The Brown Daily Herald M onday, A pril 7, 2008
Volume CXLIII, No. 46
Steal attempt: Hoops coach Robinson may go West
Becker ’09, Bell ’10 commence campaigns for UCS presidency
O ut i n t h e R a i n , for now
By Chaz Kelsh Senior Staf f Writer
By Stu Woo Senior Editor
He brought the Bears his offense, using elements of his alma mater’s team to lead them to title contention this year. He brought them pep and emotion, screaming animatedly at them
SPORTS from the bench. And he brought national ink, telling reporters about his brother-in-law, presidential candidate hopeful Barack Obama. Now, after two years in the small world of Brown and Ivy League hoops, a big-time program is luring men’s basketball Head Coach Craig Robinson to bring all that out West. Robinson is the top candidate
Joanna Wohlmuth / Herald
Sean Flanagan, a Northeastern University student and a transfer applicant, stopped by the Office of Admission Friday. See Campus News, page 5
continued on page 4
No easy way to move UEL, Brown tells community By Rachel Arndt Metro Editor
Putting Brown’s Urban Environmental Lab on a flatbed truck and driving it to a parking lot past the Olney-Margolies Athletic Center is only one of several options for the building that were discussed at an April 3 community meeting the University hosted to discuss its physical development. The UEL, along with two other buildings, is currently standing in the way of the University’s planned Mind Brain Behavior Building on Angell Street next to the Walk. To make way for the new home of the Department of Cognitive and Linguistics Sciences, the Department of Psychology and the administrative offices of the Brain Science Program, the University must submit an amendment to its Institutional Master Plan, the current version of which has already been approved by the city. Thursday’s meeting — made up mostly of East Side and Wayland Square residents and Brown administrators — was required by law “to show (the public) what is changing,” Richard Spies, executive vice president for planning and senior adviser to the president, told community members. “It’s a good process to go through.” The UEL was converted from an old carriage house to hold the Center for Environmental Studies in 1981, and it was renovated in 1983 to become what Professor Emeritus of Environmental Studies Harold Ward called the most “energy efficient building on campus,” according to a Nov. 7 article in The Herald
The building aimed to be “a model house to show what can be accomplished in an urban environment with a solar greenhouse, insulation, water-conserving plumbing, and a recycling facility,” according to Encyclopedia Brunoniana. Along with the UEL, the two houses at 127 and 129 Angell Street must be “removed” before construction of the Mind Brain Behavior Building begins in spring 2009, McCormick said. Both houses are owned by the University and rented to students. Though the University has named 11 possible sites for the building — including Pembroke Field and the parking lot of Barus and Holley — it has had little luck finding homes for the building on campus. During the meeting, Chris Tompkins, president of the College Hill Neighborhood Association, called Pembroke Field “the most underutilized space in all of Providence.” According to Spies, the field is the “largest undeveloped site” Brown owns. Moving the buildings would be expensive, Spies said. Relocating the Peter Green House last summer cost about $5.5 million, according to McCormick. “We can’t find a site where we get more benefit than damage,” McCormick said. The concerns range from the grade of hills to damaging trees while moving the buildings. “If we exhaust all the possibilities ... the importance of (the Mind Brain Behavior Building) is such that we would have to go ahead,” Spies said. “We think six to eight
‘reckless’ runaway Jessica Goldschmidt ‘10 plays a runaway wife in ARTS & CULTURE PW’s last big show this year
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No students EMSed at half-full Starf*ck By Gaurie Tilak Staf f Writer
Despite Starf*ck, Saturday night was slow for Emergency Medical Services. The Queer Alliance event drew about 150 people to Leung Gallery that night — without anyone receiving EMS attention at the event. In fact, EMS staffers weren’t even present at the event. “Nobody needed EMS, no one passed out, and there were no fights,” said Aida Manduley ’11,
an event coordinator for the Queer Alliance. Turnout for the event was lower than in previous years, Manduley said. About 150 people attended the event in Leung Gallery, which has a capacity of 290, she said. In 2005, Starf*ck was cancelled after Sex Power God received negative publicity the previous fall on The O’Reilly Factor, a show on Fox News hosted by conservative commentator Bill O’Reilly. Since then, both Sex Power God and Starf*ck
have been required by the University to have EMS on site. This was the first QA dance since 2005 that wasn’t required to have EMS on site, said QA Secretary Zachary Marcus ’10. “We’ve shown that we’ve become capable of keeping it under control,”Marcus ’10 said. Instead, party managers were responsible for contacting EMS in case it was needed. No one at the event needed atcontinued on page 4
Pulitzer winner reads from latest work By Nandini Jayakrishna Senior Staf f Writer
Book lovers crowded inside the doors and sat in the aisles of MacMillan 117 Friday night as bestselling author Jhumpa Lahiri read from her latest short stor y collection and emphasized that, as a fiction writer, she does not believe in restricting herself to any one genre and enjoys writing both short stories and novels. Raised in South Kingstown, Lahiri is the first woman of Indian descent to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction — an award given for her debut collection of stories, “Interpreter of Maladies.” She has also authored a novel called “The Namesake,” which was recently made into a movie with the same name. The Brown Bookstore organized the reading, selling nearly 200 copies of Lahiri’s books at the event, wrote Tova Beiser, the bookstore’s trade books and promotions manager, in an e-mail.
continued on page 4
CAMPUS NEWS
As Brian Becker ’09 and Martin Bell ’10 square off for the presidency of the Undergraduate Council of Students in next week’s election, many other positions will go uncontested or empty, with an upcoming referendum holding the future of class representatives in question. Candidates for every UCS position turned in the signatures they had gathered and officially began campaigning Friday at 7 p.m. The elections will be held on MyCourses from April 15 to 17. Only two elections besides the presidential are contested. Michael MacCombie ’11 and Herald Account Manager Ellen DaSilva ’10 are running for UCS vice president, while Herald Sales Manager Lily Tran ’10 and Jose Vasconez ’10 are running for chair of the Undergraduate Finance Board. Other positions will be filled by candidates running unopposed. Ste-
fan Smith ’09 is running unopposed for UFB vice chair, while Harris Li ’11 is running for UCS treasurer. Ryan Lester ’11 is running for chair of the Student Activities Committee and Herald Opinion Columnist Tyler Rosenbaum ’11 is running for chair of the Academic and Administrative Affairs Committee. No one is running for chairs of the Campus Life Committee or the Admissions and Student Services Committee. “I don’t think this has happened in a long time,” said Elections Board Vice Chair Ellie Cutler ’10, referring to the lack of candidates for the two committee chairs. If a referendum passes next week to abolish class representatives, UCS will not elect class representatives to fill vacant seats at its first meeting next year, Elections Board Chair Rakim Brooks ’09 said. In that case, only students running for class representative positions
continued on page 4
a helping hand Once again, Brown students head to New Orleans to help rebuild
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OPINIONS
Courtesy of Brown.edu
Jhumpa Lahiri, who authored “The Namesake,” spoke on fiction writing and read from her work Friday night.
A hummer’s worth Professor of Economics Allan Feldman examines the carbon footprint of the Berylson Family Fields
195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island
cloudy, 53 / 36
tomorrow’s weather Don’t let the clouds get you down — UCS’s Ratty debate will brighten and enlighten your evening
News tips: herald@browndailyherald.com
T oday Page 2
Monday, April 7, 2008
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
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Los Angeles Times Daily oCrossword Puzzle C r o ssw rd
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ACROSS 1 “Ditto” 5 Jog or gallop 9 “Terrible” tsar 13 Easy runs 15 Shakespeare’s river 16 River from Lake Victoria 17 “The Twilight Zone” host 19 Was certain 20 Purpose 21 Work quantity 22 Turn down, as a manuscript 24 Pretty to listen to 26 Morse creation 27 Racer’s advantageous starting point 32 Some PGA tournaments 35 Remove from power 36 “CSI” evidence 37 Countess’s spouse 38 Sixth sense 39 “M*A*S*H” transport 40 Org. with Eagles and Falcons 41 Surfaces for computer mice 43 Gelatin dessert 45 A boss might schedule one 48 Computer image 49 Annoying inconveniences 53 It may be sold in wheels 56 Sports contest 57 Curved path 58 Back muscles, briefly 59 Certain 13-yearold’s rite of passage 62 Plenty 63 Burn soother 64 Seis-ocho link 65 Clinton transportation secretary Federico 66 Puts in stitches 67 Cow poke? DOWN 1 Dabble on a uke 2 Came into view 3 Work on a runway
4 UFO fliers, supposedly 5 Royal abode 6 Enthusiastic 7 Swindle 8 Occupy completely 9 Many an Epson product 10 Aid for Tarzan 11 Guinness of “Star Wars” 12 Salamander 14 Once in a blue moon 18 Stirs up 23 Mark up for revision 25 October birthstone 26 Clever move 28 Sheriff’s ad hoc group 29 Mid-month time 30 Till fill 31 Area below the hairline, usually 32 Livestock enclosures 33 Rapids transit 34 SeaWorld performer 38 Steinbeck’s “East of __”
39 Moonshine containers 41 Cpl.’s subordinates 42 Single-celled organisms 43 Biscayne Bay city 44 Initial stages 46 Acapulco party 47 55-Down’s river 50 Two-time tennis Grand Slam winner Rod
51 Muse of poetry 52 TV listing 53 Applaud 54 Hearty companion 55 English school since 1440 56 Expand 60 Brew in a tankard 61 Fasten, as a ski jacket
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T he B rown D aily H erald By David W. Cromer (c)2008 Tribune Media Services, Inc.
4/7/08
If you do one thing on College Hill today... Realize that “It’s a Good Night to be Indigenous!” Native American artists present their work Hourglass Cafe from 8 p.m. to 11 p.m.
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A rts & C ulture Monday, April 7, 2008
A&C Editors’ Picks April 8: Award-winning film director and producer Spike Lee will speak in Salomon 101 at 7 p.m. Admission only with tickets distributed last week; after 6:45 p.m., if there is additional space, the event will be open to the public. April 10 to May 25: David Winton Bell Gallery presents a project by artist Walid Raad, “We Can Make it Rain but No One Came to Ask,” including an artist’s talk on April 9 from 5:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. with reception to follow. The gallery is open weekdays from 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. and weekends from 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. Admission is free. April 10: Teatro Luna performance and talkback — Chicago’s all-Latina group performs about issues of gender and sexuality at 5:30 p.m. in List Art 120. Admission is free. April 10: Spring Weekend Battle of the Bands concert will take place in Sayles Hall from 8:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. Brown and RISD students compete for the chance to open for the April 12 concert (see below). Admission is free. April 10 and 12: Mezcla’s Spring Show will take place in Salomon 101. Show times are 7:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. on Thursday and 8:00 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. on Saturday. Tickets are $5 at the post office and the Sharpe Refectory; $7 at the door. April 10 to 13 & 17 to 20: Sock & Buskin presents “... and Jesus moonwalks the Mississippi,” in Leeds Theater. Show times are Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m. Tickets are $7 for students, $12 for senior citizens and employees and $17 for all others. April 11: Lupe Fiasco with Vampire Weekend, to be held on the Main Green or in Meehan Auditorium, depending on the weather. Doors open at 7 p.m.; tickets are $12 for Brown and RISD students and $20 for the public. Tickets are sold out to rain capacity, but if concert is held outdoors, over 1,000 additional tickets for each concert will be sold, with priority given first to seniors on April 9 and then to all other Brown students on April 10. April 12: M.I.A concert, with Girl Talk and Umphrey’s McGee, will take place on the Main Green or in Meehan Auditorium, depending on the weather. Doors open at 1 p.m. and show starts at 2 p.m. Tickets are $15 for Brown and RISD students and $25 for the public. Ticket availability as described above.
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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
Punk rock, Greek legend share stage at New Plays Fest By Robin Steele Ar ts & Culture Editor
Punk rock, dystopian epics, classical mythology and above all, the confusion of adolescence, are mined for dark humor and pathos in “Growing Up and Selling Out,” a collection of original student-written plays that make up the New Plays Festival 26.2. Presented by the Literary Arts Program and Brown/Trinity Repertory Consortium, the festival showcases the work of two second-year MFA playwrights — Ann Marie Healy GS and Gregory Moss GS — as well as a duo of one-act plays by undergraduates Chen Gu ’08 and Brendan Pelsue ’08. Each play will run twice at the Pell Chafee Performance Center. Moss’s “punkplay” focuses on two adolescent boys growing up in 1980s suburbia, experiencing life through punk rock. The play is about the covergence of personal and national history through the lens of a specific type of music, Moss said. It follows threads of American history, 1980s punk rock and one boy’s high school education, he said. Moss described the play as funny, “noisy and colorful,” adding that it draws extensively on pop
culture and utilizes live music to create a “surreal journey” into the kids’ lives. Moss said his attraction to punk rock, which he grew up listening to, reflects a larger interest in subcultures, especially those that are supposed to be resistant to the mainstream. Similar to his play, Moss said the music captures the feeling of adolescence — “undirected anger and horniness and energy.” Featuring undergraduate actors Max Posner ’11 and Sam Alper ’11, the show is directed by Kerry Whigham and will run April 11 at 8 p.m. and April 12 at 2 p.m. Moss chose to cast only undergrads because his play deals with youth extensively. Other plays in the festival feature undergrad and graduate student actors as well as members of the Providence community. Although the cavernous Pell Chafee Performance Center may seem a daunting theatrical space, Moss praised set designer and Rhode Island School of Design alum Sara Ossana for creating a single, realistic boy’s bedroom in the midst of the vast former bank space, mirroring the juxtaposition of the characters’ personal histories with the larger national and global history unfolding
around them. Healy’s play, “What Once We Felt,” directed by Makaela Pollock GS, will run April 10 at 8 p.m. and April 13 at 2 p.m. Described on the Literary Arts Web site as “a terrifying and hilarious romp through the annals of genocide, suicide, infanticide and atrociously bad manners,” the story follows Macy Blonsky, a writer in a dystopian society, trying to bring her work to fruition. Moss described Healy’s work as a big, epic vision of the future that deals with people, largely women, at every class level. Because the four plays share the same performance space, Moss’s set is in front of Healy’s, which also serves as a backdrop for the undergraduate pieces. The one-act plays will be presented together as “Artifact: An Evening of One Acts,” directed by Mia Rovegno GS. Running April 9 and 13 at 8 p.m., “Artifact” includes Gu’s “Some of the Rooms” and Pelsue’s “Diagram of a Kidnapping.” “Rooms” is an adaptation of the classical myth of Orestes, according to Moss. The Literary Arts Web site describes it as “a new play about some old mistakes,” following the story of a man returning home to his
grieving, fragmented family. Pelsue said his play, “Diagram,” which he has been revising since he wrote it last spring, centers on two adolescent boys walking in the woods. As they progress, they start acting out memories and fantasies separate from their actual relationships. As these fantasies become stranger and more distant from the boys’ lives, they also begin to refract them, he said. These four plays represent the second part of the 26th annual New Plays Festival. The first installment ran in early February and featured three plays by first-year MFA playwrights. In previous years the festival has featured works by celebrated playwrights Sarah Ruhl ’97 MFA’01 and Nilo Cruz MFA ’94. This year’s festival was overseen by Bonnie Metzgar, visiting associate professor of literary arts, in conjunction with playwriting coordinator Rick Dildine and other faculty and staff. Free tickets can be reser ved online at mf.students.brown.edu/ boxoffice and can be picked up in the lobby of the Pell Chafee Performance Center, located at 87 Empire Street, 45 minutes prior to the performances.
Cheery wife escapes menacing hubby in PW’s ‘Reckless’ By Andrea Savdie Assistant Ar ts & Culture Editor
Not getting Spring Weekend tickets might seem like the end of the world, but look on the bright side: There’s always Production Workshop’s last major play of the year, “Reckless,” which runs Monday through Friday in T.F. Green Hall’s downstairs space. Written by Craig Lucas and directed by Daniel Rogers ’08, “Reckless” tells the stor y of Rachel — an excessively optimistic woman played by Jessica Goldschmidt ’10 — who in the midst of her holiday cheer is approached by her husband, Tom, with a daunting confession: He has taken out a contract on her life. Lucas’ script opens with Rachel overflowing with giddiness and excitement because it’s Christmas Eve. “I’m having one of my euphoric attacks,” she says. “I think I’m going to be terminally happy. You’d better watch out. It’s catching.” But Tom, played by Paul Cooper ’11, does not catch her cheer. Instead, at this moment, he chooses to tell her she must leave their home immediately before the killer shows up. Realizing that he is not joking, she decides to run away from her home and family and start a new life, Cooper said. “Reckless” follows Rachel’s experiences as a runaway, which include seeing numerous psychiatrists and moving in with a man named Lloyd, who offers her a ride from a gas station, and his paraplegic wife, Pooty — played by Albert Huber ’09 and Ivy Martinez ’10, respectively, Cooper said, adding that many elements of the play are “sort of surreal.” Despite her attempt to run away and move on, from the moment Rachel receives her husband’s confession, ever ything in her life begins to shatter, Rogers said. “The world victimizes her,” he said. “People keep tr ying to kill her. It’s the main thing that keeps
her moving.” The play is also “a reaction to pop psychology,” Rogers said. Wearing a lab coat — an uncommon uniform for a therapist used in the play to create a stereotype — each therapist has a prescription for dealing with life’s problems and “is tr ying to create a patent answer,” Rogers said, when “the truth of the matter is there is no easy solution.” “Reckless” is about “coming to terms with living in a world that’s kind of ultimately senseless” and can often be “cruel in a very funny way,” Rogers said. It can be seen as a meditation on the question, “If there’s a God, why do bad things happen to good people?” he said. Rachel’s “relentless optimism” creates a tension between her misfortunes and the way in which she copes with them, Goldschmidt said. In her struggle to maintain a perpetual state of happiness, it seems she often fails to face her problems. “For part of the play, there’s a lot of dramatic things that happen to me, and I don’t know how to deal so I sort of stop dealing,” she said of her character. Rachel approaches her problems “in a pretty silly way at times,” she added, which contributes an element of humor to the play. Both Cooper and Goldschmidt agree that “Reckless” is a darkly comic play. “You’re sympathizing with (the characters), but the darkness is sort of at a ridiculous level that becomes kind of comical,” Cooper said. Since “Reckless” is, as Cooper said, “a show about problems and not being able to get on with life,” it seems fitting that it involves several therapy scenes. According to Cooper, a challenge Rogers was confronted with was that many of the therapy scenes have communication without dialogue. Limited to a small set of gestures, Rogers “worked hard” on
making the body language convey the therapist’s interactions, which made these scenes “an interesting part of the show,” Cooper said. “Reckless” is broken up into “a lot of little scenes” performed on a simple set — “three distinct discontinuous platforms” — that suits the structure of the play, Cooper said. “It’s a very difficult play to stage because it has 28 scenes in about 60 pages,” Rogers said, adding that unlike film, theater has many physical limitations. “From a technical standpoint, I chose (‘Reckless’) to improve myself as a director,” he said, but then added that his main reason for choosing to direct “Reckless” was
that he “pretty much fell in love with the main character.” Rogers said the play has been compared to “Alice in Wonderland” and called it a “nice mix”: It not only combines humor with darker undertones but also includes references ranging from Freud to Nat King Cole and uses dream and therapy imager y to explore the way in which humans can learn to live in an imperfect world. Ticket reser vations for “Reckless” will be available on the PW Web site starting Wednesday at 11:59 p.m. The show runs each night from Friday to Monday at 8 p.m., with an additional performance Saturday at 11 p.m.
Monday, April 7, 2008
Page 4
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
U. sees few viable options for keeping the UEL as is
Oregon State makes play for Robinson
continued from page 1 months is time to explore as many alternatives as people are going to come up with.” The University can’t wait forever to “move on with the plan,” McCormick said in the meeting. If the UEL does indeed get moved, it will probably be made into a smaller building, McCormick told community members, and therefore won’t be able to hold the growing department. The department needs more space, he said, as its success has come to mean that “it’s going to outgrow its space.” One audience member called it “unacceptable” for Brown to an-
nounce that the options are “exhausted.” “There has never been an actual interest in preserving the space for the program,” said Wei Ying Wong PhD’07. “(The Center for) Environmental Studies ... has gone out of its way to serve its community.” Marian Thorpe ’04, an environmental studies and ethnic studies concentrator, agreed. “It’s been a community space” that brings Brown students and the community together, she said. People from outside Brown feel comfortable there, she said. “We would really like the program with the building,” Wong said. “We aren’t seeing the building as just a physical space.”
‘Namesake’ author Lahiri speaks to packed MacMillan continued from page 1 Lahiri, whose writing draws on her Indian origins and her New England upbringing, read an excerpt from a stor y in her newest book, “Unaccustomed Earth.” Set in Massachusetts, the stor y, entitled “Once in a Lifetime,” is the first in a trio of linked stories revolving around the lives of Hema and Kaushik, a girl and a boy, both of whose parents come from the Bengal region in India but who have different cultural sensibilities. The title of the new book, Lahiri told the audience, is derived from Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Custom-House,” his introduction to “The Scarlet Letter.” When an audience member asked whether she follows a set path for crafting her stories, Lahiri said ever y stor y has a “different genesis.” “It’s a matter of spending time thinking about the stories and almost meditating on them,” she said. “It’s a ver y slow — for me anyway — a slow, rather mysterious process.” In response to a question by Chintan Patel ’08, the author said she likes to write both short stories and novels since the “tools” used to create them are the same. “One works in sentences and one creates lives,” she said. “It’s exciting for me to be a fiction writer and relish all forms (of writing).” One audience member lauded Lahiri’s ability to “alternate references to New England and South Asia” in her narratives. Lahiri, who is known for writing about the immigrant experience though she grew up in the United States herself, said “India is part of who I am. I hope to maintain some kind of tie to it.” But the audience’s questions weren’t restricted to Lahiri’s writing. Lahiri said she was “pleased” with the cinematic rendition of her novel, “The Namesake.” It was “beautifully made, intelligently and passionately and carefully rendered,” she said in response to a question. The movie, directed by Mira Nair, featured Kal Penn of “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle” fame in the lead role of Gogol Ganguli, a Bengali boy born in the United States who struggles with his uncommon name and the challenges of being raised in differing, often opposing,
cultures. Speaking about the challenges of being a writer as well as a mother of two small children, Lahiri said she no longer finds time to write ever y day. But, she said, “I tr y to work when I can.” Some attendees reached the event after the doors had closed and could not be admitted. Lahiri signed 75 copies of “Unaccustomed Earth” before the reading for those who couldn’t get into the event, Beiser wrote in an e-mail. Several attendees praised Lahiri’s writing for its sensitivity and simplicity. “I think her description of characters is really excellent,” said William Whelihan, clinical associate professor of psychiatry and human behavior. “Her prose is very clean, ver y engaging.” Whelihan’s wife, Claire Whelihan said Lahiri “connects” even those readers who are not of Indian heritage to her characters. “(My husband) thinks her writing is perfect,” Whelihan added. Peter van Erp, a Rhode Island School of Design alum and Providence resident, said, “It’s fascinating how she can get in my head and write down what I would write if I could.” Van Erp said he can identify with Gogol’s character in “The Namesake” because, like Gogol, he is an architect with an engineer father who was born in another countr y and moved to the United States. Lahiri’s mother, Tapati Lahiri, who sat next to her daughter during the book signing, said she finds it “hard” to decide which of Lahiri’s books she likes best. “They are all good to me,” she said, adding that the stor y “Unaccustomed Earth,” which shares the title of the book, is one of her favorites in the collection. But one student said she felt that the piece Lahiri read did not convey the overall flavor of her writing. Though Lahiri “does a really good job capturing the sense of foreignness ... I didn’t get a sense of how (the piece she read) fit with the rest of her writing,” said Eva Glieberman ’08. Glieberman said if she hadn’t read Lahiri’s work before, she would’ve missed the excerpt’s “subtle intellectual and thematic points.”
continued from page 1 to become Oregon State University’s next basketball coach, several online media outlets and Oregon newspapers reported yesterday, all citing unnamed sources. Several outlets reported that Robinson has already accepted the position at the Pac-10 Conference school, but Sporting News and an Oregonian columnist reported early this morning that Robinson will first visit the Corvallis, Ore., institution today before he makes a decision. Robinson, a former two-time Ivy League Player of the Year at Princeton, did not return calls last night. Director of Athletics Michael Goldberger could not be reached for comment. Outside the Pizzitola Center last night, Assistant Coach Doug Stewart ’94 said he could not confirm media reports. But the former Brown team captain chose his words carefully, saying that Robinson loves Brown and that Robinson’s situation is one in which he has to consider whatever offers come his way. Stewart said Robinson, who was in San Antonio this weekend for the annual convention of the National Association of Basketball Coaches, spoke only briefly with coaches. He added that Robinson would have more details today. The reports seemed to catch players by surprise. Team captain Damon Huffman ’08, who was planning to meet with teammates last night, said team members knew nothing of Robinson’s possible hiring. Several team members did not return calls later, though Huffman wrote in a text message that “nothing is official” about Robinson yet. This season, Robinson led the Bears to a 19-10 record and a trip to the College Basketball Invitational. The Bears set the school mark for wins in a season and finished second in the Ivy League. The Bears were 11-18 in the 2006-07 season, Robinson’s first at Brown.
Ashley Hess / Herald File Photo
Men’s basketball Head Coach Craig Robinson, the brother-in-law of presidential candidate Barack Obama, may be leaving College Hill for Oregon State University.
Robinson’s departure would not be a complete surprise. He had been getting plenty of media exposure this year as the Bears began winning games and as Obama began winning presidential primaries. The Providence Journal reported today that Robinson was under consideration for the head coach position at Providence College. Robinson would have greater press and recruiting tools at his disposal at Oregon State, which went 6-25 this year and hasn’t had a winning season since 1990. Unlike the Ivy League, the Pac-10 is a major conference that allows athletic
scholarships. The Oregon State Beavers boast famous basketball alums in NBA guards Gary Payton and Brent Barry. Robinson has a couple of compelling reasons to stay at Brown. Though the team seems likely to slump next year, as its two best players will graduate in May, the charismatic Robinson may get a boost from new recruits and from the maturation of Peter Sullivan ’11 and Adrian Williams ’11, who played well as freshmen this season. The 45-year-old Chicago native lives on the East Side of Providence with his wife and two children.
QA: Starf*ck kept ‘under control’ continued from page 1 tention from EMS, and only two people were EMSed on campus Saturday night, said Margaret Klawunn, associate vice president of campus life and dean for student life. Additionally, there were no problems with students passing out or starting fights during the dance, Manduley said. “The spring dance, Starf*ck, has never had the kind of problems that Sex Power God had a few years ago,” Klawunn said. She said no special arrangements were made specifically for the dance other than the standard safety precautions. During Star f*ck, security guards from Green Horn Management and the Department of Public Safety were stationed throughout Faunce House near the entrances to the building and on stairwells to regulate entr y of partygoers, Marcus said. The University requires the presence of Green Horn Management security guards at QA dances, he said. Though the security service is used for all campus events, including the upcoming Spring Weekend concerts, QA dances usually have more security than other dances, he added. Additionally, QA student volunteers served as party managers to “make sure everything happen-
ing on the dance floor was safe and consensual,” Manduley said. The party managers were also stationed outside bathrooms to make sure there were no problems, she said. Manduley, Marcus and QA Head Chair Katie Lamb ’10 were also present for the whole event to make sure there weren’t any technical difficulties with lighting and music, she said. For the past two years, Starf*ck has been held in Alumnae Hall, Marcus said. This year it was moved to the smaller Leung Gallery, which the QA felt was more appropriate for the dance, which is typically smaller than Sex Power God, he added. Around 100 tickets were sold before the event. The Queer Alliance, which sponsored the event, usually doesn’t sell tickets at the door. But this year, fewer tickets than usual were presold, and an additional 50 tickets were sold at the door, Manduley said. In the past two years, not many students needed emergency medical attention at Starf*ck, said Kelly Garrett, coordinator of the LGBTQ Resource Center, adding that Starf*ck is always smaller than Sex Power God. The Herald reported last March that one student required medical attention at the event in 2007. In addition to advertisements
for the event, event coordinators posted preventative messages encouraging people to attend sober, Klawunn said. Promotion for the event seemed less prominent than in previous years, partly because some of the posters for the event were torn down or went missing, Manduley said. “I think SPG was better advertised,” said Chloe Swirsky ’11. Of Starf*ck, Alexandra Watson ’11 said, “I don’t think anyone went to that.” “We’re happy with the amount of people that showed up,” Lamb said. Lamb added that she and other coordinators expected the turnout, which she also said was lower than previous years’. “We expected that we weren’t going to have 300 people because there were a lot of other things going on,” Manduley said, citing parties hosted by Machado House and the Jabberwocks. The attendees tended to be more familiar with the dynamic of Queer Alliance dances, the coordinators said. Manduley said students told her that the dance seemed more relaxed and more comfortable than Sex Power God. In comparison to Sex Power God, Starf*ck attracts fewer freshmen and therefore may seem tamer, she said.
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Transfer applicant serves up charm, donuts Admission dean questions donut choice By Joanna Wohlmuth Senior Staff Writer
Courtesy of Brown Multi-Faith Council
Members of Brown Multi-Faith Council worked to rebuild homes and visited religious communities in the Big Easy.
Third wave of spring breakers rebuild NOLA By Susan Kovar Contributing Writer
College student volunteers flocked to New Orleans in droves after Hurricane Katrina wrecked the Gulf Coast in 2005. Now, several years later, students with Habitat for Humanity, Brown/RISD Hillel, the Multi-Faith Council and the Brown Christian Fellowship spent this past spring break lending a hand to ongoing reconstruction efforts. Rebecca Russo ’08 of the MultiFaith Council organized a group including 18 students, University Chaplain Rev. Janet Cooper-Nelson and two staffers at the Office of the Chaplains and Religious Life, Faye Jaffe and Angela Howard-McParland, to work with the Phoenix of New Orleans, a volunteer-coordinating organization. They worked to rebuild houses at two sites in the Mid-City neighborhood and spent free time visiting various religious communities in the city to explore issues of faith-based ser vice and social justice. “The religious leaders were incredibly uplifting. They found a way to be positive amidst the tragedy,” Russo said. The group visited two churches and a synagogue in addition to meeting with secular leaders, she said. “It was cool to see different perspectives on the same stor y.” Cooper-Nelson said she was particularly interested in seeing how the work of religious NGOs differed from that of non-religious ones. She said the group hoped to capitalize on churches’ ability to “mobilize and reach out to local communities” to respond to disaster more effectively. “The people in New Orleans were so grateful to us for caring,” Cooper-Nelson said. “They are facing a serious problem. They are exhausted and have been coping with this for so long.” She added that she felt New Orleans is a “magnificent city, full of resilience and warmth,” noting efforts by political
leaders to draw in young professionals to rebuild schools and other institutions as well as to shape the New Orleans of tomorrow. Sumbul Siddiqui ’10 said that the trip gave her a better perspective on social problems such as poverty, education and government corruption. “It was just awful that it took a disaster like Katrina to highlight these issues,” she said, “and it is still an uphill battle.” Siddiqui said that she was touched by the way the people of New Orleans appreciated her group’s work. “Many of the people feel like they’ve been forgotten,” she said. The Brown Christian Fellowship, as part of a larger effort by its intercollegiate affiliate, Intervarsity Christian Fellowship, also traveled to New Orleans. Twenty Brown students joined 30 from Wellesley College on a 26-hour bus trip. BCF stayed at St. Bernard Parish and spent time working and considering the intersection of ser vice, social justice and the Christian worldview, said Robin Davis ’10. “We worked putting up sheet rock, cleaning and moving carpets,” Davis said. “I definitely want to go back and help.” Even two and a half years after Katrina, she addded, “for ever y house that was being rebuilt on, there are two more in need of work.” Matt Thanabalan ’10 led the 17-student trip organized by Habitat for Humanity, working as part of the national organization’s Collegiate Challenge. The group previously went to New Orleans in March 2006, and Thanabalan said there was significant interest in returning. “We went to New Orleans again because it seemed like it had a bigger need than anywhere else,” he said. He left New Orleans with the distinct impression that the time was well-spent, he said, adding, “ever y volunteer matters.” Hillel first sent volunteers to continued on page 8
The well-dressed college-aged fellow stood outside of the Admission Office, smiling and greeting passersby. If they gave him a second glance or paused, he introduced himself and offered them coffee, doughnuts and candy from the fold-out plastic table he had set up on the sidewalk. But Sean Flanagan isn’t a student — at least not at Brown, anyway. He held an umbrella to keep himself and his display as dry as possible in last Friday’s drizzle, but in spite of his best efforts, the ink on his sign — which read “Free coffee, donuts and conversation with Brown’s most hopeful transfer”— had already begun to drip. Flanagan is in his second year studying political science at Northeastern University in Boston. Though he was rejected from Brown when he originally applied for regular admission to the class of 2010, his love for the University has only grown since then. He’ll learn of the University’s decision in May. “A year ago, at the end of my freshman year, I knew that I wanted
to transfer,” Flanagan said. “I decided to stay another year (at Northeastern) because I wanted to be a polished candidate to maximize my chances (of being accepted).” Shortly after deciding to apply, Flanagan decided he wanted to do something creative to show his passion and commitment to Brown and make his application stand out, but he did not finalize his plans until a few weeks ago. “I wanted to make sure that what I did was passive, hands-off and not distracting to the staff,” Flanagan said. “(The coffee, food and candy) was my hook to engage people. ... As I pour their coffee, I can talk to them and tell them about me and what I’m doing.” “My record really speaks to my achievements,” Flanagan said. “It wasn’t so much about bringing information as interest. ... I didn’t feel I needed to prove anything.” Since Northeastern’s curriculum is based on a co-op program, students divide their time between semesters of classes and internships. “After the first year you lose all sense of class identity because you are going back and forth between class and co-op,” Flanagan said. “I want a cohesive, ‘college-y’ experience.” Brown’s “passionate and engaged” students, open curriculum and diversity of extracurricular
activities make it preferable to the “apathetic environment” of Northeastern, Flanagan said. This semester, Flanagan is living in Washington, D.C., to work at the Defense Intelligence Agency in an “internship-plus” through the co-op program. This weekend was his last in the United States before he leaves to spend two months working in Asia and Europe. Though Brown is his first choice, Flanagan also applied to the University of Pennsylvania, University of Virginia and Georgetown University. “All (of those schools) are a better fit than where I’m at, but nowhere is a better fit than Brown,” he said. Flanagan will be in Paris when the transfer applicant decisions come out. “I’m debating whether to check at an Internet cafe,” Flanagan said. “I want to hold the letter in my hands; it will be closure.” Flanagan left his home in Weymouth, Mass., around 6 a.m. on Friday morning. He asked for directions to the nearest Dunkin’ Donuts when he discovered that the Thayer Street location had closed, got the donuts and then headed to Prospect Street around 7:45 a.m. The rain, which was heaviest in the morning, was a minor setback, but Flanagan never considered givcontinued on page 8
Profs. try to solve mysteries of universe By Lauren Pischel Contributing Writer
This summer, as the global physics community holds its breath in anticipation, three Brown physics professors will play an integral role in the most ambitious experiment in history.
FEATURE By racing tiny particles around a track nearly 250 football fields long — and colliding them at just under the speed of light — scientists are hoping to find the final piece of the Standard Model of particle physics, an as yet unobserved particle only theorized to exist. The experiment promises to shed light on the very foundation of the universe. Physics professors David Cutts, Greg Landsberg and Meenakshi Narain will be some of the first to analyze the data from the Large Hadron Collider, an $8.7-billion particle accelerator on the FranceSwitzerland border that will be completed this summer. In preparation, they are constructing different components of a detector that will look for traces of the Higgs boson, an unstable particle predicted by the 1960s work of, among others, a current Brown physicist. The Standard Model is a widely accepted theory of how the universe’s smallest particles interact with one another. The existence of the Higgs boson is predicted by and necessary for the model, but has not yet been proven experimentally. Confirmation will answer the question of what mass is and where it comes from. This is “physics at a very fundamental level,” said Professor of Physics Chung-I Tan, who chairs the department. He said the experiment “tests the very foundation of modern physics.”
Courtesy of Brown.edu
Physics professors Greg Landsberg and Meenakshi Narain will analyze data that could illuminate the foundation of the universe. Cutts said the research is exciting “because it provides a way to get close to the fundamental question of nature” and “recreate an early time.” The Large Hadron Collider, or LHC, which is part of the European Organization for Nuclear Research, collides protons at just under the speed of light to create conditions similar to those less than a trillionth of a second after the Big Bang, the explosion believed to have created the universe. These collisions create new, unstable particles that decay into other particles called hadrons and muons. Layers of specific detectors that encircle the collider record these particles’ signatures, which scientists use to infer what unstable particles were
formed in the collision. It’s a bit like arriving at the scene of a car crash and determining what car was in the accident by re-assembling its parts, Narain said. The two speeding beams of protons cross paths at four locations, with a detector at each point. The Brown team is working on a general detector called the Compact Muon Solenoid, a 12,500 ton machine that Narain said is like a camera that takes 40 million threedimensional pictures per second. The data is then heavily filtered by a computer program that selects the times at which Higgs boson decay is most likely to occur. Currently, the most powerful continued on page 8
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Referendum could eliminate elections for those who want to join UCS continued from page 1 in next week’s election would be eligible to fill the two vacant committee chair positions, he said. The referendum to make it easier for students to join UCS is potentially risky. If students don’t join in the fall, which would require attendance at two meetings and some signatures, then UCS could find itself with a leadership that has
no one to lead, Brooks said. “This is something UCS is really going to have to confront,” he said. Salsabil Ahmed ’11, Jeremy Harper ’11, Akshay Rathod ’10, Cecilia Strombeck ’11 and Herald business staffer Juan Vasconez ’10 are running uncontested to be UFB representatives. Jerr y Cedrone ’11, Sammy McGowan ’11 and Whitney Talbott
’11 are running for sophomore class representatives in an uncontested election. Greg Abdo ’10, David DesPres ’10, John Giannuzzi ’10, Clay Wertheimer ’10 and Alexandra Wilpon ’10 are running for junior class representatives, also uncontested. Nobody is running for senior class representative. Cutler called the number of junior class representative candidates “the most surprising and most pleasing thing” about the election. Though the position of class representative could be abolished by the proposed UCS reform, any student elected class representative would be given an at-large seat on next year’s council. At Friday’s meeting, Brooks cautioned candidates running unopposed that they will still have to receive at least 5 percent of the vote in ordered to be elected. He also warned that candidates should run clean campaigns. “This elections board is going to be very vigilant about slander,” Brooks said. “We want this election to be run with integrity.” Brooks added that the elections board
would take “harsh” action against candidates who fail to comply. The candidates running in contested elections will participate in a debate in the Sharpe Refector y tomorrow at 6:30 p.m. UCS rules require that student groups that wish to endorse a candidate send a representative to the debate, Brooks said. The candidates Currently, neither candidate ser ves on UCS. UCS presidential candidate Brian Becker served as chair of the Campus Life Committee last year before going abroad last semester. Despite seeking election to an at-large seat twice this semester, he lost both internal elections. Becker’s “small and simple” platform involves finding particular areas of Brown that can be “vastly improved with simple solutions,” he said, citing the addition of salads to Josiah’s and the Friedman Center DVD collection as some of his past accomplishments. He said he also wants to create a “more open and transparent conversation” with administrators about Banner and the “possibly changing ideals” of
the New Curriculum. UCS presidential candidate Martin Bell ser ved as liaison to the Corporation last semester before resigning for personal reasons, he told the council in February. He served on the Admissions and Student Services Committee last year as a freshman class representative. Bell said he wants to increase UCS’s visibility to “bring students into the fold” and to restore the UCS president’s role as a student advocate, adding that he thinks he is the best candidate to represent currently underrepresented groups. Bell cited the creation of the Sexual Assault Task Force as one of his accomplishments while on UCS. “It’s not about changing UCS. It’s about using the tools that UCS has in its arsenal,” Bell said. UCS vice presidential candidate Ellen DaSilva transferred from Georgetown University at the beginning of the year, joined UCS immediately and was elected alumni liaison in October. She also serves on the Admissions and Student Services Committee. She said she wanted to help increase representation on UCS next year, citing her work with the Faculty Executive Committee to improve advising, especially for transfers, as one of her UCS accomplishments. UCS vice presidential candidate Michael MacCombie, an at-large representative ser ving on the Academic and Administrative Affairs Committee, said he wanted to expand UCS membership and foster more transparency. “We want to hear from students, and students want to hear from us, but nobody’s taken the first step,” he said. MacCombie cited his work to expand the UCS teaching awards to include Meiklejohn peer advisors and graduate student teachers and his co-authorship of a resolution to introduce kegs at Class F parties as two of his accomplishments. UFB chair candidate Lily Tran, a current UFB representative, said she wanted to make the finance board more transparent by sending e-mails to student groups from the entire board explaining how it made its funding decision and by improving the board’s recordkeeping. She said that the group’s poor documentation makes it difficult to cite precedent in a clear way, making rules even more inflexible. Because of the lack of transparency, groups end up requesting more money than they want in hopes of getting enough, she said. UFB chair candidate Jose Vasconez, a current representative on both UCS and UFB, said he wanted to “ease tension” between UFB and student groups. He said he was writing a document that would clearly outline for student groups what UFB funds and what it does not to make the process of applying for money clearer for students. He said he wanted to put the amount of money available for funding on the board’s Web site and list the allocation for each meeting along with the amount groups requested, so that students can see the disparity. The relationship between UFB and student groups should be “symbiotic,” Vasconez said.
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Monday, April 7, 2008
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
M. lax takes down Yale in a squeaker for the books continued from page 12 chances. Tiffany said the offensive outburst was crucial given the slow start. “Down 3-1 on the road against a good Yale team ... it was a huge momentum boost to see the offense explode in the second quarter.” The Bears ripped 17 shots on Yale goalie George Carafides in the second period, half of their total for the game. The team did not change strategy, they just “started playing tougher, getting to tough ground balls,” according to Hollingsworth. Aiding Brown was a strong fan contingent. Tiffany said Brown fans outnumbered Yale fans, and Hollingsworth said their presence was a factor in the game. “The fans were a huge inspiration throughout the whole game. We have a strong contingent that comes to every game,” Hollingsworth said. Attackman Brendan Gibson, who had three tallies for the Bulldogs, responded to the run with just eight seconds to play in the half, scoring to make it 5-4 heading into intermission. Then, seven seconds into the second half, Yale senior Kyle Washabaugh, who gave Bruno trouble in the slot all day with his hard shooting ability, scored to tie the game at five. The Brown offense responded continually, grabbing two more leads in the second half, but the Bears were unable to pull away and Yale tied the game at six in the third quarter and then again at eight with 5:11 to play in the game. In the waning minutes, Burke rebounded to save the game for the Bears. After a pair of breakdowns, Burke made close saves to protect the tie. The biggest threat came with three minutes to play, when Brown failed a clear and Yale had a 2-on-1 that eventually left Burke 1-on-1 with Yale attackman Tyler
Casertano. Casertano shot from point-blank range, but Burke made a spectacular save. “It was as big a play as someone can make in a game,” Tiffany said. “Friday wasn’t a great game for him, but he was there in the end making two huge saves.” The save led to a Brown clear and the final possession. After a few shots missed wide, the Bears called a timeout with 40 seconds left in the game. Assistant Coach Jon Thompson called a play designed for a midfielder to dodge, but the ball found its way to Muldoon up top. “I got the ball up top, and I drew a slide and dumped it back to Hollingsworth (behind the net),” Muldoon said of the game-winning goal. Hollingsworth had a step on his man because of the slide and took the ball around the left side of the cage, beating Carafides on the left for the winner. “It was awesome. I was right behind the net and saw the whole thing. I watched it go in the left-hand corner,” Muldoon said. The ensuing face-off was knocked around, and Yale was unable to get an opportunity to equalize in the final seconds. “This was the best lacrosse game I’ve been a part of at Brown as a head coach,” Tiffany said. “To win a game where two teams play really well, we’re ecstatic.” Tri-captain Brian Sharnick ’08 said the game was a “learning experience” that will hopefully help the team down the road, should it have other close games. He also said that it was great for the team’s confidence, though he added that the players “don’t take anything lightly and always play like we have something to prove.” The Bears will next try to prove themselves at Penn on Saturday. The Quakers are 3-1 in the Ivy League, and a positive result is crucial for Brown’s Ivy League title aspirations.
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Offering donuts, a transfer Tiny chance black hole will engulf Earth applicant crosses his fingers continued from page 5
continued from page 5 ing up. “I had come this far and I wasn’t going to let a little rain get in my way,” he said. “If the weather was better there would have been more foot traffic.” After speaking with a few people, Flanagan had a “breakthrough” when students working in the admission office alerted members of the staff of his presence. Associate Director of Admission Keith Light was among those that spoke to Flanagan. “I said ‘hi’ and just told him to keep warm,” Light said. “There’s a charming aspect to his approach, but when it comes to admitting people at Brown, we look at all the application materials.” “Through my years at admissions I’ve seen students who have found ways to try and grab the attention of admissions officers,” Light said. “Sometimes it makes the staff smile; sometimes it induces a bit of eyerolling.” Dean of Admission Jim Miller ’73 agreed that attempts to get the attention of admissions staff have little bearing on admissions decisions. “It does happen at colleges and universities across the country periodically,” Miller said. “It’s nice that he very much wants to come to Brown but normally actions like
this don’t help.” “We admire his industr y but we’re not crazy about his taste in doughnuts,” Miller added. Prospective students and their parents taking campus tours constituted the majority of the movement in and out of the admissions office Friday morning. “I didn’t know what it was at first. I thought it was a fundraiser,” said tour guide Robert Moore ’11. “I’m not sure if it will get his application attention but it will get him attention.” Vinay Parameswaran ’09, another tour guide, agreed that Flanagan’s approach seemed a little “bizarre” and probably would not influence his admission decision, though he added that it shows his dedication to Brown. “It was a nice surprise to see a guy with free coffee in the morning,” Parameswaran said. Of the handful of admissions staff, students and prospective students that he spoke with, most seemed positive about his approach, Flanagan said. Students applauded his creativity, he said, while the staff wanted to know more about his purpose. “I came with low expectations, and I definitely exceeded them,” Flanagan said. “I didn’t have some far-fetched fantasy of Ruth Simmons coming and magically granting me admissions.”
particle accelerator in the world is the Tevatron at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Illinois, but it isn’t as well-suited to detect the Higgs boson. The LHC, however, is seven times more powerful than the Tevatron. The LHC, which has taken eight years to build, is now mostly complete. It is 27 kilometers around and 100 meters underground, near Geneva. The world’s longest superconducting installation, the accelerator and track are cooled to -271 degrees Celsius, just above absolute zero, in a vacuum simulating interplanetary space. Because of the sheer magnitude of the project, Landsberg and Narain said collaboration among scientists is necessar y, and the work is divided up across the globe. Approximately 10,000 scientists from 60 countries have helped construct LHC and its detectors. The Brown team has worked specifically on the CMS’s momentum tracker and the actual hadron detector. Because of the large amount of information that will be produced, the data from the experiments will be distributed and stored on computers around the globe via a system called The Grid. The magnitude of the project and the amount of data to analyze provides a “tremendous opportunity” for graduate
and undergraduate students interested in physics, Cutts said. The theory behind the Higgs boson comes from work done by Peter Higgs and others, and was developed independently in 1964 by then-graduate student Gerald Guralnik along with C. R. Hagen and T. W. B. Kibble. Guralnik, now a professor of physics at Brown, said it is “fantastic that we are finally in a position to test this theory in its simplest form.” “The theor y for this experiment is very well understood, yet if not found, there are many ways to explain SM,” or the Standard Model, “without the Higgs boson,” Guralnik added. Still, “this model it too beautiful not to be the route that is chosen.” Theoreticians like Guralnik and Tan accepted the Standard Model about 30 years ago and have now moved on to other theories, such as the currently popular string theory. But in the back of their minds they are still thinking, the Standard Theory “had better be right,” Tan said. “We must expect all possibilities,” Landsberg said, adding that evidence that the Higgs boson doesn’t exist “would be even more interesting.” Then, scientists would have to seek alternative solutions to the Standard Model, such as extra-dimensional space and dark matter. But two men from Hawaii are fearing the worst. They recently filed a lawsuit to suspend the LHC experiments, arguing that the particle collisions could create a black hole that could potentially engulf the Earth, the New York Times reported March 29. Narain dismissed the concerns. “It’s a lawsuit that doesn’t have
much merit,” she said. “If you really understand what is going on, (a black hole) is such a remote possibility it will have zero impact.” Though technically complicated, the LHC has recently entered the public eye. It and CERN, the facility where it’s located, played a role in Dan Brown’s best seller “Angels and Demons,” in which terrorists steal dark matter from the facility. The science in the book is largely unfounded. Landsberg said the LHC capitvates people for several reasons. “LHC machines (are) pushing the frontier of modern technology,” he said. “Technology is being pushed by the needs of particle physicists.” He also said CERN has a history of pushing man to his limit and riding on the cutting edge of technology — in 1989, CERN scientist Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web. Landsberg added that the experiments themselves are ver y beautiful from a scientific perspective. CMS is a “piece of modern art,” he said, adding that people want to understand the most fundamental aspects of the universe. “If satisfied, then we would never make progress,” Landsberg said. Narain also stressed the importance of these questions. “We are getting so close to figuring out where we came from,” Narain said. “Maybe we will be able to solve the mysteries of mass.” But the experiment is most philosophical for Guralnik, whose previous work is the foundation for the current project at the LHC. “You really want a theory that explains everything,” he said. “The essence of being human is to be able to ask questions like this.”
Students return to Big Easy to help with reconstruction continued from page 5 New Orleans in 2006, and this trip marked the second time they participated in Hillel International’s three-year commitment to aid the city. Jonathan Mitchell ’09 said the
trip was an amazing experience. The group met with local leaders — Mitchell described the meeting with the editor of the New Orleans Times-Picayune about the media’s perspective on Katrina as “terrifying and amazing.” The trip was “the most meaningful spring break I have had,” Mitchell said. The groups had all conducted significant fundraising before heading to New Orleans in March. Much of the fundraising came from writing letters to family, friends and Brown and community contacts. Mitchell said the Hillel group’s funds came from Hillel International and from holding events such as “Jazz and Jambalaya,” a night of music and food earlier in March in a fraternity’s lounge. Students with the Multi-Faith Council paid for their own airfare and financed the rest of the trip with $3,000 from the Office of the President and additional funding from numerous local and on-campus groups. “There is still so much work to be done,” Cooper-Nelson said. “12,000 to 20,000 people are still living in tents, and another 120,000 are said to still be in Houston waiting to return.”
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Ivy wins remain out of reach for softball M. crew easily sinks BU continued from page 12 center field, and two batters later, another Cornell double, this time down the left field line, drove in the first Big Red run of the game, tying the game at one. The Bears were unable even to get on base in the bottom of the seventh, sending the game into extra innings. The Big Red showed its strength again when Jenna Campagnolo hit a home run over the left-field fence to give her team the lead. Bruno stranded both Baxter and Linnea Anderson ’08 in the bottom of the eighth, resulting in another close loss for the Bears. “I was pleased with how they battled,” Omidiji said. “Our goal was to pick up runners on base and we missed out on those opportunities. We need the defense to remain constant and get more firepower on the offensive side of the game.” The Bears continued their home stand on Sunday, hosting the Princeton Tigers. Bruno came out strong in the first game, initially holding back the Princeton offense and getting base runners in the bottom of the second. But again, the lack of timely hitting left runners stranded and continued the Bears’ offensive woes. Princeton was able to get on the board with a home run off the bat of Jamie Lettire. Pitcher Moses was able to keep it to only a one-run deficit until the top of the fourth, when Princeton capitalized on back-to-back hits from their six and seven hitters.
Down two going into the bottom of the fourth, Chin hit a single through the left side to give a little hope to the Bears, but she was stranded at first to end the inning. After Chaddock took the mound in relief of Moses, Princteon added an insurance run in the fifth and then broke the game open in the sixth to take a commanding sevenrun lead. Brown only had two base runners after the fourth inning, and the game ended with the final score 7-0. The Bears looked to turn it around in the second game of the doubleheader, but Princeton jumped out to an early lead in the top of the second inning. A double put the Tigers’ Lettire on second, and she scored on a subsequent error by centerfielder Macrina. In the bottom of the second, Bruno had runners on first and second but couldn’t score. In the top of the fourth, several key defensive plays kept Brown close, including a diving catch by Macrina that got the second out of the inning and kept Princeton from scoring. In the bottom of the fourth the Bears got their offense going. Kelsey Wilson ’09 got on base with the help of a throwing error by Princeton’s shortstop, and Anderson hit a single to left field. Then Chaddock’s sacrifice bunt advanced both runners. In a strategic move, Omidiji brought in Andrea Browne ’10 to pinch hit for Rice, and Browne delivered a two-run single to give the Bears a 2-1 lead.
“I hadn’t played all day, and it was my time to come through for the team,” Browne said. “I wanted to contribute with a good hit.” Macrina then hit a double and advanced on an error, which scored Browne from first. The Bears had a two-run lead, but it didn’t last for long. Princeton scored one in the fifth, to which Kelsey Quist added a home run in the sixth. After the homer tied the game at three, Iwasaki replaced starting pitcher Chin. She hit the first batter she faced but came through strong to end the inning without any additional damage. Although the Bears hung tough through the sixth, Princeton took the lead again in the top of the seventh with two outs. Quist hit a deep fly ball off the right field fence for a double, picking up her second RBI of the game. The next batter hit a single to score Quist and put the Tigers up, 5-3. Bruno was unable to muster any offense in the bottom half of the inning, and the game ended in a 5-3 score. This loss puts the Bears on an eight-game skid and allows Princeton to sustain its perfect Ivy League record. “We are in ever y game. We need to find a way to put up more runs than the other team,” Browne said. Brown has a mid-week game next, as they face URI away on Wednesday. The Bears are looking to get back on track heading into an important Ivy matchup against Dartmouth at home next weekend.
while looking to Harvard continued from page 12 the Seekonk to face Radcliffe, as the teams alternated races. Those on the men’s side enjoyed the experience. “We have such respect for what the women have done over the years, so it’s great to get a chance to race together,” Cooke said. Co-captain Paul Strombom ’08 said he appreciated the power of the combined fan bases of the two teams. “We get more people cheering for us, so it’s definitely fun to have races with them,” he said. Both Bruno teams will once again share the Seekonk next Saturday,
but the men are focused entirely on their opponent: Harvard. Strombom recalled the events of April 8, 2006, the last time the teams squared off on Brown’s home course, when he was one of four sophomores on the Bears’ varsity eight that beat the powerhouse Crimson squad by half of a second. “We definitely expect some close races like that this weekend, and hopefully we’ll come out on top,” he said. Cooke expressed similar thoughts. “It’s been a very strong rivalry over the years, and it’s a big race for us, so we really look forward to it,” he said.
With kicks, m. soccer scores big with kids continued from page 12 Soccer hats. Most students failed to get the ball high enough, but the two who put a hole through the collage received the biggest ovations. The team got the final shots and though some players’ accuracy was inconsistent, the symbol of tobacco advertising eventually fell. Lee, the midfielder, called the
whole experience “pretty awesome,” and Grandstrand, a goalie, added that the team does several events of this kind in and around Providence. The men’s soccer team also participates in free clinics and works with a school in Fox Point. This event has been a staple for the men’s soccer team since 2001. “It has become a kind of rite of passage for the fourth graders,” Furlong said.
E ditorial & L etters Page 10
Monday, April 7, 2008
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
Staf f Editorial
Opening student government Next week, the student body will vote a student government into office, as it always does. Also on the ballot will be a referendum that some on the council have said signals a move by the Undergraduate Council of Students toward a reformed structure and goals. While the referendum itself is unlikely to make much difference, a recent reform movement by some on UCS should turn heads. The referendum, if passed, would modify restrictions for membership in the lower-level positions in UCS. Currently, a student must be elected to a class representative position, but under the new system, students could become voting at-large members by appearing at two meetings and having a certain number of students sign a petition supporting them. On the one hand, easing entry into UCS could bring new students into the process, helping to alleviate concerns that student government is a revolving door of similar ideas and mentalities. The latest Herald poll shows students are, once again, ambivalent about UCS, and the report by a task force that recently self-evaluated the council calls its relations with students “strained at best.” Making student government more open to students could yield more creative initiatives and give students that feel underrepresented a bigger voice on campus issues. But ultimately, this particular measure alone is unlikely to fundamentally change UCS. Winning an uncontested election, as most of the candidates this year must do, is effectively little different from showing up to a couple meetings and collecting signatures. And making it easier to join the council is very different from making people want to join. Until the latter happens, the former is unlikely to matter. But we shouldn’t forget the changes proposed in the referendum are part of a larger commitment to structural and cultural change in student government. The ultimate goal, according to the report of a task force that recently self-evaluated UCS, is to transform student government from a “policy-making body” into an “activist” body. Top-to-bottom, this means UCS needs to solicit student opinion more actively — certainly more actively than a MyCourses survey or an all-campus e-mail inviting people to their next meeting. It needs to sponsor debates with administators, walk through dorms and sponsor events that are fun and will solicit student feedback. And when it finds issues worth championing to the administration, it needs to do so intelligently but aggressively. While we appreciate salads at Jo’s and the freedom of the Flex Plan, these small improvements in quality of life represent a model for student government that is far less compelling than when UCS took on an advocate, even adversarial, role in questioning Banner’s implementation and adding pluses and minuses to grades. Loosening membership requirements is a start, but UCS should also focus on better communicating with students and taking up the role of a strong advocate for causes they feel seriously need attention.
T he B rown D aily H erald Editors-in-Chief Simmi Aujla Ross Frazier editorial Arts & Culture Editor Robin Steele Andrea Savdie Asst. Arts & Culture Editor Debbie Lehmann Higher Ed Editor Chaz Firestone Features Editor Olivia Hoffman Asst. Features Editor Rachel Arndt Metro Editor Scott Lowenstein Metro Editor Michael Bechek News Editor Isabel Gottlieb News Editor Franklin Kanin News Editor Michael Skocpol News Editor Karla Bertrand Opinions Editor James Shapiro Opinions Editor Whitney Clark Sports Editor Amy Ehrhart Sports Editor Jason Harris Sports Editor Benjy Asher Asst. Sports Editor Andrew Braca Asst. Sports Editor Megan McCahill Asst. Sports Editor
Senior Editors Taylor Barnes Chris Gang Stu Woo Business Darren Ball General Manager Mandeep Gill General Manager Susan Dansereau Office Manager Alex Hughes Sales Manager Lily Tran Sales Manager Emilie Aries Public Relations Director Jon Spector Accounting Director Claire Kiely National Account Manager Ellen DaSilva University Account Manager Darren Kong Recruiter Account Manager Katelyn Koh Credit Manager Ingrid Pangandoyon Technology Director photo Rahul Keerthi Meara Sharma Min Wu Ashley Hess
Photo Editor Asst. Photo Editor Asst. Photo Editor Sports Photo Editor
CHRISTOPHER LEE
Letters Clarifying sexual assault reporting To the Editor: We would like to respond to the recent letter (“Herald misrepresented sexual assault statistics,” April 2) and article (“Task force: U. can better adress sexual assault,” March 31) regarding reports of sexual assaults at Brown. It’s important to make the distinction between the prevalence of sexual assault and how often victims report. Sexual assault is one of the most underreported crimes in this country. Benedict Mills ’10 rightly notes that a high percentage of women are sexually assaulted in college. However, we need to add another piece to the picture: the Department of Justice also found that only 5 percent of these victims reported the crime to law enforcement. Underreporting is a reflection of the victim-blaming attitudes that are deeply entrenched in our society. Highprofile cases in the media frequently reinforce victims’ fear of reporting what’s happened to them. The Clery Act requires colleges and universities to disclose reported crimes. The crime does not have to be investigated nor does there have to be any hearing process or determination of a finding. Clery statistics must reflect all reports of sexual assault received by a university security authority. At Brown, our reports reflect all of those that might be received formally or informally through our sexual assault resources, through a report at the Department of Public Safety,
through the judicial system, or through personnel in Student Life and Residential Life. We would like victims to come forward and we are striving to remove the barriers that they face in getting help and reporting what has happened to them. To that end we are: Hiring a full-time staff person dedicated to sexual assault prevention and response; Co-sponsoring a peer education program with the Sexual Assault Task Force; Providing a dedicated phone number for sexual assault response; Evaluating the non-academic discipline process; and Providing training by a national expert for DPS and staff involved in non-academic discipline Gail Cohee Director, Sarah Doyle Women’s Center Belinda Johnson Director, Psychological Services Margaret Klawunn Associate Vice President of Campus Life/Dean for Student Life Francis Mantak Director, Health Education Allen Ward Senior Associate Dean for Student Life April 2
post- magazine production Steve DeLucia Production & Design Editor Chaz Kelsh Asst. Design Editor 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
Jessica Calihan, Chaz Kelsh, Joanna Lee, Designers Rafael Chaiken, Stephanie Craton, Josh Garcia, Alexander Rosenberg, Copy Editors Sophia Li, Alex Roehrkasse, Andrea Savdie, 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, Marisa Calleja, Noura Choudhury, Joy Chua, Ben Hyman, Cameron Lee, Ben Leubsdorf, Christian Martell, Anna Millman, Seth Motel, Evan Pelz, Leslie Primack, Marielle Segarra, Melissa Shube, Catherine Straut, Sara Sunshine, Gaurie Tilak, Matthew Varley, Meha Verghese, Allison Wentz Sports Staff Writers Peter Cipparone, Han Cui, Meagan Garza, Lara Southern, Nicole Stock, Katie Wood Business Staff Stephanie Cheung, Veronica Yu, Jay Guan, Jennifer Chang, Jamie Phinney, Anna Reisetter, Kartika Chourdhury, Serena Ho, Akshay Rathod, Galen Cho, Maryrose Mesa, Van Le, Maura Lynch, Grant LeBeau, Jacqueline Goldman, Dana Feuchtbaum, Geraldo Guanaes, Lauren Presant, Lindsay Walls, Lucy Wang, Ruyi Jiang, Saul Lustgarten, Diego Gomez, Laura Sammartino, Ava Amini, Charley Chen, Lee Chau, Rory Stanton, Oliver Bowers, Katherine Richards, Alison Greenberg, Lilia Royanova Design Staff Jessica Calihan, Serena Ho, Rachel Isaacs, Andrea Krukowski, Joe Larios, Joanna Lee, Alex Unger, Aditya Voleti Photo Staff Oona Curley, Alex DePaoli, Erik Maser, Kim Perley, Quinn Savit Copy Editors Ria Ali, Paula Armstrong, Kim Arredondo, Ayelet Brinn, Aubrey Cann, Rafael Chaiken, Stephanie Craton, Erin Cummings, Katie Delaney, Julianne Fenn, Jake Frank, Anne Fuller, Josh Garcia, Jennifer Grayson, Rachel Isaacs, Joyce Ji, Jenn Kim, Tarah Knaresboro, Ted Lamm, Alex Mazerov, Seth Motel, Lisa Qing, Alex Rosenberg, Madeleine Rosenberg, Elena Weissman, Jason Yum
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 Monday, April 7, 2008
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
Page 11
Shame on you! BY WILLIAM MARTIN Opinions Columnist Conventional wisdom has taken quite a drubbing during this presidential primary. John McCain has risen from the dead, Hillar y Clinton has gone from inevitability to insurgency and Rudy Giuliani’s once-vaunted appeal is now mocked or forgotten. But one unfounded notion persists in the minds of many commentators: the media’s love affair with Barack Obama. Supposedly, America’s fourth estate has been seduced by the junior Illinois senator’s silver tongue and liberal stances, causing journalists across the country to shirk their duty by ignoring Obama’s foibles while bombarding his opponents with baseless attacks. The Clinton campaign in particular has promoted and exploited this perception: Shortly before his strategic banishment from prominent events, Bill Clinton savaged reporters for their treatment of his wife, barking “Shame on you.” But the press’s handling of two recent scandals — NAFTAgate and Pastorgate — belies the fantasy of an Obama-media alliance. The major media outlets ignored crucial facts in their coverage of both stories, to their supposed hero’s severe detriment. The media’s most egregious elision helped sabotage Obama’s credibility in the wake of the scandal known as “NAFTAgate.” As the March 4 primaries in Ohio, Texas, Vermont and Rhode Island approached, Obama and Clinton emphasized their determination to protect American jobs by renegotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement. This appeal was particularly strong in Ohio, which has been hard-hit by industrial outsourcing. In a debate on Feb. 26, they both vowed to use the threat of withdrawal from the treaty as leverage for its renegotiation. Shortly thereafter, the Canadian media reported that there were rumors that Obama’s stance had been dishonest. This seemed to be
verified by a leaked memo from the Canadian government stating that Obama’s economic advisor Austan Goolsbee had requested a meeting with the Canadian ambassador to the United States. According to the memo, Goolsbee reassured the ambassador that Obama’s public statements about NAFTA were “more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans.” The American media picked up the story, and both Clinton and McCain exploited the opportunity to scourge Obama for his supposed mendacity. Obama’s steady advance in the Ohio polls ground to
credibility would have been restored. Now he will carry the unearned stain of dishonesty through the remaining Democratic primaries and probably into the general election, in which Ohio will again be a critical battleground. The media’s bad habits re-emerged in mid-March, when Obama was engulfed in a firestorm of criticism over the remarks of his spiritual advisor and one-time pastor, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. The catalyst was a series of prominent stories describing inflammatory phrases in Wright’s ser-
The press’s handling of two recent scandals — NAFTAgate and Pastorgate — belies the fantasy of an Obama-media alliance. a halt, and on March 4 he lost the state to Clinton by 10 points. The Canadian media went on to refute the allegations it had previously reported: It had been Canada’s Chicago consul, in fact, who had demanded a meeting with Goolsbee; the Obama advisor, rather than describing his boss’s public position on NAFTA as a politically motivated sham, reaffirmed his hope to renegotiate portions of the treaty rather than scrap it. There wasn’t enough coverage of this in American media. The truth surfaced too late to save Obama in the Ohio primary, but had the media paid more attention to it, Obama’s
mons, particularly “God damn America” and “America’s chickens are coming home to roost” — used soon after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. Obama condemned the remarks, devoted a speech to containing the fallout, and declared in an interview that he would not have remained a member of Wright’s church had the pastor not retired. But the damage had been done, and the media’s myopic approach to the story was largely to blame. Journalists covering Wright’s rhetoric made little reference to the context of the offending statements, weakening Obama’s attempts to reassure voters that they were not representative of his pastor’s beliefs.
Wright’s declaration that African-Americans should sing “not God bless America, God damn America” came at the crescendo of a sermon in which he had praised the country’s progress since the days of slavery and segregation. “Governments change,” Wright repeatedly reminded his audience, implying that the country’s bad condition was not an inherent flaw, but rather the result of its current government’s mismanagement. The context of the comment about Sept. 11 was similarly exculpatory. Preaching less than a week after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, D.C., Wright referred to them as “the American tragedy” and twice referred to them as “an unthinkable act.” The pastor declared that “America’s chickens are coming home to roost” not to dismiss the atrocities as the country’s just punishment for past misdeeds abroad, but to advance the quintessentially Christian notion that “violence begets violence.” By focusing almost exclusively on a handful of sentences, the media presented a false picture of Wright’s sentiments. They were not the pastor’s only outrageous remarks, but they were placed at the center of the sensational coverage, without the contextualization that is — or should be — standard journalistic practice. Nor has Obama ever seemed to receive any benefit from media myopia. For example, voters were treated to meticulous coverage of his ties to indicted Chicago businessman Antoin Rezko, despite the lack of even a hint of wrongdoing on Obama’s part. American journalism has consistently erred in favor of damaging his campaign. It’s not yet clear how this happened, or why — whether it came from bias, laziness, editorial intercessions or a lack of journalistic initiative. But it should be enough to put to rest the groundless suspicion that Obama has unfairly benefited from the favor of the fourth estate
William Martin ’10 can’t get fooled again
The carbon footprint of the Berylson Family Athletic Complex BY Allan Feldman Guest Columnist In this green month of April, between Earth Day and Arbor Day, I ask the Brown community to consider the carbon footprint of the newly built Berylson Family Fields. The BFF is a pair of artificial turf fields, side by side, which replaced the grass practice football fields on Aldrich-Dexter field. BFF is laid out and lined as two football fields, and used for practice by the football team, but it is also used year-round by many other sports. The fields are lit up at night by a system of 80 lights on six towers, each 90 feet tall. The entire system of lights is either on or off; the pair of football fields is either lit in its entirety or not lit at all. When the light switch is on, the system draws 120,000 watts (120 kW for short). How much electric power is that? Perhaps you are familiar with the small 14 watt compact fluorescent lights (CFLs) that replace 60 watt incandescent bulbs. Lighting up BFF is like lighting up around 8,500 of those CFLs. Lighting up BFF for a single evening burns as much electric power as a typical Providence house burns in a month (for lights, cooking, appliances, entertainment, etc.). Should you care about the electric power consumption of BFF? After all, even if Brown wastes some money on lighting BFF, it is a
minute fraction of what Brown spends to keep its various facilities heated and illuminated, a drop in the bucket. This is true, but Brown often tries to take the lead in doing the ethical thing. In fact the University has already publicly committed to reducing its own carbon footprint and helping others do so as well. It is widely believed that greenhouse gasses, particularly carbon dioxide, may be re-
used for one hour) puts 0.921 pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Therefore, lighting BFF for one hour likely puts around 120 times that amount, roughly 110 pounds of carbon dioxide, into the atmosphere. When BFF is lit up in the evening, it is typically lit for around four hours. (The lights are always turned off by 10 p.m. In late fall, they sometimes go on at 4:30 p.m.; in the spring they sometimes go on at 6:30 p.m.) I
Lighting BFF probably puts roughly 60 tons of carbon dioxide in the air each year, which is roughly equivalent to driving a Hummer H2, the biggest gas-guzzler, around the Earth twice. Is this a good thing? sponsible for human-induced climate change, climate change that may become dangerous for the inhabitants of earth, human and otherwise. One of the largest sources of carbon dioxide is electric power generation. National Grid, which sells electric power to Brown, sends its customers a “disclosure label.” The label says that producing 1 kWh (that is, 1 kW
don’t yet know whether the fields will be lit up at night in the summer, but BFF has been used intensively over the course of the year since it was opened last September; it was even used in January. With artificial turf, which can be plowed when it snows and which drains water straight into the Narragansett Bay when it rains, BFF
can be used in almost any type of weather. And in the seasons when it is used most, such as the fall, the lights are turned on ever y night of the week. To roughly estimate the annual lighting impact of BFF, let’s assume four hours of lighting per evening, seven days per week, for 40 weeks per year. These assumptions lead directly to the conclusion that lighting BFF will put more than 60 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere in a year. To put things in perspective, that is equivalent to the carbon dioxide emissions produced by burning 5,550 gallons of gasoline. Edmunds.com, a car review Web site, reports that the biggest gas-guzzling SUV now in common use, the Hummer H2, gets about 9 miles per gallon. So lighting BFF for a year dumps the same amount of carbon into the earth’s atmosphere as driving a Hummer H2 for 50,000 miles. Or, to put it another way, lighting BFF for a year has the same greenhouse gas effect as driving a Hummer twice around the circumference of the earth. (I know that you actually cannot drive around the earth because of intervening water!) In sum, lighting BFF probably puts roughly 60 tons of carbon dioxide in the air each year, which is roughly equivalent to driving a Hummer H2, the biggest gas-guzzler, around the Earth twice. Is this a good thing?
Allan Feldman is a professor of economics
S ports M onday Page 12
Monday, April 7, 2008
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
M. lax hammers Yale with late heroics Crew easily drowns BU to earn Michalson Cup By Jason Harris Sports Editor
It seemed nearly impossible for the men’s lacrosse team to outdo their 10-9 victory over Yale last season, a game that culminated in a Zach Caldwell ’10 gameBrown 9 winner with 2:20 to 8 play. Yale But Kyle Hollingsworth ’09 one-upped Caldwell on Friday, scoring the game-winner over the Bulldogs with just 11 seconds to play, unknotting an 8-8 tie and giving No. 16 Brown its sixth straight victory. The win, in front of a mostly pro-Brown crowd in New Haven, makes the Bears 7-2 overall and 2-0 in the Ivy League. Yale fell to 2-6, 0-4 in Ivy League play. Yale took a 3-1 lead less than two minutes into the second period against the Brown defense, which has been the team’s strength all season. Goalie Jordan Burke ’09, who has been “stellar” all season, according to Head Coach Lars Tiffany ’90, and who leads the Ivy League with a save percentage of 70.9, was not at his sharpest early on, though he bounced back late in the game when his team needed him. The Brown offense picked up the slack in the second period, however, scoring four straight goals to put Bruno in the lead. Three came from attackman Thomas Muldoon ’10, the team’s leading scorer, who had a total of four scores on the day. Two of Muldoon’s goals and
By Andrew Braca Assistant Spor ts Editor
Ashley Hess / Herald File Photo
Kyle Hollingsworth ’09 scored the game winning goal against Yale on Friday to give Brown its sixth straight win this season.
one from midfielder Brady Williams ’09 in the run were in man-up situations. “The second quarter is when we turned it on,” he said. “It started because we got a couple man-ups and we capitalized on them just like
Softball faces tough losses against Ivy opponents By Nicole Stock Spor ts Staf f Writer
The softball team looked to get back in the playoff hunt with their first home weekend of the season against Ivy League opponents Cornell and Princeton. Although the Bears played tough, two losses, first to Cornell 6-1 and 2-1 and then to Princeton 7-0 and 5-3, left Brown with an Ivy record of 0-8, limiting their chances of making the playoffs. Cornell proved to be a challenge for the Bears, taking both games of the Saturday afternoon doubleheader. The Big Red displayed solid defense to hold the Bears to only two runs on the day. In the first game, the Bears took an early 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first. After Amy Baxter ’08 singled and stole second, Kristie Chin ’11 drove in the run with a single. The score would remain 1-0 until the top of the fourth, when Cornell tied the game on an RBI double by Ashley Garvey. With two outs in the top of the fifth, Samantha Hare added to the Big Red’s run total with a solo home run to take the lead. After the home run, Jessica Iwasaki ’10 took over in relief of starter Chin. It looked as though the Bears would respond with a run of their own when Brittany Lavine ’10 got on base to start off the bottom of the fifth, but the Bears could not pick up the key hit to advance the runner. In the top of the sixth, a walk put the first hitter of the inning for the Big Red on base, and aggressive hitting allowed Cornell to open a three-run lead. The Bears were unable to produce much offense in
the latter stages of the game, and Cornell tacked on two more runs in the top of the seventh to put the game out of reach. The game ended in a 6-1 loss for Bruno. The second game of the doubleheader began in much the same way as the first, with the Bears starting the scoring. Emily Chaddock ’11 walked to begin the bottom of the second and advanced on a walk by teammate Lindsay Rice ’11. Maria Macrina ’11 singled to left, knocking Chaddock in from second and giving the Bears an early edge. Brown was able to contain the Big Red’s offensive attack early in the game behind Chaddock’s strong pitching and some excellent fielding. Lavine was solid in left field, making two great catches, one in a collision with the centerfielder in the top of the third to hold off a Cornell attack. “In the first game I didn’t think I played that well in the field, so in the second game I was focusing on seeing the pitches off of the bat,” Lavine said. Chaddock held Cornell scoreless through five innings of work, giving up four hits and striking out two batters. “Emily Chaddock pitched well for us and had a key strikeout right before we changed pitchers,” said Head Coach Andrea EnabenterOmidiji. Michelle Moses ’09 came in for relief work in the sixth, and it seemed as though the Bears would pick up their first Ivy win. But Cornell’s first batter of the seventh inning hit a double into continued on page 9
in the Delaware game. Man-up was moving the ball really well.” Brown converted three of its four manup opportunities, but Yale was unable to score in its four extra-man continued on page 7
The men’s crew team sped past Boston University on Saturday morning on the Seekonk River, winning all five races by at least 10 seconds to earn the Michalson Cup. “We are working towards putting down our best race possible, and this was a great step towards that early in the season,” said varsity eight coxswain Rob O’Leary ’09. Head Coach Paul Cooke ’89 said the team improved in its first home race, after opening the season by winning three out of five races at Yale on the previous Saturday. “I think we rowed with a little bit better rhythm,” he said. “We learned a few things over the course of the week that showed up in the racing.” After enduring rough conditions at Yale, the Bears were blessed with light winds and calm waters, as the Seekonk overcame its reputation for choppiness to produce what O’Leary called “probably the best conditions we’ve seen at home in a long time.” A tide shift makes comparing results between races difficult, but Cooke said it had little effect on the oarsmen. The varsity eight got Brown off to a good start by finishing at 5:53.3, 15.3 seconds ahead of BU. The Bears fought through a slight
incoming tide to quickly gain open water and pull away from the Terriers. The tide then switched directions and the times dropped, but Bruno didn’t miss a beat. The second varsity eight cruised to an equally impressive victory, crossing the finish line in 5:41.1, while BU lagged behind at 5:58.1. The Terriers put up their best fight of the day in the freshmen eight race, but the Bears’ swift time of 5:38.1 was good for a ten-second margin of victory. The final two races produced Brown’s largest margins of victory on the day. The third varsity eight finished in 5:38.2, while BU followed at 5:58.7. The Bears capped a strong day when the second freshmen boat cruised to a 20.6-second victor y, crossing the line at 6:34.4. Cooke said he particularly appreciated the strong showing by the freshmen, who had lost both of their races against Yale. “To bounce back after last week was a big deal,” he said. “It’s always good to see the smiles on the guys’ faces after they win that first race.” Saturday went beyond a normal home meet because it featured a double dose of the Bears. The women’s crew team joined the men on continued on page 9
M. soccer kicks hole in tobacco ads By Jason Harris Spor ts Editor
The cheers of aspiring soccer players are not unfamiliar to the men’s soccer team. The cheers usually come during games, though. On Thursday, the noisy adoration was coming from fourth- and fifth-graders at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Elementary School, just north of the University on Camp Street. They were supporting their fellow classmates as well as goalies Paul Grandstrand ’11 and Jarrod Schlenker ’10, midfielder Will Lee ’09 and Assistant Coach Ryan Levesque, all attempting to “kick butt” -- tobacco butts, that is -- against tobacco use by kicking soccer balls through a giant collage of tobacco ads targeted at youth. The event, sponsored and organized by Lifespan Community Health Ser vices and the Miriam Hospital, coincided with the 13th-annual Kick Butts Day, “a nationwide initiative to discourage tobacco use among youth,” according to a Miriam Hospital press release. The players went into fourthgrade classrooms three weeks ago to run three 45-minute tobacco education sessions, focusing on the media and advertising, according to Bonnie Braga, Lifespan’s outreach specialist and coordinator of the par tnership with MLK Elementar y. “It’s amazing how many of these kids have people in their families (who) smoke,” Braga said. Braga and Janis Furlong, a nurse educator at Lifespan, coordinated the program. Both said
Courtesy of Janis Furlong
Coinciding with Kick Butts day, Jarrod Schlenker ’10 and other players from the men’s soccer team participated in an anti-tabacco event with fourth and fifth graders.
the Brown soccer players were ver y effective at communicating the anti-tobacco message. “The kids are much more receptive to learning from the players,” Furlong said. The players “teach them that in sports you can’t smoke and be good.” The players saw the same responsiveness from the elementary school students. “They look up to athletes from a big school nearby that they know,” Schlenker said. “It makes the stuf f we talk about more down-to-earth. It makes it easier to connect.” After these classes, organizers put up a sheet of paper, blank but for the words “Kick Butt” and about as wide as a soccer goal, outside the classrooms. The students were asked to bring in and tape up clippings of tobacco ads targeted specifically at young people. On Thursday, the collage was
hung up between two posts, and the elementar y school students and teachers, as well as Brown soccer players and coaches, had the chance to shoot a ball in hopes of ripping down the poster. Levesque explained the dangers of using tobacco, specifically pointing out the athletic feats that the student athletes are capable of and how they would be impossible if they smoked. After the tobacco collage was effectively destroyed, the younger students’ admiration for the athletes was evident — some demanded pictures and even autographs from the players. The students who were most involved in making the collage got the first shots and then were partnered with Levesque or one of the players. Students who answered trivia questions about the risks of tobacco correctly received Brown continued on page 9