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A new grove commemorating the University’s sesquicentennial will be dedicated next Friday.. | Page 3

Danni Shen ’15 interviews artist Jenn Houle grad, who created a cave painting exhibit in Fall Creek gorge. | Page 10

The Cornell men’s Polo Team defeated the University of Conneticut in its season-opener. | Page 15

County Sees Uptick In Syphilis Cases Hook-up apps possibly a factor for increase

By TALIA JUBAS Sun Staff Writer

Syphilis rates have risen in Tompkins County, with reported cases involving those using mobile dating applications, according to the county’s health department.

While there was an average of one to three cases of syphilis reported each year from 2009 to 2013, there have already been five cases diagnosed in the area this year, according to the county’s department of health. Additionally, some cases of simultaneous co-infections were found in men ages 22 to 55 who reported anonymous encounters “arranged through mobile apps” with other men.

Although represenatives from Gannett Health Services said they cannot comment on whether or not Cornell students are among those infected, they do note the importance of students being cognizant of the increased incidence.

“Given the age range of the individuals already diagnosed, we believe it is important for Cornell students to consider their risk factors,” said Beth Kutler, a clinician at Gannett Health Services.

The “anonymous nature of the hook-ups” is particularly worrisome, she added.

Data is not available on the prevalence of such applications on campus, but Gannett staff have commented on a noticeable increase in their popularity, which they said has negative impliSee HOOK-UP page 4

K.K. YU / SUN STAFF WRITER

The next strategy | The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences began its most recent five-year strategic plan, entitled “Knowledge with Public Purpose in a Changing World” last Friday.

CALS Launches New Strategic Plan

By ZOE FERGUSON Sun Senior Writer

Last Friday, the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences launched a new five-year strategic plan, which aims to increase the diversity college faculty and improve public engagement with its programs.

The new plan — entitled “Knowledge with Public Purpose in a Changing World” — was devised after the college had achieved the goals outlined in a 2009 strategic plan, Kathryn Boor ’80, dean of the agriculture college.

See CALS page 5

Johnson Profs Develop Multi-Million Dollar Social Media Platform

By NOAH RANKIN Sun City Editor

HangIt — a social media platform with a development team including two Cornell professors — is set to launch in December with $6.2 million in seed funding.

One of the co-founders of the platform is Prof. Jason Hogg MBA ’02, management,

while the current chief executive officer is Prof. Steven Gal ’88, management.

The cloud-based service seeks to provide location-based messaging and marketing for any mobile app, based on the idea of “hanging” notifications for users to view automatically, according to Gal. “The [mobile] market grew very, very quickly because demand has continued to

Author autograph

go through the roof,” Gal said. “This issue of location … is one that really hasn’t been addressed. We’re developing a platform to allow developers to really use location.”

According to Gal, the platform’s focus on “hanging” is similar to the idea of using billboards to inform consumers of opportunities in the immediate location and promote competition among businesses in the area.

App developers who have integrated HangIt choose where and when to hang notifications and anybody who has that app on their mobile device will receive the location-specific notification, which they can then swipe to view links or more information.

See HANGIT page 4

Mayor: NYSEG Caused Commons Delays

By TYLER ALICEA Sun Managing Editor

HAEWON HWANG / SUN STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Prof. D. Medina Lasansky, architecture, signs her new book, The Renaissance: Revised Expanded Unexpurgated in Sibley Hall Tuesday.

Mayor Svante Myrick ’09 says the city is not responsible for the repeated delays to the Commons. Instead, he blames the New York State Electric and Gas Corporation.

In an interview with WHCU Radio Tuesday, Myrick said NYSEG is permitted to upgrade their services lines whenever the opportunity arises, as was the case with the Commons redesign.

Yet, according to

Myrick, the city was unable to get NYSEG to work more quickly, causing the city to fall behind on the project.

“They weren’t working for us; they’re working for a contractor,” Myrick said. “We told them we needed them to move faster; they just couldn’t or wouldn’t do it.”

After spending months of “wrangling” with the corporation to get a meeting with someone “high up,” Myrick said he was finally able to ask for NYSEG to

increase their commitment to the Commons project.

Another problem for the city, which has received criticism from business owners and Ithacans alike over the project’s delays, in communicating with NYSEG also exists, according to Myrick.

“The local crews couldn’t act without approval from their corporate office, which is now in Spain,” he said of NYSEG, which is a subSee MYRICK page 5

2 THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014

Today

Wednesday, October 8, 2014

weather FORECAST

Daybook Today

Hunt on for 1.5-Ton Gargoyles Missing From Church

The Sex of Genocide: Armenian Women And Their Children During and After World War I 4:30 p.m., 106 White Hall

Tomorrow National Student Day at the Cornell Store Noon - 2:00 p.m., Cornell Store Elections, Democracy and Levels of Education 2:30 - 4:00 p.m., G08 Uris Hall

WORCESTER, Mass. (AP) — Church officials and preservationists are trying to figure out what happened to several 1.5-ton gargoyles from a Massachusetts church.

The church in Worcester is a one-fifth scale replica of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. It was built in the 1890s and was formerly known as the Chestnut Street Congregational Church. It now is owned by an Assembly of God congregation and is on the market for $2.5 million.

Burglar Caught in the Act Offers to Share Heroin

Farm to You: 9th Annual Fall Harvest Dinner 4:00 - 8:30 p.m., Robert Purcell Community Center Foreign Policy Distinguished Speaker Series Judge Song Sang-Hyun, “Preventive Potential of the International Criminal Court” 4:30 - 6:00 p.m., Goldwin Smith Hall, Lewis Auditorium

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — Prosecutors in Montana say a man caught leaving a house he had apparently burglarized apologized to the homeowner and offered him some heroin.

The Billings Gazette reports Christopher Dayell Bittner made an initial court appearance Monday on felony bur-

Professor David Román University of Southern California Lecture 1: “Relevance, or the Case of Clifford Odets” Wednesday, October 8, 2014 4:30-5:30 p.m.

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Lecture 2: “The Hydrants are Open: Latinos on Broadway in the 21st Century” Thursday, October 9, 2014 4:30-5:30 p.m.

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glary and drug possession charges.

Authorities say the homeowner and his 7-year-old son came home as Bittner was leaving Saturday. Yellowstone County Attorney Paul Adam says Bittner apologized and offered the drug. He was found nearby, and court records say a search of his backpack turned up 31.5 grams of heroin, drug paraphernalia and items belonging to the homeowner.

Texas Man Impersonates Cop to Real Police Officer MIDLAND, Texas (AP) — A 41-year-old Midland, Texas, man got a surprise when he tried to impersonate a police officer and berate a fellow driver. The driver he chastised was a police detective.

Eleazar Cisneros confronted a driver, said he was a police officer and complained about being cut off in the parking lot of a burger joint.

When Cisneros was asked to show his police identification, he said he was working under cover.

Cisneros subsequently said he was in a police academy, then acknowledged that his connection to policing was limited to taking some criminal justice classes, according to an arrest affidavit examined by the Midland ReporterTelegram.

NEWS

Sesquicentennial Grove To Be Dedicated Next Week

By PAULINA GLASS Sun Contributor

To celebrate Cornell’s upcoming sesquicentennial, a commemorative grove on Libe Slope displaying key moments in University’s history will be dedicated next Friday.

The grove features a timeline of events significant to the University, including the 1969 Willard Straight takeover and Cornell securing the winning bid to build Cornell Tech on Roosevelt Island in New York City.

Prof. Isaac Kramnick, government, who envisioned the idea for the monument, said he hopes the grove will capture the spirit of the University.

“I wanted some permanent legacy of the sesquicentennial that had words embodying the special spirit, character and history of this very unique University,” he said.

According to Kramnick, planning for the grove was spearheaded by a series of committees that included “faculty, students, … trustees and alumni.”

Though the idea for the grove was first conceived in 2010, planning for its

creation began recently, according to Kramnick. He said a competition for the the grove’s design was held and wone by Weiss/Manfredi, an architectural design firm based in New York City co-founded

by Michael Manfredi M.Arch. ’80.

“It was they who came up with the location on the top of Libe Slope on a direct line with the statues of A. D. White and Ezra Cornell and with the idea of benches with quotations and the historical timeline underfoot,” Kramnick said.

Additionally, a small committee headed by Kramnick selected the content that is featured on the grove.

Kramnick said the committee, over the course of a year, selected 15 quotations for the benches and 26 dates for the historical timeline.

The only major challenge in constructing the grove was ensuring it is accessible to handicapped individuals, according to Kramnick.

“Our desire to make it accessible to people on wheel chairs added some difficulty, but it was well worth the effort.” he said.

Kramnick added that the monument’s

THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014 3

MANDY TENG / SUN STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Benches of history | The Sesquicentennial Grove, located behind the statue of Ezra Cornell, will be dedicated in a ceremony coinciding with Cornell’s Homecoming next Friday.

dedication ceremony will be part of a series of Homecoming events, and the monument itself will serve as a permanent reminder of sesquicentennial festivities.

“I hope that it will become in its way not just a physical legacy of the sesquicentennial celebration, but almost a hallowed spot where present and future Cornellians, visitors and neighbors from ‘the bustling town’ below can forever come to experience the spirit and history of this very special place,” he said.

Kramnick also said one of the goals of

the project is to educate members of the community about Cornell’s history in a memorable and permanent way.

Sophie Cheung ’18 said she was excited to learn more about Cornell history.

“I actually don’t know a lot about Cornell’s history,” she said. “But Libe Slope is a really ideal location for [the monument] because it’s pretty and many people will go there anyway and be able to take advantage of it.”

Paulina Glass can be reached at prg73@cornell.edu.

Ruttledge discusses travels, path to teaching at Cornell PHOTOS BY MICHELLE FELDMAN / SUN SENIOR EDITOR

By ANDREW SHI Sun Staff Writer

Prof. Thomas Ruttledge, chemistry, said he never expected to become a professor at Cornell.

“I have the most circuitous path to Cornell that I think has ever existed,” he said. “If you had asked me at age 18, or even after grad school, what I would be doing when I was 50, never in my life would I say teaching at Cornell.”

Ruttledge — a Cornell faculty member since 2007 — currently serves as a senior lecturer and the director of Undergraduate Advising in the chemistry department.

A world traveler who has visited 73 countries, Ruttledge grew up in a Detroit suburb, which he said lacked diveristy. He added that he would experience something new when he later matriculated at Wayne State University, a school that he said is very ethnically diverse.

“It kind of opened my eyes that

there was a different world out there,” Ruttledge said.

After receiving his graduate degree from the University of Chicago and taking a position teaching at Ursinus College in Philadelphia, Ruttledge said he was invited to teach at Cornell during the summer sessions and later in temporary positions beginning the fall 2001 academic year.

“It was an amazing experience,” he said. “I didn’t think I’d ever been back east.”

When the University offered him a full-time position, he said he initially was afraid that Cornell — unlike the small colleges he previously worked at

— was too big to allow for close interactions and relationships between student and professor.

“What I worried about was moving to a school that was too big and that the students would not care to develop any relationships with me,” he said.

However, he said the large number of students he taught at Cornell who chose to stay in touch with him via email later dismissed this fear.

“I thought back to the kids — who I am in contact with, three years after graduation, five years after graduation — there was a huge number of Cornell students who had decided to retain me in their lives,” he said.

Ruttledge said that he was initially intimidated by the prospect of standing in front of 800 students in a lecture hall, something he had never had to do before coming to Cornell.

“I’m always scared when I teach,” he said. “I figure I’ll retire the day that I’m no longer scared on the first day

because that’s the day it’s got boring to me, on some level.”

As a house fellow at the Alice Cook house on West Campus, Ruttledge said he regularly attends House dinner on Wednesday nights, dedicating it as “a time to get to know students.”

Ruttledge’s office in Baker Lab contains several postcards from the 48 states and 73 countries that he said he has visited.

“Travel teaches a lot about human nature,” he said.

Ruttledge also claims to be one of the most avid bikers in Ithaca. From February to December last year, he said he biked 14,286 miles. On any given day, he said he bikes around 50 miles — 15 of which are to and from work.

From his frequent international travels alone, Ruttledge said he is able to speak some Swahili, Spanish, French, German and Dutch.

He added that he knows some cities — like Paris — so well that he no longer needs to bring a map to navigate them.

Ruttledge added finds himself taking the long way and enjoying life’s journey.

“Get on a train, even though you don’t know where it’s going,” he said.

“All you need is a smile and a willingness to ask for help.”

Andrew Shi can be reached at ashi@cornellsun.com.

4 THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014

NEWS

HangIt Service to Launch in December Officials: Hookup Apps HANGIT

Continued from page 1

“The consumer doesn’t have to do anything.

If they have one of the apps on their phone that’s in our network ... then even without that app open they will get the notifications,” Gal said.

“Whether it’s a social message, an informational message from one of the many app developers that will use it or an advertisement, it will always be displayed the same way.”

According to Gal, HangIt will be free and simple for businesses to integrate into their apps: One only has to visit HangIt’s website and implement its software development kit. Clients are only charged when a customer is redirected to their business from a notification, Gal said.

“The whole advertising market online and mobile has been focused on ads and impressions,” he said. “Our whole focus is on bringing [businesses] customers. They only pay us when we bring them a customer or move a customer from one place to another that comes to their location instead of another, and we measure that.”

Gal added that several companies are already on board to use HangIt upon launch. The first year of operations will be sustained by the $6.2 million seed fund from Vesta, a company that contributed a team of engineers to develop the prototype for the service.

Gal said he plans for HangIt — which is headquartered in New York City — to become a “global platform.”

“HangIt is built from the ground up to work anywhere in the world, in the U.S. to start with,” he said. “We’ve basically taken the whole world and divided it up into very small, tight tiles and created an ability for a marketer, an advertiser or a messenger to pick where they want to hang things in that world … schedule when they appear, to whom they want to target them.”

Gal said he currently does not know what geographic location will use the app most fre-

quently.

“My guess is that the suburban areas in the United States will be the best areas for HangIt, where there’s a lot there and you’re driving anyway,” he said. “But what I see in places like San Francisco and New York is this incredible adoption curve. If people fall in love with it in one of those cities, it could grow fastest there.”

Gal, a member of the executive team for the University’s eLab program, said that Cornell had a large effect on the platform’s creation.

According to Gal, he met Hogg because they were both professors.

Gal said that the idea of starting a new business was not encouraged when he was an undergraduate.

“When I went to school at Cornell entrepreneurship was almost a bad word; there were not many people who said they wanted to be entrepreneurs,” Gal said. “Today what we see are classes and eLab where we teach [entrepreneurship]. What we’re seeing is with very limited resources students are building businesses.”

Gal — who has been involved with five startups — said he hopes HangIt will be especially useful for student entrepreneurs who are trying to leverage businesses with little capital and in short amounts of time.

“We want to put this in the hand of any student anywhere and say, ‘You can do something amazing in this location,’ and maybe it takes you a couple of days,” Gal said. “We provide the full service, all you do is link to our SDK and you can do these amazing, delightful things.”

Gal added he is “excited” to see how various app developers will use the HangIt platform.

“Our goal is to be the biggest location-based network in the world,” Gal said. “I can’t predict it, but that’s what you do when you put something in the hands of a large number of developers, is they build really amazing things.”

Noah Rankin can be reached at nrankin@cornellsun.com.

Carry Psychological, Physiological Risks HOOK-UP

said. “Be more aware and recognize that sometimes within these apps we don’t know the history of the cations for students’ sexual health. person you might be hooking up “Any sexual relationship, with — so be as proactive and proincluding hooking up with some- tective of your health as possible.”

This goes for all relationships, one, includes some element of risk,” Kutler said. “My colleagues whether initiated electronically or and I at Gannett encourage any formed organically, according to student to consider the element of Kutler.

“We’d be kidding ourselves if risk they’re comfortable taking and to take proactive steps to mitigate we didn’t acknowledge that hooking up with your best friend can be those risks.”

Brian Patchkoski, director of just as problematic as ‘swiping the LGBT Resource Center, said right’ on Tinder,” Kutler said. “Sex he has noticed an increased is complicated.”

While Gannett provides inforengagement with hook-up applications, especially for “people who mation and services on campus are just at the fringes of coming regarding sexual risks, resources are also available out” who may throughout the be looking to s u r ro u n d i n g explore their “Any sexual relationship, sexuality or including hooking up with area. Tompkins County was gender identity recently awardunder the pro- someone, includes some element of risk.” ed a $16,000 tection of state grant to anonymity.

Beth Kutler fund programs “There is to educate the not just one public about reason why someone would use these apps and syphilis and other sexually transwe must recognize that sexual mitted infections, as well as proexploration is a part of develop- vide testing and treatment, accordment — we just want all of our ing to a city announcement on students and community members Sept. 16.

One such project is the Peace of to be proactive and take good care of themselves and others,” he said. Mind Community Partnership, a Patchcoski also said these apps cooperative initiative by Cornell, can involve psychological or emo- Ithaca College, the Southern Tier tional risks in addition to the phys- AIDS Program, health services at ical risks that come with hooking Tompkins County Coummunity College, Planned Parenthood of up.

“These applications can allow the local and regional health people to be cruel, anonymously,” departments, according to Patchcoski said. “These apps Gannett. The campaign strives to sometimes trivialize people’s iden- encourage testing for syphilis and other STIs, she said. tities to certain factors,” he said.

“While some STDs can be However, he said he does not want to disparage these network- cured, others cannot,” Kutler said. ing applications, acknowledging “Comprehensive STI screening, that they are ways for people to based on individual risk factors, make connections and explore as should be done routinely for all sexually active individuals.” one develops their identities.

“If you are going to be utilizing these apps, make sure you commu- Talia Jubas can be reached at nicate with the other partner,” he tjubas@cornellsun.com.

Continued from page 1

THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014 5

NEWS

CALS Outlines New Academic Goals Mayor: NYSEG Responsible CALS

Continued from page 1

Boor said she believes this year is an appropriate time to begin a new plan.

“We are at a point now where we need to be thinking about the coming years,” Boor said.

According to the plan, the new initiative is aimed at achieving 10 overarching goals within four broad areas of interest: the academic stature of the college’s programs, engaged learning and research, a “broadly inclusive” scholarly community and control of the college’s resources.

Boor added the most important goal of the plan is that of further enhancing the academic stature of agriculture college programs.

Boor added the second goal of engaged learning and research is “something that is near and dear to our land grant mission” and intends to increase community engagement by making the ideas of agriculture college programs more accessible to the general public.

“The goal in everything that we do is always to have in mind the needs of the public and to ensure that what we’re doing helps meet those kinds of public objectives,” Boor said.

The plan aims to initially address 20 objectives, out of a total of over 50, in the 2014-15 school year. According to the plan, one of these 20 objectives is to “develop and implement effective strategies for recruiting underrepresented minority graduate students to Cornell.”

“In a perfect world, we would have a population within our college that mirrors our national population,” Boor said. “We aim to have a population among our students that is much more reflective of that.”

Boor said current undergraduate students in the agriculture college can look forward to “greatly increased” research opportunities.

“I think that we will be seeing, even in the very short run,

greatly increased opportunities for engaged learning and research,” Boor said. “That’s something that we will be able to implement in the short run. I think those opportunities will be emerging as quickly as we can make them happen.”

Boor said another change in the plan that current students can expect to see implemented soon is increasing the diversity of newly hired faculty in the college.

“Students will be seeing changes quickly … in the process of hiring new faculty,” Boor said. “Any time we bring on new faculty, there are opportunities for students to interact with them, to take courses with them, to do research with them.”

One goal of the new strategic outline is to adapt college curricula to become more interdisciplinary and “more responsive to changing student and societal needs,” according to the plan.

In accordance with this goal, the college has worked with partners at Cornell to establish the University-wide business minor. The minor was introduced in spring 2013 and is available to all Cornell undergraduate students.

Boor said she thought the business minor was a “tremendous addition” to Cornell and the agriculture school, specifically.

“Its objective is to ensure that those who are majoring in something else entirely — which could be coming from communications, food science, animal science — have the vocabulary of business,” Boor said.

She added that one focus of the new strategic plan is to help students think of their education in broader terms.

“It’s inevitable that as we look to the future, our students need to think of themselves as global citizens,” Boor said. “I think as business moves international, as communications moves internationally, our students need to have a comfort

with travel.”

Boor added that it is “very important” for undergraduate students to have opportunities to travel to areas with limited resources.

“I think there’s nothing more important to humankind than being able to imagine what it is like to be in another person’s shoes,” Boor said. “I think that the opportunity for students to have those experiences and to establish empathy for people from other places is really important as we think of ourselves as global citizens.”

According to Boor, the new plan has been under construction for one year and was a joint effort between administrative officials and a strategic planning committee.

“That committee was absolutely essential for vetting all of the ideas that are now available,” Boor said. “I am very deeply grateful to the people who spent a full year working on this plan.”

Boor said that having a new plan is itself an important step in helping the college progress in coming years.

“In terms of what I’m most looking forward to, having a plan is something that is really important to me,” Boor said.

“It’s very gratifying to have a plan that has the support of our CALS community.”

Zoe Ferguson can be reached at zferguson@cornellsun.com.

For Construction Delays

Commons end date postponed until 2015 struction season in November, pushing the finish date again to the spring.

Business owners pleaded sidiary of the Spanish compawith the city’s Common ny Iberdrola.

Myrick said that NYSEG Council last week, expressing cost Ithaca “a lot of time [and] their concerns about how the a lot of months of prime con- delays were negatively affecting their downtown businessstruction season.”

The Commons redesign es. Myrick said in his interview that project was he has initially s i n c e scheduled “It looks like everybody is reached to be comstruggling, but some folks out to pleted in more busiJune, but were just better prepared nesses to was postsee how the poned to for the construction.” construcNovember Mayor Svante Myrick ’09 tion is in part due affecting to NYSEG them. and the “It looks like everybody is truck crash at the Simeon’s struggling, but some folks Restaurant in June.

“We waited weeks and were just better prepared for weeks just for [NYSEG] to get the construction and better started, which put construc- prepared to ride it out,” tion on a full stop,” Myrick Myrick said.

The city will hold a meetsaid. “When they started, they were working with one small ing Thursday for merchants to crew. Again they had to put in continue to express their cona request in the corporate cerns and potential solutions office in Spain, which took on how to mitigate the construction’s effects, Myrick said. some time.”

Yet last week, it was announced that the west end of the Commons would not be Tyler Alicea can be reached at paved by the end of the con- managing-editor@cornellsun.com.

MYRICK

Continued from page 1

OPINION

The Corne¬ Daily Sun

Amiri Banks |

Ostentatious Is Ostentatious and Obfuscate Obfuscates

Independent Since 1880 132ND EDITORIAL BOARD HALEY VELASCO ’15 Editor in Chief

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Editorial

End the Commons Construction Delays LAST WEEK, THE CITY OF ITHACA ANNOUNCED THAT the construction on the Ithaca Commons was delayed again and is now slated to be completed in 2015, almost a year-and-a-half behind its original schedule.

Although the 200 block of E. State St. and Bank Alley will be paved by the years end, the 100 block on the west end of the Commons will remain unpaved and incomplete. We at The Sun believe that construction has gone on for too long, and it is time for the city to finish up the Common’s construction so that patrons can enjoy the area without obstruction, and so that business owners — who claim they have been negatively affected by the delays — and the local economy can recover.

In May 2013, the city marked the beginning of the Commons redesign project, which required five years of planning and multiple sources of funding before it could begin. However, last semester, the city announced that amid budgetary restrictions, the project for the Commons was pushed back to and was to be slated to be completed this fall. In May, the city underwent general cost-cutting for the project in order to try and complete it. Another setback came this fall, when the project’s end date was pushed back again to spring 2015. In addition to the disadvantages of the delay on residents who enjoy the Commons recreationally, local downtown businesses have been seeing negative effects from the construction on the Commons.

Originally, the construction’s purpose was to restore and upgrade the downtown area. Restoration included creating even and safe surfaces to walk on, fixing the leaky water main to provide the capacity to support automatic sprinkler systems, establishing a refurbished telecommunication system and creating a more efficient TCAT bus loop. Overall, the changes to the Commons seemed like positive changes for the city, but have become a nuisance in the last 17 months.

We at The Sun believe that it is time for the city to step up and finish this lingering project so that the Commons can be completed, helping both residents and local businesses.

Guest Room

I

f neither of the titular words look explain it simply, you don’t understand it familiar to you, I’m glad. The first well enough.” There is a reason my word describes anything done with the Biology textbooks, written by all these intent of impressing or attracting notice. people with PhDs, are filled with simple The obscurity of the word itself seems to metaphors and straightforward examples. serve this purpose well. The second word At that point in your education, you’ve literally means “to make unclear,” and come to fully appreciate simplicity. does a wonderful job of complicating any Granted, scientific literature can be sentence you find it in. Today, I hope to another animal entirely and academia can express my opinion of big words, and why be highly pressurized. There are those times when the wording of my textbooks they are often pointless.

In January 2014, I was convinced that, is almost as dense as a paper, so it’s not all as a writer, I was the shit. I entered the sunshine and roses. But on a classroom second semester with a huge head, but one level, no professor with any merit willingreturned essay was all I needed for a reality ly confuses her or his students.

Everyone at this school is here for the check. In retrospect, my first essay was literally five pages of big words, fancy liter- same reason, no matter what anyone ary mechanisms and unclear critique of thinks. If someone shoots you a condethe author whose work we were tasked scending look because of how you’re talkwith analyzing. Many smart people com- ing, so be it. We’re all here, and no one is pare a well-written collegiate paper to a better than anyone else. I’m just as human as you. There is conversation. My much more to the paper was more world than a high akin to a UFC I would argue that most work GPA or a large fighter loudly here boils down to the ability to v o c a b u l a r y . asserting his domOutside of the inance on media express yourself and show intellectual circles day, or an illogical a healthy level of engagement and Ivy League presidential bubbles, there are debate. The two with course content. Anything literally billions of are frighteningly similar. I’ll return extra is, well, extra. Unnecessary. people who could not care less and, to this epic failure Superfluous. Kind of like my in many ways, a few times, but hypocritical use of that third know more. I’m let’s just say I not against spent the entire adjective just now. respecting talent, semester being but I feel that schooled in intimidation from peers can lead people humility. Then I went home.

My hometown of Decatur, Georgia is to play an unwinnable game of “who’s about 15 minutes from Atlanta and basi- smarter.”

To wit: Everything isn’t a competition. cally the polar opposite of Cornell in almost every way imaginable. I suppress a I doubt anyone’s grade or destiny is good 80 percent of this side of me while dependent on how smart they sound, how on campus, but not purely due to race or deep in thought they look when speaking some perceived ethnic barrier — I main- or how intensely they seem to grapple tain this suppression even amongst my with concepts. I would argue that most black friends. Rather, this switch results work here boils down to the ability to from the stark contrast between my past express yourself and show a healthy level background and my present environment. of engagement with course content.

I have become pretty adept at adjusting Anything extra is, well, extra. my speech to different settings. But like Unnecessary. Superfluous. Kind of like the overconfident Amiri from last semes- my hypocritical use of that third adjective ter, some people translate their yearning just now.

My message to fellow Cornellians is a for recognition into ridiculously overcomsimple one: act natural. I have a natural plicated comments in class.

Let your words demonstrate your tendency towards formality when I speak, knowledge, but only to an extent. which becomes more pronounced in the Attempts to make your presence felt classroom. Still, I’d like to think I know beyond this threshold often rub people where to draw the line or when to just say the wrong way, especially since we’re all nothing at all. An aura of vanity can envestill just a bunch of naïve college kids. lope someone who is trying too hard and When you take yourself too seriously, you leak out of the classroom into your interare no longer a smart kid and have actions with people in more casual setbecome a smart ass. Using the right words tings. Not a fun time.

We all have to change it up for differin the right ways to make a point is great.

Using other words just because they exist ent settings; I know this well. But when catering your words to an audience, please is much more unappealing.

I know what I’m good at. I don’t need be honest with yourself about why you’re to prove it to anyone but myself, and doing so. Hopefully, you won’t pretenmaybe a few potential employers in the tiously employ the locution that most future. So if I sound a little formal some- ostentatiously corroborates your thesis, time, this is just a byproduct of my confi- obfuscating your missive. Hopefully, dence in my ability to express myself. you’ll just state your claim.

However, the line between confidence and narcissism is about as thin as can be. Tread carefully, or you run the risk of entering Banks is a sophomore in the College of Agriculture dangerous territory (i.e. my FWS endeav- Amiri and Life Sciences. He may be reached at abanks@corors.) nellsun.com. Guest Room appears periodically this To quote Albert Einstein: “If you can’t semester.

THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014 7

OPINION

Christo Eliot |

O

The Tale of the Dingo at Midnight

Billy Lenkin |

In the Security Line

Skid Marks

n one of the first nights of my freshman year at Cornell, the entire class of 2015 was treated to a nice lobster dinner in RPCC. It was as if the University was trying to tell us, “Welcome! It is all going to be okay … but you belong to me now.”

None of us really seemed to mind; our new overlord seemed benevolent and was willing to (allegedly) raise the price of lobster by two dollars per pound on the East Coast to make us feel at home. Three years later, the overlord seems more and more like a traditional overlord.

The point of this is not to say that Cornell infiltrates into every aspect of your life (it does), but rather to point out the fact that the next year and all the following years, no class was treated to shellfish quite like we were. I bring this up in order to a) rub it in all nonseniors’ faces and to b) point out that even in the past four years Cornell has changed a lot.

Before any of us got here, Cornell saw a lot of history. In the past 150 years, some of the brightest people in the world have studied, lectured, researched, written and performed at Cornell. Although they may not be off to a great start this year and the outlook may be bleak, if our football team manages to squeak into the new college football playoff, they would be competing for their sixth national championship. (If you haven’t bought your ticket to the big homecoming game yet, don’t worry; tickets are free.) The streets in Collegetown are made to the exact width of a horse-drawn buggy, the Grateful Dead made their best live recording ever in Barton Hall in 1977 and the guy from Workaholics went to Dunbars last spring.

During my time at this school, I have seen the birth of a new campus on the island of an abandoned leper colony (I think) in New York City, the fences replaced by nets, THREE visits from Bill Nye ’77, one actual sighting of Bill Nye and countless other landmark events

Before any of us got here, Cornell saw a lot of history. In the past 150 years, some of the brightest people in the world have studied, researched, written and performed at Cornell.

— some of them kind of disappointing. They moved spring break so that it aligned with nobody else’s spring break and forced us to contend with even more challenging winter weather. They added a February break three weeks into spring semester leading to a shortened study period. Concerts like Ke$ha and the Flaming Lips now take place on Sunday nights. Obviously “Ke$ha: Live at Barton Hall 2012” was never going to be the game-changing album it was supposed to be if it is recorded on a Sunday night.

I think all of these changes (maybe not the Tech campus, nets, Bill Nye visits or calendar changes) can all be traced back to September of 2012: Avicii for Homecoming. The concert was madness. The Swede “played” electronic music for roughly four hours. Six students were taken to the hospital. Barton Hall was physically damaged. And perhaps most notoriously, somebody pooped in the bleachers.

Just who did evacuate their bowels in the bleachers of Barton Hall that fateful night in September? What compelled them to do it? How did they wipe? These were just some of the questions posed by the phantom pooper. They never struck again, leaving these burning questions unanswered.

On the east side of Beebe Lake is a small, 572 person “census-designated place” called Forest Home. If you have ever visited, you have probably seen a green and white street sign that reads, “Forest Home Settled 1794.” Every time you go to an early-to-mid 1790’s party, you could be dressing like someone who 220 years ago lived less than a mile or so from where you live now. Sixty-one years later, Ezra Cornell summoned all of the cranes in the world, parked them on East Avenue, and opened our lovely institution for business.

In the 150 years since, Cornell has been operating and developing a relationship with its people. In the most recent years, Cornell has lost trust in its students. I really can’t blame the school for implementing some of the changes it did. Hazing is illegal; we were told not to haze and we kept hazing. We scheduled a superstar techno concert, sent six kids to the hospital and literally took a dump on Barton Hall. We were given (kind of ) free lobster, and not all of us said “Thank you.” In response, we lost the Saturday concerts, a logical spring semester calendar and senior week. I hope the beginning of Elizabeth Garrett’s tenure as President for our school will be characterized by a constant dialogue between the administration and the students. After screening 200 candidates, the Board of Trustees’ faith in Garrett to lead our school leaves me hopeful that the school will be in good hands. Most of us like our Cornell overlord. It gives us Slope Day, a wonderful education and, if you’re lucky, lobster.

Christo Eliot is a senior in the College of Engineering. He can be reached at celiot@cornellsun.com. The Tale of the Dingo at Midnight appears alternate Wednesdays this semester.

Samantha Weisman |

A Weisman Once Said

Any Person, Any Study, But Not Just Any Woman O

n September 30, the sities — should have had a Cornell University female leader by now.

Board of Trustees unanRegardless — or should I imously appointed Elizabeth say, “Irregardless,” in honor of Garrett to be the next President the 10 year anniversary of of Cornell. Some of you are Mean Girls — Cornell has probably sick of seeing head- taken the right step with lines like this in The Daily Sun, appointing a woman to be its and even in the New York next President. We can celeTimes, but I don’t care. From brate that. Any person, any what I have learned about her study, any leader! But Elizabeth thus far, she deserves the head- Garrett is not just any woman. lines.

She has an incredible list of Campus was buzzing last credentials and accomplishTuesday afternoon after the ments, that are certainly not announcement, and everyone limited to, but include serving was excitedly celebrating the as the provost and senior vice appointment of a woman to the president for academic affairs position. In case you missed it at USC, being appointed to the — or ICYMI, my new favorite Advisory Panel on Federal Tax popular internet term — Ms. Reform by former President Garrett is the first woman to assume the Cornell presi- Cornell has taken the right step with dency. I don’t appointing a woman to be its next President. know how you would have, We can celebrate that. Any person, any t h o u g h , study, any leader! But Elizabeth Garrett is because that is not just any woman. what everyone seemed to be saying, commenting, tweeting and posting George W. Bush, clerking for following the press conference. former Supreme Court Justice And then, no one really said Thurgood Marshall and workmuch else. ing for former Governor David Don’t get me wrong. This Boren. She is also an accomnews is amazing. It is a huge plished lawyer — Cornell’s secstep for our university and it ond president to hold a J.D. makes me proud to be a woman after 11th president Jeff at Cornell. It strikes me as odd, Lehman ’77 (thanks Corey though, that once people cele- Earle!) — and has authored brated this accomplishment, more than 50 articles, book many did not continue to learn chapters and essays. about why she was appointed When I listened to the buzz — besides the unusual fact that about Ms. Garrett’s appointshe is a woman. ment, much of it was about the I say unusual because fact that she is our first woman Cornell is the sixth Ivy League president. There was still some school to be lead by a woman, talk about her history, but most and keep in mind that there are of the people I interacted with only eight (Columbia and or overheard either talked about Dartmouth really need to get it how wonderful it is, or simply together...). Ms. Garrett is stated the headline and Cornell’s 13th president, which switched topics. is not that many when you conIf our next president were a sider how many years we have man, my guess is that people’s been in existence — ICYMI, it’s first questions after hearing the 150. Still, it seems like Cornell announcement would be, — one of the more progressive “What has he accomplished?” of the Ivies and of most univer- While it is outstanding that we

now have a female president, after the initial celebration, I wish people had yearned to learn more.

I am sure many people did read up on Ms. Garrett, and do know her credentials and how incredible of an appointment she is for the position.

However, to the people who read the headline and only thought of the history we are making with her sex and not necessarily with her, I urge you to learn more. I implore you to consider the fact that Ms. Garrett is more than just a different gender from our previous presidents — that she is incredibly impressive and, as board chairman Robert Harrison ’76 put it, “the most perfect person” for the job.

Like I said, Ms. Garrett’s appointment makes me proud to be a C o r n e l l woman. Her leadership will follow in the footsteps of other incredible Cornell women, like Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg ’54, Vice President for Student and Academic Services Susan Murphy ’73 Ph.D. ’94 and so many more.

Nonetheless, the fact that she is a woman should not overshadow her other achievements or be the only reason we should look forward to her term.

I am excited to see how Ms. Garrett propels the University forward even further, and how her leadership will inspire even more outstanding individuals to make a difference. More importantly, however, I wonder if she will have a burger at Trillium with me...

Samantha Weisman is a senior in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

She may be reached at sweisman@cornellsun.com. A Weisman Once Said appears alternate Wednesdays this semester.

8 THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014

SCIENCE

Entomology

Citizen Science

Prof. Arthur Agnello Can Safely Remove Bugs From Trees

By SUZY PARK Sun Contributor

The use of pesticides to eliminate insect pests on fruit trees is common throughout the world. To reduce the amount of damage and harm conventional pesticides pose to the environment, Prof. Arthur Agnello ’74, entomology, is looking at ways to produce high quality fruits without the use of toxic substances. Working at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, Agnello says his job is to make pest-management suggestions to the New York fruit industry.

“We provide guidance and recommendations about the best ways to use pesticides, the timing, the decision making that is involved in what kind of pesticides to use at what time, so the broad focus of my research is to test season-long management programs that incorporate many different kinds of pest management approaches against a whole range of pests in orchards,” Agnello said.

According to Agnello, in the eyes of the United States Environmental Protection Agency, any product that attacks or kills a pest, disease or pathogen is considered a pesticide, no matter what it is composed of or what environmental implications it has.

“Pest management methods all have to be registered by the EPA with an EPA number and they have to go through regulatory scrutiny, testing against non-target species and such,” Agnello said. “If a peanut butter and jelly sandwich was found to be a good way of killing an insect pest in an orchard, in order to sell it as a product, you would have to register it as a pesticide. It’s one of those things, it’s the way the system is set up.”

Historically, pesticides have been artificially-derived, toxic materials that posed great harm not only to the immediate surroundings, but also to those working on the orchard. However, according to Agnello, since new legislation and programs to raise awareness on the dangers of pesticides came about in the 1970s, the focus has been shifting to produce less environmentally-harmful, but just as effective, methods against pests.

“Most commercial pesticides come out of the laboratory, basically,” Agnello said.

Ingredients for conventional pesticides derive from organisms such as soil microbes, fungi or bacteria, which are then purified and chemically modified to become more effective against pests, according to Agnello.

The move away from toxic pesticides has shed light on organic production methods. According to Agnello, organically produced materials are frequently treated with pesticides, despite popular belief — the difference

is that materials used in organic productions have not been chemically modified or enhanced. However, organic production methods have their own drawbacks.

“The problem is that these natural products tend not to be quite as active and not as effective as the chemically modified formulations that come out of the laboratory.

So it is much more difficult to kill an insect pest or kill a disease pathogen using them, than you would with a conventional pesticide that would not be registered for use in organic production,” Agnello said.

Agnello said his research on non-toxic ways to produce fruits aims to find pest-regulating methods that are effective but not harmful to the environment. Agnello said he believes one of the most promising non-toxic methods is pheromone disruption.

According to Agnello, pheromones are chemical compounds that are produced by an animal and released outside the body to the surrounding environment. In pestmanagement, sex pheromones, usually produced by the female insect, are the primary focus of research. When the female insect releases pheromones into the air, the male of the species detects it through its antennae and uses it to locate the female so that they can mate.

“The intent has been to identify what these chemical compounds are so that we can synthesize copies of them, artificially, and then use them for various pest management purposes,” Agnello said.

Pheromone disruption, in combination with other traditional and organic production methods, has been very effective against certain insect species and provides a great outlook on non-pesticidal insect management, according to Agnello.

“If we release very large quantities of these pheromones into the orchards, the canopy ... then it completely saturates the air that is around the trees, so the male moth looking for a female can’t find the female because every place it goes it is smelling or detecting this pheromone,” Agnello said. “It is disrupting the communication between the male and female moths so that they don’t find each other and mate.”

Through further research and experimentation, Agnello said he hopes to improve the non-pesticidal methods so that its effects are exclusive to targeted species.

“Selectivity, I think, is the holy grail of pest management science, just trying to focus your management decisions on specific species that are in the ecosystem, without bothering everything else, or anything else,” Agnello said. “It’s kind of like having an ideal medicine that only attacks the disease and doesn’t have any side

COURTESY OF PROF. ARTHUR AGNELLO

Magic wand | This twin-tube pheromone dispenser is used

by Prof. Arthur Agnello ’74, entomology, to spread female insect pheromone in orchards to confuse males and prevent mating.

effects. It is very hard to do in medicine, and also very hard to do in agriculture.”

For the rest of us who are not actively fighting pests and diseases out in the front, Agnello said he has a small wish.

“I would be hopeful that more people would take the opportunity to become more familiar with where their food comes from and how it’s produced,” he said. “It is not very straight forward and not as simple-minded as often portrayed in the media, the popular press. It’s very easy to get misdirected in terms of things that are really important about production of food and pest management.”

Suzy Park can be reached at jp779@cornell.edu.

COURTESY OF PROF. ARTHUR AGNELLO

Spread the love | Researchers in the lab of Prof. Arthur Agnello ’74, entomology, spray female insect pheromones in an apple orchard. Agnello said using pheromones is a promising new method of pest control that is not toxic to farm workers and the environment as conventional pesticides have been in the past.

THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014 9

SCIENCE

Lab of O. Study Finds Citizen Scientists Are Major Contributors to Climate Studies

By SHIRA POLAN Sun Staff Writer

Global climate change is a hot topic of study for scientists in many fields, including ornithologists, who observe changes in bird behavior to see the impact of climate change on bird populations.

However, they do not work alone — much of the data used in such studies comes from ordinary bird watchers, who often go uncredited for their efforts, according to a recent study from the Lab of Ornithology.

“We had long suspected that a lot of what we know about global climate change comes from citizen science,” said Caren Cooper, a research associate in the Bird Population Studies and Citizen Science Programs at the Lab of Ornithology. “Most studies of climate change require long-term data sets and citizen science is one of the best ways to get these data. Also, these studies often required data sets across broad geographic areas, which is one of the advantages of citizen science — there are people everywhere.”

“Citizen science” refers to the involvement of the public in collecting data for science research. According to Cooper, citizen scientists may do anything from counting sea turtles on a beach to sampling microbes on a door handle.

“In pretty much any field you can imagine, there are people who make observations and are willing to share them,” Cooper said.

Cooper and her colleagues at the Lab

of Ornithology published a study in September that determined how often citizen science participation is acknowledged in journals.

“We had suspected that a lot of what we know came from citizen science but we didn’t know how to show it, since we also knew most people don’t use the term,” Cooper said. “So we couldn’t just search the literature for citizen science.”

In the study, the researchers analyzed a scientific review paper on climate change in which the authors evaluated the strength of 10 different articles’ claims on changes in bird migratory patterns.

Cooper said she and her colleagues found that half of these 10 papers utilized data gathered by citizen science participants on average.

“The number varied though, one claim had 20 percent citizen science data and another had 75 percent,” Cooper said.

“That was the first time we could put some kind of estimate of the magnitude of the contribution citizen science is making to our understanding of this one area.”

The study also found that there was no relation between the strength of the claim made by a study and the use of citizen science data, so the use of citizen science had no effect on the reliability of the research.

“Some of the claims that had the most support, in expert opinion, were the ones that used citizen science,” Cooper said.

“We also noticed that not one of the papers used the term ‘citizen science.’”

According to Cooper, not only was citizen science not mentioned in the papers, some of the authors were unaware of

where their data originated.

“One of the authors just said that it was publicly available data and he had no idea how it was collected,” Cooper said.

“So we showed that citizen science was very prevalent and important to what we know, and that it wasn’t explicitly acknowledged as citizen science in a way that can easily evaluate its impact on science research.”

Cooper said part of the reason for this lack of acknowledgement is the relative newness of ‘citizen science’ as a term, which had just been added to the Oxford English Dictionary this past year. The concept of using members of the public to collect data is nothing new.

“A lot of projects have been really long term. Christmas Bird Count started in 1900, and people have been monitoring weather stations since just after the Civil War,” Cooper said. “It was happening in all these different fields at all these different times, but it wasn’t seen as all the same thing. The term citizen science is starting to make us realize how someone monitoring water pollution isn’t that different from someone counting birds [or] someone watching for the next supernova.”

The Lab of Ornithology at Cornell hosts a number of citizen science-driven projects.

“Project Feederwatch, Nestwatch and eBird are set up for birdwatchers to contribute their observations over a long period of time,” Cooper said.

As part of these projects, members of the public report the species they’ve seen, when eggs are laid, when eggs hatch and

other useful information for ornithologists.

The Lab of Ornithology is among a large number of organizations that establish projects that use citizen science, according to Cooper.

“There are a lot of different organizations, academic, non-profit, government agencies, that run these kind of projects for people to aggregate their data together so that information can be used for science, conservation, management and sometimes to inform policy,” Cooper said.

In addition, communities occasionally begin their own citizen science projects, according to Cooper.

“Communities also start localized projects. They sometimes even ask scientists for input to improve their protocols,” she said. “There is a long history of that and in environmental justice movements, where people are concerned about pollutants in their environment and they’ll set out to monitor it themselves.”

Cooper said recognizing the contributions of citizen scientists in research is important for future research projects.

“We make a call in our paper for researchers to acknowledge citizen science if they use data collected by volunteers,” she said, “That would help us keep track of the use and impact of citizen science data, which I think is really important in terms of how we continue to refine and develop this method, just like any other method that’s used in research.”

Shira Polan can be reached at spolan@cornellsun.com.

A&E

10 | The Corne¬ Daily Sun | Wednesday, October 8, 2014

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT Art With a Conscience at Ithaca Falls DANNI SHEN Sun Contributor

Cave painting is brought to life by the unexpected use of construction lights and repurposed plastic bag bird sculptures in a stunning, interactive, multi-media outdoor installation by Jenn Houle grad. In a one-night, two-hour event on September 26, the artist combined colored lights, wind and history to create Featherlight (foul falls). The show’s namesake is borrowed from the Featherlight model shotgun, manufactured by Ithaca Gun Co. for over a century above Ithaca Falls.

Industrial pollutants lingered after the plant’s relocation, which then entered the ecosystem after contaminated animal remains were consumed by scavenger animals.

Hydropower fueled the first industries of the nation yet simultaneously polluted major river ways. As viewers of the spectacle, we are reminded of the impacts of rampant nation- and industry-building today. The Sun sat down with Houle after the exhibit to talk about her work, the history of Ithaca Falls and environmental activism in art.

T HE S UN : Tell me about this work in relation to the context of your practice as a whole, is this a continuation of previous works, how is it related?

J ENN HOULE: Since coming here I’ve done a few installations [in the Tjaden galleries] and I’ve been starting to use colored lights more with my animal sculptures. I’ve made bearskin out of plastic bags, a wolf tent you can crawl into. ... So the falls piece was thinking about how to create an environment with light where the sculptures have a place to exist.

S UN : And why the location of Ithaca Falls?

J.H.: The specific site has a history of contamination from Ithaca Gun Company, which had been at the top of the falls for 104 years. It closed in the 1980s but then left a ton of lead contaminants and other types of toxins behind. It was a superfund site, a brown site, which is a really big deal. In the early 2000s, the Environmental Protection Agency came and cleaned it up but they never finished it. They just

ran out of money. They literally vacuumed up the soil with huge vacuums, but then it just got left unfinished and it’s still polluted. It was crazy to me that that happened, and also because it’s been happening throughout the country like that: i.e. industries from the 1800s polluted waterways and the story just repeats endlessly. So I was thinking about these issues with the bald eagles [light props] in the installation. I also made some gold sculptures of the flag staff bald eagles on the trail that had lights shining out of their eyes, wearing necklaces made out of shotgun shells and bird claws, which all builds up into the narrative of this being about U.S. industry.

S UN : You mentioned that the event became participatory at one point because people were moving the bald eagle light props?

PHOTOS COURTESY OF JENN HOULE GRAD

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

J.H.: Yeah! That was awesome. I was so excited about that because when I tested them in August they were flapping around in the wind like crazy, but on the final installation night there was no wind so they weren’t moving without assistance. I ended up picking up one of the sculptures and moving it up and down so you could see the shadows moving throughout the gorge. I encouraged a few people to do the same and then people just started doing it. Kids were picking them up and dropping them.

They all have crushed claws now but that’s ok [laughs].

Also, I wanted this to function as a public art piece, but also not to fall into the bad stigma that public art can have … But I also knew that it was only going to exist for two hours so I wanted to get as many people there as possible and to get them to think about the issue, and maybe that could generate

some movement to finally finish the cleanup or put pressure on the mayor to do it.

Since environmental conditions are constantly changing, I’m going to try to repeat this installation in the winter when the falls freeze into huge icicles and possibly even in the spring, maybe with a painted projections instead of the huge lights.

S UN : Is it important that the work is visually a spectacle? The amount of people there really created the [spectacle] environment as well.

J.H.: That was interesting for me too because I wasn’t sure how many people would come, and then it became this enormous mass of people which became as much a part of the show as the show itself.

I liked that it created a kind of community, where people met people and could talk about the issue, or the work. And with the spectacle, the colored lights, I wanted to choose lights that were almost magenta, something false and unnatural in reference to the contamination. I also chose those lights because separately they were red and which further tied into the Americana theme, as well as this reference to cave painting via the lights and shadow as gesture.

S UN : Would you say your work functions as environmental activism?

J.H.: To some degree. I’m still figuring out where on the scale I want my work to be. I think it’s interesting to think about how people respond, the audience expectation. This was existing between four things: An art installation, borderline light show, public art piece and community event. I’ve always been interested in finding a way to talk about my experience of seeing change around me but not in an overt — I keep saying “political” — way, I’m not sure that the best word, but I’m also thinking about where my real interest lies. So obviously it’s the animals and that’s where I’m really concerned, is that there are so many animals out there that are being affected by this that have no voice. I’m not saying I’m speaking for the animals or anything but that’s what ties me into the work.

Featherlight (foul falls) was funded in part by the Cornell Council for the Arts with volunteer support from Friends of the Gorges. Look forward to future installations by Jenn Houle and for more information visit www.jennhoule.com.

0Danni Shen is a senior in the College of Architecture, Art and Planning. She can be reached at ds928@cornell.edu.

A&E

Wednesday, October 8, 2014 | The Corne¬ Daily Sun | 11

ABC’s ‘Less-Than-Legal’ Thursday Night

BY MADELINE DAY Sun Contributor

I’ve always wanted to be a lawyer. Or at least some part of me has while watching movies like Legally Blonde and My Cousin Vinny, because with the allure of a good murder mystery, who wouldn’t? But ABC’s recent pilot of its Thursday night show How to Get Away with Murder brings law into a newer, harsher light. There’s no time for fluff in Annalise Keating’s (Viola Davis) graduate law class. Both the series’ fantastically engrossing writing and the representation of Keating constitute the cold heart of the pilot, showing what it is to be “real lawyers,” even if that might very well mean letting guilty clients get away with their crimes.

Adrenaline is a key ingredient in the show, spiking even the first few seconds of screen time when an impossible task is brought to our new favorite students: Hiding a body. A few confounding time-skips later, we find out that these students met three months prior in Keating’s first lecture. Wes Gibbins (Alfred Enoch, Harry Potter’s Dean Thomas), Connor Walsh (Jack Falahee), Asher Millstone (Matt McGory, Orange is the New Black’s John Bennett), Michaela Pratt (Aja Naomi King) and Laurel Castillo (Karla Souza) are the five students picked on by their professor and given the chance to work at a law firm after winning a brief “think-outside-the-box” competition. Little did they know, they’d soon be involved in much more complicated problems than simply making it through their first class project.

“The initial idea came from the fact that I find my life very boring,” explains producer Pete Nowalk, known for his creative presence in Grey’s Anatomy and Private Practice. “Putting normal people in extreme circumstances [is] a theme that I find very appealing. So what’s more extreme than being a first-year law student who’s kind of innocent and naïve and being thrust into a murder?” The extreme is definitely what the viewers get. The show darts between hypercompetitive classroom scenes, riveting

“I

PHOTOS COURTESY OF ABC

arguments in the courtroom and every scandal in between. Unlike many movies and television spots where the actual law is almost completely lost, How to Get Away With Murder might just teach you something new. When a student brings in the drama and does some “less-thanlegal” reconnaissance, it’s only a matter of “getting creative” with newfound knowledge to win his case.

Dissimilar to other shows airing on ABC, romantic entanglements in How to Get Away With Murder take a backseat. There is so much else to focus on that the momentarily awkward flirting squeezed in here and there goes almost completely unnoticed — but that’s not to say that this smart thrill ride isn’t a sexy one as well. Here is where Viola Davis’ Oscar-nominated genius steals the show; Not only is Annalise Keating a hard-hitting and merciless attorney, she’s married and … not very happy about it, to say the least. When one of her students finds Keating in a compromising situation with the local police chief, Keating struggles to maintain her professionalism and integrity while also betraying her fears and romantic uncertainty with her hus-

band. It is as Keating states, with an acidulous look in her eye, “I spend most of my career dealing with professional liars, so you’re going to have to work really hard to fool me.”

But that leaves one central question from the first episode: In a collection of liars, whom can we actually trust? Despite Davis’ wonderfully layered portrayal of the professor, the show’s other characters are still left lacking. Keating is the absolute essence of the show, drawing potentially even too much attention to herself. Who else could we root for? The confused (and criminal) freshmen? The other ruthless class contenders? The disreputable defendant in a murder case? The show is supposedly an “ensemble drama,” but it’s missing the actual strength of the group.

The real dark, gleaming jewel of the pilot is the quick-witted and intelligent writing that is brought to light by a captivating cast. So many pressing questions are thrown immediately into the show’s audience, with just enough answers to keep the thought of the next episode tantalizing. After all, the very first words spoken by one of Keating’s new star students were, “You have no idea what you just walked in to.” But we have all season to figure it out.

Madeline Day is a freshman in the College of Arts and Sciences. She can be reached at mzd4@cornell.edu.

When Story Is Not Enough

never remember plots in movies,” Paul Thomas Anderson, director of There Will Be Blood and certified Big Deal, said before an attentive audience Sunday morning. According to Indiewire’s dispatch from the New York Film Festival, Anderson elaborated as follows: “I remember how [movies] make me feel and I remember emotions and I remember visual things that I’ve seen, but my brain can never connect the dots of how things go together.”

Note how Anderson, who I agree with, says “emotions,” and not themes, subtext or any other undercurrent that could be deemed intellectual and thus pretentious. It’s not a matter of reading into a film, at least not at first. Critics — those who write professionally and the rest of us who argue with friends over a film we just paid to see — look for meaning because we have to do something with those emotions a movie brings to the fore. Taking note of what Anderson calls “visual things” helps us comprehend those feelings, and tether them to some valuable lesson, but they stay with us longest when they are incomprehensible.

I wrote about similar matters in my last column, “How to Read a Movie,” where I detailed a few loose rules to which I hold the films I write about. I do not wish to repeat myself, but with Anderson’s comments and David Fincher’s adaptation of Gone Girl in the air, I would like to defend my first rule, “Story is not enough,” with a few more words. Because, you see, when faced with that standard, Gone Girl does plenty right but even more wrong.

I will not spoil the movie, but let me just get it out there that, regardless of whatever grievances I am about to air, you must see it.

Not only are movie people talking about it but also TV people, music people, you-sayI-get-to-see-Ben-Affleck’s-penis? people — all the peoples. For Gone Girl satisfies a basic human need, in that it tells a ridiculously engrossing murder mystery set in smalltown suburbia. Gillian Flynn, who wrote the best-selling novel and adapted it to screen, leads you to one assumption before blindsiding you with its inverse, and Fincher is so precise that even those familiar with the book will be surprised by certain cuts, reveals and flashes of light, like those from media cameras refracting through glass onto Amy (Rosamund Pike) and Nick Dunne’s (Ben Affleck) statuesque orange cat.

Yet the movie is so, so compelling for the

quite loudly and incessantly calls attention to the bloodsucking media swarming the Dunne family, the sexist construct that is the “Cool Girl” and the delusions required to marry and stay committed to another person. At one point a character rants to another about how his/her (I said no spoilers) demands condone murder, and the other character snaps, “That’s marriage.”

The movie is making a Big Point, you see. In fact, it does what critics are relentlessly accused of: overanalyzing a situation.

By pushing its multiple critiques so far into the foreground, Gone Girl wants to assure us it is more than pulp, not just meaningless “airport novel” trash. It has things to say all right, but these verbal and visual stingers indicting cable news, marriage and sexism struck me, for the most part, as easy, smug and way too abstract, like the lazier bits from The Daily Show. It’s one of those things where I “get” what the movie is trying to say and then, in my head, scream, “You think I A Lover’s Quarrel don’t know that already?!” with the World The indirect reason for this is that Gone Girl spends almost every speed with which it serves its ever-shifting waking moment issuing plot developments plot that I worry it overlooks qualities that that the psychology of Nick and Amy would stand out with subsequent viewings, Dunne never finds time to take root. Now when the question is not, “Is this entertain- that may sound like a pretentious thing to ing?” but “Is this art? Is this really a master- say, but I am convinced the great movies we piece?” While our conditions for “master- return to again and again feature protagopiece” status clearly differ, one condition I nists with tricky and boundless interiorities, hope we can agree on is that plot for plot’s snippets of which we see during largely sake is not ideal, for revisiting a mystery plotless moments.

These moments do not need to be slow, story with the answers in hand usually amounts to diminishing returns. Gone Girl though they many memorable ones are, such does not suffer that problem, exactly, for it as Scottie’s silent stalking of Madeleine in

Zachary Zahos

Vertigo or Juliette Binoche’s stare into the camera in Certified Copy (the masterpiece I keep imploring you, yes YOU, to see). We can also peek into the minds of our heroes when the action gets tense, like when Gary Cooper’s conflicted marshall stalks the streets in High Noon. Just so you know I think Fincher does this beautifully in other movies, how about in The Social Network, when Mark Zuckerberg aims his genius at coding Facemash.com, in what we see, through a brilliant, exhilarating montage, to be a misogynistic reaction to an unsuccessful date.

During revealing moments such as the ones described above, these movies cease to be about a story of made-up people or hot button themes but human behavior. There is no phenomenon better suited to cinematic exposure than the way we look, move and sweat, and if the filmmaker is talented enough, those external snapshots will clue us into what lies within, which, as a viewing experience, can be quite emotional.

Gone Girl is so cynical that neither Nick nor Amy Dunne face any chance at redemption, and so Fincher keeps their interiorities, to say nothing of their moralities, out of sight. It’s a shame, because not only did I not learn much new from this slick piece of entertainment, but I left the theater without any empathetic connection to two of the most messed-up characters in recent cinema, and what the hell am I doing to deserve that?

Zachary Zahos is a senior in the College of Arts and Sciences. He can be reached at zzahos@cornellsun.com. A Lover’s Quarrel with the World runs alternate Wednesdays this semester.

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

12 THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis

ACROSS 1 Subject of a historic 1919 sports deal, with “The” 5 Type of large TV 11 Pre-LCD screen 14 Enthusiastic 15 Virgil epic 16 Informal greeting 17 Rooftop energy generators 19 Hieroglyphics snake 20 Standard deviation symbol 21 Picked-up pickup, perhaps 22 On the level 23 Keats’ “__ to a Nightingale” 24 Hopper 26 Markets 27 Removable denture 31 Marseille menu 33 College Football Playoff gp.

34 Image on a 42Down, briefly 35 TV hillbilly __ May Clampett 36 Looks toward 38 Opening night nightmares 39 Lovey-dovey murmur 40 Surrounding glow 41 Peter or Paul 43 Apollo 11 achievement 46 Latin clarifier 47 Fearful squeal 48 Dr.’s group 51 Medium rare 52 Farrier’s file 55 Restrict 57 Witness 58 Eidetic memory 60 Kin of -trix 61 Geometric figure with equal angles 62 Sicilian rumbler 63 AL and MO 64 Tropical fruit 65 Peters out DOWN 1 Opera villain, often 2 Skirt

37 Constellation 50 Geography 3 Poppycock volume near Scorpius 4 Dutch export 38 Oinker 52 Santa __: 5 Mushy food 40 Museum filler Sonoma County 6 Absorbed, as seat 42 Common 34lessons Across site 53 At the apex of 7 Ill-fated Boleyn 44 Query 54 The “Star 8 Ooze Wars” films, 45 Position 9 “Bloom County” strategically e.g. reporter 56 Like most 10 They often adorn 48 Cremona craftsman cupcakes city buses 49 “Now We Are 58 Helpful hint 11 Fraud 59 Messenger __ Six” author 12 Consequential 13 Prepares for ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE: printing 18 Morocco’s capital 22 __ Aviv 25 Filled with rage 26 Relaxing getaway 27 Get too personal 28 Peruvian of yore 29 Big shot in the sky 30 Glasgow gal 31 Least fair, in a way 32 State of seclusion 35 17-, 27-, 43- and 58-Across begin with types of them 10/08/14 xwordeditor@aol.com

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14 THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014

SPORTS

Firing Coaches Is Not the Answer Local TV Viewership Stays Strong for MLB Business During Season DUBNOV

Continued from page 16

progressing in some way after a firing. However, it is not common that these changes fail to lead to any more success on In an industry as the field. cutthroat as professional Firings sports, the coaching are expected to happen in position is never safe. the industry,

but in the modern world of sports, coaches are fired all too often. The issue is that the firings do not usually solve issues of the team. Unless coaches make blatant mistakes in their ability to create a winning environment with all of their resources, it would be much better to see a coach stick by a team through a rough patch and try to carry the team through an unsuccessful season en route to eventual success.

Nikita Dubnov can be reached at ndubnov@cornellsun.com.

NEW YORK (AP) -- From April to September, from Boston to Seattle, people sat down night after night after night to watch their hometown baseball team more than everything else on television.

In 11 metropolitan areas, local ballclubs made for the most popular window of prime-time TV over the course of the regular season: The average rating for games on their regional sports network outpaced the offerings of any other channel in the market from 7-11 p.m.

Now the playoffs are underway, and the broadcasts are all national.

With no Yankees, no Red Sox, no Cubs - big-city franchises that lure in casual fans - the stark figures of viewership numbers will likely seem puny compared to even a decade ago, when far fewer entertainment options offered competition.

Yet in the face of record-low World Series ratings and the increasing average age of viewers, baseball officials are giddy about their business, and a major reason is the value of those local summer audiences.

Regional sports networks are an increasingly lucrative source of revenue for clubs. And they’re doing just fine with their baseball telecasts.

“To have something trending up on standard pay television is remarkable,” said Tim Brosnan, Major League Baseball’s executive vice president of business.

Local baseball ratings have held steady over the last five years as Netflix, DVRs, the ever-expanding channel universe and other innovations shrink the viewership of other prime-time fare. According to Nielsen, baseball broadcasts on regional sports networks topped the rankings this season in Detroit, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Kansas City, Cleveland, Baltimore, Milwaukee, Seattle, San Francisco, Boston and Phoenix.

“The engagement and passion the fans have for their local team is clearly unmatched in their markets,” said Fox Sports President Eric Shanks, whose company owns the networks in six of those cities.

Fox also televises baseball nationally, culminating with playoff games and the World Series. The NL Division Series and five of the seven NLCS matchups are on upstart cable channel Fox Sports 1 for the first time this fall, meaning they’re available in fewer homes.

Ratings for this season’s playoffs on FS1 and TBS are off to a solid start, boosted by all the extra-inning games.

Peterson Case Prompts Child Abuse Discussion MINNEAPOLIS (AP) -- Yes, Adrian Peterson said, the allegation that he struck his young son with a branch is true. No, he does not believe he committed a crime.

This type of discipline, he said, is how his parents punished him.

The charge of child abuse, Peterson said, does not apply because he meant the boy no harm.

Peterson’s stance is startling, at least for much of the country where corporal punishment has been largely cast aside. Usually offthe-field incidents in the news involving NFL players produce downplays or denials from the accused.

Peterson’s argument is likely to surface again this week, when his case goes before a judge in Texas.

Peterson has support from people in areas where severely spanking children is still a generational and cultural practice, including some of his peers around the league. But his use of a switch and belt to spank his 4-year-old son for misbehavior has also prompted harsh rebukes, even from disciplinarians who believe boundaries were crossed. He is on paid leave from the Minnesota Vikings until the case is resolved.

The case has sparked discussion - and reflection - from athletes and others who say they were disciplined in the same way. Some are revisiting how they feel about the act, and it prompted others to talk about how spanking affected them - in good ways and bad.

Hall of Fame wide receiver and ESPN analyst Cris Carter voiced an emotional epiphany about his changed view of corporal punishment since being raised in a poor seven-child family in Ohio.

“It’s the 21st century. My mom was wrong. She did the best she could, but she was wrong about some of that stuff she taught me,” Carter said on the network’s pregame show shortly after Peterson was indicted. “And I promised my kids I won’t teach that mess to them. You can’t beat a kid to make them do what they want to do.”

Though 31 states have outlawed corporal punishment in schools, all 50 states allow parents to hit their children as a reasonable means of discipline. But the definition of what’s reasonable has been contracting, said Victor Vieth, executive director emeritus of the Gundersen National Child Protection Training Center in Winona, Minnesota.

“A quarter of a century ago what Mr. Peterson allegedly did to his son probably wouldn’t have resulted in a prosecution in many parts of the country. Today it almost always would,” Vieth said.

“It’s not so much that judges or legislators are changing the law. It’s the jurors themselves. Reasonable force is really in the eyes of the community: What do they regard as acceptable?”

Vieth added: “Most parents just don’t hit their children at that level anymore.”

THE CORNELL DAILY SUN | Wednesday, October 8, 2014 15

SPORTS

POLO

Cornell Polo Topples University of Connecticut

By ELANI COHEN Sun Staff Writer

After the team finished last year’s season with a loss in the semifinals against top-seeded Westmont, the Cornell men’s polo team was determined to get back on its feet this season with a victory in its season-opener against the University of Connecticut. The match ended in Cornell’s favor, with a final score of 23-19.

Head coach David Eldredge said that he was content with the Red’s performance but still sees room for improvement moving forward.

“Overall I was very happy with how the team played.

The starters produced well and showed some flashes of the play we can expect for the future. Definitely some things to cleanup and work on but on the whole I was happy with the effort,” he said.

Cornell started the match with senior captain Nick Steig, senior Hakan Karabey and sophomore Ignacio Masias. As the first chukker began, the Red quickly scored its first goal of the season. Though the Huskies did get a few goals in, by the end of the first chukker the Red was in the lead, 6-4. Cornell never relinquished its lead during the second chukker. In fact, the squad continued to

CONNOR ARCHARD / SUN SPORTS PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Strong start | Senior captain Nick Steig, who started for the Red in its season-opener against University of Connecticut, said that the Red is confident in its abilities and anticipates a successful season.

increase its lead as the game played out. By half time, the Red led the Huskies 14-7.

Going into the second half, Cornell switched up its starting players, with senior “We proved we have a Alex Langlois and freshman really talented group and K a m r a n Pirasteh I’m very optimistic about replacing our season.”

Karabey and Masias. As the Ignacio Masias third chukker began, the Huskies scored three goals, which cut the Red’s lead to just four points.

Cornell responded, however, by scoring a quick three goals of its own, bringing its seven-point lead back with the score at 17-10. After butting heads throughout the end of the third chukker, the teams went into the fourth chukker with an overall score of 18-14. In the fourth chukker, Karabey and Masias replaced Pirasteh and Steig, and the men re-established their seven-point lead once again. The match ended in Cornell’s favor with a final score of 23-19.

“This was a great way to start the season by playing against such a solid team. We proved we have a really talented group and I’m very optimistic about our season,” Masias said.

The Red saw some players achieve particularly high scoring numbers in the victorious season-opener. Masias had a final goal count of nine, followed by Steig who had five goals and Karabey and Langlois who each had four.

“As our first game of the year, it was a great start. The UConn men played well and came up with some strong plays when they needed them,” Steig said. “We definitely have a lot of work to do, but our team is strong this year and it should be a great season for us.”

The team looks forward to its next match against Skidmore College, which will be played at home.

Elani Cohen can be reached at ecohen@cornellsun.com.

Women Finish Fifth at Invite Red Looks Forward to Syracuse, CROSS COUNTRY Continued from page 16

meets at the end of the year,” he said.

The women’s cross country team took a slightly different approach to the invitational, entering most of the team in the open and gold divisions and taking a fifth place team finish.

Highlights included sophomore Taylor Spillane smashing another Cornell record. The record been previously held by All-American Katie Kellner ’13.

“She’s really performing great right now. It’s fun to watch,” women’s head coach Artie Smith said of Spillane.

Smith explained that he chose to enter most of the women in back-to-back races in order to mimic the intense schedule the team will have during the postseason, when the Red hopes to compete in both the regional and national championships which are one week apart.

“Being able to kind of simulate that kind of experience now with back-to-back races is a good way to learn how to handle that … so that if we are at the good fortune of being at the national meet later we’ll be that much better prepared to handle that,” he said.

Lang said that for the men, it made more sense to rest the Red’s top runners after the rigorous meet in Boston in order to let them focus on preparing for the pre-national meet. Despite the differing approaches, both coaches said they were pleased with how their teams ran.

“This week their morale was very high and they were excited to get back out and racing for the team and it showed,” Lang said of his returning veterans.

Highlights for the men included a strong 19th place finish by junior Ben Rainero in his season-debut and a 20th place finish by sophomore James Gowans in his first race since the Army meet in September.

The women showed that they learned from their performances last weekend and made great improvements, according to Smith.

“We had some frustrating experiences a

week ago in some cases and I was really pleased with how people applied the lessons that they needed to learn from last week in a very positive way,” Smith said. “I thought we really took several very important steps forward.”

Junior tri-captain Caroline Kellner, who ran a good race in Boston last weekend, also gave an impressive performance at Paul Short, finishing in the Top-20 and setting a record for the fourth best time for Cornell on Lehigh’s course.

“I think that [by] putting myself forward in the race I gave myself the opportunity to run better,” Kellner said of her success.

Overall, the women came into the Paul Short Invitational with a more positive attitude which resulted in better performances.

“In just one week it’s not so much people’s physical capabilities that improve, it’s their approach,” Smith said. “People were more assertive.”

For Ronchetti, the Paul Short Invitational was only the third race of his collegiate career.

“The adjustment has been … it’s been difficult at times,” he said. “Our workload and the length of our workouts is double — sometimes triple — the length of what I was doing in high school but in general it’s been going very well.

It’s produced a lot of big gains for me in terms of fitness and my ability to compete as well.”

Ronchetti said that his time has improved by a minute and a half over the course of his three races and he is looking forward to running at the Princeton Invitational in two weeks.

“I’m really excited to give it another go and see if I can continue to improve,” he said.

Next on the schedule for the Red are the Wisconsin and Princeton Invitationals for the women, and the Pre-National and Princeton Invitationals for the men.

“I think that the morale is pretty high on the team right now and we’re just kind of looking forward to [our] next set of races,” Lang said.

Ariel Cooper can be reached at acooper@cornellsun.com.

Aims to Play ‘Full Seventy Minutes’ FIELD HOCKEY

Continued from page 16

came through on her one shot to score the fourth goal for the Red. On the defensive end, junior goalkeeper Elizabeth Schaeffler had her first shut-out of the season with one stop.

“In preparation for the game we worked on our corners a lot and put some set plays in, Standiford said.

“We executed them well because we scored three of our goals off of corners.”

The preparation paid off, and Cornell improved its record to 8-1 after the game.

“It feels great [to be on top of the Ivy League],” Garrity said. “It takes a lot of effort to be on top but it’s a really open conference this year and I think it could be our year.”

Less than 24 hours after flattening Yale, the Red took on American University at home. It was a meeting of two conference leaders, Cornell at the top of the eight-school Ivy League, and American leading the Patriot conference this year, as well as its returning champions from the 2013 season. In contrast to the Red, the Eagles hadn’t played a game in over a week but the opponent came out fast.

The Red’s defense staved off the Eagles’ offensive line and came out even harder on the other end, racking up eleven shots. Twenty-two minutes in, the Eagles offense converted and scored the only goal of the game. The Red’s offense was balanced, with Marisa Siergiej shooting

four times, Krysten Mayers shooting three times, McIlwrick shototing twice and Georgia Lord shooting once.

The most exciting moment of the game came with 12 minutes to go in the second half when Standiford powered the ball in from just outside the circle. After being deflected, the ball hit the back of the cage, but the officials negated the goal, saying there had been no deflection.

The home team battled it out to the end, despite the controversy, and remains positive.

Garrity said that the squad plans to take on the season focusing on one game at a time and does not feel that playing Saturday influenced the squad’s performance on Sunday.

“I don’t think any game really affects the next,” she said. I mean, its tough that we played yesterday and were maybe a little more tired today.

But overall I think we just had mindset that today was a different day.”

Looking forward to Syracuse on Oct. 12, the Red is focusing on a couple points specifically.

“I think just playing a whole seventy minutes … that entire game, we had more shots, more corners, I think we played better than them in all aspects,” Garrity added. “But you know, one mistake, one or two mistakes can lose you the game, and I think we just have to pay a full seventy minutes without major mistakes like that.”

Olivia Mattyasovszky can be reached at sports@cornellsun.com

The Corne¬ Daily Sun

Sports

WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 8, 2014

16

CROSS COUNTRY

C.U.Cross Country Has Strong Showing MLB,NFLCoaches At Paul Short Invitational Saturday Fired in Post-Season AfterTeams Fall Flat I

By ARIEL COOPER Sun Staff Writer

The Red cross country team ran through the rain at Saturday’s Paul Short Invitational. The freshmen are continuing to show major improvements, with Will Ronchetti and Michael Wang running to 27th and 34th places respectively.

“I thought that our freshmen who went there … they really took big steps up. It’s always exciting for the younger guys to be improving and adapting to the training system,” men’s head coach Zeb Lang said.

Since all of the runners who competed this weekend for the men ran in the “It’s always exciting for open division there was no the younger guys to be team score, but improving and adapting the Red finished with a to the training system.” solid 31 points, Zeb Lang making it the top collegiate team at the meet.

Lang said that he chose to rest his top runners this week in order to keep them fresh and ready for upcoming meets. The men’s team will be competing at both the Princeton Invitational and the Pre-National Invitational in two weeks.

“It was really more just sort of a strategic decision

t is that time again in the sports year when a bunch of coaches start losing their jobs. It seems to happen every year. With the end of the MLB regular season, Bo Porter of the Houston Astros and Ron Gardenhire of the Minnesota Twins lost their jobs after subpar performances by their teams. In the NFL, Dennis Allen of the Oakland Raiders surrendered his coaching position after the team’s tenth straight loss dating back to last November. In professional football, the term “Black Monday” has come to describe the mass firing of coaches following the final Sunday of every NFL season. Last year’s casualties included Mike Shanahan of the Redskins, Leslie Frazier of the Vikings, Greg Schiano of the Buccaneers, Jim Schwartz of the Detroit Lions and Rob Chudzinski of the Browns.

None of those names are legendary coaches.

Some are young coaches while others are mediocre coaches that were stuck with subpar teams. In an industry as cutthroat as professional sports the coaching position is never safe. But

CONNOR ARCHARD / SUN SPORTS PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Making strides| Sophomore Taylor Spillane broke a Cornell course record previously held by Red All-American Katie Kellner ’13.

Nikita Dubnov

See CROSS COUNTRY page 15

Nik’s Knacks

FIELD HOCKEY

Cornell Conquers Yale in Weekend Match Red loses in tight contest to American University, slips to 8-2 on season

By OLIVIA MATTYASOVSZKY Sun Contributor

Though it may not have happened on Schoellkopf, the Red did manage to trounce the Yale Bulldogs once this weekend. On Marsha Dodson field, the Cornell field hockey team crushed its Ivy League opposition, 40. This placed the squad in the top seat in the Ivy League and continued

its undefeated streak in the conference.

Early on, junior captain Taylor Standiford and senior co-captain Ann DiPastina worked together to set up freshman midfielder Sam McIlwrick for a shot off a penalty corner.

McIlwrick’s shot was good, and the Red went up 1-0 within five minutes of the starting whistle.

Cornell was relentless on attack

throughout the whole game. Junior defensive back Marisa Siergiej had an impressive seven shots, tallying one assist and one goal. McIlwrick continued to build her momentum with four shots on goal. Four more shots, and the second goal of the game, came from forward Krysten Mayers, and junior forward Katie Garrity See FIELD HOCKEY page 15

MICHELLE FELDMAN / SUN STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

In it to win it | Junior defensive back Marisa Siergiej had a strong showing in the Yale game with seven shots, recording one assist and one goal.

what makes a good coach? A good coach is not one who can draw up the best play or substitute in the best player. That comes with luck. A good coach can understand the players he is given to coach and can do an excellent job of developing chemistry with and amongst the players.

However, how can a mediocre coach succeed with a poorly performing team? There is little hope. It is often too easy to blame the failures of a team on a lack of talent of the person directing the show. If a team that is expected to win fails to do so, a coaching change is not an outrageous option. However, it is all too common that a young coach has to take over a struggling team and find a way to make sense of the mess. It is very rare that this type of change is successful (barring the signing of a major free agent or draftee alongside the introduction of the coach).

This is a ‘good guys finish last’ type of scenario.

The real issue is that sometimes fans get tired of seeing the same result under the same coaching staff. Then the change happens. A new face is introduced. There is a short period of success (or sometimes there is not). And after all that, the team is in the same place. The Cleveland Browns are a great example. The team changed four coaches in a span of five years, and after all the commotion, the team is still one of the worst in the league.

Bo Porter’s departure from the Astro’s dugout is another example of a coach taking the blame for a terrible roster. The team’s poor performance was certainly not due to any outrageous mistakes that Porter made with the lineup. With a roster composed of players that would find far greater success at the Triple-A level, Porter had little power in trying to compete in the Major Leagues.

Teams that perform poorly need a way to show the fan base that changes are being made. Instead of doing the dirty work, which includes developing young players and recruiting big name free agents, it is much easier to prove that a team is See DUBNOV page 14