Friday, January 25, 2008

The Brown Daily Herald F riday, J anuar y 25, 2008

Volume CXLIII, No. 3

Since 1866, Daily Since 1891

$5.75 million given to U. for Africa scholarship

By George Miller Senior Staff Writer

A new endowment will increase financial aid for students from subSaharan Africa and will help them financially for two years after graduation if they pledge to return to work in Africa, President Ruth Simmons and Israeli businessman Idan Ofer P’12 announced Thursday.

The “Advancing Africa Scholarship Fund” was announced in Davos, Switzerland, where both Simmons and Ofer are currently attending the World Economic Forum. The scholarship requires students to sign a pledge to return home for at least two years after receiving their degrees — an effort to “build capacity” in the continent, Simmons told The Herald.

Ofer’s gift of $5.75 million will fund $250,000 a year in scholarships for undergraduate students starting with the 2008-2009 academic year.

The endowment will grow over time due to returns on investment, Simmons said, allowing the University to fund more students in the future.

The establishment of the fund marks an important milestone in Brown’s efforts to attract international students. Until recently, Simmons said, it was hard to attract students from Africa. Even with financial aid, those students would have difficulty paying off loans or fulfilling the parent contribution. International students have long complained about a lack of economic diversity among their peers at Brown, something Sim-

mons called “a valid concern.” The endowment came as good news after years of “agonizing” over financial aid for international students, Simmons said.

Ofer is chairman of the board of the holding company Israel Corporation and the shipping company ZIM Integrated Shipping Services, Ltd. The businessman, whose daughter will attend Brown this fall, approached Simmons about scholarships for African students in the summer of 2007, when they first met at a dinner in Israel, she said.

“He said almost immediately, ‘I want to do something for Africa,’ ” Simmons said. The signing of the gift agreement last night marked the end of a months-long process, though, during which the University and Ofer hashed out a deal, she said.

Students applying for the scholarship will be admitted through the normal admissions process, Simmons said, a requirement of any gift to the University. The scholarship includes funds for two return trips, to keep students in contact with their homes and a monthly stipend for the two years students must live in Africa after their graduation.

“Sub-Saharan African nations face poverty, illiteracy, illness and other significant obstacles to economic and social development,” Ofer said in a press release Thursday. “Enabling students to be educated at one of the best universities in the world will give them the tools to help their nation.”

Ofer could not be reached for comment last night.

SPOTLIGHT

Kim Perley / Herald ; Melina Mara / Washington Post Men’s basketball Head Coach Craig Robinson, Sen. Barack Obama’s brother-in-law, first met the presidential candidate nearly 20 years ago.

For his candidate-in-law, hoops Coach Robinson records an assist

By Stu Woo Senior Editor

As Craig Robinson takes a sip of his coffee, his cell phone buzzes.

He puts down his drink to look at a new e-mail.

“German public radio,” he says.

They want an interview.

So a radio station from Germany wants to interview Brown’s men’s basketball coach for a story about his team?

Not quite. Though Robinson has taken the Bears from the Ivy League cellar and turned them into championship contenders in the past two years, a German public radio station and a bevy of other media outlets have been clogging Robinson’s voice mail and e-mail inbox for an another reason: They

want an inside look at his brotherin-law, Barack Obama.

Since last summer, Robinson has been officially campaigning for the Democratic presidential candidate. Robinson said he has been the main speaker at just over a dozen Obama events in Boston, Chicago and New Hampshire. He rarely appears with Obama or his wife, Michelle, who is Robinson’s sister, but he occasionally has been asked to take their places if one of them can’t make an event.

Robinson made most of his trips during the summer, though he did campaign in South Carolina over winter break on a day off for the basketball team. With the Ivy season getting underway, Robinson has limited his campaigning to only interviews, setting aside

time during mornings before he starts work.

Like this morning, at Blue State Coffee, which Robinson insists he chose as an interview site primarily “because it’s the closest place to my office.” Robinson is in a good mood, though his team lost its league opener at Yale on Saturday, and is eager to talk Obama.

When Craig Robinson met Obama nearly 20 years ago, he liked him immediately. His sister, Michelle, was dating Obama at the time, and she brought the then-Harvard Law School student to their Chicago home to meet the family.

Obama appeared smart, engagcontinued on page 9

U. to cut carbon emissions by 42 percent

Different goals set for current buildings versus new allocations

By Alex Roehrkasse Senior Staff Writer Herald File Photo

The Office of Admission is receiving 30 percent more applications than it did five years ago.

20,566 vie for College Hill

Jacob Tower Contributing Writer

Brown has received a record 20,566 applications for the class of 2012, surpassing 20,000 applications for the first time. The number of applications is a 7.7 percent increase over last year, when the University received 19,097 applications for the class of 2011. Applications were up 4.3 percent last year and 8.3 percent two years ago.

The number of applications will continue to rise, said Dean of Admission James Miller ’73, because of late applications. “They’ll

3

CAMPUS NEWS

be trickling in over the next three weeks or so,” he said.

The “continuing attractiveness of Brown” contributed to this rise in applications, as well as the rising total number of high school seniors nationwide, Miller said.

The end of early admission programs at Har vard and Princeton also contributes to the increase in Brown’s applicant pool, Miller said, since students who might have been accepted early to those universities can now apply to a wider range of schools such as Brown.

THE GRADUATE Grad school apps are up 5 percent, while Alpert has opened its arms to 30 new students

www.browndailyherald.com

continued on page 4

5

CAMPUS NEWS

The University announced several new initiatives designed to cut back on its carbon emissions Thursday and said it will commit itself to environmentally responsible expansion.

The measures include emissions and energy efficiency stipulations that will apply to existing University facilities as well as to acquisitions and new developments.

The plan includes a commitment to reduce the carbon emissions of existing University buildings by 42 percent from present levels by 2020, and students, administrators and faculty members see it as a key step in committing Brown to aggressive yet achievable environmental goals in the long term.

“I am pleased that Brown is taking a leadership role by significantly

shopping spree Students can now use Mocha to find out what textbooks they need for those capped courses

11

OPINIONS

cutting our greenhouse gas emissions,” President Ruth Simmons said in a press release Thursday.

“Brown is committed to doing our part to create a more sustainable environment. It is important to lead by example, taking action to preserve and protect the planet.”

The University plans to curb its emissions in a variety of ways, such as switching to cleaner natural gas at its central heating plant, improving the generation of electricity on campus and revamping buildings with more energy-efficient technologies, said Chris Powell, director of sustainable energy and environmental initiatives.

“I think our goal is a stretch, but it’s achievable,” Powell said, having met this week with enthusiastic Facilities Management teams for planning, design and construction to get these emissions reductions projects underway. He said the University’s official commitment to these goals is especially important because it allows Facilities the financial agility to make them a reality.

We can do it Maha Atal ‘08 discusses femininity and its role in this year’s presidential elections.

195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island

cloudy, 36 / 19

As for the University’s expansion agenda, the recently approved goals include a commitment to reduce the emissions of acquired buildings by between 15 and 30 percent. All new construction must maintain energy efficiency levels between 25 and 50 percent below those mandated by state code, as well as achieve a silver rating in accordance with Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design standards.

But the implications of the recently approved goals for Brown’s net emissions would still be somewhat unclear should the University expand rapidly in the future, said Steven Hamburg, associate professor of environmental studies.

“The key challenge for the University is that it can’t differentiate between old buildings and new buildings” in terms of emissions standards, Hamburg said. He added that the establishment of absolute and universal goals for emissions reductions would be a more effeccontinued on page 4

tomorrow’s weather Saturday will be cloudy, just like the lead-contaminated water in our drinking fountains.

News tips: herald@browndailyherald.com

T oday Page 2

Friday, January 25, 2008

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Menu

But Seriously | Charlie Custer and Stephen Barlow

Sharpe Refectory

Verney-Woolley Dining Hall

Lunch — Creamy Cappellini with Broccoli, Italian Roasted Potatoes Oregon Blend Vegetables, BLT Sandwich, Italian Roasted Potatoes

Lunch — Chicken Fingers, Baked Vegan Nuggets, Sticky Rice, S’mores Bars

Dinner — Vegetable Stuffed Peppers, Basmati Rice Pilaf, Steamed Vegetable Melange

Dinner — Fisherman’s Pie in Puff Pastry, Grilled Chicken, Cheese Raviolis with Sauce, Focaccia with Rosemary, New England Clam Chowder

Vagina Dentata | Soojean Kim

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

Dunkel | Joe Larios

RELEASE DATE– Friday, January 25, 2008 © Puzzles

by Pappocom

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle

C

o ssw or d Lewis Edited by RichrNorris and Joyce Nichols

ACROSS 1 Desirable reward 5 In reserve 10 Arctic Cat products, for short 14 Skinny 15 Hulk in a ring 16 One of Wales’s national emblems 17 Ltr. letters 18 Sarcasm, e.g.

19 Not behind 20 Muttering from a Scottish dry cleaner?

23 Good, in the ’hood 25 Great time 26 1930s refugees 27 Scottish region with low cholesterol levels?

32 Theme 33 Small container 34 Some agts.

35 Country sound 37 Endnote abbr.

41 Cotton textile named for an Italian city 42 Tulsa-based rental company 43 View from a Scottish waterfront deli?

48 What a clerk might be in 49 Until now 50 Ring site 51 “Get that Scottish game official something to wear!”?

56 W, vis-à-vis Yale 57 The Mercury Comet was originally designed to be one 58 Cereal “for kids” 61 Prefix with hertz 62 Deceive 63 Hibernia 64 Checked out 65 Complicated 66 Eponymous retailer Andrew DOWN 1 Treo 90, for one 2 Kismet 3 Not obsolete 4 One might be pulled down

5 Toledo native 6 “We have time” 7 “__ Plenty o’ Nuttin’”: Gershwin song 8 Tilt 9 Singer born Eithne Patricia Ní Bhraonáin 10 Where Cook Inlet is 11 One in the back row 12 Put the kibosh on 13 Light bits 21 Working stiff’s sighed line 22 Gal with a gun 23 It may be finished, in an ad: Abbr.

24 Elemental unit 28 Like some ears or gods 29 Celeb in “The First Wives Club” with the cameo line “Remember girls, don’t get mad, get everything” 30 Sling ingredient 31 Crone 35 Business card abbr.

36 “What __ I thinking?”

37 UN workers’ advocate 38 Coccus and tetanus 39 Mitigating chat room letters 40 Teaspoon, say 41 Joke around 42 Prefix with meter 43 Castle’s defensive wall 44 Magazine with annual Best of Beauty awards

45 Hit the roof 46 Miracle workers of ’69 47 Arrange for battle 48 Do figures, in a way 52 Command post 53 Actress Falco 54 Purposes 55 MapQuest offerings: Abbr.

59 Nettle 60 They often go in boxes

Gus vs. Them | Zachary McCune and Evan Penn

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

Nightmarishly Elastic | Adam Robbins

xwordeditor@aol.com

1/25/08

But Seriously | Charlie Custer and Stephen Barlow

By Donna S. Levin (c)2008 Tribune Media Services, Inc.

1/25/08

T he B rown D aily H erald Editorial Phone: 401.351.3372

Join The Herald Info sessions on Jan. 29, Jan. 30, Feb. 6 8 p.m. at 195 Angell St.

The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is an independent newspaper serving the Brown

Business Phone: 401.351.3260

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

Simmi Aujla, President

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

Ross Frazier, Vice President Mandeep Gill, Treasurer Darren Ball, Secretary

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.

C ampus n ews Friday, January 25, 2008

Grad School apps up 5 percent as life sciences apps drop slightly Thirty students admitted to Med School so far

By Brian Mastroianni Senior Staff Writer

The Graduate School has received 6,800 applications so far this year, a five-percent increase from the number of applications received around this time last year. The school will continue to accept applications through Sept. 1, said Chad Galts, communications director for the Grad School.

With 44 doctoral programs and 22 master’s programs, the Grad School saw a 12 percent increase in applicants to the physical science programs, a six percent increase in the social sciences and a two percent increase in the humanities, Galts told The Herald.

Applications to life sciences programs declined by less than 2 percent. The Herald reported last February that 17 percent of a 6,500-person applicant pool was accepted to the Grad School.

Similarly, the Med School’s application cycle does not officially end until the first day of classes in September. While the admissions cycle is still in its early stages, “so far 30 students have been offered admission to the Alpert Medical School,” said Kathleen Baer, the Med School’s director of admissions and

financial aid.

“Last year, the Alpert Medical School accepted roughly 94 applicants out of an applicant pool of 2,599 with an admissions rate of 3.6 percent,” Baer said. The total class of 90, which includes 55 PLME students, is not an unusual number for the Med School. “Relatively speaking we are a small medical school, since most medical schools enroll 150 to 300 students,” Baer said.

Prospective medical students have to jump through some hoops before being considered for an interview. Applicants complete the Association of American Medical Colleges standard application by Nov. 1 and then fill out a Brown-specific supplemental application due Dec. 31.

Students whom the admissions committee are interested in will be invited to interview. The invitation process is nearing its completion, Baer told the Herald.

The relatively small student body of the Alpert Medical School may increase as a result of a $100-million donation for proposed expansion that Brown received last semester. The expansion would include a new building for the 37-year-old Med School away from College Hill, in Providence’s Jewelry District. Though this expansion will eventually accommodate a larger student body, “there are no plans to expand the Alpert student population before the completion of the new facilities,” Baer said.

Med student honored for starting health initiatives

By Christian Martell Staff Writer

At the age of five, Rajiv Kumar ’05 MD’09 knew he shared the same “passion” for medicine that the 20 doctors in his family have. In two years, Kumar will graduate from the Alpert Medical School — via the Program for Liberal Medical Education — with not only three successful health initiatives under his belt, but also the honor of being chosen as one of Providence Monthly magazine’s “10 people you don’t know now (but soon will)” for 2008.

“I’m thrilled the work I’m doing is getting this kind of attraction.

That’s how I know I’m doing the right thing,” Kumar said.

Kumar’s current work includes the nationwide expansion of Providence Health Solutions, a workplace wellness company he co-founded with Brad Weinberg ’03 MD’09 last year that helps employers teach their employees how to lead healthy lifestyles. The program has already impressed people in the state by winning the Rhode Island Business Plan Competition in 2007.

The idea behind Providence Health Solutions is similar to that of Kumar’s biggest project, Shape Up RI. Providence Health Solutions holds exercise and weight-loss competitions in the workplace, while Shape Up RI does so for the entire state.

Having founded Shape Up RI in

Page 3

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Min Wu / Herald File Photo

Rajiv Kumar ‘05 MD’09 December 2005, Kumar continues to believe that “innovative solutions” are the best cure for obesity, which he considers “the single greatest health challenge in the nation.”

Shape Up RI’s Web site said the program was accountable for a 28,519-pound collective weight loss among 6,916 people in 2007.

This year — the first year in which all 39 cities and towns in the Ocean State will be represented in the competition — will mark the program’s third competition. Last year, University employees made up 431 of those involved, a number Kumar hopes will rise in 2008.

“We already have 350 employees signed up, but the last day to register is Monday,” he said, adding that the $15 entrance fee is covered by the University.

Kumar’s ultimate dream for continued on page 4

www.browndailyherald.com

Late architect brought modern touch to College Hill

By Joy Neumeyer Staff Writer

When sleepy-eyed students file into Wilson Hall for morning classes, they may not pay much attention to the architectural features of the classrooms in which they sit. They’ve also probably never heard of Robert Hill, whom they have to thank for many of these classrooms’ more modern features.

Hill, who died in December at 89, was a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design and a prominent professor in RISD’s architecture depar tment. The modern sensibilities that Hill brought to renovations of Wilson and Arnold Laborator y in the 1960’s were cultivated over decades of teaching and designing residences and commercial buildings across Providence.

Born in Providence in 1918, Hill attended Hope High School and received a B.S. in architecture at RISD. He also ser ved in World War II as par t of the Army Air Corps. Hill designed the renovations for the interior of Wilson in 1966, shortly after he left RISD to

go into private practice.

The changes made to Wilson were intended to create “a more aesthetically pleasing study and classroom environment,” said Chad Cavanaugh, a Facilities Management computer-aided design technician. Originally completed in 1891, Wilson is described by the Encyclopedia Brunoniana as “a Romanesque style building of random ashlar sandstone.” After its first occupant, the Department of Physics, moved to the then-new Barus and Holley building in 1965, Hill was called upon to reconstruct the building to provide classrooms and meeting rooms.

Hill’s cosmetic changes, such as new ceiling tiles, new plaster, repairs of exposed brick walls, replaced door ways and a new entrance, while not significantly altering the building’s structure, endowed Wilson with the “clean simplicity and functionality” that Hill brought to many of his buildings, his son-in-law, Steve Cohen ’75, said. Cohen recalled Wilson as “one of the cooler buildings in which to take classes,” thanks in par t to the “juxtaposition of ver y spare, clean styling” that

Hill added with the “really old, classically designed building.”

Many new features were also essential to classroom convenience and safety, such as lighting over chalkboards and a new sprinkler system.

Dan Hill ’79, one of Hill’s sons, said that his father “took a contemporar y approach” to renovating building interiors with modern details and cost-effective materials. But Hill added that his father did so “always in a way that was ver y respectful of the period of the building itself,” integrating details like glass walls and metal framing and preser ving preexisting conditions such as exposed brick walls in Wilson and local residences such as 89 Angell St., a 19th centur y building next to Corliss-Bracket House, home of the Office of Admission.

Around the same time he redesigned Wilson, Hill also renovated Arnold Lab, his family said.

Although Hill was commissioned to redesign two of the more traditional buildings on Brown’s campus, marked by arches, brick continued on page 6

Page 4

Kumar’s project donates money to doctors in Africa continued from page 3 Shape Up RI is to raise enough funds to offer the service free of charge.

His third project is Adopt A Doctor, an organization he co-founded in June 2003 with Ray Rickman, a former state representative, to “reverse the brain drain (of doctors) in Africa.”

It currently gives 16 doctors ­— in Liberia, Malawi, Mali and Sierra Leone — $100 per month to help them stay and practice in their home countries, in exchange for a several-year commitment to

Friday, January 25, 2008

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

stay in the country.

When asked how he did it all, Kumar said, “By sacrificing a lot of sleep.”

In a more serious tone, he added that “Brown students are full of ideas, passion and energy but sometimes schoolwork gets in the way of all that.”

“I encourage other students to take advantage of being in a state like Rhode Island. It’s a wonderful place to bringing about change in the community,” he said.

Kumar, originally from Connecticut, now views Rhode Island as his new home.

U. takes environmental efforts off campus continued from page 1 tive approach because the University’s total emissions are what really matter.

The recommendation of the Energy and Environmental Advisory Committee to the University originally called for the reduction of its emissions by 42 percent, inclusive of all projected growth — about 1.1 million square feet by 2020 — said Powell, who chairs the group.

Though the University shied away from a universal goal that would apply to both current buildings and those to be acquired or built, Powell said a growth policy that combined high-performance design and LEED certification would still make a “powerful difference” in reducing emissions and promoting energy efficient practices.

By making a formal, binding commitment to construct buildings that abide by these goals, said Michael Glassman ’09, Undergraduate Council of Students president and an EEAC member, Brown’s expansion won’t fall prey to “value engineering,” a scheme in which building designers and contractors are forced to shave

costs and compromise their environmental goals.

But part of the reason why the University has been so successful at implementing environmentally sound policies, Powell said, is that they are usually economical as well. Certain energy-efficient technologies may be more expensive up front but often yield much greater savings in the long run. Because approximately 90 percent of the total price of a given building over its life cycle comes in the form of energy costs to power the building, investing in energy-saving technologies, even if it is expensive, makes sense, he said.

Participating in energy and environmental certification schemes such as LEED is also worth the cost to Brown so that it can validate — and better communicate — its impressive track record, Glassman said.

To mirror its progress on campus, the University has also slated plans to extend its environmental leadership beyond its grounds. The Community Carbon Use Reduction at Brown program, jump-started last year with substantial financial commitments by Simmons’ office and the Sidney E. Frank Foundation, hopes to fund a

variety of student- and faculty-led projects that reduce carbon emissions in the greater Providence area.

“We want to get as many people involved as possible,” Glassman said.

He is collaborating with Hamburg on a pilot project that plans to distribute compact fluorescent light bulbs in local low-income neighborhoods, leading simultaneously to savings on electricity bills and a reduction in carbon emissions.

Hamburg likens the project to a micro-credit program, in which small amounts of capital — in this case, light bulbs — can be a catalyst for positive social and economic change.

“Technological adoption is a slow process, and we’re trying to accelerate it,” Hamburg said. In this case, he joked, “If you do a social good you can actually do a carbon good.”

While he is pleased with the outlook of Brown’s environmental policies, Hamburg admitted that a large piece of the puzzle is neither financial nor technological, but behavioral.

The new plan is an important step, he said, but more plans are needed.

“It’s also about recognizing when we need things and when we don’t,” he said.

Applications up from minorities, internationals continued from page 1 “As the population has grown, all of the demographic pieces have grown. So we’re up in international kids, students of color, up in students from all parts of the countr y and up in all disciplines,” Miller said. The growth has not been lopsided either, he added, explaining that each demographic of applicants has shown increasing interest in Brown, but no group significantly more so than another.

International applicants are up by about 15 percent this year, a tribute to the University’s efforts to create a more international community, according to Miller. “In the last two years we’ve done a lot more international travel,” he

said.

The admissions of fice had representatives working around the globe in Asia, South America, Africa and Europe as long as one month at a time. The University has contacts with local schools, alums in the regions and even in the state departments of foreign countries so that they “reach out to find people,” Miller said.

The new Brown-RISD dual degree program has also added to this year’s admissions dynamic. “We’re getting applicants we wouldn’t have seen before, and I think that RISD is getting applicants they wouldn’t have seen before,” Miller said.

Over 400 students have applied for the program. “We didn’t know what to expect but we’re delighted that

we had that many,” Miller said.

The surge in applications this year presents a large task for the Office of Admission, but it was not unexpected since applications have been up 30 percent in the last five years, Miller said. “We anticipate that we’re going to go up each year,” he added.

Despite the increasing number of applications to review, each application still receives the same amount of attention, Miller said.

“Brown is a very personal place, so in the admissions process we want to replicate that,” he said.

The Office of Admission does not know yet how many students will be accepted for the class of 2012, Miller said, because they anticipate difficulty estimating the number of those students who will matriculate. “For a couple of years it’s going to (be) hard to predict,” he said, partly because of Harvard and Princeton’s decisions to end their early admission programs.

The class size will also be marginally larger due to the addition of the Brown-RISD program.

Cora Allen, a senior at the Immaculate Heart High School in Los Angeles, Calif., who applied regular decision this year, said, “It makes me a bit ner vous that there are so many people applying because it could decrease my chances a little of getting in.”

Sophia Dean, a senior at the Noble and Greenough School in Dedham, Mass., also applied regular decision. “This is the year that the most people are applying to college ever, so that’s intimidating,” she said. “It seems like before it used to make sense where people are getting in and now it’s a lot more random.”

C ampus n ews Friday, January 25, 2008

Ne

ws

Page 5

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

i n

B

r i e f

Fresh brew of Mocha includes textbook prices The team behind Mocha, Brown’s student-run alternative to the University’s online course catalog, released an updated version of the Web site yesterday, simplifying the software’s interface and integrating information on courses’ required textbooks and their prices from the Brown Bookstore and Amazon.com.

Launched in January 2006 by five computer science concentrators who developed it over winter break as a pet project, Mocha quickly gained popularity as a user-friendly alternative to the Brown Online Course Announcement. In March 2007, developers quickly adapted the software to function with the University’s ill-received Banner Catalog and Schedule.

Reached Thursday night in the Center for Information Technology, Colin Gordon ’08 and Andres Castroviejo ’09 told The Herald the latest changes have been in the works for several months.

“We started actually thinking about it seriously pretty much as soon as we figured out the books were listed online, and then hacked up a quick prototype last semester and cleaned it up last week,” Gordon said.

He and Douglas, along with Tim O’Donnell ’09, Dave Hirshberg ’08 and Aaron Myers ’07 GS, make up the student team that has maintained Mocha since four of its founders graduated last spring.

The team integrated textbook assignments using a method similar to that which connects Mocha to Banner: a program known as a “Web crawler” browses the Bookstore’s Web site and Amazon.com for course reading lists and prices for new and used volumes. That information is then stored on Mocha’s own server in the Department of Computer Science and displayed below scheduling information for some courses.

In addition, Mocha’s developers say they’ve made course listings easier to read and fixed several bugs in the site’s calendar.

The updates come amid continued discussions aimed at integrating Mocha into Banner, which have been taking place between student developers and University officials for several months.

“We have officially decided to adopt the Mocha functionality,” Michael Pickett, vice president for computing and information services and the University’s chief information officer, told The Herald Oct. 26. “By January 1, CIS will definitely own that piece of the code.”

Instead, negotiations have dragged on. Gordon and Douglas refused to discuss specifics, but the team’s demand for financial compensation may be a sticking point — though Pickett had said that he was open to the idea of money changing hands.

The student developers insist their motivations for working on Mocha stem from more than financial gain. “It’s nice to be able to work on something that actually has some impact and some value to the community, as opposed to most of our CS projects, which you write once, and then you’re done,” Gordon said.

For the most part, the developers’ workload skyrockets during pre-registration and shopping period, Gordon added, though “in the middle of the semester, it can stay mostly on autopilot.”

This is Mocha’s first major update since its integration with Banner in March 2007, but developers say it won’t be the last. One ultimate goal, should the University acquire the software, would be to permit course registration directly through Mocha.

“We haven’t looked at how (that part of) Banner actually works,” said Douglas, “but it shouldn’t be that hard.”

— Sam Byker

Packed classes leave students bustling

By Isabel Gottlieb News Editor

Three minutes before the start of ANTH1242: “Bioethics and Culture,” Salomon 202 was packed.

Forty chairs had been set out and 40 syllabi had been printed — the class enrollment was capped. But far more than 40 had shown up, and many students, unable to find a seat, sat on the floor.

This sight is common during the chaos of shopping period — students crammed into aisles, sitting on windowsills and mobbing the professor after class. Though Banner limits the number of students who can register for most classes, many unregistered students show up anyway, hoping for a spot.

Though the professor made it clear that she was keeping the enrollment limit “firmly at 40,” only a few people left during the class, said Maura Soucy ’10, who was registered for the class but ended up without a syllabus or a chair.

Popular capped classes in a variety of departments face similarly high demands from students.

Among the most infamously competitive classes for students to snag a spot in are VISA0100: “Studio Foundation,” ENGL0180: “Introduction to Creative Nonfiction” and TSDA0220: “Persuasive Communication.” The number at which Banner caps a class is often meaningless during shopping period, University Registrar Michael Pesta

Herald File Photo

Students facing competitive enrollment and course caps are scouring course bulletins looking for classes in which to enroll. said. “We noticed last semester that when departments use an enrollment limit, students go when the classes are filled,” he said. Many departments create waitlists for the students who are not registered but show up to the class anyway.

Capping classes and controlling enrollment is usually left to departments, but one class is so popular that the Registrar’s Office had to take matters into its own hands.

For at least eight years, according to Pesta, students interested in taking VISA0100, a prerequisite for all other visual arts courses, have had to enter a lottery system. Though many students are lucky enough to be selected, others are disappointed, sometimes more than once.

Pesta said he sees some stu-

dents enter the VISA0100 lottery after two or three unsuccessful tries. But, he said, “Since they’ve tried repeatedly ... we give them first crack at it.”

According to Daniel Stupar, adjunct lecturer in visual art and coordinator for the class, the department offers seven sections of VISA0100, each with maximum enrollment of 22. But the lottery only places 18 students in each section, he wrote in an e-mail to The Herald.

That leaves a handful of spots for persistent students who show up to the class and get their names on the waitlist.

“After the first week we compile the waitlists and try to match stucontinued on page 6

Page 6

Friday, January 25, 2008

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Late RISD professor modernized Wilson, Arnold Students continued from page 3 and stone, Dan Hill said that his father would have been supportive of the more modernist buildings that the University was beginning to erect in the same period. The simple concrete exteriors of the Sciences Librar y and List Ar t Building, which were completed in 1971, reflect the Brutalist style Le Corbusier inspired in the 1960s.

Dan Hill noted that his father was highly interested in “the economy of means”; like Le Corbusier, he saw little value for the client or society in extravagant materials and often used concrete in the bank buildings he designed, such as the People’s Savings Bank in downtown Providence. Friedrich St. Florian, who began teaching at RISD during Hill’s tenure there, described him as “ver y much a

modernist,” recalling conversations they shared over modern architects they both admired such as Walter Gropius, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Le Corbusier.

Hill applied his af finity with another modern architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, to the homes he designed in Providence — including his own residence on Barn Street — which are often strongly distinct from the traditional New England Victorian-influenced houses surrounding them.

In a home he designed on Halsey Street, Hill incorporated the “ver y conscious interplay of the public and private” that Dan Hill said his father admired in Wright’s work, providing privacy through an obscured entrance and a facade with only a small strip of windows at the street side, but opening up to the more private backyard with a large glass wall.

As he lived and worked in Providence, Hill maintained close

ties with many at Brown, working on the house of former Director of Admission James Rodgers and earning the respect of William Jordy, a longtime art histor y professor at the University. Hill was also modernization coordinator for the Providence Housing Authority from 1977 until 2003.

The University continues to commission modern buildings like the Creative Arts Center — to be designed by Diller, Scofidio and Renfro — alongside old brick stalwar ts like University Hall. Dan Hill said that his father would have been excited to see the ever-evolving architectural creations the University continues to spring upon College Hill. The firm’s sleek works, such as the Institute for Contemporar y Art in Boston, are designed with their surroundings in mind, “which is something (my father) always loved,” Hill said. “I think he would have been happy.”

stressing about courses continued from page 5 dents with open sections,” Stupar wrote.

Leigh Tarentino, adjunct lecturer in visual art, also teaches a section of VISA0100. She said that as a faculty member she does not get involved with the lotter y, but does take several students off the waitlist to fill her sections.

“The lottery seems a little stressful,” she said. “I wish we had space for everyone who wants to take the course.” The department is currently tracking the number of students who want to get in to the course, she added, so it can plan sections accordingly the next time VISA0100 is offered.

According to Stupar, the class is not difficult to get into if students are flexible. “Students who want (VISA0100) can usually find an opening in the evening on Fridays or the morning sections — what it comes down to now is whether or not they can fit it into their schedules,” he wrote in the e-mail.

Angelika Garcia ’10 entered the lottery last fall and didn’t get in. But, wanting to take the introductory class so she could enroll in more advanced courses at the Rhode Island School of Design, she tried the lottery again for this semester — and was once more turned down. This time, though, she showed up to the section she wanted, and her professor gave her encouraging news.

“I have a good shot in this (section) or another at a different time,” Garcia said, adding that she will keep attending the class in the hope of getting off the waitlist.

Pesta said another popular class is POLS0220: “City Politics,” with Professor of Political Science James Morone. The class has an enrollment limit of 500 people, because, according to Pesta, the enrollment neared 600 the last time the class was offered, a number the professor “just couldn’t handle,” Pesta said.

Pesta said many writing courses in the English department as well as the introductory Spanish language sequence HISP0100-0200: “Basic Spanish,” also often fill up quickly.

ENGL0180 usually sees many more students show up than the 20 at which the class is capped.

TSDA0220 has an extensive selection process. The class has an online application, which must be submitted a semester or more in advance. Among the application’s directives are, “Describe your experience in public speaking,” “Characterize your strengths and weaknesses as a speaker,” and elaborate on “What you can bring to the class.” Barbara Tannenbaum, the TSDA0220 professor, said the class is composed entirely of seniors, with priority given to theater arts concentrators — meaning many students will miss their one opportunity to take the class.

Another problems with shopping period is that, as enrollment fluctuates for many classes, the Registrar’s Office is flooded by requests from professors for larger classrooms.

“A room that appears too small in the end won’t be, and if we move it, it won’t be as good,” Pesta said.

“The problem is not the eventual enrollment of the class but the agitation of the first two to three weeks of classes.”

W orld & n ation Friday, January 25, 2008

Page 7

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

$7 billion lost in unusual Rebates could reach taxpayers by spring Parisian bank fraud

By Molly Moore Washington Post

PARIS — For five years, Jerome Kerviel toiled in the back offices of Societe Generale, learning the intricacies of the six-layer security system that France’s second-largest bank used to protect its money, investors and customers from fraud, according to bank officials here.

Kerviel then made an unusual career move. He was promoted to trader — becoming one of the very employees the security systems are designed to oversee and keep honest.

Over the next several months, his chagrined employer alleged Thursday, Kerviel used his inside knowledge of the security system and his brazenness as a futures trader to pull off one of the largest banking frauds in history, ringing up losses of more than $7 billion for Societe Generale.

The trader hid the massive fraud “using extremely sophisticated and varied techniques,” Societe Generale Chairman Daniel Bouton told reporters Thursday. Bouton and other bank officials had little explanation for Kerviel’s motivation, except to say he appeared to have acted alone and to have made no personal profit, instead creating losses through successive transactions of buying dear and selling cheap.

There was no comment Thursday from Kerviel, whom the bank said it had fired along with several of his supervisors. The man, described as a 31-year-old computer genius, dropped out of sight, but Elisabeth Meyer, his lawyer, said on French television that he “is not fleeing” and is “available for judicial authorities.” She did not specify where he was; calls to a telephone number listed under his name went unanswered.

The disclosure of the losses was the latest shock to world financial markets as they struggle to recover from a massive sell-off earlier in the week linked to problems in the U.S. subprime mortgage market.

Some analysts suggested that highvolume sales by Societe General on Monday as it secretly liquidated Kerviel’s tainted investments contributed to the global market drops that led the U.S. Federal Reserve to counter Tuesday with an interest rate cut of three-quarters of a percentage point.

The Fed said it was unaware Monday that the bank was making its sales, leading some analysts to charge that the central bank overreacted in its rate cut. Investors in futures markets are now betting there is less likelihood that the Fed will make another steep rate cut at its regularly scheduled meeting next week, as some analysts had earlier predicted.

The case highlighted global distrust of the financial institutions that hold personal nest eggs and corporate wealth, and the regulators charged with keeping them honest.

The Bank of France, the country’s banking regulator, conducted 17 investigations at Societe Generale during 2006 and 2007, but spotted no evidence of fraudulent activity, its chief reported Thursday.

“I don’t consider this a failure of our controls,” Christian Noyer, governor of the Bank of France, told reporters. “We can’t have a

controller behind every trader at every bank in the country at every moment. Even the best laws and the best police can’t always stop someone who is determined to defraud the system.”

But analysts and banking experts said the statements by both institutions revealed troubling failures in oversight. “What guarantees do we have that this cannot happen again tomorrow with another trader?” asked Xavier Timbeau, director of analysis and forecasting at the French Economic Observatory.

“None.”

If confirmed, the losses at the bank would be the largest ever caused by an individual trader. They are far higher than the $1.4 billion run up by trader Nick Leeson in the mid-1990s in Singapore. His fraud caused the collapse of the institution where he worked, Britain’s 233-year-old Barings Bank.

Leeson, now living in Ireland after serving a prison sentence in Singapore, told the BBC that he was not shocked such a fraud had happened again, but that “the thing that really shocked me was the size of it.”

Banking specialists said Societe Generale’s first misstep was catapulting an employee armed with the back-office secrets of the bank’s internal security monitoring system into the aggressive role of a futures trader.

Kerviel, who banking officials said was paid just under $146,500 a year in salary and bonuses, was tasked with trading in European equities futures, a speculative market that involves betting on the future performance of stocks.

The trader maintained two sets of books, one in which he kept accounts of his successful investments, and a secret parallel book where he was “voiding his losing positions,” Bouton said.

“He knew when controls were going to take place,” Bouton said, because “over the years he had become an expert in controls.”

Bouton said Kerviel managed to outmaneuver six levels of controls and firewalls intended to detect and prevent fraud.

Kerviel “made a mistake in December which triggered our controllers,” Bouton said. But for reasons that remain undisclosed, bank officials did not discover the fraud until last Friday night, when markets began a precipitous slide and the losses in some of his speculative trades became more obvious.

Societe Generale officials hauled Kerviel into the office for a six-hour interrogation on Saturday. By Bouton’s account, the trader confessed to cooking the books to hide unauthorized trades. “His motivations were totally incomprehensible,” Bouton said. “It does not seem that he would have profited directly from this gigantic fraud.”

Bank officials spent last weekend and the early part of this week secretly selling many of Kerviel’s investments to try to mitigate the damage. But the worst collapse in world stock markets since the Sept.

11, 2001, terrorist attacks drove Kerviel’s losses higher and higher, eventually topping $7 billion.

“These losses could have been gains if the market had climbed on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday,” Bouton told reporters.

By Maura Reynolds, Kathy M. Kristof and Nicole Gaouette Los Angeles T imes

WASHINGTON — Hoping to jolt the ailing economy — and counter criticism that Washington is too divided to come to Americans’ aid — House leaders and the Bush administration reached a deal Thursday on a package of tax breaks and mortgage rules designed to put more money in consumers’ hands and stimulate business investment.

The centerpiece of the plan is a rebate of as much as $1,200 per household — even more for families with children — that could be mailed to most taxpayers as soon as late spring. The package also includes temporar y tax breaks to encourage businesses to expand and create more jobs this year.

And in a provision critical to high-housing-cost states, there would be a significant one-year increase in the size of mortgages that could by backed by the government. That would make it far easier for homeowners to refinance into more affordable mortgages.

Economists said the package, meant to forestall or soften a feared economic recession, should provide a significant psychological boost to the economy. But it still might not be enough to prevent a slowdown.

“It is a nice shot in the arm,” said Peter Morici, a professor at the University of Maryland. “It reduces the likelihood of a recession, but doesn’t eliminate it. Overall, the slowdown will be less severe, but that doesn’t mean that the economy won’t still slow down.”

The move comes at a time when

Americans are growing increasingly worried about the economic outlook. A Los Angeles Times/ Bloomberg poll released today showed that 79 percent of respondents are convinced there will be a recession this year.

The cost of the economic stimulus package, some details of which remain murky, would be roughly $140 billion — $100 billion for the rebates and $40 billion for the business tax incentives. Leaders have set a deadline of Feb. 15 for passing the legislation, although it remained to be seen whether the Senate would leave the deal intact.

Still, all sides hailed Thursday’s action as a stunning compromise between parties and branches of government that have been rendered largely dysfunctional by partisan differences.

“I can’t say that I’m totally pleased with the package, but I do know that it will help stimulate the economy. And if it does not, then there will be more to come,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

At the White House, President Bush called the agreement “an effective, robust and temporar y set of incentives.”

The stock market rose on the news, with the Dow Jones industrial average climbing 108.44 points, nearly 1 percent. It was the second day of solid gains spurred by rising optimism about the impact that the stimulus plan and lower interest rates would have on the economy.

The deal was the second major initiative by the federal government this week to forestall a major downturn in the stock market

and in the economy as a whole.

On Tuesday, the Federal Reserve, which controls the government’s monetary policy, cut a key lending rate by three-quarters of a point in a surprise move designed to inject more money into the banking system.

Congress and the administration control the other main lever of economic policy -- government spending and taxes.

The government’s plan fell into place after Pelosi decided to give up Democratic demands that the package include expanded spending on unemployment benefits and food stamps, which Republicans opposed. In turn, House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, agreed that even workers who earn too little to pay taxes would receive a check, a key Democratic demand.

“Democrats gave something, Republicans gave something,” Boehner said. “The beauty of this package is that it is simple, it is clean and it is neat.

Key Senate leaders -- while giving general approval to the deal -- also signaled that they intended to reintroduce at least some unemployment and food stamp benefits and were weighing proposals to spend at least some stimulus funds on infrastructure investment.

“Working families should be assured that this agreement is not the final word,” said Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., chairman of the Labor Committee. “Families are in crisis, and it’s not enough just to help with their taxes. I intend to offer amendments in the Senate to strengthen this package — to continued on page 8

Page 8

Friday, January 25, 2008

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

M. hoops hopes to rebound against Bulldogs on Saturday continued from page 12 of the Week for his 24-point, sevenrebound effort against the Bears.

Mark McAndrew ’08 and Huffman both dropped 15 points for Bruno, right around their season averages of 15.9 and 15.7, good for second and third in the Ivy League.

“We executed the game plan (last week). They just out-physicalled us,” Huffman said.

Brown hopes that a win on Saturday can catapult them into a strong conference showing. Robinson said that the non-conference schedule had prepared the team for a good run in the second half of the season.

“For us, it will be about confidence, knowing how to win,” he said. “We’ve proven we can win on

the road and beat teams we weren’t supposed to.”

Huffman added that the team has to win at home and be ready for the grind of the Ivy League schedule.

“We have to string solid weekends together,” he said. “We can’t win Friday and then be too tired to win Saturday.”

Though the schedule includes many back-to-back games, the team has to make sure it devotes its full attention to each opponent.

“We have to go one game at a time,” Robinson said. “Right now we are only thinking about Saturday at 3 p.m.”

Ivy League Preview Cornell (9-5) – Picked by most to finish first in the Ivy League, the Big Red are a young team, but they

are deep. They have the Ivy League Rookie of the Year from the past two seasons, including last year’s winner, Ryan Wittman, who leads the team in scoring with 14.2 points per game.

Cornell is particularly dangerous from the perimeter, shooting 42.2 percent from downtown so far this season.

Dartmouth (8-8) – Junior forward Alex Barnett is the name of the game for the Big Green. He leads the Ivy League in both scoring (16.6 ppg) and rebounds (7.0 rpg). Last year Dartmouth was plagued with injuries, leading it to a disappointing 9-18 finish. More injuries set in early in the fall, but the team has overcome them and has almost equaled last season’s win total already.

Yale (7-8) – The Bulldogs were predicted by many to be one of the

top two teams in the Ivy League. The strength of their team is inside and it shows in the rebounding margin, where the squad is second in the Ivy League. Yale is led by returning First Team All-Ivy performer Eric Flato, who leads the team in scoring.

Columbia (7-9) – The Lions have a balanced scoring attack, with eight different players averaging at least five points per game. The standout among those eight is last year’s First Team All-Ivy selection, senior forward John Baumann, who pours in 15.0 ppg.

Harvard (6-12) – Harvard has a notable home win against Big Ten foe University of Michigan, but the Crimson have struggled in the first half of its season. Harvard has balanced scoring, with four players averaging in double figures, which has led to the team’s 71.1 ppg, good for second in the league. The Crimson also generate points off of 8.1 steals per game.

Penn (5-12) – After three straight Ivy League titles, including a 13-1 in-league campaign last season, the Quakers look to be on track for a rebuilding season. Ibrahim Jaaber, last year’s Ivy League Player of the Year, has graduated, along with fellow First Team All-Ivy award winner Mark Zoller. Tyler Bernardini now leads the team in scoring with 12.9 ppg, many of which have come on his 27 treys.

Princeton (2-12) – The Tigers have fallen far from their traditional seat atop the Ivy League and look to be headed for a second straight year in the league’s cellar. While the team has the best scoring defense in the league at 64.7 ppg, Princeton’s offense has its own woes. It is last in the league in scoring at 54.9 ppg, and its 27.0 rpg is also a league low.

House works on tax-break package continued from page 7 provide unemployment insurance to workers looking for jobs and to help families coping with high heating costs and skyrocketing food prices.”

At a news conference Thursday, flanked by Boehner and Treasur y Secretar y Henr y Paulson, Pelosi said: “This is the beginning of the legislative process. I think the strength of our bipartisanship in this announcement today will mean a lot to (the Senate). But far be it from me to ever predict what the Senate may produce.”

“There’s more to do,” said Paulson. “I’m looking forward to working with the Senate.”

At the hear t of the plan are tax rebate checks that will go out to about 117 million middle- and lower-income households.

The rebates will reflect a new 0 percent tax bracket that will apply to the first $6,000 in adjusted gross income for singles and $12,000 in adjusted gross income for married couples filing jointly. Adjusted gross income is the amount of income that’s taxable after accounting for contributions to retirement and employee benefit plans.

The benefit would phase out for single filers earning more than $75,000 in adjusted gross income, until evaporating completely at $87,000. The phase-out for married couples would start at $150,000, and end at different points depending on the number of children in the family.

The plan also would provide rebates to people who earn at least $3,000 in annual income, but don’t earn enough to pay taxes. Single filers in this categor y would get a standard check of $300, while married couples would qualify for $600. Taxpayers eligible for rebates would get an additional $300 for each child under the age of 17.

“This package is aimed where it should be — bull’s-eye on the middle class,” said Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y. Republicans hailed the business tax incentives as the most important part of the package, arguing that job creation is the key to halting a slide into recession.

Under the proposal, all businesses would be allowed to write off 50 percent of the money they spend on capital expansion in 2008 — a deduction that would normally be spread out over many years.

And it would double the amount small businesses can write off their taxes for new investments made in 2008 from $125,000 to $250,000.

The plan also would include a significant increase in the maximum loan limits for the Federal Housing Administration and quasigovernment secondar y mortgage operations best known as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The precise hike in loan limits was still being debated late Thursday. House Republicans said they had agreed to temporarily raise the limit for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to $625,500, while Democrats were proclaiming that the deal would hike limits to $729,750.

Either way, the increased limit on loans guaranteed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would be temporar y, expiring Dec. 31 of this year.

It was not immediately clear whether the higher FHA limit would be temporar y or permanent.

Friday, January 25, 2008

Robinson stumps for his candidate-in-law continued from page 1 ing and outgoing — “all the stuff you would look for in a boyfriend” for Michelle, Robinson said. Nothing about Obama struck Robinson as especially prodigious — and certainly not presidential — at the time. But he did see potential.

“It’s like seeing a guy in college basketball — he might play in the NBA, he might not,” Robinson says.

As Michelle’s relationship with Obama got serious, she asked Robinson for an unusual request: Take him to the basketball court with your friends.

“My father often said that you could tell a lot about a person’s personality by taking him to the basketball court,” Robinson says. “You judge a guy on how he reacts when his team is losing, when he’s not one of the better guys on the court or how he guards his man when the game is on the line.”

Still, Robinson initially blanched at the request. The first reason was that he liked Obama.

“I kind of liked the guy, and I didn’t want to come back and say I found a flaw,” he says.

The second reason was that Robinson was a 6-foot-6 forward at Princeton, earned the Ivy League Player of the Year title twice and played professionally in Europe. The 6-foot-2 Obama played a bit for his Hawaiian high school team.

But Robinson granted his sister’s request and called up some friends.

In Chicago, they played with Obama, who “was fine on the court,” Robinson said. Obama was confident but not arrogant and worked well with his team.

“He passed all of that with flying colors, which was obvious,” Robinson says, “because (Michelle) married him” in 1992.

Robinson got close to Obama in the decade after they became bothers-in-law. Obama and Michelle stayed in Chicago after their marriage, he as a lawyer, law school lecturer and then state senator, and she as a nonprofit director and a University of Chicago dean. Meanwhile, Robinson was a vice president in the Chicago offices of Morgan Stanley Dean Witter before changing careers to become a basketball coach at Northwestern University in 2000.

As Obama’s résumé became more and more impressive, Robinson began thinking of Obama’s political potential. But he still didn’t imagine Obama as commander in chief until the event that boosted Obama’s presidential star, the 2004 Democratic National Convention, in which Obama delivered a now well-known keynote speech.

But when Obama asked Robinson to join his campaign before last summer, Robinson hesitated. He wasn’t sure how he could help his brother-in-law’s candidacy.

“Why would anyone care about what a basketball coach says?” Robinson recalls thinking. But he signed up, and now when he campaigns he thinks of himself less as a basketball coach and more of a brother-in-law who’s known Obama for nearly two decades.

Robinson acknowledges that he wouldn’t be getting the publicity he gets if he weren’t a Division I basketball coach. But he doesn’t feel that he is wrongly using his coaching fame and he considers himself an Obama expert.

“If (the media) asked me about the Arab-Palestinian conflict, that’d be different,” he says.

Page 9

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Obama’s game Barack Obama can handle himself on the debate floor. But how does he do on the basketball court?

Craig Robinson, head coach of the Brown men’s basketball team and Obama’s brother-in-law, has been shooting hoops with Obama for nearly two decades. Robinson praised Obama’s game, saying the Illinois senator could play “with 85 percent” of all pickup players.

The six-foot-two Obama is tricky to guard, Robinson says, because he’s a lefty. But because of his slight frame, Obama doesn’t like to tussle near the basket.

“But he’s a got a great jump shot,” Robinson says. “I’d characterize him as a small forward” or shooting guard.

Obama plays confidently and unselfishly, Robinson says. Obama also likes to banter with his opponents, but Robinson won’t characterize it as trash talk.

“He’s just like any other pickup player,” Robinson says. “He’s like a regular guy.”

—Stu Woo Robinson says the University is fine with him campaigning for Obama, though there are restrictions. Robinson can’t conduct inter views about the campaign on campus, and he refused to be photographed in Brown apparel or with his team for this story. Before every interview, he makes it clear that he is speaking as “Craig Robinson the person, not Craig Robinson the Brown basketball coach.”

Robinson says he only does campaign activities in his free time, and his players say his campaigning has not affected the team at all.

“Coach Robinson is extremely professional and he does everything the right way,” said Damon Huffman ’08, one of the team’s three captains.

Huffman added that he didn’t even know Robinson was campaigning until recently, when the coach told the team he had spent one of the team’s day’s off on the campaign trail.

Huffman and Mark MacDonald ’08, another captain, say Robinson has never encouraged any player to support Obama, and that he rarely brings up the presidential race, though the players sometimes like to banter with him about it. MacDonald says the 15-man team is about evenly split between liberals and conservatives, and that no player has ever expressed discomfort that Robinson is stumping for Obama.

Though Robinson says he is focused on Brown basketball, he’ll have to fight a compelling distraction on Saturday. While his team plays Yale at home on Saturday afternoon, South Carolina will be holding its Democratic primaries.

Robinson says he’ll be focused on the pre-game preparations, but what about afterward?

“It depends on whether or not we win,” he says flatly. The coach, who isn’t afraid to show his emotions or make his opinions known to referees and poorly performing players during basketball games, says he might only catch the news at the end of the night.

That’s not to say that he isn’t enthusiastic about his brother-inlaw’s candidacy. When talking about Obama, Robinson speaks excitedly, making strong eye contact to hammer home points.

“I support him, number one, because I trust him,” Robinson said.

“I don’t trust a lot of politicians.

Number two, I think he is the best candidate to change the way in Washington.”

Robinson, who has voted only for Democratic presidential candidates, has even adopted a bit of Obama’s vocabulary — “change” is a word that Robinson uses often to describe the Illinois senator. The coach says he finds it easy to speak on behalf of Obama because he trusts and loves him so much. Robinson, who has made many presentations as a

corporate executive vice president and countless more pep talks as a basketball coach, says he’s won over crowds as large as 500 speaking at Obama events.

The similarities to Obama don’t end there. Both Obama and Robinson’s stars have quickly risen.

Obama declared his presidential candidacy after just three years in the U.S. Senate, while Robinson became a Division I head coach after six years at Northwestern. Both have stellar academic credentials — Obama attended Columbia and Harvard Law School, while Robinson received his masters of business administration from the University of Chicago. And as a New York Times article pointed out last year, Robinson coaches at a gym on a street named Hope, a word commonly associated with the Obama campaign because of the senator’s memoir, “The Audacity of Hope.”

But Brown basketball fans concerned about losing Robinson to politics shouldn’t worry, the coach insists. Robinson says he doesn’t think Obama would offer him a spot in his presidential administration if he’s elected. Even if he did, Robinson says it would be hard for him to leave basketball. And Robinson doesn’t think he’d enter politics himself because he doesn’t have the temperament.

“I don’t really see it happening,” Robinson said of running for office.

But in the same way that critics say Obama hedges his words about campaign issues, Robinson adds: “But I didn’t see myself coaching a Division

W. skiers set hopes higher after UConn Carnival continued from page 12 ing all competitors to win the giant slalom on Friday. Consiglio’s time of 2:20.55 was nearly two seconds faster than the second place finisher.

Consiglio’s win combined with two other top 15 finishes by the Bears helped Brown secure a second place finish as a team. Elisa Handbury ’10 came in 12th at 2:26.16, and Sophie Elgort ’08 took 13th with a time of 2:26.58.

Consiglio’s win was even more impressive considering she was battling an illness earlier in the week.

“The week in between carnivals we got some solid training in, but I was sick so I tried to take it easy and get healthy,” Consiglio wrote.

Unfortunately the slalom course on the second day of the Carnival proved to be difficult for the Bears.

The course was set up as a double slalom set, with red and blue poles all over the mountain as the men raced on the right side of the course and the

women on the left. The course did not seem to bother Consiglio, who turned in another fast performance.

Consiglio finished second with a time of 1:28.36, just .3 seconds behind the winner.

However, no other Brown skiers finished in the top 15, as a couple of Bears suffered falls during their runs. Bengston took 26th place with a time of 1:45.00, and Blaine Martin ’11 was right behind her with a time of 1:45.70. Sophie Elgort took 31st at 1:46.72, and Handbury’s time of 1:48.28 was good for 34th place.

The team’s times were enough for a fifth place finish on a day which was disappointing for the Bears.

“As a team we want to get a top three finish every race,” Consiglio wrote. “It’s a good goal that is completely attainable.”

The Bears will have their chance for more top three finishes when they continue their season at the Plymouth State Carnival in Waterville Valley, N.H., this weekend.

Close matches for wrestlers at Lone Star Duals continued from page 12 tice. (As for) the match against Bucknell, I won’t lose to (Marble) again. It was close in the beginning but I made a few mistakes and he was a good enough opponent to capitalize on those errors,” Schell said.

As one of the captains, Schell thought the team wrestled well at the Lone Star Duals. He said small errors were what cost the team victories. “Wisconsin is perceived by ever yone as a better team because it is a big school, but we lost a lot of close matches because we made small errors.

Same thing goes for North Carolina. But the scores don’t really show that,” he said.

In the 189-pound weight class, Matt Gevelinger ’09 also performed well over the break. After splitting at the Lone Star Duals, he went 3-0 in the duels against Bucknell, Franklin & Marshall

and Rutgers. Gevelinger attributed his success to being more confident on the mat.

“Confidence goes a long way,” Gevelinger said. “We work as hard as any other team. Knowing that we are in good shape, we have to take the intensity from practice to the competition.”

Looking ahead to this weekend, the Bears will host three duals. The weekend will star t at 2:00 pm on Friday at the Pizzitola Center as the team faces of f against Drexel University.

Then on Saturday, the team will first duel against United States Militar y Academy at 11:00 am and against Lehigh University at 6:00 pm later that day.

In order for the team to succeed this week, it will have to overcome the small errors that plagued it over break.

“The guys need to be a little more ruthless and wrestle tougher on the mats,” Schell said.

E ditorial & L etters Page 10

Friday, January 25, 2008

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

S t a ff E d i t o r i a l

Diamonds and coal Diamond to the Office of International Programs — but only if you agree to send students to study abroad in our office.

Coal to spam filters that block The Herald’s pyramid schemes. (Interested in learning about the seven steps to success? Contact us.)

Diamond to Erik Resly ‘08. Not just anyone can stand up to Rudy Giuliani and 1,000 angry senior citizens, all in the name of democracy.

Cubic zirconium to ResCouncil’s goal of getting half of the freshman class to come to a talent show, which will determine who gets first pick in the housing lottery. We admire your ambition, but 50 percent of the firstyear class has never done anything together. Except drink, maybe.

We’d give a coal to Chuck Norris, but he’d roundhouse kick us, eat our young and probably sue us.

Coal to the lead in our water fountain that we have been drinking from for years. With our IQs now in the single digits, we’re blaming the health effects for any errors in this newspaper.

While we’re on the subject, a diamond to the Office of Environmental Health and Safety for reading The Herald. We know you saw our article on lead in the water, given that said water fountain was removed within hours of publication Thursday.

P ete fallon

Diamond to mid-year transfers. Even though the Office of the Dean of the College doesn’t seem to know who you are, we think you’re swell.

Coal to money spent on revamping Ladd Observatory’s timekeeping system, which hasn’t worked since 1961. The money’s better spent on the Grad Center heating system, which hasn’t worked since, well, 1961.

Cubic zirconium to the wrestling team. We saw you split your first dual meets, but we really admire your resolutions to be “more ruthless and wrestle tougher” in the future.

Un diamant to a very special group of young journalists from the French American School of Rhode Island, who visited The Herald Thursday for a little inspiration for a class project.

T he B rown D aily H erald Editors-in-Chief Simmi Aujla Ross Frazier editorial Arts & Culture Editor Robin Steele Asst. Arts & Culture Editor Andrea Savdie Higher Ed Editor Debbie Lehmann Features Editor Chaz Firestone Asst. Features Editor Olivia Hoffman Metro Editor Rachel Arndt Metro Editor Scott Lowenstein News Editor Michael Bechek News Editor Isabel Gottlieb News Editor Franklin Kanin News Editor Michael Skocpol Opinions Editor Karla Bertrand Opinions Editor James Shapiro Sports Editor Whitney Clark Sports Editor Amy Ehrhart Sports Editor Jason Harris Asst. Sports Editor Benjy Asher Asst. Sports Editor Andrew Braca Asst. Sports Editor Megan McCahill

Senior Editors Taylor Barnes Chris Gang Stu Woo Business Darren Ball General Manager General Manager Mandeep Gill Susan Dansereau Office Manager Alex Hughes Sales Manager Lily Tran Sales Manager Public Relations Director Emilie Aries Jon Spector Accounting Director Claire Kiely National Account Manager University Account Manager Ellen DaSilva Darren Kong Recruiter Account Manager Credit Manager Katelyn Koh Ingrid Pangandoyon Technology Director photo Rahul Keerthi Meara Sharma Min Wu Ashley Hess

Photo Editor Asst. Photo Editor Asst. Photo Editor Sports Photo Editor

post- magazine production Steve DeLucia Production & Design Editor Chaz Kelsh Asst. Design Editor Asst. Design Editor Alex Unger Catherine Cullen Copy Desk Chief Adam Robbins Graphics Editor

Matt Hill Rajiv Jayadevan Sonia Kim Allison Zimmer Colleen Brogan Arthur Matuszewski Kimberly Stickels

Managing Editor Managing Editor Features Editor Features Editor Associate Editor Associate Editor Associate Editor

Letters Israel’s actions speak for themselves To the Editor: In his recent letter (“Israel’s actions must be considered in context,” Jan. 24), Harry Reis attempts to provide historical context for the crisis in Gaza. In my view, he fails to do so. Reis would benefit from looking at some of the many human rights reports that deal with the topic.

Reis characterizes Israel’s siege of Gaza as a “defensive measure” in response to “Hamas’ incessant barrage of rocket attacks.” The truth is that Israel attacks the Palestinians with far more intensity and frequency than the Palestinians attack Israel. According to B’Tselem, Israel’s leading human rights group, the Israeli army killed 668 Palestinians in Gaza between September 2005 and July 2007. During the same period, Palestinians killed eight Israelis. Readers should be reminded that this takes place in the context of Israel enforcing a 40 year-old colonial military occupation, repeatedly condemned by the UN. Reis claims that “in August 2005, Israel withdrew completely from the Gaza Strip.” No major human rights organization shares this view. Following the much-hyped ‘disengagement,’ Israel actually tightened its restrictions on Gaza’s borders, airspace and coastline while continuing to carry out indiscriminate attacks against its people. As a result, Human Rights Watch flatly stated in 2006 that “under international humanitarian law, Gaza remains occupied, and Israel retains its responsibilities for the welfare of Gaza residents.”

Reis follows this falsehood about the ‘disengagement’ with another: that Israel’s ‘withdrawal’ provided the Palestinians with an opportunity to “raise up a state.”

Incidentally, the Israeli politicians who devised the policy would completely disagree with Reis. In October 2004,

then-prime minister Ariel Sharon’s most senior advisor, Dov Weisglass, told the major Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz that the unilateral ‘disengagement’ was intended to “freeze the peace process” and “prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state and prevent a discussion about the refugees, the borders and Jerusalem.” He likened it to “the amount of formaldehyde that’s necessary so that there will not be a political process with the Palestinians.”

Keeping with Sharon’s frequent, public pledges, massive settlement expansion in the West Bank coincided with and followed the ‘disengagement’ from Gaza, leading to further fragmentation of the territory.

Reis’s letter conveys the misleading impression that Israel’s border closures are somehow new, being implemented only in the last few days. They’ve actually been in place for years, much longer than Hamas has been in power, and with devastating consequences.

According to the UN Conference on Trade and Development, Israeli restrictions on movement within and between the West Bank and Gaza resulted in $8.4 billion in lost Palestinian income between 2000 and 2005 – a sum more than twice as large as the entire Palestinian economy today.

Indeed, Mr. Reis, “Israel’s actions need to be considered in context.” That context is Washington and Tel Aviv’s unrelenting war against a dispossessed, occupied and colonized people’s ability to lead a halfdecent existence. How much longer will we in the West be silent?

Jake Hess GS Jan. 24

Alex Unger, Designer Jake Frank, Jennifer Grayson, Seth Motel, Elena Weissman Copy Editors Sam Byker, Max Mankin, Brian Mastroianni Night Editors Senior Staff Writers Sam Byker, Nandini Jayakrishna, Chaz Kelsh, Sophia Li, Emmy Liss, Max Mankin, Brian Mastroianni, George Miller, Alex Roehrkasse, Caroline Sedano, Jenna Stark, Joanna Wohlmuth, Simon van Zuylen-Wood Staff Writers Stefanie Angstadt, Amanda Bauer, Evan Boggs, Caitlin Browne, Marisa Calleja, Zachary Chapman, Joy Chua, Patrick Corey, Catherine Goldberg, Olivia Hoffman, Ben Hyman, Erika Jung, Sophia Lambertsen, Cameron Lee, Christian Martell, Taryn Martinez, Anna Millman, Evan Pelz, Sonia Saraiya, Marielle Segarra, Melissa Shube, Gaurie Tilak, Matt Varley, Meha Verghese Sports Staff Writers Han Cui, Evan Kantor, Christina Stubbe Business Staff Diogo Alves, Steven Butschi, Timothy Carey, Jilyn Chao, Pete Drinan, Dana Feuchtbaum, Patrick Free, Sarah Glick, Soobin Kim, Christie Liu, Philip Maynard, Mariya Perelyubskaya, Paolo Servado, Saira Shervani, Yelena Shteynberg, Robert Stefani, Lindsay Walls, Benjamin Xiong Design Staff Ting Lawrence, Philip Maynard, Aditya Voleti, Wudan Yan Photo Staff Oona Curley, Alex DePaoli, Austin Freeman, Emmy Liss, Tai Ho Shin Copy Editors Ayelet Brinn, Rafael Chaiken, Erin Cummings, Katie Delaney, Jake Frank, Jennifer Grayson, Ted Lamm, Max Mankin, Alex Mazerov, Ezra Miller, Seth Motel, Alexander Rosenberg, Emily Sanford, Elena Weissman

C O R R E C T I O N S P olicy The Brown Daily Herald is committed to providing the Brown University community with the most accurate information possible. Corrections may be submitted up to seven calendar days after publication.

C ommentary P O L I C Y The staff editorial is the majority opinion of the editorial board of The Brown Daily Herald. The editorial viewpoint does not necessarily reflect the views of The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Columns, letters and comics reflect the opinions of their authors only.

L etters to the E ditor P olicy Send letters to letters@browndailyherald.com. Include a telephone number with all letters. The Herald reserves the right to edit all letters for length and cannot assure the publication of any letter. Please limit letters to 250 words. Under special circumstances writers may request anonymity, but no letter will be printed if the author’s identity is unknown to the editors. Announcements of events will not be printed. advertising P olicy The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. reserves the right to accept or decline any advertisement at its discretion.

O pinions Friday, January 25, 2008

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Page 11

Matching aprons to pantsuits: dilemmas of the new politician Maha Atal Opinions Columnist I’ve been thinking a lot recently about femininity. Maybe it’s because a woman whose braver y and beauty I admired was gunned down in Pakistan last month. Maybe it’s because a woman whose raw ambition I’m learning to love got off to a rocky start in the presidential primaries. Or maybe it’s because the political flavor of the week is a man who is decidedly un-macho.

Allow me to explain: In early Januar y, I began a prolific newspaper-reading spree, trying simultaneously to get my head around Benazir Bhutto’s assassination and Hillar y Clinton’s loss in the Iowa caucuses. Amidst countless articles on how Benazir’s security could have been better or what Hillar y did wrong was one piece on what Barack did right.

Barack, most analysts now agree, won in Iowa because women under 50 preferred him to Hillary. Presented with the chance to elect a female president, the third-wave feminist generation chose a man. According to Lucy Berrington and Jeff Onore of the New York Post, this is exactly what feminism is all about: Revised conceptions of what is acceptable in a woman have resulted in a parallel revision of what is desirable in a man.

Our mothers’ feminism told women that to be as successful and powerful as men, we’d have to be like men — burn our bras, wear pantsuits and cut our hair short. We’d refuse to stay home with the kids, and insist upon seats in the boardroom instead.

To family-values conser vatives in the 1980s, that model posed a problem: If men were still being macho (and they were),

and women were tr ying to do the same, who would babysit? Thus was born a new feminism that said women could make individual choices. Enter the fashionista-meetschair woman of “Sex and the City.”

As ambition ceased to be a masculine virtue and trendiness a feminine instinct, men acquired the right to make individual choices too: to be metrosexual dressers, devoted househusbands and still claim their manhood. Moreover, Berrington and Onore argue, to the latest wave of feminist women, these new men are the most attrac-

high heels.

For most of my adolescent life, I’ve been a proud proponent of this brand of feminism.

I’ve written on this page before about female friends who speak openly about making individualized choices about career and family and see neither path, nor any combination of them, as the necessarily correct or womanly choice. I’ve become a staunch believer in the new feminism’s success at improving women’s lot in life.

The last few months make me question that judgment. When Benazir Bhutto was

My vote in the Democratic primary was with Hillary on policy grounds long before these dismal reflections on modern day femininity set in. But my support for her has acquired a new fervor as I’ve watched her candidacy become inextricably bound to her gender. tive sort. Barack’s appeal to young women is his androgyny, his “nice guy” optimism, his slender, lanky frame. This is the 21st century jock. Looking through current teen magazines, filled with pictures of puppydog types like Jake Gyllenhaal alongside older muscle-men like David Beckham, I’m inclined to buy the argument.

If the new feminism has succeeded, as the Post article claims, women should benefit from the same right to choose, to be judged no less feminine as wives and mothers by their decision to play the power dynamics of Congress, and no less legitimate in the workplace by the decision to wear delicate

shot, critics immediately cited her foolhardiness in campaigning for reelection out in the open and among the crowd. Yet the same critics blamed her for feminine cowardice during her years in exile. When she came back to politics, they called her a bad mother. When she spoke of her family life, they called her nothing more than a political heiress.

In a less fatal way, Hillar y Clinton is in a similar box. When she stayed with Bill after his affair, she was lambasted as a shameless political opportunist and a “bad” woman.

When she showed up in New York to run for the Senate in 2000, she was seen as too

womanly — just Clinton’s wife, and not a professional. When she asserted her independence by playing the moderate hawk in the Senate, she was pegged as heartless and unfeeling, once again not womanly. When she finally broke down on television, her opponents denounced her feminine weakness — she croaked when it counted most.

While the blurring of the gender line has opened the door for men to have it either way — macho or sensitive — it may have closed more doors to women by requiring us to be both. In our effort to eliminate the double-standard of differing standards for men and women, we have only squared it: Now there is also the doubleness of the contradictor y criteria a successful woman must meet.

My vote in the Democratic primar y was with Hillar y on policy grounds long before these dismal reflections on modern day femininity set in. But my support for her has acquired a new fer vor as I’ve watched her candidacy become inextricably bound to her gender. She’s tried to be both womanly and androgynous and neither path has proven the “right” one in America’s eyes.

Nor has public dialogue respected her right to choose her own brand of femininity, the way we’ve done for everyday women or television characters. Instead, what I read and hear about Hillar y suggests that her run is becoming an emblem of the impossible: In politics at least, the glass ceiling is as strong as ever.

When I vote on Feb. 5th, I’ll be voting for Clinton because I need to believe in the possibility of individual choice feminism in the upper echelons of power. And I’m meeting more and more women who say the same.

Clinton’s supporters are not sellouts to cynicism, but idealists with hopes as audacious as her opponents’.

Why I support Obama

BY Matt Prewitt Guest Columnist Many voters make decisions based on moral lessons from past elections.

For example, Democrats who ask themselves how George W. Bush ended up in the White House often conclude that the nation foolishly and disastrously voted for an unserious candidate because he was likable.

Hillary Clinton understands this and tries to exploit it. She positions herself as the “serious choice,” and casts Obama as the unserious, charismatic seducer. I reject this message partly because I think he is serious, and partly because I learned different lessons from the last two elections: First, that personality actually is a good voting criterion, and second, that it is foolish to elect someone who has a former president in his nuclear family.

Personality-driven elections twice gave us George W. Bush, so how can I advocate voting on personality? Because if Democrats had been sur veyed in 2000 or 2004, I think most would have perceived George W. Bush as a spoiled sleaze with a disturbing attitude of entitlement. This perception turned out to be correct. If I, personally, had voted on the basis of personality in the last two general elections, I would have chosen Al Gore and John Kerry, respectively. Everyone who can make a similar claim ought to dismiss the sanctimonious notion that voting on person-

ality is dangerous. It is also worth noting that if Democrats had voted on charm over substance in the 2004 primar y, they might have managed to unseat George W. Bush.

In Hillary, I see a hard-to-like personality.

Her presidency would deepen animosity between the nation’s coasts and the center — at a time when many of us are ready to pour out our Blue State coffee and make amends with Texas under a fresh leader.

Her personality is a legitimate reason not to vote for her.

position.

As little as a month ago, I was suspicious of Obama because of his hard-to-pin-down politics, but the more I listen to him, the more comfortable I feel with him. I like that he doesn’t use partisan language. I like that he wants to move toward a foreign policy that will win back some international respect. But most of all, I think he is a decent person, smart enough to do the job, and thoroughly well-intentioned. What more could anyone ask for? I trust my instincts,

“Change” is a president who doesn’t have former presidents in the nuclear family.

Of course, policy is also important, but positions can be slipper y and promises can be broken. Candidates state positions on a few major issues during their campaigns, but they cannot tell you ever ything they plan to do, and they cannot tell you how they will react to changing circumstances.

It is a gross oversimplification to evaluate candidates as the freeze-dried sums of their stated positions. Furthermore, I find Clinton’s appeals to competency sanctimonious and distasteful, given the quality of her op-

and I resent that the Clinton campaign tells me I ought not to.

The second lesson I take from the previous two elections confirms my choice: New blood is absolutely essential in politics.

Hillar y has somehow managed to deflect this issue, but it deser ves to be front and center.

I do not want a president who knows what she’s going to do on her first day in office, as Hillar y has repeatedly asserted.

Nicholas Kristof wrote a great column on

Jan. 20 noting that many of our most “experienced” presidents have been ineffective: think Nixon, Lyndon Johnson and McKinley.

I want someone who will actively figure out what to do, not someone who already has it all figured out.

Even more importantly, I do not want someone who has pre-existing relationships with the Washington elite. This is my interpretation of the “change” mantra.

“Change” is a president who doesn’t have former presidents in his nuclear family.

Change is when American politics is not dynastic and incestuous. Bill Clinton was the perfect president for his time, but we need to turn the page.

Improving the international perception of America is a consensus top priority, and I think the appalling fact of Bush-ClintonBush-Clinton would, with some justification, confirm our detractors’ suspicions that the United States is a corrupt oligarchy.

On a different note: Once, I was traveling in an underdeveloped, quasi-democratic countr y, and I sat down with a local for a short primer in domestic politics. I learned that many of the prominent politicians in that countr y were the scions of established political families and dynasties. I remember thinking, briefly and pompously, how sad and backward that was. Surely, in a proper democracy, that sor t of thing would not happen. I wish it were so.

Matt Prewitt ’08 has cast his ballot.

S ports F riday Page 12

Friday, January 25, 2008

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

W. skiers face uphill battle

M. hoops hopes to bite Bulldogs back

By Megan McCahill Assistant Spor ts Editor

After a strong non-conference run that put the men’s basketball team at its highest ever position, No. 86, in the Rating Percentage Index, Brown dropped its first game in Ivy League play. The Bears’ 66-63 overtime loss to Yale last weekend put Bruno in a 0-1 hole in conference play, and dropped the team to 8-7 on the season.

The early misstep makes Saturday’s rematch with the Bulldogs, picked by some to finish in the top two of the Ivy League, even more important. The game will be at 3 p.m. at the Pizzitola Center.

“Everyone has a chance to win the league,” Head Coach Craig Robinson said. “But there is always a top half and a bottom half. Yale is picked to be tight with Cornell (at the top).

You have to beat the best teams to be in the top half.”

The league’s competitive nature is a break from the past. Since the 1988-89 season, either Princeton or Penn has won the league every year, with the exception of the 2001-2002 season, when Yale split the crown with the Tigers. Currently, Brown has the second best overall record in the Ivy League at 8-7, behind Cornell, which is 9-5. Yale is 7-8 but is already one step ahead of Bruno because of last week’s nail-biter, which could have gone either way.

Despite appearing to be one of the stronger teams in the league, Brown cannot take any game for granted because any Ivy League team can beat another on any given night.

“The league is wide open,” said tri-captain Damon Huffman ’08.

“There is parity among the teams.

It comes down to who wants it more.”

Huffman pointed to that fact that since the Ivy League has no end-ofseason conference tournament to determine which team gets a bid to the NCAA tournament, each individual game during the season has extra weight. The team with the best record in league play gets the bid.

“It’s like a 14-game playoff. It comes down to execution and who can win on their home court,” he said.

The importance of home-court

While many Brown students were cruising down the slopes and enjoying some recreational skiing over winter break, the women’s ski team was battling serious competition on the mountains in its opening races of the 2008 season.

The team began the season with strong third and fourth place finishes on Jan. 11 and Jan. 12 at the ColbySawyer Carnival in Mount Sunapee, N.H. The Bears finished behind ColbySawyer College and the University of Massachusetts - Amherst on day one and came in behind Colby-Sawyer, UMass and Boston College on the second day. The event had all teams compete in the giant slalom on both days. Krista Consiglio ’11 was the team’s top skier on both days, overcoming difficult conditions on the rainshortened first day to steal a second place finish, then placing ninth on the following day.

“Skiing in my first college carnival was really fun and a much different environment from high school,” Consiglio wrote in an e-mail to The Herald.

“The visibility was not very good. It wasn’t ideal race conditions but that is part of the sport, and I just kept a positive mentality and didn’t let the conditions affect me.”

Despite finishing fourth on the second day, Brown put together an impressive team effort. All nine of Brown’s skiers individually finished in the top 40 out of a field of 65. Consiglio’s ninth place finish with a total time of 1:44.98 led the way for the Bears, with co-captain Anna Bengston ’08 following in 11th place with a time of 1:45.84.

The Bears’ next six skiers all finished between 25th and 34th place.

“We felt that we had a pretty solid performance, but we can definitely ski faster and place better,” Consiglio wrote.

After a solid week of training, Brown took its momentum from the Colby-Sawyer Carnival into their next competition, the UConn Carnvial at Mount Cranmore, N.H., on Jan. 18 and Jan. 19. Consiglio continued the quick start to her collegiate career by smokcontinued on page 9

By Jason Harris Sports Editor

S i n

p o r t s

Br

i e f

After strong start, gymnasts tumble

Bears don’t plan to make too many adjustments, though.

“We haven’t made any huge changes,” Robinson said. “We have to keep them off the boards and keep them from having ease down low.”

Yale out-rebounded Brown, 40-28, lead by Travis Pinick, who cleaned the glass 11 times off the bench. He was helped by forward Ross Morin, who was named Ivy League Player

The gymnastics team jumped out to a quick start over break but could not sustain the success on a West Coast trip.

On Jan. 13, the team hosted Rhode Island College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in its opening competition of the season. Bruno edged out MIT 178.075-175.100, while RIC finished a distant third with a combined team score of 161.200.

The Bears performed well in all events, but the bars is where Brown separated itself, sweeping the event. Victoria Zanelli ’11 led the charge in her first collegiate competition, posting a score of 9.5. She was followed closely by fellow first-year Vida Rivera ’11 and captain Hannah Goldstein ’08.

Jennifer Sobuta ’09 and Stephanie Albert ’10 did double duty, placing second and third on the vault, respectively, and third and second in the floor exercise, respectively.

The team then traveled to Fullerton, Calif., the next weekend to compete against California State University - Fullerton, the University of California - Los Angeles and Wisconsin University - Eau Claire.

The Bears finished with a score of 183.025, good for third behind UCLA (196.125) and Cal State Fullerton (191.025) and in front of Wisconsin - Eau Claire.

Again it was Zanelli who had Brown’s highest finish in a non-allaround event, with a score of 9.475 on the bars, netting her a teambest ninth place. Sobuta picked up tenth on the balance beam, and Chelsey Binkley ’11, Zanelli and Sobuta finished fifth, sixth and seventh in the all-around.

After a return home, the team will be back in action this weekend. Brown will host Bowling Green State University, M.I.T., the University of Bridgeport and West Chester University at 1 p.m. Sunday at the Pizzitola Center.

continued on page 8

— Jason Harris

Ashley Hess / Herald

The men’s basketball team will need a strong game from tri-captain Mark MacDonald ’08 down low if it hopes to avenge last week’s loss to Yale this Saturday.

advantage and the league’s parity are already evident this season. On Jan. 5 Harvard destroyed Dartmouth, 82-56, in Cambridge, Mass. Just six days later, the teams played again, at Dartmouth this time, and the Big Green gave the Crimson an almostequally resounding defeat, 73-56.

Brown will attempt to mirror Dartmouth’s turnaround on Saturday. The quick rematch should make for an even more competitive game since each team is familiar with the other from last week. The

Wrestlers split duals in winter break tournaments Trials and triumphs around the country Han Cui Spor ts Staff Writer

Ashley Hess / Herald Tri-captain Jeff Schell ’08 led the wrestling team over break, going 6-1. The rest of the team did not fare as well, going 3-4 over two weekends.

The wrestling team kicked of f its dual meets season on the first weekend of the new year. At the five-team Lone Star Duals, the Bears dominated Utah Valley State University, 30-10, and won a narrow victor y over United States Air Force Academy, 19-15. But the team fell to University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill and the No. 14 University of Wisconsin, 28-3 and 34-6, respectively. The action did not stop there as the Bears traveled to Lewisburg, Pa., to duel against Bucknell University on Jan. 18. Facing Bucknell, their first conference competition, the Bears fell to the Bison, 21-12, in a tug-of-war

grudge match. The next day, the team wrestled against Franklin & Marshall College and the host school Rutgers, where the Bears split again, with a win over Franklin & Marshall, 28-13, and a defeat of Rutgers, 26-9.

Tri-captain Jeff Schell ’08 led the team with a 6-1 record overall in the 133-lb weight class. His sole loss was to David Marble from Bucknell, the No. 15-ranked wrestler in that weight class. In the dual against Air Force, Schell and tri-captain Mark Savino ’08’s wins-by-fall got bonus points for the team, which were the key to Bruno’s eventual victor y. Despite his winning record, Schell thought he wrestled rather poorly.

“Although I won the matches, I left the day thinking that there are a lot of things I need to praccontinued on page 9