Nov. 29, 2018

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dailyorange.com

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The Women’s Network, a professional development organization at Syracuse University, is expanding to Ithaca this spring. Page 7

Syracuse’s Common Council will vote on funding for the University Hill Bike Network Implementation Project, which could improve bike lanes near SU. Page 3

IN THE

PAINT SEE INSERT

Growing presence

on campus

SU says SEM 100 met its goals

How SA is working to become more visible

By Catherine Leffert asst. news editor

A Syracuse University survey gauging the success of SEM 100, a new first-year seminar on diversity and inclusion, showed that a majority of students who responded believed the course met expectations and achieved its goals, SU announced Wednesday. Out of the 3,778 students enrolled in the course, 66.1 percent of them responded to the survey, which was emailed to all enrolled students in late October, according to an SU News release. More than 80 percent of those students said they were able to “identify complex sources of identity” and they were able to identify the “differences between implicit and unconscious bias,” which were two learning goals of the course, per SU News.

(ABOVE) TORRE PAYTON-JACKSON, co-chair of SA’s Public Relations Committee, wants to “see SA everywhere.” laura oliverio staff photographer

66.1

(RIGHT) PETER CHOI, co-chair of SA’s Public Relations Committee, said SA had limited outreach in the past. hieu nguyen asst. photo editor

By Gabe Stern staff writer

Percent of SEM 100 students who participated in the survey

A

fter her first year on campus, Torre Payton-Jackson knew almost nothing about Syracuse University’s Student Association — except that it was big, gave away free football tickets and oversaw other student organizations. Despite not being familiar with SA, she applied during the summer to join its Public Relations Committee after her friends within SA encouraged her to join. Now as co-chair of SA’s Public Rela-

source: syracuse university

More than 95 percent of surveyed students said their facilitators maintained an atmosphere of respect and trust and 92.8 percent said their facilitators encouraged everyone to participate in the forum. SEM 100 was a five-week course in which first-year students met once a week to talk about implicit bias, health and wellness. One component of SEM 100 was a shared reading experience, in which all students were asked to read comedian and political commentator Trevor Noah’s memoir “Born a Crime.” Many students previously said in interviews with The Daily Orange that the book was rarely a subject of conversation. Only about half of survey respondents said they thought the classroom activities were valuable to the experience. Several students enrolled in the course and peer facilitators for SEM 100 told The D.O. that, though they thought the idea of the experience was valuable, the course wasn’t well-executed. Provost Faculty Fellow Kira Reed and Dean of Student Success Amanda Nicholson, co-chairs of the First-Year Experience Initiative Steering Committee, both said that there are plans to completely change the course. At University Senate meetings, the two have presented future intentions to restructure the see forum page 4

tions Committee, Payton-Jackson is spearheading a PR movement with cochair Peter Choi to make the organization more visible to the student body. “If you don’t have that friend inside SA, it’s really hard to know what SA is,” Payton-Jackson said. Building SA’s brand is a long-term project. Choi and Payton-Jackson split up the year into two projects that will span each semester. Choi said they spent the fall semester building an “infrastructure of trust” within SA by recruiting new members and externally with the student body by promoting university-wide events.

Payton-Jackson said the first semester focused on planning for the long-term. The SA assembly has largely planned initiatives that won’t be implemented until the spring semester or the 2019-20 academic year. Now, she said she wants to start a branding committee. She wants people to “see SA everywhere.” In the spring semester, the cochairs plan to get to what Choi describes as the “heartbeat” of the student body by gauging what students want to see out of their student government. Academic Affairs Committee Chair see sa page 4

city

5 Syracuse ZIP codes still in economic distress By Carolina Espinal staff writer

Several communities in downtown Syracuse ranked 90 or above in levels of economic distress, on a scale from 0 to 100, nationally from 2012 to 2016, according to a report by the Economic Innovation Group. The report, which was released last month, assessed the levels of economic well-being of United States ZIP codes. It included a measurement that combined seven factors: adults without a high school diploma, adults not working, poverty rate, housing vacancy rates, median income ratios, changes in

employment and changes in business establishments. Scores revealed that the same central New York communities have remained distressed, and worsened, when compared to data from 2007 to 2011. Based on ZIP codes, five neighborhoods in downtown Syracuse have distress scores higher than 90: 13202, 13203, 13205, 13208 and 13210. ZIP code 13202 had the highest distress score at 98.4 and ranked No. 6 in the state’s overall distress rank. ZIP code 13210 includes the University Hill area. Robert Ashford, a Syracuse University College of Law professor, said the report brought necessary

attention to the persistent problem of economic distress in the area. The fact that the distress continues to be unevenly distributed along socioeconomic, racial and geographic lines, made worse by unequal educational and other economic opportunities, is also an important takeaway from the report, he added. Juhanna Rogers, director of performance for the Economic Inclusion division at business development group CenterState CEO, said that the statistics of distress skyrocket when intersected with communities of color. Syracuse has the highest concentration of poverty among minority communities in the U.S.

“Communities don’t become economically distressed on their own, especially not in a city like Syracuse,” Rogers said. “There are some systemic things happening that are keeping our communities in that kind of distressed position.” The three main variables measured in the report —the number of jobs, businesses and population — give an ambiguous look, at best, at the distribution of economic prosperity and distress, Ashford said. Looking at the number of jobs without considering the wages, quality and stability associated with those jobs is misleading, he added.

see report page 4


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