Thursday, January 29, 2009

Daily Herald the Brown

vol. cxliv, no. 7 | Thursday, January 29, 2009 | Serving the community daily since 1891

Most admits choose Brown, numbers show

Obama taps 3 alums for legal counsel

By Mitra Anoushiravani Senior Staff Writer

inside

Brown ranks 12th on a new collegeranking list published by U.S. News and World Report, beating out two fellow Ivies.

This single-variable list, released online on Monday, uses yield — the percentage of students accepted that enrolls at a college — to determine the most popular colleges, according to Robert Morse, the director of data research at the magazine.

Brown stands higher on U.S. News’ new “Most Popular Colleges” list than on its more established list of the “Best Colleges,” on which it places 16th, behind all of its Ivy League counterparts.

In U.S. News’ popularity ranking, Brown’s 56 percent yield placed it ahead of both Dartmouth and Cornell.

Harvard — which saw 79 percent of the students it admitted matriculate — topped the list. It also topped U.S. News’ more prominent list in 2008.

“This list shows how prized some of these acceptances are,” Morse said, adding that the yield is a statistic based mainly on student choice and is therefore “not a very strong academic factor.”

Dean of Admissions James Miller ’73 said he did not give too much weight to the list, characterizing it as a “silly survey” that was “not representative of much of anything.”

But, he added, “Any survey where we’re among the best colleges in the country — I’m delighted to be there.”

U.S. News stopped using yield as one of the factors in its widely lookedto “Best Colleges” list because it is not a reliable statistic, Morse said.

Miller agreed yield was unreliable.

“I’m not saying anyone manipulated it, but it can be easily manipulated,” he said.

Morse also mentioned other problems with using yield to rank schools.

Religious schools such as Brigham Young University and Yeshiva University ranked in the top ten on the “Most Popular Colleges” list mainly because “they have a unique relationship with their applicants,” he said.

Yield for some schools, he said, “is impacted by early decision. It is artificially boosting the yield.”

Military academies also have very high yields because of their lengthy application processes and free tuition.

State and public schools rank high because they are cheaper and closer to home for most students, Morse said. In the current economic climate, more public schools will make the list simply because students cannot afford out-of-state or private colleges, he added.

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by Mitra Anoushiravani Senior Staff Writer

after the camp was set up.

The “tent city” is a project of the Homeless Peoples’ Action Committee, a group of homeless and formerly homeless people, and receives support from the Brown student group, Housing Opportunities for People Everywhere, or “HOPE.” The camp,

President Barack Obama announced more than a dozen key appointees Wednesday to a top executive branch office — among them three Brown alumni.

Norman Eisen ’85, Karen Dunn ’97 and Katherine Shaw ’01 were named to the Office of the White House Counsel, which is responsible for providing legal advice to the President.

Eisen, a classmate of Obama’s at Harvard Law School, was appointed Special Counsel to the President for Ethics and Government Reform, a position from which he will help advance the President’s agenda to change Washington politics. A philosophy concentrator at Brown, Eisen was a partner at Zuckerman Spaeder LLP, a D.C. law firm, and most recently held the position of Deputy General Counsel to the Transition, where he served as lead ethics advisor. Eisen is also a co-founder of the good-government watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

Dunn, a political science con-

continued on page 6

continued on page 3

George Miller / Herald

Nearly 15 homeless locals have set up a “tent city” under the Crawford Street Bridge downtown.

After death, homeless stick together

by George Miller Metro Editor

Under the shadow of the Crawford Street Bridge in downtown Providence, just feet from where a friend died earlier this month, a few homeless people are living in a camp of three or four tents to raise awareness of their plight.

And because there is safety

in numbers.

Though several organizations operate shelters in the city ­­— a few within walking distance of the tents — many of the roughly 15 people here prefer to sleep outside.

“Down here, I know the community. I know the people,” said Ernest Alther, a Vietnam veteran living here since Sunday, a day

New coach? No problem “He’s done a phenomenal job so far,” said tri-captain Chris Skrelja ’09. “It’s always tough to The sideline is nothing new to transition into a new system — Coach Jesse Agel. new plays, new assistant coaches With 20 years of experience — but he’s been doing a great coaching Division I men’s bas- job.” ketball — two years under his “I’m just upset that it’s my belt as an assistant at Brown and last year here, and that I won’t 17 years at the University of Ver- have more years to succeed in mont — and multiple his system,” Skrelja NCAA tournament apadded.

SPORTS pearances to show for Coming into the it, Agel has much to draw from in season, Agel had a number of goals for the team as well as his first year as head coach.

Having worked with his play- changes he wanted to effect. ers for two years under the preOne goal was to win the Ivy vious head coach (and now first League championship, regardbrother-in-law) Craig Robinson, less of what the Bears’ chances Agel was ready to hit the court looked like at the beginning of running in his new role. the season.

“The transition has been very “You have to shoot for the smooth,” he said, adding that his top,” he said. “That certainly is players “have done a great job.” our goal, and will be our goal ev“They have a tremendous will- ery year.”

The Bears have a 6-10 record ingness to learn and a great desire overall, including an 0-2 mark in to be successful,” Agel said. “So that has enabled everything to the Ivy League after back-to-back work very smoothly for us.” losses to Yale.

The respect was mutual, But his foremost concern is to as each of the team’s captains continued on page 7 praised their new coach.

By Etienne Ma Staff Writer

post-

Courtesy of Sarah Kay

A giant pillow fight broke out in Old Town Square in Prague.

Magazine features student trips last fall, thanks to National Geographic’s Glimpse Magazine.

Started by Nick Fitzhugh ’02 in Sarah Kay ’10 considers herself 2000, the print and online magazine an adventurous traveler, but even offers firsthand accounts of young she couldn’t have imagpeople living abroad. ined the experiences she In the spring of 2007, FEATURE would have in Prague, Glimpse moved from its which included getting to know lo- original Pawtucket office to its curcal artists and meeting a man who rent Washington, D.C. location in made wooden marionettes.

National Geographic’s headquarAnd now Kay will have the ters, said Glimpse Editor-in-Chief chance to share the stories she continued on page 3 picked up while studying abroad

By Christian Martell Staf f Writer

Inside

Metro, 5

Opinions, 11

is a naughty girl with a bad habit, and baby we’ve got a brand new bag

CHECKING OUT Funding issues have set up a battle for the city’s public library system

liberal sciences Nick Hagerty ’10 thinks the humanities are more PC than science courses

195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island

herald@browndailyherald.com

Page 2

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

C ampus N EWS

Thursday, January 29, 2009

“We don’t want to seem like a bunch of kids coming off the hill and being charitable.” — Raisa Aziz ’11

Quinn Savit / Herald

Four students (left to right), Raisa Aziz ’11, Mollie West ’09, Andy Posner GS and Nabeel Gillani ’12 plan to start a microfinance bank in Olneyville.

Students start Olneyville microfinance bank

By Alexandra Ulmer Staf f Writer

Four Brown students are launching Providence’s first microfinance bank in Olneyville next month to give loans to poor entrepreneurs and to immigrants looking to become permanent residents and citizens.

Mollie West ’09, Andy Posner GS, Raisa Aziz ’11 and Nabeel Gillani ’12 started the Capital Good Fund project last month in the predominantly low-income, Hispanic community of Olneyville. The neighborhood, one of the city’s oldest, is located near Federal Hill.

In the absence of a microfinance bank in the area, “many entrepreneurs were turning towards loan sharks who weren’t really focused on advancing social good,” Gillani said.

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Center’s Social Innovation Initiative, $2,000 from the Clinton Global Initiative and $3,000 from private contributions.

The students’ goal is to make the project self-sufficient and completely integrated into the Olneyville community, Aziz said.

“We don’t want to seem like a bunch of kids coming off the hill and being charitable,” she said.

Initially, the pilot project, which will run from February to October, plans to offer two or three $2,000 loans for small businesses and five $900 loans to cover application fees for permanent residency and citizenship. Many factors will be examined before the loans are given out, such as likelihood of achieving citizenship or character recommendations. continued on page 3

First dual degree class working hard at RISD

By Brian Mastroianni Senior Staf f Writer

the Brown

The project “assumes that people have the skills they need to get out of poverty but need the capital,” Posner added.

Stressing the need to respect existing community networks, the students held discussion sessions in Spanish for Olneyville residents and worked with local organizations to learn about the families’ needs.

Participants in the groups voiced entrepreneurial ideas such as creating day-care centers, selling books in Spanish and starting a print design company.

“We found that there was a huge demand for banking services for the working poor,” West said.

To finance the idea, the students wrote grant appeals and contacted similar banks at Harvard, Yale and Rutgers University. The project received $5,000 from the Swearer

Before winter break, Caitrin Watson ’13 had a 13-hour cram session with her friends for an introductory art history course. But Watson was not taking the same popular art class taught here, and her friends were students at the Rhode Island School of Design — not Brown.

Watson is one of the 13 students currently enrolled in the pilot Brown-RISD dual degree program.

Now in her second semester at RISD, Watson plans to combine her love of art and academics in the five-year program that will allow her to graduate with degrees from both schools.

“Art is my passion, but I have also always done well in academ-

ics,” Watson said. “This is the perfect program for me.”

As the dual degree program between Brown and RISD enters its second semester, students said it has been both successful and challenging.

Through the dual degree program, students live at RISD during their first year of college, and at Brown in their second year. After their first two years, students can live at either school, and have the option of living off campus in their last two years.

Currently, all of the dual degree students live in the same residence hall at RISD, helping them bond, said Beth Soucy ’13, another student in the program.

“We have all become really close this year,” Soucy said.

But she admitted she didn’t feel as connected to the college she will live at next year. “I wish we had more interaction with the students on Brown’s campus,” she said.

For this first class of dual degree students, the transition to RISD’s rigorous course load has been intimidating. Students often spend entire days working in the first-year studio foundation classes, working on their own projects while obser ving others’ work and taking few breaks, Soucy said.

But they had been warned. At the RISD orientation last fall the students had been told that they could expect to get little sleep in their first year, Soucy said.

At Brown, the students will continued on page 3

Thursday, January 29, 2009

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

C ampus N EWS Alums head to White House continued from page 1 centrator in her undergraduate years, will serve as an Associate Counsel to the President. She previously worked on the Obama for America campaign as the deputy to Chief Strategist David Axelrod and clerked for Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer. She graduated from Yale Law School.

Shaw will also serve as an Associate Counsel to the President.

She also worked on Obama’s transition team and was a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens. After earning her Brown degree in gender studies and religious studies, Shaw went on to Northwestern University School of Law, where she was editor-inchief of the Northwestern Law Review.

None of the appointees were successfully reached for comment.

Microfinancing Olneyville continued from page 2 Clients who have been selected for the pilot project will obtain their loans in mid-March. They will attend bi-weekly meetings and receive training in business skills.

“You’re basically hand-held throughout the project,” Aziz said.

The second type of loan permits clients to apply for a change in their legal status, helping increase their sense of belonging, access to jobs and eligibility for welfare.

“It’s a very different, innovative use of microfinance,” Aziz added.

If the plan is successful, the bank will be self-sufficient and oriented toward environmental sustainability in five years, said Posner, who is writing his thesis on green microfinance.

The students said they became interested in the subject after reading Nobel Prize winner Muhammad Yunus’ books and studying

and working for microfinance banks abroad.

Gillani said the models they studied helped the group decide to focus on individual loans rather than the group lending model.

Alan Harlam, the director of social entrepreneurship at the Swearer Center, who has advised the group since the beginning, praised the students for their extensive research on microfinance.

“The (Capital Good Fund)team has created their model to leverage the relationships and credibility of their community partners,” he wrote in an e-mail to The Herald.

The group said it will file for nonprofit status in March and hopes to receive it in October, before giving out a new batch of loans in November.

Aziz said she was excited for the launch of the bank.

“The four of us are pretty much giving our lives to it,” she said. “It consumes us.”

Page 3

“I probably just seemed like a naive and impressionable American girl to them.” — Sarah Kay ’10.

Magazine shares Glimpse of adventures continued from page 1 Kerala Taylor ’02. Though Taylor and Fitzhugh first presented their idea to National Geographic in 2002, it took almost five years to make the original magazine and Web site part of National Geographic, Taylor said.

“The first four years were spent bartending,” she added, and tr ying to further establish the magazine.

In the fall of 2008, Fitzhugh and Taylor launched the National Geographic Correspondents Program, Taylor said. Kay was one of eight correspondents chosen to participate in the pilot program.

In order to receive the $600 stipend and the chance to be published in the print magazine, correspondents must complete two stories in video, photo or written form, as well as a written feature on a resident of the region and 20 tips for future travelers to the area, Taylor said.

“The purpose behind the program was so that Glimpse would have an elite group of writers that would produce high-quality content for the print magazine,” Taylor said.

Though the program may have given Glimpse ready-to-publish writers, Professor Emeritus of Engineering Barrett Hazeltine said the magazine was professional from its start as an independent study project he oversaw in 2000.

“Glimpse started off with highclass content provided by students not just from Brown, but from other nearby colleges,” Hazeltine said.

“I’m proud Nick was able to merge Glimpse with National Geographic

Courtesy of Sarah Kay

Sarah Kay ’10 studied abroad in the Czech Republic and will write about her experiences for National Geographic’s “Glimpse” magazine.

as early as he did.”

That National Geographic seal of approval was key to Kay’s insider look into a foreign land.

“Being a National Geographic correspondent was like having an all-access pass (to the Czech Republic),” Kay said.

While in Prague, Kay realized how nice and helpful Czech people could be. That is, after “they decided they liked and could trust you,” she said.

“The best thing about the program was that the National Geographic name gave you legitimacy, but by not being a big-time journalist, people didn’t freak out around me,” Kay said. “I probably just seemed like a naive and impressionable American girl to them.”

This accessibility to people abroad is what she liked best about the program and what led her to her wildest adventure — the pur-

suit of a rock that some claim is Superman’s Kryptonite.

“My mom is kind of a rock enthusiast and told me about a certain rock that can only be found in the Czech Republic,” Kay said.

Bits of a meteorite that hit Germany years ago merged with the Earth to form the green-colored rock, moldavite, Kay said. It eventually traveled by river to the Czech Republic, now the only place it can be found.

When Kay set out to look for the rock, which some believe holds metaphysical powers, she met an entire village and found herself asking its inhabitants whether people made the connection between maldovite and Superman. “ ‘No, that’s a made-up story,’” was the only reply she received, but that made-up story will reach a world of readers through Glimpse’s pages.

Brave class of artistic ‘pioneers’ working hard on dual Brown, RISD degrees continued from page 2 encounter less rigid degree requirements. “We only have to take roughly 16 classes at Brown for our degree, which is definitely not as stringent as our requirements at RISD,” said Alison Rutsch ’13.

Though it may be difficult to balance the different course loads at their two colleges, the dual degree students are capable of rising to the challenge, said Joanne Stryker, dean of foundation studies at RISD. “These students are real pio-

neers,” she said. “As a group, they are great — they certainly have their act together.”

Stryker, a member of the BrownRISD Dual Degree Oversight Committee, comprised of both administrators from both schools, said the committee is keeping a close eye on things. “We are always tweaking things,” she said. “We’re always looking for aspects of the program to improve and review.”

Str yker said she thinks the greatest challenge facing the students is to be able to feel a part of both schools, as opposed to just

one or the other.

For Rutsch, par t of the challenge is getting used to the different environments on each campus and the contrast between the teaching styles of Brown and RISD professors, she said.

“At RISD, ever ything is much more interactive, in studio classes you are moving around the room and looking at the work produced in other classes,” she said. “At the Brown freshman seminar that I took, the classroom environment was more reserved — it was a completely different atmosphere.”

Though some of the dual degree students have already enrolled in classes at Brown, they will begin the majority of their studies here next year when they live at Brown.

As for the dual-degree class of 2014, selections will begin shortly, Dean of Admissions James Miller ’73 wrote in an e-mail to The Herald. The committee waits to see which candidates were admitted to both schools independently, then makes its selections from that group, Miller wrote.

For Miller, the continued

growth of the program is indicative of Brown’s need to evolve constantly. “This program is clearly on the continuum of academic innovation that has characterized Brown throughout its histor y,” he wrote.

Though she often has to sacrifice sleep and her social life to keep up with her work, Watson’s faith in the program remains unshaken, she said.

“I will walk away with a degree from two great universities — I don’t want anything other than that,” she said.

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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

C ampus N EWS

Thursday, January 29, 2009

“It really complements everything Brown is about.”

— Carly Sieff ’09, on a bike-sharing program.

Bike-sharing program gears up for spring Students dreaming of riding a bike around campus need wait no longer, thanks to a new bike-sharing service slated to begin soon.

The Brown Outing Club plans to launch Bikes@Brown, a bike sharing service with seven bicycles, in early March.

The service, funded using leftover money from the club’s budget from last semester, will be based in the old Undergraduate Finance Board room in lower Faunce House, said Carly Sieff ’09, who is in charge of the program along with Michael Teshima ’11.

Brown students will be able to borrow a bike, along with a lock and key, for up to two days after providing a $20 deposit and their student ID number. When they return the bike, they’ll get the deposit back.

Students must pay a $5 fee, which will be used for bike maintenance, to participate in the program.

The office in lower Faunce will be open for one hour each day, Monday through Friday.

“Freshman year, I was sort of shocked that it wasn’t here, because I feel like it really complements everything Brown is about,” Sieff

The outing club tried to create a bike-sharing program last year, but it failed because the club wasn’t as committed to the idea as it is now, Sieff said, adding that it couldn’t find a space for the bikes.

The club made proposals to both the Student Activities Office and the Undergraduate Finance Board last year, but neither was approved, The Herald reported in October.

Sieff said she has received a lot of positive reaction about the program from students and faculty alike.

With seven bicycles, the program will “start out small,” but Teshima hopes it “will grow and we can expand (its) hours and accessibility.”

The organization plans to eventually have bikes available at the Sciences and Rockefeller libraries so students can check one out with a librarian at any hour of the day.

“If they’re flamboyant, like, sick bikes, people will notice them and be like, ‘Hey, I want one too,’” said Ariel Shecter ’10, a member of the Outing Club. The bikes will be teal and pink, following the custom of most bike-sharing programs, which use signature colors both to publicize their programs and prevent theft, according to club members.

Bikes@Brown will try to become independent of the outing club

said.

sometime next year, Teshima said,

By Shannon O’Brien Contributing Writer

news in brief

Faculty rebuffs UCS on pre-reqs

Frederic Lu / Herald

Memebers of the Brown Outing Club Bike Co-op (L to R): Bao Nguyen ’12, Roukintou Aboubacar ’09, Michael Teshima ’11 and Carly Sieff ’09.

adding that the club also plans to petition UFB for additional funding for Bikes@Brown next week.

In March or April, Bikes@Brown plans to launch a student-run maintenance shop where anyone with a Brown ID can get a bike fixed. Also in the works are training sessions on bike maintenance that would be open to both potential maintenance shop volunteers and students who just want to know how to fix their bikes.

Some students said they were excited about the program.

“That’s a service I would definitely use, and more so because it’s organized by Brown students,” said Ian Gray ’12.

Others, like Frankie Nuzzo ’09, thought the program would be successful even though he wouldn’t take advantage of it.

“I’m not really a bike rider,” he said. “But if I was a freshman or a sophomore, I might have used it.”

Members of the Undergraduate Council of Students’ executive board met with the Faculty Executive Committee Tuesday to present a proposal for halting Banner’s enforcement of prerequisites. But at Wednesday night’s meeting the general body learned of the FEC’s rejection of the request.

In a letter to Academic and Administrative Affairs Chair Tyler Rosenbaum ’11 and President Brian Becker ’09, FEC Chair and Chair of the Faculty James Dreier wrote “the FEC does not support removing Banner’s enforcement of prerequisites … We think instructors should be able to have enforced prerequisites if they want to.”

After the meeting Rosenbaum told The Herald “It was disappointing to me — not entirely unexpected.”

“I kind of wished I could have known how much support there was” among the faculty, he added, noting that he did not know if the FEC rejected the UCS request overwhelmingly or if a significant minority supported it. “We’re not just going to back down because we’ve experienced adversity,” he said.

The next committee meeting of the Academic and Administrative Affairs Committee will be open to the public and will concern response to the FEC decision.

UCS also filled an at-large vacancy on the Undergraduate Finance Board as well as electing a UCS-UFB liaison Wednesday night.

Benjamin Schrank ’11 was elected from among ten candidates as an atlarge member of the board.

Schrank told the council that he considered UFB “the lifeblood of student activities here at brown.”

Council members pointed to Schrank’s experience as financial signatory for the mock trial team and the Brown Contemporary during deliberation.

Rosenbaum, a Herald opinions columnist, beat out fellow UCS members Brady Wyrtzen ’11 and Lucy Wang ’12 to be elected UCS-UFB liason. He told the council that he believes there have been past instances in which UCS did receive as much funding as it should, and that on UFB he would vote for UCS interests.

“I do my own taxes,” he added.

— Ben Schreckinger

Metro The Brown Daily Herald

“The city called for this.”

— Tonia Mason, spokeswoman for the Providence Public Library.

Thursday, January 29, 2009 | Page 5

Five library branches face closure

By Lauren Fedor Senior Staf f Writer

The Providence Public Library system, a private, nonprofit organization which serves nearly 75,000 registered borrowers, may be forced to alter its operating strategies for the coming year.

With an estimated budget deficit of $1.4 million, the library’s staff and board of trustees have presented a proposal to the city that would close five of the library’s nine neighborhood branches. But the proposal faces resistance from the Providence Community Library, a recently formed nonprofit seeking to take over all the neighborhood locations.

The library’s board approved the proposal on Dec. 18, according to the PPL Web site.

The public librar y’s proposal also calls for scaling back funding for the Central Library — the large, downtown branch on Empire Street — and converting the five closed branches to city- or community-owned “neighborhood learning centers.” Such centers would maintain community activities, such as after-school programs, and the system would be willing to donate the buildings, content and support services, said Tonia Mason, director of marketing and communication for the PPL. But “these buildings would not operate as library buildings,” Mason said, “because we would not be able to staff them.” At least 80 percent of operating costs go to staffing, she added.

The system’s Olneyville, Wanskuck, Fox Point, Washington Park and Smith Hill branches are facing

closings.

Mason said the library’s proposal attempts to create a “sustainable” or “affordable” system.

“There have been continuing, growing gaps in the amount of funding we receive versus what we actually need to run the system,” she said, adding that the library’s board had agreed to fund this year’s budget gap while the library continues its planning process with the city.

“This is an ongoing process from the library’s perspective,” Mason said. “The city called for this.”

The library anticipates local government leaders to reach decisions about the library as soon as March, she added.

Possible choices for the city, Mason said, include postponing the deadline for taking action, deciding to fund the library’s anticipated budget gap for next year or accepting the board’s sustainable system proposal. She said the city could opt to incorporate the library system into a city department or even fund a third party to run the system.

The Providence Community Library, meanwhile, seeks to gain control of the library system’s nine local branches, while allowing the PPL to maintain ownership of the Central Library.

In an opinion column in the Providence Journal this month, PCL President Marcus Mitchell criticized the library’s sustainability plan. The plan to close the five neighborhood branches, he wrote, was “neither necessary nor acceptable.”

Mitchell presented PCL’s plans for budget adjustments — including hiring fewer administrators and engaging in more “robust” fundrais-

ing — and urged the city to “end its relationship” with the PPL. City Council President Peter Mancini said council members plan to meet with Mayor David Cicilline ’83 and other city officials to examine the proposals of both the PPL and the PCL. He said the meeting will likely be held next month.

The PCL’s proposal to take over the nine neighborhood branches “sounds really good,” Mancini said, but there are details of the plan — especially fundraising strategies — that must be examined before a decision is made. “We need to get together and see if we can make this work,” he said.

It is “extremely important” to many of the city council members to ensure that the local branches stay open, Mancini said. Moreover, it is “not likely” that the city will take over the library branches, he added.

As of Wednesday afternoon, the PCL’s online petition asking the city to transfer funds from the PPL to the PCL had more than 300 signatures. The PCL held a public forum Wednesday night at Knight Memorial Library on Elmwood Avenue.

The organization’s next community meeting will be held at the South Providence Library on Feb. 3.

Janine Cheng / Herald

The Providence Public Library’s budget deficit may mean the closing of five of its nine neighborhood branches.

Page 6

M etro

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Thursday, January 29, 2009

“We wanted to get together so another one of us doesn’t have to die alone.”

— Roland Colpitts, a homeless resident of the “tent city” under a bridge

Under a bridge, homeless locals build ‘tent city,’ and stick together for safety continued from page 1 consisting of a few tents, a couple of lanterns and boxes of supplies, is sandwiched between two roads.

A well-worn track of packed-down snow leads down to the camp from the street, trodden down by wellwishers and members of the media.

Roland Colpitts, a middle-aged man wearing two coats and a white, knitted cap, said the camp should be “a last alternative” after the shelters.

But for those who don’t stay in the shelters, it’s best to stick together.

“We wanted to get together so another one of us doesn’t have to die alone,” Colpitts said.

Earlier this month, Paul Langlois died under this ver y bridge. His bedroll still lies here, undisturbed, steps away from the tents. A service held Wednesday morning at Beneficent Church on Weybosset Street honored him and 30 other homeless people who died over the last year.

To avoid another death, Colpitts said, he and others have been making rounds to places where other homeless people sleep — places he says the police don’t know to check.

They’ve had some luck getting some

to go to shelters, and those who won’t go to shelters sometimes come join them in the tents.

Colpitts said residents of the tent city take shifts keeping watch over one another.

“Your backpack is your life,” he said. “You don’t want to wake up and find it’s not there.”

Many tent city dwellers say they are fed up with shelter services — some for personal reasons, such as dislike of crowds, others because they have been barred from shelters before.

Barbara Ferrara, who has been staying at the tent city since Saturday, said she can’t stand the fights and drugs she ran into at shelters.

She said she was banned from shelters after she left to rent an apartment with roommates — only to be back out on the streets after her roommates were evicted.

Anne Nolan, president of Crossroads Rhode Island, an organization that runs emergency shelters, said that though “occasionally, people are barred for behavioral infractions or safety violations,” nobody is excluded during bad weather.

“We will not leave somebody out in the cold in the winter,” she said.

George Miller / Herald

Many “tent city” dwellers say they would rather sleep outside than in the shelters.

Meghna Philip ’11, a member of HOPE, does outreach for the tent city, bringing food and publicity.

She said the group wants to see funding restored to programs such as the Neighborhood Opportunities Program, which provided funds for construction and rent subsidies.

That program, and others, were recently cut as Rhode Island struggles to balance its budget.

HOPE plans to lobby the state for a change to the “program assurances,” agreements between the state and shelters run by Crossroads and

the Urban League of Rhode Island, Philip says. The assurances, which determine how shelters are run and allow for complaints, are vague and not enforced, she said.

Megan Smith ’10, another member of HOPE who volunteers at the tent city, said she wants to see the local government take more action.

“The city and the state have abdicated their responsibility,” she said, adding that the city of Warwick has adopted a 10-year-plan to end homelessness. “We’d like Provi-

dence to have the same foresight,” she said.

Meanwhile, the tent city has received plenty of attention from newspapers, radio and television.

People have brought food, blankets, brand-new backpacks and tents. The police have also been cooperative.

And Colpitts said he is not worried about ice and snow. He plans to stay under the bridge for as long as he needs to, “until we can get something done.”

“I’ve woken up under a foot of snow before,” he said.

SportsThursday The Brown Daily Herald

Thursday, January 29, 2009 | Page 7

Sports weekend wrap-up Agel, m. hoops make a smooth transition

By Katie Wood Assistant Spor ts Editor

The Bears were well represented on the road last weekend, taking on teams from all over New England.

W. tennis The women’s tennis team pulled out a tight 4-3 win over Boston University on Sunday afternoon. The match came down to the winner of the doubles point as each team split its singles matches, 3-3. At number one doubles, Bianca Aboubakare ’11 and Sara Mansur ’09 put together an 8-6 win. At number three, Kathrin Sorokko ’10 and Emily Ellis ’10 fell 6-8 shortly after the conclusion of the number one game.

Cassandra Herzberg ’12 and Marisa Schonfeld ’11 won a close 9-8 (4) decision to claim the decisive doubles point for the team.

Aboubakare and Herzberg provided two key wins for the Bears in singles at number one and two.

The Bears will look to continue their success in the new year with two home matches against Army on Sat. at 11 a.m. and Buffalo on Sun. at 10 a.m.

M. swimming and diving Harvard remained undefeated on the year as the men’s swimming and diving team dropped a 169-119 decision to Brown on Saturday. Daniel Ricketts ’09 swam to three victories on the day for the Bears in the 50 free (21.10 seconds), the 100 free (46.37), and the 100 fly (50.30). Conor Carlucci ’11 followed Ricketts for second (51.99) in the 100 fly, combining for a solid one-two punch in the event. Carlucci also notched a second-place finish for the Bears in the 100 back (54.99). J.D. Pinto ’10 led the way for Brown in the 200 back (1:53.81), recording one of five first place finishes in the meet. The Bears closed out the meet strong, winning two of the final events. Ryan Kikuchi ’11 won the 400 IM (4:04.62) and the 200 free relay team of David Koweek ’09, James Hunter ’12, Richard Alexander ’09 and Carlucci finished off the meet also with a win (1:27.44).

W. swimming and diving The Crimson also prevailed over the women’s swimming and diving team as the Bears fell continued on page 8

Recap by the numbers M. track and field Matt Jasmin ’09 continued to excel in the 55-meter hurdles for the men’s track and field team at the Boston University Terrier Invitational, a meet which also saw several strong performances in the field for Brown.

Top Performers • Jasmin: 55-meter hurdles, 7.70 s, 3rd place • Bryan Powlen ’09: Shot Put, 15.82m, 5th • Andrew Chapin ’10: Triple Jump, 14.15m, 6th • Jordan Maddocks ’11: High Jump, 1.89m, 6th

continued from page 1 make the men’s basketball program consistently strong, rather than reliant upon incoming and outgoing players. He plans to develop players who do not have sufficient experience or exposure and put them in a position to succeed.

Still, Agel said there is work to be done.

“We’re a work in progress,” he said. “We don’t have all the pieces we need to play the style that I foresee us playing in the future.”

Tri-captain Scott Friske ’09 echoed Agel on player development. “Our team’s not very deep,” he said.

“We have four guys in the top 10 in the league in most minutes played,” Friske said, referring to the team’s lack of support from the bench.

The loss of All-Ivy players Damon Huffman ’08 and Mark McAndrew ’08, two of the top scorers in Brown history, last year hasn’t make the transition to a new coach any easier, Friske said.

Another change has been the complete re-vamping of the assistant staff, with new assistant coaches Lamar Barrett, T.J. Sorrentine and Kyle Cieaplicki. Sorrentine and Cieaplicki are former players of Agel’s from Vermont and have experience in the NCAA tournament.

Having the younger coaches “really benefits us, because they can relate to us,” tri-captain Peter Sullivan ’11 said.

“Because they’ve been in the NCAA tournament, you respect what

they say that much more,” Skrelja added.

Under Agel, the team has switched from Robinson’s Princeton offense — which involved back-door cuts and more perimeter play — to a high-low offense, where the players’ first look is inside at the post before the ball returns to the perimeter. With more freedom in the offense, players have room to be creative and use their talents to be successful.

The new offense suits the team much better, Sullivan said.

On the defensive end, the Bears now use a man-to-man defense that “makes opponents uncomfortable,” instead of the zone defense that they had used under Robinson, Skrelja said.

Because the team’s style has changed so much, so too have the practices.

One of the most welcome changes has been the rescheduling of 5:30 a.m. practices to the afternoon.

“Those were rough,” Skrelja confessed with a laugh.

“My philosophy about practice is you want to keep it fresh,” Agel said.

“You want to be in a positive work environment, (where) people tend to do their best.”

But while the same freedom afforded to them in games is also allowed in practice, the afternoon sessions have still “been really intense, really stressing a lot of defense,” Skrelja said.

Even so, Sullivan said, “You enjoy playing basketball, rather than practice being a chore” and “you wake up

excited to practice.”

Agel wants the Bears to be known as the “team in the Ivy League that works the hardest,” Sullivan said.

“He wants us to be a real physical team — he always wants us to play hard,” Sullivan said. “He always stresses playing harder than our opponents — always be the first guy on the ground for the loose ball.”

Last season, which saw the Bears finish second in the Ivy League, set the bar high for this year’s team.

But the sub-.500 record, the captains agree, is not reflective of the progress the team has made. In non-conference play, Brown faced up with teams like Virginia, Northwestern, George Mason, Holy Cross and Providence — “tough teams that are expected to beat us,” Sullivan said.

“Our record may not show the strides that we’re making this year just because we’re playing some tough teams,” he said.

From Agel’s perspective, the six wins are significant — the fourthhighest non-conference win total in the history of the program. Things don’t get easier immediately as the Bears ready themselves for nearly a month without a home game, but Agel thinks the hostile road environments will benefit the team in the long term.

“It’s a good place to go to grow up,” Agel said. “We play in front of the (opposing) team’s fans.”

“If you want to be champions, you have to be able to win both home and away,” he said.

Women’s track and field Brynn Smith ’11 and Nicole Burns ’09 led a solid effort for Brown at the Terrier Invitational, with Smith posting a second-place finish in the shot put, while Burns turned in an impressive race in the 500-meter run.

Top Performers • Smith: Shot Put, 14.71m, 2nd • Burns: 500m, 1:13.92, 3rd • Danielle Grunloh ’10: Shot Put, 14.03m, 4th • Thelma Breezeatl ’10: 55m, 7.19, 5th • Rachel Biblo ’11: Triple Jump, 11.40m, 7th

Men’s fencing Brown went 5-1 as a team at the Northeastern Fencing Conference in the OMAC on Saturday, led by solid performances from the foil and saber squads. The team defeated Tufts, Vassar, Dartmouth, Boston College, and MIT, while losing to Brandeis.

Top Performers • Adam Pantel ’10: 16-1 in foil • Jonathan Yu ’11: 15-3 in foil • Peter Tyson ’12: 12-6 in saber

Women’s fencing The women’s foil squad went 5-2 at the NFC, also due to strong performances in foil and saber.

Top Performers • Linda Zhang ’10: 7-1 in foil • Francesca Bartholomew ’11: 12-3 in foil • Christina Salvatore ’09: 14-7 in epee • Randy Alevi ’10: 12-2 in saber — Compiled by Benjy Asher, Sports Editor

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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Thursday, January 29, 2009

S ports W eekend

Star Bears bring home Ivy, ECAC awards

By Benjy Asher Sports Editor

Jarred Smith ’12 had a breakout performance for the men’s hockey team this weekend that earned him the ECAC Hockey Rookie of the Week Award. In Friday night’s 4-1 win at Colgate, Smith notched the first goal of his collegiate career to break a 1-1 tie late in the second period.

Though Brown struggled on Sat-

urday night at Cornell, Smith came through for the Bears again, tallying the only goal of the night for the team in a 5-1 loss.

In a narrow 57-55 loss to Yale, Matt Mullery ’10, who was named to the Ivy League honor roll for the week, shone for the men’s basketball team. Mullery scored 22 points, grabbed nine rebounds and registered six blocked shots. Mullery has established himself as one of the top

post men in the league this season, with averages of 16.3 points, 5.6 rebounds and 1.9 blocks per game, all of which rank in the top 10 in the league.

The women’s basketball team struggled in its 71-37 loss to Yale, but Sadiea Williams ’11 was in top form. Williams was named to the Ivy League honor roll, after leading the team with 12 points, five rebounds and four steals.

M. squash cruises to third straight victory continued from page 7 199.5-99.5. Allyson Schumacher ’12 tallied the Bears’ first victor y on the day in the 200 free (1:52.09). Candice Sisouvanvieng-Kim ’11 swam a 24.21 in the 50 free to notch the second win for the team. The free proved to be a strong event for Brown, as Kristen Caldarella ’12 claimed the 100 free title (53.36). Kelley Wisinger ’11 notched the final victor y in the pool for the Bears, as she led her team to a one-two sweep in the 200 back (2:07.44) as Sage Erskine ’11 followed closely behind in second (2:09.76). Sisouvanvieng-Kim, Caldarella, Susannah Ford ’10 and Schumacher led the way for Brown in the relays as the team combined for a secondplace finish in the 200 free relay (1:39.02).

M. squash The no. 14 men’s squash team came away with their third consecutive victor y as they handed Bowdoin an 8-1 defeat. Adrian Leanza ’11 began the day for the Bears with a solid 3-0 win at number one, helping the team gain the momentum it carried into the remainder of the match. Adam

Greenberg ’10 at number three, Brad Thompson ’12 at number four, Patrick Davis ’10 at number five, Tucker Br yan ’12 at number seven and Brett Camarda ’09 at number nine followed up Leanza’s performance with five 3-0 decisions of their own. The Bears will look to continue their success on into their Ivy League match-up with Dar tmouth on Saturday.

W. squash The no. 10 women’s squash team equaled the men in their performance, defeating Bowdoin 8-1 for their third straight victory.

Charlotte Steel ’09 catapulted the Bears to a strong showing on the day with a 3-0 win at number one.

Breck Haynes ’09 lost a hardfought five-game match, falling 3-2. After the close loss, Brown did not turn back and won the next seven matches. Kali Schellenberg ’10 at number five, Nikoo Fadaifard ’12 at number six, Carolyn Tilney ’11 at number seven, Sarah Rober ts ’10 at number eight and Charlotte MacMillan ’09 at number nine each notched 3-0 victories for the Bears. The team will face Dar tmouth and Stanford on Saturday.

Editorial & Letters The Brown Daily Herald

Page 10 | Thursday, January 29, 2009

e d i to r i a l

State of the University It almost seems that the recent spate of harsh weather in Providence was intended as a metaphor for the University’s dire financial state.

President Ruth Simmons’ recent e-mail to the Brown community regarding the University’s budget painted a bleak picture of our present fiscal situation and outlined some drastic measures in response.

The figures listed in Simmons’ e-mail are alarming: The Corporation estimates that Brown’s endowment will be worth $2 billion at the end of June, down $800 million from last year. Simmons noted that fundraising for the next two years could drop by as much as 10 percent. In the face of these revenue shortfalls, Brown will have to slash spending by $60 million for the upcoming budget and postpone major initiatives that were part of the Plan for Academic Enrichment, including increases in graduate school enrollment and the size of the faculty.

Faced with an almost 30 percent loss in the endowment, the University will have to make painful adjustments. Simmons’ e-mail presents a pragmatic approach that we can grudgingly appreciate while wistfully dreaming of the performing arts center and permanent swimming pool that we thought would materialize during our time on campus.

Brown’s commitment to meeting students’ full demonstrated financial need displays a laudable concern for many families’ recent financial difficulties. Brown also deserves praise for its decision to cut jobs and other budget items in areas which will have a minimal impact on teaching faculty and academic departments.

We should bear in mind that Brown is not suffering alone. The University luckily escaped the fallout from Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, the collapse of which has taken a toll on many other universities. Brandeis, for example, has been forced to close its Rose Art Museum and sell 6,000 artworks in an attempt to recover, and may have to cut 10 percent of its faculty. Yale, Harvard and Princeton all expect their endowments to fall by 25 to 30 percent by the summer. These schools, with larger endowments than ours, have proposed cost-cutting measures similar to what President Simmons outlined in her e-mail.

As stakeholders in the University and its future, we understand Brown’s conservative outlook. The recession demands sacrifices, and the University has chosen to lower spending prudently. Once the economy starts to turn around, we trust that Brown will bounce back bolder than ever.

Editorials are written by The Herald’s editorial page board. Send comments to editorials@browndailyherald.com.

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ale x yuly

l e t t e r s to t h e e d i to r s

Two views on liberals and partisanship To the Editor: Within the first two paragraphs of Jonathan Topaz’s ‘12 column (“The dirty ‘c’ word,” Jan. 27), I read this curious phrase: “... (Matt Taibbi) makes his points without excessive ire and without raising his voice, pointing out idiocy and hypocrisy with restraint and tact.”

I then wondered if Topaz had ever actually read an article by Taibbi. Taibbi’s articles are so laden with insults and profanity (routinely referring to Republicans

as “c*cksuckers” and the candidates for the 2008 Republican ticket “a collection of second-rate buffoons”; fairly tame remarks for Taibbi) that his anger towards and loathing of the GOP practically explodes off the page.

Even liberal Rolling Stone readers write frequently to the magazine to condemn his language and writing style. It’s almost a joke to see “tact” and “Taibbi” in the same sentence.

Aaron Zick ‘11 Jan. 28

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Editor-in-Chief Editor-in-Chief

Room for conservative views in discourse To the Editor: Positive letters to the editors are rare in most publications, but I’d like to applaud Jonathan Topaz’s ‘12 column (“The dirty ‘c’ word,” Jan. 27). I self-identify as left-of-center politically, but on many issues I hold views that are much more conservative than what you’d expect to find at a “liberal university” like Brown.

I have nothing but respect for the openness this school fosters when it comes to issues of gender, race and identity. But when it comes to politics, there’s the ever-present fear of creating a chilling effect. What if you say something that doesn’t fit the mold? There’s an incentive, in other words, to keep non-liberal opinions to yourself.

The class Mr. Topaz mentions, which “felt at times

more like an Obama rally than nuanced discussion,” strikes a chord with me because I think I was in it.

Intolerance for other ways of thinking is not a conservative value, nor is it a liberal value. But it always finds its voice when we put our brains on autopilot and let partisanship take over the conversation.

I sincerely hope President Obama, his staff and, most importantly, his supporters can find a way to put aside the hateful nonconstructive partisanship of the past decade. To borrow a phrase from one such partisan organization, it’s time to “move on.”

Eric Johnson ‘11 Jan. 27

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Opinions The Brown Daily Herald

Thursday, January 29, 2009 | Page 11

The liberal sciences

BY NICK HAGERTY Opinions Columnist What are liberal arts? Besides paintings by gay-married terrorists who happen to like arugula or unsubstantiated claims of self-induced abortions by Yale art students.

Many Brown students might respond: literature, languages, history, philosophy, political science and anthropology. (Economics is typically disqualified because it is thought to guarantee its concentrators future housing conditions better than those of a refrigerator carton.) Math and science are of course in an entirely separate category.

This would be quite a shock to students of the first Western universities, those in Europe during the Middle Ages. Their “artes liberales” consisted of the trivium — grammar, rhetoric and logic — and the quadrivium — geometry, arithmetic, music and astronomy. Yes, fully half of the original liberal arts were what is now known as math and science.

Curricula have evolved, entire social science disciplines have sprung up, and arithmetic is now taught to elementary school children. But even in our time, the liberal arts are commonly considered the opposite of pre-professional education. A liberal arts education involves studying a range of fields not for their immediate relevance to job placement, but for the intrinsic appeal of learning and the development of general intellectual capabilities.

After all, most people work in jobs unrelated to their undergraduate major. In the long term, the abilities to think critically, analyze,

communicate, adapt and learn independently are more conducive to career success than the memorization of a narrow body of knowledge that will be obsolete in 10 or 20 years.

These attributes are easily recognizable in disciplines like English, art history and sociology. Excellent manifestos espousing the value of humanities and the study of the seemingly useless have appeared on this page. It is indeed frustrating when science and engineering concentrators at Brown look down upon, or refuse to take courses in, the supposedly too-soft fields that comprise

jects more concerned with human creations.

For one thing, the natural sciences at an undergraduate level are almost as impractical professionally as humanities and social sciences. Sixteen courses hardly make an expert, so there are few jobs in which science concentrators are qualified to directly apply their particular discipline without extensive graduate work.

Just as medical schools do not require a biology concentration, not all biology concentrators plan to become doctors. Interest in, for example, the coevolution of Mesozoic

Somehow it is more politically correct at Brown to ignore the sciences altogether than to permanently stay cooped up in Barus and Holley and the CIT. the humanities and social sciences.

But more widespread than chemistry concentrators who never dabble in the humanities (over four years, a difficult feat!), are international relations or literary arts concentrators who declare math and science irrelevant to their academic lives, vowing that high school was the last time they would ever take a math or science course. Somehow it is more politically correct at Brown to ignore the sciences altogether than to permanently stay cooped up in Barus and Holley and the CIT. This attitude is disappointing and misguided. The natural sciences and mathematics are not only absolutely relevant to a liberal arts education but equally valuable as sub-

reptiles and ferns is as immediately useless as the works of Cervantes or Foucault, and potentially as rewarding.

More important than the particular subject under study — much of which students will forget within a few years — are the quantitative reasoning, logical analysis, abstract thinking and problem-solving skills learned through math and other sciences. It’s no coincidence that Wall Street was the largest employer of theoretical physicists in the 1990s.

But the knowledge and intuition gained in science courses is immensely useful in everyday life. The more science you know, the more often you can answer yourself when you think, “I wonder why….” You can more easily understand medical treatments and

new technologies.

A basic grasp of science is also crucial for effective participation in democracy. A surprising number of political issues, from stem cells to climate change, require extensive scientific knowledge for a truly informed vote.

The halls of Congress overflow with lawyers, but we sorely need leaders and policymakers with scientific sensibilities.

More romantically, the natural sciences are the purest expression of intellectual curiosity. Since antiquity they have aspired to explain our surrounding universe, from the wondrously intricate workings of our own bodies to the origins and motion of celestial bodies millions of light-years away. The humanities may ponder the human condition, but only the natural sciences can place it in a meaningful context.

So if you are a humanities or social science concentrator who hasn’t taken a course in science or math since high school, try one! If you don’t remember much biology, take BIOL0200: “The Foundations of Living Systems.” If you have some calculus background, look into PHYS0160: “Introduction to Relativity and Quantum Physics.” For something new, try GEOL0010: “Face of the Earth.” Even psychology or cognitive science courses can work if you want. If you are worried about the difficulty, that’s precisely what S/NC is for.

And no, ENGN0090 doesn’t count.

Nick Hagerty ’10 is a biological physics and economics major from Portland, Oregon. He can be reached at nicholas_hagerty@brown.edu.

Illinois’ lesson for Rhode Island

BY JEREMY FEIGENBAUM Opinions Columnist Two words: Rod Blagojevich. For those of you who were abroad this past winter or simply refuse to watch the news, Blagojevich is the still-governor of Illinois who allegedly tried to trade Barack Obama’s former senate seat for campaign donations and lucrative private-sector jobs.

Blagojevich promised not to appoint anyone to the seat after the public learned of his misdoings, but wound up sending former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris to Washington anyway. This gave Senate Democrats days of heartburn. They promised not to seat Burris but capitulated shortly thereafter.

While selling a Senate seat is probably the worst scandal involving a gubernatorial appointment in recent years, it is not the only one. After Frank Murkowski appointed his daughter to the Senate seat he vacated when he became governor of Alaska, voters punished him in the subsequent election by voting for a little-known mayor named Sarah Palin in the Republican primar y. The backlash from a nepotistic appointment helped Palin rise to power.

So how does this affect the Ocean State?

If one of the Rhode Island’s senators vacates his seat, the governor appoints someone

to take his place. So what can the voters do? They must wait until the next round of federal elections to pick their senator.

For up to two years, an appointed senator can vote however he pleases and author whatever legislation he chooses, ostensibly representing the Rhode Island citizens who had no choice but to accept the governor’s decision.

Before 1913, U.S. senators were selected by state legislators — apparently, voters

John Chafee. Lincoln Chafee was arguably the best choice. He was mayor of Rhode Island’s second largest city and was already an announced candidate for the upcoming election. But his appointment raises questions about the legitimacy of the process.

Is it fair that, as a U.S. senator, Lincoln Chafee had the ability to raise more money and attract additional media attention? In the next election, newly minted incumbentChafee had substantial electoral advantages

An appointed senator can vote however she pleases and author whatever legislation she chooses, ostensibly representing the Rhode Island citizens who had no choice but to accept the governor’s decision. were incapable of picking their own representatives. The 17th Amendment went a long way toward expanding democracy by allowing voters to pick their senators in general elections, but made no such provision for filling senate vacancies. As a result, governors have the power to fill vacancies in many states.

Rhode Island governors have recently made use of this undemocratic power. In November of 1999, Governor Lincoln Almond appointed the mayor of War wick, Lincoln Chafee ’75, to fill the seat of his late father,

over his Democratic opponent because the governor decided that he should.

Thankfully, Chafee’s appointment may be the last of its kind. One organization, FairVote Rhode Island, is working to institute special elections. When I spoke with Matt Sledge ’08, the group’s executive director, he said he felt optimistic about the likelihood that a bill mandating special elections would pass.

When David Segal, D-Dist. 2 introduced this legislation one year ago, voters and reporters paid little attention. The House

Judiciar y Committee simply recommended that the measure be held for further study. I hope that Illinois provided all the additional information that they needed.

Perhaps some good can come from Blagojevich’s corruption. “People have finally decided to take a look at this issue,” Sledge said. “Letting a governor make an appointment to a federal elected office is a problem. And it is a flaw that is ver y easily corrected.”

All it takes is one bill, and Chris Fierro, D-Dist. 51 has already introduced legislation in the State House similar to Segal’s measure. “A U.S. Senate seat is too important to be appointed by any one person, be they Democrat or Republican,” Fierro told me in an interview. Time and time again, senators shape national policy by placing holds on legislation, even relatively uncontroversial bills involving land protection. That is far too much power for any unelected man or woman to hold.

Fierro also said that the image of Rhode Island as corrupt has kept some businesses away from the state. By reforming the appointment process, Rhode Island can clean up its image and attract new jobs in the aftermath of the Blagojevich scandal.

Jeremy Feigenbaum ’11 is a political science concentrator from Teaneck, New Jersey. He can be reached at jeremy_feigenbaum@brown.edu.

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the news in images

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c a l e n da r January 29, 2008

January 30, 2008

7 p.m. — “Common Ground: Justice and Equality in Palestine/Israel,” MacMllan 117.

7 p.m. — W. basketball v. Cornell, Pizzitola Center.

4 P.M. — “Institutional Transformation and Women in the Sciences,” Smith Buonanno 106.

5

7 p.m. — M. ice hockey v.

Quinnipiac, Meehan Auditorium.

menu Sharpe Refectory

Verney-Woolley Dining Hall

Lunch — Vegan Tofu Raviolis with Sauce, Savory Spinach, Vegan Tofu Pups, Grilled Ham and Swiss Sandwich

Lunch — Hot Roast Beef on French Bread, Vegan Tofu Raviolis with Sauce, Nacho Bar, Cream Cheese Brownies

Dinner — Lemon Broiled Chicken, Dinner — Vegetarian Gnocchi Ala Pasta Spinach Casserole, Black & Sorrentina, Mashed White Potatoes White Pudding Cake RELEASE DATE– Thursday, January 29, 2009

Los Angeles Times Puzzle c r o sDaily s w oCrossword rd Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis ACROSS 1 Unit of capacitance 6 Three-time NFL MVP 11 Noel contraction 14 Agave fiber 15 Hamburger helper?

16 Harry Potter’s pal Weasley 17 Landmark birthday, informally 19 Notable flagraising site, briefly 20 Street “where the air is sweet” 21 Finished 22 Nibble persistently 23 Retreat 25 Garlicky sauce 27 Gives strict orders 32 “Can’t Help Lovin’ __ Man” 33 Go astray 34 State bordering Arizona 35 Some investment accts.

37 On the double 39 Full of life 40 Live-in employee 43 Chickadee’s cousin 45 Canon camera 46 Bird who loved Horton in Broadway’s “Seussical” 50 “... could __ lean” 51 Trading post item 52 Butler’s last word 54 Not to 56 Part of a biblical miracle 60 Actor Wallach 61 Hot-weather rash 63 HVAC abbr.

64 Handle 65 Saint-Saëns’ “__ Macabre” 66 Jerry’s adversary 67 Fabulous fellow?

68 Foul moods DOWN 1 Is just right 2 Tennis star who won each grand slam tournament except the French Open

53 Violist’s clef 36 Beelzebub 3 Hwys.

55 Quadri38 Unlikely hero 4 Capital near doubled 41 NYC subway Troy 42 Enjoy the wild, as 57 Start of an 5 Martian moon ancient boast animals 6 Stentorian, in 58 Bridge position 44 Immune system music notation 59 Fr. holy women lymphocyte 7 Like areas with 61 “Do you know 47 Fishing boats arroyos where your 48 Pink and golfer 8 Costar with children are?” is Raymond?

Lucille one: Abbr.

49 Dweller in the 9 Prepares a third 62 Keystone Uintas draft of bumbler 52 Net worth factor 10 That, in Toledo 11 “Lemon Tree” ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE: singer, 1965 12 Davenport site 13 Reception problem 18 Crystalline stone 22 Quiet valleys 24 Metal band with the 1999 triple platinum album “Issues” 26 Discoverer’s cry 27 “Law of the Lash” star, 1947 28 In short supply 29 Penned 30 __ con pollo 31 Behavior 32 How TV screens are measured: 01/29/09 xwordeditor@aol.com Abbr.

comics Enigma Twist | Dustin Foley

Alien Weather Forecast | Stephen Lichenstein and Adam Wagner

Cabernet Voltaire | Abe Pressman

By Gareth Bain (c)2009 Tribune Media Services, Inc.

01/29/09

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