SCENE
2013 FOOTBALL PREVIEW
Of Monsters and Men is one of many bands coming to Boston this fall, C3
Junior Spiffy Evans strives for consistency, the secondary continues to improve, five seniors lead a final bowl charge, and more as the Eagles kick off the 2013 season under new head coach Steve Addazio.
FALL ARTS GUIDE
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www.bcheights.com
THE
The Independent Student Newspaper of Boston College
established
1919
Thursday, September 5, 2013
Vol. XCIV, No. 25
Athletics works on Gold Pass kinks BY AUSTIN TEDESCO Heights Editor
DANIEL LEE / HEIGHTS SENIOR STAFF
While the stands were packed on Saturday, some students had trouble with the Gold Pass.
The first thing the members of the Boston College athletic department did on Tuesday morning after the long weekend was meet with athletic director Brad Bates to debrief on the season-opening football game against Villanova. Although plenty of things worked as planned, like the new Eagle Walk and the return of the live eagle, the new Gold Pass for student season tickets needed fixing. “This was definitely on top of the priority list,” said Associate Athletics Director of Media Relations Chris Cameron. On Saturday, 30 percent of the students
that entered Alumni Stadium arrived before 11:45 a.m., but 70 percent of them arrived after, forming long lines at Gate A. More than 500 Gold Passes were sold on Saturday, with 200 of them coming between 10 a.m. and noon, according to Cameron. The department did not immediately respond to questions about the total number of students at the game or the total number of Gold Passes sold. Some students who arrived after 11:45 a.m. did not make it into Alumni Stadium until the end of the first quarter. Gold Passes for a small number of students were not activated on IDs yet, while others would not register right away when swiped. Sorting out these issues caused the lines to back up.
Students whose IDs were not scanning were sent to a side table where they gave their information to a BC staff member working a computer. Eventually, students were told to just give their Eagle ID numbers and were allowed to enter the stadium. While the athletic department is encouraging students to arrive earlier for Friday’s 8 p.m. kickoff, they have also made changes around Gate A to speed up the process. The physical set up around Gate A where the lines form will be altered for game day. There were 10 access points and 10 scanners for the Villanova game, but there will be 16 access points and 16 scanners tomorrow
See Gold Pass, A3
Alcohol and drug matrix discontinued
Case around Belfast tapes continues
More discretion will be afforded to RDs
BY ELEANOR HILDEBRANDT News Editor Editor’s Note: This story is part of an ongoing series about the subpoenas of the Belfast Project.
BY DEVON SANFORD Assoc. News Editor Beginning this fall, the Dean of Students Office (DSO) will be implementing a revised student conduct system for alcohol and behavioral policies. The DSO has removed the previously used drug and alcohol matrix, in which students were held to a rigid structure of sanctions for policy violations. The new student conduct process will follow a mutual resolution process based largely on the discretion of students’ Residential Directors (RDs). “There was a fair amount of dissatisfaction with the way the conduct policy was operating,” said Dean of Students Paul Chebator. “Some of that dissatisfaction was centered on the ‘matrix,’ which was the strict guideline for sanctioning. Students were unhappy about it because they thought the sanctions were too rigid. I don’t think the staff was any happier than the students. [The matrix] eliminated the possibility of allowing hearing officers to make judgment calls around personal circumstances.” The new student conduct process, which will be considered a “transitional change,” uses sanctioning guidelines. This change in conduct allows residential life staff members to resolve a reported incident or complaint based on the specific circumstance, rather than a community standards matrix. Students who would have previously faced disciplinary probation for minor violations will now be facing less severe sanctions. “There is consistency within the new policy,” Chebator said. “Everyone is being addressed. How that matter is resolved, however, is based on each circumstance.” The changes in the student conduct system began last fall. “The dissatisfaction seen within students and staff seemed to coincide with an administrative review we did last fall and spring,” Chebator said. “The review consisted of a self-study. The office gathered a number of students, faculty, and administrators to obtain feedback on the system. We wrote a report. Then we had three external experts on student conduct come to campus and interview everyone involved—from students all the way up to the vice presidents of the University.” During the administrative assessment, Christine Davis, Boston College’s former assistant dean of student conduct and head of the review, left her position. Davis’ absence disrupted the review process and as a result, the DSO chose to implement only certain features of the new conduct system. “One of the things we wanted to implement this fall was the elimination of the matrix and the development of a
See Sanctions Update, A3
IMAGE COURTESY OF THE OFFICE OF NEWS AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS
GASSON QUAD ADOPTS NEW LOOK
EMILY FAHEY / HEIGHTS STAFF
Architectual rendering of proposed changes to the Quad (above); the current view looking across the Quad toward Fulton and Lyons (below). BY ANDREW SKARAS Asst. News Editor After students left campus to go their myriad ways for the summer, construction teams geared up to work on several different parts of the campus. The most noticeable changes for students returning to the Heights this fall are the massive renovations to the Academic Quad in Middle Campus.
“The work started right after Commencement,” said Vice President of Facilities Management Daniel Bourque. “They moved trees, excavated sites, brought [the Quad] down to grade, and located the utilities.” This work went on all summer and was the culmination of the campus landscaping renovations that began with the lawn in front of Stokes Hall and O’Neill Plaza. “[The Quad renovations] serve as a
connection between Stokes and O’Neill Plaza,” Bourque said. “It is a link to create a unified campus.” As a part of the renovations, Bourque said that they removed trees that were “ill or diseased” and brought in new red oak and crab apple trees. They were able to save the linden tree in front of Lyons Hall. In addition to the horticultural
See Construction, A3
On Friday, May 31, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Boston issued a ruling with regard to interviews from the Belfast Project, Boston College’s oral history project on the Troubles in Northern Ireland. The interviews in question were subpoenaed in 2011 by the U.S. Department of Justice in pursuance with the Treaty Between the Government of the United States and the Government of the Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland on Mutual Legal Assistance on Criminal Matters, or Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (U.S.-UK MLAT). UK authorities requested the tapes in connection with an investigation by the Police Services of Northern Ireland (PSNI) into the 1972 death of Jean McConville. U.S. District Court Judge William G. Young, who originally reviewed the tapes to determine their relevancy to the McConville investigation, ordered that 85 of the interviews, conducted with seven former members of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), be turned over to the UK authorities. The University contested the decision, and Judge Juan R. Torruella of the First Circuit Court reexamined the subpoenas. Torruella determined that only 11 segments of the 85 interviews were relevant and needed to be released. “[The district court] abused its discretion in ordering the production of a significant number of interviews that only contain information that is in
See Belfast Project, A3
Barbara Jones begins work as University’s new VPSA BY ELEANOR HILDEBRANDT News Editor
After seven months without a vice president for student affairs (VPSA) on Boston College’s campus, Barbara Jones arrived on July 1 to begin work in her new position. “I was looking for something different, and when I got the call about BC and started doing some research on it,” Jones said. “I was really attracted to the fact that it was the student affairs work that I loved doing, but with this extra system of values on top of it that goes even deeper than we would normally go in student affairs at a public university.” Jones earned her masters degree from Indiana University and then moved on to work in student affairs at the University of Memphis. She then worked as the director of student activities for eight years at Minnesota State University-Mankato, concurrently earning her Ph.D. in educa-
tional administration from the University of Minnesota. Jones spent 10 years at Ball State University in Indiana, and then took on a broader range of responsibilities—including working with adaptive athletics for students with disabilities—as
the assistant chancellor of University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. Most recently, she finished the 2012-13 academic year at Miami University of Ohio, where she had worked as the vice president of the division of student affairs since 2008.
Jones is not the only administrator at BC with ties to Miami University—athletic director Brad Bates served as Miami University’s athletic director from 2002 to 2012. According to Bates, he and Jones interacted regularly at Miami University, as they both reported straight to the university president and worked directly with students. Although Bates, who joined the University last October, was not initially aware that Jones was considering the VPSA position at BC, he said that he found it easy to speak highly of the school, and was pleased when she took the position. “She’s been trying to develop relationships with as many people as possible, so she’s been very busy,” Bates said. He added that they have spoken fairly frequently since Jones began at BC, and anticipates that the two will continue to work closely together, calling her knowledge of stu-
GRAHAM BECK / HEIGHTS EDITOR
Barbara Jones, pictured in her Moloney Hall office, joined the BC administration in July.
See Jones, A3