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The Herald By and for the students of Hobart and William Smith Colleges FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2008
VOLUME CXXX ISSUE 10
Meal Plan Runaround
Geneva, NY
Super Tuesday Event Draws Large Crowd to the Pub
By Trippe Duke Managinge Editor While Dining Services here at HWS has made great strides the past few years as far as accommodating student needs, the HWS administration and Dining Services make it nearly impossible for students who wish to seek alternate dining options. One emerging problem that has been brought up recently has to do with the kosher meal options on campus. SAGA recently introduced its ‘Just Vegin’ food counter in the main dining hall which is aimed at providing a vegan option for students. Kosher options however have been largely absent, which is surprising since there is a comparable number of both vegan and kosher food needs at HWS. This problem has an easy solution which simply involves not eating at SAGA. This however, is exactly where Dining Services and the administration slam the door on student options. It is required at the Colleges that every student has a meal plan, even for those students who live off campus. In what can be referred to as a ‘food monopoly,’ HWS provides no other viable choices for the students who wish to seek other dining options, such as comparably priced meal plans offered at restaurants like Cicinno’s in downtown Geneva. The Colleges will not even allow privately owned area bakery’s access to the mailing list or even on campus during orientation, so parents could have the opportunity to order their children birthday cakes not provided by Dining Services. This is all a result of a contract the Colleges have with the SodexHo Corporation. There is no doubt the important role community dining plays as far as bring the campus together is concerned, but unless one has the ability to charge hundreds of dollars worth of snack money to your student account every First-year, Sophomore, and Junior is forced to eat in the main dining hall. In this respect, ‘forced’ carries the entire weight of the word, as there is no other dining option for HWS students. There is one loophole however. In order for a student to get out of the
requirements created by the SodexHo ‘food monopoly’ they must apply for exemption under a disability waiver. That information is not easy to come by. Just ask Harrison Goldberg ’10. Last summer when he was attempting to find a viable kosher option on campus, the school gave him the bureaucratic run around. First the Deans told him to go to ResEd, who told him to go to CTL because CTL deals with disabilities. It is pretty safe to say that most members of the HWS community would shy away from calling someone’s religious faith a ‘disability.’ At least that is what CTL thinks, who then sent Harrison back to the Deans office, who then sent him to Rob Flowers. Harrison was then asked to write a one page statement of his religious faith, which he now feels should have never been necessary and was “rather insulting.” After all of this, too much time had gone bye so there was no possibility of changing the meal plan. Fortunately Harrison was able to move into a Fraternity house that was able to accommodate his dining needs. This solution however is not available by any means for William Smith students. This brings attention to the greater problem this ‘food monopoly’ poses to HWS students. Gender, religion, special needs, personal preference, are all viable reasons which would cause some students to seek other dining options. Unfortunately current policy lumps all of these reasons together and apparently treats them as disabilities. By going around and asking students their opinion on this, specifically regarding the usage ‘disability,’ it is clear that this whole affair is rather offensive. There are plans to have an adequate kosher menu next year after the completion of the dining hall renovation, but this will not solve the problem that the school forces its students to at least pay for a meal plan and offers no other alternative, something which would not only benefit the student body, but would also substantially contribute to the local Geneva economy.
Photo Courtesy of Courtney Apple
Derogator y Stall Wall Graffiti By David A Hernandez Herald Contributor On Saturday night an event was observed and reported which should serve the Hobart and William Smith community a reminder that as a society we have not been able to unite and leave behind the issues of race that separate us. While using a bathroom in one of the academic buildings a Hobart student found a message written on a wooden ledge which had a derogatory image written toward a specific group of people. The message essentially categorized the “whites” of Geneva as being a group which have sexual intercourse with animals only in a more descriptive language. Not only was such a message a direct attack on Caucasians, but more directly Caucasians in the community based on
World News
Rundown of International Events By Meg Stirling ‘10 Herald Contributor Death in Kenya: Violence in Kenya (a result of the Dec. and an estimated 60 people were injured. 27 elections) has hardly diminished. According to the Red Iran fires off rocket: Iran fired a rocket, the “Researcher Cross, at least 863 people have died and 261,000 have been One,” on Feb. 4. The rocket is designed to carry the driven from their homes. Recently the opposition party country’s first domestically satellite in a low earth orbit. asked both the United Nations and the African Union to Some experts fear that Iran’s space program is a cover to send in peacekeepers. improve its military No more troops: missiles. Despite a reported French bank request from the in crisis: In France, United States, following a bank Germany insists that crisis in which a it will not send extra trader lost $7.2 billion troops to Afghanistan. in European index German Defense futures, a government Minister Franz Josef report said that banks Jung said Germany has should have greater fulfilled its mandate. suspicion about Currently, there are employee fraud. 3,200 German troops 40 die in Rwanda in Afghanistan. earthquake: An Bombing in Israel earthquake in Rwanda kills 1: A suicide in central Africa killed bombing at an Israeli about 40 people on Feb. Alcinoe Calahorrano shopping center on 4. Nearly 400 people Feb. 4 left one dead and eleven Ecuador’s Tungurahua volcano erupts sending were injured, and at least 230 wounded. When police arrived homes were destroyed. thousands fleeing at the scene, a source told an Violence rocks Sri Lanka: officer that a second bomber was still alive. Officer Kobi On Feb. 4, a series of explosions occurred throughout Mor shot and killed the second bomber when he witnessed Sri Lanka as the country. The Tamil Tiger rebels were him move his hand toward an exposed belt of explosives. immediately blamed for the attacks after twelve were Nine die in German apartment fire: A fire broke killed. The violence occurred as the nation was celebrating out Feb. 3 in an apartment in southern Germany during 60 years of independence. Carnival festivities. Nine people died as a result of the blaze Source: CNN.com/world
archaic stereotypes that are based on no more fact than the existence of UFO’s. Security was notified and the incident was reported. An individual jotted down the details but I felt compelled to write an article about the event to inform the schoolwide community about the event because there are several things which such an event shows us. The first of these is we are on a campus where there is a reactive but not proactive attitude; secondly that issues concerning racial attacks move along an unfair one way street and lastly but perhaps most importantly, that as a community we are divided.
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