The Observer, Volume LVI, Issue 27 4/25/2025

The Case Western Reserve The Case Western Reserve

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Friday, April 25, 2025 Volume LVI, Issue 27 Est. 1969

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News

The Case Western Reserve Observer Friday, April 25, 2025 observer.case.edu Volume LVI, Issue 27

Academic interests intersect at CWRU’s Intersections Vani Subramony News Editor On April 18, Case Western Reserve University’s undergraduate research symposium, Intersections, was held in the Veale Convocation, Recreation and Athletic Center. Students across disciplines presented faculty-mentored research, including Senior Capstone projects, to attendees.

Intersections, which is held thrice a year—April, August and December—highlights the “diverse and interdisciplinary work of CWRU undergraduates across the arts, humanities, engineering, life sciences, physical sciences, and social sciences.” This year’s Intersections was the largest yet, showcasing the work of over 800 undergraduate students through 502 research posters.

The event began with a few words from Sheila Pedigo, director of undergraduate research, who congratulated attendees on the presentation of their research. “Intersections is a great place for students, faculty, staff, and our wider community to learn about the breadth of research and depth of involvement and passion of many of our researchers,” Pedigo said in a comment to The Observer. “They continue to give me hope for our future, and I hear this from many others who attend and hear their presentations.”

Also in attendance was Vice President of Student Affairs Travis Apgar, who noted that this was his first time attending Intersections. “Events like Intersections are a powerful reminder of the impact that hands-on, faculty-mentored research can have on a student’s academic and personal growth,” Apgar said in a comment to The Observer. “Each presentation reflected both intellectual rigor and a genuine passion for discovery and problem-solving … I left the event

feeling incredibly proud for the participants and optimistic about the future. CWRU students are already making an impact—and I can’t wait to see where their ideas take them next.”

Due to restrictions on the Undergraduate Research Office’s finances, the food for Intersections judges, student workers and presenters was sponsored by Discussions, CWRU’s undergraduate research journal. Editor-in-Chief of Discussions Aryahi Deorukhkar expressed her organization’s dedication to promoting undergraduate research and the accessibility of student publications. “This event is not only a valuable opportunity to showcase student research published in our journals, but it also allows us to connect with a wide range of emerging research and promote submissions to our publication,” she said. “Since we accept research from all disciplines, Intersections is a great opportunity to engage with the diverse and interdisciplinary research happening at CWRU.” Although Discussions runs a table at Intersections every year, Deorukhkar noted the importance of Discussions’ presence at the event this year.

She said, “With current changes in research funding, we may see a rise in independent research, which is no less valuable and equally deserving of recognition. We hope that Discussions can sustain meaningful academic dialogue and continue to foster an environment for intellectual curiosity.”

Student presenters cited Intersections as an opportunity to grow as researchers and connect with the campus community. Ashwin Menon, a fourth-year student studying mechanical engineering and material science, said, “Intersections was a great chance to exhibit the work I put into my project this semester and to chat with members of the community. I re-

The spring 2025 Intersections was the largest one yet, with 502 posters presented by over 800 CWRU undergraduate students. Auden Koetters/The Observer ceived some valuable advice and suggestions from various professors and students, which I will be incorporating into my project.”

Mahi Tomar, fourth-year biomedical engineering student, echoed Menon’s sentiment, adding that she was happy to experience her classmates’ research projects and Senior Cap-

stones. “It was cool to see different types of projects, because there are so many different disciplines represented at Intersections, not just my own field or my own discipline,” she said.

The next Intersections is scheduled for July 31 and will feature undergraduate student research that has continued into the summer months.

NSF, DOE funding changes impact CWRU Vani Subramony News Editor Darcy Chew Sports Editor On April 21, President Eric Kaler sent a campus-wide email updating the Case Western Reserve University community on federal research funding and its effect on CWRU research operations.

In his email, Kaler said, “On Friday, April 18, the National Science Foundation (NSF) announced that, effective immediately, it is terminating all grants that do not align with updated agency priorities.” This decision stems from changes in policy from the national government and “research priorities within the policy framework established by Congress, the Administration and the Director of NSF,” as stated on the NSF’s website. The website also notes that “Awards that are not aligned with NSF’s priorities have been terminated, including but not limited to those on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and misinformation/disinformation.”

The NSF’s priorities include “two statutory criteria to ensure that every award has the potential to advance

new knowledge (Intellectual Merit) with maximum impact on the Nation and its people (Broader Impacts).”

More specifically, Kaler explained, “Research projects that give a preference to some groups at the expense of others, directly or indirectly exclude individuals or groups, or have impact limited to subgroups of people based on protected class or characteristics will not be seen as aligned to NSF priorities.” He added that it has become clear that research not in line with the NSF’s priorities would be terminated by the organization.

Beyond the NSF updates, Kaler also said that the Department of Energy (DOE) has capped the indirect cost rate for DOE grants at 15%. He explained that indirect cost rate, or facilities and administrative costs, “cover necessary costs of doing research including personnel, research facilities, regulatory compliance, utilities, safety requirements and myriad other support.” With the 15% cap, CWRU could lose up to $4 million that would have originally been spent to support research.

In concluding his email, Kaler cited the recent lawsuit filed against the DOE’s cap by the American Association of Research Universities (AAU), the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU) and

the American Council on Education (ACE) as temporary and welcome relief. He encouraged principal investigators to continue research as normal and reasserted the university’s dedication to providing information on changes to the research environment.

On April 22, the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) released a public statement condemning the Trump administration’s efforts to insert their influence in the higher education space, including the new limitations on funding by research organizations such as the NSF and DOE. The letter, titled “A Call for Constructive Engagement” states, “We are open to constructive reform and do not oppose legitimate government oversight. However, we must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live, and work on our campuses. We will always seek effective and fair financial practices, but we must reject the coercive use of public research funding.”

This follows Harvard University’s April 15 statement from their president in response to an email with a list of demands for the university to follow. “No government—regardless of which party is in power—should dictate what private universities can

teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue,” it said. On Monday, Harvard also filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over threats to cutting federal funding.

Initially, the letter was signed by over 150 university and college presidents; Kaler is not one of the presidents who signed. The listed signatures included a wide variety of schools across the U.S., from Ivy Leagues and small private colleges to large public universities. Since its initial publication, the letter has doubled in size, and as of April 23, the presidents of CWRU’s UAA opponents Carnegie Mellon University, Brandeis University and the University of Rochester all signed the letter. Nearby Ohio universities such as Oberlin College, Kenyon College and Capital University have also signed the statement.

Former CWRU president and current President of the AAU Barbara R. Snyder is a signatory of the letter.

When asked why CWRU is not a signatory on the letter and whether this affects the university’s stance or any planned responses regarding federal government involvement, the university spokesperson was unable to comment before The Observer’s publication deadline.

News 3

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Legacy Week 2025: An examination of the “Case” era for CWRU Zachary Treseler News Editor In appreciation of this year’s Legacy Week celebrations, The Observer will be investigating and shedding light on a contentious period of Case Western Reserve University’s history: the early 2000s at CWRU, a time of logo and name changes, new residence halls, presidential debates and financial woes at the university. All of this rings true to modern experiences and worries at the school.

At the start of the 2003 school year, students at CWRU returned to University Circle with new banners draped overhead featuring a new logo.

The largest change for students was the shortened name of the university, which changed from “CWRU” to “Case.” According to the university at the time, “research shows that the acronym CWRU is harder to pronounce and remember, and has little name recognition outside of the immediate region.”

The Observer Editorial Board of that year joked that students should “Hold on to those rare, collectible CWRU sweatshirts, because they’ll pay for your children’s education here someday.”

The change to the shortened name of “Case” was also accompanied by a new logo, which, much like the recent logo change, was met with intense community reactions. At the time, the Editorial Board summarized that it looked like “a bent paper clip” or a “crumpled Celtic knot.”

One supposed student, writing on an old course website, remarked, “I can’t believe they wasted millions of dollars on a logo, when the logo we had was perfectly [serviceable] and looked a hell of a lot better. i like the rising sun … this new one, it’s just crap. that’s all there is to it. and i will never buy it.”

That logo was eventually immortalized colloquially as the “fat man with a surfboard.”

While the reaction to the new logo on campus was swift, the financial implications that came with the new logo and branding took longer to fully realize. The first sign of trouble was at the start of the 2005-2006 academic year, when the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported that the school was suffering a deficit of $37 million and thus embarked on a cost-cutting program worth $17 million. Originally, this deficit was accounted for due to a decrease in federal funding, research and donations. Some blamed the deficit on national disasters, the Iraq War and the 9/11 attacks.

The new logo and shortened name are attributed to be the brainchild of CWRU President Edward M. Hundert.

Now a lecturer of bioethics at Harvard University, Hundert and his administration led a large push to improve CWRU’s national image and recognition. A key cornerstone of this push was the updated logo and shortened name.

He also pushed for a revitalization of the undergraduate general education curriculum, being the president who championed and oversaw the rollout of the now-ended SAGES program. At its implementation, students complained about the selection of classes to take, while faculty were annoyed by a lack of instructors to teach the courses. In February of that academic year, Hundert came under fire on local television due to “issues with Hundert’s style and management techniques.”

The SAGES program is one of the many reasons for Hundert’s eventual resignation. This push came in March of 2006 at the hands of the faculty of

the College of Arts and Sciences. They voted 131 to 44 that they had no confidence in Hundert. The petition, which was originated by former Professor Lawrence Krauss, had enough signatures for the vote within 12 hours of its email being sent.

The main gripes of the College of Arts and Sciences faculty were threefold: fiscal and budget issues, mismanagement of programs such as the SAGES rollout and the alienation of donors and alumni. Professor Cyrus Taylor, who still teaches in the Department of Physics, told The Observer that Hundert “upset the Reserve Alumni with the name change.” Further, professors outlined how with this reduced amount of donations, programs such as SAGES were never able to be fully funded.

Professor Joe White, who still teaches in the Department of Political Science, told students at an open town hall that the issue was with his strategy that he called “hype and hope,” where Hundert instead claimed that nothing was to change at the university, that it was just a budget “challenge” and that cuts would be made among the administration. Many students at that town hall sided with Hundert, expressing dismay over what they saw as “personal” attacks against the president.

Despite the support of some students and the Board of Trustees, within 15 days of the vote of no-confidence, Hundert resigned, effective at the start of the 2006-2007 academic year.

It wasn’t until he left that many started to bridge the connection between the name and logo change and its direct impact on the university’s budgetary stance. In early 2006, many media outlets, ranging from the Chronicle of Higher Education to the Associated Press and the Harvard Crimson, attributed Hundert’s fall to poor fundraising efforts.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer first reported in a September 2006 article that one of the reasons leading to the university’s financial crisis was the new branding. A former VP of the Undergraduate Student Government, Adam Rupe, told The Observer in 2007, “The [logo] change angered alumni. Angered alumni stop giving money.”

While exact fundraising data from this time makes it hard to officially draw a connection between the two events, the CWRU community as a whole has associated the name change with a financial crisis, which then prompted Hundert’s resignation. Even the website for the 2026 bicentennial lists the financial deficits and the new university marketing in the same sentence on Hundert’s bio page.

It would be unfair to chalk up all of Hundert’s legacy to the controversial rebranding and associated financial struggles. During his tenure as president, he made considerable efforts to bolster community outreach and involvement efforts. Dennis Kunitch, former congressional representative, noted that “Dr. Hundert’s leadership, expertise and exceptional interpersonal abilities has created a new sense of partnership, possibility and energy within the Cleveland medical community.” Additionally, under his leadership, the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine was developed, which would eventually pave the way for further development of the Health Education Campus.

Hundert also advocated for the creation of a new student union building where Thwing Center currently is—a push that eventually led to Tinkham Veale University Center opening in 2014. Under his watch, CWRU also hosted the 2004 vice presidential de-

Courtesy of The Observer bate between Dick Cheney and John Edwards in the Veale Convocation, Recreation and Athletic Center and began planning and construction of the Village at 115 complex for students, which many students saw as his most crowning legacy. It was the first construction of on-campus housing to take place at CWRU for more than 35 years. Many of the proposed changes from his 2005 campus master plan can be traced to developments today, from the Nord Family Greenway to the new Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Building.

By October of 2006, Interim President Gary Eastwood announced a “name change task force,” which drew a small amount of criticism at a time of greater financial uncertainty. The Observer’s Editorial Board argued that “A name change will only bring more disorder to an already divided campus,

revealing to the world that Case is once more walking on thin ice,” noting the attention it would bring to the school for a second name change within five years.

By March 2007, the university changed its shortened name back to “Case Western Reserve,” and by September, a new logo was developed, which would be known as the “sunburst.” The sunburst remained the logo until the 2023 logo change.

Many parts of this decade ring true to contemporary experiences at CWRU, from the 2020 presidential debate, recent logo change, new residence hall construction and potential financial problems due to a cut in federal funding. Thus, the 2000s are a reminder of our university’s longevity in the face of crisis and what the community can do—staff, students and faculty—to impact CWRU’s course.

Life

The Case Western Reserve Observer Friday, April 25, 2025 observer.case.edu Volume LVI, Issue 27

Cleveland is home to one of the world’s largest Indian classical arts festivals—is it worth the visit?

Kethan Srinivasan Social Media Content Creator Not many residents or Case Western Reserve University students seem to realize how important a cultural hub the city of Cleveland is in the eyes of others. Even with centers for visual and performing arts like the Cleveland Museum of Art and The Cleveland Orchestra, some find that there is more to be desired of a municipality purportedly designated as a “global city.” But believe it or not, one of the largest classical music festivals in North America takes place in Cleveland every year, and for students at CWRU, it is only a bus ride away.

Usually held annually through the Easter weekend, the Cleveland Thyagaraja Festival is frequented by accomplished artists and students from India and across North America.

The festival is named after Saint Tyagaraja, a veteran composer of South Indian classical, or Carnatic music.

An established composer of over a thousand devotional compositions in the Telugu and Sanskrit languages, he is honored in his hometown and resting place of Thiruvaiyaru in Southern India through a week-long festival of music in the months of January and February. Although this is where the festival first took its influences, back in 1977, noted percussionist Ramnad Raghavan moved to Northeast Ohio, where he met a group of Indian immigrant families who had some level of training in music. With this discovery, he proposed starting a festival in the city of Cleveland modeled after the large festival back home.

This began in the form of a three-act concert in the basement of a rented church in Richmond Heights. Today, the festival is a 12-day event held on Cleveland State University’s (CSU)

campus, jam-packed with concerts and unique showcases, plus upholds traditions reminiscent of the original festival.

One of these traditions is the group performance of the “pancharatnas,” which translates to “five gems” in San-

skrit. These songs are sung in praise of the Hindu deity Rama and are composed of multiple stanzas and set to different scales, which lend them a unique tone and further the intricacy of their lyrical structure. During the Cleveland Thyagaraja Festi-

The Cleveland Thyagaraja Festival runs from April 16-27 at Cleveland State University. CWRU students can enjoy one of the world’s largest Indian classical arts festivals with only a short bus ride. Kethan Srinivasan/The Observer

val, professional artists and students alike gather in CSU’s Wolstein Center arena to sing these timeless songs en masse in an event that pulls many audience members.

Third-year biomedical engineering student Maanyav Gangaraj is one of those audience members. “I have always enjoyed the Pancharatnam singing,” he said. “It has been a formative experience for me to see this group of stellar musicians join the stage to honor the great poet-composer.” The festival is a vital tradition to Gangaraj and his family. A student of the Carnatic violin and treasurer of CWRU’s classical music club Naadam, he has attended the festival ever since he began learning. “It additionally provides platforms for up-and-coming young artists to perform with the support of many senior artists,” he adds. “The competitions held at this festival provide opportunities for youth to receive valuable feedback from other artists.”

Gangaraj refers to the T. Temple Tuttle Memorial Music Competition, an event at the festival that spans multiple categories and age groups. The competition is named after the late ethnomusicologist and CSU professor who had a vested interest in Carnatic music and its principles. Some category winners receive a performance slot at next year’s festival.

Overall, this year’s festival is certainly worth the visit, from the grand showcases to the scattered array of concerts to choose from, albeit with some slight scheduling issues. Certain concerts can have a delayed start on certain days, while running up to an hour behind schedule. Gangaraj had a similar experience when visiting this past weekend. On Saturday at 7:45 pm, the artist Dr. D. Raghavachary of the Hyderabad Brothers duo of singers was scheduled to perform.

The scheduled artist’s brother, D. Seshachary, had passed away just last year before the festival, meaning to see the artist this was an especially important moment for Gangaraj and his family.

“My parents and I have always been huge fans of the Brothers, and we were very excited to listen to Dr. Raghavachary’s concert,” he said.

“But the festival was running dreadfully late by over an hour, and Dr. D. Raghavachary had to be subbed out for another artist at the last minute due to illness. For this and the fact that the 1.5 hour concert was delayed to begin at almost 9:30 pm, we left Saturday unfortunately disappointed.”

But despite the delays, the festival was still a treat for Gangaraj, who still intends to visit the festival for the foreseeable future. “Overall, the experience was still very enjoyable, and I still felt the same joy and satisfaction from attending the festival. It was like visiting an old friend,” he said. And it is hard to disagree with this statement.

The Cleveland Thyagaraja Festival has many interesting experiences in store for those who choose to stop by.

For CWRU students, this is a golden opportunity to connect with the city in another meaningful way, whether it’s for those who long for a familiar sound or a new chance to explore and step outside their comfort zone.

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WRUW’s Punk Prom: Prom, but make it punk Kate Gordon Life Editor Last Friday, April 18, Case Western Reserve University students flocked to the Grog Shop’s B Side Liquor Lounge to attend Punk Prom, an “alternative formal and concert” put on by college radio station WRUW. From the talented student performers to the eclectic crowd to the venue’s lively-yet-intimate atmosphere, it was definitely not a night you wanted to miss.

I’ll start with my favorite part of the event: the clothes and the people-watching. It’s no secret that CWRU students have pretty much no school spirit to speak of, and sometimes don’t follow personal grooming regimens as closely as they should (if at all). This means that dressing for a themed event can be a bit of a mixed bag. However, all of the punk prom attendees actually showed out and impressed me with their creativity. I saw real (typically thrifted) floor-length prom dresses and tuxedos, dark eye makeup and an abundance of black clothing. I felt like I really was attending prom with the school’s alternative crowd.

And with a line to use the on-site photo booth and an abundance of digital cameras snapping pictures, you could tell that everyone else felt that they looked good, too.

Moving on to Punk Prom’s atmosphere, B Side was a great choice of

venue. I loved that they worked with WRUW to create custom cocktails for the event. My favorite was the “Motha Mule” with grapefruit juice, ginger beer and tequila, but the “Punk POM” (vodka, triple sec and pineapple-orange-mango juice) and “The L Word” (vodka, lychee juice and lavender syrup) were crowdpleasers too. (My roommate actually made the lavender syrup for “The L Word” out of water, sugar and Sleepytime tea bags, which I think encapsulates the care and dedication WRUW put into Punk Prom.)

B Side was also perfectly sized and located to accommodate a CWRU event: It is off campus, which makes it exciting for underclassmen, but still close enough for students to take a Safe Ride or the shuttle to the venue. Plus, the Grog Shop is right next door to Cilantro Taqueria, and I personally don’t know of a better place to end my night than that.

Finally, there was the music itself. The lineup consisted of three local and/or CWRU student bands—Placid State, Sons of Greek Love and RRRIOT!—and several WRUW student DJ sets. The crowd was definitely into the live music, although I personally find mosh pits in a small space a little much (even if the band’s playing a cover of “Teenage Dirtbag,” you guys need to behave yourselves). My one small qualm with the entire event is that the speakers for the DJ sets weren’t very loud. I honestly couldn’t tell

when the background playlist ended and the DJs began, which didn’t give the latter half of the evening the anticipated “club” effect. Other than that, however, I thought all of the performers did a fantastic job, the vibes in B Side were great and I appreciate WRUW’s dedication to showcasing local and CWRU talent.

WRUW was also pleased with how the night turned out, especially considering how much work went into organizing the event. Of the planning process, Event Coordinator and fourth-year mechanical engineering student Ana Carolina Cao said, “Punk Prom was definitely my magnum opus. I wanted it to be big, awesome and memorable. I started planning very early in the semester, sketching out a vision and then breaking it all down piece by piece until it took real shape. Pretty soon after, I had the venue and bands locked down. My main concern throughout the planning process was making sure that people actually found out about the event. Because not a ton of people know about WRUW, I was worried that they also wouldn’t catch wind of Punk Prom. We got someone to do our posters and a lot of our Instagram posts. And there were a lot.

Our @stwruwdents account really was the most awesome tool to get the word out.”

“Come Punk Prom day, my concerns disappeared,” Cao continued.

“I felt like I was on a cloud the entire

night because I was so happy to see that everything worked out and everyone was having a fun time. Truly so gratifying. Makes me a bit emotional to think that graduation is right around the corner and I’m going to have to leave WRUW behind.

But I think it’s so special that I went out with a bang and overall have made an impact on the station.”

WRUW Operations Director and fourth-year civil engineering student Mariel McInnes echoed these thoughts, emphasizing the importance of the event’s waived entrance fee for students. (The general public was welcome to attend, but were largely and—so I’ve been told—purposefully deterred by the $12 ticket.) “I’m glad we were able to make the event free for all students, because there were a handful of CIA and CSU students who came and had a blast. I’d love to organize more intercollegiate events among Northeast Ohio’s college radio stations and other student organizations to widen our community off campus.”

Overall, Punk Prom was a blast and I’d encourage any CWRU—or Cleveland Institute of Art, Cleveland Institute of Music or Cleveland State University—students who missed out to attend the event when it (hopefully) returns next year. The live music, drinks and general atmosphere were off the charts, and I can’t imagine anyone not having a good time.

“Marcus Aurelius” statue returns to the CMA for one last exhibition Elie Aoun Director of Print Visitors to the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) will notice a familiar face—or lack thereof—in the rotunda: the 6-foot-4-inch statue thought to depict the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius. Once standing in the Greek and Roman Art gallery, the emperor has returned to Cleveland for one last appearance.

In September 2023, the statue was seized as part of an investigation by the Manhattan district attorney’s office into artifacts illegally smuggled out of Turkey. On Feb. 14 of this year, the office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg announced that the statue will be repatriated to Turkey after the investigation concluded that it originated in Bubon, Turkey, and had been removed from the site by smugglers. The exhibit in the rotunda began on April 8 and will end on June 8, after which the statue will leave the CMA forever.

Around the statue are four panels that have not been previously exhibited. They detail the statue’s iconography and identity, the site of Bubon, the scientific analyses conducted to confirm the statue’s provenance and the legal aspects of the investigation. I can only share some of what the panels say lest I turn this article into an essay—I will only add that the panels are worth reading in full for the insight they provide into the statue’s history.

The first panel notes that the statue is unique for its depiction of a Roman man in the style of an Athenian, showing a comparison to a statue of the playwright Sophocles. “Other statues of men found at Bubon represent Roman emperors as gods, taking the form of heroic nudes, sometimes with recognizable portrait heads and matching

inscriptions on statue bases,” the panel reads. Furthermore, it says that the statue’s base did not stand on the base with Marcus Aurelius’ name on it: The statue stood on an uninscribed base, so the connection to Marcus Aurelius is not fully certain.

I found the third panel to be the most interesting because it explains how scientists and investigators confirmed the connection between the statue and Bubon. After it was shown that the plug on the left foot of the statue closely matched a pedestal without an identifying inscription, “isotope analyses were performed on lead samples taken from the statue’s foot and from the corresponding holes in the pedestal.” Further analyses were conducted on soil from the site and the statue, all of which led to the conclusion that the statue once stood on this uninscribed pedestal. Wonderful discoveries can be made when science and classics come together.

If you ever want a break from taking final exams and writing essays, I encourage you to drop by the CMA and see this statue before it departs on June 8. It is a breathtaking piece of craftsmanship (seriously, how does one achieve the effect of a flowing robe out of bronze?) and has always been one of my favorite artifacts from the Greek and Roman Art gallery. It is a miracle that such a work of art survives, since at any point in the last two millennia it could have been melted down for useful metal or simply lost to the ravages of time. Take advantage of such a fortunate opportunity and see this imposing masterpiece for yourself!

Thus ends my trilogy on the Marcus Aurelius statue, which I first beheld with awe as a first-year beginning his lifelong study of classics, whose story I have enjoyed following for the last year and a half and whose presence at the CMA will be sorely missed.

After an investigation discovered that the CMA’s “Marcus Aurelius” statue was illegally smuggled out of Turkey, the CMA agreed to give the statue over to Turkey—but the statue has one more display in the CMA rotunda until July 8.

Courtesy of the Cleveland Museum of Art

Fun

The Case Western Reserve Observer Friday, April 25, 2025 observer.case.edu Volume LVI, Issue 27

Weekly Horoscope What will you leave behind at CWRU?

Aries Supreme leader of CWRU Quizbowl

Gemini Legacy Week tshirts

Taurus Tears

Cancer Many many issues of The Observer

What We've Been Listening To What Was That?

Lorde

Hot & Heavy Lucy Dacus

Kethan Srinivasan

Auden Koetters

Bachelorette Bjork

Orange Blossoms GoldFord

Lucas Yang

Sahar Kapasi

Sunny Boney M.

Dreams Carol Ades

Hannah Johnson

Vani Subramony

Fly Away G.E.M.

Bombs Over Baghdad Outkast

Darcy Chew

Clay Preusch

Operator (That's Not the Way It Feels) Jim Crocce Kate Gordon

Leo

Virgo

My sanity

The Greek Games trophy

Libra

Scorpio

USG president

Your belief in love

Sagittarius

Capricorn

A new definition of a low GPA

Celery

Aquarius

Pisces

Destruction of property

Vandalism

THE JUMBLE 1. ILEE _____________________________ 2. IGASNHVI _____________________________ 3. YRDAC _____________________________ 4. NNAHHA _____________________________ 5. YLCA _____________________________ 6. SULCA _____________________________ 7. DUEAN _____________________________ 8. JKGDFSJKGKG _____________________________

Fun 7

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Crossword Across 1. Healthful resorts 5. Novelist Picoult 9. Molts 14. James of steam engine fame 15. Bowled over 16. Full range 17. James of jazz 18. Tenants’ protest 20. Feudal lord 22. Knighted actor McKellen 23. Sketched 24. Objective for the distant future 28. Andrea Bocelli’s record label 29. Chaps 33. Whopper lover?

35. Copacabana city, familiarly 37. Maker of Asteroids games 38. Travelers’ stop 39. Civil War battle site also called Manassas 42. Tattered T-shirt, often 43. Chocolaty brew 45. Bit of Morse code 46. Bit of Morse code 47. Iroquois tribe with namesake silverware 49. Principle 51. Function of police and fire departments 56. Line of symmetry 59. Prohibit by law 60. Anne of “You’re Killing Me” 61. Nicely packaged food sampler 65. “Excuse me, but...”

66. Big name in Indy racing 67. Maker of Sonic the Hedgehog games

68. Carryall 69. Ancient Greek gathering spot 70. Air freshener’s target 71. Extend across Down 1. Hunky-dory 2. Spot for grilling 3. Truant officer’s concern 4. Walk unsteadily 5. Jelly container 6. Have to pay 7. Durable fabric 8. Dog collar attachment 9. Cpl.’s superior 10. Tough time of it 11. Qatar’s leader

12. Durham university 13. One-pot meal 19. Nose-in-theair type 21. “And so forth...”

25. Light beige 26. Subway track part 27. Apollo astronaut Shepard 30. Woodsplitting blow 31. Noteworthy periods 32. Exhale sorrowfully 33. Fancy wheels 34. Privy to 36. Outdated 39. Singer Erykah 40. Campus military grp.

41. Four Corners tribe

44. Cool dude 46. Losses 48. “Mamma Mia!” group 50. “Huh-uh” 52. Roundup rope 53. Tattooed 54. Eighth Greek letter 55. Neighbor of Saudi Arabia 56. Water, in Juárez 57. Word after PED or DEER 58. “Should that happen...”

62. Bikini half 63. Freud’s rational self 64. Paver’s gunk

OUR final message: Goodbye - Shivangi + Elie

8 Fun

Friday, April 25, 2025

Photos of the semester

Hannah Johnson/The Observer

Shivangi Nanda/The Observer Shivangi Nanda/The Observer

Auden Koetters/The Observer

Auden Koetters/The Observer

Elie Aoun/The Observer

Shivangi Nanda/The Observer

Shivangi Nanda/The Observer

Hannah Johnson/The Observer

Kethan Srinivasan/The Observer

Auden Koetters/The Observer

Shivangi Nanda/The Observer

Kethan Srinivasan/The Observer

Fun 9

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SUDOKU (EASY)

Top 10 best production night moments

10. Leaving production night at 8 a.m.

9. Perogi Cat (aka the night Elie gave Auden COVID-19).

8. Mid-production night Mitchell's run.

7. The "3 a.m. Trio's" first production night.

6. The curious incident of the missing Doordash order.

5. Elie suspiciosly incapacitated at production night, so Auden and Shivangi had to finish everything.

4. Auden not sleeping for 48 hours, crashing on the UMB couch and Elie finishing the whole issue. Auden then went to class the next day and recieved a 7% on her exam.

3. October 23, 2024, 12:03 a.m.

2. Elie turning 21 at production night ... wink wink.

1. Auden leaving her ID in the UMB office so Elie and Shivangi had to walk back at 3 a.m. to retrieve it.

Most honorable mention: the estimated 600 hours the "3 a.m. Trio" have spent together.

Honorable mention 2: Elie yelling at editors.

Honorable mention 3: The innumerable fights between Auden and Elie (at the fault of Elie). Auden (with love) (especially the yellow cover debacle) Honorable mention 4: Lucky (Happy) the dinosaur.

Honorable mention 5: When Shivangi missed production night and nobody spoke a single word the whole time.

Honorable mention 6: None of the words being in the word search for serveral months before anyone noticed.

Honorable mention 7: Elie's midnight lucubrations.

Opinion

The Case Western Reserve Observer Friday, April 25, 2025 observer.case.edu Volume LVI, Issue 27

EDITORIAL

Welcome Class of 2029 Editorial Board To Case Western Reserve University’s incoming Class of 2029: Everyone says it, and you’re probably getting tired of hearing it, but we’re living in uncertain times. As you get ready to step into the next stage of your life at such a contentious time, you face countless opportunities—many of which can make a difference not only in your own life but also in the lives of those being targeted by those in power.

At a time when speaking out against racism, nationalism, homophobia and many other unfair practices is being punished more and more severely, it’s of utmost importance that we continue to have each other’s backs. While administrations and companies may not be willing to stand up for our rights, we can take a stand for each other in big and small ways. We must push love over hatred and education over ignorance. Most importantly, we must be willing to have conversations with one another.

This school year started shakily, with a big topic of discussion even before the first day of classes being the university’s new protesting policy. The administration changed the policy in response to the pro-Palestine encampment during the 2024 spring semester—much to many students’ discontent—labeling it a disturbance and instating rules to prevent a protest of the same caliber again. This sentiment only worsened as the university took harsh punitive measures against encampment participants once the school year was underway. Thus, before the semester could begin, it felt as if the administration was not open to enacting certain changes based on student and faculty concerns. Some other early issues with the administration included housing concerns, as sophomores were ushered into the unfinished John Sykes Fayette and Mary Chilton Noyes Houses dormitories at higher-than-expected prices, and then

came the widely criticized rebranding of the beloved CWRU logo.

Before long, though, the U.S. presidential election escalated concerns beyond the campus community and toward extreme governmental interference. Since President Donald Trump’s election, the school has been threatened with research funding cuts, the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Engagement office has been terminated and now upward of a thousand international students around the country have begun to lose their visas. Additionally, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has raided a beloved local business— Cilantro Taqueria—spreading fear and panic around the community as immigrants and minorities are left wondering if they will be the next targets. Governor Mike DeWine signed Senate Bill 1, requiring “Ohio’s public universities [to post] course syllabi, [enforce] a mandatory civics course and expand[] review of faculty post-tenure.” Additionally, the bill prohibits DEI orientation, training and related descriptions in hiring practices.

Higher education is being attacked from many different angles, and freedom of speech is constantly being threatened. As a result, the school is scrambling to protect the institution, relaying new, stomachchurning information what feels like every day.

Although this academic and societal landscape is grim in many ways, there is still much opportunity to make a difference and find community. There are still chances for us to work together to help alleviate some of these burdens. If we want a university that celebrates diversity, even with the dispersion of diversity initiatives, we’ll have to make our own initiatives. Rather than losing hope, we must remain set on our goals, believing we can genuinely create the environment we want to see. There is still hope as universities across the nation sign onto “A Call for Constructive Engagement,” a public statement that speaks out against recent excessive

Jana Ashour/The Observer and illegitimate government interference.

These are not tasks that can be accomplished alone or fixed simply by placing names on a list, though.

We must make sure we are taking care of ourselves by building our community. Don’t come to CWRU with rigid expectations about the person you will be. Instead, come to campus with an open mind and allow yourself to explore opportunities and interests without burning yourself out. There are many people—students, faculty and staff—who are willing to provide support for the troubles you are going through. Many of your peers are academically and socially in the same boat as you, so you will certainly find people you click with.

CWRU holds countless fairs and showcases to display our talents and help us gain insight from each other—you just have to be open to engaging with them. These are not times when we can afford to succumb to gloom and helplessness.

Attend a protest, speak up when you feel you are being taken advantage of or find a group who can back you in case you need it. Write for The Observer to share your concerns with the campus community and take a break when needed. The fight for justice and peace is not linear, nor will it be simple to achieve, but you have many tools to start right at your fingertips. Good luck, Class of 2029. We know you’ll go on to do great things in your years here.

Hit after hit: Charli XCX’s cultural party movement is best added to the playlist, not the lifestyle Aleksandra Majewski Staff Writer Undoubtedly, cocaine has gained a glorified spotlight in today’s media— and English singer-songwriter Charli XCX is its movement’s leader. The 2024 album, Brat, received countless nominations and multiple awards taking a shape of its own in the cultural movement for party hedonism and drugs. The Brat album is charged with cocaine allusions and restless partying that has given way to its normalization on TikTok and other social media platforms. As a generation, should we be bumpin’ that?

Cocaine is a white, powdery, highly-addictive stimulant that causes lifelong complications to the human body and mind, though it is also seen as a

party drug for the elite and restless.

This normalization is a dangerous road that we shouldn’t go down. From March 2020 to March 2021, 96,779 drug-related overdose deaths were reported. Two main metabolite enzymes can be identified in urine samples followed by cocaine consumption, benzoylecgonine and ecgonine methyl ester. These can be detected for up to four days, depending on the dosage of the cocaine, individual’s metabolism and usage frequency. When combined with alcohol, the cleansing and removal of the substance from a person’s body takes much longer.

Another staple in the party scene is a good Cosmopolitan if you’re Carrie Bradshaw from “Sex and the City” or a gin martini from “Gossip Girl’s” Blair Waldorf. The combination of alcohol and cocaine are especially dan-

gerous and not to be crossed. This is something that is not explicitly stated by these glamorous, New York-based shows and movies or their romanticization of a party-esque, lavish lifestyle. Though when reality hits, and we remember that we are not Blair or Carrie, we may be in for a rude awakening. Instead, we should respect our health, bodies, and mind by staying away from these harmful mixtures.

The euphoria of a cocaine dose can be felt for up to 20 minutes when not orally ingested. Euphoria of the drug is temporary, so why not focus more on being present and the raw excitement of a moment? Besides, usage of the stimulant increases risks of HIV/ AIDS, heart attack and stroke. Cocaine addiction can make a person anxious, paranoid and reckless with their dopamine levels craving a higher

demand as their baseline for happiness is raised. This will only cause the brain to crave stronger, more frequent doses of the drug. Extended use of cocaine could cause life-threatening medical issues like infection and organ failure.

Though Charli XCX’s Brat album may have painted an alluring picture for teenage youth, behind the dancing and flashing lights lies a grave and treacherous reality to be avoided with drug abstinence. Cocaine should not be seen as a party enhancer, but a fatal, highly-addictive substance. As a collective generation, it is irresponsible to give cocaine an online platform. Instead, we must spread awareness about the dangers of cocaine. The fantasy of euphoric parties and highs should not come at the expense of our health.

Opinion 11

observer.case.edu

As an underrepresented minority student, I know why DEI matters Reda Riffi Contributing Writer The room buzzed with quiet energy. Students, joined by proud parents at the Yale School of Medicine’s closing symposium, sat together as a diverse cohort. As the symposium began, images of prominent biomedical researchers flashed across the screen.

“What do all these people have in common?” Dr. De La Cruz, head of Branford College at Yale University, asked.

“They are leaders in science,” a few voices murmured.

“Yes, but what else?” he insisted.

“Just say it, it’s not an insult.”

The silence continued until someone said, “White dudes!”

Not a single woman, not a single person of color, no minorities—all of the leaders were white men. But in front of the screen, we were the most diverse cohort I had ever seen.

We were underrepresented minorities with different races, national origins, orientations and religions.

Within our group, no one was a minority. Each difference added a unique piece to the puzzle.

This research opportunity existed because of the university’s commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) through programs such as wwhich recruit underrepresented minority students and provide them with the opportunity to demonstrate their talent. In such a program, we didn’t just discover a shared love for

science—we found ourselves and realized that our differences were strengths, not weaknesses. This was real progress. Diversity in science drives innovation, strengthens problem-solving and enriches research teams by bringing a wide range of perspectives, experiences and ideas to the table.

This environment affirmed that we could belong in science, learn, grow and lead. Discrimination and exclusion once told us minorities didn’t belong. Science today shows us we are essential. When people from all backgrounds are included, the questions change, and so do the answers. Innovation happens when every perspective has a seat at the table. As Dr. Eric Winer, Alfred Gilman professor of Medicine and Pharmacology, once told me, “We just can’t afford to miss out on that talent.”

For many of us, the mission wasn’t only to make biomedical discoveries, it was also to create a social impact—to show what’s possible when historically excluded students are given a real chance. This mission is still being challenged today. Recent federal directives have placed severe restrictions on DEI efforts across higher education. Institutions nationwide are reviewing and altering DEI programs, with some universities even changing department names to avoid severe government consequences. Harvard University has already begun paying “the price of bravery,” facing billions of frozen dollars for standing with values that

protect students like me. The result of these reactions and governmental consequences is a wave of uncertainty, driven by fear.

As a first-generation Moroccan American, I returned to the U.S. with a deep passion for science and research but faced challenges navigating a system unfamiliar to students like me. DEI programs gave me the opportunity to grow, contribute and find my place in science— an opportunity I know many other young undergraduate students still need today. But talent isn’t the problem—opportunity is. Many students may have the same goals, but we don’t all start from the same place.

We don’t all face the same barriers.

That’s why equity matters—and why programs that measure the “distance traveled” are not only fair, but necessary. Without these programs, my academic and research experience would not have been possible.

And now, countless students stand where I once stood: full of potential, waiting for just one chance to prove it.

The strength of the American higher education system lies in its holistic investment in students— from admission evaluations to academic support, research opportunities and a clear commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion. Unlike systems abroad that rely solely on final scores, U.S. universities assess students by evaluating letters from mentors, student leadership experiences, student identity— and most importantly—the distance

traveled, which is a measure of resilience and potential. This approach reflects true meritocracy by offering all students, especially those historically excluded, a fair opportunity to contribute to science. Investing in diversity isn’t just about equality or equity, it is about creating opportunities for every motivated student to contribute to and shape the future of science.

Having studied at several foreign institutions, I’ve observed that private American universities tend to thrive in comparison because they can uphold these values without being constrained by rigid, stateimposed guidelines. That freedom is what has enabled students from diverse backgrounds to access opportunity and benefit scientific research. Until now, this model allowed America to lead in academic excellence in higher education. But recent federal actions threaten to restrict this freedom, risking the quality of evaluation and the inclusive environment that gave so many, including myself, the chance to belong, contribute and lead in science.

Recent federal restrictions threaten to reverse the progress made in science that gave underrepresented minority students the chance to belong, contribute and lead. We will return to a dark past and to the same silence that echoed when Dr. De La Cruz asked his question. In the libraries of tomorrow, we will once again display elegant portraits of science leaders—and once again, they will all only be “white dudes!”

You need to get a hobby Catherine Choi Staff Writer When we see people who are so bored that their boredom becomes an annoyance to others, we say, “you need a hobby” so they leave us alone. We are often asked what our hobbies and interests are when we meet someone new. However, we often get stuck if we don’t have one in particular because, of course, doomscrolling on social media is not a hobby. Despite many people thinking hobbies are a waste of time, too childish, not profitable nor beneficial in life, they enrich our lives by widening our interests and helping us to learn about ourselves.

The first reason that we need a hobby is because people have to refresh every once in a while. When people are having a bad day at school, work or in their social life, it is important that they get out of those negative thoughts and emotions. Although acknowledging and processing the incident is also important, if it becomes excessive, people can fall into an endless spiral of depression and stress. Aside from that, putting too much energy into a certain area of life for a long period of time can cause burnout, leading to a loss of productivity and health strains. Having a hobby lets people get out of this spiral of imbalance and disorganization so that they can lead healthier lives. When people dedicate a specific amount of time to themselves, breaking the endless work cycle, they will have the energy to keep going for the long term.

The second reason to get a hobby is because it makes life more enter-

Jana Ashour/The Observer taining and adventurous. Regardless of how much you enjoy your job, school or family, your everyday routine will eventually become unbearably boring, which is why some people resort to doom scrolling. By exposing themselves to new things, people can help relieve their boredom and add vibrancy to their life. For example, if someone has a sports hobby, it gives them an excuse to get out of the house without needing to be proficient at the sport, which will eventually improve their

personal health. If someone has a social hobby, it is a great outlet for them to meet new people and build friendships as an adult with likeminded people. If someone has a practical hobby, such as cooking, it can help save money and build life skills. Instead of spending a lot of money on restaurants, they could cook delicious meals at home. Thus, exploring new things is a good way to make life more interesting.

The third reason to get a hobby is because it is associated with skill

building and confidence boosts. At first, trying something new is hard and frustrating. However, after being patient and putting in effort, people can escape that phase and become proficient. Along the way, people are likely to feel a sense of accomplishment and confidence about overcoming difficulties and knowing that they have grown their skill in an area. If their hobby is related to a career or a specific field, it may help them start a new career or assist them in advancing their current one. For example, a creative hobby like crafting lets people develop creative thinking and problem solving skills—perhaps they could even earn additional income by selling their creations. Having an active hobby, such as exercising or playing a sport helps improve physical and mental well-being by enhancing body function and preventing serious diseases. A hobby that involves learning, such as reading or learning a new language, can shine when the skill is needed.

Of course, there should be a limit. Just because having a hobby is better than doomscrolling or relying on others for entertainment, it does not mean that we should cross the line of moderation. In the case of high-cost hobbies such as photography, golf or fishing, spending excessive amounts of money can cause a huge financial burden. Also, if one is spending too much time pursuing hobbies that require a lot of time commitment and frequent vacancies, it could lead to strains in social relationships and strain work performance. As much as it is important to have an outlet to have fun and express ourselves, it is important that we stay on track with our life and goals.

12 Opinion

Friday, April 25, 2025

What my second year at CWRU taught me Katharina Staehr Staff Writer There’s a reason they call it the “sophomore slump.” As I cap off my second year of college, I certainly relate. Nothing is quite as new and exciting as freshman year, but you are not quite at the finish line, either. The result: a feeling of being overwhelmed, and at times unmotivated, academically, socially and mentally. Yet, on the other side of crashing out, chaos and conundrum, there was plenty of room for learning, reflection and self-discovery this year.

There is no doubt about it— second year is hard, and when I thought having one year under my belt would make things easier, I was wrong. Organic chemistry reaction mechanisms slipped my mind no matter how much I drew them; upon finishing one difficult assignment, I was already chasing the next. My mistake: When things weren’t clicking, I refused to believe that I was feeling burnt out because the class content was rigorous. Instead, I told myself I wasn’t working hard enough. My friend’s words stuck with me: “Sophomore year is challenging—you are allowed to admit that.”

On that note, it is okay to feel overwhelmed. If anything, it can be comforting to realize that our peers are feeling the exact same way. Yet what was most helpful for me was putting my anxieties into perspective. A low test grade, a rigorous class, homework piling up? Start asking yourself: “Will this matter in two weeks? What about in a couple of years down the road?” It isn’t that our current struggles are invalid,

but framing them in a bigger picture can help transform near meltdowns into more manageable moments.

My biggest revelation this year was perhaps realizing that I don’t have to do things just because I think I should. In the undergraduate experience, we are inclined to fill our schedules with clubs, work, extracurriculars and research—alongside being full-time students. This overload is problematic not only when our stress levels skyrocket, but especially when every activity begins to feel like a chore. My second year helped me filter out that noise, find my focus and lean into the things that felt meaningful to me. I created a STEM curriculum to excite students for science, took on the role of captain on my club soccer team and wrote for The Observer about topics I am passionate about.

Soon, I realized time felt fuller not when I was filling it with more activities, but when I filled it with what I wanted to be doing.

Friendships were another area of growth. It is natural for friendships to ebb and flow, friends to come and go. This year especially, I felt like I was distancing myself from the people closest to me. We stopped talking as much, and the time to hang out was sparse due to our busy schedules. I quickly jumped to the conclusion that something was amiss on my part. Little did I know, a conversation over lunch revealed that my friend was dealing with personal anxieties I wasn’t even aware of. Our much-needed chat turned into a moment of growth and a commitment to check in on each other.

That is all to say: you never know what someone else is going through.

Silence doesn’t mean anger, but perhaps it is about time to pick up a

conversation.

I am still figuring out the balancing act between academics and social life. This year, school definitely took the front seat. There were plenty of nights I skipped getting dinner with a friend to finish a paper, or weekends I spent studying in my dorm while others were out.

While I finished my assignments on time, I regret missing out on certain moments I’d wanted to join.

I’m now learning it doesn’t have to be all or nothing—there is room for both, and perhaps we can all work on finding that rhythm.

I’ve realized that sometimes the best way to do that is by being spontaneous. A late-night Eurowafel run with a friend turned into a memory for which I gladly sacrificed my

studying time; an unplanned evening run became time well spent, not wasted. When consumed by our busy schedules, it is essential to leave some room for spontaneity, even when our to-do list says otherwise.

Lastly, amidst this emotional whiplash of my second year, the feeling of pride followed by waves of disappointment, the moments of success overshadowed by defeat and short bursts of motivation consumed by a loss of energy, it is crucial to hold on to positivity. My second year was far from perfect, but things have a way of working themselves out. Ultimately, it’s about how we face our challenges, turning them into lessons that help us grow.

We wouldn’t want it any other way.

The Case Western Reserve Observer Established in 1969 by the undergraduate students of Case Western Reserve University

Shivangi Nanda Executive Editor & Publisher PRINT Elie Aoun Director of Print Vani Subramony News Editor Téa Tamburo News Editor Zachary Treseler News Editor Kate Gordon Life Editor Hannah Johnson Opinion Editor Darcy Chew Sports Editor Sahar Kapasi Copy Editor Ella Lasky Copy Editor Siya Motwani Copy Editor Ellie Palaian Copy Editor Katherine Riley Copy Editor DESIGN Auden Koetters Director of Design Elizabeth McHugh Layout Designer Anjali Bhuthpur Layout Designer Tyler Vu Layout Designer Shareen Chahal Layout Designer Jana Ashour Graphic Designer Lucas Yang Graphic Designer DIGITAL MEDIA Clay Preusch Director of Digital Media & Photo Editor Aambar Agarwal Social Media Manager Shejuti Wahed Social Media Content Creator & Video Editor Kethan Srinivasan Social Media Content Creator Moses Fleischman Web Editor Esha Bagora Social Media Editor BUSINESS Kamila Sattler Sanchez Director of Business Operations The Observer is the weekly undergraduate student newspaper of Case Western Reserve University. Established in 1969, The Observer reports news affecting students and provides an editorial forum for the university community. Unsigned editorials are typically written by the opinion editor but reflect the majority opinion of the senior editorial staff. Opinion columns are the views of their writers and not necessarily of The Observer staff. For advertising information, contact The Observer via e-mail at observer@case. edu.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR should be e-mailed to observer@case.edu or submitted on our website at observer.case.edu. Letters can be mailed to Thwing Center 11111 Euclid Avenue, Suite 01, Cleveland, Ohio 44106. For policy and guidelines related to the submission of Letters to the Editor, refer to observer.case.edu/submit-a-letter.

The Observer is a proud member of CWRU’s University Media Board. Follow The Observer on Facebook, Twitter, TikTok and Instagram @cwruobserver.

Lucas Yang/The Observer

Farewells

The Case Western Reserve Observer Friday, April 25, 2025 observer.case.edu Volume LVi, Issue 27

Editor’s Note: The faces, stories and memories that defined my time at CWRU Shivangi Nanda Executive Editor I came to Case Western Reserve University with minimal expectations. Starting college at the tail end of the pandemic, the only thing on my mind was being back in person and getting to socialize and learn from beyond a computer screen. While I had taken on many COVID-19 hobbies, like cooking and crafts, even the homebody in me was starting to get tired of being at home all the time.

CWRU was an escape for me—a fresh start in a new school around new people and unfamiliar places where I could rediscover myself—as cliché as that sounds.

What I did not know was that it would not be school or Cleveland necessarily that would provide me that much needed room to grow.

No, I would soon learn that a college newspaper, nestled in the basement of Thwing Center, would be the single most enriching experience of my college journey.

If you asked me my first year, I would never have considered myself a newspaper person. The elevator pitch I gave potential friends and mentors would not have included a stint on a school newspaper or even a distant interest in the field of journalism. Sure, I loved writing, but news coverage and print media—especially at a collegiate level—were never a part of my four-year plan.

You see, there were 63 people in my high school’s graduating class, and all of us were taught to focus on one thing—preparing for a career in healthcare. Classes in anatomy and physiology, nutrition and biomedical sciences left little room for creative exploration or dabbling in the arts. Most of the writing I did was solo: book reviews, blog posts, short stories and recipes scribbled on notecards and Google Docs. Year after year, words became a sanctuary for all the thoughts, ideas and passions that had nowhere else to go.

Coming to CWRU, I expected to follow the path that had been ingrained in me since highschool— join some volunteer clubs, academic groups and perhaps start a new hobby, time permitting. It was only at the Student Activities Fair, when I came across a barren blue table with “The Observer” printed across the tablecloth, that I thought writing for the newspaper could be worth a try.

A few weeks later I attended the interest meeting, dipping my toes in college journalism and getting my first look of the office I would later call a second home. I wish I could say I instantly fell in love with The Observer—the people, the culture and its mission—but, frankly, I left that meeting rather unimpressed.

But, two months later, a friend of mine encouraged me to join as a copy editor, boasting about the amazing people she had met and the free dinner every Wednesday. By this point, I had grown tired of Leutner Commons food, so I gave The Observer a second chance.

My first semester as a copy editor was a struggle. There were many days I talked to nobody while I edited and even more days that I returned home after midnight, tired and unable to wake up for my classes the next morning. But, I loved the work.

In that first month, I learned so much about CWRU, its campus, administration, clubs and the communities and traditions that made this school so perfectly complex. And as I grew to enjoy the role, I gained a liking for the people too. By my second semester, I had found friendships in my tight-knit team of copy editors, tag-teaming 2000-word articles, investigating the AP Stylebook when we were too nervous to ask former Director of Print Sara Khorshidi for help and walking home together every night—enjoying quiet, comfortable conversation until we said goodbyes and goodnights.

And just as every great club will do to you, I got lured in deeper and deeper. I remember writing my very first piece for the Life section, a review of “Spider-Man: Homecoming.” I spent a good portion of winter break writing, rewriting, thinking and overthinking whether or not I wanted to publish. It wasn’t that my views were particularly controversial or my prose particularly poor, but the idea of having my words under the public eye, eternalized long after my time at CWRU, felt daunting.

I took the plunge then, and I am so glad I did, because that piece was the first of many in entertainment, arts and campus life. And that fear of exposure was quickly replaced by a passion for having my voice heard.

Fast forward to my third year, I had just been elected executive editor, and all those days of hard work felt like they had prepared me well.

I had several articles under my belt and two years of editing experience.

I mean how hard could it really be?

In my first weeks as executive editor, I was naive. I felt invincible, having the power to take The Observer to new heights and leverage the support of my skilled team to make all my big ideas a reality. While that was all true, and there were many many opportunities to improve, the role of the executive editor is so much more than that of a changemaker.

These past four years have been tense for this campus and for colleges across the country. Between administrative, federal and political tensions, the role of the student newspaper to document, report and inform has become increasingly important. Dealing with these serious and deeply personal issues on campus, I started to see another side to my role: a protector. The Observer, like many college newspapers, is the subject of scrutiny. And dealing with that criticism, growing from critiques and finding ways to be and do better became an everyday mission. Protecting the integrity of the paper and the strength of our content was an uphill battle, where every small win seemed to be met with yet another challenge. But looking back, I am grateful for all of it. Because in these moments of uncertainty, stress and utter confusion, I learned what was most important: the people.

On its surface, The Observer is a newspaper meant to amplify student voices and inform audiences about current campus events. But behind the scenes, there is a team of talented, dedicated and skillful editors, graphic artists, writers, content creators, etc. who are just doing the things they love most.

Leadership for me quickly became a passion for my people, doing what-

Clay Preusch/The Observer ever I could to protect their work, support their passions and make The Observer a community they kept coming back to. Our biggest stories have taken a village to publish. And I could not express how much I appreciate all the people on my Editorial Board, in University Media Board and across the CWRU community who have made our content as loved as it is today.

Our Director of Print Elie Aoun is one of the brightest, most hardworking and caring people that I have met. From helping me crack down on our copy editors to listening to me rant about everyday problems, I don’t know if I would have enjoyed my time as executive editor if he were not there beside me. I will say, my initial impression of Elie was not all positive, but today, I am proud to call him my friend—or colleague if he so prefers. Another special mention for the third musketeer in our “3 a.m. Trio,” Director of Design Auden Koetters. In addition to being a wildly incredible designer, Auden is the kindest and most friendly person I know. Even when InDesign has crashed her entire layout or we have added two extra Fun pages at midnight, she pushes through with optimism and determination that I am hard-pressed to muster at times.

I will miss our late nights of scrambled page finishes, spilled secrets and inside jokes, but I am certain these friendships are ones that will last far beyond the baby blue walls of this newsroom.

Outside of this group, I have formed special friendships with nearly every person on the Editorial Board. Sports Editor Darcy Chew never fails to amaze me with her 23-credit course load and her near perfect attendance at Undergraduate Student Government general assemblies, and News Editor Zachary Treseler who, even thousands of miles away, remains one of our most dedicated contributors—and biggest champion of our work. Darcy, Zachary, News Editor Vani Subramony, Life Editor Kate Gordon and Opin-

ion Editor Hannah Johnson have been core members of our print team and dear friends of mine through the trials and tribulations of running The Observer. And still, this is such a small glimpse of all the wonderful and talented people that make up our paper—from our resident artist, Graphic Designer Lucas Yang, to Clay Preusch, the best photo editor ever.

Needless to say, my time on The Observer was more than I asked for, and everything that I needed. I think my friends and family would agree, but The Observer has changed me.

I have learned leadership is not only about what I can bring but the space I can create for others to thrive as their best selves. Every production night has made me realize how important it is to surround yourself with good, hardworking people who will call you out when you are on the wrong path and stand by you when you need support to stay on the right one. And that camaraderie extends beyond just my peers. Time and again I have leaned on my advisors, Associate Director of Engagement JohnPatrick O’Hagan and Professor Bernard Jim, who have guided me in my toughest decisions and shown me the power of great mentorship.

I say this in many of my newsletter blurbs, but I truly believe The Observer is a family. We bicker with one another, argue at the conference table, constantly give advice that we may or may not want to take, but above all, we are always there for each other. Whether it’s reworking pieces, creating a last minute graphic or simply walking home together at the end of a long night, you know you will always have a person, or 10, by your side when you are with us.

As I silently hold back tears, all I can say is that I am eternally grateful—grateful for the series of events that led me to this point and all the people I have befriended along the way. It has truly been a privilege serving as your executive editor, and I cannot wait to continue to cheer for you all from the sidelines!

14 Farewells

Friday, April 25, 2025

Fragments of a time that I will cherish forever Elie Aoun Director of Print The summer after my first year at Case Western Reserve University, I applied to The Observer on a whim, hastily updating my resume and writing a cover letter at 2 a.m. in the hopes of being accepted as a copy editor. Since attending my first Student Activities Fair in August 2021, I had known about The Observer and often grabbed an issue off of the stand in Clark Hall after my Elementary Latin classes, but I had chosen not to apply or write; those who knew me in high school can attest that I had given my soul to the Reserve Record, the school newspaper, and I had no intention of spending my college years editing articles and chasing writers until the wee hours of the night. Nevertheless, a regrettably uneventful first year at CWRU and an impulse that I will never fully understand pushed me to apply that summer. I was accepted as a copy editor and began editing on the fourth issue of my second year. What followed were three years that have had an indelible effect on my life.

My first year on The Observer was the year of Executive Editor Shreyas Banerjee, one of the most industrious and dedicated people I have ever met, and Director of Print Sara Khorshidi, a boss who terrified me and yet could make me cry with laughter every week.

(Funny coincidence: I wrote in the first sentence of this article that “I applied to The Observer on a whim,” and only later did I check and see that the first line of Sara’s farewell article reads, “I joined The Observer on a whim”— great minds think alike, right?) Among the copy editors laboring with me in the trenches of the University Media Board (UMB) Office was Shivangi Nanda, a student whose love of journalism and The Observer in particular knows no bounds—and who will play a big part in this story later.

We copy editors were a tenacious bunch, always eager to leave production night early but perpetually unable

to because the section editors were frequently writing and/or editing their articles late. One time Sara took us out into the hallway like a teacher who had had enough and chastised us for the negative way in which we spoke about the section editors—in hindsight, she was right to do that. Anyway, I did my work like a diligent little copy editor, learning when to use numerals when reporting scores in sports articles, when to capitalize someone’s title and all the other minutiae of AP Style that go unnoticed by anyone outside of the Print Team.

That year, I began my five-part series reviewing “Mario Kart 8 Deluxe” tracks, which was probably a bane to the two life editors who have had to edit those ridiculously long articles (sorry); I remember begging Sara to final edit those articles so that Shreyas would not rip them asunder. Somehow Sara let me include the phrase “casual pickle enjoyers” in a caption for an article about the Cleveland Pickle Fest.

Oh, and I wrote a ridiculous article reviewing a selection of chairs proposed for the new residence halls; most of the Editorial Board wanted to title it “Butts for science,” but Sara and I refused to let that appear in print, opting for the conservative “New chair alert.” I had a difficult time making friends that year.

The closest was Shivangi, with whom I walked back to Southside every Wednesday after production night, but our conversations consisted of talking about Observer work and speculating about who the next executive editor would be. The 2022–23 school year ended; Shivangi was elected executive editor, and she picked me to be her director of print, a position that I have held for the last two years.

While I was out of the UMB Office around 10 or 11 p.m. as a copy editor, finishing before 2 a.m. as director of print in fall 2023 was early. Who knew that final editing half the articles and finalizing all the Adobe InDesign pages would take so long? It did not help that something always—always without fail—went wrong. Still, I had Director of Design Auden Koetters to rely upon,

an academic weapon if I have ever met one and the best InDesign user I have ever known. It was a rocky start, however, as her first encounter with me involved my adamant refusal to reformat one of my “Mario Kart” articles when I was a copy editor and she a layout designer. For 27 issues that year, she, Shivangi and I (the “3 a.m. Trio”) worked on the paper and slowly grew to like each other.

That year was rough on the print side. There were several instances when we sent off an issue to print around 3 a.m., only for me to check the PDFs in my 10 a.m. class on Thursday to find some major error, which then entailed emailing our contact at the printer to halt printing so that someone could run to the UMB Office and fix the problem. There were other times when an error was not caught, and my day would be ruined when I found the error in print or was told about it by someone else. Near the end of that year, the “3 a.m. Trio” pulled an all-nighter in the UMB Office, finishing the issue around 8 a.m. because of complications with a timeline displaying events regarding the Israel-Hamas war on campus. (There were still errors on that timeline when it arrived in print.) Shivangi and Auden still get on my case for leaving at 7 a.m. even though there was nothing for me to do while Auden was editing on the sole open computer. I will never forget seeing the sun rise as I left the UMB Office—I was reevaluating the life choices that had led me to that point, but somehow I stuck around on The Observer. What else was I going to do with my Wednesday nights (and Thursday mornings, apparently)?

Entering this year, my last year as director of print and at CWRU, I still did not feel like I truly “belonged” on The Observer. Most of that was honestly my fault, as I am very slow and hesitant to socialize. Once when asked if I considered Shivangi and Auden my friends, I remarked that they were “colleagues,” a comment that they still bring up and I can never live down. I made a greater effort to get to know

Clay Preusch/The Observer

them, and it was the best decision that I have made in my time working on this paper.

I have spent so much time working with section editors, copy editors, layout designers, graphic designers and other various staff members, and their talent and dedication has been a continual source of inspiration to me.

It has been one of my most meaningful college experiences to watch them improve their skills and help them whenever I could. Particular praise is due to Sports Editor Darcy Chew and News Editor Zachary Treseler, who have devoted so much of their time to covering the most important news on campus and ensuring that we get all the facts right. Life Editor Kate Gordon and Opinion Editor Hannah Johnson manage our two most popular sections in terms of writers, sometimes having to edit five or more articles a week while also writing a piece of their own; the paper would be so devoid of content without their weekly contributions.

Without Auden’s exceptional InDesign skills, every production night would have finished at 8 a.m. Nobody can match her talent on that software, and I have been the luckiest director of print to have her at my side. I owe endless gratitude to Shivangi, the beating heart of The Observer for the last two years. She has taken on far more than her fair share of work, not only final editing articles and working with InDesign as I have done, but also defending us against the administration, dealing with the budget, planning bonding events and so, so much more.

She deserves endless credit for keeping the paper and all its staff on track every single week, making an environment where everyone feels welcome and appreciated.

All in all, after 54 issues, I have spent around 500 hours in the UMB Office with Shivangi and Auden, and in that time they have grown into two of my best friends. Conversations about friends, family, classes, careers, religions, love and much more have occurred in those late hours, and I would not trade those for anything—not even more sleep. I have leaned on them regarding problems in my personal life, and they have been a wonderful source of support and advice. I could not have asked for two better colleagues—I mean friends, friends!

I know that when I reflect on my years on The Observer in the near or distant future, I will not remember deleting this or that superfluous comma or spellchecking every name that I came across—though that was essential work, occupying almost every Wednesday for the last three years of my life. Rather, I will remember picking up an issue fresh off the printer every Friday afternoon, the culmination of at least 100 hours of combined work and a permanent record of what we, the CWRU community, thought, felt, experienced and accomplished. I will remember the staff bonding events at The Big Bounce America, Tabletop Board Game Cafe and Shivangi’s apartment, where I learned so much about all the amazing people on the Editorial Board who are too numerous to completely name and praise.

Most of all, I will remember the late nights spent in conversation with close friends, musing about the purpose of our lives as the bright light of InDesign illuminated our faces until I gave the call that the last page was finalized and we all promptly packed up to go home—all in order to repeat the process the next week with fresh minds, new topics in our lives to discuss and a collective passion to create a product to inform you, dear reader, about the latest events affecting our unique, bustling and infinitely complex campus.

Farewells 15

observer.case.edu

Still observing, still reporting Zachary Treseler News Editor I joined The Observer in 2022 for no other reason than because I got COVID-19, and I was bored out of my mind. I saw that a new bus shuttle route started, the Night Link, and I wanted to write about it because buses! To my friends reading this article, my revelation here will not surprise them. But to think that my boredom and wanting to write about buses eventually bestowed upon me the responsibilities that it did is a powerful testament to the impact of journalism and student expression. Even if CWRU has a reputation for distrustful and apathetic students, The Observer is a testament to the feisty, rebellious and confrontational nature that is emblematic of our school’s history.

It’s hard for me to say when it all clicked that I wanted to dedicate two years of my college life to this paper, and I still honestly can’t say what in the world caused me to apply for news editor at the end of my sophomore year. In high school I was a yearbook kid, and I started my collegiate career as a theatre kid. What I do remember are some of the important points where I figured out “hey, I like this whole journalism thing” and that “this Observer thing is pretty fun.” My best guess is that it had to come from a few articles, starting with investigating the Integrated Graduate Studies program or possibly from counting every single laundry machine for “A spin cycle of emotions.” From there, I was successfully bitten, and my content went, low-key, nuts. Some of my personal highlights range from Pierogi Cat, reporting on Cleveland Institute of Music, investigating the closure of a sorority and then this year exposing the new protesting policies. There is something about having a scoop, finding out something that very few people have and then sharing it with the wider community. The challenge of figuring out why something happened, and what its impacts are, is a feeling that I cannot easily describe, but it is incredible. To this day, I look forward to every time I get a text asking for help chasing

Clay Preusch/The Observer something down or finding the reason behind a change. It’s exciting, and it’s also the scariest thing I have done.

And to qualify that further, no conversation about my time on The Observer can be complete without discussing the 2024 Gaza Solidarity Encampment. It is weird to say that this was a highlight of my time on the paper—I think I got eight hours of sleep total that first week, frequently stayed up late at Kelvin Smith Library writing and editing pieces and then came to Thwing Center early in the morning to write more. Being arrested or injured as Observer staff was a genuine concern, but we rose to that challenge immensely. Coordinating the coverage and working with such amazing people really was a highlight that showed our ability to produce many forms of content, from live updates to long form stories and Insta-

gram posts. It is something I am still incredibly proud of. And we did this all during finals week.

To say it has all been smooth sailing would be wrong. To say that I haven’t struggled, had some important figures at CWRU directly call me out or had a certain director of print ring me on the phone after I got off two flights to scold me for 20 minutes would be a falsehood. After finding out about my various run-ins, my cousin said, and I quote, “How the hell are you still a student there?” And I often wonder the same thing.

But there was something that called me back, time and time again. And it wasn’t being able to drive the UMB Golf Cart. I would look forward to production nights each week for the collaborative energy they would bring and for the jokes that would be made.

In that room are some of CWRU’s

smartest and brightest people, and to have worked with them is one of the greatest privileges of my college career.

I think it’s important to note the special rules that are placed on the paper because of me. These include, but are not limited to: one article about the Cleveland RTA per semester, one article on The Bachelor per semester, one CWRU history article a semester and one laundry machine article a semester. There is also an overall request to limit articles on the following subjects: public bathrooms in Cleveland, unrelated Amtrak journeys I take or Greyhound stations in Cleveland. Oh, and no 5,000 word articles. Learned that one the hard way…

My biggest takeaways are just the memories I have. While there have been plenty of moments of anxiety and spiked adrenaline, there are also so many sweet spots in my time on The Observer. The ones that bring a smile to my face include: dragging a future news editor to collect documents at Cuyahoga County Court on her birthday, scrapbooking (many times) in the middle of production night and going to Jolly Scholar and then turning around to attend a Student Presidents’ Roundtable meeting during my last production night. There was also that one day my article got picked up in Montana State University’s newspaper about radio chess. That was a fun one. And of course, hands down, the eclipse—probably one of my favorite days ever.

Everyone whom I have met through The Observer is an absolute joy. Calling out the shadow Editorial Board here … y’all know who you are. I will forever miss our milkshake runs during production night.

To journalism as a whole, I will miss you. Hopefully we meet again.

And to The Observer, I will miss you more. I am so excited to see what you turn out to be over the next few years and decades.

Even if I’m 4,300 miles away, one thing still holds: I am still observing and still reporting. And I probably will be, for at least a little bit longer.

Signing off as The Observer’s biggest yapper.

Standing on the right side of history with The Observer Vani Subramony News Editor On May 4, 1970, student journalists at Case Western Reserve University’s college radio station, WRUW-FM, broadcasted a revolution. With a 10watt signal, they hauled yards of cable, mixers and mics across campus, providing vital, though amateur, coverage of campus reactions to the murder of four Kent State University students. As Art Ellis notes in WRUW-FM archival material, “I’m not sure if any member of our enthusiastic staff had completed a journalism course, but we somehow knew what great radio is all about. We simply turned on our mics, described what we saw and invited others to speak their minds.”

This is vital and powerful journalism—born of CWRU students with a dedication to free speech, telling the truth and amplifying voices within a community wrought by a diversity of perspectives. In my time at CWRU, I have had the privilege of engaging with everyday students who embody this spirit in all of their work: academic, journalistic or activistic. We fight to do what Ellis did in 1970; we describe

what we see and invite others to speak their minds.

In my short time on The Observer’s staff, I have fallen in love with the organization and its ability to provide an outlet for the campus community to engage in discourse beyond the classroom. Last semester, I met a student who expressed their frustration with the empty promises made by CWRU administration to protect and support the student body. They also expressed a desire for The Observer to continue magnifying ignored student voices.

“You speak for students,” they told me, “It is already hard to talk about topics on campus and honestly, coverage from The Observer is the only thing keeping me from actually losing it.”

I applied to be The Observer’s News editor immediately after this encounter. I see the amplification of student voices—what The Observer publishes, what student activists stand up for at demonstrations and what representatives advocate for during student government meetings—as vital in developing and maintaining a campus climate of forward-thinking empathy.

Through our words, written or broadcasted, we can call out injustice, yes, but also unite people in fighting for a

common goal and ultimately strive for morality and positive change.

I am eternally thankful to The Observer (and WRUW-FM, my heart and soul) for teaching me what cannot be learned in the classroom: how to not

just think critically but act on what matters most, how to develop meaningful relationships founded on mutual understanding and empathy and how to lead with integrity when standing on the right side of history.

Clay Preusch/The Observer

16 Farewells

Friday, April 25, 2025

A place for self-expression, and a lot of laughter Kate Gordon Life Editor When I arrived at Case Western Reserve University, I had no intention of joining the paper or being involved with college journalism in any capacity. I only ended up on The Observer’s sign-up sheet because my friend was interested, and I thought, sure, I might as well tag along. But she ended up changing her mind, and there I was, alone at the interest meeting. Although I intended to listen politely and then ghost the editors, I actually found myself intrigued by their spiel. I was particularly interested in the Life section—they would pay me to write movie and music reviews? Sign me up.

I spent my first year on The Observer as a staff writer, churning out biweekly articles and largely disconnected from anyone on the staff except for then-Life Editor Shreyas Banerjee. I won’t say I didn’t have fun—I wrote about the 2021 Met Gala, Britney Spears’ “toxic” conservatorship and the time I got norovirus from one of the dining halls (though Bon Appétit claimed otherwise). I can say in retrospect that none of these pieces are exactly “good journalism,” but there’s no denying that they have serious entertainment value. Even now I’m proud to say that you can tell when I’ve had fun writing one of my articles just by reading it. But I knew I wanted to be a lot more involved with The Observer than I was as a writer. So the summer before my

second year, I applied to be a copy editor and officially joined the Editorial Board.

I think that second year was my favorite out of all my time spent on The Observer. Not only did I learn more than I ever thought possible about writing mechanics and beat the instinct to type an Oxford comma out of my fingers forever, but I also found my place within an incredible group of people. Shreyas had risen through the ranks to become executive editor, and he and Director of Print Sara Khorshidi brought a lovable chaos to production night that kept it from ever feeling boring.

My favorite memories were reading aloud lines from Shreyas’ unhinged pieces—who else remembers exactly where they were when they heard that Dave’s Market on Cedar Hill was closing?—and listening to Sara fight with her successor Elie Aoun about photo captions. (“[A] s he rejoices in the taste of authentic Cleveland-brewed pickles” was a real phrase that we put into print.)

Even though my Wednesdays never ended earlier than 10:30 p.m., attendance (almost) never felt like an obligation. The Editorial Board, and particularly the mid-stage crew of copy editors, made the editing process fun, and all I can really remember is how much of the evening we spent laughing together.

For these last two years on The Observer I’ve been the Life editor, and although it has a lesser degree of involvement at production night than copy editing, it’s a role that feels like it was tailor-made for me. I love that I’ve been able to keep writ-

Clay Preusch/The Observer ing about the things I’m passionate about, as silly as some of them are.

Apart from the people I’ve met on the Editorial Board, I’m probably most grateful to The Observer for giving me a place to express myself and share my opinions—a creative outlet in such a STEM-centered school is nothing to take lightly, and

I’m genuinely sad to have to give it up. Even though I’m not trying to be a professional writer or journalist or anything, knowing how to write well and in a style all my own is something I’ll be able to take with me wherever I go. I’ll always be thankful that The Observer helped me find my voice.

Finding my focus: How a random decision shaped my college journey Clay Preusch Director of Digital Media I joined The Observer mostly on a whim during the spring semester of my first year. I was sitting in a PHYS 121: General Physics I lecture in Strosacker Auditorium when a current member of the club came in to advertise that they were hiring video editors. I had run into The Observer’s booth during the Student Activities Fair, but I had also spoken to so many other clubs that everything kind of blurred together. I figured I’d apply anyway—mostly just to see what would happen.

I ended up becoming the third member of a blossoming digital media team, editing videos shot by the other two members—and occasionally featuring other volunteers from the rest of the Editorial Board. These videos included Ouija readings, cooking tutorials and some of the first editions of Tink Tunes.

It didn’t take long for me to realize that video editing wasn’t really my thing. I liked being part of the team, but spending hours cutting and arranging video clips in the basement of Thwing Center wasn’t very fun. By the time my second year rolled around, the previous photo editor had graduated, and I applied for the position. I had experience with Photoshop, but my familiarity with cameras was limited to occasionally helping to film videos in the previous semester.

At first, I had no clue what I was doing, and I actually missed our first production night because Slack had accidentally been deleted from my phone.

There was a learning curve, but I really appreciated the opportunity to develop my photography skills while contribut-

Clay Preusch/The Observer ing to campus journalism. As photo editor, I found myself covering a wide range of events, from local concerts to student protests. What started as an uncertain venture soon became one of my most rewarding college experiences. I learned not just technical skills but also the ability to use design to tell visual stories and collaborate with the rest of the newspaper to bring articles to life.

But beyond the camera work, what really made The Observer special were the people and the moments that took place outside of production nights.

One of my most memorable moments was when a group of us traveled to San

Diego for a journalism conference. Between the long nights spent at airports, walks to nearby stores for snacks and time spent during conference sessions, we created memories that remain some of my most cherished ones from college. There’s something special about sharing Trader Joe’s snacks at midnight around a hotel pool fireplace with people who started as colleagues but became friends—a connection that began with a random decision and evolved into one of the defining experiences of my time at university.

As I prepare to say goodbye to The Observer and Case Western Reserve University, I find myself reflecting

on how a random decision in a physics lecture hall shaped so much of my college experience. The skills I’ve developed, both technical and interpersonal, will accompany me into my future life and career. Though I’m stepping away from production nights and InDesign, the lessons surrounding storytelling and collaboration from capturing moments will remain. Looking back, I’m grateful for that random decision in Strosacker Auditorium. It didn’t just give me a role in a newspaper; it gave me friendships, skills and memories that have helped shape who I’ve become during these transformative college years.

Farewells 17

observer.case.edu

I think I have observed enough Kethan Srinivasan Social Media Content Creator I have spent the last four years here at Case Western Reserve University with a lot more regrets than I wanted.

I sometimes wish I structured my coursework each semester in a way that would not be so difficult for me to manage. Other times I wish I would have taken a chance on a club or spent more time with another than I originally did. But a lot of the time I wish that I wrote more for The Observer and joined the Editorial Board earlier than I actually did.

I started out at The Observer in September of my first year when I was still adapting to my schedule. After a meeting for interested writers, I had the opportunity to connect with the former Life Editor, Shreyas Banerjee, who would eventually become Executive Editor the year afterward. I was not always very confident in my writing abilities, but having an affable and eccentric lead helped take the pain out of it. Writing for The Observer became a motivator of sorts—one that allowed me to appreciate the media we consume and even form my own opinions and taste. I do not think I can recall a time where I wanted to listen to or watch some piece of creative material before truly sitting with them and

unpacking my thoughts on it. I was always the kind of person who listens to or watches something just as background noise, but writing for the paper actually allows me to sit down and take the time to appreciate what I am writing about.

Eventually I began to write more, albeit with some long periods of silence because of the weight of my academic obligations. But the passion and enjoyment that came along with writing still remained. Eventually, it came to a point where a close friend suggested that I apply for the Editorial Board.

I hesitated for a decent chunk of time, since the idea of doing something on that level seemed somewhat daunting. But getting to sit down and talk with the team made me realize that running a quality publication can take hard work, but not the kind of work that will consume you. By joining the editorial board in my third year, I was able to make more of an impact in different ways than I had previously. In my time with the paper I have been responsible for social media and videography, but also have had the chance to provide additional reporting, breaking updates, photos and more. I got to meet a board full of like-minded students who were always supportive and welcoming of any outside help if needed—plus I

Clay Preusch/The Observer can’t forget all the free merchandise.

All of this explains why I regret not joining The Observer sooner than I did. It has been an amazing experience working with great people who do great work and care not just about keeping an entire university informed, but also about the people who are responsible for that effort. I am glad

that I was able to spend almost half my time at CWRU with a top-notch publication and a top-notch group of friends and colleagues. While I have my regrets, I also have the memories of what I’ve managed to accomplish.

And at the end of the day, maybe I have observed just about enough for now.

The newspaper that saw me throughout the many changes Shejuti Wahed Social Media Content Creator About two weeks into being a student at Case Western Reserve University, I told my parents over the phone that I would write for the school newspaper. I’m sure the decisiveness in my voice confused them—I had never written for a newspaper before, I had never taken a writing class and I certainly would not have considered myself a strong writer back then. But the pandemic had been transformative for me (as it had been for many), and I discovered that there were a lot of thoughts I wanted to share with the world, from my experiences with campus events to musical critiques that I had been keeping to myself for so long.

My first article was one of my proudest accomplishments. I spent so much time working on a piece covering Period@CWRU’s second ever Period Fair for menstrual health awareness, and a couple of friends and I spent what felt like forever brainstorming a creative title (we finally settled on “Period Fair was a bloody good time”). Since then, I have written stories that have been more personal to me, but there was a special joy in seeing my first article ever on the front page.

I never expected my role in The Observer to undergo such a large shift, from writing about entertainment to filming it. But over winter break, I had gotten so many of those “What are you listening to?” videos on my TikTok For You page that I was curious if The Observer would do them. I pitched the idea to our executive editor, and soon enough, we were producing one ourselves and calling it “Tink Tunes.”

During that first video, I was so nervous that my voice was shaking. I begged our photographer to approach people instead of me, and I never, ever made eye contact with the camera. Sometimes when I feel like being humbled or need a good cringe, I watch that first video. Over the next

Clay Preusch/The Observer few weeks, though, the person filming (former Director of Digital Media Joce Ortiz) and I became very close and developed a rhythm. We filmed gratitude videos, spelling bees, trivia, outfit checks—pretty much anything we were in the mood for. We even moved onto larger projects like interviewing the owners of Mount Granita, a local Italian ice business, and interviewing the student performers at Springfest Committee’s Battle of the Bands. If you watch the videos in order, you can watch my confidence grow over time. I became more comfortable approaching strangers, and I genuinely started enjoying my time despite my distaste for being on camera.

As I made more videos, I devoted

less time to writing, but I still wrote about the topics that were important to me—whether it was the opening of the new Wade Park Community Engagement Center or the “die-in” staged

by CWRU students and faculty during CWRU’s Open House/Admitted Students Day. But eventually, our video content also tapered out as we faced more restrictions with where we were permitted to film on campus. Instead, we transitioned to filming TikToks and Instagram Reels, which many of my friends know were already some of my favorite hobbies.

Despite the many changes, I will always be proud of our work. Around University Circle, both students and people unaffiliated with CWRU have

recognized me from our videos, which I am so grateful for. An international student from Botswana once told me that he was not able to visit CWRU before attending, and seeing The Observer videos was the only way he was able to see what the campus culture was like. Some prospective students and their parents have told me they watched my videos before deciding to commit to CWRU. Hearing these stories makes me confident that there will always be a place for digital coverage in The Observer.

There will be more changes in the future, and we would be ignorant to assume that the changes around the world will not be experienced on our campus. We will not be immune to change because our school is a private, R1 institution, because we keep our heads down or because we are STEM students. Audre Lorde once said, “My silences had not protected me. Your silence will not protect you.” Repression of media across the globe is only increasing, with 2024 being the year with the most journalists killed—twothirds of them were in Gaza. Here in the United States, Rumeysa Ozturk, an international student at Tufts University, was detained by ICE in broad daylight—her only reported activism was co-authoring an op-ed for Tufts University’s student newspaper. As our world inevitably goes through further change, it is up to student journalists to refuse silence because silence is not protection. Throughout my time in The Observer, I have learned that the intention to silence comes from all directions, but a strong journalistic commitment to uncovering truth means that the coverage will continue, despite the repression.

I have often struggled with goodbyes, so I am glad we use the word “farewell” as it better captures how I feel. I hope The Observer fares well in the uncertain years to come, and regardless of change, I hope I am still reading The Observer in my inbox every Friday afternoon, many years in the future.

Sports

The Case Western Reserve Observer Friday, April 25, 2025 observer.case.edu Volume LVI, Issue 27

Despite difficult doubleheader, Spartans clinch win over NYU Darcy Chew Sports Editor On Friday, April 18, the Case Western Reserve University baseball team began their four-game series against New York University with a doubleheader. Following the exciting weekend, the Spartans improved 22-11-1 overall and remain first in UAA standing with a record of 11-4-1.

Friday’s doubleheader was a difficult start to the series with the Spartans seeing a 9-13 loss and a thrilling 19-19 tie against the Violets. The afternoon game began with an intense back and forth between the two teams with the Violets eventually pulling ahead in the sixth inning.

After the game one loss to NYU, the Spartans looked to tie the doubleheader and stepped onto the field with renewed energy. The second game of the day was a high-scoring affair, beginning with the Violets notching 2 home runs for a total of 4 runs to start scoring in the second inning. The Spartans followed with runs of their own to gain a 1-point lead over the Violets. CWRU continued to extend the lead during the bottom of the third inning after graduate student catcher Jack Anderson hit a 2-run double to center field and returned home on a balk, bringing the score to 8-5. Following a scoreless fourth inning and a single-run fifth inning for both teams, CWRU continued to add more runs to the board. Fourthyear left fielder Logan Andreyko drove in graduate students second baseman Franco Alonso and first baseman Dane Camphausen on a 2-RBI single.

Graduate student third baseman Zack Carinci and second-year shortstop Nate Arterburn followed with RBI singles. Fourth-year center-fielder Nick Harms rounded out the Spartans’ sixth inning scoring with 2-RBI single, giving CWRU a 15-6 lead.

However, the Spartans were unable to maintain their 9-run lead and the

Violets soon followed with a 6-run inning of their own during the top of the seventh. The following innings were difficult for the Spartans as NYU closed the gap and eventually accumulated in fielding errors, resulting in 3 unearned runs for the Violets giving them a 1917 lead. During the bottom of the ninth inning with 2 outs and CWRU down 17-19, all the pressure was on Camphausen as he stepped onto the plate.

Undeterred, Camphausen successfully delivered the crucial double to bring third-year pinch runner Jasiah Harris and Carcini back to home plate and tie the score. The game eventually concluded after the ninth inning when the umpires called a tie due to darkness.

The following day, the Spartans had a chance for redemption and successfully bounced back after the doubleheader. They won 17-1 and ended the game early by mercy rule after seven innings.

In the circle, second-year left handed pitcher Quinn Saunders and firstyear right hand pitcher Ayush Shetty held the Violets to 3 hits and a single run across the seven innings.

“Saturday was a big test for us,” Anderson said. “After Friday, we knew we couldn’t afford another slip-up if we wanted to stay in control of the UAA. But this group handles pressure well—we didn’t overreact. Our pitchers stayed confident despite what happened the day before, and they kept attacking hitters with the same approach. That mental toughness made a big difference.”

On Sunday, the Spartans held their Senior Day festivities celebrating graduating teammates: Alonso, Andreyko, Camphausen, Harms, fourth-year pitchers Jackson Brewer and Kyle Gearding and fourth-year right fielder Jay Smith. Anderson shared his experience with the graduating class.

“I’ve been fortunate to share a lot of memories with this senior class, from UAA championships to NCAA regionals, but what really stands out

is their development and leadership,” Anderson said. “Guys like [Harms], [Smith], and [Andreyko] have adapted to constant position shifts in the outfield and still found ways to contribute both defensively and at the plate. On the mound, [Brewer] and [Gearding] have taken on multiple pitching roles but have also emerged as vocal leaders for our young bullpen. Beyond the seniors, players like [Carinci], [Camphausen], and [Alonso] have been foundational to our success. [Carinci] (who I’ve played with for 5 years now) has battled through a shoulder injury and is fundamental to our success as a consistent hitter/pitcher and a vacuum at third base. [Alonso’s] been a steady presence in the middle infield and an on-base machine (while also working his way toward becoming a doctor).

And [Camphausen], even while dealing with injury, has continued to deliver as a consistent power bat. Each of them has brought something unique and essential to this team.”

The Spartans began the game with

a 3-run homer from Camphausen at the bottom of the first to give them an early advantage. They continued to pull away from the Violets during the bottom of the fourth inning after Andreyko and Anderson both hit 2-RBI singles. The rest of the game, the Violets would try to close the gap, but ultimately CWRU won 7-3. The victory against NYU extends CWRU streak to 10 consecutive UAA series wins which began in 2023.

Across the weekend, Camphausen recorded 4 home runs, increasing his career total to 55. He currently holds the second highest record of active DIII players.

This coming weekend, the Spartans will be traveling to Waltham, Massachusetts for their final UAA series against Brandeis University. They will host their final two home games this season against Baldwin Wallace University on April 29 and John Carroll University on May 4 at Nobby’s Ballpark before NCAA DIII Regionals, which take place from May 16-18.

[FINAL] CWRU C rew takes on the 2025 K necht C up

Second-year Nate Arterburn steps up to the plate during the Spartans’ weekend matchup against NYU. On Sunday, the team honored five graduating seniors as part of their senior night celebration. Moses Fleischman/The Observer

Women’s tennis sweeps Allegheny to conclude regular season Abhishek Nambiar Staff Writer In their final regular season contest of the season, the Case Western Reserve University women’s tennis team swept Allegheny College 7-0.

The results of this contest, which took place on Friday, April 18, at the Carlton Courts, saw CWRU improve to a 12-5 record for the season, while Allegheny fell to a 18-7 record.

Reflecting on the day, graduate student Laurel Utterback took note of how the matches were played outdoors, giving the team a rare opportunity to play home games outside amidst the warming temperatures seen across campus this past week.

“Being able to have our last home match outdoors was really great,” she said. “I think everyone was excited to get outside and play tennis. While the weather was nice, we did have to stop play in the middle of doubles due to rain, but everyone did a great job regaining focus and maintaining full effort until the very end.”

The contest began with the doubles

matches, all of which saw Spartans defeat their Gator competitors 6-1.

Second-year Kareena Sivanesan and first-year Yasemin Bilgin were the first to finish in the No. 3 doubles match,

followed by Utterback and third-year Ellior Rose in the No. 1 doubles before second-year Katie Wong and first-year Maya Brink rounded out the doubles sweep in the No. 2 match.

Third-year Katalina Wang won the No. 2 doubles with a score of 6-4, 6-2, helping the CWRU women’s tennis team close out the regular season with a dominant 7-0 victory over Allegheny. The Spartans will take on WashU in the opening round of the UAA Championships on April 24. Courtesy of Tim Phillis/CWRU Athletics

With the conclusion of the doubles matches came the commencement of the singles matches. The Spartan domination failed to slow down, with CWRU once again achieving decisive wins over Allegheny in every single match. First to finish was Utterback in the No. 1 doubles, achieving a score of 6-0, 6-1. Next up were Sivanesan in the No. 5 doubles and first-year Sara Fernandez at No. 6; both finished with scores of 6-1, 6-0. Following them was Brink at No. 4 doubles, who bagged her match 6-1, 6-3, before third-year Katalina Wang won the No. 2 doubles with a score of 6-4, 6-2. To top off the Spartan sweep, Rose achieved victory at No. 3 doubles (6-2, 6-1).

With the regular season now complete, the Spartans will be heading to Altamonte Springs, Florida, this weekend to compete in the UAA tournament. CWRU will begin their tournament play in the quarterfinals, facing off against Washington University in St. Louis on Thursday, April 24. Semifinals will take place the day after, April 25, starting at 12:30 p.m., followed by the placement matches on April 26 at 8:30 a.m.

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observer.case.edu

Club Kung Fu takes down competition at 33rd Annual Great Lakes Kung Fu Darcy Chew Sports Editor On April 12, Case Western Reserve University’s Club Kung Fu participated in the 33rd Annual Great Lakes Kung Fu Championships at Maple Heights High School. The international tournament features over 150 divisions, allowing athletes to compete in various events such as Kung Fu Forms and Weapons, Tai Chi, Xing Yi, Bagua, Light Contact Sparring and Chinese Wrestling.

This year, the club sent 10 athletes to the championship and returned with 17 medals. The Spartans competed in Kung Fu Forms at the beginner and intermediate levels as well as Shuai Jiao, also known as “Chinese wrestling.” In the beginner forms category, first-year Julia Schiek took

second place in both women’s open and weapons events. On the men’s side, first-years Xavier Burval and Tyler Gilson tied for second in the open event, with first-year Alex Nerney taking third. In the weapons event, Burval and Nerney finished second and third, respectively.

At the women’s intermediate level, fourth-year Grace Koh earned the bronze medal in both the short and long weapon forms, while third-year president of CWRU Kung Fu AnnaSung Park received a gold medal in the open forms event and silver in the long weapons form event.

Park shared her reaction to learning she had medaled.

“Frankly, it was mostly disbelief when I heard my name get called for medals. After that, it was more disbelief. My face hurt at the end of the day from how much I was smiling,” she

said.

In the men’s category, second-year Ben Amsterdam took home silver in the open event and bronze in the long weapons event. Second-year Vice President of CWRU Kung Fu James Flores also medaled after placing second in the short weasons event.

In the Shuai Jiao competition, firstyear Justin Shih placed second in the men’s 133-143 lbs bracket, while Schiek and Park took second and third place, respectively, in the 115-135 lbs bracket.

“Fighting against a teammate of mine was kinda scary, but it was really fun, knowing that no matter what the outcome was, there would be a CWRU student winning the match. I got absolutely demolished, but it was a lot of fun!” Park said.

Flores recalls his favorite memory from the tournament: “I want to say

‘getting thrown like a sack of potatoes,’ but it seems a little counterintuitive. Honestly though, in Shuai Jiao every opportunity you get on the mat is memorable, win or lose.”

Flores reiterates the statement as he explains how the medals are not everything and it is the memories that make the experience.

“It was more fun participating than actually winning,” he said. “The medals are nice but I really didn’t feel much other than exhaustion and relief when the time came. The excitement came much later, celebrating with the team and taking pictures is when I felt the most proud of myself and my team. After the competition we were even lucky enough to be invited to dinner by some of the other Kung Fu teams, where we got to celebrate with, and get to know people outside our own club.”

CWRU Crew takes on the 2025 Knecht Cup Darcy Chew Sports Editor During the weekend of April 12-13, the Case Western Reserve University club crew teams traveled to Cherry Hill, New Jersey to compete in the 2025 Knecht Cup. The teams entered a total of eight entries across their men’s and women’s novice and varsity crews and returned with two third-place finishes for their varsity 4+ crews.

In a joint response from the two teams’ coaches, Katie Tolles and Nathaniel Shoemaker, they described the preparation leading into the competition.

“To prepare for spring racing we simulate race pieces on the Cuyahoga River where we row in downtown Cleveland. There are straight-stretches of our river where we are able to put our boats side-by-side and simulate parts of the race. Additionally, we have indoor training on rowing machines and set lifting circuits which helps to maintain fitness of our athletes,” they said.

Their training proved to be effective as all of CWRU’s entries made it to day two of competition following the preliminary races held on day one.

In the novice races, the women’s 4+ crew of first-years Anne Marie Begola, Adeline Laster, Anlin Wei and Chloe Ng, coxed by second-year Misiki Baruah, finished 5th in the Petite Finals while the women’s 8+ crew of Begola, Laster, Wei, Ng and first-years Arya Srivastava, Valentina La Marca, Genevieve Suorsa, Ivy Chen with Baruah as coxswain placed 6th in the Grand Finals behind Drexel University. Laster commented on her favorite part of the races.

“The best part of the 2000 meter race is the final 500. Everyone in the boat is cooked, you are at the breaking point, and yet, when you hear your coxswain call the final sprint, you feel the boat start flying! You and your fellow rowers press with everything they have left. You can feel the lactic acid in your legs and push through the pain.

What’s especially invigorating is when you catch up to the boat in front of you and just barely cross the finish line before them. The coxswain then calls to “way enough” and there is a good 5 minutes where no one can speak a word and we struggle to catch our breaths. We left it all out on the course and paddle slowly back to the docks.

This final 500 is the adrenaline rush that makes me get in the boat every race,” she said.

Both the men’s 4+ crew of firstyears Xavier Choe, Colin Blair, Miles Ehrbar and Argeles Samuel, coxed

by Juliene Jones and the 8+ crew of Choe, Samuel, third-year’s Ryan Hari and Ruben Beneitez, first-year’s Farouk Fofana, Calais Michaelsson and Kai Figureroa along with Blair, coxed by Jones placed 4th. The men’s 4+ crew were only 1.57 seconds from medalling, crossing the finish line behind Lafayette College.

Choe described the challenges the team faced at the regatta.

“A multi-day regatta like the Knecht Cup is an exhausting affair. In addition to rigging and derigging boats, loading and unloading the trailer, and the long drive to and from Cherry Hill, NJ, some of our team members raced as many as four times. Ask any rower and they’ll tell you: to push yourself to the brink of collapse—trying to squeeze every ounce of strength and speed from your legs—multiple times in one weekend is an immense challenge, both physically and mentally,” he said.

Furthermore, the weather was another obstacle the crews faced as they raced down the course.

“The conditions were not the best for rowing as it was rainy and cold. The wind was really strong which made it quite difficult for the coxswains to steer. Even then, they did a great job and we did so well in the race thanks to them. Even in bad weather like this we all have to push through and give our all. Training in Cleveland prepares us for bad weather races like these,”

Laster commented.

At the varsity level, the women’s 8+ crew and men’s 8+ crew both came in 4th in the Petite Finals. The women’s team consisted of secondyear Sadie Belding, graduate student Emma Joseph, second-year Anna Falcone, third-year Quinn Watercutter, second-year Euphemia Skinner, Elena Thomas, first-year Samantha Hopper, second-year Sophie Scherer and second-year coxswain Jessica Van Horne, while the men’s team consisted of fourth-years Carlos Blanes and Davis Kraus, third-year’s Thomas Murphy, Grant Williams, Mose Langway, Samuel Diener and Abhivira Akshay Singh, second-year Eli KropSiegmund and third-year coxswain Marko Enriquez. The women’s team and men’s team finished the race in 7:50.41 and 6:38.96, respectively.

“I loved the intense competition at this regatta! This was my first regatta with 50+ teams and it was a really cool experience. Seeing our boats on the big screen with an announcer and tons of spectators was incredible, and it was even cooler seeing us do well!” Scherer said.

The most impressive finishes from the team came from both of the 4+ varsity crews which took home two bronze medals. The women’s lineup of Belding in Stroke, Watercutter, Falcone and Scherer with third-year Caroline Kier as coxswain finished behind Gordon College and Washington College with a time of 8:40.16. The men’s team of Blanes in Stroke, Murphy,

Williams and Kraus with third-year Shae Jenkins as coxswain completed the race behind Washington College and the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy with a time of 7:11.21.

“My absolute favorite part of the competition is winning medals. I haven’t done another sport that has the same feeling of winning. I think it has something to do with the fact that the rowers face backwards in a shell, and so you get to watch your boat walk away from all the other crews. And every crew member gets their own medal to show for their work, but at the same time we win as one,” said Kraus.

This coming weekend, the team will be heading to Virginia to participate in the Mid Atlantic Collegiate Crew Championships, where they will face opponents such as Carnegie Mellon University and John Carroll University.

“Individually, it’s my last race as a Case Western Reserve rower and I want to end on a high note. Not only do I want to win all of my events and take home that gold medal. I want to walk away from the dock feeling like we left nothing on the table and really gave it our all to row the best damn race we could’ve. I’ve won races before where the whole crew felt like something was off about the boat, and that there was still more to give. I don’t want [that] for my last race.” Kraus said. “As for the whole team. I think we’re all expecting to try and clean sweep this regatta. We want to medal in, if not take the gold in every event. And I think we can do it.”

The CWRU men’s and women’s club crew teams competed in the 2025 Knecht Cup over the weekend, each earning third-place finishes in their varsity 4+ events. They will wrap up their season at the MidAtlantic Collegiate Crew Championships this coming weekend. Courtesy of CWRU Crew

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Friday, April 25, 2025

ACL: Agony, crutches and limbo Ellie Palaian Copy Editor For athletes, the game isn’t just something they play—it’s a core part of who they are. An athlete’s worst fear is a season ending injury or anything that comes between them and playing the sport they love. For many female athletes, that fear has a name: a torn anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL—an injury so common and devastating, it’s starting to be referred to as an “epidemic” in women’s sports.

The ACL is a crucial band of tissue that connects the shinbone to the thigh bone, helping to stabilize the knee by controlling forward movement and rotation. But for female athletes, this vital ligament is also incredibly vulnerable. Due to a combination of anatomical, hormonal and biomechanical factors, one in every 29 female athletes will suffer an ACL tear, and they’re up to six times more likely to experience this injury than their male counterparts.

Several anatomical differences put female athletes at greater risk.

For one, women typically have a wider pelvis than men, which causes the knees to angle inward, placing added stress on the ACL. Additionally, women tend to have smaller intercondylar notches—the grooves at the back of the femur where key ligaments, including the ACL, are housed. These narrower notches give the ligaments less room to move, increasing the likelihood that they could be pinched or torn during intense physical activity.

Aside from the physical disadvantages that women face with ACL tears, they also experience a hormonal disadvantage. During the menstrual cycle, rising estrogen levels can make ligaments more stretchy and flexible—precisely the opposite of what you want for a stable ACL. This increased laxity can put women

at greater risk for injury.

ACL tears are particularly common in sports that demand quick stops, sharp pivots and sudden changes in direction—such as basketball and soccer. What may surprise many is that nearly 70% of these injuries are non-contact, meaning they often occur without any collision at all. The fact that the majority of ACL tears are non-contact actually makes the injury scarier, as it can happen at any time and anywhere, no matter the environment you are in.

Emma Struck, a third-year women’s soccer player at Case Western Reserve University, has faced the challenge of ACL injuries twice in her career, tearing the ligament in both knees in back-to-back setbacks.

“The second time around was honestly more difficult,” Struck said. “Obviously both times it was extremely frustrating, discouraging, and upsetting. However, the first time around I was honestly just depressed and upset at first. But the second time, I was harder on myself, wondering what more I could have done to prevent this.”

While the tear itself is the initial injury, the real challenge lies in the recovery. A complete ACL tear typically requires surgery followed by a six to nine month rehabilitation process. This is where the injury has its greatest impact on athletes. For many, especially college athletes, their sport structures their entire life. Classes, social events and personal time all revolve around practices and team commitments. So when, in just a matter of seconds, everything you’ve built your identity around—your athleticism, fitness and work ethic—comes to an abrupt stop, it can take a heavy toll on the mind.

“I have always been proud to be defined as a soccer player because I have always known I was good,” Struck said. “Now, I struggle being proud and confident being defined

as a soccer player because I don’t want to be known as the girl who’s always injured. It’s almost like a little bit of imposter syndrome, like my credibility and identity as a soccer player has been taken away from me.”

Tearing an ACL typically means missing the rest of the season, but the effects can go even deeper. During recovery, the injured leg is essentially out of commission, forcing the healthy leg to take on all the work.

This overcompensation can create imbalance and strain, increasing the risk of injury. Like in Struck’s case, when an athlete finally recovers and returns to play, it’s not uncommon for the previously healthy leg to give out—resulting in a tear of the other ACL. “My college career has definitely not panned out the way I had expected or hoped for and coming to terms with that has been extremely difficult,” Struck said. “My now changed and complicated relationship with soccer has forced me to question if I should continue playing or if it is just never going to happen for me again no matter how hard I work.”

The numbers surrounding soccer and ACL injuries are truly staggering—nearly half of all ACL tears in the UK are linked to the sport. In the 2023 Women’s World Cup alone, between 25 and 30 professional players were sidelined due to an ACL tear. Yet, despite these alarming statistics, only about 6% of sports injury research is focused on women. This lack of research and initiative leaves little hope for meaningful progress in prevention and protection, making it even harder for female athletes to access the support and strategies they need to stay healthy.

“Even on the highest professional level, it feels like this injury is becoming extremely common despite growing efforts and discussions to prevent ACL tears,” Struck said. “I don’t know a single soccer team who

does not have a member who has torn their ACL, so I honestly find it extremely frustrating that more programs don’t prioritize injury prevention programs despite the growing conversations.”

Although women face physical, hormonal and biological disadvantages, research shows that implementing prevention techniques— such as thorough warm-ups and cooldowns, strengthening the hamstrings, quadriceps, core and improving landing techniques and balance before and after practice could reduce ACL injuries by up to 73%, representing a significant improvement for female athletes.

“There is so much research out there regarding diets, strength training, mobility exercises, technologies, recovery practices, etc. aimed at preventing ACL injuries,” Struck said.

“I absolutely think if this aspect of the game became more prioritized by coaches and programs we would see a decrease in the number of injuries.”

Although ACL injuries are widely acknowledged as an ”epidemic” among female athletes, they continue to be met with insufficient attention and action. Reducing the frequency of these season- and career-ending injuries—and the emotional and mental strain that comes with them—requires meaningful change starting at the high school level and continuing through to the professional ranks.

“I think today more than ever, people are becoming more educated on ACL tears and injury prevention because of the insanely large number of people who have unfortunately experienced this injury,” Struck said.

“While some ACL injuries are more unavoidable, like a contact injury or a genetic factor, there is no reason that programs shouldn’t implement more recovery, and strength training programs aimed at preventing this prevalent injury.”

Scores and Upcoming Games Men’s Tennis

CWRU at Carnegie Mellon (4/19) - W 4-3 CWRU at 2025 UAA Championship (4/25-27) CWRU vs Brandeis (4/25)

Baseball CWRU vs NYU (4/18) - L 9-13 CWRU vs NYU (4/18) - T 19-19 CWRU vs NYU (4/19) - W 17-1 CWRU vs NYU (4/20) - W 7-3 CWRU at Brandeis (4/25-27) CWRU vs Baldwin Wallace (4/29. 4 p.m., Nobby’s Ballpark)

Softball CWRU vs UChicago (4/18) - W 1-0 CWRU vs UChicago (4/19) - W 11-2 CWRU vs UChicago (4/19) - L 1-6 CWRU at Brandeis (4/25-26) CWRU vs Hiram (4/29, 3 p.m., Mather Park) CWRU vs Hiram (4/12, 5 p.m., Mather Park) CWRU at Mount Union (5/4) CWRU vs Carnegie Mellon (5/8, 4:30 p.m., Mather Park) CWRU vs Carnegie Mellon (5/9, 2 p.m., Mather Park) CWRU vs Carnegie Mellon (5/9, 4 p.m., Mather Park)

Women’s Tennis CWRU vs Allegheny (4/18) - W 7-0 CWRU at 2025 UAA Championships (4/24-26) CWRU vs WashU (4/24)

Track and Field

CWRU at Sparky Adams Invite (4/18-19) Men’s team: 2nd of 11 teams (134.5 points) Women’s team: 3rd of 12 temas (111 points) CWRU at UAA Outdoor Championships (4/26-27)