The Heights February 8, 2016

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RUMORS IN ROBSHAM RAINING THREES

NO CHILL FEATURES

ARTS & REVIEW

SPORTS

BC Synchro is skating its way into your heart, A5

The DOBC, Heightsmen, and Synergy came together for the DOBC’s ‘Rumors’ show last week, B8

Nicole Boudreau nailed eight 3-pointers in Sunday’s loss to North Carolina, B1

www.bcheights.com

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established

The Independent Student Newspaper of Boston College Monday, February 8, 2016

Vol. XCVII, No. 6

G\ib`ej CfXe <ok\e[\[ K_ifl^_ k_\ )'(-$(. JZ_ffc P\Xi 9P FC@M@8 DFIC<P ?\`^_kj JkX]] Boston College undergraduate students who have demonstrated financial need can still borrow a federal Perkins Loan to help finance next year’s tuition. Congress has recently extended the Perkins Program, but the loan’s expiration date is still upcoming. Under current circumstances, students cannot receive

further disbursements after Sept. 30, 2017. When the Perkins Loan was retired last year, 710 BC students with high financial need were left to grapple with an impending financial aid gap that threatened their ability to pay next year’s tuition. Under the loan’s retirement conditions, students who had a Perkins Loan disbursed before or during the 2014-2015 school year were eligible

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to receive the loan until they completed their program, as long as they did not change majors and still met the financial need requirements. Congress enacted the Perkins Loan Extension Act on Dec. 18, 2015. The Act makes it possible for undergraduate students to receive aid until the extended 2017 deadline, but includes a new stipulation. Any student who borrows the loan must exhaust all of his

subsidized and unsubsidized Stafford Loan eligibility for that year before being awarded a Perkins Loan. There are more loan forgiveness options available for Perkins borrowers than for borrowers of any other federal loan. The Perkins Loan also has a fixed interest rate, while Stafford interest rates are variable. The Extension Act adds several stipulations that apply specifically to

graduate students. Under the new rules, graduate students will stop receiving Perkins funds a year before undergraduates. They can receive additional Perkins disbursements until Sept. 30, 2016, but only if they received their first Perkins disbursement from their current school before Oct. 1, 2015. When the loan was retired last year,

See Perkins, A3

EYE ON THE PRIZE

Jkl[\ek Zlkj _X`i ]fi ZXeZ\i i\j\XiZ_ 9P ?<@;@ ;FE> ?\`^_kj <[`kfi Jesi Watson passed away at the age of 16 after a hard, courageous fight against leukemia on Sept. 11, 2014. Her hometown of Lexington, Mass., was struck with multiple deaths around the same time. As a result, Lexington held several fundraisers for those who had recently passed away. Megan Vanderhooft, MCAS ’17, however, who was close friends with Watson’s brother and twin sister, noted Lexington’s neglect to remember Watson and her battle. Razor in hand and with friends to support her, Vanderhooft decided to take action and get involved with the St. Baldrick’s Foundation, at the expense of her hair. “A lot of people were doing fundraising for other people who had passed away, but I realized that nobody had really remembered her,” Vanderhooft said, “She was very young, she was 16, and she hadn’t spent much time at the high school, and so I felt like just to put her name on it, to remind people of her, was really important.” Starting its first year as an independent foundation in 2005, St. Baldrick’s Foundation was established for childhood cancer research funding. Participants set a goal for desired donations on their site, and if that goal is reached, the participants then shave their heads, in solidarity with those battling cancer. Anyone can sign up to become a “shavee.” Last year, close to $37 million was raised through the foundation in total. This year’s running total is currently at around $2 million, $5,425 of which was raised by Vanderhooft’s efforts. During high school, Vanderhooft knew a friend who became a “shavee” after raising around $500. While Vanderhooft was impressed with her friend’s courage, it didn’t strike her as something she would participate in. After Watson passed away, however, Vanderhooft took action. “I figured, if not now, when?” she said. “For me, I mean, it’s hair. It grows back, it shows solidarity, it raised a ton of money—$5,425, as of right now. You can still donate. It gives people something tangible for their donation.” The degree to which people were willing to donate to her cause, many times without even knowing her personally, surprised and touched Vanderhooft. Her father’s friends, her brother’s friends, her roommates, her high school friends, and even her roommates’ parents happily donated when prompted with a link to her site. She quickly surpassed her goal of $1,500 by about 350 percent. “When I saw that she was doing this, it was completely out of the blue, but it never struck me as something that she wouldn’t have done,” Nick Crain, CSOM ‘17, a good friend of Vanderhooft’s since freshman year. “So we went to her house on a Saturday, had some brunch, and then shaved her head.” In March, St. Baldrick’s offers events for shavees to gather for a collective, public shaving. Vanderhooft decided to instead make her shave of solidarity more personal. She invited all who had donated to cut her hair with her on Jan. 16, 2016, a nod to Watson’s age when she

See Vanderhooft, A3

SAVANNA KIEFER / HEIGHTS EDITOR

9: d\eËj Xe[ nfd\eËj _fZb\p cffb kf i\ZXgkli\ k_\ 9\Xegfk :_Xdg`fej_`gj k_Xk \jZXg\[ k_\d X j\Xjfe X^f# 9(

ÊMX^`eX Dfefcf^l\jË 9i`e^j KXYff =\dXc\ Kfg`Zj kf C`^_k <m\ <ejc\iËj gcXp X`dj kf \dgfn\i Xcc nfd\e 9P AFJ<G? PL<E><IK =fi k_\ ?\`^_kj Hundreds of students, along with many other members of the Boston College community, crowded into McGuinn 121 on Thursday night as V-Day of Boston College kicked off its first of three consecutive performances of The Vagina Monologues. “There was an overwhelmingly positive response from everyone who spoke to us after the performance,” Samantha Costanza, the director of the production and MCAS ’16, said in an email. “We are so humbled and honored to be able to present such an important show to the BC community.” The Vagina Monologues was first performed in 1996 and written by Eve Ensler. The monologues are based on the experiences of over 200 women who Ensler interviewed for this project. For many of the participants, the project was the first time in their lives that they were able to express their thoughts and experiences regarding sex, marriage, love, expectations, rape, masturbation, and many other topics related to the female experience that had long been considered taboo.

Ensler started the V-Day movement in 1988 to raise awareness and end violence against women and girls. Performances of The Vagina Monologues during February in conjunction with VDay have become an annual tradition on many college campuses, raising millions of dollars for the fight against violence toward women. As a part of the global V-Day movement, the proceeds from the ticket sales were donated to two different charities: V-Day’s Spotlight on One Billion Rising and to a project of the Justice Resource Institute, whose mission statement is “a preventative initiative which helps adolescent girls in the Boston area identified as being at risk for sexual exploitation.” The Thursday show started with an introduction to the topic of the night’s performance: vaginas. The performers presented all forms of the word from across the globe. The actresses had the audience laughing with innuendo references to various BC landmarks, like White Mountain, Agora Portal, and Mary Ann’s. The show continued with 16 monologues that discussed different aspects of the female experience from various perspectives. Issues from the past, the present, the LGBTQ community, and DREW HOO / HEIGHTS EDITOR

See Monologues, A3

Boston College hosted three performances of The Vagina Monologues starting Thursday.


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