Wednesday, April 4, 2007

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD WEDNESDA

Volume CXLII, No. 43

Pickett named new CIS chief

2007

Since 1866, Daily Since 1891

Columnist Rush ’78 spies, pries and eavesdrops

GETTING FRISC-Y

BY ABE LUBETKIN STAFF WRITER

BY ZACHARY CHAPMAN SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Michael Pickett has been named the University’s new vice president for computing and information services, the University announced Tuesday.

Pickett, who has spent the past 24 years in various IT positions at Duke University, will take over for Terri-Lynn Thayer ’81, who has headed Computing and Information Services on an interim basis since Ellen Waite-Franzen left for Dartmouth College last September.

Thayer will work closely with Pickett as she returns to her post as assistant vice president for administrative information systems.

The vice president for computing and information services is responsible for managing the University’s academic and administrative technology services and working with the University Librarian on systems such as the Josiah catalog. Pickett, who most recently served as deputy chief information officer at Duke, will lead a 152-member professional staff at CIS. CIS supports nearly 18,000 users, maintains more than 40,000 network ports in more than 160 buildings and operates an e-mail system with nearly 16,000 mailboxes, according to a press release announcing Pickett’s statement.

Pickett will start in his new role on July 1 and will report to Provost David Kertzer ’69 P’95 P’98.

“For more than two decades, Michael Pickett has been closely involved in the growth and evolution of information technology on the college campus,” Kertzer said in the release. “His depth of experience in both university and academic medical settings, coupled with the strategic policy and planning work he has done as a senior information officer at Duke, afford him an excellent background to provide leadership in Brown’s complex information systems environment.”

Pickett, a North Carolina native who grew up on Duke’s campus, will face a number of challenges as he transitions into his new role. He will be responsible for managing ongoing initiatives such as MyCourses continued on page 4

“Excuse me,” Princess Diana once said to George Rush ’78 as he stood close behind her at a party, straining to overhear every word of her private conversation. “Could you move your ear?”

FEATURE

Sara Molinaro / Herald Just two days after spring break, students spent early Wednesday morning studying in the Friedman Study Center.

Simmons to step down from Pfizer board boards of Goldman Sachs and Texas Instruments, and she previously held a seat on the board of MetLife, Inc. She was first elected to Pfizer’s board of directors in 1997, while she was president of Smith College.

Simmons told Pfizer’s board of directors Feb. 21 that she will not seek another term “due to her increased responsibilities”

BY ROSS FRAZIER NEWS EDITOR

After a decade of service, President Ruth Simmons has chosen not to seek re-election to Pfizer’s board of directors, citing increased duties at the University, the pharmaceutical giant announced last month.

Simmons also serves on the

at Brown, according to the company’s recent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. She will continue to serve on the Pfizer board until April 26, when the company holds its annual election of directors.

University and Pfizer officials could not be reached for comcontinued on page 4

UMass prof Nieto kicks off Latino History Month

BY OLIVIA HOFFMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER

The Third World Center launched its commemoration of Latino History Month with a convocation ceremony Tuesday evening called “Uniting Our Roots” that featured student speakers, a short film and a keynote address delivered by Sonia Nieto, professor emerita at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Nieto’s speech stressed the importance of preserving the unique and diverse ethnic iden-

continued on page 6

tity of the Latino community and emphasized the importance of education as a “way out” for Latinos, who she said have “by and large experienced poor academic achievement.”

“Access to high quality education and respect for students’ identities” are the major issues to consider in the future of education for Latinos, Nieto said.

Latinos make up 19 percent of the school-age population in the United States, she said, but most

Roots Spring Weekend concert moved to Friday

The resolution was passed unanimously after concerns about the speed of planning for the center were addressed by President Ruth Simmons.

“Sometimes we have to put together a proposal in response to a donor … before they lose interest (in the project),” Simmons said, explaining the brevity of the twopage proposal for the center.

The faculty also unanimously

The first concert of this year’s Spring Weekend, featuring hiphop group The Roots, has been rescheduled for Friday, Apr. 20.

Funk band Soulive will still open for The Roots as planned. Mission of Burma, a late addition to the original Thursday lineup, will now play with the Flaming Lips on Saturday, April 21.

Due to a scheduling conflict involving a concert in Beijing earlier that week, The Roots would have been unable to play on Thursday, said Joe Posner ’07, Brown Concert Agency co-chair.

The Friday concert will take place in Meehan Auditorium as planned, and doors will open at 7:30 p.m. Tickets for the Thursday concert will be honored on Friday, according to the announcement.

continued on page 4

— Chris Gang

Chris Bennett / Herald Sonia Nieto kicked off Latino History Month with a lecture in MacMillan Hall last night.

continued on page 4

Faculty approves Rhodes Center, adult education program

BY SCOTT LOWENSTEIN SENIOR STAFF WRITER

The faculty approved the creation of the William R. Rhodes Center in International Economics and the establishment of continuing studies certificate programs on a pilot basis in its meeting Tuesday. A summary of the University’s budget plans — which outlined the University’s increasingly aggressive spending — was also presented.

INSIDE:

3 CAMPUS WATCH

The Rhodes Center, which will be housed in the Watson Institute for International Studies, will “promote research into international trade and international finance … and will build a stronger relationship between Watson and the (economics) department,” said Barbara Stallings, director of the Watson Institute.

The creation of the center — made possible by a $10 million donation by trustee emeritus and Citigroup executive William Rhodes

PROF. KUMAR OR TAJ? Kal Penn, known for playing Kumar in the ‘Harold and Kumar’ movie, has been hired to teach classes at the University of Pennsylvania

www.browndailyherald.com

’57 — will include the hiring of a new professor in the economics department and will provide research grants on a competitive basis, said Professor of Economics Ross Levine, who presented the motion to the faculty.

“This is an interesting area of economics that complements our current strengths … in development and economic growth,” said Andrew Foster, professor of economics and chair of the department.

5 CAMPUS NEWS

COOKE TO HELP HOPE The Jack Kent Cooke Foundation donated $1 million to the University to establish an advising program ffor R.I. high schoolers

Rush said it wasn’t the first time someone had asked him to mind his own business. As a syndicated gossip writer for the New York Daily News, the former semiotics concentrator spends his days — and nights — concentrating on the world’s juiciest spats, divorces, romances and anything else that grabs the public’s voyeuristic eye.

“It’s sort of like a sandwich shop compared to a French restaurant,” he said, comparing his brand of journalism to reporting hard news. “But people do like a good sandwich.”

With that in mind, Rush and his wife, Joanna Molloy, stack their daily column with succulent gossip and a hint of irreverent humor. “Rush and Molloy” appears five days a week in about 30 newspapers worldwide and covers scandalous or otherwise attentiongrabbing news from the realms of entertainment, politics and media.

“We sort of create a little newspaper every day that has something for everybody,” Rush said.

“People who normally wouldn’t be that interested in Britney Spears

11 OPINIONS

195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island

THESIS THRILLS Despite the pain and suffering it has caused her, Courtney Jenkins ’07 will keep a special place in her heart for the finished project

12 SPORTS

BASEBALL BASHES TIGERS The baseball team rode clutch hitting to two victories over Princeton weekend but couldn’t got anything going against Cornell

News tips: herald@browndailyherald.com

TODAY THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

PAGE 2

WE A

Chocolate Covered Cotton | Mark Brinker

T H E R

TODAY

TOMORROW

rain 46 / 36

partly cloudy 45 / 30

MEN

SHARPE REFECTORY

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

U VERNEY-WOOLLEY DINING HALL

LUNCH — Falafel in Pita, Vegan Lentil Chili, Vegetarian Fagioli Soup, Roasted Eggplant and Tomato Sandwich, Barbeque Beef Ribs

LUNCH — Vegetarian Cheese Soup, Ham and Bean Soup, Steak and Pepper Fajitas, Vegan Roasted Vegetable Burritos, Frosted Cookie Squares

DINNER — Sweet and Sour Vegetable Stir Fry, Red Rice, Carrot and Garlic Medley Chicken Cacciatore, Baked Stuffed Pollock, Strawberry Jello, Whipped Cream Strawberry Torte

DINNER — Savory Chicken Stew, Tomato Basil Pie, Rice and Orzo Pilaf, Whole Green Beans, Stewed Tomatoes, Hearth Bread, Whipped Cream Strawberry Torte

SU

WBF | Matt Vascellaro

D O K U

Fill in the grid so that every row, every column and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 through 9.

Hi, How Are You | Alison Naturale

Deo | Daniel Perez �������������������

CR ACROSS 1 Maker of colorful timepieces 7 Cause of chills 10 Protective trench 14 Computer enthusiast 15 Sculling item 16 Freeze front?

17 Star in Aquila 18 Open, as a shirt 20 Squandered 21 “The evil that men do lives after them” speaker 23 Scrabble piece 24 Govt. group first called the Laboratory of Hygiene 25 In comparison (to) 29 Hospital battery 33 Gap 34 Calendar pg.

36 Bash 37 Frenzied way to run 38 Spirit in a bottle 40 Equitable 41 Heap 42 Fraction of a joule 43 With whimsy 45 Said with a sneer 47 Knee jerks, e.g.

49 Fed. numberscrunching gp.

51 Fragrant neckwear 52 “The Cider House Rules” author 56 Big brass 60 They’re all abuzz 61 Genre dominated by King’s English 63 Popular walking site 64 Club for swingers 65 Instructed 66 Like many a horse 67 Trains above the road 68 Has the wheel

O S S W O R D

DOWN 1 Try 2 Oil source 3 Entr’__ 4 Defrost 5 XVII x VI 6 Secluded retreat 7 This puzzle’s theme 8 Tall and skinny 9 Citified 10 He plays Dr. Jack Shephard on “Lost” 11 Not tricked by 12 Copious amounts 13 Not easy to see 19 Textbook chapter 22 2001 biopic 23 Basker’s acquisition 25 Insert forcefully 26 Amoxicillin target 27 English golfer who won the 2006 Honda Classic 28 Dermal opening 30 Oil-yielding rock

31 Drudges 32 Not slowing down a bit 33 Overtakes, in a way 35 Traffic stoppers 39 Slip up 44 In medias __ 46 Bahrain bigwig 48 Marsh 50 What a slush fund may fund

52 Preserves 53 Colorful fish 54 Big Island port 55 Wiener schnitzel meat 56 “Can’t argue with that” 57 Encourage 58 Los Alamos scientist 59 Song and dance 62 Cereal grain

Deep Fried Kittens | Cara FitzGibbon

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

Cloudy Side Up | Mike Lauritano

xwordeditor@aol.com

4/4/07

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University community since 1891. It is published Monday through Friday during the aca-

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once in July by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. POSTMASTER please send corrections to

Mary-Catherine Lader, Vice President Ally Ouh, Treasurer Mandeep Gill, Secretary

By Edgar Fontaine (c)2007 Tribune Media Services, Inc.

4/4/07

The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is an independent newspaper serving the Brown demic year, excluding vacations, once during Commencement, once during Orientation and P.O. Box 2538, Providence, RI 02906. Periodicals postage paid at Providence, R.I. Offices are located at 195 Angell St., Providence, R.I. E-mail herald@browndailyherald.com. World Wide Web: http://www.browndailyherald.com. Subscription prices: $319 one year daily, $139 one semester daily. Copyright 2007 by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. All rights reserved.

CAMPUS WATCH ATCH WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

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U N D U P

Kal Penn of ‘Harold and Kumar’ to teach at Penn The University of Pennsylvania is bolstering the stature of its faculty with a new addition for next spring — actor Kal Penn, otherwise known as the stoner medical genius Kumar from the movie “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle,” will teach two classes in Penn’s School of Arts and Sciences in spring 2008.

The courses, tentatively entitled “Images of Asian Americans in the Media” and “Contemporary American Teen Films,” will be crosslisted in Penn’s Asian-American studies and cinema studies departments.

“The Asian American Studies Program is delighted that Kalpen Modi, a.k.a. Kal Penn, chose our program to host his teaching engagement at Penn,” said Grace Kao, the program’s director, in a press release. “Mr. Modi is one of the leading Asian American actors of his generation and is particularly aware of how his racial and ethnic identification has affected his professional experiences.”

Kal Penn, who has a bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Los Angeles and is pursuing a graduate certificate in international security at Stanford University, became famous for his role in “Harold and Kumar,” though he has also starred in episodes of “24” and the movies “Van Wilder” and “Van Wilder 2: The Rise of Taj.” In 2006, he was a Teen Choice Award nominee.

In response to Penn’s recruitment, some students have said the university should be focusing on academic credentials when making hiring decisions.

“I think it’s kind of funny because his academic qualifications don’t seem comparable to other professors, and I’m kind of surprised this institution would give in to popular culture and hire a professor that’s not of the same caliber as the rest of the faculty,” Penn sophomore Gokul Dhingra told The Herald.

“I want to assuage some of your doubts about my teaching position at the university next spring semester,” Kal Penn wrote in a letter Friday to the Daily Pennsylvanian, which printed an editorial skeptical of his appointment. “I can understand how my ‘public persona’ may make me a dubious candidate for a traditional teaching position, but it is the amalgamation of my professional experiences as an actor, director, producer and guest lecturer that have given rise to this opportunity at Penn.”

“I don’t think I’ll enroll, but I may sit in on a few classes to see if he can teach,” Dhingra said.

— Ross Frazier

GRE changes canceled amid concerns Students applying to graduate schools can thank their lucky stars.

The Educational Testing Service — which designs and administers the Graduate Record Examination, the standardized test most often required for graduate school admission — on Monday called off plans to redesign the exam.

One of the planned changes to the GRE was to lengthen it by 65 minutes. Other alterations were to include more data analysis, less geometry, more reading comprehension and fewer analogies. All of those changes are now indefinitely on hold.

ETS announced in February that the new GRE would be ready

by September, but as graduate school admission committees expressed frustration with the revised test — especially with its lack of availability overseas — the testing service ultimately decided to cancel the revisions.

ETS officials said the non-profit company planned to administer the GRE electronically through 3,200 testing centers around the world, but since it could not guarantee access, it decided to hold off on any changes for now.

“The decision to cancel the revised GRE General Test best serves the interests of test takers and the graduate institutions that use those scores to make admissions decisions,” said David Payne, executive director of the GRE program, in a press release. “After much debate and evaluation, it became clear that the current format offers students more convenient and flexible opportunities to test when and where they choose, while still providing score users with valid predictors of test takers’ preparedness for graduate school study.”

— Ross Frazier

Half of college students over-consuming booze, drugs

BY MARIELLE SEGARRA STAFF WRITER

About half of full-time college students abuse drugs and alcohol, according to a March 15 report from Columbia University’s National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse.

The study, titled “Wasting the Best and Brightest,” which polled 2,000 students and 400 administrators between 1993 and 2005, found that 49 percent of full-time college students — nearly 3.8 million students — binge drink and abuse drugs. About 23 percent — or 1.8 million — “met the medical criteria for substance abuse and dependence,” almost triple the proportion in the general population.

“It’s time to take the high out of higher education,” Joseph Califano, the center’s chair and a former U.S. secretary of health, education and welfare, said in a statement.

The study found that, since 1993, binge drinking has increased 16 percent and the number of students drinking to get drunk has risen 21 percent. It also said the number of students who drink 10 times or more in a month has increased 25 percent.

At Brown, some students said the drinking problem is partly due to the country’s legal drinking age of 21.

Corrie Tan ’10, a self-described “social drinker,” said the legal drinking age in her home country, Singapore, is 18 — and students abuse alcohol less there because it is more prevalent.

“Underage drinking is not an issue” in Singapore, Tan said.

Tan said students in the United States often drink to get drunk, but young adults in Singapore drink for the taste or for the “warm, fuzzy high,” while not going over their limits.

“The drinking age being 21 encourages binge drinking,” Meaghan Caulfield ’10 said. “The thrill comes from the illegality of it.”

The culture was completely different when Caulfield visited Europe, she said. In Spain, she could just “sit around and have a beer” with a group of people without getting drunk.

“Americans, by making the drinking age 21, put this forbidden stigma on it. It’s not that way in Europe,” Caulfield said.

“I think some students drink as a reaction to the drinking age,” said Kristina Jackson, assistant professor of community health at the Brown’s Center for Alcohol and Addiction Studies.

Because alcohol is more difficult

read share recycle

Chris Bennett / Herald File Photo About half of full-time college students abuse alcohol and drugs, a new study found.

to obtain for those under 21, underage drinkers consume alcohol less frequently but more heavily than those over 21, she said.

Universities sometimes create programs for incoming students to stress the dangers of drugs and alcohol, she said, but most of the prevention comes in “restricting access and cracking down on bars that have cheap drinks.”

In his statement, Califano blamed college administrators for facilitating alcohol abuse. “College presidents, deans and trustees have facilitated a college culture of alcohol and drug abuse that is linked to poor student academic performance, depression, anxiety, suicide, property damage, vandalism, fights and a host of medical problems,” he said.

“By failing to become part of the solution, these Pontius Pilate presidents and parents, deans, trustees and alumni have become part of the problem,” Califano said.

Caulfield said she thinks drinking is a big part of Brown’s culture, mostly because of the large size of its campus. Caulfield was surprised at the lack of alcohol on campus when she visited her sister at Skidmore College, but she said that the scarcity was due mainly to the school’s small campus and students’ inability to use fake IDs in the area, where students face the harsh penalties for being caught.

“Alcohol certainly has made a leap,” said Andre Burnier ’10.

“There is definitely a difference between now and previous generations — we consume it for the ends

and not for the taste.”

Burnier said alcohol has become his generation’s “drug of choice,” compared to the prevalent use of marijuana in the 1960s. Also, he said, it is a “way of breaking the law,” though he said it is easy to gain access to alcohol — much more so than when he was in high school.

Along with the increase in alcohol abuse, the study said marijuana use has doubled since 1993 and other illegal drug use has increased 52 percent.

Use of prescription painkillers such as Percocet, Vicodin and OxyContin has increased by 343 percent, and use of tranquilizers like Xanax and Valium has gone up 450 percent, the study found.

And prescription stimulant abuse — including use of Ritalin and Adderall — has risen 93 percent, though one student thinks this figure could be misleading.

“You have to take into account the students that use Adderall to stay up late,” Burnier said. These students are not using the drug to get high, he said.

Burnier and Tan said they haven’t seen much drug use at Brown, though Caulfield said she thinks the drug culture is just “not as visible” as the drinking culture.

Also, Caulfield said, alcohol is mostly dangerous when students don’t know their limits, especially if they did not drink in high school.

Tan said she doesn’t think Brown’s drinking levels are “out of the ordinary,” because college is a “place where people experiment.”

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

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Duke’s Pickett selected as CIS vice president continued from page 1 and wireless Internet expansion, as well as overseeing upgrades to some of Brown’s aging administrative systems.

Daniel Leventhal ’07, a computer science concentrator and member of the search committee that selected Pickett, told The Herald that he is excited about Pickett’s hiring but that, at least initially, he will be in a difficult position.

“He has a big job in front of him, which would be true for anyone coming here,” he said. “At the same time, I think that bringing in someone new who doesn’t have experience with how things are done at Brown could be great for the University. He brings a whole new perspective and approach to the position.”

Last July, Waite-Franzen told the Dartmouth student newspaper that “Dartmouth is in a different place with how they think about technology and how it should be used on campus. At Brown, IT takes more of a backseat, while at Dartmouth, the college continues to assume a leadership role at the forefront of the industry.”

Pickett said he was not aware of Waite-Franzen’s comments, though he did discuss her departure during the interview process. President Ruth Simmons assured him that the University “will not seek to fail by under-funding projects,” he said, and added that he had no reservations about taking the role at Brown and was looking forward to the opportunity to work within Brown’s

“innovative environment.”

“Brown is different from a lot of other universities. There is a spark of creativity and innovation here among students, faculty and administrators that I’m excited to be a part of,” he said. “I am extremely excited at the idea of improving things and finding a better or more efficient way to get something done. I like to tweak things around and think of new solutions and in that sense I think Brown really fits with my values.”

Pickett said he is conscious of the need to tailor spending on technology to meet the needs of students and professors.

“I’m not a person who is interested in technology for technology’s sake,” he said. “I want to make sure that our initiatives are geared towards supporting research and the overall academic experience. Hugely funded projects are not always the most successful, and I don’t want to be wasting money that could be used to hire another professor or provide a scholarship to another student,” he said.

But, Pickett added, he will “fiercely advocate for” projects he thinks deserve funding.

Pickett said he thinks his background in teaching and research helps him to put his work in context and understand the need to balance academic needs with the goal of developing technology. He has a master’s degree in education, and he taught and conducted seminars and workshops in developmental disabilities at the University of North

Carolina at Chapel Hill in the late 1970s. He was also on the research faculty at the University of Oregon in the early 1980s.

Pickett, whose father was a professor at Duke Medical School as well as an inventor with 43 patents, became involved in technology at a young age. He joined Duke in 1983 as a microcomputer programmer at Duke Medical School.

Pickett said he was not looking for a job outside of Duke, but he quickly became very interested in Brown when he was contacted by the search committee about the vacancy in January.

“Brown is perhaps the only University that could have attracted me away from Duke,” he said.

Pickett said his first major initiative at Brown will be to “talk with a number of people.”

“I don’t want to make the mistake of ‘ready, fire, aim,’ ” he said.

“I want to gather a lot of information from students, faculty and administrators before moving forward with anything,” he said.

He said he is familiarizing himself with Brown’s specific needs and projects, mentioning the implementation of Banner, overcrowded physical facilities and challenges presented by the current human resources payroll system.

Pickett said Duke’s similar size to Brown, as well as his friendship with a number of members of Brown’s CIS administration through the IvyPlus Administrative Computing group, will help ease his transition to his new job.

Nieto speaks on Latino education challenges continued from page 1 attend poorly funded and highly segregated schools.

“In general, Latinos are among the poorest in the nation,” she said. “These are grim realities, but they are important realities to know.”

Nieto, whose appointment is at UMass’ School of Education, sought to debunk several myths about why Latinos in the United States tend to achieve less academically, including the assumption that education is not a priority for Latino parents and that Latino students are “culturally and experientially deprived.”

She told the audience in MacMillan 117 that the existing deficits are rather a result of discrimination and a lack of knowledge among many Latinos about educational opportunities, such as

scholarships and financial aid.

“I think the biggest obstacle is not the cost of tuition but that (Latino) students perceive that that’s the biggest obstacle,” she said.

Despite the current bleak situation, Nieto said there is a lot that can be done. “There is hope, and you are that hope,” she said of the Latino students at Brown.

Nieto emphasized the importance of taking responsibility and serving as an educator and advocate in the Latino community and teaching others about the unique perspective of Latinos in the United States.

“All Latinos are not alike, and it’s important for you to educate people about that,” she said.

Latino History Month Programmer Andrea Lopez ’08 also spoke in her opening remarks of the diversity of the Latino community, evidenced by the recent

growth and success of cultural and academic student groups among Latinos at Brown.

For Mayra Reyes ’10, the event’s other student speaker, friendships with fellow Latino students on campus have helped her to feel more at home on College Hill. “I can say with great certainty that the Latino community here at Brown shares a great responsibility in my triumphs,” she said.

The convocation was the first of several events that will take place over the coming weeks in recognition of Latino History Month. Upcoming events include a “fiesta” in Sayles Hall and a lecture by Ana Vilma de Escobar, the vice president of El Salvador and first woman to hold that post.

The Latino History Month events are part of an effort by students at the Third World Center to provide “the Brown community with experiences to learn more about Latinos … (and) a forum for Latino students to work together,” Lopez said.

Nieto’s speech provided additional inspiration for Lopez and other attendees, such as Jeffry Esquivel ’09, a member of the Latino History Month Committee. “I found it interesting that she challenged misconceptions that people have about Latinos,” he said, adding that it was moving to hear her speak of the responsibility that Latino students have to the community at large.

Lopez said Nieto’s emphasis on education was relevant to issues facing Latino students at Brown.

“Being here at Brown, it’s kind of easy to forget about where you come from and where your roots are,” she said, adding that it is important maintain a sense of responsibility. “We’re here because other people came before us and other people took those risks.”

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

Citing increased U. duties, Simmons steps down from Pfizer board post continued from page 1 ment.

University officials hinted to the Wall Street Journal on Feb. 24 — three days after Simmons told Pfizer she would not seek re-election to its board — that the president was considering reducing her corporate activities, adding that her work on corporate boards had not affected her job performance at Brown.

In a September interview about her corporate board responsibilities, Simmons told The Herald that her priority is her duties at the University.

“In talking to each of the boards, I made clear that obviously my responsibility to Brown came first. If it got to the point where I could not go to the meetings because of my obligations at Brown, I would drop the boards — this is a no-brainer,” Simmons said. “I give every day, long days, every weekend to Brown … but I do get my own time like anyone who works.”

“It would be easier for me without a question — not better — if I didn’t have the board responsibilities,” Simmons said in September.

But board directorships bring her and the University benefits that outweigh the costs of such commitments, she said.

According to the company’s recent proxy statement, Pfizer’s full board met nine times and its corporate governance committee, of which Simmons is a member, met 10 times. Directors attended 90 percent of the company’s board meetings, the report said.

People often underestimate the commitment required of corporate board members, who are not only legally liable for the company’s conduct but also for maintaining strong knowledge of its finances and strategies, said Nell Minow, editor of the Corporate Library, an interest group that collects data on corporate governance. Service on a corporate

board typically demands upward of 300 hours per year, Minow told The Herald.

New regulations such as the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act have also imposed new requirements in corporate governance, such as stricter auditing methods and greater accountability for boards of directors, Minow added.

Simmons certainly isn’t the only university president on a corporate board. According to a November 2005 survey of 688 college presidents in the Chronicle of Higher Education, 31.8 percent of college presidents sit on a corporate board, while 12 percent sit on more than one and 1.2 percent sit on four or more boards.

Minow said leaders in academia joining corporate boards is a long-running trend but that in recent years, presidents have been joining more boards than ever to garner support for their schools. Serving on a corporate board lends academic stature to companies, and in return, university presidents are afforded networking opportunities and access to potential donors.

“College presidents joining corporate boards has become more prevalent. But they are stuck on the audit committee or the compensation committee, where they really don’t know very much,” Minow said. “Oftentimes the deal is college presidents … won’t rock the boat on corporate boards, and they are able to get a lot of support from that company for their school.”

According to the Chronicle’s analysis of its survey, the typical college president serves on the boards of local or regional companies — not necessarily the world’s largest corporations — and brings in modest funds from retainer fees and stock options. Simmons, who earned $199,801 in retainer fees and stock from Pfizer, and other presidents of other top-tier universities are among a select few who serve large international firms.

Faculty approves 2 initiatives continued from page 1 voted to create a three-year pilot program to offer for-credit continuing education programs for adults. Under the plan, the University will offer series of courses, called a certificate programs, intended for adults with bachelor’s degrees. A certificate program would include about five to six courses specially designed for a target population, said Karen Sibley, dean of summer and continuing studies, who presented the motion to the faculty. Adults completing these courses would receive grade reports, a transcript and a document acknowledging the program’s completion.

“This is a nice opportunity to teach a new population of students … and would allow us to reach out to the adult learner community,” Sibley said.

Professor participation in the program would be completely voluntary, and pay would be determined similarly to summer studies programs, in which a professor receives 1/9th of his or her academic year salary for teaching the course, Sibley said.

Sibley told the faculty that hypothetical examples of certificate programs include a program to teach multi-language education to

secondary school teachers and a program in workplace health and disease prevention.

The three-year pilot program will not mix adult learners and traditional undergraduates, although faculty input will be taken into consideration if the pilot is successful and expands to further programs, Sibley said.

Also, Elizabeth Huidekoper, executive vice president for finance and administration, gave an updated summary of the University’s capital plan, which includes increasing University debt and boosting spending from the University’s endowment.

“We will have a higher dependence on strong endowment returns and a greater reliance on student fees,” Huidekoper said. If either source of income does not perform as expected, she said, the University faces financial “disaster.”

Still, the University is basing its decision to increase debt and endowment spending on the actions of peer institutions.

“We need to increase the size of the faculty, improve international financial aid … and undertake big capital projects to stay competitive and to attract the best students from all around the world, Huidekoper said.

CAMPUS N EWS WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

PAGE 5

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

U. gets $1m for high school advising effort

BY FRANKLIN KANIN STAFF WRITER

The Jack Kent Cooke Foundation recently donated $1 million to the University to establish the College Advising Corps, which will help Rhode Island high school students navigate the admission process.

The Swearer Center for Public Service will implement the program, which will build on existing work by Brown undergraduates, said Roger Nozaki MAT’89, the director of the Swearer Center and an associate dean of the College. These programs include a free SAT prep course taught

by Brown students and a guidance program to help Hope High School students with the college application process.

Sejal Jhaveri ’09, a student coordinator who works with area high school students, said she does not know how the new corps will interact with existing programs, but she said a main goal is to expand college advising efforts beyond nearby Hope High School.

“We’re still in the early stages, so we don’t know exactly how everything is going to work together,” Jhaveri said. “But we’re definitely going to take some of their ideas and bring some of our ideas, and we’re going to try to mix it and come up with the best solutions we can to help in the schools in Providence.”

The grant to Brown is part of a $10 million nationwide initiative of the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, modeled after the “College Guide” program at the University of Virginia, also funded by the foundation.

“The goal of the College Advising Corps is to help more students, particularly low income students, enter college. It’s to help supplement the information students receive about the admission process and financial aid,” said Elizabeth Morgan, director of youth programs for the foundation.

The program will recruit and train Brown alums to act as col-

BY DEBBIE LEHMANN SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Chris Bennett / Herald File Photo The Swearer Center for Public Service will use a $1 million grant to implement a program to help Rhode Island high school students navigate the college admission process.

lege guidance counselors in Rhode Island high schools. There will be one person at each school who will work with school guidance staff to aid students with the college admission process.

The Swearer Center hopes to send out a job description to current Brown seniors and recent alums to get them interested in applying for the program, Nozaki said. He said he hopes to launch the hiring process before the end of the school year. Training will take place in August, and members of the corps will begin working with high school students at the beginning of the next school year.

Brown was chosen as a recipient of the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation grant because of its history and commitment to community service among both undergraduates and graduates, Morgan said.

“The Swearer Center for Pub-

lic Service makes a very good home for this effort, and Brown has also already been quite involved in public education efforts, particularly in Providence,” she said.

Lamont Gordon ’93, director of education outreach at Brown, said the program affirms the importance of making college accessible to high school students.

“Having access to college — education in general — is one of the most important things in our society that will enable students to really grow, develop and participate in our society,” he said.

Nozaki said inequality in access to higher education “has nothing to do with students’ ability and potential — it’s a reflection of inequalities within the system.”

“Students in families in the top income quartile are five times more likely to get bachelor’s de-

gree by age 24 than those in the bottom income quartile, so there’s a huge disparity there in terms of access to college and success in college that’s correlated with family income,” he said.

The College Advising Corps program intends to help students receive financial aid so they can go to college. “There are millions of particularly lowincome students and students whose parents didn’t attend college who have no idea how to get to college. They have no idea of the options that are available to them. … They just assume that ‘my family can’t pay for college and therefore I can’t go,’ and they don’t realize how much need-based financial aid is available or how to make it work for them,” Morgan said. “We’re actually hoping to see the percentage of high school graduates who go on to college increase.”

English master’s program to be suspended after next year

BY OLIVER BOWERS SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Next year’s incoming master’s students will be the final class admitted to the Department of English’s terminal master’s program before its suspension, said Daniel Kim, associate professor of English and the department’s director of graduate study.

“We may revisit (the program) in the future, but for now we’ve suspended (it),” Kim said. Two students are currently enrolled in the program, which offers a two-year course of study leading to a master of arts in literatures and cultures in English.

The primary reason for closing the program was the continued lack of financial support for master’s students. Kim said providing departmental support for the master’s students would divert resources from the much more popular doctoral program.

Unlike doctoral candidates

U. releases pamphlet on student-DPS interactions

— who, starting next academic year, will receive five years of full funding along with other benefits — master’s students often do not receive aid from the Graduate School. Some departments offer funding to master’s students but many others — including English — do not provide financial aid packages, though master’s students in English may apply for loans, according to the Grad School Web site.

“M.A. students (in the English department) don’t receive financial support, and we felt that if we are going to keep the terminal M.A. program, we should have a much more substantial support structure for it,” Kim said. But, he said, increasing support for the master’s program would be difficult without diverting resources from the doctoral program.

Another reason for the suspension was the program’s lack of a distinct purpose, Kim said.

“The Graduate School is redoing their Web site, and they wanted to make a clear distinction between M.A. programs and Ph.D. programs,” Kim said. “We took that as a request to clarify the purpose of the M.A. program. …

We looked at it, and we realized it doesn’t have a clear and distinct purpose on its own.”

Dean of the Graduate School Sheila Bonde said the Grad School more clearly distinguishes between the degree programs now than in the past.

A year and a half ago, “our admissions procedures simply admitted you to (the Grad School) and asked you to check a box for the (M.A.) or the Ph.D. We’re now focusing on those programs to say, ‘Who are we admitting?

Where are we focusing our energies?’ ” Bonde said.

Kim said the decision to suspend the program was “difficult” because some “really terrific students” have come through it.

David Liao GS, one of the two students in the English master’s program, said there is little to distinguish the master’s from the doctoral program.

“The master’s program is just a small chunk off the Ph.D. program. You’re taking all of your classes with Ph.D. students,” Liao said. “It is a good program, but it doesn’t feel very distinct from what Ph.D. students are doing.”

He said the program has been “very useful” as preparation for the doctoral degree he plans to pursue after graduation.

“I needed (a master’s program) as a stepping stone for following the Ph.D.,” Liao said. “I feel like I would not have been ready to go right from an undergraduate to a Ph.D. program,” he added.

“I needed to learn the difference between serious academic scholarship and doing well as an undergrad. I feel like the master’s program taught me what serious scholarship is.”

The Department of Public Safety and the Division of Campus Life and Student Services released a new brochure this week outlining what students can expect if they are stopped by DPS officers and how they can pursue concerns about student-officer interactions.

Students received the brochure, titled “Your Basic Rights and Responsibilities When Interacting with Law Enforcement,” in their campus mailboxes. The pamphlet is also available online on the DPS Web site.

Discussions with the Public Safety Oversight Committee led to the publication of the brochure, according to Interim Vice President for Campus Life and Student Services Russell Carey ’91 MA’06.

The alleged incidents of police brutality that occurred in September sparked conversations about students’ awareness of their rights and brought to light the need for better information and education “in an accessible, proactive way,” Carey said.

The guidelines in the pamphlet will “serve as the necessary catalyst” to encourage mutual respect between officers and students, wrote DPS Manager of Special Services Michelle Nuey in an email to The Herald. The brochure outlines how students can expect to be treated by officers and offers advice to help students make good decisions during encounters with officers. Nuey wrote that this is intended to alleviate student anxiety during interactions with law enforcement officers.

“We realize being stopped by an officer can be a bit intimidating,” Nuey wrote. “However, students need to understand that officers play a very specific role here on campus and strive to keep our community safe.”

Asking students to provide identification is “often critical” to maintaining community safety, Nuey wrote. She added that student cooperation during field stops “really does assist DPS in providing a safe and secure environment.”

The pamphlet also informs students about how to provide feedback to DPS about their interactions with officers. This will result in improved communication and understanding, Nuey wrote.

The publication of the pamphlet builds on DPS’ ongoing efforts to increase information available to students, Carey said. The information in the brochure was available to students before, but the pamphlet makes it quick and easy to read, he said.

Associate Vice President for Campus Life and Dean of Student Life Margaret Klawunn also said the brochure makes information more accessible to students.

“The information was available, but not in a way that was cognizant to students,” she said.

“The pamphlet is an attempt to put something out there that would be very clear.”

PAGE 6

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

Gossip columnist dishes — about himself continued from page 1 might find something about Bill Clinton that will keep them talking.”

As a kid growing up in the Chicago suburb Highland Park, Ill., Rush was not particularly interested in celebrity gossip, but he did admire legendary Chicago SunTimes writer Irv Kupcinet’s local gossip rag. At Brown, Rush wrote for Fresh Fruit, which was then The Herald’s weekly alternative magazine, and spent a summer interning at the Providence Journal. Sold on the news business, he moved to Manhattan and got a master’s degree from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.

After freelancing for magazines such as Esquire and Rolling Stone and writing news copy for a local New York TV station, Rush took a job reporting for the New York Post’s famed Page Six gossip page.

“They were going to provide health insurance,” he said.

While reporting for Page Six, Rush met his wife and co-columnist-to-be, fellow reporter Joanna Molloy.

After about five years, in 1993, the New York Daily News offered Rush his own column, and the following year the paper’s editor “thought it would be a cute idea” if Molloy joined him.

Since then, “Rush and Molloy” has been an enormous success.

Last television season, the couple featured prominently in Bravo’s documentary series “Tabloid

Wars,” which chronicled the lives of New York Daily News reporters.

In addition to appearing in newspapers throughout the United States, Canada and New Zealand, the column is often quoted in the Internet’s most widely read blogs. The Drudge Report has a permanent link to Rush and Molloy’s Daily News page.

But as a young reporter planning a career in news, Rush hardly thought his beat would one day include Paris Hilton and Nicole Ritchie.

“Certainly thoughts have crossed my mind, like ‘How did I end up here?’ ” he said. “But I’m not really bothered by it.”

He said his job is immensely gratifying because he knows ordinary people, as well as other media outlets, read his writing.

“You take the subway to work and you see people checking out what you’ve been working on the day before, and you kind of feel like you’ve become a part of the routine of New York,” he said. “Entertaining people is not such a bad thing, I’ve come to think.”

Over the years, Rush said, many reporters who have graduated from Ivy League schools have contributed to his column.

“I suppose it’s a comment on the sad decline of our civilization that I should end up with so many Yale graduates at my beck and call,” he joked. “But it does give you a kind of satisfaction, in going to Brown, that Yalies want to work for you.”

In deciding what to print, Rush said he and his wife usually get

confirmation from at least two sources before publishing anything. The pair also maintains certain standards of privacy for their subjects, such as trying to keep celebrities’ children out of the spotlight.

“The kids didn’t seek out the fame,” Rush said. He and Molloy also avoid printing people’s home addresses.

“We try to be tough on people, but not gratuitously mean,” Rush said.

When it comes to appropriateness of content, lurid sex stories are out. The two print only what they would be comfortable describing to their eight-year-old son, Eamon. But “he’s growing up pretty fast, I think, being around us,” Rush joked.

The couple’s typical day begins in the office around 9:30 or 10 a.m.

They pore over the day’s news and decide which stories to pursue.

They then work the phones, talking to sources, and submit their column by 6 p.m.

After deadline, Rush and Molloy hit the town. They dig for material at Manhattan’s hottest events, from club parties to film premieres, book receptions, art openings and other star-studded affairs.

As consummate observers of Manhattan’s social elite, Rush said he and Molloy appreciate their comparatively low profiles.

“Writing about celebrities has made us cherish what anonymity we have,” he said. “Particularly at a party, when you’re trying to slink around undetected as you eavesdrop.”

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WORLD & N ATION A MONDAY, APRIL 2, 2007

WO

PAGE 7

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

R L D

I N

BR

I E F

East coast braces for ‘active’ storm season (Baltimore Sun) — With El Nino no longer running interference, more hurricanes and tropical storms are expected this summer, forecasters say.

Scientists at Colorado State University say the dissipation of the El Nino weather pattern in the Pacific in recent months is likely to bring more hurricanes sweeping up the Atlantic coast beginning in June.

Whether the culprit is global climate change or just the result of cyclical patterns, this year’s hurricane season is likely to be bad, the forecasters say.

“We are predicting a very active season this year,” said Philip Klotzbach, a research associate in the Department of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State.

The Colorado State report is the first of three traditional hurricane forecasts issued for a season that begins June 1 and ends Nov. 30. AccuWeather.com is due to issue a forecast in early May followed by the National Weather Service’s National Hurricane Center on May 22.

Klotzbach and forecaster William Gray are predicting 17 named storms, including nine hurricanes, five of which will be Category Three storms with winds of at least 111 mph.

Iranian diplomat is freed as standoff talks continue BAGHDAD, Iraq (Los Angeles Times) — An Iranian diplomat seized in Iraq two months ago has been freed, the Iraqi government said Tuesday. The envoy was welcomed by senior Iranian officials at the airport in Tehran, the official Iranian news agency IRNA reported.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s office later announced it has held “direct contacts” with Ali Larijani, Iran’s chief international negotiator, to help end the diplomatic standoff over 15 British sailors and marines being held for alleged violations of Iran’s territorial waters.

“The prime minister believes both sides share a desire for an early resolution of this issue through direct talks,” Downing Street said in a statement Tuesday night. “The U.K. has proposed direct bilateral discussions and awaits Iranian response on when these can begin.”

But Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett earlier cautioned against hope of a speedy resolution to the standoff, which began March 23 when the British military personnel were detained in the northern Persian Gulf. Britain maintains that the 14 men and one woman were in Iraqi waters; Iran says they entered its territory.

“I would urge you to be cautious in assuming that we are likely to see a swift resolution to this issue,” she said in a statement, issued after a briefing with reporters.

Hormone improves social skill, study finds (Newsday) — Scientists call it the love hormone, the chemical that binds people to one another. Now researchers from the University of Zurich in Switzerland have found that the hormone, released in high amounts in mothers after childbirth, can improve a person’s ability to interpret what is going on in another person — by reading information gleaned from their eyes.

Gregor Domes, Markus Heinrichs and their colleagues asked 30 male volunteers to guess the mental states of others after receiving a nasal dose of the hormone oxytocin. The men were much better at these social interpretations after using oxytocin than when a placebo dose was used, according to a study in the journal Biological Psychiatry.

Oxytocin is a brain chemical that supports social behavior, and Domes and his colleagues suspect that it may play a role in autism, in which people have difficulty understanding social cues.

In 2005, the Zurich researchers showed that oxytocin increases trust among people, in addition to playing a role in maternal bonding. In some of the latest work, it seems that oxytocin’s role isn’t just in regulating social interactions. Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg of the National Institute of Mental Health and his colleagues found that oxytocin dampens the fear response. Scientists are studying the hormone’s role as a treatment for social anxiety, but nasal doses are short-acting. There are synthetic oxytocin compounds now in development for anxiety and autism.

Bush attaches conditions on Court’s EPA ruling

BY JOEL HAVEMANN WASHINGTON POST

W WASHINGTON — President Bush, acknowledging that humans are at least partly responsible for global warming, said Tuesday that he took “very seriously” the Supreme Court’s ruling that the Environmental Protection Agency must regulate greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles as pollution.

But he attached two conditions that appeared likely to retard EPA regulation of carbon dioxide and other gases that trap heat at the Earth’s surface: He said any regulatory program should not slow economic growth, nor should its benefits to the atmosphere be offset by mounting emissions from China, India and other growing economies.

Bush’s stance sets up a potential conflict with the Democratic Congress, which has been laying the groundwork for tougher regulation of greenhouse gases.

“The president still doesn’t get it,” Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said in a statement.

She said his legislative proposal to encourage cleaner automobile fuels would actually result in greater emissions of greenhouse gases.

This is because Bush has proposed a program of liquefying coal for use in automobiles — a process that releases substantial amounts of carbon dioxide.

The Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decision, ruled Monday that the EPA was required by law to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases as pollutants. The administration, siding with automakers, had argued that carbon dioxide was not a pollutant as defined by the Clean Air Act, but the court held that it was merely a different kind of pollutant.

Asked about the decision at a Rose Garden news conference, Bush said, “I have said that it is a serious problem. I recognize that man is contributing greenhouse gases.”

But solving the problem, he said, must not cut into economic growth.

“It’s going to require new technologies, which tend to be expensive, and it’s easier to afford expensive technologies if you’re prosperous,” he said.

Bush also said China and India must get on board the international effort to combat global warming.

“Unless there is an accord with China,” he said, “China will produce greenhouse gases that will offset anything we do in a brief period of time.”

Boxer jumped on that remark.

“I find it offensive that the president is still using China as an excuse to do nothing when the U.S. has always been a leader in environmental protection,” she said.

Boxer said she would summon EPA officials before her committee in April to explain how they

planned to follow the Supreme Court ruling. Her goal, she said, was passage of “the strongest possible global warming legislation.”

EPA spokesmen said Tuesday that it was too early to respond to the court decision.

Two House committees have also expressed an interest in global warming legislation. A subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee, whose chairman is Rep. John Dingell, a Democrat whose Michigan district is home to much of the auto industry, has already held 10 hearings on the subject.

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, is also interested in the issue, but he has not yet formulated an action plan.

The auto industry, the principal target of the Supreme Court ruling, reacted guardedly to the decision and Bush’s response to it.

Dave McCurdy, chairman and chief executive officer of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, said in a statement that “there needs to be a national, federal, economy-wide approach to addressing greenhouse gases. This decision says that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will be part of this process.”

The alliance emphasized the importance of building more fuelefficient cars because vehicles that use less fuel produce less carbon dioxide.

Many college students hesitant about vaccine offering protection against cervical cancer

BY LAURA SESSIONS STEPP WASHINGTON POST

WASHINGTON — THE FOUR WOM EN ARE LOUNGING IN THE SIGM A KAP P A LIVING ROOM AT GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY, DISCUSSING THE NEW VACCINE THAT M AY KEEP THEM FROM DY ING OF CERVICAL CANCER. BRYTTAVA OLSON, A SOP HOM ORE , HAS HAD TWO OF THE SERIES OF THREE INJECTIONS “BE CAUSE M Y M OM P ICKED M E UP THE

fiRST TIM E

AND SAID,

‘YOU ’RE

GOING TO

HAVE A SHOT.’” HER THREE SORORITY SIS TERS , HOWEVER TWO SENIORS

“I

— A SOP HOM ORE — ARE WAITING .

AND

I SIERRA STRATTNER, THE OTHER SOP HOM ORE .

SINCE THE CERVICAL CANCER VACCINE GARDASIL CAM E ON THE M ARKET IN JUNE , HEALTH AUTHORITIES AND STU DENT LEADERS AT COLLEGES AND UNIVERNEED SOM EONE TO TELL M E

HAVE TO DO IT,” SAYS

Ukrainian confrontation escalates

SITIES HAVE BEEN WAGING A CAM P AIGN

MOSCOW (Los Angeles Times) — Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko demanded Tuesday in a face-to-face confrontation that the prime minister accept early parliamentary elections and warned against violent street protests — noting pointedly that as president, he commands the military.

Backers of Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich in turn asked the Constitutional Court to overturn a presidential decree signed Monday that disbanded parliament and called elections for May 27.

The day’s developments suggested that an ongoing power struggle between the pro-Western president and pro-Russian prime minister would be played out, at least for now, primarily through the legal system rather than on the streets.

The two men were bitter rivals in 2004 when massive street protests forced a repeat of a presidential runoff that Yanukovich claimed to have won. He lost the second balloting but became prime minister last August when he put together a coalition of parties to form a parliamentary majority.

At his meeting with the prime minister Tuesday, the president warned that he would not tolerate any violent means of preventing fresh elections. “As the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian armed forces, I will not allow a forcible scenario,” Yushchenko declared, according to his press service.

VACCINE AND THE HUM AN P AP ILLOM A-

TO INFORM YOUNG P EOP LE ABOUT THE VIRUS , OR HPV, THAT IT ATTACKS .

AT GWU, FRESHM AN EM ILY BROOKS AND HER FELLOW CAM P US DEM OCRATS WORKED INFORM ATION TABLES ON CAM P US FOR A WEEK IN

FEBRUARY,

AND HEALTH P ROFESSION-

ALS HAVE GIVEN M ORE THAN JECTIONS .

“I’VE

300

SO EX CITED ABOUT SHOTS ,” SAYS

SP INELLI,

IN-

NEVER SEEN WOM EN

CINDI

A NURSE AT GWU’S STUDENT

HEALTH CENTER.

BUT THERE ARE ABOUT 5,000 FEM ALE AT GWU. WHILE

UNDERGRADUATES SOM E OF THEM

M AY HAVE STARTED

THE SHOTS IN THEIR HOM E TOWN, M ANY

M ORE , OBVIOUSLY, ARE HOLDING OFF.

ONE REASON IS COST, WHICH CAN RANGE FROM $360 TO $500. (SOM E HEALTH INSURANCE P LANS DO NOT COVER THE VACCINATION, OR COVER ONLY P ART OF IT.) BUT THEY GIVE OTHER REASONS

as well: The virus is transmitted through sexual activity, and they’re not having sex right now. Or they are having sex but are uncertain about how effective Gardasil is or what its long-term consequences might be. Some assume that hookup partners who can afford poppedcollar shirts and expensive jeans are not the kind of guys who would be infected. And some admit they think that cervical cancer won’t happen to them — even when, like Strattner, they know someone their age who was diagnosed at an early stage of the disease.

Although the vaccine is most effective in individuals who haven’t yet had sex — a profile that most college students don’t fit — medical authorities are closely following the progress of the vaccine on campus because students, male as well as female, are at such a high risk of acquiring the virus. A recent study by the Centers ffor Disease Control and Prevention found that women between ages 20 and 24 had the highest infection rate — nearly 45 percent, though only 2 percent of those were infected with cervical cancer strains.

What authorities are finding is some acceptance, but also ambivalence and confusion. Truth is, information doesn’t drive behavior in adolescents and young adults, particularly social behaviors like sex, according to specialists such as Michael Cohen, professor emeritus of pediatrics at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York.

“Teens don’t plan their Saturday night that way,” he says.

What they learn only in a brochure or class won’t make them run to the health clinic for a shot.

It won’t make them have less sex or, if they get a shot, more sex, as some vaccine critics contend. Other factors are involved in such decisions: sexual maturation, the advice of parents and educators, what they see on YouTube or at the cineplex, what their friends are doing and saying — particularly a friend they’ve ended up in bed with.

Condom use is a good example. Most young people know that condoms provide some protection against sexually transmitted diseases, including HPV. But those who are sexually active report using a condom only about half the time, according to the 2006 American College Health Survey.

Male partners are one reason protection is not more common, says GWU senior Adrian Tworecke.

“They’ll ask if you’re on birth control, and if you are, they’ll say they’re not going to use a condom.”

And if a woman brings up the fact that a man can be infected with HPV and pass the virus to her?

“You’re going to offend him,” Strattner says. Or, senior Mallory Kirsh says, “He’ll say, ‘Do I look like someone who would have an STI?’ It’s so hard. It makes it look like you don’t trust him.”

Many young people tell researchers that they use condoms the first time they have sex, particularly if they don’t know the partner well.

If they and their partner get tested for STDs and the results are negative, or if they go out with the person several times, they’re less likely to continue using protection because condoms lessen the sensations that come with sex. continued on page 8

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

PAGE 8

Many college students hesitant about HPV vaccine continued from page 7 Four male GWU students interviewed together in a university dining hall say they rely on their partners to enforce condom use. Three of the four say they’re more worried about pregnancy than disease.

If a date says she’s on birth control and doesn’t ask her partner to use a condom, “that’s a green light,” senior Brian Levey says. It’s a matter of knowing her well enough to trust that she would tell you if she were infected, he adds.

The young men admit they don’t know much about HPV or the new vaccine. Three are surprised to learn that condoms don’t provide 100 percent protection against the virus. (Under the best conditions, it’s about 70 percent.) They don’t know that at least half of all sexually active people will get HPV at some point in their lives or that for most of them, it will clear up by itself.

What they do know is that HPV has more serious health implications for girls and women than for them, that males can’t be tested for it yet nor vaccinated against it. “It’s hard for guys to take responsibility for condoms or a vaccine when they don’t know a lot about the virus and don’t think it really affects them,” says Jake Tworecke, Adrian’s younger brother.

This is a generation that has been vaccinated against more than a half-dozen diseases in their lives, starting in infancy. You might think taking a new series of shots would be a no-brainer for young women.

But some sound war-weary.

“There will always be something else out there, some other disease discovered, or a drug that doesn’t work anymore,” Kirsh says. “We’re always hearing about STDs becoming more prevalent. This is the time of our lives when we’re supposed to be carefree. Now there’s always some danger hovering above.”

Some students prefer to focus on the dangers right in front of them, like the friend passed out after a party. Says Levey: “You see someone who’s wasted on alcohol or stoned on your couch. Viruses like HPV can seem minor by comparison.”

At Howard University, many male students are similarly blase, according to Robaer Washington, a senior. “Some guys I know use condoms; some don’t,” he says, “but a lot of them don’t care. All they say is, ‘Right now, I’m going to enjoy myself.’”

Howard senior Dominique Scott isn’t willing to give young women a free pass, however, saying, “For every guy who’s nonchalant about negative conseqences (of sex), I’ve met a female who doesn’t care.”

Scott and Washington argue that if the students they know had better information about STDs, they might pay more attention to what they do. Renee Jenkins, presidentelect of the American Academy of Pediatrics, agrees.

Behavior may not change quickly with information, says Jenkins, an adolescent medicine specialist at Howard University Hospital, but it

won’t change at all if you don’t have the information.

In a recent national survey of mostly white university students, two out of three said they knew little or nothing about HPV. Jenkins says the proportion is also high among the low-income adolescents she serves.

Pediatricians, who are the primary caregivers for this group, don’t have a lot of experience with STDs and are often not well-informed on the subject, Jenkins says.

Additionally, the educational material that physicians and clinics receive from government sources are “pretty dense, not something a lot of people will want to read. We’re trying to educate our patients, but I don’t get a lot of requests for the vaccine.”

At Howard, junior Jennifer Ransome is taking a health class this semester that includes instruction on HPV and other STDs. The class is for women only, and many of the students are afraid to go to a gynecologist, she says. When the teacher told students that condoms, even correctly used, didn’t protect completely against HPV, “everyone gasped,” she says.

Still, “a lot of them were not for the vaccine.” But she is. She says she plans to get her first shot at her upcoming annual visit to the doctor.

Scott, too, says she’ll get the vaccine, but only if a friend goes with her.

“It’s not something I like to do by myself,” she says. “I don’t need a doc or some commercial telling me.

I need my friend’s support.”

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

Videographer cuts deal, is freed from prison

BY JOE MOZINGO Los Angel es Times

A videographer who spent 7 1/2 months in prison for refusing to turn over footage of a San Francisco street demonstration to a federal grand jury was released from custody Tuesday after striking a deal with prosecutors to publish his outtakes on the Web. Under the agreement, Josh Wolf, 24, will not have to testify or identify people shown in the video. The U.S. Attorney is investigating who hit an officer in the head with a pipe during the demonstration, as well as an alleged attempt to set fire to a police car.

The video footage Wolf released Tuesday morning on his Web site, www.joshwolf.net, did not show either incident.

The blogger stepped into clear, bright day later that afternoon after 226 days at the federal prison in Dublin, Calif. — a longer term than any journalist in U.S. history has served for refusing to reveal unpublished material or sources.

“I feel really good, a bit overwhelmed,” he said in an interview via cellphone. “The pace of life is so slow in prison, I feel like a kid from the country coming to the city, even though I live here.”

All along Wolf insisted that the video did not contain anything that would be relevant to the investigation, but said that he had a constitutional right as a journalist not to cooperate and become “an arm of law enforcement.” Several media advocacy groups, including the Committee to Protect Journalists, supported his stance and called for his release. The U.S. Attorney argued that he was not a journalist and did not have that right.

In November, having had no luck on appeal, Wolf agreed to release the video as long as he didn’t have to testify, he said. But the U.S. Attorney wanted his testimony.

On Feb. 12, Wolf did an extensive interview with the syndicated left-of-center radio program, Democracy Now, and said he received hundreds of letters of support. The next day, U.S. District Judge William Alsup referred the case to a magistrate for mediation. On Monday, Wolf and the government came to the current

agreement.

Wolf released the video and answered two questions under penalty of perjury — whether he saw anyone throw anything at a police car, and whether he saw the person whom San Francisco Officer Peter Shields was trying to take into custody when he struck in the head, suffering a skull fracture.

“My answer is no,” he replied to both.

In court papers, the U.S. Attorney requested that Alsup release Wolf from confinement but said the government would not be precluded from issuing another grand jury subpoena to Wolf in the future.

Wolf continued to insist he was acting as a journalist, not a participant, on July 8, 2005, when he set out to film the anarchist demonstration. “The purpose of me going out that night was to go out and document a protest that would be ignored by the establishment media,” he said.

Wolf’s incarceration came as a spate of journalists faced prison time for refusing to comply with jury subpoenas. Former New York Times reporter Judith Miller spent 85 days in jail for refusing to testify in the CIA leak investigation. And two San Francisco Chronicle reporters — one of them Lance Williams ’72 — were facing prison time for refusing to testify who leaked them confidential documents in the steroid probe of the Bay-Area Laboratory Cooperative — the threat was dropped when a defense attorney admitted he was the source and pleaded guilty to contempt of court and obstruction of justice.

While California has a shield law to protect journalists from testifying in state court, there is no such protection in federal court. The federal government prosecuted the Wolf case on the basis that the victim — the San Francisco police department — received federal funding.

Wolf said he kept his sense of humor in prison. He quipped that he actually gained muscle mass by working out with Barry Bond’s personal trainer, Greg Anderson, who has been in prison on contempt of court charges for refusing to testify in the BALCO probe. “He had everyone working out.”

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

PAGE 9

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

W. water polo wins five straight before sinking vs. Tritons, Anteaters continued from page 12 2-0 lead in the first quarter, but Blaxberg scored with 2:33 left in the period to cut the lead to 2-1.

Despite a goal from Glick and two goals from Balassone in the second quarter, Bruno trailed 5-4 at halftime. After Cal Baptist increased its lead to 6-4 in the third, Balassone found the net for the third time to make it 6-5, and Claire Angyal ’07 tied the game at 6-6 as time expired in the third quarter. In the final period, Brown finally took control of the game, cruising to a 9-7 victory behind goals from Lansing, Presant, and Wyatt, who finished with a teamhigh four assists.

Against No. 15 Long Beach State, the Bears started strong, building a 6-2 halftime lead with goals from six different players. With 4:08 remaining in the third period, Glick scored to give Brown a 7-2 lead, and the game appeared well under control.

But Brown could not shake the pesky 49ers. Long Beach State dominated the fourth quarter and scored four unanswered goals to tie the game at 8-8 with 3:23 remaining. But with 1:39 left, Lansing struck again for her third goal of the game to secure the 9-8 victory for Bruno.

The next day, the Bears let an early lead slip away against No. 6 University of California, Irvine, despite another hat trick from Lan-

sing. Though Brown led 4-2 at the end of the first quarter, Irvine scored three early goals in the second period to take a 5-4 lead. After Lansing tied the game at 5-5, the Bears were outscored 7-1 the rest of the game, and Irvine came away with a 12-6 win.

“We came out strong, and we had some opportunities to score in the second and third quarters where we weren’t able to score, and they capitalized on our mistakes,” said Head Coach Jason Gall. “It all has to do with experience. They’re No. 6, and I think we know that we can play with that caliber of team, but we need more games like that under our belt.”

On March 29, Brown closed out its eight-game swing at No. 15 University of California, San Diego.

Two goals and two steals from Caitlin Fahey ’07 were not enough to overcome an initial 6-0 deficit. The Bears were held scoreless until Fahey’s goal 45 seconds into the third quarter cut the deficit to 6-1. After the Tritons took a 7-1 lead with 4:43 left in the third, Angyal and Lansing scored to make the score 7-3 heading into the final period. With 5:20 remaining in the game, Fahey scored her second goal to cut UCSD’s lead to 7-4. Unfortunately, the Bears could not mount any further offensive attack, and another Triton goal made the final score 8-4.

On Saturday, Brown will face No. 13 Hartwick College, which defeated the Bears 13-7 in their last meeting.

The following week, the team will round out its regular season play.

“We know we can win the rest of our games,” Gall said. “And then we’ll start preparing for (the Northern Division Championship). We have a legitimate chance to win Northerns, which would give us a great feed going into the Eastern championship.”

With wins over nationally-ranked teams such as Long Beach State and the University of Michigan under its belt, the team looks poised for a solid finish to the regular season and a strong postseason as well.

Baseball finishes grueling road trip 6-5, opens Ivy season with split continued from page 12 seven innings. Going into the top of the ninth, the Bears trailed 83 and, as Drabinski said, “looked like we had no business being in that game.”

What happened next resembled something out of a Little League game. After the first four Brown batters of the inning walked, a wild pitch scored rightfielder Adjatay Nyadrjoh ’07, trimming the lead to three. Dietz then hit a tworun double before Nuzzo tied the game with an RBI single. After two more batters reached base, Nuzzo, who went 8-for-9 on the day to raise his batting average to teamleading .352, scored on Robert Papenhause’s ’09 bases-loaded sacrifice fly — the first out of the inning

— to give Brown its first lead of the game.

The Bears would score five more runs that inning, thanks to an RBI single by Nyadrjoh, in his second plate appearance of the inning, and catcher Devin Thomas’s ’07 two-run double. The Bears wound up sending 16 batters to the plate in the top of the ninth alone, and Princeton aided the rally with three errors and a hit batsman.

“It was probably one of the most exciting games I’ve ever been a part of,” Thomas said. “We were flying pretty high after the game.”

Unfortunately, the offensive momentum didn’t carry over to the next day, when Brown faced Cornell in Ithaca, N.Y. Right-hander Will Weidig ’10 pitched a splendid, six-inning complete game, giv-

ing up just two runs, but he took a tough loss as a trio of Big Red pitchers held Bruno to just one run on four hits over seven innings. Drabinski said it was a frustrating game, especially since the Bears stranded 11 runners.

“There were a couple of calls that were kind of fluky and odd, but we had many chances in the first three innings, and we only got one (run) in,” he said.

Sunday’s second game was postponed to Monday because of rain, but the extra day didn’t help the Bears’ situational hitting.

Brown took an early 1-0 lead after centerfielder Steve Daniels ’09 led off the game with a double and scored after a steal and a throwing error on the catcher, but Cornell scored two runs in the bot-

Eagles hitters thrash softball’s pitchers continued from page 12 BC made sure to score when it had the opportunities. In the top of the fi fth inning, the Eagles put five runs on the board, which put the game out of reach.

Boston College started off the inning with a single to left, but its next hitter popped up to Katie Rothemel ’10 at shortstop, who alertly fired the ball to first base and nailed the baserunner, caught between first and second for a double play.

Despite the two quick outs, BC continued to apply pressure on Brown. Taylor Peyton doubled to left field. The next batter walked,

putting two on for Amanda Booth.

She promptly doubled to center, bringing in Peyton and moving pinch-runner Amy Tunstall to third. Weir followed with a bloop single to right field that scored two more runs. Relief pitcher Jessica Iwasaki ’10 walked the next hitter, then plunked the next batter to load the bases. Jenna Macchi hit a sharp single to left, which scored two more runs and ended the BC scoring binge.

“They got the hits when it counted,” Baxter said. “We didn’t have any lapses defensively, but they capitalized on their opportunities.”

Brown scattered seven hits

throughout the game, only advancing a runner past first base twice, and left eight runners on base.

“As a team we are struggling offensively,” Baxter said. “We are having a hard time putting runs together.”

Though Brown was no match for BC, the team felt the competition against an Atlantic Coast Conference opponent would serve it well in the long run.

“This will prepare us for the rest of Ivy play,” Enabenter-Omidiji said.

Brown returns to action this weekend when it faces Columbia and the University of Pennsylvania. Both games are on the road.

W. lax halts Gaels, Crusaders, falls to Dartmouth in Ivy opener continued from page 12 battled hard and played with consistency ffor the whole 60 minutes,” Vitkus said.

Against Holy Cross, it was the Crusaders — not the Bears — who got off to a hot start. Holy Cross went up 3-0 in the first 14 minutes of play, and despite Kaitlyn Giles ’10 scoring her first career goal and another score by Vitkus, Bruno struggled to find its offense, trailing 4-2 at the half.

“We knew at halftime that we needed to pick it up and gain the momentum if we wanted to compete in the second half,” Vitkus said.

Kelly Robinson ’09 provided the first spark for Bruno’s offense when she found the back of the net just 1:44 into the second half. After two more goals by the Crusaders, DeTolla scored back-to-back goals to ignite a 4-0 Brown run that gave the Bears a 7-5 lead.

Holy Cross responded and cut the deficit to one, but the first career goal by Kiki Manners ’10 temporarily restored Brown’s twogoal advantage. The Crusaders answered again, but with 11:51 to play, Vitkus netted her second goal of the game, which proved to be the game winner. The Crusaders managed to keep things interesting by scoring once more with 9:17 remaining. Fortunately for the Bears, goalie Melissa King ’08 made two big saves down the stretch, including one on a breakaway, to secure the 9-8 win. King had 11 saves in the game.

“We came out strong in the second half and didn’t let up until the final whistle,” Vitkus said.

But in their first Ivy League game of the season, the Bears could not muster much offense or defense against No. 13 Dartmouth. The Big Green jumped out to an early 5-0 lead and never looked back. Vitkus managed to

score Bruno’s only goal of the first half, and the Bears went into halftime down 11-1.

The Bears were finally able to put a dent in Dartmouth’s backline in the second half when Vitkus scored her seventh goal in three games and Manners added her second of the season to make it 12-3. Nunn added her 13th goal of the year to cut the deficit to 144, and Markowski tacked on another with 3:39 remaining to make it 16-5. Dartmouth scored the final goal of the game to hand Brown a 17-5 defeat and its first Ivy League loss.

“In our next six Ivy games, we’re looking to come out strong from the very first whistle,” Vitkus said. “We want to play our game and dictate the pace of play. It should be an exciting Ivy season.”

Brown continues Ivy League play when it returns to action at home Saturday against Columbia at 12 p.m on the Turf Field.

tom of the inning, thanks to the Bears’ own throwing error. The two teams then traded runs in the fi fth, sixth and seventh innings to give Cornell a 5-4 lead, which ended up being the final score as the Bears could not manage a rally in the last two innings. Starter Alex Silverman ’08 took the loss, giving up four runs, two earned, over 5 2/3 innings. The team stranded the tying run on third three times in the game.

With the Cornell games in mind, Drabinski said the modus operandi of the week will be situational hitting.

“So all we’re going to do (this week) is suicide bunt, hit and run, situation hitting,” he said. “Cornell forced our hand.”

The team fared a little better on

the South Carolina road trip, facing teams that have played about twice the games Brown has played. The Bears took three of four against Charleston Southern University (13-22) and The Citadel (17-11).

Drabinski said the only low point of the trip was the 7-3 loss to Division II Francis Marion University.

The trip “was definitely a positive,” Thomas said. “We were able to beat some pretty good teams.”

The Bears are scheduled to travel to Kingston today to play a doubleheader with the University of Rhode Island, but the forecast calls for one-to-two inches of rain, and Drabinksi said the game may be rescheduled. Brown hosts Columbia and the University of Pennsylvania in a pair of doubleheaders this weekend.

E DITORIAL & L ETTERS THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

PAGE 10

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

STAF F EDITORIAL

A warm welcome to Mr. Pickett At first glance, the University appears to have made an excellent choice by selecting Michael Pickett as the new vice president for computing and information services.

Coming to Brown following a 24-year career in IT work at Duke University, Pickett brings extensive experience to College Hill at a time when the University seems to be emphasizing upgrades to its technology. The recent changes made to computing infrastructure, expansion of wireless Internet on campus and academic initiatives such as MyCourses have sometimes seemed more clumsy than coherent. These continuing woes with outdated computer systems will soon be on Pickett’s plate, along with managing the new Banner system that unites the computer records of 11 different University offices. These aren’t small tasks, and we hope Pickett’s experience will help him manage these projects with a steady hand.

We are most encouraged, though, by Pickett’s appreciation of the symbiotic relationship between IT and academics. Pickett told The Herald he is not “interested in technology for technology’s sake” but wants to “make sure that our initiatives are geared towards supporting research and the overall academic experience.” Technology on a college campus is only as valuable as its practical use, and though Pickett will be taking over a University division based off-campus, its work must have meaning on College Hill. With the expansion of MyCourses and other initiatives, there is potential for a more vibrant, effective marriage of academic work — in the classroom and out — with cutting-edge technology. Pickett seems to be the right man to lead that effort.

We are hopeful, but it is still too early to tell what kind of chief information officer Pickett will be. For now, we wish him a warm welcome as he moves north.

PETE FALLON

LETTERS

Why Hope matters The needs of a struggling high school a mile away from the Main Green may not strike students as relevant to their lives or to the University. For many of us, interactions with Hope High School are limited to fleeting glances at the school’s students on Thayer Street or brushes past them in the P.O. as they make their way home in the mid-afternoon. But as the University boosts its commitment to local schools and its links to Hope through programs like the newly created College Advising Corps, we’re reminded that Hope High’s success is important to Brown students.

Two years ago, the chaotic school was on the brink of closure. Among the suggestions for its rehabilitation was a scheme that would have put Brown in control of at least one branch of the school and other Rhode Island universities at the helm of its other two parts. Though the Ocean State’s universities did not take Hope under their wings at that time, a handful of student volunteer programs such as Let’s Get Ready have continued Brown’s sometimes tenuous but lasting connection to its neighbor.

Now, thanks to a $1 million grant from the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation to create the College Advising Corps, at least one Brown alum will provide ongoing college counsel to Hope’s aspiring students, and current Brown students will volunteer to help with SAT preparations.

As President Ruth Simmons ratchets up the University’s relationship with Providence’s schools — most notably through a $10 million endowment — concrete measures like these must demonstrate Brown’s commitment to Providence’s students and their success, not just its schools’ annual budgets.

T HE B ROWN D AILY H ERALD Editors-in-Chief Eric Beck Mary-Catherine Lader

Executive Editors Allison Kwong Ben Leubsdorf

Arts & Culture Editor Arts & Culture Editor Features Editor Features Editor Metro Editor Metro Editor News Editor Opinions Editor Opinions Editor Sports Editor Sports Editor Asst. Sports Editor Asst. Sports Editor Asst. Sports Editor

PHOTO Eunice Hong Christopher Bennett Jacob Melrose

Photo Editor Photo Editor Sports Photo Editor

To the Editor: I’m a junior in the East Asian studies department, and I’d like to explain my support for the Undergraduate Council of Students resolution against Banner and echo its call to bring back the printed Course Announcement Bulletin.

Like many interdisciplinary departments, the East Asian studies department depends on cross-listed courses. When I search Banner, only courses listed under “EAST” show up. This actually excludes from the results HI 41: “Introduction to East Asian Civilization: China” and HI 42: “Introduction to East Asian Civilization: Japan,” two survey courses that are required for the concentration. The registrar’s office showed me how to look up “courses of interest to concentrators,” but doing so only turns up a list without even linking to the referenced courses — students are forced to search individually for each cross-listed course. Implementing a system with no support for cross-listing is downright shameful for a school which goes so far as to advertise itself as supporting interdisciplinary fields of study!

Today we received in our mailboxes a sheet of pa-

per announced as a “printed course schedule,” which was closer to a Chinese takeout menu than the Course Announcement Bulletin. No cross-listed courses were included, nor were course descriptions.

I am going to cry “foul” here. This is hypocrisy. All that we, the students, are asking for is what we have always had: a printed course bulletin, listing for each concentration what courses are available, which are required, when they meet, who teaches them, a brief description and associated prerequisites. There used to be no links to follow, no hoops to jump through. The computer science students who wrote Mocha have been a huge help, but Banner cannot offer us all that information in one easy-to-access place. Even BOCA was better than this.

We would like our Course Announcement Bulletin back. Surely being able to easily see your own concentration’s course offerings is worth the cost of printing paper.

K. Adam White ‘08 April 3

Senior Editors Stephen Colelli Sonia Saraiya BUSINESS

EDITORIAL Lydia Gidwitz Lindsey Meyers Stephanie Bernhard Stu Woo Simmi Aujla Sara Molinaro Ross Frazier Jacob Schuman Michal Zapendowski Peter Cipparone Justin Goldman Sarah Demers Erin Frauenhofer Madeleine Marecki

Interdisciplinary study requires printed course bulletin

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O PINIONS WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

PAGE 11

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

To thesis or not to thesis?

COURTNEY JENKINS OPINIONS COLUMNIST It’s a little late to start wondering why in God’s name I wrote a thesis. Maybe I was feeling a little bit idealistic, or maybe I was a little bit masochistic — either way, I sat around on my senior year spring break not sipping an umbrella-accented pina colada on the beaches of Puerto Rico with my imaginary tan, non-English-speaking boyfriend-in-a-loin-cloth Pablo, but instead at home pounding Diet Cokes like they were tequila shots. It was a pretty sad sight, and I’d bet my third chapter that there was a chorus of seniors singing the same tune, so I thought I’d take a moment to consider why we thesis.

A thesis is, in essence, a curricular capstone. For some departments it’s required, and for some it is simply the cherry on top of an already delicious and pretty marvelous Brown degree — that is to say, honors probably won’t mean anything in three years, unless of course you want to brag in the New York Times social section when you get married to that guy from Princeton who will probably have more inflated honors than you anyway.

For the sciences, a thesis might require engaging in an original experiment or killing mice or doing something smart-sounding, but they say to write about what you know — and I know absolutely zilch about science — so I want to send my apologies to all you kids toiling in the lab saving our generation

while I sit around and pontificate on some old Soviet dudes.

A humanities thesis is, as Charles Dickens so eloquently put it, the best of times and the worst of times. I am currently in the homestretch of writing a thesis for the history department which is, alternately, about as many pages as Ryan Cabrera weighs in pounds and about as finished as the song that never ends. Though I know my topic frontward, backward, sideways and in some other dorkier dimension, there are moments

lonely, tumultuous and ultimately exorbitantly rewarding process. Come April 16, I will have little tangible evidence — save for three bound copies, an estimated $500 coffee bill and a pasty white skin tone that most closely resembles a fluorescent light bulb — of the trials and tribulations which I’ve gone through in producing this work. From doing a little dance in the Smithsonian Archives when I came across the “smoking gun” letter I’d been digging for (a notable high point) to the day when I booked my flight home for

My thesis is, alternately, about as many pages as Ryan Cabrera weighs in pounds and about as finished as the song that never ends. when I’m actually not sure what it’s really all about. Stepping back from page 126, it’s scary to start to question whether what I’m doing is original, or worthwhile, and wondering if anyone will really care.

But then it hits me, in a rather Shakeresque experience probably induced by an overdose on hot tamales: I care. It sounds very Tony Robbins, a little too self-help for Brown, but it’s true — writing a thesis is a

spring break (a low point), to those rare and fleeting seconds when the whole thing made sense, the defining moments of my thesis process have occurred in front of an audience of one.

That said, there’s a perceptible camaraderie which extends to thesis writers; it’s like being a part of a little community of historians who understand what it’s like to sort through primary documents, organize 40 page chap-

ters and to construct an interesting narrative in the depths of the library while all your friends are watching Grey’s Anatomy and going to the GCB. It’s also about pride. Pride in knowing that, as miniscule or microscopic as your argument may be, it’s a means of interjecting into the ongoing historical dialogue with a contribution all your own. I may be idealistic, but some part of me hopes that one day, years down the road, some pasty, pale kid out there looking for someone else’s words of wisdom on the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies and its impact on Reagan-era Washington, stumbles upon my dirty manuscript and finds it halfway readable.

It’s a small goal, yes, and whether or not that’s worth sacrificing your social life for is an individual assessment. But five years down the road, it won’t be about the honors.

It will be about knowing that my proudest and most challenging senior moment was hammering out this damn paper, and that somewhere in the dungeons of the John Hay, in an alternate Toy Story-esque universe, my bound and laminated words will sit there for eternity, chatting away about George Kennan and the Cold War with the thousands of other theses with their own stories to tell. It may have come with its fair share of blood, sweat and tears, and it’s certainly not over just yet, but I don’t regret writing a thesis one bit. And — here’s the kicker — I might really miss having it around. Here’s to you, thesis writers. And all you historians out there, I’ll see you at Spats at 4:01pm on Monday the 16th.

Courtney Jenkins’ ’07 hard drive just crashed.

Lent and Easter have become a sham SEAN QUIGLEY OPINIONS COLUMNIST As we return to campus after a restful spring break, we also enter the holiest of Christian weeks. Yet, in observing the trite displays of faith that frequently accompany this week and the entire period of Lent that precedes it, I truly do wonder if fellow Christians care at all about Christianity — save for its most superficial aspects.

The sham of Lent and Easter, as they exist in the modern age, is quite dispiriting.

One of the most common questions that I hear in the days surrounding Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, is: “What are you giving up for Lent?” I try to be respectful when someone asks me this intensely personal question, but in recent years I have begun to cast aside my characteristic reticence when the issue of “giving up something” arises.

In all honesty and with all due respect, I find our modern approach to Lent, Easter and virtually every other Christian holiday to be a profound misinterpretation, or more probably, a profound ignorance of Scripture.

I do not contest the idea that Christians are called to sacrifice during Lent. However, I find the notion that God commands us, during a single period of the year, to offer empirical sacrifices to Him quite repulsive. It betrays an immature — borderline childish — understanding of faith if one regards as eminently indispensable sacrifices such as “giving up soda,” “watching less television,” or not eating meat on Fridays, all of which comprise only a portion of the towering list of feigned religiosities.

A biblical scholar I am not, though I find absolutely no justification, in Scripture or through Reason, for the legalistic maintenance of many modern Christian traditions.

I can tolerate the existence of Lent and Easter, as they aim to commemorate events that

merit a Christian’s highest respect, but only so long as the events that these holidays celebrate are properly understood and the holidays celebrating them are regarded as facilitators of this proper understanding.

No enlightened Christian can participate in the superficialities of these manmade holidays unless one understands that their religious importance amounts to little.

Their propensity to cheapen the sacrifices of Christ should make us approach them with the utmost caution.

Let us examine the tradition of Easter egg hunts, bunnies and baskets. From where do they derive their justification? Certainly not from the Bible. And, I doubt that Catholics would have the gall to suggest that their sa-

evolved from the pagan practice of worshipping the “resurrection” of fertility and “longer” days.

The cliched traditions that accompany these two Christian events, from eggs to baskets, are merely paganism with a Christian face, seeing as they too have evolved out of non-Christian celebrations of the vernal equinox. At best, they distract us from the true meaning of Christ’s sacrifices in the desert, his death on the Cross and his Resurrection. At worst, they instill a modern form of paganism into an increasingly selfish and consumerist society that appears neither to care for the sacrifices of Christ nor to reflect earnestly and exhaustively on what salvation entails.

No enlightened Christian can participate in the superficialities of these man-made holidays unless one understands that their religious importance amounts to little. cred tradition supports these practices.

So then, what is their origin? I ask that question without completely knowing the answer myself. Many scholars speculate that some early Christian leaders created Lent and Easter as a way to “Christianize” formerly pagan holidays. Referring specifically to the practice of a 40-day period of sacrifice, followed by the joyous celebration of a lifedeath-rebirth deity, they are oddly similar to the ancient Babylonian festival that venerated the resurrected Tammuz. It should be noted that theories abound concerning what exactly led to the creation of Lent and Easter. But in virtually every account, Easter

Briefly returning to the practice of making specific sacrifices during Lent, at the end of the day, no one is seriously harmed because of this innocent tradition. However, making such sacrifices marks only the beginning of one’s duty to the Lord. It is a childish endeavor to undertake, meant for those who have the basest understanding of Christian duty. In time, a Christian should mature.

Thus, making trite, material sacrifices is not wholly unjustifiable. It possesses the ability to make Christians more mindful of the myriad sacrifices — large and small, public and private — that are inherent to calling oneself a Christian. But he who thinks his

duties have been fulfilled come Easter, ending his on-display “sacrifice” once the period of Lent is over, will only possess an infantile faith.

In closing, I would like to dwell on one sacrifice that is especially vital, and difficult, for a Christian to make — the sacrifice of becoming and constantly remaining counter-cultural. A Christian must never become a mere sheep in a herd of believers, except when Christ is the shepherd. Yet, such an occurrence will only happen when the Kingdom of Heaven is realized, in the afterlife.

Until that point, each individual person is under the constant, rather than periodic, burden of extracting personal meaning from Christianity. No external factor — including, but not limited to, attending a sunrise service (which has strong pagan origins), making a meager sacrifice, or deceiving children with tales of a fictitious bunny — can cement a lasting faith in the Lord.

Only rigorous introspection, coupled with a persistently humble approach to existence, can make the beautiful truth of Christianity come alive. The occasional sacrifice, public displays of faith and feel-good symbols often become the focal points, thereby distracting us from this important work.

In his 1855 “Attack Upon Christendom,” the Christian existentialist philosopher Soren Kierkegaard passionately wrote, “The human race in the course of time has taken the liberty of softening and softening Christianity until at last we have contrived to make it exactly the opposite of what it is in the New Testament.”

When I encounter the Easter Bunny, colored eggs, hot cross buns and virtually every other artificial sign of faith, I see the story of our salvation unnecessarily altered to suit the whims of a materialistic, faithless people. I see near-heresy conveniently disguised as indispensable Christian tradition.

Look harder, and you will also see it.

Sean Quigley ’10 is the guy who tells little kids that Santa Claus doesn’t exist.

S PORTS W EDNESDAY WEDNESDAY, APRIL 4, 2007

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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

W. lax quiets Gaels, Crusaders but falls to Dartmouth in Ivy opener

BY MEGAN MCCAHILL SPORTS STAFF WRITER

The women’s lacrosse team didn’t need any divine intervention in winning its first two games over spring break, easily defeating St. Mary’s College 17-6 last Saturday, and using a second-half rally to earn a come-from-behind, 9-8 victory over the College of the Holy Cross the following Tuesday. But the Bears could not maintain their streak against then-No. 13 Dartmouth College in their Ivy League opener.

Brown employed a total team effort in dominating St. Mary’s.

Thirteen different players registered at least one point in the contest, and nine different players scored. Jesse Nunn ’09 and Molly McCarthy ’10 led the Bears with five points each, and Meghan Markowski ’10 was right on their heels, tallying four points.

“Our offense really connected,

and our defense played steady throughout the entire game,” said midfielder Lauren Vitkus ’09.

The Bears dominated the Gaels from the start — Vitkus scored the first of her three goals just 31 seconds into the game. Brown went into halftime with a 7-3 lead and never looked back. Goals by tricaptain Mimi DeTolla ’08, Vitkus, tri-captain Ali Holland ’08, Nunn and Markowski put the Bears up 14-4 midway through the second half. But the Bears were not satisfied with the 10-goal lead and continued to overpower St. Mary’s through the end of the game. Justine Lupo ’08, tri-captain Amie Biros ’07 and Callie Lawrence ‘09 all scored their first goals of the season in the waning minutes to make the final score 17-6.

“The win was huge for our team not only because so many people contributed, but also because we continued on page 9

Softball blanked by BC

BY JUSTIN GOLDMAN SPORTS EDITOR

Ashley Hess / Herald File Photo Matt Nuzzo ’09 went 8-for-9 to lead the Bears to a doubleheader sweep of Princeton on March 21.

Baseball breaks even in spring trip, Ivy openers

BY STU WOO FEATURES EDITOR

While some Brown students were vacationing in Cancun or Miami, the baseball team spent its spring break grinding its way through a 10-day, 11-game road trip against tough squads in South Carolina, New Jersey and New York.

The Bears played well enough to finish the trip 6-5, but they also started their Ivy League season with a disappointing 2-2 record, following a dramatic sweep of Princeton by dropping two onerun games at Cornell. The team’s overall record is now 7-13.

After a six-day swing through South Carolina, the Bears opened their Ivy League season with a doubleheader at Princeton, last year’s league champions. The first game was a pitcher’s duel between Brown ace Jeff Dietz ’08, Collegiate Baseball’s Ivy League Preseason Pitcher of the Year and the Tigers’ Steve Miller.

Both starters pitched solid seveninning complete games, but Dietz, who gave up just two runs and five hits while striking out six, was slightly better in helping the Bears to a 4-2 victory. The Bears scored a pair of runs in the second and the fourth innings.

Shortstop Matt Nuzzo ’09 went 3-for-3 at the plate, starting both rallies with singles.

“Dietz pitched a great game,” said Head Coach Marek Drabinski. “We got some timely hits and played very well after that.”

After a baseball purist’s dream game, the second match between the Bears and Tigers was a messier affair. Starting pitcher James Cramphin ’07 had a rocky start, giving up six runs, four earned, in six innings, while Princeton starter Christian Staehely held the Bears to just two runs in his continued on page 9

The momentum from its first Ivy League win this weekend was not enough for the softball team to overcome Boston College Tuesday. The Eagles utilized a fiverun fi fth inning to take an 8-0 win, dropping Brown to 7-15 (1-3 Ivy League). Brown had its chances but could not come up with the big hit when it counted.

“We started slow,” said Head Coach DeeDee Enabenter-Omidiji. “We didn’t get into the flow of the game until it was too late. I thought we’d come out better considering what we did last weekend, but it wasn’t there today.”

After a scoreless first inning, the Eagles put three runs on the board in the second. Michelle Moses ’09 got the first batter she faced to foul out, but she allowed a double to the next batter and then gave up back-to-back walks.

With the bases loaded, Dani Weir

hit a line drive double that scored two runs. The next hitter stroked a single to left field, which plated another run.

Brown almost let up a fourth run in the inning after catcher Amy Baxter ’08 misplayed a pitch from Moses. But Baxter raced to the backstop and fired a strike to Moses, who was covering home plate. She tagged out the runner trying to score on the play.

Amanda Asay ’10 and Whitney Lewis ’10 had back-to-back, twoout singles in the bottom of the fourth inning, but Linnea Anderson ’08 grounded out to the first baseman to end the threat.

“We need to make better adjustments at the plate,” Enabenter-Omidiji said. “We have to work on putting the ball in play early in the count and making adjustments with two strikes.”

Though Brown could not capitalize on the few chances it had, continued on page 9

W. water polo wins five straight before being sunk by Tritons, Anteaters

BY BENJY ASHER SPORTS STAFF WRITER

The women’s water polo team made a strong stand in California over spring break, winning five of eight games over six days, including posting a 3-1 record at the Aztec Tournament in San Diego. Brown also upset No. 15 Long Beach State University. The road trip left Brown at 14-7 heading into the home stretch of the regular season.

On March 24, the team began the Aztec tournament, facing host San Diego State University, ranked No. 4 nationally. The Aztecs dominated the game throughout, building a 72 lead in the first half and holding the Bears scoreless in the final 15:34 of the game. Despite two goals and three steals from Elizabeth Balassone ’07, Bruno fell to San Diego State, 12-3.

But Brown rebounded in its second game of the day, playing stellar defense and executing on offense en route to a 10-4 victory over Cla-

remont-Mudd-Scripps. Once again, Balassone led the Bears with four goals, and Lauren Presant ’10 added three goals and two steals.

The following day, Bruno notched two more wins in a pair of tight games against Pomona-Pitzer and California State University, Bakersfield. After allowing PomonaPitzer to take a 3-0 advantage in the first quarter, the Bears stormed back. Alexis Blaxberg ’08, who finished with two goals, put Brown on the scoreboard with 3:15 remaining in the first quarter. Brown rallied to tie the game at 5-5 at the end of the third quarter, behind two goals from Sarah Glick ’10, as well as one goal apiece from Balassone and Paige Lansing ’07. The Sagehens went ahead 6-5 in the fourth quarter, but Presant’s clutch goal with 15 seconds left in regulation forced overtime, where the Bears completed their comeback, outscoring Pomona-Pitzer 2-1 to earn an 8-7 victory.

After falling behind early against Cal State Bakersfield, Bruno scored

Jacob Melrose / Herald File Photo Paige Lansing ’07 dumped game-winning goals against No. 19 California Baptist University and No. 15 Long Beach State University on March 27, then put in another three goals in a loss to No. 6 University of California, Irvine, the next day.

three unanswered goals to gain a 31 advantage in the first period and never looked back on its way to its third consecutive win, 9-7. Early in the fourth quarter, Balassone’s second goal of the game put the Bears ahead 8-5, but the Roadrunners answered with two goals to cut Brown’s

lead to one. However, the Bears held off the Roadrunners’ surge, and a goal from Ally Wyatt ’08 with 45 seconds remaining sealed the victory for Brown. Wyatt and Balassone scored two goals each. Presant led the team with three goals.

On March 27, Brown had a re-

match with the California Baptist University team that handed the Bears a disappointing 6-5 defeat just over a week earlier at the Wolverine Invitational. The Lancers looked poised to upset the Bears for a second time when they jumped out to a continued on page 9