count totaled 20 Earth science satellites, 18 solar science probes, 16 interplanetary orbiters and rovers, and 15 space telescopes.

Besides, the anti-space advocates are simply mistaken if they think the money NASA spends never produces real-world benefits.

All this hardware is an investment of taxpayer money. And it provides real results. Modern weather forecasting, for example, would be completely impossible without the data collected by these missions.

The camera in your cell phone would prob-

ably not exist if it were not for the revolutionary work in digital imaging performed during the design of the Hubble Space Telescope.

And perhaps most importantly, space-based observations have proven to be essential in developing our understanding of the Earth and its climate.

These are just some examples. Surely such important advancements are worth such a small price tag. But these are ultimately pedestrian points. I want to make a difference argument. Spaceflight has a more abstract but much more important effect. Spaceflight inspires.

I challenge you to find a single person old enough to remember the space race who was not inspired by the monumental accomplishments of the Apollo program. The achievements of those days inspired a generation of scientists and engineers the likes of which the world has never seen. Isn’t such a jolt of inspiration exactly what we need right now?

Without a doubt, we are going to have to make some hard financial choices over the next few years. It may seem like such a lofty goal as spaceflight must be put on the back burner in lieu of more pressing terrestrial concerns. But such a sentiment is misplaced.

Our current administration has built itself on a platform of inspiration, hope and optimism, and what could be more inspiring than putting a human on Mars, as the Constellation program is currently attempting?

What better expression of hope is there than a search for Earth-like planets around other stars, as the Kepler Space Telescope is currently performing? What could inspire optimism better than the knowledge that humans are surviving and thriving in a place that is not the Earth, as six brave men and women are currently doing on board the International Space Station?

Even in times of hardship—and especially in times of hardship—we must always keep pushing and hoping for the stars. It’s part of our human nature. To do less would be, well, inhuman.

—Max Fagin ’10 is double-majoring in physics and astronomy.

Obama’s speech to children misleads Justin Chay

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Guest Columnist

he ascending “Thank you! THANK YOU!” is characteristic Obama oratory.

“All right, everybody. Go ahead and have a seat!” Obama’s arms are outstretched like that of a pastor, calling the masses to be seated.

The general opinion has been that Obama is a skilled orator and inspiring speaker (if you’re a Democrat), and one who talks the talk without walking the walk (if you’re a Republican). But Obama’s recent education speech to returning students shows he’s not always that great at talking the talk either. Delivered in front of hundreds of students at Wakefield High School, Arlington, Va. on Sept. 8, the speech was neither an amazing speech nor an especially troubling one but for the disturbing equation of Obama’s education plan with the future of students’ lives. All of this is happening at a time when the fireworks of Obama’s historic election have faded.

Perhaps even the glow of Obama’s rightly lauded Cairo address has worn off. The embattled president has had to talk more than ever in more domestic locales where specifics are not merely requested by the audience, but required to win them over. Obama has also been speaking in increasingly tense situations—the town hall meetings he’s held recently, for example, have been bombarded with acerbic vigor by some very angry Americans. So maybe this is why the education speech was somewhat disappointing. Inconsistently, Obama encourages students to work to achieve their dreams—“whatever you resolve to do, I want you to commit to it”— while stigmatizing the most popular dreams.

Obama says, “I know you get that sense from TV that you can be rich and successful without any hard work. That your ticket to success is through rapping, basketball or being a reality TV star. Chances are, you’re not going

to be any of those things.” But isn’t successful rapping, playing basketball and being a reality TV show star often inclusive of hard work?

Who’s to say Michael Jordan (whose example Obama cited in the speech) didn’t work hard, play hard? And it may be true that many high schoolers will not become successful rappers, basketball players or reality TV stars. But is it really right to discourage students by saying chances dictate they will not be these things?

Still, none of this is especially disturbing.

Obama’s task was to give a pep talk to stu-

It is more obvious than ever that the speech was for political gain. dents, and he did just that (though the student audience did seem bored and sleepy throughout).

What is disturbing is the way in which the White House has attempted to use Obama’s education speech to platform dedication from the younger generation, much in the same way McDonald’s tries to encourage lifetime customer dedication beginning with its Happy Meals for kids.

The infamous lesson plan issued by U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan directed schools nationwide to create a lesson plan for Obama’s speech, including asking students to write a letter about how they can “help the president.” Critics leapt on the opportunity for controversy, one of them, Oklahoma Senator Steve Russell, comparing the directive to

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

something you’d see in North Korea or Hussein’s Iraq. That’s probably going too far off the deep end. But it’s not all wrong. Obama’s speech hints a little at the lesson directive.

“My education, my future” reads the slogan emblazoned in capital letters behind Obama.

It should really read, “My education, Obama’s future.” After all, Obama’s portrayal of himself as inspiring students and asking the right questions (“asking questions is a sign of strength,” Obama says, adding that he asks questions all the time), are clearly attempts to rally renewed support from a domestic audience he has not upset yet.

Meanwhile, some of America’s adults had been busy trying to block the speech from schools, perhaps as revenge for their perceived losing out on health care. Later, the White House changed the directive’s wording to “how they can help their education goals,” saying the wording was an error.

This sounds like an excuse. If you listen closely, Obama’s speech, near the last five minutes, included the statement, “I’m calling on each of you to set your own goals for your education.” Shouldn’t Education Secretary Duncan’s directive have been worded thus, instead of “what they can do to help the president?”

President Barack Obama probably knew of the Education Secretary’s plan, so the White House’s steps to placate angry parents and school administrators—providing the speech script online for parents to read, downgrading the directive into a suggestion—are embarrassing for him, too.

The speech and directive may not be indoctrination so much as a gaffe. But now people perceive the lesson plan as indoctrination, and it is more obvious than ever that the speech was for political gain, especially to American adults who already dislike Obama.

The consequences are in motion.

OPINIONS

September 17, 2009

Page 13

HUMOR & SATIRE

Trustee forum: Board too bored to attend Everything has a bright green sequined lining

Kelly Stout

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Guest Columnist

Mitchell Gilburne Guest Columnist

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Molly Turprin/The Miscellany News

hances are, you’re one of the 2,370 Vassar students who didn’t attend last Sunday’s Board of Trustees meeting in UpCDC. As a person who did attend the meeting, I could take this moment to chastise you all for your civic disengagement, but instead, I think I’ll just congratulate you on a decision well made. The meeting was exactly what you’d expect: approximately zero attendees seemed excited to be there, a few belligerent morons spat unintelligible questions at the guests of honor and it went on for about an hour too long. It was probably a good idea you didn’t take even a minute away from your life to attend. After all, there were Facebook statuses to update, (“OMG. RIP Patrick Swayze!!!!1”) and Blackboard posts to struggle through, (“Conrad’s Heart of Darkness engages closely with the Belgian Congo, both the idea of it and the reality of it”).

The meeting was so epically boring that even most of the Trustees didn’t show. To be fair, the eminent William Plapinger ’74 generously granted us an hour of his jet-lagged international attorney hours, and the everperky Sally Gordon ’82—whose resume is about as large as Russia—was kind enough to come as well. The notable absence of the remaining 34 Trustees begged two questions: 1. Who pays for William Plapinger’s plane flights from London? and, 2. If not at the meeting, where were the Trustees? Since I’m a wannabe reporter, I decided to roll up my sleeves and conduct a little investigation of my own. Here’s what I discovered: Mary Lloyd Estrin ’66: Really wanted to keep her promise to herself that this year she would go to the gym more and set aside more “me time.” Signed up for “In The Pink” yoga, and it conflicted with the meeting.

Sally Dayton Clement ’71: The sole living human reading the Misc’s live blogging of the event.

Henry P. Johnson ’88: The Board’s youngest member was later found passed out in the attic at 44 LaGrange after an off-campus party.

That’ll teach mean old Margaret Jean McKee ’51 to throw keggers for underclassmen.

Jeffrey A. Goldstein ’77: Using the same logic as an elementary school tee-ball team, volunteered to play for Rochester Institute of Technology’s very small rugby team. Lost to his own alma mater. New post-grad low point.

Geraldine Bond Laybourne ’69: In moment of karmic retribution for going to the U.S. Open instead of the meeting, found herself on the receiving end of a tennis ball to the mouth

Chair of the Board’s Academics Committee Sally Gordon ’82 dozes off while Chair of the Board William Plapinger ’74 address approximately four students. courtesy of Serena Williams. She should be happy Vassar students only use their words.

Lisa Kudrow ’85: Stayed home watching Friends reruns on DVD to nurse a massive inferiority complex brought on by her status as the Board’s second-most famous member.

Alice Pack Melly ’56: Hasn’t been seen in public since the death of the old Backpage.

Fears free speech may have been squelched.

Isn’t sure though, since she didn’t read the new Backpage last week.

Paula Williams Madison ’74: Had like a bazillion pages of reading to do, and like, a thousand papers to write already. OMG so stressed. Like, on what planet would she have time for a meeting?

John P. Arnhold P’07: Has withdrawn from all activities that don’t involve beer and ugly costumes since joining the frisbee team.

Meryl Streep ’71: Ashamed of recent Julie and Julia weight gain. Does butter really make everything better?

Margaret Venecek Johnson ’84: Out with a touch of H1N1. Should clear up by Saturday, which is good, because Baldwin will be closed this and every weekend.

Barbara Manfrey Vogelstein ’76: Unapologetically slept through it. Homegirl.

Lurita Alexis Doan ’79: Had a film screen-

ing: an excuse which, as we all know, can get you out of absolutely any commitment. No questions asked.

Brooke Duncan III ’74: The Powderkegs IZ BACK!!!!JAZZNIGHT! Didn’t want to miss it.

Diane Downing ’77: Totally lost it when she found out Beyonce didn’t get a callback from the Vastards, busting in on their audition process declaring, “Beyonce had one of the best auditions of all time.” Later apologized to the Vastards on her blog, stating that she felt like Ben Stiller in Meet the Parents.

So the meeting wasn’t a total success.

Clearly the Vassar student body can accept that. But let us not be complacent in this time of economic and cultural doom. We’re on the edge of a precipice and if we as a student body don’t bend our sensibilities toward selfimprovement now, the end is surely in sight.

As Mr. Plapinger iterated, the sustainability of Vassar as an institution hangs in the balance. But we’re not a total failure yet, so next time, VC, let’s try to summon a crowd a little larger than the average attendance at a CDO info session.

—Kelly Stout ’10 is an English major contributing this year to The Miscellany News humor page as well as other sections of the paper.

Weekly Calendar: 9/17 - 9/30

by Kelly Stout

THURSDAY, 9/17

SATURDAY, 9/19

TUESDAY, 9/22

10 a.m. ViCE Ticket Giveaway.

Is it worth skipping Intro Macro to see Grizzly Bear for free, even though you had never heard of them before last week? Quandry.

Chapel Lawn.

12 p.m. Work by Studio Art Majors.

Friends with a studio art major? This is just the first opportunity of many to pretend to be impressed by their mixed media sculptures and abstract portraiture while drinking mediocre wine.

Palmer Gallery.

3 p.m. Tea. Who knew Vertical Horizon was a Christian band? Vassar Christian Fellowship, that’s who!

Rose Parlor.

3 p.m. Tea. Ah, the year starts afresh! Time to decide which clubs to join and then ditch after three weeks!

Rose Parlor.

FRIDAY, 9/18 5 a.m. Outing Club Sunrise Hike.

I will not see you there.

Main Circle.

3 p.m. Tea. In your heart of hearts, do you truly believe joining the College Democrats will bring us closer to universal healthcare? Thought not. Rose Parlor.

SUNDAY, 9/20 10 a.m. Rosh Hashanah Service.

Do the right thing. Your grandma would want you to go.

Aula.

MONDAY, 9/21 3 p.m. Tea. I guess you could give the Feminist Alliance a shot, especially if you were wondering what a feminist actually looks like.

Rose Parlor.

12 p.m. Artful Dodger Lecture.

Please sir, I want some more small cheese cubes and sugar cookies.

FLLAC.

WEDNESDAY, 9/23 3 p.m. Tea. Going to two or three Amnesty International meetings won’t make up for all that non-fair trade coffee you drink.

Rose Parlor.

5:30 p.m. William Starr Freshman Lecture.

What do Billy Collins and Lady Gaga have in common? You might know if you’d done your summer reading (or Wikipedia’d him before the lecture).

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

ey, I’m the kid withthe light-up shoes.

I have many names, but this one works as well as any other. Let me preface this section of my inner most musings by assuring you that you are in for a treat. So, you better read the whole damn thing, and then come back every week for more. Ok? Do we have an Understanding?

This is my first foray into this style of journalism, and I would be lying if I didn’t say I was totally pumped about it. In light of the recent back page backlash, I’m more than ready to lash out with my own brand of stories that will make you giggle and wince, squirm and smile, and a whole host of other visceral and mildly erotic verbs. Today’s story focuses on my drag alter ego, Medea, auditioning for the night owls. It’s delicious.

I promise.

I met Saturday with a bright face, eager eyes, and a few butterflies in my stomach. It was a momentous day in the life of Mitchell.

After being unable to audition for a single comedy or a cappella group last year due to my cousin’s bar mitzvah, I was ready to bust down doors and claim my spot among the musical and comedic elite. Unfortunately things did not go exactly according to plan. Despite my heart wrenching, tear jerking rendition of Alicia Keys’ “If I Ain’t Got You” and my side splitting comedic performances (not so much on that front, but I tried and they should have seen my raw and unbridled potential) I received zero call back. I can’t say it made me want to do cartwheels, but I got over it. Besides, as a strong, independent woman, I don’t let anything get me down. I’m also confident in my ability, and have always considered myself more of a solo act.

Of course my entire day wasn’t mired in loss and rejection. Thanks to a certain in your face, larger-than-life, alter ego of mine, I was able to pull through the day. That’s right fellas, Medea was out to play! MeeYow! Not unlike myself, Medea is also an aspiring vocal artist, and she knew an opportunity when she saw one. She is no fool.

She put on her Saturday best (A knee length couture green sequined gown with an explosion of tinker bell tulle pouring from the hem, and her most demure necklace, which she likes to call the amulet of power.) She hadn’t shaved in a few weeks, but she felt good and isn’t that all that counts ladies?

Can I get an Amen!

Medea didn’t want to be in just any a cappella group. Only the best and most historically rooted gaggle of ladies would do.

(Despite popular belief, Medea is highly invested in the history of this campus. She’s just that kind of lady) If you haven’t guessed already, Medea tried out for the Night Owls.

After sizing up the competition, she confidently cut the line and strutted straight into the audition room under the premise that she had a gynecologist appointment in the near future and would really need to be on her way soon.

The bitch was FIERCE! She wowed the judges with her range, vibrato, bravado, and her rack. She was the full package. She sang “Queen of the Night” from Mozart’s “The Magic Flute” and was proud and confident that her formal training in Vienna had paid off and then some. Knowing in her heart that she was a Night Owl no matter the outcome of the audition, she sashayed out of Davidson Parlor, looked the competition up and down, and wished them good luck. She’s such a good sport like that.

—Mitchell Gilburne ’12 is writing a guest column for The Miscellany News called “The Kid With the Light-Up Shoes.” Look for the second installment in next week’s issue.

ARTS

Page 14

ViCE improves its ticket distribution procedures Erik Lorenzsonn

S

Arts Editor

eeing the popular band Beirut play in the chapel last January is a cherished memory for the Vassar students who attended the Vassar College Entertainment (ViCE)-sponsered concert. Actually getting tickets, however, may not be remembered as fondly.

The morning of Monday, Jan. 26 heralded a line snaking out the front doors of the College Center well beyond the entrance to the College Bookstore. Students waited hours for their turn at the Information Desk, despite having arrived early. While some managed to get tickets, others were told they would have to return later. The second distribution session that afternoon was a similar ordeal. Some even waited up to six hours.

The biggest complaint was that the process was slowed down by students who picked up additional tickets for their friends. Students could show up to five other Vassar College IDs in order to get tickets for those who were not able to stand in line. “My friend stood in line for two hours to get tickets for me,” said Stephanie Donnelly ’11. “But I remember that it was ridiculous that some people brought five IDs with them. I think that was very unfair.”

The ticket distribution for the Beirut concert was a problematic affair, but now ViCE has a chance to redeem itself. On the evening of the Clipse concert on Sept. 4, the organization announced an Oct. 9 concert by indie rock band Grizzly Bear to be held in the Chapel.

Distribution of the highly anticipated event’s tickets began yesterday on the Vassar Chapel Lawn. This time, ViCE has taken measures to make this year’s process a smoother one. For example, the number of IDs that can be held per person has been limited.

“We have learned a lot from the Beirut ticket experience, and we try to make improvements to the system each time,” said ViCE Music Chair Christine Yu ’10 in an e-mailed statement.

“This time, we have instituted limits: one ticket per ID and two different IDs per person.”

Another major shift from last year’s distribution is the change of location from the College Center to the grassy area outside of the Vassar Chapel. “To alleviate the traffic we used

to cause in the College Center, we decided to give out the tickets outside on the Chapel Lawn, which we hope will be a more pleasant waiting experience,” said Yu. It is unlikely that anyone will argue against the Chapel Lawn being more pleasant, but some nevertheless look dubiously upon the change’s logistics. “It’s just going to be chaotic outside,” said Donnelly. “When they gave away tickets in the College Center, the limited space caused one big line. But in front of the Chapel there’s just a lot of lawn. I feel like there will be clumps of people scattered around, you know?

Who’s going to be regulating that?”

As contentious as the new location might be, Yu said that the one factor that will make the distribution decidedly less hectic is the apportionment of tickets over three days’ time. “Last year, we gave out all Beirut tickets on the same day,” said Vice Music Chair Christine Yu ’10.

“Because the concert was so soon after Winter Break, we didn’t really have much choice.”

This time distribution has been divvied up.

Half of the 800 tickets were given away yesterday, 200 more will be distributed today at 10 a.m., and another 200 will be given away tomorrow. In addition, 150 tickets will be sold to via ticketweb.com, and a limited amount of tickets will be for sale at the door.

“We just want to ensure the most fair distribution,” said Yu. “After all, this is a free show for the Vassar community, so everyone who wants to come should have the best possible chance of receiving a ticket. In fact, we are selling fewer tickets to the public this time.”

The Beirut ticket distribution may have been a fiasco, but a giveaway of free tickets may be a more desireable alternative to how ViCE events had been handled in the past.

When MIA came to Vassar in spring of 2008, the show wasn’t free at all. A large portion of the show’s tickets were sold online, and bought up within minutes. And even though the Beirut scenario was a trying experience for most students, there were a few who managed to ascertain tickets through happier means.

“Somebody just gave me a ticket!” said Julia Sisson ’12. “It was very sweet. I originally wasn’t planning on dealing with standing in line, but someone offered me one, so I took it!”

September 17, 2009

A capella rocker to expose students to German music Gabrielle Kotkov

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Guest Reporter

ll over the world, children are growing up listening to the sounds of Lady Gaga, Britney Spears, the Jonas Brothers and other pop phenomena. But the global influence of America is hardly reciprocated. Americans may know the lyrics to “Just Dance” and “Womanizer” by heart, but it is unlikely that they have heard the likes of “Gabi und Klaus” or “Millionär.”

Sebastian Krumbiegel, a member of the intensely popular East German a cappella band, Die Prinzen, is responsible for the aforementioned hits. He will perform at Vassar next Tuesday, giving students the opportunity to experience pop music from the other side of the Atlantic.

Die Prinzen may be a pop band, but all of its members actually have a classical background.

The seven men are former members of the prestigious Thomanerchor, a choir based in Leipzig, Germany that features boy sopranos. The choir, founded in 1212, provides intense musical education and training in a boarding school setting.

Johann Sebastian Bach served as director to the choir from 1723 to 1750, solidifying its worldrenowned reputation. In forming Die Prinzen, Krumbiegel and his fellow band members took their knowledge of classical music and used it to create something new.

“All of the members of Die Prinzen are multiinstrumentalists that perform with an extended pop setting,” wrote Wolfram Hermann, Krumbiegel’s representative, in an e-mailed statement.

“But wasn’t Bach a real pop writer as well?

Some music experts think so.”

New or old, the music of Die Prinzen had a mass appeal to the youth of Germany during the politically-turbulent years of the late ’80s and early ’90s. Very few East German bands were able to continue their careers after Germany’s reunification.

Die Prinzen was a major exception. They enjoyed massive success in German-speaking countries, not only because of their infectious sound but also because of their politicallyaware, sarcastic lyrics.

Visiting Instructor in German Studies Peggy Piesche noted that the members of Die Prinzen were always political, but made an effort to

incorporate their political messages into their music in a way that would not overwhelm their audiences. They didn’t want to become a political band; they wanted to express their views about culture and society in an ironic way that would be easily accessible to young people.

Krumbiegel does put forth a more pointed political message in his solo projects. This musical activism has personal roots for Krumbiegel as he was once the victim of a right-wing, neo-nazi attack. Outside of the musical realm, he has also published a book about the experiences of third-world immigrants fleeing to Germany and the United States. The lyrics of Die Prinzen’s songs, however, speak more lightly about matters that affect everyone. One of their songs questions issues of originals and copies in relation to brand labels of companies, and how one can be an individual in a society in which everything is copied and labeled. Another song pokes fun at contemporary identity in Germany and describes stereotypes about Germans in a very humorous way.

“They’re very easy lyrics, but ironic,” Piesche pointed out. “They stick with you. It’s a very smart concept.”

Everyone, even students who don’t understand German, can experience something unique at Krumbiegel’s concert. Having grown up in East Germany before the fall of the Berlin Wall, Krumbiegel was raised in a society that no longer exists, yet continues to influence his artistic career. Krumbiegel’s music provides a glimpse into a part of history that is more often accessed through history books and newspapers than musical entertainment. The concert can provide students with the experience that is commonplace for so many young people all over the world who don’t speak English: listening to music and not understanding the lyrics— simply absorbing the sounds and the atmosphere.

“We just experienced the death of Michael Jackson, who was world famous,” noted Piesche.

“Young people all over, who didn’t necessarily speak English, loved his songs and danced to his music. You can try that yourself too.”

Sponsored by the German Studies Department, Sebastian Krumbiegel will perform in the Villard Room on Tuesday, Sept. 22, at 7 p.m.

Popular vocalist to sing mixture of modern and classical Carrie Hojnicki

“O

Assistant Arts Editor

Kathleen Mehocic/The Miscellany News

h. My. God. I love Christine Howlett, ” said Choir Librarian Andrew Gaines ’12 in a breathless fit of appreciation. Gaines’ sentiments are not uncommon among students who have had the opportunity to study or work with the Assistant Professor of Music and Director of Choral Activities.

Much to the joy of her adoring students, Howlett will showcase her vocal prowess with a faculty concert this Friday, Sept. 18 at 8 p.m. in the Skinner Hall of Music.

Accompanying Howlett will be the Chatham-Wood duo, consisting of violinist Patrick Wood and pianist Holly Chatham.

Although this combination—made up of voice, violin and piano—seems to be of ordinary composition, the three musicians actually had trouble finding 19th and 20th century music to suit their concert needs.

“When we first decided to do this concert, we had trouble finding music for the grouping of voice, pianist and violin. A lot of times this is difficult because with older music one finds [arrangements for] voice, piano and cello,” explained Howlett.

Discouraging at first, this lack of music actually opened doors for Howlett and her two accompanists, as several composers were willing to tailor music to their needs. One such composer was Vassar’s own Professor of Music Richard Wilson.

“That is one of the exciting things about this concert.

Richard Wilson composed two pieces for us and an English composer, Tarik O’Regan, has also arranged something that we will be playing. In a way, it’s actually good because we have composers who have written especially for us,” explained Wood.

Further enhancing the uniqueness of this concert, the pieces composed by Wilson are set to poetry written by Vassar Professor Emeritus of English Eamon Grennan.

Friday night will mark the premiere of these two compositions, entitled “Couple” and “Swifts over Dublin.” Howlett

praised Grennan’s poetry as having a quality that makes them easily adaptable to beautiful music.

“They are full of rich musical ideas, and the poetry is stunning,” said Howlett of Grennan’s poems.

Although these modern compositions are a large part of Friday’s program, the concert will also feature a wealth of romantic French pieces by composers including Fauré and Poulenc, which Howlett describes as one of her favorite genres to perform. She attributes some of this appreciation to her Canadian heritage.

“I am definitely a big fan of French music,” explained Howlett.

“Gabriel Fauré and Francis Poulenc—I really love them; that’s why they’re on the program. They really suit my personality and voice, and they are stunning to perform,” she continued. “Because I’m Canadian, I had a good deal of French in school. And I think that’s why I really enjoy this music—because I’ve had this French repertoire.”

As Vassar’s Director of Choral Activities, Howlett’s performance will likely be well-attended by her adoring students. Students like Gaines, a member of the Vassar College Choir, hope to show Howlett their support at Friday’s concert.

“I feel like Christine gives a lot to us and devotes a lot of time and effort and energy to us, so that it will be really nice for us to pay that back to her by showing support at her concert,” said Gaines endearingly.

Howlett also sees the importance of having students at her concert, but from a less sentimental standpoint.

“I think it’s important to do the faculty concert; students need to see that you can do it,” she explained. “I don’t do this outside of Vassar too much, so this is an excellent opportunity to perform in a concert setting.”

After Friday’s performance, Howlett and the ChathamWood duo are taking their program to perform throughout New Jersey, stopping first for in Summit, N.J. for the Lile Hall concert series, a series founded by Wood and Chatham.

Choir Librarian Christie Howlett is well-loved by peers and students alike. She will be performing this Friday in the Skinner Hall of Music.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

September 17, 2009

ARTS

Page 15

Workshops provide fledgling directors with experience Christie Musket Guest Reporter

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Christie Musket/The Miscellany News

ust try it, and see how it feels,” says Jason Simon ’13, one of the 11 student directors participating in the upcoming Philalatheis Directing Workshops. “We can try a whole bunch of things.” With that advice, his cast of five other students jumps right into the first scene. Even though they have only had a few rehearsals, some of the actors have already started memorizing their lines, and the others all interact with confidence and familiarity. The students only have two weeks to put together a 10 to 15 minute play of their choice, so the usual directing and memorizing process is accelerated. Everything needs to happen at a faster pace.

Simon sits quietly in the front row of chairs in the classroom in Rockefeller Hall where they have chosen to rehearse. He watches his actors intently, barely glancing at the open script of Carol Lashof’s “Medusa’s Tale” that is lying in front of him. “It’s a retelling of the Medusa myth, about how she came to be,” Simon explained in an earlier interview. “Back in high school, [this play] caught my eye, and I really wanted to do it, but it wasn’t really appropriate for high school.

Now I finally have a chance.”

He lets the actors run through a large portion of the script uninterrupted, allowing them to get a feel for it. Only occasionally does he give silent cues to actors offstage. When he finally does ask them to stop, he begins his commentary with something positive that he thinks the actors did well and then moves on to what he thinks could be changed or improved.

“I try to direct the way I think I’ve best been directed,” says Simon, who directed in an event similar to the Directing Workshops in high school and has done a fair amount of acting since. “I try to take the best of what I’ve experienced and put my own spin on it. I think it makes for kind of strange directing—there are a couple of people who have looked at me like I have three heads,” he says with a laugh, “but I think I’ve had enough experience with different directing styles that I can sort of start to make my own style, which is pretty cool.”

Something that differentiates the workshops

from larger productions is the fact that they don’t have a budget. The implications are that a fully-rounded piece is not expected, but that a minimalistic piece that tests a director’s skills is. All applicants are told from the get-go that they will be operating under limited conditions when it comes to set, lights, sound, props and costumes. Julia McGill ’13, was informed about these technical limitations when her application was accepted for the Directing Workshops.

Like a few others in the group of 11, she worked around such creative obstacles by directing a self-written play, “Alex and Amy.” “It’s basically about two very different people, high school seniors about to go off to college, and they realize that they’re actually kind of the same,” she explained with a smile, pushing back a lock of her fiery orange hair.

McGill wrote “Amy and Alex” when she attended a summer playwriting workshop at the Manhattan Theater Club in New York City two years ago. “I got a lot of feedback…and I got to see [my work] read by different people, and by actors in the final project, and now I’m going to try to direct it,” she said eagerly. “I think it might be easier to direct it since I wrote it. I can change it if I want to.”

McGill was born in New York and moved to Brazil when she was six, where she found far fewer opportunities for drama and theater.“It came to a point where I was thinking, ‘What serious thing can I see myself doing?’ and all I could think of was something in the realm of acting,” she explained. So she applied and was accepted to a performing arts high school in New York City and graduated with a major in drama.

“I started liking [directing] more than just acting,” she said. “I’m so excited to be directing.

Now I get to have my own actors,” she laughed.

The Directing Workshops not only provide valuable experience for first-time directors, but also open up the opportunity to direct larger Philaletheis projects in the future. Emmaline KeddyHector ’11 is a drama major who hopes to do just that. She is directing a one-act play called “Eye to Eye” by Christopher Graybill for the Workshops. While this is the first time that she has participated in a Philaletheis production, she

Zach Nanus and Amy Corenswet, both Class of 2013, rehearse “At Least a Place to Visit,” a short play by Isabella Batts ’12. The play is just one of many in the Directing Workshops. has stage managed multiple productions for the Drama Department, such as last fall’s “Three Sisters.” Last year she also co-directed the Drama Department’s production of “Metamorphosis.”

“Eye to Eye” is about “two people at the end of a day that did not go very well,” Keddy-Hector said simply. “I was looking for a show that had no design elements, and I was looking for a small cast…I wanted to work with a small group of people, and I kept going back to this one.” She continued, “I joke when I’m stage managing, saying ‘If I were the director, I would do this,’ because the stage manager’s role isn’t to have creative input. I’m excited to have a piece that has my creative input.” Philalatheis Executive Manager and Vice President Kathryn Kozlark ’11 also directed in the Workshops, a requirement for Philaletheis members if they wish to direct a full-length play.

“The Workshops have been going on for at least 10 years and started out as only studentwritten and student-directed pieces,” said Kozlark. “But since then it has developed more into just a scene or an act of a larger work.” Though it is no longer required, many of the student

workshops this year are in fact student-written, and another of the directors, Lia Dykstra ’12, has written her own play, entitled “Facebook.” It is “a satire of the website Facebook, told in a manner reminiscent of ’50s and ’60s [era] educational filmstrips,” explained Dykstra. “Although it is a satire, there’s not really any sort of message for my piece; maybe it will make people realize how silly Facebook is sometimes. But overall, I just want people to laugh and have fun with it.”

The other students directing are Gilad Thaler ’13, directing “The Dining Room” by A.R. Gurney; Violet Edelman ’12 directing “Watermelon Boats” by Wendy Mclaughlin; Hannah Ehrenberg ’13 directing “Dinner with Friends” by Donald Margulies; Anne Sando ’10 directing “The Bear” by Anton Chekhov; Jake Levitt ’12 directing “Angels in America: Millennium Approaches” by Tony Kushner; Daniel Rajunov ’12 directing a self-written play, “On a Particle of Dust”; and finally Isabella Batts ’12 directing a self-written play, “At Least a Place to Visit.” The Workshops will be held on Thursday, Sept. 17 and Friday, Sept. 18 at 8 p.m. “There are different workshops each night,” specifies Kozlark.

Cabaret a casual, spontaneous show Morgan Namian Guest Writer

Bambrick blogs art, graphic design Wally Fisher

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Guest Writer

assar, art and humility rarely seem to coexist in the minds of Vassar students. Yet despite its pretentious appearances, the Vassar art scene is home to a number of individuals who manage to possess both talent and tact.

Rhys Bambrick ’11 is one of them.

Bambrick’s work appears all over campus, though unsigned. He is responsible for various DJ Olmec (Nick Inzucchi ’11) posters, the current window décor of the VSA office windows, the Josselyn House hoodie and the dowel-ribbon sculptures that were erected around campus last year, among other things.

Despite the popularity and prevalence of his art, Bambrick maintains a humble mantra: “I’m in college; I’m not yet an artist.” He calls himself a student-artist because education is his top priority at Vassar. “I’m here to learn,” Bambrick said. “That’s what I get the most excitement out of.”

As a student, the five-class schedule he registers for every semester receives the majority of his time. And he takes his position on the rugby team equally seriously, citing the importance of an athletic outlet in life.

“I actually enjoy getting out there,” he remarks about playing the tough sport, in spite of the physical toll of participation. There are times following games when Bambrick is too sore to stand for long periods of time at an easel. He is quick to add about the exhaustion, “I really embrace it.”

With responsibilities elsewhere, Bambrick says, “There are definitely times when art falls onto the back-burner.” He cannot always create personal art pieces on top of those assigned for homework and those required for the bi-weekly multiple-hours-long critiques, where studio

art majors must present their work. These mandatory assignments aren’t the ones that build on his reputation. Last year, Bambrick started commercial work, such as posters and merchandise, to spread the word about his art.

This year, he struggles to find time for such arduous pursuits. “Posters require commissions,” Bambrick noted.

Thus, with any free time he scrounges up, Bambrick chooses to pursue drawing. “One of my favorite things is just doing figure drawings,” he said.

He accordingly spent some of his summer drawing bars in Sydney, Australia.

Also, this past summer, Bambrick saw a mural on a Brooklyn apartment building that melds with his current view of art. “I really believe in just putting art out there,” he says. Like putting a mural in the middle of a city block, Bambrick tries to make his surroundings more visually interesting through his poster-work as well as his placement of sculptures. “If you see something typed in Word, you pass over it,” he explains. Thus he tries to utilize dynamic imagery and typography that can be otherwise ignored. This encouragement of interactivity is further illustrated through his blog, grhyzzly.wordpress.com. He posts, “Come see my new sculpture on the quad, get inside it (if you can limbo), and get some color.” The blog also serves as a medium for communication of images of his artwork. This digitalization doesn’t deter him. “I don’t think it gets altered by being put on the Internet,” he explained.

Currently, he is meditating on his future.

“I need to begin to think about where my art career might take me,” he said. He has a conflict over choosing graphic design or finer art.

While he loves the latter, he says, “As an artist these days, you need something more to say.”

I

magine that there is a kid dressed as a caricaturized city slicker in the Susan Stein Shiva Theater. He’s finishing up a passionate lip-sync to an undoubtedly homemade Joy Division/ Journey mash up in the middle of the theater’s recognizable black box set. On the bleachers sit students having a good time: chattering, laughing and generally enjoying the silliness. It wouldn’t matter if you had only a few personal acquaintances in the whole room. This is an atmosphere of inclusion.

Inclusion is exactly what Philaletheis hopes to emphasize with the first of their semi-annual Cabarets on Saturday, Sept. 19 at 9 p.m. These shows make for a very casual and fun Vaudevillean theater-going experience, which differs from the often-serious Vassar drama scene.

Weeks before the curtain rises on a variety of drama projects on campus, Philaletheis’ producing board accepts proposals from any individual who wants to produce a play or theatrical event. After a proposal is accepted, the organization provides support and resources for those interested in student theater. Cabaret night is a decidedly less beaurocratic affair.

This particular brand of cabaret is “a very open, non-judgmental arena for artists to express themselves in any way they choose,” said Philalethesis Executive Manager and Vice President Kathryn Kozlark ’11, who has been working with Philaletheis for three years. This proves to give a distinctly Vassarian feel to the tradition of cabaret—one of humor, creativity and last minute talent.

In the past, themes have included CabaHeroes, Caba-Villains and Caba-Royalty. While the theme oftentimes steers the nature of the performances, acts do not necessarily have to conform to it. This year the theme is CabaDowntown, meaning the night is sure to have plenty of metropolitan motifs.

The evening consists of a variety of different acts that wouldn’t ordinarily make it to the stage at Vassar, including things like lip-syncs,

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

dances, dating how-tos and even Facebook wall-post readings. “Our Cabaret is much more a way for people in the theater community, and maybe people that aren’t in the theater community, to do performances in a way they would never be able to do otherwise,” said Production Manager Danielle Morvant ’10.

Furthermore, the theme doesn’t necessarily define what attendees will see, which adds even more to the mystery and draw of the event. As of right now, the list of performances has yet to be finalized. There are, however, several groups that frequent Philaletheis’ cabarets.

In past years, such groups have included Improv, Air Cappella and Sexual Sexual Dance Collectif, which is “an underground dance troupe that dances ludely,” says Kozlark.

Morvant says that this particular cabaret is a bit out of character compared to the organization’s usual fare. “Philaletheis prides itself in being professional,” she says. “Cabaret is the one time the executive board and general body are able to relax a little bit.”

As a result, the evening leaves lasting impressions on the hearts, minds, and even parents of attendees and performers alike. “Our first semester show last year correlated with Parents Weekend, which was kind of hilarious,” says Kozlark, remembering last fall’s nearly disastrous outcome. “It’s not necessarily a parentfriendly event; it’s on the risqué side.”

The zaniness often overshadows Cabaret’s underlying principle of making a major drama organization seem a little more accesible to newcomers. Morvant recalls her first cabaret experience as one that adhered to Phil’s general welcome of newcomers and made her feel less intimidated.

“I remember my very first semester freshman year when I wasn’t even a part of the theater community yet, feeling that it was such a unifying experience for the people involved,” said Morvant. “It’s really just a party and a way for people to act silly. We have a dance party immediately following. It’s just a mess, fun and enjoyable.”

ARTS September 17, 2009 Liberian peace movement subject of stirring documentary Page 16

Esther Clowney Guest Reporter

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Coutesy of Peggy Piesche

ysistrata, the heroine of the ancient Greek play that takes her name, forces an end to the Peloponnesian war by organizing women to deny their husbands the pleasures of a loving bed until the men stop fighting. Leymah Gbowee hadn’t read “Lysistrata” when she became a peace activist during the Liberian Civil War, but she decided to employ the same strategy.

“We were so desperate for peace,” she explains in the documentary Pray the Devil Back to Hell, “we were going to have a sex strike.”

While the strike depicted in “Lysistrata” ends up exacerbating the relationship between men and women, Gbowee’s tactical maneuver gave a degree of power back to the Liberian women and made peace a common goal between the sexes.

In 2003, inspired by a dream and fed up after 14 years of civil war in Liberia, Gbowee led a coalition of Christian and Muslim women in a courageous protest for peace. Gbowee’s movement, which paved the way for the first democratic election of a female head of state in Africa, is the focus of the 2008 documentary Pray the Devil Back to Hell. Gbowee will be speaking with Gini Reticker, the film’s Emmy Award-winning director, at Vassar on Sept. 24.

The film screening and lecture come as part of Vassar’s first annual Peace Week, an event organized by the Women’s Studies Program in celebration of the United Nation’s International Peace Day taking place on Sept. 21.

“We want to deliver the message that peace takes tenacity. It’s a process, not an event,” says Director of the Women’s Studies Program and Associate Professor of History Lydia Murdoch.

For Gbowee and the market women, as the women she led came to be called, this process has taken years. After becoming too large and vocal a group to ignore, the women convinced Liberian president Charles Taylor to attend peace talks with enemy warlords in Ghana. Gbowee brought members of her grassroots movement to Ghana to supervise the talks. When she realized that the warring factions were not coming

up with a solution, she organized a sit-in and physically refused to allow the negotiating parties to leave the building.

“I kept expecting the film to follow a conventional narrative arch, to end with victory,” says Murdoch. “But even after the election of [Liberian President] Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, you see that these women are constantly on call. They are working on demilitarization. They are trying to assimilate ex-child soldiers back into society.”

For the most part, today’s wars are not fought between standing armies.

“Wars are fought between rival gangs, and civilians are the targets,” said Reticker. “Rape is a poor man’s B-52 bomber. With rape, you can terrorize a village.”

“There’s no such thing as an idealized domestic space that’s safe from war,” Murdoch said.

In Liberia, children were not only in danger of becoming casualties; they were recruited and trained as child soldiers.

Reticker’s film, culled from many sources after the events depicted took place, explores women in war not only as victims but also as agents of change.

“Women play a very under-recognized role in war,” said Reticker. “People still tend to think of them as collateral damage. Gbowee is an incredible speaker and storyteller, but she’s also just a regular person. I like making movies about normal people who accomplish extraordinary things.”

Peace Week includes other events intended to bring peace work within reach for students and community members. On Sept. 3, the Office of Fellowships and Pre-Health Advising is organizing a Panel on Student Fellowships for Peace, which will provide information on getting funding for peace work. A students’ roundtable on Sept. 25 will provide a forum for organizations and individuals who have experience in the field to provide their perspectives on peace work.

“Peace isn’t just about quiet meditation,” Murdoch said. “It is not about effacing oneself.

Peace means speaking out and being vocal.”

In that vein, the Office of Religious and Spiri-

Leymah Gbowee is one of the subjects of the documentary Pray the Devil Back to Hell, which will be screened as part of the Women’s Studies Program’s Peace Week on Sept. 24. tual Life organized the Peace is Loud vigil on Sept. 21. Rev. Petero Sabune ’77, a native of Uganda and the chaplain at Sing Sing Correctional Facility in Ossining, N.Y., will lead a drumming circle and naming ceremony honoring peace workers and victims of violence.

Before producer Abigail Disney stumbled upon the story, the influence of the market women seemed destined to remain in obscurity forever. But since Pray the Devil Back to Hell

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premiered in 2008 the market women have fianlly been getting recognition; they collectively won a 2009 JFK Profile in Courage Award.

The film will be screened on Tuesday, Sept. 22 at 5 p.m. in the Rosenwald Film Theater. There will be an open reception with Gbowee and Reticker on Thursday, September 24, at 4 p.m. in Swift Hall. They will present their lecture, titled “Women, War, and Peace,” in Sanders Auditorium at 5:30 p.m.

September 17, 2009

ARTS

Page 17

Summer’s batch of singles hit the right note S

ummer 2009 has come and gone, and if you’re like me, all you have are hazy memories and a bunch of lame pop songs stuck in your head. So in an attempt to exorcize these tunes from my cranium, here are four tracks from across the musical spectrum whose only overarching similarity is that I heard them in someone’s car at some point this summer.

Maybe 20 years from now, when we’re all overweight and finally done with grad school, these songs will remind me of what it was like to be 19 again. Or maybe I’ll play them for my children in a vain attempt to prove that I was cool once. Either way, here they are, the jams of Summer ’09.

I’m not afraid to admit it: I used to like emo.

Anyone who grew up in the New York metropolitan area between 2001 and 2006 will back me up on this. Emo, and all its permutations, were the alternative music choice if you were in your early teens, and all across the suburbs—Long Island, Jersey and many more— the scene was booming.

But not even a decade later, the only band that has stuck with me from that phase is Brand New. On their 2003 album Deja Entendu, they eclipsed their Long Island contemporaries with music that mixed the moody lyrics of the Get Up Kids with the sonic ambitions of Radiohead and Wilco.

Their fourth album is due out at the end of this month, and the first single “At The Bottom” sounds a lot like the band’s third record: dark, densely layered and angry as hell. There’s more guitars than I can count; there’s an army of vocal tracks—screams, yelps and whispers.

And at the end of a song, you feel like you’ve just been kicked in the head. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

While Brand New’s emotive rhythms brought me back to my bar mitzvah years, it was far removed from the pop music that ruled the radio this summer. Jason Derulo, on the other hand, is the poster boy for that brand of bombastic hip-hop. There are plenty

of young rappers who are using autotune to sing their own hooks, and Jason Derulo isn’t the first. I’m pretty sure that kid who was on Degrassi had three hit singles this summer alone. Derulo is already tasting the same kind of success with “Watcha Say,” a radio-ready slice of synth-hop that samples its hook—and most of its redeeming qualities—from “Hide And Seek” by Imogen Heap.

The original track was a poignant and contemplative break-up song. “Watcha Say” is a shiny, robotic monstrosity. Producer J. R. Rotem—the musical force behind Sean Kingston—knows how to take a good chord progression and milk it for everything it’s worth, something he does too well on “Watcha Say.” Amidst the throngs of computerized keyboards and pitch-corrected vocals, the singular beauty of the original gets lost. Unfortunately for Rotem and Derulo, some songs are better left alone, not butchered and packaged for mass market consumption.

In direct contrast to Derulo’s pop-rap, The Wu Tang Clan is still alive and spreading their brand of vintage east-coast rap. Almost every member of the Wu Tang Clan has at least one outstanding solo record, and Raekwon’s was 1995’s Only Built 4 Cuban Linx. Nearly 15 years later, the sequel is finally being released. The album has been stuck in record label purgatory since 2006, and hungry Wu fans have been salivating at the thought of a return to form for Raekwon.

If “House Of Flying Daggers” featuring Inspectah Deck, Ghostface Killah and Method Man is any indication, Only Built For Cuban Linx... Pt. II should not disappoint. The track is vintage Wu Tang, straight out of Staten Island 1994, with cinematic strings and Kung Fu movie samples courtesy of the late J Dilla.

Everyone is up to form, especially Ghostface Killah, who seems to relish every chance he gets to spit his wild, imaginative verse, even if it’s only for a guest spot.

Raekwon isn’t too shabby himself, and In-

spectah Deck opens the song with a classic Wu Tang line. “I pop off like a mobster boss / Angel hair with the lobster sauce,” he says with a vengeance, and any real Wu fan will know exactly what he means. The streets are dark; the life is dangerous, but Deck’s just chilling, counting his riches and enjoying his grub. If there’s one thing the men of the Wu Tang do best, it’s telling a story, and Rae’s new album looks like it will be filled with plenty more tales from the storied slums of Shaolin.

And in the indie-rock realm, one band epitomized the lo-fi aesthetic that ruled the blogs this summer, and that band was Japandroids.

Though Japandroids haven’t actually released any singles from their spectacular debut, PostNothing, the album is probably my favorite of the year so far. The Vancouver band only has two members, but they get more mileage out of guitars and drums than most bands get out of a full set-up.

“Wet Hair” is only one of the nine great tracks off of Post-Nothing, and it features everything that I love about this record. The guitar is drenched in so much fuzz that it sounds like an orchestra; the drum set is attacked with merciless energy; the vocals capture every bit of the teenage angst that the lyrics glorify. The duo’s voices become indistinguishable as they sing, “She had wet hair / Say what you will / I don’t care / I couldn’t resist it,” and anyone who was a 16-year-old boy instantly knows what they’re talking about.

And if you can’t imagine resisting the girl with the wet hair, then you can’t possibly imagine resisting Japandroids. If the rest of the young lo-fi bands making music these days had as much enthusiasm and naive glee as Japandroids, the world would be a much better place.

—Martin Bergman ’12 is a prospective film and philosophy major living in Jewett House and writing a bi-weekly column on recently released albums.

Vassar’s comedy preview night, done right Erik Lorenzonn

T

Arts Editor

he name of the game was to find a rhyme for the name “Emily” while freestyle rapping. The result?

“Got married to my cousin, like to keep it in the…” spat Sam Caravaglia ’12, to a beat dropped by his fellow members of the comedy ensemble Improv Everywhere.

“Family!” cried the audience packed in Sanders Classroom 212 before raucously cheering for the winner of the comedy troupe’s rap battle. The opening act of Friday night’s comedy preview show ended with last-man-standing Caravaglia jubilantly high-fiving front-row audience members. “Family” and “Emily”? Not quite perfect, but it would have to suffice.

The night was still young and already the show was a hit. This was surely good news for the five comedy troupes performing. The entire purpose of the show was to pique the interest of potential comedians in the crowd and goad them into showing up at company auditions the following day.

They had plenty of prospects to choose from. The cliché of sardines in a can came to mind when I first beheld the crowd. There wasn’t an empty seat in the house. Students sat in the aisles, and new arrivals were being herded onto the stage itself. Can you say fire hazard?

As I acclimated myself to the overly-intimate seating arrangements, however, I picked up on heavy vibes of expectation. The audience seemed optimistic that laughter was in the cards as they clapped along to the Modest Mouse song playing over the speakers. Vassar is without a doubt a college willing to sacrifice comfort for the sake of a good show.

And the openers Improv Everywhere cer-

tainly delivered the goods. The Whose Line Is It Anyway?-style comedy was a no-fail act, winning the audience over with its spontaneity. In my mind, though, it was the follow-up act No Offense that was the cream of the comedic crop.

Their first skit was funny enough, detailing the tumultuous relationship between Ben and Jerry (“I’ve been seeing Häagen-Daas!”). The real winner of their set took place in God’s personal office, where a secretary named Gina (Andi Sharavsky ’11) helps the man upstairs himself (Danny Galvin ’12) deal with a hangover and the repercussions of a night that got out of control.

“I think I might have created a remake of Melrose Place?” groaned God at one point.

“What was I thinking?”

Later, an irate Satan stormed onto the stage.

“You puked on my bed!” screamed Daniel Rajunov ’12, playing the Prince of Darkness.

“You were in the bathroom, and you came into my room and you puked all over my bed! I had to bunk with Gabriel! I was little spoon!”

Between acts, a girl could be heard above the buzz of the crowd: “Oh, I loved that.” The audible comment got as much laughter and applause as any of the night’s punchlines.

The Limit was up next, and took no time proving themselves to be sketch-comedy heavyweights as well. Their piece about hicks discussing the birds and the bees was a little trite, but hilarious nonetheless. My favorite bit of theirs wasn’t live comedy at all but a Youtube video projected onto the auditorium’s movie screen about two stoners (Seth Biberstein ‘10 and Matt Leonard ‘11) who are granted a wish from a genie: “I wished for a bong that when you ripped

it, it would play the best song ever.”

“Can’t argue with that!”

The subsequent torching of the bong was set to Aerosmith’s “Don’t Want to Miss a Thing.” I could have died laughing. As much as the video tickled the collective funny bone of the audience, it also incited the only booing of the evening. The audience good-naturedly voiced disapproval at a disclaimer at the end of the clip revealing that “No actual marijuana was used in the making of this film.”

Happily Ever Laughter (HEL) was a smash with the multimedia as well. Andrew Massey ’12 played a hapless doctor walking the audience through the wonders of childbirth in a video entitled The Miracle of Birth: Part 3.

Massey was perfectly vacuous, and the mockbirthing with a basketball left the auditorium gasping for air. HEL also killed with their live comedy. I have never seen senior citizens coupled with such graphic sexual dialogue.

The all-female comedy troupe Indecent Exposure was the only one to delve into standup. Having seen my fair share of Dane Cook and Demetri Martin, I have grown to hate stand-up, but I still have to tip my hat to any monologue ending with a quote as bizarre as this: “Nick was crying, I was crying, this woman’s baby was still crying on the monitor, I was surrounded by Simpsons memorabilia and there was an albino python in a cage in front of me.

Don’t take candy from strangers.”

Once the show ended, I listened to chatter as I filed out of Sanders Classroom. Most people were ecstatically gushing over the show, with only the occasional nay-sayer.

As for myself, I will giggle whenever I listen to Aerosmith from now on. The damage has been done.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

“300 every night before I go to bed to get me pumped up.

I’m not lying.”

Andrew Massey ’12

“Atonement. It was good. I fell asleep.”

Meghan Feldmeier ’13 “Gang Land.

It’s a History Channel show about the history of gangs.

I’m a dork, but I like to get my fill of action, too.”

Jonathan Wood ’12

“The seasons mournfully changing.”

Sam Caravaglia ‘12

“Glee. My friends and I decided that it’s the show with no filter.

Dana Cass ’11

“Like, oh my god, haven’t you heard Gossip Girl is back? xoxo, Casey.”

Casey Katims ’10 —Carrie Hojnicki, Assistant Arts Editor

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September 17, 2009

SPORTS

Page 19

UNLV Athletics cuts hypocritical Brian Bianchetti using his head, scoring goals and unethical Mitchell Gilburne Guest Writer

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Nik Trkulja

Guest Columnist

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Eric Schuman/The Miscellany News

he date is Tuesday, Sept. 8, 2009. Brian Bianchetti ’10, a streak of ginger lightening, charges towards the enemy goal. Fierce and fearless, he receives Harrison Freund’s ’12 brutal corner kick; undaunted by the hurtling orb of black and white, Bianchetti executes a flawless header—scoring the first and only goal in Tuesday’s game between the Brewers and Mount Saint Mary College.

Soccer has always been an integral component of Bianchetti’s reality. Since his dawning stardom at the young age of five, Bianchetti has been unable to conceive of a life without the game. An athlete from elementary school all the way up through his time as a Vassar undergraduate, Bianchetti has experienced soccer as more than a simple recreation. This commitment to the sport and to his team has aided him in becoming an encouraging and respected captain.

Bianchetti attributes much of the team’s success to his coaches, Andrew Jennings and Nathan Gibboney, and cites them as his source of inspiration. When pressed about who his professional role models are, Bianchetti coyly admits, “David Beckham inspires my underwear choices.”

Over the course of Bianchetti’s tenure at Vassar, he has witnessed the soccer team’s tremendous growth in both performance and attitude. “We have gotten better in terms of commitment, success, attitude of the team and-- taking things more seriously,” he shares with an air of humble pride and a pinch of excitement. This excitement, of course, stems

from the distinct possibility that the Brewers will make the Liberty League playoffs this year—a triumph that Bianchetti does not hesitate to attribute to the dedication and skill of his coaches.

This season, Bianchetti leads the team in terms of number of goals scored, two of them being game-winning goals.

During the 2008 season, Bianchetti started in all 16 regular season games and led the team, and Liberty League, offensively with 10 goals.

During his junior year, Bianchetti was a two-time Liberty League Offensive Performer of the Week. As a sophomore, Bianchetti touted the same title as leading goal scorer in the fall of 2007. He was named to the AllLeague Second team during the 2007 and 2008 seasons.

When asked what he will miss most after graduation, Bianchetti did not need to think long before deciding on his team and the time he spends with them.

As a captain, Bianchetti is a both a mentor and a friend to the younger players. He is an anchor for the team, and, like any good anchor, he isn’t looking forward to moving on anytime soon.

Bianchetti has no doubt that competitive sports will always play a major role in his life regardless of whether he is on the field or in the stands. In the meanwhile, he has an entire season of goal-shattering, game-winning headers to look forward to.

To catch this ginger flash in action, head over to the soccer fields on Sunday, Sept. 20 to watch the Brewers crush Drew University.

Brian Bianchetti ’10 takes his soccer inspiration from his coaches and teammates.

This year’s national football forecast A season for unexpected record-breaking Andy Marmer

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Guest Reporter

t’s football season, so everyone on campus is undoubtedly getting ready to watch the undefeated Vassar Brewers take the field.

Well, maybe not. Even though the College does not have a team, it shouldn’t stop you from getting your fall football fix; after all, what is football without incorrect speculations? So why watch ESPN when you can read my divinations right here? Without further fanfare, I now present my predictions.

1. Tim Tebow will win the Heisman Trophy and lead the University of Florida to another National Championship. Just in case two national championships and a Heisman Trophy wasn’t enough, Tebow and the Gators should win one more, making him the most accomplished College Football player of all time.

2. The Gators will beat the University of Southern California (USC) in the title game.

There is no reason USC should lose to anyone on their schedule. They are the strongest team in the Pacific-10, and they’ll prove that this year. It’s hard to pick anyone in the mediocre Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), Big 10 or Big East to make the title game. Nor is it likely that any Southeastern Conference (SEC) team other than Florida can find their way into the big game. That leaves the Big 12 and, much like last year, those teams will beat each other. This means that an undefeated USC will slip into the title game.

3. The Mountain West and Western Athletic Conference will each crash the Bowl Championship Series. Boise State and Utah will each earn BCS bowl bids. Boise State will take on Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, while Utah and Oklahoma square off in the Fiesta Bowl. The other BCS bowls will feature Penn State and Texas in the Rose Bowl, and Virginia Tech against Pittsburgh in the Orange Bowl. This would mean that the two teams who have most recently lost to non-BCS schools would play the last two schools who have won those games. I would like Oklahoma and Boise State to win their games, as well as Texas and Pittsburgh.

4. The third-best Conference will be the Mountain West. While they don’t have the name recognition of other conferences, with the exception of the SEC and the Big 12, Mountain West will be the best conference in college football. The Pacific-10 and Big 10 each have one great team, USC and Penn State respectively, but I’ll take Brigham Young University, Texas Christian University and Utah over the top three in any conference. Oregon and California have already started to fall off in the Pacific-10; while Ohio State and Iowa, the presumed second and third best teams in the Big 10, have looked poor to say the least.

No one is even taking the Big East serious-

“No one is talking about the Vikings, and I don’t understand why.” ly—and rightfully so. They don’t have a single team that could beat any of the three Mountain West leaders. While the ACC has many solid teams, I’m not sold on Virginia Tech, Miami or Florida State being better than any of those three teams.

5. In the professional world, Adrian Peterson will win both an NFL MVP and a Super Bowl. The Vikings are the team that no one is talking about, and I don’t understand why.

In Antoine Winfield, they arguably have the best cornerback in the league. Adrian Peterson is everyone’s top running back. The Williams’ wall—defensive tackles Kevin and Pat Williams—make up the best unit at that position in the league.

Chad Greenway and EJ Henderson lead a very solid group of linebackers. Sure, Brad Childress hasn’t been the greatest NFL coach

so far, but with Brett Favre under-center, the Vikings are the most talented team in the NFL and my pick to hoist the Lombardi Trophy. As for retiring, I make no guarantees that Favre won’t come back.

6. The Vikings will beat the Baltimore Ravens, another team that is not getting the attention they deserve, in the Super Bowl.

Baltimore returned most of their key players from last year’s AFC runner-up. Last year, the Ravens finished the season with six losses, including three to Pittsburgh; something tells me that won’t happen again.

7. Both Super Bowl teams will be wildcard teams. Division winners will be the Pittsburgh Steelers, New England Patriots, Tennessee Titans and San Diego Chargers. The Indianapolis Colts and Baltimore Ravens will win the wildcard spots. The Ravens will beat the Titans, while the Colts will beat the Chargers. The Ravens will then beat the Steelers and Colts in the next two rounds.

Meanwhile, in the NFC, the Packers, Eagles, Saints, 49ers, Vikings and Bears will make the playoffs, with the seeding in that order. The Bears and Vikings will win their first games.

The Vikings will then beat the Eagles, while the Packers defeat the Bears. In the deciding game, Brett Favre and the Vikings will win the NFC championship on the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field.

8. Adrian Peterson will break the Singleseason Rushing Record. Last year, Peterson ran for over 1,700 yards with Gus Ferrotte and Tavaris Jackson at quarterback. Now they have Brett Favre, one of the greatest quarterbacks of all-time. While Favre is not as good as he once was, he still has a strong arm to force defenses to respect the pass, something the Vikings lacked last year. With defenses now playing Peterson honest, he should be able to break Eric Dickerson’s single-season record of 2,105 yards.

These are just my predictions. I am not an expert. I don’t know if I’m right or wrong, but this is what I think will happen; this is what I’m looking out for. Ladies and gentlemen, enjoy your pigskin.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

t has now become an all-too-familiar storyline: facing massive budget cuts, schools have slowly but steadily been carving away at their athletic departments. From media guides to entire programs, nothing has been off-limits, but it seems that finally one school has gone a little too far.

In July, the University of Nevada Las Vegas (UNLV) announced yet another round of budget cuts to cover a new $1.1 million decrease in its state-approved operating budget. After excising the simple things such as complimentary coffee (a savings of $5,900) and the more complex lighting costs associated with nighttime practices (around $20,000 worth of savings), the Athletic Department took one step too far.

In an unprecedented move, UNLV decided to put cost-cutting ahead of student-athletes’ health and moved to do away with primary health insurance for its walk-on student-athletes. The decision has saved UNLV a grand total of around $75,000, or the equivalent cost of two out-of-state athletic scholarships for its 105-member football team.

To understand the truly despicable nature of this move, one must understand the concept of a walk-on and what they represent. Walk-ons are students who, for one reason or another, ended up at a school at which they were not recruited for a sport, but who decided to try out for a varsity team anyway. Even under the very unlikely circumstance that they make the team, they are generally relegated to practice squads and few even get the chance to suit up for a game, let alone play. Nevertheless, many teams around the nation, including UNLV, have multiple walk-ons. They have long been the perennial underdogs loved by fans and represented best by Rudy Ruettiger—the Notre Dame Football walk-on who was never meant to play football, but whose resilience and persistence not only allowed him to make the team but to also play in just one unforgettable game.

Furthermore, walk-ons do not receive athletic scholarships unless the coach specifically wishes to give them one, and they do not have any sort of guaranteed spot on the team. Essentially, they are there giving their all for the love of the game in one of the purest ways left in athletics.

However, by cutting health insurance for these dedicated student-athletes, UNLV has shown that it considers them nothing less than the secondclass citizens of the athletic world. While UNLVrecruited athletes, like most other NCAA Division I athletes, receive comprehensive primary and secondary (post-injury recovery) insurance, walk-ons have now been left with the task of picking up the substantial tab from athletic injuries they sustained while trying out or playing for the school’s team.

The cost of something as unfortunately common as ACL tear surgery can easily run in excess of $35,000, without any other related expenses and post-surgery treatments being accounted for.

The only potential security these walk-ons have is the NCAA’s “Catastrophic injury” insurance policy that is offered to student-athletes in extreme cases and presently carries a $75,000 deductible that will increase to $90,000 next year.

However, while the NCAA does have this safety net, it is one used only in truly extreme cases— meaning that for lesser, but still costly, injuries UNLV walk-ons are on their own.

What makes this story even worse, though, is that it comes just four months after UNLV publicly praised its walk-ons and declared its commitment to them. In a March article entitled “Walk-Ons Shape All UNLV Athletics,” published by Rebel Yell, UNLV’s award-winning student newspaper, UNLV football coach Mark Sanford was quoted as saying that UNLV’s walk-on program was especially important to him personally following his experiences at Notre Dame, where the walk-on program is huge due to the popularity achieved by Ruettiger’s story. The article then went on to state that “walk-on athletes…have helped transform their programs, and there’s no plan to change it any time soon,” and ends by claiming that, “If anything defines UNLV athletics, it should be our walk-ons, who committed themselves to the program, even when the program didn’t initially commit itself to them.”

Well “the program” sure showed its commit See UNLV page 20

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September 17, 2009

School colors darkened in early ’70s with coeducation Lillian Reuman

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Sports Editor

Kathleen Mehocic/The Miscellany News

nyone who has been fortunate enough to be in the center of the Thompson Memorial Library as an admissions tour passes by may have overheard the tour guide’s spiel about the beautiful stained-glass window situated along the back wall. The window depicts Lady Elena Lucretia Cornaro-Piscopia wearing a dress of rose and grey while defending her dissertation on Aristotle. Piscopia was the first woman ever to earn a Ph.D., which she got from the University of Padua. In 1867, rose and grey were adopted as Vassar College’s official colors.

On Oct. 11, 1868, Ellen Swallow, Class of 1870, wrote to her mother: “I send you a bit of our college colors, rose and silver gray... One and one-half yards each we have and wear in some form on public occasions.” The colors signified the dawn of women’s education, “the rose of sunlight breaking through the gray of women’s intellectual life.” Swallow’s explanation served as the official reasoning behind the college’s color choice.

Flashing forward a century to the early 1970s, not so coincidentally around the time that men were first admitted to the College, Vassar changed its school colors from rose—a color that had been interpreted as pink—and grey, to maroon—a darker shade of rose—and grey.

Legend has it that when the men’s rugby team, suited in their pink and grey striped jerseys, stepped out onto the field to face Army, the game was over before it even started. Vassar’s Online Encyclopedia states that the male athletes petitioned the administration, and eventually then-Dean of Studies Colton Johnson changed the colors of the uniforms due to convenience and budget cuts.

Professor of Physical Education and Director of the Life Fitness program Roman Czula came to the College in 1975 as the Head Coach for the men’s tennis team. At that time, financial support for athletics was lacking and many teams had to share uniforms across seasons. Although pink and grey was the “understood combination,” it was difficult to find pink uniforms from manufacturers.

Despite the increased funding for athletic departments in the early 1980s, bulk quantities of pink and grey uniforms were hard to come by. Furthermore, Czula mentioned that the

administrators felt that pink did not embrace males and athletics, two aspects of the institution that the College was trying to bolster—a viewpoint much different from that of the students who sought to break down the gender binary. The decision to settle for maroon and grey came about because the color combination was “easier to get” and it “played into a concern of selling Vassar as a co-educational institution to potential male athletes,” Czula commented. Vassar College Historian Elizabeth Daniels ’41 had a similar assessment. “I suppose the speculation is that rose was considered a feminine color. A darker red was considered more masculine.”

Despite the College’s official decision to embrace a more “masculine” color scheme, many traditions, buildings and groups on campus still embrace the original color combination.

Although a great deal of tradition has been lost over the years, the administrators still annually revive a song from the Vassar songbook at serenading: “Three Cheers for the Rose and Grey.”

Rose and grey are also the colors that seniors wear in the hoods of their gowns at graduation.

Beyond the aisles of graduation, the pink legacy rides around campus on a daily basis. The Vassar Shared Bike Program, the sophomore class gift from the Class of 2009 and Paul Lehman ’86, chose pink bikes for two reasons: pink and grey were once Vassar’s colors, and the pink bikes are easy to spot. The Rose Parlor, “named so because of the colors of its paint, curtains and paraphernalia,” is a testament to Vassar’s original founding color, Daniels noted.

In the athletics department, Czula has titled his series of Life Fitness classes as “In The Pink” as a way to “pay homage to the original pink.”

Czula added that it was his “way of connecting to the traditional Vassar color.”

Teams such as the ultimate frisbee team and the cycling team have also consciously decided to don the original Vassar colors in their uniform. While ultimate frisbee can often be a very intense and competitive sport, there is also an element of exhibitionism.

“The Vassar team, in particular, embraces the parts of frisbee culture that encourage dressing up, playing games and promoting friendship between teams,” women’s Captain Jennifer Harkness ’10 said. “We often wear costumes at tournaments of all levels of seriousness and we love to receive, and give, compliments from,

Keri Peacock ’11 led the Women’s Rugby Team on Sunday against RPI. The score was 38-21, and the team sported Vassar’s maroon and gray. and to, other teams.” In her opinion, “pink is a much more playful and fun color than maroon and it certainly contributes to, if not inspires, many of our costumes.” Despite a recent shift in the ultimate frisbee realm to make the game more regulated and “varsity sport”-like, the Vassar team has actively decided to resist some of these changes by maintaining their reputation as a “spirited and quirky” team.

“Having pink uniforms, which usually stand out quite a bit among the sea of red, navy blue and white, help to remind both ourselves and the teams we play that playing frisbee is about more than just points and winning, but having a good time and looking fantastic while doing it,” Harkness said.

The frisbee team’s decision to wear pink stems not only from their desire to stand out in the crowd, but also from their intention to counteract the stigma of femininity that is attached to the color pink.

“One of the reasons that the ultimate frisbee team at Vassar, specifically the men’s team, continues to embrace the color pink, is that we

don’t believe masculinity should be so overly entrenched in sports culture,” Nathan Mandel ’10 said. Czula truly “loves” what individual student-run teams such as cycling and frisbee have done despite the College administration’s decision to present the case for a “serious athletics program.”

Furthermore, although a variety of shades of pink, maroon and gray can be seen throughout the Vassar campus, the official Vassar colors are up for interpretation. “One person’s maroon is another person’s burgundy is another person’s wine,” said Andrew Jennings, Head Coach of the men’s soccer team.

Nowadays, the campus bookstore sells campus apparel in green, blue, black, tie-dye and many other variations found on the color wheel.

To further the example, Associate Dean Raymon Parker commented, “you used to only be able to buy a Yankees hat in blue. I saw a red one the other day, and thought, ‘that’s too close to Boston!’” Teams and colleges alike are straying from the limitations of just a few school colors in order to broaden their spectrums.

Brewers are runners up at Betty Richey Schools must maintain walk on insurance

Stephanie Rapp

A

Guest Reporter

Juliana Halpert/The Miscellany News

fter two miserable rainy days, a clear blue sky and warm weather arrived in time for the Brewers to play in the finals of the 21st Annual Betty Richey Field Hockey Tournament on Sunday, Sept. 13. The Brewers had already secured a win against Elms College in the first round of the tournament on Saturday, allowing them to advance to the championship game against the Engineers from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

The day began with a consolation game between Elms College and Manhattanville College, which the latter team easily dominated with a score of 8-0. However, Elms College maintained a good defense for most of the game.

This was all just a precursor for the main event. As the athletes from Vassar and MIT filed out onto the field to begin their warm-up, the trophies for both the winner and the runner-up were placed in plain sight. Vassar has consistently finished as runner-up in the tournament every year since 2004, and has not won the championship since 1995.

Sadly, it was not the day for the Brewers to challenge this record. MIT started out strong, and the Brewers had a tough time initially reacting to the pressure. Within the first 20 minutes, MIT had already scored three goals—a score that, to the Brewers’ credit, did not increase from then on. After a beautiful goal by freshman Rebecca Smith, Vassar regained some momentum and went on to play an outstanding game for the rest of the half. As the sun got brighter, both teams fought to the finish, with Vassar repeatedly making solid efforts to better the score and getting several shots on goal. The game ended in excitement, allowing Vassar to score one last time—raising their final goal count to two. The Engineers and the Brewers were presented with

Vassar lost to MIT at the Betty Richey Field Hockey Tournament on Sunday, Sept. 13. The score was 3-2, and he team’s record for the season thus far is 1-3. their trophies, as well as plaques for All Tournament Selections. These awards were presented to Brewers Rebecca Backer ’12, Jessica Lance ’11 and Catherine Fuller ’10. The tournament’s MVP award was presented to MIT’s Kimberly Barker.

Both teams accepted these honors with dignity.

When asked to comment on that day’s game, MIT Captain Alex Wright said, “It’s very nice to come out successfully and play as a team.”

While some seemed disheartened by the game’s outcome, there were several positive aspects of Vassar’s efforts that are not to be overlooked.

Senior Jennie McAllister had four shots on

goal—her personal high for the season. Vassar also led 7-2 on penalty corners, with the team’s final attempt resulting in their second goal.

“This weekend was definitely a collective effort by all the girls on the field,” Varsity Head Coach Cara Dunn said after the game was over and the trophies had been presented. She says the team will be “looking to win Betty Richey next year.”

And judging by the Brewer’s strong attempt this weekend, in both of the games they played, it doesn’t look like that win will be too hard. The Engineers continue their undefeated season as the Brewers fall to 1-3 for the season.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

UNLV contnued from page 19 ment by risking the very livelihood of these students and potentially putting many of them in debt for years for the sake of cutting the University budget an entire 0.014 percent relative to their endowment. Despite that fact, UNLV does deserve some credit because it provides comprehensive health insurance to some of its athletes, even though it is not required to. Presently the NCAA, like the United States government, does not mandate that schools cover their student-athletes with comprehensive health insurance. This leads to a serious disparity. Many schools, like Vassar, provide all of their student-athletes with great insurance policies that truly keep the student in mind. But others, like University of Wisconsin, provide nothing more than coverage for minor injuries handled by staffed athletic trainers. It’s simply unacceptable. There is no way I can be convinced that any higher education institution can pay the money necessary to have various athletic teams, but then not have enough to protect its own. After all, these athletes compete not only for themselves, but also for the school.

It is the school that reaps the benefits of their successes through championship trophies and ticket sales revenue; in turn, in my mind, it is obligated to protect its own—especially when they are hurt. After all, if they can’t be there for their kids when they are down, how can they possibly be allowed to stand with them with when they succeed?