SINCE 1891
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD VOLUME CL, ISSUE 16
WWW.BROWNDAILYHERALD.COM
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 2015
Companies in common good diversify career opportunities Separate fair for careers in the common good expands offerings beyond nonprofits By JOSEPH ZAPPA UNIVERSITY NEWS EDITOR
RYAN WALSH / HERALD
A team of five Minority Peer Counselors has worked since the beginning of the spring semester to produce a multifaceted look at the #BlackLivesMatter movement, culminating in an event Tuesday.
MPC event examines ‘Black Lives Matter’ Workshop aimed to contextualize movement within American history, recent events By SHAVON BELL SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Anti-black racism is “harder to see, harder for people to understand, because it’s not written in law,” said Mi-
nority Peer Counselor Jacinta Lomba ’17 Tuesday at “Why #BlackLivesMatter: an MPC Workshop Exploring Anti-Blackness in the United States.” The hashtag was created in 2012 response to the fatal shooting of black teenager Trayvon Martin by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman in Florida. Its creators — Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi — wanted it to serve as a “call to action” by highlighting acts
of racism in the country. The workshop, which took place in a packed Leung Family Gallery, explored several “racialized forms of social control,” including slavery, Jim Crow, the War on Drugs, the School-to-Prison Pipeline and stopand-frisk policies, said Lomba, one of the event’s organizers. Lomba and MPCs Jieyi Cai ’17, Jovaun Holmes ’17, Maya Finoh ’17 » See WORKSHOP, page 3
Employers from 81 organizations will ascend College Hill Wednesday at noon to recruit students for summer internships and full-time jobs. The event includes a general career fair in Sayles Hall and a fair for opportunities in nonprofit and service sectors in the Kasper Multipurpose Room. This marks the third consecutive year the University has organized a separate fair for careers in the common good, though it has previously been billed as an event only for nonprofits, said Jim Amspacher, interim director of career services. Forty-one organizations will participate in the event — one more than the count for the general fair. “You don’t have to be a nonprofit to do good work,” Amspacher added, noting that “common good” casts a wider net than nonprofit, enabling the University to invite a greater number of companies that orient toward social change. The University’s decision to provide an alternative venue expressly
for careers in the common good fits into a national trend in college career services’ approach to campus recruitment events, Amspacher said, adding that career offices have turned toward specialized fairs in order to drum up student interest. By holding the common good fair, the University can facilitate successful job searches for students intent on positions in that field, and also “send a strong message to employers that Brown students are interested in internships and jobs that make an impact,” he said. Additionally, the common good fair may dilute the usually high concentration of recruiters from lucrative industries, such as technology, finance and consulting, and will difersify opportunities for students who may not be interested in those fields. “It’s good that they’re expanding into other industries,” said Kat Hsu ’17, adding that students often ask themselves, “If I don’t code, I’m not an engineer and I don’t want to do banking, how am I going to find an internship?” But some students still feel that the career fairs do not cover their professional interests. Sam Hill-Cristol ’17, who intends to concentrate in environmental studies, said he does not plan to attend the event because » See CAREER FAIR, page 2
Huidekoper nominated to Spring theater to provoke dialogue, innovate to feature alumserve on state commission Season written play along with Retiring from longterm post, finance VP to join state commission overseeing I-195 lands By ALIZA REISNER SENIOR STAFF WRITER
Beppie Huidekoper, executive vice president for finance and administration, is one of six nominees for the I-195 Redevelopment District Commission, Gov. Gina Raimondo announced last week. The commission recommends and implements new strategies for developing 19 acres of vacant land in Providence previously occupied by the interstate highway. Huidekoper recently announced her retirement after more than a decade of serving as the University’s top administrator in charge of finances. While the nomination did not contribute Huidekoper’s retirement decision, she could not have joined the commission while working at the
INSIDE
University due to several potential conflicts of interest, she said. Her role as executive vice president for finance and administration helped prepare her to act as a commission member, she said, adding that she worked on redeveloping the Jewelry District near the new Alpert Medical School campus in order to attract investment — a task similar to those she could face as a commission member. The nomination process began with a meeting between Huidekoper and Mayor Jorge Elorza, who recommended her to Raimondo, Huidekoper said. Raimondo then reviewed recommendations from Elorza and Speaker of the House Nicholas Mattiello, D-Cranston, to form a group with the diverse experiences and skills required to develop the vacant land and foster economic growth. Huidekoper said she does not foresee a difficult transition to being a committee member, adding that » See HUIDEKOPER, page 3
well-known classics, dance festival By GABRIELLE DEE
ARTS & CULTURE EDITOR
Shakespeare meets Edward Hopper, a Roman slave chases the girl next door to win his freedom and a Chinese-American woman follows her brother into the underworld in this semester’s array of performances from the Department of Theater Arts and Performance Studies and student performance groups, forming a diverse lineup that mirrors some of the challenging conversations that students face every day on campus. Sock and Buskin’s spotlight this year falls on a version of Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night,” revamped by Jane Nichols, a member of the theater apprentice program faculty and lecturer in acting at the Yale School of Drama. In this rendition, a live jazz
ARTS & CULTURE
band playing 1930s chart-toppers will accompany the original Elizabethan script. “Twelfth Night” runs Feb. 26– March 1 and March 5-8 in the Stuart Theatre. “Shakespeare’s plays are so universal, why not place them in a world I like the sound of?” Nichols said. Edward Hopper’s painting of a classic white-faced, ruffed clown, called “Soir Bleu,” inspired the play’s aesthetic, Nichols said. In the painting, the clown sits isolated from the surrounding cafe, smoking a cigarette and shuffling a pack of cards. The clown’s comedic isolation mirrors the feeling of being at the “edge of the party, holding your coffee when everyone’s having a good time except you,” said Paul Magrave, the publicity and box office coordinator for the TAPS department. The title “Twelfth Night” refers to the last night of the twelve days of celebration of the Feast of the Epiphany. The lively jazz music that penetrates the play reflects a celebration’s “buoyant spirit” and sense of community with others. But slower, more melancholic tones reveal the same loneliness
that Hopper depicts in “Soir Bleu,” Nichols said. Bright accents of color and sharp contrast cut through the play’s intentionally minimal stage set and blackand-white costume palette to create an unsettling atmosphere, Nichols said. The party’s environment “becomes mad.” This dramatic stage set also mirrors the “shimmering distinctions between light and dark” that define Hopper’s painting. “Shakespeare was a humanist,” Nichols said. “His images resonate for all of us in all times.” Sock and Buskin will also present “410: Gone,” written by Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig ’05 and directed by Erik Ehn, professor and chair of the TAPS department, April 2-5 and 9-12 in the Leeds Theatre. The semi-autobiographical work started as Cowhig’s senior capstone project. The plot centers on a Chinese-American woman trying to come to terms with her brother’s suicide. “410: Gone” combines opposites — the life and the afterlife — to investigate “what it means to let go of » See THEATER, page 2
WEATHER
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 2015
UNIVERSITY NEWS Brown Employee Appreciation and Recognition Day events highlight dedicated staff members
ARTS & CULTURE Exhibition at Watson Institute showcases comics that mix Arab and Western culture
COMMENTARY Khleif ’15: Focusing on perfect grades causes stress and obscures the value of learning
COMMENTARY Ha ’18: University’s financial aid policies neither meet students’ needs nor live up to its ideals
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