The Daily Princetonian: February 6, 2020

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Thursday February 6, 2020 vol. CXLIV no. 4

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U . A F FA I R S

U . A F FA I R S

COURTESY OF KENNY PENG / THE DAILY PRINCETONIAN

The new Block plan will cost less per meal than all current Block plans.

Announced U. block plan cheaper than current meal plans

By Zachary Shelvin Head News Editor

& Marie-Rose Sheinerman Associate News & Features Editor

Beginning next year, the University will be replacing its three offered “Block” meal plans for a single option — one that is less expensive and costs less per meal than all currently offered dining options.

Previously, three separate “Block” plans were offered to juniors, seniors, and graduate students in addition to the Unlimited plan. According to a statement, the University is doing away with all three currently offered Block plans — the Block 235, Block 190, and Block 95. Going forward, juniors and seniors will be able to choose between the Unlimited

plan and a new, $2,850 Block 105 plan.

According to the statement, which was sent to all first-year students, sophomores, and juniors on Feb. 5, the change came out of “recommendations from student focus groups and surveys.”

“During a comprehensive review of meal plans, we identified an opportunity to offer greater value with a new plan,” the University Dining website notes. “The new Block 105 Plan is less expensive and offers greater per-meal value compared to any of the current block plans.”

Additionally, beginning in the 2020–2021 Academic Year, students will be able to use both the Unlimited and Block 105 plans for single-swipe entry to meals during fall and spring

recess. Currently, only students on the Unlimited plan have automatic access to dining halls during these time frames.

For Wintersession, a twoweek period at the end of winter break under the new academic calendar, students can sign up for meals in the residential college dining halls free of charge, no matter their meal plan.

All other associated programs, including Guest Meals, Late Meal, Lunch to Go, Meal Exchange, and Two Extra Meals, will remain intact under the new system.

Grace Masback ’21, a student on the Block 95 plan this year, said her meal plan was “kind of annoying to have.”

“I was living in a residential college, so I had to be on a meal See MEAL page 2

COURTESY OF ZACHARY SHEVIN / THE DAILY PRINCETONIAN

The Undergraduate Admissions Visitor Center will officially open on Monday.

Undergraduate Admissions Visitor Center opens at 36 University Place

By Sam Kagan Assistant News Editor

& Rachel Sturley Assistant Features Editor

A new, two-floor Undergraduate Admissions Visitor Center has officially opened at 36 University Place, nestled alongside the University Store.

Beginning on Monday, Orange Key tours will start from this location.

The space, designed by architecture firm EwingCole, will provide a singular home for Orange Key Tour Guides and prospective undergraduate student information sessions. In the past the student group lacked a space of its own,

typically beginning tours at Whig Hall on weekdays after information sessions and Frist Campus Center on weekends.

“Now we have one consistent starting place, regardless of whether an info session is happening or not,” Orange Key Co-Chair Rachel Hazan ’21 said. “It’s just nice that everything is condensed into one space, and that it is being fit essentially to the needs of the admissions office.”

This opening has been long awaited by the Office of Admission as the inauguration of an improved visitor experience. In the past, programming operated out of Clio Hall, See CENTER page 2

BEYOND THE BUBBLE

McCosh Hall.

U. professors send letter requesting corrections to 1619 Project

By James Anderson staff writer

University professors James McPherson and Sean Wilentz were two of the five historians who sent a letter to The New York Times in December requesting corrections to its 1619 Project, igniting debates in the national media and on Twitter over the role of slavery in American history.

The 1619 Project, published

In Opinion

by The New York Times Magazine, aimed to “reframe the country’s history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of black Americans at the very center of our national narrative.” The project began with a 100-page spread of essays, photos, poetry, and fiction published in Aug. 2019 — what the magazine called the “400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery.”

Guest contributors Matt Frawley and Nic Vogue advise students on how to handle Princeton’s overwhelming workload, and guest contributors Aly Kassam-Remtulla, Irini Daskalak, and Robin Izzo explain the University’s response to the coronavirus.

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Some scholars, such as University professor emeritus Nell Irvin Painter, critiqued that claim. When asked for comment, Painter deferred to her previous remarks.

In their letter, the five historians called the project’s assertion that a primary reason behind the American Revolution was colonists’ desire to protect slavery “not true” and its treatment of Lincoln’s views on black equality “mislead-

Today on Campus 12:30 p.m.: Live Music Meditation — ­ Jean-Guihen Queyras, Cello. An hour long meditation with a live music performance.

ALEXANDER HALL, RICHARDSON AUDITORIUM

son had interviewed with the organization on some of his books years earlier and said they did “pretty sound work.”

WSWS published interviews with four of the historians who later signed the letter, with the exception of Wilentz.

Those conversations subsequently went viral.

On Nov. 4, before McPherson’s interview was published, Wilentz delivered the fourth annual Philip Roth Lecture, entitled “American Slavery and ‘the Relentless Unforeseen,” in Newark. In his speech, he expressed several of his reservations on the 1619 Project.

His lecture was later published in the New York Review of Books.

“I ran into him [Wilentz] in the hall one day, and he mentioned he had seen my interview, and we chatted for a while about our mutual criticisms of the 1619 Project,” McPherson recounted. “He drafted the letter and recruited those of us who signed it.”

In an interview with the ‘Prince,’ Wilentz said that after his initial draft the five historians “went back and forth and cowrote it,” and that “I saw that the five of us had a common theme in the question of factual accuracy.”

On Dec. 20, The New York Times Magazine Editor-inChief Jake Silverstein published a 2000-word reply in which he defended the claims See PROJECT page 3

WEATHER

COURTESY OF JON ORT / THE DAILY PRINCETONIAN

ing.” They also disputed the project’s arguments about the connections between slavery and modern capitalism, as well as its allegation that, “For the most part, black Americans fought back alone.”

Furthermore, they contended that the sources consulted in the project’s research and the historical vetting process were “opaque.”

James McPherson, who won the Pulitzer Prize for his 1988 Civil War history, “Battle Cry of Freedom,” is the George Henry Davis 1886 Professor of American History, Emeritus. Sean Wilentz, the George Henry Davis 1886 Professor of American History, won the Bancroft Prize for his 2005 “The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln.”

The other signatories are Victoria Bynum of Texas State University, James Oakes of the City University of New York, and Gordon S. Wood of Brown University.

In response to their letter, multiple History and African American Studies professors at the University did not respond to requests for comment or declined to speak with The Daily Princetonian.

In an interview with the ‘Prince,’ McPherson said that in October he was approached by a reporter for the World Socialist Website (WSWS), which was soliciting critiques of the 1619 Project. Although he said he doesn’t share the WSWS’s Trotskyist ideology, McPher-

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The Daily Princetonian

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Thursday February 6, 2020

Block 105 plan offers Hain ’21: Orange Key helps you greater per-meal value re-fall in love with Princeton MEAL

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plan, and so I chose the cheapest one,” Masback said. “It felt like an expensive investment for not that many meals.”

Currently, students pay $6,695 for the Block 235 plan, $6,410 for the Block 190 plan, or $3,610 for the Block 95 plan.

Out of this group, the Block 235 plan was the cheapest on a permeal basis — costing students approximately $14.25 per meal.

The Block 105 plan will cost about $13.57 per meal.

“If I were living in a res college again next year, I think the 105 would be a good option,” Masback said.

This change will also eliminate Dining Points, something currently offered as a part of the Block 95 plan. In addition to 95 meals, the current Block 95 plan allows students to spend an extra $250 in the dining halls, the Frist Food Gallery, and at eight other campus venues. According to University Deputy Spokesperson Mike Hotchkiss, the Dining Points were initially added to the Block 95 Plan in 2017 “to temporarily address concerns about the value of the plan.”

The Block 105 Plan is priced at $760 less than the current undergraduate Block 95 plan. For graduate students, the Block 105 Plan will cost $790 less than the current Block 95 option.

“Students can choose to apply those savings in a way that best suits their dining needs,” Hotchkiss wrote to The Daily Princetonian.

Current sophomores, juniors, and graduate students will be able to choose between the $2,850 Block 105 plan and an

Unlimited meal plan, the price of which is still being determined, according to Hotchkiss.

The current Unlimited plan costs $7,060 for undergraduates and $7,090 for graduate students.

“The rate is subject to change as a result of the rate approval process that occurs in late spring. If a fee changes, then a new housing contract reflecting the revised rate will be issued,” Hotchkiss wrote.

A Shared Meal Plan will still be available to certain eating club members living in residential colleges, and that plan will be unchanged. Students with a Shared Meal Plan receive 125 total meals — 95 from their club and 30 from the University.

According to Hotchkiss, there will be no changes at all to the Shared Meal Plan system.

New this year, the University will also grant a $200 reimbursement to sophomores who join a co-op or eating club in the spring semester. However, the $200 reimbursement will not be offered to juniors who join eating clubs, no matter their current meal plans.

“The $200 reimbursement recognizes that some students on the Unlimited Plan will take meals during the spring semester at co-ops or eating clubs,” Hotchkiss noted.

Former Cloister President and ICC Chairperson Meghan Slattery said the clubs are excited about this initiative.

“With this change, Street Week 2020 will grant all sophomore students additional funds that can be applied directly to sophomore spring dues resulting in a significant reduction of sophomore membership costs,” she wrote to the ‘Prince.’

CENTER

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a space owned by the Graduate School. The recent move to Whig Hall was always intended as a temporary fix.

“I am really happy that we are able [make] some parts about Orange Key uniform,” Orange Key Co-Chair Cristina Hain ’21 said. “It’s all together now, and that’s going to improve the experience for visitors and … guides.”

In collaboration with the Office of Admission, University administrators envisioned 36 University Place as a space to promote accessibility, inclusivity, and centralization.

Despite the change, tour guide Bobo Stankovikj ’20 emphasized that Orange Key tours will retain their existing caliber.

“In terms of the quality of the tours, it doesn’t meaningfully change anything,” he said. “You’re starting closer to where you would have started before the move.”

At the Visitor Center, guests are welcomed into an open reception space with orange armchairs looking out on the south side of Blair Arch. The second floor features two offices for admissions staff and a large room for information sessions, complete with rows

of chairs and a TV display. The building also features a reception desk, which will enable Orange Key and the Office of Admission to begin checking in visitors — a much-needed improvement, by Hain’s account.

Emily Crosby, Assistant Dean for Events and Visitor Management, has been involved in overseeing the new space since the summer of 2018. She moved into her new office last week and is preparing for the official transition.

“The impact will be incredibly positive,” Crosby said. “We want people to get the impression that Princeton is a place that is welcoming and inclusive, not stuffy or elitist. And I think just the space alone is saying that.”

The Undergraduate Admissions Visitor Center lacks the large marble steps of Whig and Clio. In line with efforts to increase accessibility, guests enter 36 University Place on the ground floor, and an elevator is installed nearby to access the upper level.

“It’s definitely more accessible,” Stankovikj said. “It’s closer to parking and where people can actually find it. Also, so many people want to actually go to the U-Store after tours that it’s conveniently located for those purposes.”

Orange Key offers under-

graduate-oriented tours seven days a week, generally surveying the northern half of campus and lasting roughly an hour. Though the tours are fully student-run, tour guides are paid $11.20 an hour by the University, according to the Orange Key co-chairs.

In the spirit of focusing on undergraduates, Hain noted that the space is specifically tailored for prospective students.

“It’s not necessarily a touristy space,” the Operations Research and Financial Engineering concentrator explained. “It’s more … for people who want to go to school here.

[High school students] are the primary audience.”

Beyond ensuring admissions events are available to a wider audience, Hain and Hazan look forward to utilizing the space to improve the experience and community of Orange Key guides, a group of just under 100 undergraduates, according to Hain.

“Orange Key just helps you re-fall in love with Princeton,” Hain explained. “I really love [giving tours] — I love talking to people and getting to meet people, especially prospective students. I’m really excited to move to 36 University Place and experience the change.”

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Thursday February 6, 2020

The Daily Princetonian

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Wilentz: The stress on identity undercuts everything we do ... There is no social justice without truth PROJECT Continued from page 1

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in the project’s lead essay by Nikole Hannah-Jones on the American Revolution and Lincoln’s views.

“We don’t agree that the areas that they are disputing need to be corrected. Jones pointed to a number of pieces written in response to the letter, including ones in the Boston Review and the American Historical Review which defended the project.

Hannah-Jones added that “not a single one of those historians has ever reached out to me for a correction.”

“I’ve never been included on a single piece of correspondence on the project I created,“ Hannah-Jones said.

To address the letter’s contention of a “closed process,” Silverstein wrote that the Times consulted numerous scholars in a group meeting, as well as holding individual conversations.

Among those who initially consulted with the Times were University professors Matthew Desmond and Kevin Kruse, according to Silverstein’s letter.

Kruse and Desmond had not responded to request for comment at the time of publication.

The five historians contesting the project’s accuracy wrote that, though they applaud the larger work of the 1619 Project in bringing attention to the centrality of slavery in American history, their corrections are “matters of verifiable fact.”

“I think the purpose is a good one, which is to alert people who are interested in American history to the importance of slavery, of race and racism, in shaping important aspects of American history,” McPherson said.

“No matter what people tell you that it’s not about the facts, it’s about the facts,” Wilentz said, in a possible allusion to Adam Serwer’s article in The Atlantic. He added, “we weren’t attacking the whole project.”

Both professors said that American slaveholders did not view Britain as in any way threatening slavery or the slave trade. In his rebuttal, Silverstein cited the 1772 Somerset decision, in which the British high court ruled, “chattel slavery was not supported by English common law,” according to the Times. Wilentz said the case made no difference because it applied only in England, not the colonies.

McPherson explained the case and said, “And from there, the author of the introductory article extrapolates that the British represented a threat to the survival of slavery in the American colonies.”

“In fact, the British didn’t abolish slavery in their West Indies colonies until more half a century later,” McPherson noted.

Silverstein also cited the Dunmore Proclamation of 1775, which offered freedom to slaves who fled to the British army.

McPherson pointed out first that the revolution had already been fought for about eight months when the proclamation was made.

“It applied only to the slaves of those who had already committed themselves to the war against the British,” McPherson explained. “If you stayed on the British side you could keep your slaves, so in fact the opposite was true. Those people who supported the revolution were doing so in spite of the threat that their support for the revolution posed to slavery, exactly the opposite of the argument that the motive was to preserve slavery.”

McPherson said that even if the project’s assertion had been true, many northern supporters of the revolution actually opposed slavery.

“One of the impulses that grew out of the revolution was the abolition of slavery by more than half of the states that became part of the United States, starting with Massachusetts and Vermont,” he noted.

Regarding Hannah-Jones’ claim that, “In London, there were growing calls to abolish the slave trade,” Wilentz said, “The Americans were the ones who were trying to close the slave trade. They had tried throughout the 1760s and 1770s repeatedly,” adding that for Britain it would have been “economic suicide.”

“There was not a rising clamor around slavery, that’s for sure, and the English government showed absolutely no interest in getting rid of slavery at all, as of 1776,” Wilentz said, “So the idea that American slaveholders were shaking in their boots because of an abolitionist or anti-slavery British government is ludicrous.”

“To say without very persuasive proof that the American Revolution was about protecting slavery is as grave as a distortion as the old assertion which is still current in some places that the Civil War had nothing to do with slavery.

It’s just as damaging,” Wilentz added.

Hannah-Jones argued that she never claimed that the British government was anti-slavery, saying she pointed instead to “growing abolitionist sentiment in Britain.”

“I don’t point specifically to the government,“ said HannahJones. “We know that there had been major slave rebellions in the other British colonies, we know that there was a pre-existing abolitionist movement in Britain at the time of the revolution, and I never make the argument that it was the British government that was planning to abolish slavery.”

“I would appreciate if we argued the terms of my essay on the facts of what was actually written in the essay,“ HannahJones added. “That’s not what my essay argues.”

On the question of whether blacks have fought largely alone, Wilentz commented, “There have always been white liberals and white radicals standing up against white supremacy.”

On Desmond’s essay for the 1619 project, which draws on American capitalism’s roots in slavery, Wilentz said, “He draws on an historical literature which I think is much less wellsettled than I think he might have thought.”

The five historians also requested a correction with regards to Lincoln.

“The project criticizes Abraham Lincoln’s views on racial equality but ignores his conviction that the Declaration of Independence proclaimed universal equality, for blacks as well as whites, a view he upheld repeatedly against powerful white supremacists who opposed him,” they wrote.

“If they had said that Lincoln, like most Americans, could not imagine full social and political equality between blacks and whites, I would have had no objection. But to say that he’s opposed to black equality — that’s wrong,” Wilentz said.

The 1619 Project, in Wilentz’s words, takes Stephen Douglas’ position that “the Constitution did not cover blacks, it’s only about white people.” He noted that although Lincoln did for a time believe in colonization, towards the end of his life he was much closer to the view of the abolitionist Radical Republicans. “[Lincoln] didn’t view blacks as an obstacle to national unity, he viewed slavery as an obstacle to national unity,” McPherson said.

Silverstein defended the project’s portrayal of Lincoln on the grounds that a comprehensive account of his views was unfeasible and the public “tends to view Lincoln as a saint.”

Both professors saw the project’s reading of the Constitution and American racism as overly cynical, noting that it is a question of interpretation and beyond the scope of their letter.

Silverstein wrote in his reply that the United States was one of the last nations to abolish slavery and that social progress

has generally not come “as a working-out of the immanent logic of the Constitution.”

Wilentz took issue with the project’s broader treatment of the Constitution, which he said conforms to the orthodoxy that the Constitution was a victory for the slave trade and a proslavery document, “that simply by tolerating it, we were enshrining it in the Constitution.”

In his 2018 book “No Property in Man: Slavery and Antislavery at the Nation’s Founding,” he argues that founders weren’t so untroubled. “That’s just not true, and if you look hard, go back in the debates as they were transcribed by James Madison, you see that it was very different,” he told the ‘Prince.’

McPherson rejected HannahJones’ claim that “Anti-black racism runs in the very DNA of this country,” saying, “The implication is that if racism is baked into our DNA it’s an irrevocable part of the American historical experience, and I think that’s a rather gross exaggeration.”

Furthermore, Wilentz said that the Constitution did “open up the possibilities for abolitionist politics.”

“There’s a conflict; the conflict is embedded in the Constitution. And I think if you see it that way, it’s much more fruitful than one way or the other,” he said.

“In these very bleak and pessimistic times, as far as race is concerned, one side of American history tends to come to the fore, but another side is forgotten,” Wilentz said.

“The struggle was there from the beginning,” he said.

“That’s what was missing in the 1619 Project. They don’t see the struggle. They only see the oppression, and the oppression is real, but there’s the struggle.”

McPherson argued that America is built on compromise, with many conflicting points of view. He invoked the concept of “cognitive dissonance,” the necessity to “reconcile opposites or differences, and that we have to be able to live with these contradictions.

And one contradiction is that

America means liberty, but for a long time it meant slavery.”

McPherson argued, “I think the argument that the Constitution is a pro-slavery document is wrong. It’s not an antislavery document either.”

Hannah-Jones said that the use of the phrase “runs in the very DNA” was a metaphor, and one “cannot use historiography to prove or disprove a metaphor.”

“It is my perspective, and I actually frankly think it is a silly thing to try to refute,“ HannahJones said.

Hannah-Jones also pointed to the fact that Pulitzer-prize winning Yale historian David Blight also used the “DNA metaphor” in his own writing in the Teaching Tolerances report.

“It would be interesting to know if these historians have also publicly challenged David Blight and asked him to issue corrections of that metaphor,“ Hannah-Jones said.

Both McPherson and Wilentz believed that the project has not attended to the literature on American slavery adequately.

“There’s kind of an implication, and it’s not explicit, it’s implicit, that mainline history has ignored the importance of these matters, of slavery, of racial discrimination and racism,” McPherson said. “That’s just not true.”

The letter also referred to a “[d]ismissal of objections on racial grounds — that they are the objections of only ‘white historians.’” According to The Wall Street Journal, HannahJones called the project’s critics old, white male historians, although Silverstein wrote that the authors of the letter took the quote out of context.

“The stress on identity undercuts everything we do,” Wilentz said. “In that, it disallows the possibilities for reasoned inquiry,” he said, “There is no social justice without truth.”

Hannah-Jones denied that she said anything about “old white historians not being able to comment,“ pointing out that a number of white scholars contributed to the project.

“What I’ve said, and what I’ve

always said, is that white historians are no more objective than any other race of historians at producing historians,“ Hannah-Jones said.

Several professors declined to sign the correction request because they believed it was an unnecessary escalation or that it aimed to discredit the whole project, according to Serwer’s article. This included University professor emeritus Nell Irvin Painter.

“I felt that if I signed on to that, I would be signing on to the white guy’s attack of something that has given a lot of black journalists and writers a chance to speak up in a really big way,“ Painter said. “So I support the 1619 Project as kind of a cultural event.”

Wilentz, however, reiterated what he saw as the necessity of the corrections.

“One of the things I’m worried about is … people on the other side, politically, I suppose, who are going to use this as an event to show how corrupt the left is. Unfortunately, you’re giving them the sword to kill you with, if they leave this stuff uncorrected. Gingrich has said we should run the 2020 campaign on the basis of this 1619 Project,” Wilentz said.

Hannah-Jones disputed that necessity.

“Historians disagree all the time, but to go to this depth of demanding a correction, is taking this disagreement of interpretations to a realm outside of what I would consider normative historiography,“ HannahJones said.

Hannah-Jones added, however, that a debate around these topics is “healthy” and “fruitful” for the public.

“I think a good faith debate around the project is a very good thing,“ Hannah-Jones said. “I just wish these historians who had critiques of the project would have gone about it a different way.”

Thursday February 6, 2020

Opinion

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Too much to read, too little time?

Matt Frawley PhD

Nic Voge

Senior Associate Director, McGraw Center

You started reading this article from the beginning and, given its engaging content, will probably read it straight through to the end. You’ll read this article in a linear manner, and you most likely apply that same strategy to your academic reading. And how is that working for you?

“Too much to read and too little time” is probably the answer for a good many students.

We begin our courses with romantic notions of learning, discussing world-changing ideas, growing deeper and more nuanced in our understanding of ourselves and the world. Soon, however, we are in survival mode, simply trying to keep up with — or at least not fall too far behind in — our work, because we’ve got too much to read and too little time.

We were able to handle the work and reading in high school, but now there’s more reading, the reading is harder, and we’re asked to read “more deeply,” to come to precept with a thorough understanding of what was assigned so that we’re ready to engage in a supposedly engaging discussion of the texts. It can feel like you’re supposed to do hundreds of pages of close reading every week.

Even if we’d like to come to precepts prepared, it can be hard to do so because the texts are often not straightforwardly instructional — nor were they written with students as their main audience. They’re articles and books from academics for other academics, and so they assume a fair amount of background knowledge that most students just don’t have, since they have not received years of advanced training in the field.

In the end — many students tell us — a lot of the readings just make you feel inadequate, that you aren’t smart enough to handle the work. Your frustration and confusion quite possibly lead you to struggle with imposter syndrome, a feeling that you don’t belong intellectually at Princeton.

And even if you are among those who aren’t struggling with fears of inadequacy, you probably have walked away from your assigned readings wondering why in the world it was assigned in the first place because it doesn’t seem to relate to the lectures.

With so much to read and with so little time to do it, and with the reading not necessarily proving initially relevant and engaging, we’ve seen students take a number of approaches.

The polar extremes are either to throw up our hands and just not do the reading or to hunker down and plow through as much of the reading as possible, liberally highlighting as we go along, though knowing full well that we probably won’t remember why we highlighted various passages when we circle back to them for exams and papers.

There’s an obvious problem with the first approach: while we could “get by” without doing the reading, we’re missing out on an important aspect of

a Princeton education. In the moment, we may not think we care, but deep down or later in life, we’ll sense that we missed out on something valuable, and let ourselves down.

We’d like to let this approach go for now and address the second extreme option because our hunch is that there are a lot of students who are making the noble, but tragic, effort to “hunker down,” to grind through as much of the reading as possible.

There are problems with this approach as well — some obvious like the first, but other problems that are not. For example, while you are at least attempting to engage the text, you spend so much time reading that you are missing out on other opportunities. Isn’t that a common feeling among many students, that you’re missing out somehow? FOMO is real and pervasive.

What’s additionally tragic about this approach is that it can contribute to feelings of inadequacy. While we may take pride in proclaiming among our friends how much work we have to do, rare is the Princeton student who admits that they can’t finish their work. So we think to ourselves that we’re not as smart as everyone else because we must be the only one, or among the few, who can’t keep up.

And let’s just say you miraculously do get all the reading done; shouldn’t it be the case that you’ve now earned a good grade in the class? Isn’t that the unwritten compact you believe you have with your instructor, like in high school where doing what you were assigned was what mattered? You do all the reading and they give you a good grade. How is that working out?

Probably not so great, because in the end, your instructors really don’t care if you’ve done all the reading; they care about your comprehension of the reading and how you can apply that learning to various problems in their discipline.

Working hard is necessary, but not sufficient.

How’s that for a conundrum — you feel bad about yourself if you don’t do all the reading, but even if you did do all the reading, there’s no guarantee that that will ensure a good grade in your class, or even that you understand it well.

By now we’ve probably got your attention by hitting on a nerve. We’ve identified, and clarified, perhaps, what you’re feeling about Princeton’s reading demands and some of your frustrations with yourself and with the academics here at the University.

So what now? You may think, or at least hope, that we’re about to give you the five easy-to-implement steps you can apply right now for faster reading and more effective comprehension.

But we’re not, because that’s ultimately not the solution.

Few, if any, of your professors follow such simplistic advice.

A true and lasting solution is out there, but it’s really up to you to discover it for yourself.

You have to be in a position to see it — or at least believe it exists. You have to come to believe in yourself as a creative problem-solver and that this is yet another opportunity for you

to search for solutions and test what works for you.

We know that probably comes across as incredibly unsatisfying, and a good many of you are ready to stop reading this article now. Before you do, though, know that we want to validate your belief that your approach to reading in the past has been unsustainable — it’s nuts. We also want to help you steer away from the conclusion that somehow you’re at fault or inadequate.

In fact, we want to say the very opposite: that you have the capacity within you to implement changes in the way you approach texts where you can consistently, week after week, get what you want from your assigned readings such that you are prepared for precepts and exams, and, ideally, can satisfy your own intellectual curiosity.

You can learn to learn in ways that are fulfilling and lead to success here — just as you’ve done in the past.

However, that’s not going to come from us giving you a couple of easy-to-implement steps.

While we may have shown some appreciation for your predicament, we ultimately don’t know you and your existing skills and the demands you face to such a degree as to provide the guidance you need. Only you can do that. So really, the beginning of the solution lies in you. We believe that students create their own strategies; they aren’t imparted to them.

We’re positive that if you took the time to reflect on your life where you did overcome a difficult situation, your creative problem-solving skills were highly active and effective. You were able to generate and apply solutions that were truly impressive.

And if you were to examine the steps you took to overcome those obstacles, you probably first had the “this is nuts”-type reaction and started to scan for possible solutions. Unlike how you read now, in a fairly direct, dogmatic, linear approach, you were willing to suspend beliefs in the right or wrong way to do something in order to entertain other approaches.

That is what we are asking you to do right now: suspend for the moment the assumption that linear reading is the right, or more importantly, the only way to read. Suspend for the moment the thought that the goal of reading is to read every word or simply to finish the reading. Hold on instead to the belief that the goal of reading is to grow in knowledge and mastery of what is discussed — and to get better at reading and learning along the way.

Now perhaps you’re in a position to entertain other approaches.

For example, let’s just say, hypothetically of course, that you blow off your reading until midterms or finals. You need to cram, so reading linearly goes out the window. Instead you ask yourself how you can get what you want or need from the text, and to do so you purposely jump around the text reading the beginning and end — maybe more than once — and then search around for what you think might be important, dwelling on what’s useful and interesting.

You wouldn’t normally do this, right? It probably even seems a bit naughty to do so, a compromise solely based out of necessity, but, hey, you’ve only got a couple of hours to get as much info into your brain as possible, so you do what must be done.

And the result? You probably did a pretty good job of getting the gist of the reading, enough to have some competence, if not a lot of confidence, on the exam.

You probably vowed never to do that again. But what if you adopted that non-linear, cramming method as a way to approach your reading initially in general (with the exception of fiction, poetry, and other similar texts which don’t lend themselves to this kind of reading)?

In fact, this is a perfectly valid method — one that most experts employ — and, coupled with other methods of reading (a linear approach being one of them), forms an effective strategy for tackling all that reading you have for the week.

Now this is simply one way to develop a reading strategy. We encourage you to allow yourself some space to explore different approaches to reading so that you can create your own reading strategy. Ask your friends, ask your preceptors, ask your professors, explore the internet — do whatever you need to do, go wherever you need to go, to find what works best for you.

That said, we appreciate that space and time is what you believe you don’t have in excess right now. We get it.

Whether this week is the right time to begin or not, we do ask that you not dismiss the feeling that there has to be a better way. There’s something inside you that came to that realization, and it’s that part of you that you really need to appreciate. And is there truly a better way? Yes — yes, there is, but you have to make the journey to find it, just as generations of students and faculty before you have done.

To start, you have to believe that there is a solution and that you can find it. We believe that you can, but only you can make yourself let go of the comforts of how you have always done things in the past and be willing to experience that interim period of discomfort where you have to test and practice new techniques before growing in mastery.

Lastly, we beg of you not to believe the lie that you’re inadequate, that you don’t measure up. We understand that you may feel that you’re getting that message from all around you, but that is simply not true. We know; we’ve worked with literally thousands of Princeton students. Encountering demands we have yet to master is not a sign of inadequacy — it’s an expected and necessary prerequisite for real learning.

Allow yourself to risk the belief that you have the ability to grow and adapt and thrive here, that you are an amazing, creative problem-solver who can blaze your own trail here at Princeton.

Nic Voge is the Senior Associate Director of the McGraw Center for Teaching and Learning. He can be reached at nvoge@princeton.edu.

editor-in-chief

Jonathan Ort ’21

BOARD OF TRUSTEES president Thomas E. Weber ’89 vice president Craig Bloom ’88 secretary Betsy L. Minkin ’77 treasurer Douglas Widmann ’90 trustees Francesca Barber David Baumgarten ’06 Kathleen Crown Gabriel Debenedetti ’12 Stephen Fuzesi ’00 Zachary A. Goldfarb ’05 Michael Grabell ’03 John G. Horan ’74 Joshua Katz Rick Klein ’98 James T. MacGregor ’66 Alexia Quadrani Marcelo Rochabrun ’15 Kavita Saini ’09 Richard W. Thaler, Jr. ’73 Abigail Williams ’14 trustees emeriti Gregory L. Diskant ’70 William R. Elfers ’71 Kathleen Kiely ’77 Jerry Raymond ’73 Michael E. Seger ’71 Annalyn Swan ’73 trustees ex officio Jonathan Ort ’21

144TH MANAGING BOARD managing editors Benjamin Ball ’21 Elizabeth Parker ’21 Ivy Truong ’21 Cy Watsky ’21 Sections listed in alphabetical order. chief copy editors Lydia Choi ’21 Anna McGee ’22 associate copy editors Celia Buchband ’22 Sydney Peng ’22 head design editor Harsimran Makkad ’22 associate design editors Abby Nishiwaki ’23 Kenny Peng ’22 head features editor Josephine de La Bruyère ’22 head multimedia editor Mark Dodici ’22 associate video editor Mindy Burton ’23 head news editors Claire Silberman ’22 Zachary Shevin ’22 associate news and features editor Marie-Rose Sheinerman ’22 associate news editors Naomi Hess ’22 Allan Shen ’22 head opinion editors Rachel Kennedy ’21 Madeleine Marr ’21 associate opinion editors Shannon Chaffers ’22 Emma Treadway ’22 head sports editors Tom Salotti ’21 Alissa Selover ’21 associate sports editors Josephine de La Bruyère ’22 Emily Philippides ’22

NIGHT STAFF copy Grey Raber ’23 Esther Levy ’22 design Imaan Khasru ’23

T H E D A I LY

News. Opinions. Sports. Every day.

Recycle your ‘Prince’!

Thursday February 6, 2020

Opinion

page 5

{ www.dailyprincetonian.com }

Caring for community during a global health emergency Ally Kassam-Remtulla

Vice Provost, International Affairs and Operations

Since the emergence of the new coronavirus in China and declaration of a global health emergency, we have taken the situation seriously and have redoubled our efforts to fulfill a core responsibility we have as an administration: to ensure the health and safety of every member of the University community.

It has now been a week since the University first reached out to all students, faculty, and staff with information on coronavirus and the steps being taken on behalf of our community.

Our actions so far and plans going forward have been shaped by federal and state government guidance — including from the New Jersey Department of Health (NJDOH), with whom we are in constant contact — as well as public health best practices and the recommendations of the University’s health and emergency response experts.

Based on guidance the NJDOH issued this past Sunday, University Health Services has completed comprehensive assessments of the nearly 150 members of the University community who had shared with us that they had been in China in the past 14 days. Based on that assessment, they are not required to self-quarantine

and can follow their normal, daily routines on campus and elsewhere. Importantly, none of these people are sick or have reported any symptoms consistent with coronavirus. In addition, there are no confirmed cases of coronavirus in our community or in the state of New Jersey.

Prior to receiving the NJDOH guidance on Sunday, and based on federal guidance, we had asked that these community members quarantine themselves — meaning staying home from class and work and refraining from being around others. A team from across the University moved quickly to provide support to those who were self-quarantined, especially those in University housing.

Self-quarantine is very challenging, especially on a university campus with limited residential space and where most students share housing with others. We are extremely grateful to all the students for their cooperation in this difficult situation and the commitment they have demonstrated to doing all they can to help ensure the safety of their fellow students and community members.

We worked on a one-on-one basis with these students to address their housing, dining, and academic needs. We also recognize — and have heard di-

rectly — that not all students were placed in housing arrangements with which they were entirely comfortable.

For example, some of these students were asked to share bathrooms and kitchens with other self-quarantined students. While this approach is a common practice in public health emergencies and necessary given the limited housing availability on campus, we can understand that some students were not comfortable with the situation. We value their feedback and welcome additional conversations as we work to address their concerns in this and similar future situations.

Finally, we’d also like to thank everyone on campus for their efforts — in keeping with our shared values — to be supportive, respectful, and inclusive of the members of our community who are affected by this global issue.

In the wake of this outbreak, several universities have experienced the targeting and exclusion of Chinese individuals, individuals perceived to be Chinese, and individuals recently returned from China due to fear and misinformation about the virus. Acts of bias, discrimination, and harassment run counter to our University values and to Princeton’s policies, including our Respect for Others and Non-Discrimination policies, as well as our Statement on Di-

versity and Community.

Princeton University is committed to maintaining an educational, working, and living environment that is free of all forms of discrimination and where every member can thrive.

It is essential that each of us uphold and demonstrate these core values of dignity and respect.

The global health emergency caused by coronavirus continues to evolve on a daily basis, and we are committed to keeping the University community informed about updates we receive from federal and state authorities alongside our efforts to keep the campus safe.

The latest updates and FAQs for students and faculty and staff are available on the University’s Novel Coronavirus website.

Anyone who has questions or concerns about the University’s response to this situation can email response@princeton. edu.

Follow us on Twitter! #BeAwesome

@Princetonian

Aly Kassam-Remtulla is Vice Provost for International Affairs and Operations. He can be reached at akassam@princeton.edu. Irini Daskalaki is an Infectious Disease Physician at University Health Services. She can be reached at irinid@princeton.edu. Robin Izzo is the Executive Director of Environmental Health and Safety. She can be reached at rmizzo@princeton. edu.

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Opine.

Write for ‘Prince’ Opinion.

48 University Place

Sports

Thursday February 6, 2020

page 6

{ www.dailyprincetonian.com } WOMEN’S SQUASH

No. 2 women’s squash reigns victorious over No. 4 Yale, Brown

By Sophie Cantine Contributor

No. 2 Princeton women’s squash recorded two wins at home last weekend against no.

4 Yale and Brown, granting them an overall record of 9–1 and an Ivy League record of 4–1.

The weekend started off in Jadwin Gym with a match against Yale in which Princeton clinched the win with a score of 6–3. On the next day, the Tigers returned to Jadwin Gym to sweep Brown’s squad, winning 9–0. Head Coach Gail Ramsay described that a key highlight of the weekend was the match against Yale, currently ranked fourth in the country, according to the College Squash Association’s College Squash Rankings.

Many of the Princeton women had strong performances in the game. Ramsay cited sophomore Emily Rose’s aggressive and consistent performance, which helped her win her match against

Yale’s No. 7. First-year Caroline Spahr also made a significant impact, winning against Yale’s No. 4 after a tough loss against Penn.

Ramsay also added that “Leonard at 3 came off a week of the flu and somehow won the match over Yale No. 3.” After missing the match against Penn the previous weekend due to illness, junior Emme Leonard said that she put in an immense effort to prepare herself for the matches against Yale and had help from her teammates as well.

“Recovering from the flu takes time, but I tried to speed up my recovery by drinking lots of fluids and eating properly,” Leonard said. “Luckily, I had my amazing teammates to drop me off food and I tried to rest as long as I could before Yale.”

On the day of the Yale match, Leonard got the energy she needed to win her match.

“On the day of the game, I felt more like myself, but

I honestly think it was the adrenaline that helped me play so well,” she said. “Yale is a very tough team to play,

but I knew I had to be smart on court and move as efficiently as possible in order to conserve my energy. I re-

COURTESY OF BEVERLY SCHAEFER / GOPRINCETONTIGERS

First-year India Stephenson, facing Yale.

mained focused throughout the match and I was super happy with my performance overall.”

Currently, the Tigers have only lost to Harvard, which happens to be ranked first in the country. Princeton is ranked right behind Harvard at the number two spot. This is an improvement for the Tigers.

“We jumped to number two in the rankings above of Trinity,” Ramsay said, “but they are a good team and we are looking forward to playing them on the 15th at home.”

Before facing Trinity, the Tigers will finish off their Ivy League matches this weekend, playing against No. 11 Cornell and No. 6 Columbia.

“This weekend will be a test to see if we are going to stay on track,” Ramsay said. “Cornell will be home and Columbia away — we hope to play well and compete hard, and if we do that we should be in good shape”.

MEN’S BASKETBALL

TRACK

Track and field opens indoor season with Men’s basketball to continue Ivy strong performances over Intersession play against Columbia, Cornell

By Jesse Brewer Staff Writer

Over Intersession, while most of campus traveled back home to rest and recuperate after a grueling finals week, the men’s and women’s track and field teams were busy traveling and facing fierce competition all across the Northeast.

To open the 2020 indoor track and field season, the Tigers posted fast times against Navy in a dual meet. Continuing the start to a strong indoor season, the majority of Princeton men’s and women’s track and field teams took part in the Columbia Challenge, held at the New York City Armory, while some men competed at Cornell’s Upstate Challenge.

Most recently, both the men’s and women’s teams traveled up to Harvard University for the Crimson Elite and Scarlet and White meets, where the Tigers continued to perform fiercely both on the track and in the field.

In the first dual meet of the season hosted at Navy, the women came out on top, securing a 90–87 win, while the men put up a strong fight, placing second with a score of 107–68. On the women’s side, the 4x400 relay team, comprised of first-years Milana

Malec and Arianna Smith, junior Katie DiFrancesco, and senior Heide Baron, came out on top with a time of 3:47:71 for the third-fastest time in school history.

In the 4x800 relay, firstyear Abbey Loveys, sophomore Gillian Wagner, junior Sophie Cantine, and senior Madeleine Sumner posted a time of 8:51:57 to win and to place eighth on the Princeton all-time list. Wagner also took first place in the 1000m with the ninth-fastest time in program history: 2:50:3.

Next up, the men and women faced highly competitive fields at the Columbia Challenge, held inside New York’s historic Armory Track. For the men’s team, senior captain Conor Lundy finished first in the college section of the 3k with an impressive PR of 8:09:05.

The armory meet was a “great chance to get used to racing on the indoor track,” Lundy said. The team is “looking forward to competing well at and winning the HYP meet next week.”

The Princeton women also had some impressive performances at the Armory, with Cantine finishing fifth overall in her first-ever attempt at the 3k with a time of 9:23.93 — the eighth-fastest

COURTESY OF GOPRINCETONTIGERS

Sophomore Isabella Hilditch clears a hurdle.

in program history. DiFrancesco ran the second-fastest Ivy League time in the 200m in 24.56, placing 12th overall.

In the throwing arena, firstyear Annika Kelly’s fifth-place weight-throw finish of 17.63m was the fifth-farthest in program history.

Records continued to fall at the Crimson Elite Meet, held at Harvard University. Firstyear sprinter Olivia Hee and sophomore sprinter Grace Lanouette moved into fourth and fifth on Princeton’s alltime list in the 60m dash with times of 7.64 and 7.70. After returning from injury, Lanouette is “excited to keep improving and watch the team continue to improve on what’s turning into a great season.”

In the Pentathlon, junior Lindsey Schmidt improved her PR by 500 points and now ranks third in the Ivy League.

In the throws arena, Kelly and sophomore Luisa ChandlerEdmond both threw a foot further than their previous PRs with distances of 18.19m and 17.71m.

The Princeton women continued to perform outstandingly at the Scarlet & White Invite, as the 4x400m relay team of Malec, Baron, Smith, and senior Ashley Willingham set a new school record in a time of 3:42:05. In the 200m, DiFrancesco set a new PR with a time of 24.28 to move up to second on Princeton’s all-time list. Malec and Baron also moved up to sixth and seventh all-time for Princeton in the 400m with times of 55.74 and 56.15.

Coming up this Saturday, the Tigers will have the opportunity to face Ivy League rivals Harvard and Yale at the HYP Meet, taking place at Yale in New Haven, Conn.

Last year in this same competition, the Princeton men and women took first place in a decisive fashion when the Tigers outscored both Harvard and Yale combined, and are looking to repeat the performance this weekend.

By Elan Zohar Staff Writer

On Dec. 10, Princeton men’s basketball dropped a heartbreaking loss to Monmouth and watched their record drop to 1–7.

“I keep asking my guys,“ said head coach Mitch Henderson, “do we need to lower our expectations, and they all say no.”

When Princeton men’s basketball entered Ivy League play in early January, it did so floundering, boasting a meager 4–8 record. Ivy domination — any domination, for that matter — seemed unlikely. But we’re now four weeks and four games into Ivy League play. The athletes’ expectations are still high; for the first time, their results match them. The Tigers have proved their doubters wrong.

Princeton boasts two wins against a strong Penn team and a tight victory against preseason league favorite, Harvard, effectively turning their season around. Now, heading into their second straight weekend of league play, the Tigers look to continue what they started, facing Cornell on Friday and Columbia on Saturday.

The Tigers will head to Ithaca hoping to replicate last year’s results against the Big Red where Princeton swept the season series. Cornell currently sits in the bottom half of the Ivy League standings, with their only win coming against Columbia at home.

Coming back from a two-loss road stint last weekend, the

Big Red seem to be missing home — after all, they tend to play much better in Ithaca, with a 4–2 record at home and 0–11 record on the road.

After Friday’s game, Princeton will head to New York City to face off against Columbia.

The Lions have lost their last three contests, currently putting them at second-to-last in the Ivy League. Like their instate rivals, Columbia’s record shows how important home court advantage is to them.

The Lions are 5–1 at home, but 0–12 on the road this season.

The Tigers as of late have been led by a three-headed scoring monster featuring sophomore Jaelin Llewellyn, junior Ryan Schweiger, and senior Richmond Aririguzoh. In their last game, a onepoint victory against Harvard at home, Aririguzoh scored 10 points, most notably hitting two free throws in the final seconds to give Princeton the victory. While the three players all average at least 12 points per game, two sophomores, Drew Friberg and Ethan Wright, have also emerged as strong scoring options as Ivy League play progresses. In the same Harvard game, Wright shot 4–5 from the three point line, scoring a team high of 15 points.

Although Princeton’s two opponents are in the back half of the Ivy League standings, their strong home records suggest that this weekend will be no cakewalk. However, the Tigers, currently on a sixgame win streak, have beaten tougher opponents this season.

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