The Brown Daily Herald F riday, O ctober 12, 2007
Volume CXLII, No. 87
Strong job market awaits class of 2008
After Grad School policy change, TA shortage strikes some classes
It looks to be a good year for graduating seniors at Brown and around the country — employers nationwide are planning to hire 16 percent more new college graduates this year than they hired last year, according to a recent survey by the National Association of Colleges and Employers. The NACE survey, which compiled responses from 203 of its employer members, has been conducted for at least the last decade, said Andrea Koncz, employment information manager at NACE. Nearly 58 percent of responding employers said they plan to increase their college hiring, while only six percent expect to trim the number of college graduates they hire in entrylevel positions, according to a Sept. 13 NACE press release. “For the most part, it’s telling us that there are a lot more positions open for college graduates because of retirements. The companies are growing, and they have more positions open to hire new college graduates,” Koncz said. This is the fi fth consecutive year that employers have projected double-digit increases in college hiring. “There haven’t really been many major changes within the last four or five years. We’re continuing to see increases across the board,” Koncz said. “It’s really just more of the same good news.” That national trend bodes well for the class of 2008 at Brown. “We see every indication that there will be strong hiring of Brown graduates across industries in the year ahead,” said Barbara Peoples, senior associate director of the Career Development Center. “We have a continued on page 4
places an emphasis on reducing graduation time. As grad students face increased pressure to complete their degrees more quickly, balancing teaching responsibilities and graduate work is proving difficult for many grad students — and large undergraduate classes are feeling the unintended consequences. Professors teaching some of the University’s most popular lecture courses have been forced to either reduce the frequency of section
Sections replaced by online films, and professors ponder setting new course caps By Chaz Firestone Senior Staff Writer
By Erika Jung Contributing Writer
Since 1866, Daily Since 1891
A shortage of teaching assistants that has hit several large classes across many academic departments may be the result of recent policy changes in the Graduate School, which now guarantees five full years of funding to each grad student and
allows individual departments to allocate funds as they please. The five-year funding guarantee, which was announced in 2006 and took effect this semester, was designed to make the Grad School more competitive with peer institutions. Though funding may be available to some grad students beyond the initial five years, the new policy
Internationalization, construction on agenda By Michael Skocpol Senior Staff Writer
portance to college students because they are targeted as a primary source of piracy. The Recording Industry Association of America has taken particular notice of this demographic, serving pre-litigation letters to universities around the country found to have students engaged in illegal file-sharing. In April, The Herald reported that RIAA served pre-litigation notices to the University accusing 12 undergraduate students of illegally downloading music. Vijay Raghavan, the DFU program director, mentioned the litigation as he began the event before posing questions to panel members representing the so-called “content industry”: David Green, vice president for public policy development at NBC Universal; Jason Oxman, vice
At its regular fall meeting this weekend, the Corporation, the University’s highest governing body, will focus on construction plans and hear reports on internationalization, the Task Force on Undergraduate Education and faculty hiring. The University also plans to announce the appointment of the new vice president for international affairs this weekend. The Corporation will discuss a number of building projects slated for completion in the next few years, possibly finalizing sites for the proposed Creative Arts Center and a cognitive and linguistic sciences building and discussing architect selection for upcoming renovations that will turn Faunce House into the Stephen Robert Campus Center, said Secretar y of the University Al Dahlberg and Director of Media Relations Molly de Ramel. The Corporation will also decide how to accommodate plans for a new swim center in the University budget, said Elizabeth Huidekoper, executive vice president for finance and administration, in an interview last week. The Herald reported Wednesday that plans for a new aquatics facility — necessary after the Smith Swim Center was closed last year due to structural instability — may have led University officials to table plans to construct new student housing. The University’s internationalization efforts will also play a prominent role this weekend. Provost David Kertzer ’69 P’95 P’98 will focus on the subject in his report to the Corporation’s Committee on Academic Af fairs, Dahlberg said, and the University plans to announce this weekend its selection for the newly created position of vice president for international affairs. First announced in October 2006, internationalization is ex-
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Tai Ho Shin/ Herald
The Graduate Center Bar, which operates underneath Grad Center, is not financially affiliated with the University.
Beneath Grad Center complex, a happy haven By Gaurie Tilak Contributing Writer
“Find the door that looks like it belongs to a nuclear bunker, and take the stairs down,” read the instructions to the Graduate Center Bar on the Web site for the Graduate Student Council. You might not expect it, but beneath
the nondescript concrete towers of the Grad Center complex lies a privately run, fully functioning bar. Unlike the Underground in Faunce House, which is recognized by the University as an undergraduate student organization, the GCB is run as its own corporation. It leases its property
By Catherine Cullen Contributing Writer
A sparsely attended debate last night in Salomon 001 kicked off Digital Freedom University’s evening at Brown, featuring a panel discussion about consumers’ rights in the digital age followed by a free concert at the Underground. Digital Freedom University is an offshoot of the Digital Freedom Campaign, a political group founded three years ago and based in Washington, D.C., that seeks to protect and expand consumer rights to use digital entertainment. The group’s DFU program is in its early stages and will appear at several universities along the East Coast to spread awareness about entertainment issues in the era of the Internet. Digital freedom is of particular im-
Chris Bennett / Herald
Everyone But Pete vocalist Jim Fanale speaks with Vijay Raghavan of Digital Freedom University in the Underground before the band’s performance.
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ARTS & CULTURE
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Corporation to meet this weekend
from Brown and holds a Class D liquor license. The GCB corporation, officially known as “Brown University Faculty-Graduate Student Club Doing Business at the Graduate Center Bar,” is run by a board of governors and a manager. Board members can continued on page 6
Digital ‘freedom’ debate questions consumer rights
INSIDE:
meetings led by grad students or scramble to find more TAs. Sections in HIST 1740: “Civil War and Reconstruction,” which enrolled 151 students this semester, now only meet every other week, and students are asked to watch films online on off-weeks instead of discussing course material. “With three TAs and 151 students — and a TA in our department is not expected to teach more
NOT BLACK & WHITE Thulani Davis discusses her family’s complicated past in Civil War-era America.
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CAMPUS NEWS
next stop: Mars Col. David Scott, Apollo 15’s commander, tells Brunonians that Mars colonization is in the future.
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OPINIONS
195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island
no place to study Sean Quigley ‘10 thinks the University’s libraries are hideously and distractingly ugly.
12 SPORTS
Tackle & Turnover Men’s football looks to turn around its three-game losing streak this Saturday, when it hosts Princeton.
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