Friday, September 9, 2011

Daily

Herald

the Brown

vol. cxlvi, no. 62

Friday, September 9, 2011

Since 1891

CLPS to McLaughlin takes reins unite in as dean of the faculty renovated Metcalf

By Shefali Luthra Senior Staff Writer

By Caitlin Trujillo Senior Staff Writer

The Metcalf Chemistry and Research Laboratory is on track to reopen the first week of October after more than a year of renovation, bringing the Cognitive, Linguistics and Psychological Sciences department under one roof for the first time since the July 2010 department merger.

Construction is scheduled to wrap up Sept. 30, with the CLPS department moving into labs and faculty offices the week of Oct. 3.

But classes will not be held inside the building until the spring, said Stephen Maiorisi, vice president for facilities management.

Department members previously housed in Metcalf relocated to 229 Waterman Street last summer. That space has posed some problems and inconveniences, said Guillaume Riesen ’12, a CLPS concentrator conducting research in a computational vision lab. The Wayland Square space is newer and cleaner than Metcalf used to be — “medicinal, in a way,” Riesen said. The current facilities are also more spacious and, because they continued on page 2

Kevin McLaughlin P’12, the new dean of the faculty, gave his walls a fresh coat of white paint. He’s getting new furniture, including a desk designed by the architects of colonial Williamsburg.

And he’s learning to use Excel.

McLaughlin, who previously served as chair of the Department of English, views his new position as an experiment of sorts. He said he views himself as a scholar, not a senior administrator.

But, he said, “We always tell our students in the humanities that a B.A. with a concentration in a humanities field is great preparation for anything.”

“I think this is a test,” he said.

“I’m a literary scholar. That’s what I do.”

Though McLaughlin has been on the University faculty for 15 years,

his new position has changed things.

He used to live in Massachusetts and commute to Providence, but after accepting the job, McLaughlin and his wife — who teaches French at Boston College — decided to move closer to campus.

“Even though Brown, the campus, is very familiar to me, it suddenly feels different because of where I am,” he said. “Because I live here now. Because I’m in this office and not in an English office.”

Moving in

Room 111 of University Hall always had a “kind of aura” for McLaughlin. His new office is bigger than his previous one in the English department. He’s still waiting on the last pieces of furniture to come in — a new table and a desk to replace the single, larger desk that Rajiv Vohra P’07, the office’s previous occupant,

Brigitta Greene / Herald

continued on page 4

Kevin McLaughlin P’12, the former chair of the English department, changed offices and positions upon assuming his new role July 1.

Female directors dominate fall theater By emma wohl Senior Staff writer

Strong women take center stage and run the show at Production Workshop and on the Main Stage in the upcoming semester of student theater.

Last spring, Meredith Mosbacher ’11.5, Abby Colella ’12 and Deepali Gupta ’12 collaborated on “Bitches in the Upspace,” a series

of plays addressing the inadequate representation of female relationships on stage. Now they, and a number of other female students and faculty members, will have the chance to confront that issue with a season of entirely female directors.

Friedrich Durrenmatt’s “The Visit,” the first show of PW’s season, runs Sept. 23-26. It features a “strong female protagonist” and re-examines the concept of “what

is justice” in the light of the character’s former betrayal and present triumph, said Mosbacher, the show’s director.

“The Visit” is in the style of “comically grotesque,” Mosbacher said. It goes beyond a story of love gone bad to show “how morals disintegrate … as money comes into play, as technology comes into play, continued on page 3

Profs, students launch clinic in Honduras

inside

After more than three years of planning and preparation, the 500 residents of the town of Guachipilincito, Honduras, gathered in July for the opening of the first health clinic in the community. The clinic staff, alongside Alpert Medical School professors and volunteers, served lunch to each member of the town between medical appointments.

Emily Harrison, clinical professor of family medicine and executive director of Shoulder to Shoulder, a nonprofit organization that works with poor rural Honduran communities, spearheaded the project.

Twice a year for the past three years, the Med School’s Department of Family Medicine has sent a “brigade” of doctors, students and volunteers to Guachipilincito to provide care and community health workshops, Harrison said. Medical

news....................2-4 editorial...............6 Opinions................7 SPORTS....................8

students can receive elective credit for participating in the trips, which occur each year in January and July.

Facilitating a project with high ethical criteria was a top priority for the department, said Jeffrey Borkan, professor of family medicine and department chair. The department chose to partner with Shoulder to Shoulder because of the organization’s community-based, sustainable and highly ethical model.

“Shoulder to Shoulder is not just the delivery of health care,” Harrison said, adding that the organization also works to empower young women and increase education and nutrition throughout Honduras. “It’s a really well thought out model.”

“Theoretically, all international health development work is about partnering and working with the community instead of for them,” said Meagan Morse ’12.5, who traveled to Guachipilincito with Med School continued on page 3

High Honor Prof wins prestigious Guatemalan award

NEWS, 4

EMS calls increase during orientation Emergency Medical Services received 10 calls during the first weekend of first-year orientation this year, the most since 2007.

During the same period in the past three years — from Friday through the Monday night before the start of classes — EMS fielded three calls each year, according to Margaret Klawunn, vice president for campus life and student services.

More first-years arrived on campus before orientation this year, Klawunn said. After waiting for additional students to join them when orientation started, they were overexcited when the weekend finally came, resulting in the increased need for medical attention, she said. The University modified orientation in 2007 to decrease the amount of scheduled free time, because students had used the downtime to consume alcohol and other drugs.

Though Klawunn said the amount of alcohol consumption at Brown is “pretty typical for college campuses,” she still believes steps need to be taken to lower that rate.

Courtesy of Meagan Morse

— Nicole Grabel

Brown physicians and students helped open a Honduran town’s first health clinic.

Pitch Perfect

Easy PLME?

W. soccer kicks off season with straight wins

Seol ’14 questions med program’s rigor

Sports, 8

Opinions, 7

weather

By Brielle Friedman Staff Writer

Ne ws in brief

t o d ay

tomorrow

80 / 61

74 / 56

2 Campus News calendar Today

September 9

2:30 P.m.

ToMORROW

September 10

4 p.m.

Scavenger Hunt,

Capture the Flag,

Stephen Robert ’62 Campus Center

Main Green

10:30 p.m.

7 p.m.

A Cappella Arch Sings,

Sex@Brown,

Stephen Robert ’62 Campus Center

Salomon 101

menu SHARPE REFECTORY

VERNEy-WOOLLEY DINING HALL LUNCH

Mediterranean Shrimp StirFry, Rosemary Portobello Sub Sandwiches, Butterscotch Cookies

Chicken Fingers, Vegan Nuggets, Sticky Rice, Summer Squash, Enchilada Bar

DINNER Mediterranean Shrimp Stir-Fry, Vegetable Stuffed Peppers, Chicken Tikka, Clam Bisque

Grilled Caesar Chicken, Cheese Raviolis with Pink Vodka Sauce, Garlic and Butter Infused Rice

Sudoku

The Brown Daily Herald Friday, September 9, 2011

Metcalf renovations on schedule continued from page 1 are further from the main campus, quieter.

“Not many people make it out there who don’t need to be there,” Riesen said.

But the distance is also a drawback. It was easier to recruit experiment volunteers in Metcalf because participants did not have to travel as far, Riesen said.

A department-wide policy compensates subjects at the Wayland Square facilities an additional $5 per session.

Clara Kliman-Silver ’13, who does research in two CLPS labs, said Metcalf was crumbling around itself. One of its most notorious features was its elevator, which was so unreliable that taking a nighttime ride was “an experience” for department members, she said.

Daily

the Brown

“Wayland Square doesn’t have quite the same charm, though it’s certainly a nicer place to be,” Kilman-Silver said.

Students and faculty expressed excitement for Metcalf ’s renovations, including the newly refurbished auditorium with large exposed windows that is “completely unrecognizable” from its predecessor, said William Warren, a CLPS professor. The building will also include a “teaching studio” and additional conference rooms, he said.

Other features to debut include a faculty library, a courtyard at the building’s center and a public art display by artist and Yale School of Art critic Sarah Oppenheimer ’95.

The piece replaces the doors facing Lincoln Field as an “intervention into the building,” said Jo-Ann Conklin, director of the David Winton Bell Gallery and member of the Public Art Committee

Herald

www.browndailyherald.com 195 Angell St., Providence, R.I.

Ben Schreckinger, President Sydney Ember, Vice President

Matthew Burrows, Treasurer Isha Gulati, Secretary

The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is an independent newspaper serving the Brown University community daily since 1891. It is published Monday through Friday during the academic year, excluding vacations, once during Commencement, once during Orientation and once in July by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Single copy free for each member of the community.

POSTMASTER please send corrections to P.O. Box 2538, Providence, RI 02906.

Periodicals postage paid at Providence, R.I. Subscription prices: $280 one year daily, $140 one semester daily.

Copyright 2011 by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. All rights reserved. editorial

(401) 351-3372 herald@browndailyherald.com

Cr ossword

Business

(401) 351-3260 gm@browndailyherald.com

that selected the piece. Two glass panes partially mirror each other so that, depending on the time of day, students who look down into the display can see outside, into the basement or their own reflections — showing how perceptions of the world can differ, Conklin said.

But the renovations do not address the lack of parking near Metcalf, said James Morgan, another CLPS professor. Morgan, whose infant research laboratory benefited from the parking space in Wayland Square, said local families who participate in child development research often have a hard time finding parking. Despite lobbying for better parking, treatment of the problem has been “disappointing,” Morgan said.

Some graduate students have also expressed concern that they will not have enough space in the renovated Metcalf, Riesen said.

Though the rooms themselves are bigger, more graduate students are sharing space in the new layout, wrote Adam Darlow GS in an email to The Herald. Five to eight students are assigned to each room, in contrast to the three to four who shared space in the past, he wrote.

The relocation to Wayland Square “caused disruptions for everyone,” Warren said, but anticipation is high for the new building. Faculty took a tour two weeks ago, and Warren called the space “totally transformed.”

“You won’t recognize the place on the inside,” he said.

Campus News 3

The Brown Daily Herald Friday, September 9, 2011

‘Fragmented femininities’ Students test waters of new clinic continued from page 1 clinic’s medical staff saw hundreds of chipilincito and hopes the University headline theater season people each day during DuVernois’ will fund student travel to the clinic. continued from page 1 as fascination with capitalism and objects comes into play.”

In its portrayal of “the extremes people will go to to protect their families and to have some sense of safety,” the show is a reflection of current economic times, Mosbacher said.

“Dr. Faustus Lights the Lights,” PW’s second show of the semester, was originally written by Gertrude Stein as the libretto for an opera. It has now been adapted into a rock opera — complete with original music — by Gupta.

It is based on the story of Doctor Faustus, who sells his soul to the devil in exchange for power and knowledge. But in this version of the story, the doctor trades his soul for electricity, Gupta said.

The play also deals with the idea of multiple, fragmented femininities, a common theme in Stein’s work, said Colella, who is directing the show. In most productions, a single female character is played by multiple women.

In recent seasons, “PW has been doing a lot of fairly realistic, structured plays,” Gupta said. This year, “there’s sort of this collective urge to do something really experimental.”

“We felt very reactionary at the end of last year,” Collela said.

“That was also reflected in a palpable lack of enthusiasm for people proposing projects” that were not exciting or new, added Sean Patrick McGowan ’12, a member of the PW board.

“Dr. Faustus Lights the Lights” is “not recognizably a play,” Colella said. The text is composed of long blocks of text, unbroken by stage direction or dialogue with other characters. It will be performed with the audience — who will stand for the entire run of the show, roughly an hour — “inside the stage,” with everything happening around them, she said. Despite this, Colella said she hopes “to maintain accessibility.”

The theater arts and performance studies department will begin its season at Leeds Theater with “Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde,” by Moises

Kaufman, which will run Sept. 29Oct. 2 and Oct. 6-9.

“Gross Indecency” is about “how the artist is pitted against society,” said Kym Moore, the director and an assistant professor of theater arts and performance studies. It is a dramatization of Wilde’s trials for the crime of “indecency” when he was suspected of practicing homosexuality. Moore said she hopes the play will be “part of a larger conversation about gay rights and human rights.”

After viewing the history of Wilde’s private life, theater-goers can see one of the playwright’s earliest, more controversial plays, “Lady Windermere’s Fan,” running in Leeds Theater November 3-6 and 10-13.

“We felt like ‘Gross Indecency’ is going to contextualize this conversation on a larger level about the public and the private, about what commitment is,” Moore said. This idea of commitment and relationships — both public and private — will be a theme for the whole season, she added.

Sheila Callaghan’s “Dead City,” a retelling of James Joyce’s “Ulysses,” continues the theme by looking at a woman’s relationship to her husband and a female companion, Director Alex Keegan ’12 said. The show will run in Leeds Theater Dec. 1-4.

“Dead City” is “about women who are really talking to each other … about things that spark importance to them,” Keegan said.

Last spring in “Bitches in the Upspace,” Gupta, Colella, Mosbacher and Rebecca Sigel ’11 critiqued the role of women in theater.

They applied the Bechdel test — which requires that a work feature at least two women, who talk to each other about something other than men — and found, among a year of Brown shows, under an hour of stage time that passed the test.

In a sense, this semester — which showcases female directors and writers, reconsiders gender identities and lets women speak their minds — could be an antidote to the critiques presented in the show.

professors after her freshman year and has remained involved with the community since. “All of your thinking has to be long term, and sometimes it can be frustrating because it feels like you’re not making any progress.”

But she said the program has had some fantastic successes. “Three years ago, there wasn’t even a relationship.”

On her first trip to Guachipilincito, the group’s goal was to decide how the University could best partner with the community, Morse said. The decision to build a health clinic in the town had only been made a few months before. “It was very much exploratory,” she said.

It was only a two-week trip, which “really wasn’t enough time to develop a relationship with the community,” Morse said. “I felt like I wanted more time there.” A year later, she took a semester off and returned to Guachipilincito.

During the semester, Morse tested water quality, planted a community garden at the clinic and researched the effectiveness of Shoulder to Shoulder’s recently instituted supplementary feeding program for young children. Morse said she visited different houses every day and had conversations with the families about various health topics to better understand how they saw the health and nutrition problems in the community. “It was very important for me to figure out what they wanted,” she said.

Morse returned to Guachipilincito for two weeks in July to participate in the clinic’s opening. She said she looks forward to seeing how the community takes ownership of the clinic and has plans to develop a scholarship program for community members who want to go into medicine.

“I’m really excited for the possibilities,” she said.

Gabriele DuVernois ’11 MD’15 also traveled to Honduras for the opening of the clinic. A month into medical school classes, she said her time in Guachipilincito has already helped her in her studies.

“Right now we’re doing patient interviewing — how to approach and connect with people you’ve never met,” DuVernois said. Though the

stay in Honduras, they managed to spend at least 20 minutes with each patient.

“They really wanted to get a sense of who these people were, what their lives were like,” DuVernois said, adding that this is something she hopes to mirror in her future career as a doctor.

Harrison said these interpersonal relationships constitute the most important aspect of community work.

She said she would like to see more undergraduates volunteer in Gua-

Undergraduates are “incredibly energetic, they’re smart, they have skills that are really useful in building community relationships, and that’s really important to us,” she said. “They give a lot.”

Borkan said he hopes to see a formal student organization develop in the near future. “At the opening, people were already talking about future projects,” DuVernois said. “They kept asking, ‘How can we make this better? How can we improve?’ The clinic wasn’t just an ending point.”

4 Campus News

The Brown Daily Herald Friday, September 9, 2011

McLaughlin settles in, with new desk and paint job continued from page 1 used. He had the walls painted this summer — because, he said, you have to show the people you’re recruiting that you can afford to paint your walls.

There are the windows, higher from the ground than McLaughlin is used to, which he said bring in sunlight and a great view.

“You almost can’t get past this office without being seen,” he said.

“If you keep the shades open, you can see people walking by — on the Main Green, down to the library, anyone coming into University Hall

from this side has to walk right by my window.”

He said he hasn’t succumbed to the distraction of people-watching — yet. But now that people are returning to campus, McLaughlin said the traffic outside his window has started to pick up.

Because University Hall has more security than the English department’s building at 70 Brown St., McLaughlin can decorate his office with paintings from the University collections. Four paintings currently hang in his room, one of which was painted by Wendy Edwards, professor of visual arts.

Challenges and changes

McLaughlin said his years as chair of the English department prepared him for parts of his new job — department chairs and the dean of the faculty frequently interact, especially when making administrative decisions about hiring, budgets and staffing. Even the work is similar — both jobs require management and coordination of faculty.

But at the same time, his new job is bigger, McLaughlin said. He will now have to adopt a “big picture perspective” and prioritize individual issues.

McLaughlin’s administrative role

also leaves little time for interaction with students.

“It feels a little weird being in a University and not being a student or a professor,” he said. And though the job is worth it, contact with students is something McLaughlin still wants to maintain. He read this year’s freshman required reading — Leslie Chang’s “Factory Girls” — to keep in touch with student life. A copy sits on his desk, next to stacks of documents and Post-It notes.

Stephen Foley ’74 P’04 P’07, acting chair of the English department, said McLaughlin’s “likeable disposition” and leadership skills equip him well for his position.

“I think that Kevin is one of the best administrators I’ve seen in my life,” Foley said. He added that McLaughlin will naturally bring different perspectives than those of his predecessor, but said the same story would be true of any new dean.

McLaughlin said he doesn’t know what his biggest challenge will be yet — that’s something he will discover as the year progresses.

But he did say he is worried about “living up to the position.”

Getting started

McLaughlin was named dean of the faculty at the end of May and assumed the position in July. But he did not start working until August because he spent July in France on a research trip he planned before taking the job.

The beginning of the job was busy, he said. Over the summer, the dean is required to go through all departmental search requests for the go-ahead to advertise and recruit new faculty. Typically, that requires meeting with department chairs to hear their explanations and rationales for recruiting new faculty. This year, there were about 60 requests to go through.

“That just means spending time here in the office meeting people and trying to find time later in the day to follow up and get things done,” he said.

McLaughlin also had to organize his own office structure — a process which involved hiring Janet Blume, formerly an associate professor of engineering, to serve as associate dean of the faculty.

Before leaving for the summer, McLaughlin worked with Vohra, his predecessor and now a professor of economics, to choose a new department chair for English. Foley will hold the position as interim chair this year, and Professor of English Philip Gould, who is on sabbatical this semester, will take the position next.

Looking ahead

McLaughlin’s goals for the semester include furthering several academic initiatives as well as examining hiring and tenure. He will focus on the Humanities Initiative — a project based out of an anonymous $3 million donation the University received last year to use toward hiring renowned humanities professors and hosting international symposia. He also plans to strengthen the Middle East studies program and collaborate more with the administrators of the School of Engineering.

McLaughlin said he wants to emphasize “strategic” faculty appointments to enhance existing University strengths. Currently, he plans to use existing monthly meetings with divisional chairs to determine hiring needs and interests across departments.

McLaughlin also said implementing the new tenure procedures — which faculty approved last year — is another “big topic” his office has been working on and will continue to address this year.

Ultimately, McLaughlin said he hopes to connect the faculty with real-world questions and problems they could feasibly address — a “public service” for society “defined in a global sense.”

“We can’t afford not to keep the humanities central to the education of leaders,” he said.

Guatemalan gov’t honors anthro prof

By Esther Kim Contributing Writer

Stephen Houston, a professor of anthropology, received the Order of the Quetzal in the rank of Grand Cross from the president of Guatemala in July in recognition of his extensive work on the Maya civilization. The award is the most prestigious the Guatemalan government can grant.

“I’ve spent close to three decades studying the archaeology of Guatemala — I suspect that’s not a record matched by many other colleagues,” Houston said. His fieldwork involved two long-term excavations in the country, and he said his published works seemed to have resonated with those who choose the recipients of the Order

of the Quetzal.

The rank of Grand Cross is most often awarded to prominent Guatemalan diplomats and heads of state.

Houston, who called the award an “overwhelming honor,” said his work deciphering Maya writing has helped increase the understanding of the culture and the history of the Americas.

He added that the award reflected not just his work, but the work of many current and former Maya scholars.

“The whole department is very proud of him and the work that he has done for many, many years,” said Catherine Lutz, professor of anthropology and chair of the department.

Houston is currently on sabbatical leave but will return to campus next fall.

6 Editorial & Letter Diamonds & Coal

The Brown Daily Herald Friday, September 9, 2011

Editorial comic

b y lo r e n f u lto n

Coal to Amazon.com, which had a glitch in its system that caused “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” to show up as required reading for several courses on Mocha this week. Amazon didn’t fool us for a second. We’re no Rowena Ravenclaw, but even we know that horcrux theory won’t help much with Caribbean postcolonial narratives of transgender political action.

Coal to the Committee on the ROTC, which released its longawaited findings Wednesday without making a clear recommendation for or against ROTC’s return. So what is the University’s policy on ROTC? Don’t ask, don’t tell.

A cubic zirconium to the Queer Alliance member who explained that Rhode Island’s gay couples have not been entering newly legalized civil unions because full-fledged gay marriage is available in neighboring states. “We have better options close by,” he said. Coincidentally, this is the same reason we applied early to Yale.

Diamonds to the hockey players who rescued three drowning swimmers off a Little Compton beach last Tuesday. Ball’s in your court, swim team.

Coal to Robert Villarreal ’01 MD’05, who stands accused of forgery, drug distribution and conspiracy. According to an affidavit from a federal agent, Villarreal has admitted to using up to 20 Adderalls a day, putting him just behind the average Brown student.

A cubic zirconium to Brown Student Radio, which lost its FM radio signal this summer and now just broadcasts online. Only Brown could have a radio station so underground it’s not actually on the radio.

A cubic zirconium to the first-year who said of his comparative literature professor on the first day of classes, “I think just being around her is going to expand my mind.” You’re right, but it’s because of what she’s going to slip in your tea.

2015 diamonds to the class of 2015. We see that this year’s orientation weekend saw the most EMS calls since 2007. Looks like you’re a class that knows how to party. But seriously, be safe. But also party.

letter to the editor A fond farewell to the Saunders Inn To the Editor:

quote of the day

“We just want to spread the love.

”

— Lex Rofes ’13, a Brown Derby

We write to mourn the loss of the Saunders Inn at Brown.

Since we graduated, our alma mater has often welcomed us back with the open arms of an awesome New Dorm double — with a private bathroom and a lovely view over Charlesfield Street, no less! The inn gave us stone’s-throw access to Wriston parties, late night spi-

cies with from Josiah’s and card access to New Dorm.

How could you ask for anything better than that?

Where will we and future alums go when we want to pretend that we’re still at Brown, the greatest place on earth?

Matt Gelfand ’08 Alana Jacoby ’08 Jake Johnson ’08

Join The Herald!

See Derbies on page 8.

Info sessions on t h e b r ow n da i ly h e r a l d Editors-in-Chief

Managing Editors

Senior Editors

Sydney Ember Ben Schreckinger

Brigitta Greene Anne Speyer

Dan Alexander Nicole Friedman Julien Ouellet

editorial Kristina Fazzalaro Rebecca Ballhaus Claire Peracchio Talia Kagan Amy Rasmussen Tony Bakshi Alex Bell Ethan McCoy Ashley McDonnell Sam Rubinroit Anita Mathews Tyler Rosenbaum Sam Carter Hunter Fast

Arts & Culture Editor City & State Editor City & State Editor Features Editor Assistant Features Editor News Editor News Editor Sports Editor Sports Editor Assistant Sports Editor Editorial Page Editor Editorial Page Editor Opinions Editor Opinions Editor

Graphics & Photos Abe Pressman Graphics Editor Emily Gilbert Photo Editor Rachel Kaplan Photo Editor Glenn Lutzky Photo Editor Jesse Schwimmer Sports Photo Editor Production Dan Towne Anna Migliaccio Katie Wilson Leor Shtull-Leber

Copy Desk Chief Design Editor Design Editor Assistant Design Editor

Business General Managers Matthew Burrows Isha Gulati

Office Manager Shawn Reilly

Directors Aditi Bhatia Danielle Marshak Margot Grinberg Lisa Berlin

Sales Finance Alumni Relations Special Projects

Managers Hao Tran National Sales Alec Kacew University Department Sales Siena deLisser University Student Group Sales Valery Scholem Recruiter Sales Jared Davis Sales and Communications Lauren Bosso Business Operations Emily Zheng Business Analytics Nikita Khadloya Alumni Engagement Rajiv Iyengar Special Projects Arjun Vaidya Special Projects Webber Xu Special Projects Post- magazine Editor-in-Chief Sam Knowles Editor-in-Chief Amelia Stanton BLOG DAILY HERALD David Winer Editor-in-Chief Matt Klimerman Managing Editor

Sunday, Sept. 11 at 6 p.m.

Tuesday, Sept. 13 at 7 p.m.

Thursday, Sept. 15 at 7 p.m. at our 195 Angell St. office 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 editorial is the majority opinion of the editorial page 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 clarity 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.

Opinions 7

The Brown Daily Herald Friday, September 9, 2011

The program in lax medical education

By Young Seol Opinions Columnist “The goal of Brown’s PLME is to graduate doctors, scholars and leaders in medicine who have been exposed to a wide, sensitizing view of the human condition.” So reads the educational philosophy of Brown’s Program in Liberal Medical Education. On paper, the spirit of the PLME is admirable.

Train doctors unfettered by the stresses of the MCAT or resume-building, and surely they will have more time to devote to a liberal education, which in turn will enable more humanistic medicine. Notably missing is a stance on the preparedness of graduates of the PLME, and in practice, even basic competencies are sacrificed in the name of diverse learning. Even then, the compulsory competencies for a PLME undergraduate are so minimal as to be farcical. The result is students who are woefully underprepared for medical school.

Such problems are endemic to the program, and recent reforms have sought, in a measured capacity, to address them. The incoming PLME class of 2015 will no longer be able satisfy the physics requirement with a 650 on the SAT II Physics test or an A- in AP Physics, as their predecessors were. Instead, they need merely a 5 on the AP Physics B or the AP Physics C: Mechanics test.

Compare that standard, however, with the MCAT’s expectation of competency across the physical disciplines of Newtonian me-

chanics, electricity and magnetism, optics, acoustics, hydrostatics, electronics and particle physics, and it is clear that we expect far too little of our PLME students.

The societal impact of such under-education is admittedly questionable. Brown’s Alpert Medical School is certainly capable of imparting such knowledge to students who need it. Yet PLME students must pay the price. Those who graduate from a conventional pre-medical program either won’t need such education or will have sufficient familiarity with the subject material to facilitate deeper study. The consequence is two-

edge the philosophical discrepancies that cause them. The PLME’s commitment to a “wide, sensitizing” education is fundamentally incompatible with the New Curriculum. As Francis Wayland, Brown’s fourth president, envisioned, the New Curriculum enables every student to “study what he chose, all that he chose, and nothing but what he chose.” The freedom to purposefully exclude undesirable courses from one’s education is inherent to that vision. This freedom, however, is antithetical both to what we as a society expect of our doctors and to the PLME’s explicitly stated goals.

Worryingly, the PLME seems to be headed not toward establishing a baseline of competency, but rather toward eliminating it entirely. pronged: Our PLME students in medical school are underprepared and will be disadvantaged compared to their non-PLME peers, and Alpert’s medical education must provide courses to teach what most other medical students already know. The latter scenario results in a decreased quality of medical education and repetition antithetical to the PLME’s emphasis on efficient and diverse undergraduate learning. Consider the non-PLME students, studying alongside PLME students, whose education will also suffer, and negative externalities abound.

Discussion of the consequences of the PLME’s policies is only half the picture. Numerous and impactful as they may be, analysis focusing on symptoms fails to acknowl-

The PLME and its students suffer from a crisis of legitimacy. While requiring only one semester of organic chemistry pass-fail may help recruitment statistics, it does little else except earn the ire of pre-medical students who must take a full year for a grade. It is no wonder that the Association of American Medical Colleges and the National Resident Matching Program see fit to require undergraduate transcripts for PLME students in medical school applying for residency, a standard not required of medical students that have taken the MCAT. Granted, PLME students tend to receive excellent residency matches, with several students matched to prestigious schools like Harvard or Yale every year. But this is

a testament to the competence of our PLME students and only serves to downplay the failings of the program itself. When PLME students in medical school must expend additional effort to compensate for gaps in undergraduate education, when pre-medical students are deterred from applying to and suffer while at schools like Alpert because of a curriculum that must cater to PLMEs — and, in fact, is to some extent designed by them — and when our PLME students, arguably among the brightest at Brown, are scorned by their peers and additionally tested by national organizations, there is something wrong with the program.

Worryingly, the PLME seems to be headed not toward establishing a baseline of competency, but rather toward eliminating it entirely. As stated by Dean Ip in an email to the PLME community, “the PLME is working on developing a truly integrative curriculum that will eliminate the need for many competency courses.” Clear philosophical stances are politically useful, but de facto expectations are insufficient. In keeping with the higher expectations placed upon doctors and the PLME’s commitment to liberal education, the PLME should institute some form of distribution requirements to ensure a broad education. PLME students, for their part, would be wise to remember that acceptance into the program is neither a promise of success nor an entitlement to an easy ride.

Young Seol ’14 is a chemistry and economics concentrator from Iowa City, Iowa. He can be reached at j_young_seol@brown.edu

African-American matriculation is a Brown issue, not a Black issue

By Malcolm Shanks Opinions Columnist As we return to Brown this year, we have the pleasure of welcoming the class of 2015 to our campus. These undergraduates will come to love the place that we call home. It is my special pleasure also to congratulate what has been called “the most racially, socio-economically and geographically diverse class in Brown’s history.” Props to the Admission Office for prioritizing diversity and educational access in an increasingly unequal society. It is therefore in the interest of maintaining forward momentum that I address diversity and matriculation so early in the year. It is my hope that, in the future, Brown is even more sensitive to intersections between race and class. Matriculation affects all of us, regardless of identity or background. It is in this broader vein that I would like to address the issue of African-American matriculation.

In a recent article in GOOD Magazine, Senior Editor Cord Jefferson calls attention to “the dirty little secret” of the Ivy League — that on many campuses, the make-up of black students is not representative of black communities outside of the academy. Rather, there are higher percentages of black immigrants — ­ and upper-class African-Americans — than one would suspect. The article illuminates one fact: Admissions strategies that ignore the intersections of race and class are bound to fail at addressing racial inequality. Furthermore, these strategies allow Brown and other colleges to provide window-dressings of racial diversity without ad-

dressing the material inequalities that make diversity a specific goal at all. The histories of U.S. racism and class inequality create a complex structure where considerations of race cannot be separated from class.

Though first-generation blacks constitute only 8 percent of the U.S. black population, they form fully 41 percent of black students in the Ivy League. I have spoken to many black students at Brown who would put the latter figure higher at our own school. I have sat with others and tried counting the African-Americans we know at Brown, and have rarely been able to exhaust our fingers. In

grants. Bennett stated that the distinguishing factor in college attendance for black immigrants was “differences in family resources,” not quality of performance. Data has shown that African immigrants, specifically, are on average wealthier and more educated than their African-American counterparts. While the African-American median household income in 2000 was $30,000, the median African immigrant household income was $45,000.

The fundamental problem here is not that the wrong kinds of black people are in the Ivy League. Intellectual achievement should

Educational access and the American color line are especially relevant for Brown University, whose prestige and influence were originally financed by the transatlantic slave trade 2000, Harvard professors Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Lani Guinier also noted that out of 530 black undergraduates at Harvard, only 180 “could claim a completely Black American ancestry.”

In the 2009 study cited by Jefferson, Dr. Pamela Bennett and Dr. Amy Lutz reported that not only are black immigrants four times more likely than African-Americans to attend four-year institutions, they are more likely than white students of comparable socioeconomic backgrounds to attend college.

Clearly, there is something more than race at play here. Even more unsettling, black immigrants are not outperforming AfricanAmericans — they do not even “value education more,” a common refrain about immi-

be celebrated everywhere. These findings reveal the continued disadvantage of AfricanAmericans, the figuring of black immigrants as the solution to a “black problem” and the effective relegation of African-Americans to the category of damaged goods. Educational access and the American color line are especially relevant for Brown, whose prestige and influence were originally financed by the transatlantic slave trade. Furthermore, the academy has long been the center of privilege and of legitimating the status quo, including — historically — that of the dehumanization of an entire race and their brutal centuries-long captivity. The institution holds just as much as responsibility for the violence of slavery and its aftermath as the

flows of capital which made the institution possible.

In 2003, President Simmons created the Brown University Steering Committee on Slavery and Justice, in order to explore the history of Brown and the slave trade. This courageous step towards historical honesty has yet to be replicated by comparable institutions — a wonderful example for all of us undergraduates. The committee recommended that, given “Brown’s history of racial exclusion,” the University should focus “in particular on increasing the representation of African-American students at both the undergraduate and the graduate levels.”

It begs the question of whether the commitments of the report are being honored by the University.

Black identity is not monolithic. I’m just one point of view in the diverse black community at Brown. This is not about drumming up xenophobia toward other people of African descent. The “you took my spot” argument is counter-productive, as it implies that applicants determine the structural realities they’re born into. But it is our duty to hold accountable even the institutions we trust. Lewis Gordon recently wrote on affirmative action, “in a society committed to injustice, it is very easy to create unjust practices of exclusion.” America is now the thirdmost economically unequal country in terms of income in the G-20, behind only South Africa and Brazil. I have faith that, having done so well, Brown can reach higher and achieve better.

Malcolm Shanks ’12 is a gender and sexuality studies and Middle Eastern studies concentrator.

Daily Herald Sports Friday the Brown

Friday, September 9, 2011

W. Soccer

Cross Country

Bears set sights on Ivy League title New head coach joins cross country squads

By Sam Wickham Sports Writer

Success in team sports is determined by many factors, but one that remains a topic of debate across the sporting world is the question of youth versus experience. For the women’s soccer team, a combination of the two is responsible for its blazing start to the 2011 fall campaign. The Bears (3-0, 0-0 Ivy League) are off to a perfect start to the season, defeating Liberty University, Coastal Carolina University and Providence College in a six-day span.

“We want to win an Ivy championship,” said captain Sarah HebertSeropian ’12. “We’re not looking for anything less.”

The team got a boost this year from the introduction of eight first-year players, who will all bring the youthful energy necessary to make a run at the Ivy League title. Six returning seniors will provide experienced play from defense through attack.

“We really like to attack the flanks,” Hebert-Seropian said.

“We’re also looking to dominate the middle.”

Head Coach Phil Pincince will be returning for his 33rd year as head of the Brown women’s soccer program. As the 13th-winningest coach in Division I history, his experience should help him steer the younger members of the squad as they seek to stay hot going into upcoming games.

Brown 1, Liberty 0

The Bears’ youth proved the deciding factor in the team’s opening game of the season at Liberty (1-21) Friday, as Bruno edged out the Flames with strong performances from several underclassmen.

Though the team dominated the first-half proceedings, the breakthrough goal came early in the second half by way of Allie Reilly ’15.

By James Blum Sports Writer

Jesse Schwimmer / Herald

Maddie Wiener ’14 scored in Bruno’s 2-0 win over Providence College.

The Bears’ defense held Liberty to a mere five shots in the shutout win.

Brown 3, Coastal Carolina 1

Two goals from Eliza Marshall ’13 helped Bruno take the edge over the Chanticleers (1-4-1) in Lynchburg, Va., Sunday. The Bears were outshot 10-5 in the first half of play, but a goal from Kiersten Berg ’14 allowed them to take a 1-0 lead into halftime. Twenty minutes into the second half, Bruno went up 2-0 after Marshall put away a cross from Marybeth Lesbirel ’12.

Berg assisted Marshall just seven minutes later to stretch the lead to 3-0, and a late goal from the Chanticleers was not enough for them to claw back into the game.

Brown 2, Providence 0

After a back-and-forth first half, Bruno finally got on the board in the 77th minute, when a long free kick from Diana Ohrt ’13 was guided in by Hebert-Seropian for the eventual game-winner. A

slip-up from the Friars (1-2-4) keeper just 30 seconds later allowed the Bears to further their lead — Maddie Wiener’s ’14 driven cross skipped off the slick surface and deflected off the keeper into the net to give the Bears a 2-0 advantage.

Staunch goaltending from Amber Bledsoe ’14 and MC Barrett ’14 gave Brown its second shutout win of the season.

The Bears look to keep their winning streak alive as they welcome University of Vermont (23-1) to Stevenson Field Saturday.

Though there is plenty of promise to start off this season, the team also remembers the recent loss of a loved one. The death of Assistant Coach Denis Chartier this spring only provides more motivation for the Bears to play their hardest.

“We’ve had a difficult start to 2011 and some sad times and a lot of adversity to deal with,” Pincince said. “And I think this team and coaching staff will tell you that we are definitely on a mission.”

As the men and women of cross country train for their upcoming seasons, they are joined by Mitchell Baker, the newly appointed head coach of women’s cross country.

Before coming to Brown, Baker served as an assistant coach at Williams College, where he helped the Ephs win 11 Division III New England Regional Championships and coached 10 student-athletes who collectively earned 22 All-American awards. But, after four years at Williams, Baker decided to continue his education.

“I wanted to keep learning and set myself up to have a career in coaching,” Baker said. “Getting an advanced degree was a strong interest.”

Baker said he later re-evaluated his decision to attend graduate school once he was offered the position at Brown.

“I just felt like I couldn’t find many other places like Brown to have my first head coaching job,” Baker said. “I already feel very comfortable here.”

Baker brings a unique perspective to the women’s program because he spent a few weeks during the fall of 2009 in Kenya, studying under the renowned former head coach of the Italian soccer team, Renato Canova.

Over the years, Canova has coached multiple world champions, including Saif Saeed Shaheen, who holds the world record in the 3,000-meter steeplechase.

“He has an incredibly storied coaching history,” Baker said. “He emphasized how important it was to care about the athlete personally.”

According to Baker, he would write workout plans with Canova and the pair would spend up to 15 hours a day discussing coaching strategy. “A coach has to be watch-

ful on what athletes do really well and then extend the talents,” Baker said. “Even thinking about limits is a self-fulfilling thing.”

Baker said he is seeking to translate what he learned from Canova into success for the women as he starts his first season on College Hill.

“The big goal is to be healthy and make really good choices every day,” Baker said.

Last year, the women finished third at the Ivy League Heptagonal Championships and seventh at the NCAA Northeast Regionals. Baker said he hopes they can match or exceed these past performances. Strong seasons can be expected from Ari Garber ’12, Heidi Caldwell ’14 and Margaret Connelly ’14, he said.

On the men’s side, according to co-captain Matt Duffy ’12, the team’s goal is to maintain a high level of fitness and place higher at the Ivy League Heptagonal Championships and NCAA Northeast Regionals than they did last year. In 2010, they finished eighth at both competitions.

“The men’s team has a different level of fitness than we’ve had before — everyone is much stronger aerobically than last year,” said Duffy. “We have a much deeper pack.”

The men welcome back many of their top runners, including Duffy and Dan Lowry ’12. Additionally, nine first-years have joined the team, and Duffy said he expects some of them to make the varsity squad.

Despite these gains, the team also graduated Christian Escareno ’11 and Brian Schilder ’11.

Baker is also the assistant men’s cross country coach. “He’s very knowledgeable and very insightful,” Duffy said. “He has a keen ability to look at situations and dissect them and know how to proceed.”

The first meet for both men and women will be the Dartmouth Invitational in New Hampshire Sept. 10.

Derbies ‘spread the love’ on Gospel Music Channel By phoebe nir Arts & Culture Staff Writer

The Brown Derbies a cappella group may lack girls and instruments, but that didn’t stop them from drawing national attention this summer on the Gospel Music Channel’s new competitive reality show, “America Sings.”

Arts & Culture Hosted by Drew Lachey, of 1990s boy band 98 Degrees, “America Sings” gave its contestants the opportunity to win $10,000 and offered a platform for everything from church choirs to flash mobs in the United States and Canada.

Though the majority of singing groups featured on the show submitted videos online, the Brown Derbies were contacted by the show’s producers, who had come

upon a YouTube video of the Derbies helping a visiting lecturer on campus propose to his girlfriend.

In the video, a Power Point presentation on “mayor-centric” academic reform is interrupted when undercover Derbies in the classroom begin a rendition of Weezer’s “My Evaline,” tailored specially for the woman who then became the lecturer’s fiancee.

“It seemed really spontaneous, but actually he’d contacted us eight months before the actual proposal,” said Lex Rofes ’13. “The entire lecture was just a set up for him to pop the question.”

The producers described the video as “uplifting” when they contacted the Derbies to ask them to air it on the show, according to Derbies business manager and bass singer Nate Wardwell ’14 . Though the Derbies did not make it past the first stage in the competition, performance requests have been

BrownDerbies.com

Since appearing on the reality show “America Sings,” the Brown Derbies have received many performance requests.

flooding in ever since their clip appeared on television.

“Many of them, unfortunately, we have to turn down outright, because of scheduling conflicts,” Wardwell said. “But we’ve ended up everywhere from bar and bat

mitzvahs to a beach in Cancun, and it’s great that we’ve gotten so many opportunities from the show.”

But despite their newfound celebrity, the Derbies agreed that their priorities remain the same

— the brotherhood and the music.

“What really sets us apart is the joy and the sense of fun that we bring to each performance,” Rofes said. “We all love each other, and we love the music. We just want to spread the love.”