2024-25 Year in Review

Year in Review 2024–25 2024–25

The Ithacan

2024-2025

Lucia Iandolo/the

ithacan

Lily Parlakian/the ith

acan

Christo

Kai Lincke/the ithacan

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acan Christian Gratto/the ith

Mei Dennison/the ithacan

Christop

A sp e c i a l p u b lication of The Ithacan

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YEAR IN REVIEW

2024-25

EDITOR Kalysta Donaghy-Robinson

PHOTO EDITOR Maddy Dombrow

DESIGNER Jackson Gruenke

PROOFREADER Lucretius Rutkowski

COVER PHOTO Leila Marcillo-Gómez and Kalysta Donaghy-Robinson

EDITOR-IN- CHIEF Lor i e n Ty n e

THE ITHACAN

M A NAGING EDITOR Noa Ran-Ressl e r COM MU N IT Y OU T R E ACH M A NAGER Kai Lin cke OPIN ION EDITOR S Lea h El l e nburg Sam Rui z Chl o e John s ton N E W S EDITOR S P ra k r it i Panwar Ka el e i gh Ban d a ASSISTA N T N E W S EDITOR S Viv i an Rose Tayl or Bora sh Ju li an DeLu c i a Eam on Corbo

PHOTO EDITOR S Ka el e i gh Ban d a Lu c i a Ian d ol o ASSISTA N T PHOTO EDITOR S Lu c i a Ian d ol o Sammi e Ma caran a s Mar i ssa Mosch el l a Me i De nni s on V IDEO EDITOR S Ray Milbur n Ma k ai Y l l an es Ju li a Harg reaves Ava Suf f redini PODC AST EDITOR Eth an Kauf m an

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PRO OFR E A DER Re ese Sch e nkel Ch ayann e T h omps on Cl au di a Homi sk i Ja d e n Col li e r W EB DIRECTOR Surya Sharma DESIGN EDITOR S Mol ly Tesk a Gu s tav Bau e rl e Kai d e n Ch an d l e r Osl e n e Vanyanba h SO CI A L MEDI A M A NAGER S Ju li a Harg reaves Tam ar Wa chi A D SA L ES M A NAGER Gra ce Van d e r ve e r

L IFE & CU LT U R E EDITOR S Nol an Sh e eh an Sh e el a gh Do e Mar i an a Cont re ra s G e org i e Ga ssaro SPORTS EDITOR S Dav i d Schur te r F ly nn Hy n es Ja cob Infa l d

CHIEF COPY EDITOR Carolin e Fe nn el Re ese Sch e nkel

N E W SL ET T ER EDITOR Ja cqu ely n Reaves Mar i an a Cont re ra s IT H AC A N A DV ISER Ca se y Mu sar ra © 2024–25 | THE ITHACAN

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Year In Review

Table of Contents 8-9 FROM THE EDITORS

10-19 GLOBAL NEWS 12 August 13 September 14 October 15 November 16 December 17 January 18 February 19 March

20-24 STUDENT PROFILES 21 Ren Kato 22 Devon Jezek 23 Umu Barry 24 Riley Rhoder 25 Lily Milkis

26-91 NEWS

43 2025 Women of Distinction Award ceremony 44-55 COLLEGE AFFAIRS 45 BIPOC Unity Center pauses search for director 46-47 Contingent faculty at IC find solidarity in union 48 MTD orchestrates search for permanent dean 49 IC's only staff union promotes OPS advocacy 51 Return to Trump-era Title IX rules raises alarm 52 State of the College discusses IC’s budget deficit 53 IC to build new outdoor track facility 54-55 IC investigated for alleged racial discrimination 56-67 STUDENT AFFAIRS 57 Background checks for student employees 58 IC community volunteers to remove invasive plant 59 Research group joins romantic preference study 60 Banned Books Week 2024 61 New club creates safe space for women in tech 62 Community remembers Oct. 7 attacks 63 SGC holds first town hall of Fall 2024 64 IC alumni create app to better understand politics 65 Angela Davis speaks to IC about social justice 66 First-year students to live in themed communities 67 South Hill Sweets set to reopen in Fall 2025

28 IC BY THE NUMBERS 29 IN MEMORIAM 30-43 ACADEMICS 31 IC welcomes Wells’ students amid college closures 68-79 GREATER ITHACA AFFAIRS 32-33 IC modernizes recruitment strategies 69 Community concerns about synthetic turf fields rise 34 IC professor makes medical strides in adhesive 70-71 County experiences lack of transitional housing 35 CNS students combine diverse skills 72 Climate Action Plan for Ithaca to be rewritten 36 Leadership works toward enabling media literacy 73 Two Cornell students found in Fall Creek Gorge 37 Emergency relief fund to launch in Spring 2025 74 Museum of the Earth faces closure 38-39 IC facilitates study to reduce deficit 75 Cayuga Health and Arnot Health merge 40 ICLA starts classes safe from wildfires 76-77 ICE presence prompts community action 41 Ithaca College implements new scheduling grid 78-79 Ithaca City School District under investigation 42 Researchers reflect on federal scientific research cuts

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80-89 ELECTION 2024 81 State and national ballot overview 82 Community discusses proposal on state ballot 83 Task force leads voting registration initiative 84-85 County makes voting more accessible 86 Campus community shares thoughts on election 87 Campus community reacts to results of election 88-89 Concerns about Trump administration 90-91 DIVERSITY REPORT

92-123 LIFE AND CULTURE 94 Backyard Flea brings small businesses outside 95 ‘Divisible’ film screening discusses gentrification 96-97 Hupstate Circus hosts international talent 98-99 Ithaca’s bar scene expands 100 LGBT Center opens new clothing program 101 Film Festival projects stories on reproductive rights 102 Finger Lakes Crossword Competition 103 BIPOC retreat crowns students with confidence 104 Mocktails and music fill Nabenhauer Hall 105 Q&A: Ashton showcases freestyle yo-yoing 106 IC soars into the Hangar Theatre 107 Community bakes cupcakes for a cause 108-109 Fake blood leads to conversations about safety 110 Sophomore students dial up the DJ scene 111 Ithaca garners praise on U.S. Arts Vibrancy Index 112 IC alum presents original play, ‘Calling Bluffs’ 113 Rust Cup encourages queer skaters 114-115 Emerging magazines promote new voices

table of contents

122 CHROMAKOPIA’ / Short n’ Sweet 123 DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOTos / Hurry Up Tomorrow

124-147 SPORTS 126-127 Fresh coaching staff brings a new era 128 Former champion vaults into coaching role 129 Men’s tennis star shines bright for the Bombers 130 Field Hockey wins Liberty League showdown 131 Women’s soccer advances to Liberty Leagues 132 Alum scores deal with the Toronto Argonauts 133 Walk-on provides spark for men’s soccer team 134 New women's wrestling team announced 135 Women leaders push for growth in NCAA 136-137 Cortland claims the 65th Cortaca Jug 138 Volleyball claims third straight Liberty League 139 Lacrosse alum takes his talents to the pros 140 Senior defensive back earns All-American nod 141 Graduate transfers make noise on the field 142 First-year duo adds depth to women’s track team 143 Back on the mound: Pitching trio returns to action 144 Rowing teams breaks ice with preseason training 145 Women’s swimming and diving dominates 146-147 IC fosters involvement of women in sports media

148-149 MULTIMEDIA

116-123 REVIEWS 116 ‘Anora’ is an independent film classic 117 A24 terrfies with captivating characters in ‘Heretic’ 118 ‘Wicked’ is holding space for fans 119 Ridley Scott plays with fresh cast in ‘Gladiator II’ 120 A horror classic worth retelling in ‘Nosferatu’ 121 Adrien Brody delivers as star in ‘The Brutalist’ Stories in the 2024-2025 Year in Review have been modified from their original version. They have been edited for length or clarity. This is a selection of content and is not representative of everything published by The Ithacan during the 2024-2025 academic year. For a full selection of stories written in completion, please visit theithacan.org.

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Year In Review

Year In Review Editor

Editor-in - Chief

If you walk into The Ithacan office during a production week it is very likely you will experience at least one of these things: someone with their head completely absorbed in editing a page, a debate between editors about what would translate the best and contagious laughter shared among friends. For me, the most important thing about working at The Ithacan has always been the incredibly hard-working team behind it — the invisible red ink that crafts a page before it ever reaches any kind of audience.

When I first joined as a photographer, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. As a young, eager journalism major, The Ithacan had everything I hoped for before coming to Ithaca College. But walking into the office to turn in my first photo assignment, SD card shaking in my hand, I was terrified. With barely any photography experience and no photojournalism experience, I somehow became not only a photographer for this paper but an assistant and later head photo editor.

What I learned after a few weeks of being on the editorial board and feeling terrifie of messing up is that when you are working in The Ithacan office, you are never working by yourself. Time after time, I found that I was constantly surrounded by people, fellow editors and committed staff, who were not only learning just as much as I was but who were also always willing to support me, collaborate with me and work toward constantly improving the paper in every achievable way.

When I decided to take on this project I knew that I wanted this quality of the paper to be the drive of the magazine. Through a scrapbooking and collaging theme, I hoped to pay homage to the paper’s ability to change, adapt and improve year after year. The cover was created from pictures published in old editions of the Year in Review that were cut out by hand and pieced back together into a new image. I hope that this book feels like a culmination of all of the past Year in Review editors' work, some of whom were kind enough to lend a hand in the creation of this year’s edition.

Lastly, I need to give recognition to my supporters, both friends and family, but especially my father who has always empowered me to believe I am capable of anything I put my mind to. Your unquestioning support fueled my work for this project and you continue to be my biggest source of inspiration.

In our rapidly changing digital world, good journalism can disappear in a race for clicks and views. Resources are scarce, local news is drying up and distrust in journalism is high. If the past four years have taught me anything it is simply to listen to those around us and always keep an open mind. Although the world is going through an uncertain transitional time in many ways, I feel much more equipped to handle whatever happens next because of the lessons I've learned with The Ithacan.

Four years ago I was making a choice that would change the direction of my life and through the acceptance and rejection letters I had my eye on The Ithacan the whole time. I walked into the newsroom during orientation week, already impatient to get started. At the time, I had no idea how much The Ithacan would impact my personal and professional life over the course of my college career. I would not be the person or the journalist I am now without the support of all my coworkers and friends who spent so many deadline nights at my side. I also have immense appreciation for the hundreds of people who trusted me to tell their stories.

While reporting is my passion, I am incredibly grateful to have had the opportunity to support the staff and editors in running such a dedicated and innovative student media organization. Our team covered the aftermath of an ICE operation in Ithaca and the establishment of the first women’s wrestling team at the college. We produced the first-ever Ithacan Election Edition and made strides in improving our relationship with the community through our new Community Guide. I am beyond proud of the work my peers have produced this year but I am even more inspired by everyone's commitment to fostering a culture of support, empathy and personal and professional growth.

Becoming editor-in-chief was just a dream when I was a first-year student and there are so many people who helped make that a reality by pushing me to be a better journalist and leader. Through all the ups and downs, I truly have loved every minute working for The Ithacan and leaving the office for the last time will be one of the hardest parts about graduating. I can’t wait to follow along as an alum in the years to come as students continue to tell important stories, innovate within a constantly changing field, and maintain a space on campus where lifelong relationships are made.

Kalysta Donaghy -Robinson

Lorien Tyne

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from the editors

Design Editor Jackson Gruenke

My time at Ithaca College has been a whirlwind of different experiences. Whether it’s been editing television, singing a cappella, or working with The Ithacan, my college experience has been incredibly rewarding.

The standards set by the paper and the people who work here have been incredibly motivating and have encouraged me to strive for excellence. Even with a background in design, this project has been very challenging. The time and creativity needed to design such a complex book has been different from my other graphic design projects. It has allowed me to learn a great deal more, not only about graphic design and the software, but also about consistency, communication and collaboration. The Year in Review team has been a pleasure to work with every

day and has been incredibly helpful when I reach a rut. Being able to throw around ideas while also enjoying the time spent working is not something you find on every team, and the hard work all of us have put in has certainly paid off.

The best lessons I've learned in my education have been to try everything and to learn from your mistakes. Every opportunity has been a learning experience and I have been able to meet incredible people along the way. As I think about where to go after graduation, I'm reminded of how many paths have been laid out before me.

I know that wherever I end up, I'll have gotten there because of the support and encouragement from my friends and family.

Photo Editor Maddy Dombrow

I grew up writing and telling stories. Even at age four, I was stapling horrible illustrations together and calling it a “novel.” That knack for storytelling only expanded as I began writing novels, making short films and exploring photography. Although I never thought of myself as a journalist, I've always been drawn to telling stories of empowering community members and educators in my local town.

At Ithaca College, I knew I wanted to continue my passion for storytelling. Within my first week, I began capturing campus life through photography, covering sports and events for The Ithacan. It quickly pushed me outside my comfort zone and helped me embrace everything the community had to offer. Through storytelling, whether photos, video or writing, I’ve found a way to connect with and

contribute to the broader Ithaca community.

Being part of The Ithacan's video team has allowed me to grow as a creative professional and as a journalist. One moment that left an impact on me was covering a local ICE protest when an advocate said, “We have each other. That’s why we’re here.”

That statement has stuck with me and continues to fuel my drive to tell stories that matter, stories that amplify voices that are too often left unheard.

Joining the Year in Review project felt like a natural way to further my drive for telling relevant and empowering local and global stories. This magazine is so much more than a collection of headlines, it’s a living artifact of this moment in time — documenting both beautiful and challenging ripples of recent events.

Proof reader

Lucretius Rutkowski I’ve worked as a proofreader at The Ithacan for three years straight now, and before that, I worked as a copy editor — so it’s funny I stumbled into this position completely by accident.

When applying to work on the board, I had no idea what, exactly, was meant by “proofreader” and checked the box as my last-preferred choice.

Naturally, that’s the role I was hired for, and ever since I’ve been happy with this little twist of fate.

Staying in this role has allowed me to read over every single article The Ithacan has published in my time at college, and I have such fond memories of stories about bros lifting rocks and geese harassing students. Sometimes, being a proofreader can be a very slow-going job, and in those moments I’ve watched the friends I’ve made on the board construct long sticks out of

newspapers and play videos of dancing fruit on our iMac desktops. I even made a scavenger hunt my sophomore year, which is still present around the office in stray pieces.

Which isn’t to say we don’t take our jobs seriously, but we take them enthusiastically and in good company.

Working as a proofreader has already launched me onto a career path in the direction of being a grammar-and-usage pedant, and that’s not appealing to everyone, but it’s fun for me! I couldn’t have gotten to this point — the point of singling out the lengths of dashes and existence of gerunds — without the encouragement of the other proofreaders who have been such great, equally pedantic friends with me. It’s a job that constantly reminds me the smallest of additions can have real, lasting impacts.

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Year In Review

s w e N Global REUTERS/Stringer

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Year In Review

Mikhail Voskresensky/TASS via ZUMA Press

Russia and the United States conduct prisoner exchange On Aug. 1, the United States and Russia coordinated the largest prisoner swap since the Cold War. Among the 24 detainees that were released during the swap were American journalist Evan Gershkovich and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan. The exchange took place at the Ankara Esenboga Airport in Turkey.

REUTERS/Feisal Omar

Civil war in Somalia suffers an uptick in violence Throughout the month of August, the Somali Civil War faced a surge in violence, including a deadly attack on Lido Bear in Mogadishu. On Aug. 21, the terrorist group al-Shabaab seized an upscale hotel in Mogadishu that left 21 people dead and more than 100 wounded, according to the New York Times.

REUTERS/Fabrizio Bensch

2024 summer Olympic Games hosted in Paris, France

August

From July 26 to Aug. 11, the 2024 summer Olympic Games took place in Paris, France. The United States took home a total of 126 medals and 40 gold medals, the most of any country that competed. The 2028 summer Olympic Games will take place in Los Angeles.

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September

global news

School shooting takes place in Georgia highschool On the morning of Sept. 4 in Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia, a 14-year-old shot and killed two students and two teachers. Colt Gray was taken into police custody and indicted for a total of 55 counts, including four counts of malice murder, four counts of felony murder, plus aggravated assault and cruelty to children, according to The Guardian. Colin Gray, his father, was also charged in relation to the shooting for buying his son the AR-15-style rifle that was allegedly used in the shooting

REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz

Jason Getz/The Atlanta Journal-Constitution/TNS

Floods leave one dead, many missing in northern Japan At least six people were killed and several others remained missing after torrential rains caused flooding in a northern Japan coastal region that was still recovering from a deadly earthquake earlier in the year. Japan’s weather agency issued its highest-level warning Sept. 22 for heavy rains in Ishikawa prefecture.

Hurricane Helene sweeps the southeast of the United States On Sept. 26, Hurricane Helene made landfall in Florida as a Category 4 storm. The storm lasted a total of four days and caused widespread devastation and record-breaking rainfall. The storm unleashed devastation across Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia and Tennessee and killed at least 230 people, making it the deadliest storm since Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

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Year In Review

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Israeli forces strike a school in central Gaza On Oct. 10, Israel attacked a school building in central Gaza with an airstrike and killed at least 17 people, according to reports from the Al-Awada hospital. The Al-Shuhada school in the Nuseirat refugee camp was being used as a shelter for displaced people.

Haitian gang attack leads to the death of at least 20 people Members of the Gran Grif gang attacked the small Haitian town of Pont-Sondé on Oct. 3. According to AP News, the attack killed at least 20 people, including children. The Gan Grif gang, which has been described as one of Haiti’s cruelest based on its frequency of fatal attacks, has been gaining more territorial control since 2022 under the leadership of Luckson Elan.

JIJI Press/AFP/Getty Images/TNS

Former One Direction singer dies in Argentina On Oct. 16, former One Direction band member 31-year-old Liam Payne died. Payne, who had extended his stay in Argentina after attending a concert by former fellow bandmate Niall Horan, fell from a third-floo balcony of the CasaSur Palermo Hotel, Buenos Aires. Toxicology results later revealed traces of alcohol, cocaine and prescription antidepressant in his body.

October

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November

global news

Regions of Spain hit with deadly flooding In early November, multiple regions of Spain, including the areas surrounding the city of Malaga and Valencia, were hit with the deadliest flooding in decades. According to CNN, the storm that caused a year's worth of rain to fall in one week killed at least 205 people and dozens more remained missing for several days.

Donald Trump wins the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election O n Nov. 5, president-elect and former President Donald Trump defeated president-elect and then-Vice President Kamala Harris in the United States presidential election, winning both the electoral college and popular vote. Trump, who held office previously from 2016-20, ran alongside now ice President JD Vance.

REUTERS/Juan Sebastian Lobos

Israel retaliates against Iran after missiles attack After Iran launched a missile attack on a central Israeli town and injured 11 people in late October, Israel launched several strikes on Iran in retaliation. One Iranian civilian and four Iranian soldiers were killed in the attacks, according to the BBC.

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Year In Review

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UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson shot and killed On Dec. 4, UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot in the back and killed outside the Hilton hotel in Manhattan. Five days later –– on Dec. 9 –– 26-year-old Luigi Mangione was detained in a McDonald’s in Altoona, P.A. as a suspect for Thompson’s murder. After being detained, Mangione was charged with murder through use of a firearm, stalking and a firearms o ense.

Bakr Alkasem/AFP/Getty Images/TNS

Rebels overtake the Syrian capital of Damascus After a rapid two-week offensive movement, Syrian rebel groups successfully captured the capital of Damascus. Forces were led by the opposition group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and effectively toppled the Assad regime, which has been in power since 1971.

REUTERS/Souleymane Camara

Government of Guinea honors 56 lives lost in mass stampede On Dec. 2, the government of Guinea stated that at least 56 people were killed and many injured after a mass panic among soccer fans.

Clashes among rival fans broke out in the city of Nzerekore on Dec. 1 after a red card was shown to a Labe player with the score at 0-0 late in the game. Fans of Labe started throwing stones while security forces began using tear gas, which sparked the mass panic.

December

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January

global news

Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/ AFP/Getty Images/TNS

Cyber Truck explodes outside the Trump International Hotel On Jan. 1, Matthew Livelsberger, a highly decorated army soldier, shot himself in a Cyber Truck in front of the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas moments before the truck blew up in flames. Livelsberger left several notes on his cellphone explaining his actions as a “wake up call.”

Truck attack in New Orleans injures dozens At least 14 people were killed and dozens more were injured after a man identified as Shamsud-Din Jabbar purposely drove a truck into Bourbon street in New Orleans L.A. amid New Years Celebrations.

REUTERS/Adam Gray

Fires in Los Angeles cause devastation From Jan. 7-31, a series of 14 destructive wildfires spread throughout the metropolitan area of Los Angeles and San Diego County in California and caused the death of 29 people.

The Palisades Fire, one of the two largest fires remained active for a total of 24 days.

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Year In Review

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M23 rebels advance toward major city in eastern Congo The M23 rebel group is advancing toward another major city in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, a leading UN official said Jan. 31. Days after taking the city of Goma, the Rwandan-backed fighters are about 60 km north of Bukavu, according to UN expert Jean-Pierre Lacroix.

REUTERS/Ann Wang

Wildfires rage across northern Thailand The North of Thailand is grappling with a surge in wildfires, with 401 hotspots detected across 17 provinces, according to the Region 3 Forest Fire Control Centre. Phetchabun province has been particularly affected, registering 82 hotspots — the highest in the region — with fires spreading across almost the entire province.

Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images/TNS

China’s surge in AI creates optimism on A-share market While the surge of Chinese domestic artificial intelligence companies has led to upbeat sentiment in the A-share market recently, the inflow of more long-term and patient capital and improving fundamentals will be the major drivers sustaining the market’s performance.

February

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March

global news

Mark Carney elected to replace Justin Trudeau On March 10, Mark Carney, a prominent central banker and investor, was elected to fulfill Justin Trudeau’s previous position as the elected leader of Canada’s Liberal Party.

Israel strikes Hezbollah targets as fragile four-month ceasefire frays Israel responded to rocket fire from southern Lebanon as a fragile four-month long truce with Hezbollah showed new signs of strain, even as the Iran-backed group denied its involvement. The Israel Defense Forces said it was striking Hezbollah positions, including a command site and rocket launchers, which occurred March 22.

REUTERS/Blair Gable

Trump administration cancels protections for immigrants The Trump administration is canceling deportation protections and work permits for over 500,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguan and Venezuelans who arrived in the United States under a two-year Biden-era humanitarian parole program. The program will shut down in late April.

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Year In Review

Student Profiles

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profiles

International student bridges cultures and builds community

R en Kato School of Business

“Compared to other countries, like India, China, which has a lot of international populations [at the college], I know there's only two … people [who are] from Japan right now,” Kato said. “Finding a connection in my own culture was hard here … [so] I wanted to make a kind of Japanese community.”

Kato said he has enjoyed seeing how some Japanese American students who grew up in the U.S. and want to have a deeper connection to Japan have joined the club maddy dombrow/the ithacan and connected with new community members.

First-year student Daichi Kutsuma co-founded the Japanese Learning Club with Kato and now serves as a

By Kai Lincke language instructor in the club. Kutsuma, who is also Two Wednesday nights each month, senior Ren an international student from Japan, said he is grateful Kato takes a break from his responsibilities as a for how Kato has helped him meet other students and business administration student, private wealth feel more at home at IC. “As a freshman international student, I was feeling management intern, resident assistant, senior week committee finance co-chair and vice president of a bit excluded, in a sense, so it was very … reassurExternal Relations for the Beta Alpha Psi Honor ing [and] encouraging [to meet another student from Society to lead a group of students in activities Japan],” Kutsuma said. “[He] has multiple similar exlike folding origami and bean throwing. As the periences and background so we don't really struggle co-founder and president of the Japanese Learning with understanding each other.”

Kato said he has lived through the frustraClub, Kato leads these bimonthly meetings with the hope of teaching fellow students about Japanese tions of being an international student — like adjusting to American food, cultural differencculture and language.

Kato, an international student from Tokyo, Japan, es between the U.S. and Japan, and speaking and learning at the college almost solely in founded the Japanese Learning Club in Fall 2024.

Kato said he noticed that several students were English. Kato said he now enjoys helping other interested in learning Japanese but didn’t have international students find their community and access to learning resources at the college. Kato support system at the college.

Kato also helps underclassmen adjust to college said students have to travel to Cornell University to take a Japanese language course — since Ithaca life. He worked as an RA for Lower Quads for two College does not offer any — which can be com- years and now works as an RA in Upper Terraces.

Carly Dudek, residence director for Upper Terracplex to schedule and coordinate travel. He wanted to provide a space for students to learn more about es, said the most important job RAs have is to build Japan — and for Japanese students to bond over community through making the building feel safe, giving their residents academic or social advice and their shared culture.

connecting their residents with on-campus groups and resources. Dudek said Kato is a strong role model and supporter for his residents.

“He has a sort of quiet leadership about him, where he doesn't want to be the center of attention,” Dudek said. “But when [I] get talking to him, I'm like, ‘Wow, you really know your stuff, you really know your residents in and out, and you're really a quite thoughtful and resilient person.’”

Outside of his work as an RA, Kato also works to build community by serving as the vice president of External Relations for Beta Alpha Psi, an international honor and service society for accounting, finance and business analytics students.

In this role, Kato coordinates and publicizes professional development events like speaker series, networking events and career workshops.

Kato also helps plan the chapter’s community service initiatives, like book and clothing drives, cooking and baking for homeless shelters and volunteering at the ReUse Center.

Margaret Shackell, associate professor in the Department of Accounting and Business Law and director of Graduate Business programs, serves as the faculty adviser to Beta Alpha Psi. Shackell said Kato is an enthusiastic and driven leader in the chapter, and his hard work and dedication to helping others has made a deep impact on Ithaca and Ithaca College communities.

“A lot of times we would think of that [altruism] as helping people who need food or clothes or things like that, but really he's helping the School of Business students significantly by organizing these events where they can connect with people in business and make their network bigger,” Shackell said. “He is going places. I'll be excited to see where his career takes him.”

As Kato prepares to graduate, he said he hopes to get a job in wealth management, potentially as a financial advise .

Dudek said Kato’s passion for helping people is evident in everything he does.

“Truly everything he brings to the table, he brings fully of his own volition and out of a place of sincerity for truly wanting to make an impact on other people,” Dudek said. “It is not about any kind of praise or accolades or resume building for him. … It is truly about just doing the right thing by his community.”

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Year In Review

Documentarian shines light on contended conversations

Devon Jezek Roy H. Park School of Communications

A formative experience for Jezek was when she attended Interlochen Summer Camp for the Arts for acting when she was in high school. In her time at the camp she found her love for filmmaking and a mentor in one of her guest teachers — Kat Corio.

“She kind of took me under her wings and showed me how to film, Jezek said. “I was like, ‘This is super cool. I love this.’”

Learning the process of filmmaking was only one aspect of Jezek’s creative journey. For Jezek, it is not about how much maddy dombrow/the ithacan she can get done, but the impact the work she does has on her community. Finding a way to By jacquelyn reaves combine her love of film and her passion for Growing up, senior Devon Jezek always had a community service is why Jezek first became inpenchant for storytelling. At six, she would direct terested in producing documentaries.

“I'm very passionate about making things bether brother, filming him using a little camera her parents gave her. Jezek said she has always had an ter,” Jezek said. “I just want to make a stance, like, interest in storytelling, but it has manifested itself I want to change the world — and how am I going to change the world? That's what really drove me to in different ways.

Jezek’s passion for storytelling led her to the Roy documentary filmmaking itsel .”

Jezek’s passion for making an impact on the H. Park School of Communications where she is currently majoring in documentary studies and pro- world reflects in her work. Her documentaries duction and has been a producer, writer and anchor “Without Shame, Without Stigma, Without Fear” for ICTV shows like News Watch, Good Day Ithaca and and “Pages of Protest” have a social justice lens Evening in America; along with internships with WFRI and are focused on human rights issues. Her documentary “Without Shame, Without Stigma, Without Community Radio, WBNG TV and NBC Universal.

Senior Lauren Piccone, who worked with Jezek Fear” won an award for best longform college docon her senior thesis film “Pages of Protest,” said umentary at the Cayuga Film Festival. Her senior that before working with Jezek, she was familiar thesis “Pages of Protest” — a documentary focused with Jezek’s reputation as a person who cares deep- on book bans in the U.S. — was screened with other senior thesis’ in Fall 2024. ly about the work she creates.

“Pages of Protest” centers around Da'Taeveyon Dan“I actually didn’t [have any classes with Jezek] at all,” Piccone said. “I came in as a transfer — so, my iels, an incoming student at Rice University and youth junior year — and she was studying abroad at that activist, and his battle against censorship. The documentime. But I definitely heard of her, because she's, like, tary also addresses the real-life consequences censoring books has in elections and within communities.

I think the star of the documentary program here.”

This documentary involved Jezek and senior documentary studies majors Lauren Piccone and Leila Marcillo-Gomez travelling down to Jezek’s home state of Texas during October 2024 — and staying there for a week to film.

Jezek said that being a Texas native and seeing firsthand how her community rejects specific beliefs and ideologies is where she got inspiration on what her senior thesis would be.

“It's very different than Ithaca,” Jezek said. “I am from a bubble, as most people would call it. The city itself has had this overturn of banning critical race theory, banning gender inclusive bathrooms — pretty much anything that is somewhat like basic human rights — my community has banned it.”

Piccone said Jezek’s drive and motivation was a trait she appreciated when working on the film “The night before we were getting on the plane to go to Texas, she had a whole itinerary planned out, and it just made everything go so smoothly,” Piccone said. “It is a miracle that we even got good footage the way that things were leading up to [the trip]. And then there were still some things that we didn't get — but she was able to go back to Texas all on her own and get some footage that helped amplify our documentary.”

John Scott, associate professor in the Department of Media Arts, Sciences, and Studies and director for the documentary studies and production degree program, is Jezek’s adviser and has supported her throughout her studies. Scott helped get Jezek's documentary “Without Shame, Without Stigma, Without Fear” shown at the Reproductive Justice Film Festival.

“From the beginning [I thought Jezek] was somebody who seemed serious minded,” Scott said. “She found our program all the way from Texas, which tells me that she looked around and she had a lot of good energy and a lot of spunk.”

Scott said Jezek’s motivation and attention to detail was something he noticed as her professor and adviser.

“She prepares for everything that she does in a way that's rigorous and in a way that's thoughtful — she doesn't cut corners,” Scott said. “One of the things I admire about her is that she deliberately challenges herself in areas where she doesn't necessarily think she's strong. I don't know if I'm always doing that, and I feel like that's inspiring.”

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Profiles

profiles

Aspiring pediatrician uplifts campus community voices

Umu Barry

Health Sciences and Human Performance experiences into its curriculum. Because of this, Barry’s first work experience was as an intern at The Wall Street Journal when she was only 14 years old. Despite this influential experience, which Barry credits toward her early academic diligence and drive, she said she was always aiming for the medical field “When I finally got placed in a hospital, I was so happy,” Barry said. “I was working with a lot of patients … giving them warm maddy dombrow/the ithacan blankets, some snacks, even talking to them and building a conversation with them. Those are things that made me come to a realization: people By kalysta donaghy-robinson just want someone to talk to.”

When senior Umu Barry moved to Ithaca from Barry said her experience at Mount Sinai the Bronx, NY, she knew she wanted to make an Morningside Hospital lit a passion within her for impact and achieve academic success as the oldest community building. Consequently, when she came sibling in her large family. What came as a surprise, to Ithaca College in Fall 2021, she sought out comhowever, were the communities she found and the munities with people she could connect with. journey she underwent as a student leader.

Sister2Sister was one of the first student orgaBarry, whose family is from both Guinea and nizations Barry joined. The group is a designated Sierra Leone, came to Ithaca College as a student space for women of color at Ithaca College. in the exploratory program, but she said she always “It was a safe space for them to explain [and] just knew what she wanted to gain from her college talk about things that they experienced in college, as experience. As she approaches a degree in health well as just talking about how to build sisterhood in sciences with a pre-med concentration, Barry said a predominantly white institution,” Barry said. her dream ever since she was a little girl has been Since that experience, Barry said she has grown to become a pediatrician. into a far more confident leader and is the current “I want to understand children and just help president of the Ithaca College African Students them in the system in any way,” Barry said. “I want Association. Barry is also a recipient of the Ithaca them to feel more appreciated … and making College Leadership Scholar Award, a member of them smile is just going to make my day.”

Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority Inc. and has worked Barry said this dream was enriched by an as a student employee in both the Office of Inforinternship experience she had at Mount Sinai mation Technology and Analytics and the Office of Morningside Hospital in Manhattan while she was Access, Opportunity and Achievement (OAOA). attending Cristo Rey New York High School. BarAs a leader, Barry said she strives to make everyry’s high school incorporated weekly internship one feel they are included and have a voice.

“I'm the person that loves to ensure that everyone has that space to speak because I feel like there's always a good idea, always, no matter what,” Barry said. “It builds communication, and … a good relationship, where people can be able to speak freely without having to feel like they are being held back.”

Denise Polanco, director of OAOA, has been Barry’s faculty counselor under the Higher Education Opportunity Program ever since Barry first applied to the college. HEOP is a program under OAOA that is designated to provide academic, financial and personal services to students who are considered underprepared for college, whether that is because of economic or academic circumstances. Within this program, students are paired with a counselor to work with throughout their college experience.

Barry, who began making connections with Polanco as early as her admissions process, is now a peer mentor for OAOA. Polanco said one of Barry’s biggest strengths as a student leader is academic drive and approachability.

“She's always been super responsible; she does what needs to get done [and] she takes advantage of all the opportunities available,” Polanco said.

“She's been a really good role model to help … regulate [new students] on how to organize, how to prioritize and kind of just balance out life.”

Dusan Ducic, associate director of the Information Technology Support Center, was involved in the process of hiring Barry as a learning technology consultant, and later, a student manager. Ducic said he loves to talk to Barry about her large family and her background, as Barry is both the child of immigrants and the oldest sibling.

“As an immigrant myself, I always joke with her about that,” Ducic said. “It is amazing to see in her the love toward people — the way she expresses that love to her own siblings, family and people around her.”

As Barry prepares for her next steps after graduating, she said she is looking forward to learning more about her profession and carrying with her everything she has learned at the college about fostering community. Ducic said he has no doubt that Barry will accomplish anything she sets her mind to.

“She's so focused and she's so determined that whatever she decides she will achieve,” Ducic said.

“I don't see anything stopping her.”

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Year In Review

Working towards promoting diversity in literature

Riley Rhoder School of Humanities and Sciences

environment for herself and her peers because she was never afraid to go beyond the content of the literature.

“She was always willing to sit there with how things made her feel,” Adams said.

“That requires a courage that is almost indescribable because you are having to be vulnerable in a space full of relative strangers. …

She was also incredibly responsive to the feelings that other people would share.”

O utside of her typical coursework, Rhoder is also the president of the international English honor society, Sigma Tau Delta. She started maddy dombrow/the ithacan as a first-year sophomore liaison and has worked her way up. Adams said Rhoder is a great mentor and By kaeleigh banda leader to the first-year students she works with “She is one of the most reliable, responsible Driven by her passion for promoting diversity in literature, senior English major Riley Rhoder has ex- and assured people that I've ever worked with — plored a wide range of coursework and extracurriculars and that includes at the level of graduate study throughout her time in the Department of Literatures — because you never have to ask her to do anything in English. Her commitment to highlighting inclusive twice,” Adams said.

Rhoder is also involved in the New Voices Literliterature and her welcoming presence in classes have ary Festival, an annual festival where seven newer earned her recognition from her professors and peers.

While the typical English class stereotypically authors share their work through readings, panels focuses on classic literature, Rhoder said she has and class visits. Rhoder is involved in the planning of taken many classes that go beyond the readings and the event, creating community displays and is part of critically engage her to learn about cultures and the class that reads all seven of the new works.

In addition to being involved with the NVLF, perspectives different from her own.

“The English department has so many incredibly Rhoder is the editor of the Graphic Novel Advisofascinating and innovative classes within it,” Rhoder ry Board newsletter. GNAB is a community-service said. “We get to read a lot of contemporary [content] group that operates through the two-credit English that's looking at real world issues and is also incredi- Professional Development course. Students read graphic novels and write a review and description bly applicable to our lives and our careers.”

For example, Rhoder took a class called Global of the novel to be shared with libraries across the Blackness with Derek Adams, associate professor in local area in a newsletter. The board also does prothe Department of Literatures in English. The class grams for rural local libraries. The graphic novels provides a space for students to learn about Black chosen are often ones that center around themes of identity through texts written across the globe. Ad- LGBTQ+ issues or race and thus are more likely to ams said Rhoder always provided an engaging learning be banned by other libraries or schools.

Katharine Kittredge, professor in the Department of Literatures in English and the adviser of GNAB, said one of her favorite memories of Rhoder was when she was involved in the children’s programming events that GNAB has done, which included visiting rural areas and speaking to children about diverse literature.

“There was a little girl [at the event] who was just in love with Riley,” Kittredge said. “She just thought Riley was the coolest person that she had ever seen. They were sitting there creating comics together and this little girl just got closer and closer until she was actually sitting on Riley's chair with her. And, I know that little girl is going to think, college is now connected to a great grown up who sat and listened to her and I think that that could be a real turning point.”

To conclude her college career, Rhoder has been working on her senior thesis. She is writing a research paper about the modern manifestations of the cult of domesticity, also known as the cult of true womanhood, within contemporary women’s literature. Rhoder said she is looking into how society defines womanhood through femininity, domesticity and motherhood.

After graduating college, Rhoder said she is considering pursuing a degree in library sciences.

“I'm really interested in looking at diversity and inclusion in library spaces,” Rhoder said. “Ensuring that library shelves represent the wide breadth of experiences and identities within the communities that they're surveying — that is super important to me.”

Despite her multitude of academic accomplishments, senior Meaghan Burke— another English major and Rhoder’s close friend — said Rhoder is humble about the work that she does.

“She is the essence of the Graphic Novel Advisory Board,” Burke said. “But, she's not looking for accolades. She's doing this because she believes in it and she values it.”

Burke said she has taken many classes with Rhoder over their four years at the college together.

She said she has not only learned how to be a better student from Rhoder but also gained a best friend.

“She's just such a good person to have in your corner,” Burke said. “She's reliable, she's dependable and she's also just so fun.”

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profiles

Exploring the intersection of management in music

Lily Milkis School of Music, Theatre, and Dance

in through multiple roles, including her summer job at the prestigious Aspen Music Festival and School.

As an operations assistant, she managed seating auditions, coordinated student recitals and oversaw logistics for six major concerts.

“It was a really interesting way to explore the intersection of what I’m studying through being immersed in a very, very busy summer festival setting,” Milkis said.

Her experience at Aspen built upon the skills she had developed through her work with the Cayuga maddy dombrow/the ithacan Chamber O rchestra during the academic year. She helped facilitate auditions and managed logistical details for performances — tasks that gave her a comBy tess ferguson petitive edge when applying for the Aspen position.

A violin player herself, senior Lily Milkis orig“Aspen is one of the biggest orchestra festivals inally majored in music education in hopes of in the world, so to get to work there was very cool,” eventually teaching string instruments.

Milkis said. “It’s a lot of transferable skills, and I’m As she immersed herself in the School of Music, very grateful to have been able to intern with the CCO Theatre, and Dance, she found herself drawn not only while I was still learning about what I wanted to do.” to performance, but to the intricate behind-the-scenes At the college, Milkis took on another key role: work that brings orchestras to life. Now, as she pre- student orchestra manager for the college’s symphony pares to graduate, Milkis has carved out a unique path and chamber orchestras. Ho-Yin Kwok, director of orthat blends her passion for music with the business chestras at the college, said that in addition to playing acumen necessary to run world-class ensembles. violin in the ensembles, Milkis has been a necessary Milkis is pursuing a Bachelor of Music with an component in ensuring their smooth operation. outside field in business, a program designed to “Every orchestra has lots of moving parts — allow music students to integrate another area of personnel, rehearsals, logistics,” Kwok said. “Lily study into their education. For her, that outside essentially worked as a student employee and field has been instrumental — literally and figur - helped me operate these orchestras. She’s in tively — in shaping her career aspirations. charge of scheduling, attendance, set-up, even tour “I didn’t realize how applicable music was to other logistics. She just has [a] top-notch work ethic.” areas of study, and I also didn’t realize how applicable Beyond her technical skills, Kwok said it is Milkis’s other areas of study were to music,” Milkis said. “It’s confidence and composure that set her apart really kind of changed the way I thought about every“When you are responsible for so many people, thing, and it’s made me ask a lot more questions.” you need to have that confidence,” Kwok said. “She Milkis’s curiosity led her to explore orchestra op- is calm, composed and confident, and that is what erations, a field she has gained hands-on experience makes her successful.”

Milkis has also found strong mentorship outside of the music school. Ted Galanthay, associate professor and chair of the Department of Mathematics, became an unexpected supporter after having her in class for business statistics. Galanthay said he quickly took notice of her drive and commitment.

“She seems like the type of person where, when she says she’ll do something, she does it,” Galanthay said. “She sees things through until they’re done. And it’s that type of character that gets things done for the benefit of others.

Galanthay became one of Milkis’s biggest advocates, ultimately nominating her for the Presidential Scholar Award through Phi Kappa Phi. When she won, Milkis said she was she the first music major in many years to receive the honor.

“I like to see folks who’ve worked hard, folks who’ve given back, get recognized,” Galanthay said. “I was ecstatic when she won.”

Milkis’s passion for music extends beyond performance and management — she is also deeply committed to making classical music more accessible.

As treasurer for the American String Teachers Association at IC, she has focused on administrative strategies to expand opportunities for students. As president of the college’s violin studio student organization, she has worked to facilitate guest artist visits and master classes, ensuring that students have meaningful connections with professionals in the field “One big career goal of mine is to make classical music more accessible because it’s awesome and I think more people should know about it,” Milkis said. “There’s a lot of potential to connect music with different fields and bring it to new audiences.

Milkis’s ability to see connections between disciplines has also influenced her volunteer work. She has been actively involved with Smile Train for most of her life, a nonprofit that provides cleft lip and palate care worldwide. Born with a cleft lip herself, Milkis has leveraged her background in music to create innovative fundraising campaigns, including sharing classical music playlists to raise awareness and donations.

Galanthay said that with her adaptability and vision, there is no doubt that Milkis will continue making an impact in the world of orchestral operations.

“If I were to give Lily one piece of advice, it would be to trust herself,” Galanthay said.

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Year In Review

News 26 News 26-27 COVER.indd 28

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News

Lucia Iandolo/the ithacan

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Year In Review Sources: IC OFFICE OF ADMINISTRATIVE RESEARCH AND INstitutional research

IC

BY THE

Fall Students, Faculty and Administration by Race/Ethnicity White 72.6%

NUMBERS Tuition, room and board Costs

Fall 2024 opening enrollment

BIPOC 22.3% Unknown 2.3%

International 2.8%

Ithaca college Degrees Awarded

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IC BY the numbers/in memoriam

IN MEMORIAM prakriti panwar/the ithacan

K it K elly

courtesy of zach cava

Courtesy of 607 News Now

H arry S hu ldm a n

J u li a n E uell

By prakriti panwar

By kai lincke

By kaeleigh banda

Ithaca College sophomore Kit Kelly died by suicide O ct. 15. Kelly was a television and digital media production major in the Roy H. Park School of Communications. They worked in the Towers Marketplace on campus and were an assistant director on “Game Over,” an Ithaca College Television show. Kelly graduated from Unionville High School in Pennsylvania.

Sophomore Emerson O rders said they were grateful to be Kelly’s friend since their bond began during their first year at the college “Kit was one of the most adventurous and curious and creative people I’ve ever met,” Orders said.

“I’m so grateful I had the chance to know him, even if it was only for a little while. He brought so much light and fun into every life he was a part of.”

O rders said Kelly impacted their life in a meaningful way.

“I hope [Kit] knows how much love everyone has for him,” Orders said. “He made my life better just by being in it. … It’s hard to ask for help, but I promise it’s worth it, no matter what you’re going through.”

Amy Falkner, dean of the Park School, said she was saddened to hear about Kelly’s death and encouraged everyone to be kind to the people around them.

Junior Eli Francoeur works at ICTV and said he vividly remembers Kelly’s positive energy in the studio.

“I, unfortunately, did not get to know Kit very well,” Francoeur said. “But I do remember [hearing their voice] over headset; their voice always just sounded very uplifting and very positive. I think that atmosphere [permeated] throughout the control room where we worked.”

The Ithaca College community remembers Harry Shuldman ’08, who died in a car crash Jan. 26 during a wildlife trip in Uganda. Shuldman was a staff member for The Ithacan who went on to work as a copy editor for The New York Post.

While at the college, Shuldman majored in cinema and photography with a concentration in screenwriting, according to April Johanns, coordinator of student and external relations in the Roy H. Park School of Communications.

Shuldman worked as a cartoonist and staff writer for The Ithacan, covering movie releases, comedy events and more for the Accent section of the paper, which is now known as the Life and Culture section.

Andy Swift ’09 said he edited Shuldman’s work while also working at The Ithacan from 2006-2007.

“He was an absolute pleasure to work with,” Swift said. “Any week that we had a piece from Harry Shuldman in our section was a very good week.

He had a real gift for writing beyond just crafting a well-structured review. He wrote with authority and deep, cultivated knowledge of his subject matter.”

Zach Cava ’09 said he met Shuldman while living in Emerson Hall. Though Cava was a biology major and did not take any of the same courses as Shuldman, the two bonded over their passions for art and music and their curiosity about the world. They also enjoyed traveling together, including to Costa Rica in 2024 and Uganda in January.

“If he had to have one final adventure, this one was hard to top, because I don’t know if I’ve ever seen him so happy,” Cava said. “He was just a really unique guy, very funny, very sweet [and] really loved his family.”

Julian Euell, former associate professor in the Department of Sociology at Ithaca College, died Jan. 4 at the age of 78. Euell —– known as “Dr. Only,” by his students, friends and colleagues to honor his commitment to expand representation —– was the first African American professor to receive tenure at Ithaca College.

Euell started working at the college in 1974, received tenure in 1980 and retired in 2020. Euell and his partner Cha Roberts had one daughter, Johara Euell Malcolm. He also had four grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Sean Eversley Bradwell, assistant professor in the Department of Education and director of the Center for the Study of Culture, Race and Ethnicity, said in an Intercom post that Euell died in his home with Roberts.

Jonathan Laskowitz, former associate professor in the Department of Sociology and a friend of Euell, said he admired that Euell refused to let his identity as a person of color define him as a professor. Laskowitz said Euell was an advocate for representation, but he did not teach any Black studies courses.

“He didn’t allow himself to be placed in the Black studies box,” Laskowitz said. “In fact, he demanded to be seen as a sociologist first —– a whole person, not solely a Black person. And his courses reflected that.

Before becoming a professor, Euell studied photography and design and got degrees in anthropology and sociology at the University of Rochester, and a degree in urban planning at Cornell University Euell taught a variety of classes at Ithaca College, including Sociological Theory, Introduction to Sociology, Technology and Society, Urban Sociology and more.

Samantha Jacoff

B ruce H atch

H enry N eubert

Ithaca College alum Samantha Jacoff ’10 passed away O ct. 2 in Woodbury, N.Y., after a nearly two-year battle with lung cancer. Jacoff was surrounded by her family.

After graduating from Syosset High School and Ithaca College, Jacoff lived in Manhattan and then the Cobble Hill section of Brooklyn. Jacoff ’s passion in life led her to the world of dog rescue, where she worked as an adoption coordinator for Korean K-9 Rescue.

Among other things, Jacoff loved Broadway, travel, reading and walks with her rescue dog Laddie.

Bruce Hatch, former Director of Physical Plant for the college, passed away at the age of 79 Nov. 1 in Shinglehouse, PA, at his beloved hunting camp.

Hatch worked at the college for over 14 years until January 2002 and worked a similar role at Cornell University before coming to Ithaca College. Hatch excelled as a manager overseeing all facilities services and staff. His professional life was led by a deep commitment to excellence and mentorship.

A passionate hunter, Hatch made significant contributions to his local hunting community, including five entries in the ope and Young Club.

Former Ithaca College double bass professor Henry Neubert passed away peacefully at his home in Sun City, Bluffton, South Carolina on Feb. 18.

Neurbert, who was a professor at the college from 1972-2005, taught in the New York state public schools on Long Island after graduating from Northwestern University. In addition to teaching double bass at Ithaca College, Neubert taught a variety of other courses in music education, coached chamber music and conducted Symphonic Band.

While retired, Neubert played community softball and was president of his local golf league.

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Year In Review

Academics

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News - Academics

IC welcomes Wells’ students amid wave of college closures

by Jacquelyn Reaves Published Aug. 28 Wells College — located in Aurora, New York — announced its closure in May, 2024. It was one of the many institutions that did so in a recent wave of college closures across the U.S. Amid this uncertain phase in higher education, Ithaca College is providing support to Wells students.

Ithaca College partnered with the former college to provide a simple transfer process. In Fall 2024, the college supported 13 former Wells students through a teach-out plan.

A teach-out plan is when an institution that has lost its accreditation — and must close — makes an agreement with another accredited institution to ensure that students attending the closing institution can complete their degrees from another. Ithaca College is one of the 24 teach-out institutions Wells College partnered with.

Under the teach-out program, the college matched net costs — which encompasses tuition, housing and meal plans — that students had at Wells College. Ithaca College also transferred all coursework completed by students at Wells and provided on-campus housing to students if they chose to live on campus.

Nicole Eversley Bradwell, executive director of admissions, said that because Wells closed at a time when transfer applications were closed, the college extended deadlines for former students and got rid

of application costs.

Ithaca College senior Bailey Hamm transferred from Wells after its closure and said she felt very supported by the college throughout the transition. “[Ithaca College] green-lighted me to [have] all of my credits transfer, and I don’t have to retake any classes,” Hamm said. “All of the professors have been very kind and understanding. I mean, honestly, the [transition] process has been very smooth, which has been nice.”

The financial cost of supporting fo mer students Ithaca College is supporting the former Wells students without impacting its deficit. A deficit is when the college’s total expenses are greater than its total revenue. For the 2025 fiscal year, the college has a budget deficit of $9.2 million Tim Downs, vice president of finance and administration and chief financial office , said that because there are only 13 former Wells students who transferred to Ithaca College, there are no significant added costs that need to be budgeted for their enrollment.

“We’re not hiring more staff to account for that — 200 students may have been a different story,” Downs said. “It’s actually going to be a pickup for us on the room and board side because our enrollment is down, we have capacity in our dorms, so we are actually able to fill them in our dorms again without having to take on additional costs. So, that is not a budget hit to us.”

Downs said the college has a pool of institutional

Through the teach-out program, Ithaca College is offering support to students who transferred from Wells College, one of several New York colleges that have closed in the past few years.

illustration by molly teska/THE ITHACAN

funds from which financial aid is distributed. As long as the financial aid given to these students fits within the budget line of this funding pool, he said it does not impact the deficit the college is in.

Shana Gore, associate vice president of enrollment operations and student success, said the financial aid provided to former Wells students comes from institutional funds like revenue, endowed scholarship and donations.

The recent wave of college closures Bradwell said college closures will continue and Ithaca College wants to provide space for students who have to deal with the aftermath.

“Wells, unfortunately, wasn’t the first, and likely will not be the last — in terms of institutions that we work with — where students have come to us from those institutions,” Bradwell said.

The influx of these closures is because of financial strain as a result of low enrollment placed on these colleges following the COVID-19 pandemic. At the All College Welcome held Aug. 27, Downs said that this year, new student enrollment at Ithaca College was 200 below the target.

According to The Hechinger Report, on average, one college or university per week has announced its closure or merger with another institution so far in 2024. Institutions in New York state like Cazenovia College, Medaille University, the College of Saint Rose and Wells College all announced their closures in 2024.

Hamm said that whether school administrations believe they are going to close or not, they should always have a safety net to ensure that students are supported in case a closure does happen.

“Small liberal arts colleges are always going to be a risky choice, and especially now when we’ve seen so many other schools close,” Hamm said. “Even if you don’t think you’re going to close. It’s silly not to have a backup [plan]."

Robert Kelchen, professor and department head of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, said two big signs that a college might close are a drop in enrollment and continuous loss of money each year.

“The first big indicator [of a closure] is just consistently losing money, and that’s something that you can see in the financial statements,” elchen said.

Bradwell said the proximity between the two colleges was key to Ithaca College’s endeavor to support former Wells students.

“There was already a relationship there, and many of us care deeply,” Bradwell said. “Not only for Wells College, but of course, the Wells College community [as well].”

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Year In Review

Variations in enrollment patterns lead IC to modernize recruitment

ITHACA

NATION

Higher education enrollment has been decreasing nationally at a rate of 1.5% each year since 2011. Graduate students make up 11.69% of Ithaca College’s student population, but excluding The School of HS&HP students, graduate students make up approximately 1%.

mei dennison and Kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

by sebastian pickford and brady dumas Published sept. 25 Ithaca College and many colleges and universities across the U.S. are amid a higher education enrollment cliff. However, while undergraduate enrollment is down at the college — outpacing the national dip — graduate enrollment is growing despite a national decline.

According to a report by the Chronicle of Higher Education, the consensus view about the enrollment cliff was that the nation would peak at approximately 3.5 million high school graduates around 2025. This would cause the college-age population to shrink by as much as 15% over the following five to 10 years College enrollment patterns at undergraduate and graduate levels Excluding The School of Health Sciences and Human Performance, graduate programs at the college have low enrollment. Graduate programs in the School of Humanities and Sciences and the School of Business have 22 students each and the continued education program has three students, according to the

Office of Analytics and Institutional Research Margaret Shackell, associate professor and director in the Department of Accounting and Business Law of Graduate Business programs, said she has seen a steady fall in students from when she started the Masters Program for Accounting, going from 35 to seven.

Shackell made it clear that this decline is not exclusive to the college.

“This is a national trend, so it’s nothing about Ithaca College,” Shackell said. “We are certainly concerned here, but students [in general] aren’t majoring in accounting.”

Suzanne Ortega, president of the Council of Graduate Schools, oversees the only U.S. organization that exclusively focuses on the development and research of advanced degrees. Ortega said the national decline in graduate students can be attributed to the job market.

“Traditionally, graduate enrollment has been counter-cyclical to the economy,” Ortega said. “If there are good jobs, then enrollments are lower. If there aren’t jobs, people return to school.”

The National Center for Education Statistics is the primary federal entity for collection and analysis of

education data. According to its 2023 findings, higher education enrollment has decreased nationally at a rate of 1.5% each year since 2011, with enrollment reaching its lowest point since 2006 in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic, with 15.4 million students enrolled in undergraduate programs in the U.S. College’s recruitment strateg y Graduate students make up 11.69% of the school’s student population, but excluding The School of HS&HP students, graduate students make up only approximately 1%.

To address low enrollment in both graduate and undergraduate programs, the college has modernized its marketing strategies by focusing on social media and online advertisements.

Mark Eyerly, vice president for marketing and communications, said the college’s new focus on recruiting students through social media and online advertisements represents a departure from theme-driven campaigns. The school entered its sixth year of the ‘Ithaca Forever’ campaign in Fall 2024, which began in Fall 2019 and replaced the ‘Imagining

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Ithaca’ campaign, which began in Fall 2018. “[Themes] don’t necessarily generate good content for social media, which needs to be current and in the moment,” Eyerly said. “The strategic change we’re undertaking is to put more emphasis on storytelling.

Instead of seeing campaigns, we’re going to try to tell stories that people want to be a part of and do that in an ongoing, continuous way.”

Lisa Searle, associate director of visit coordination and operations in the Office of Admissions, has been working to boost engagement with the school from prospective students and families through visits to campus, as well as virtual programming.

Searle said this engagement dives deeper than using mainstream social media platforms by using programs like Naviance and Sage Scholars, which are specifically tailored to prospective college students “We are trying to be in the spaces that students are in,” Searle said. “That’s not just Instagram and Tiktok.

We’re also trying to be in the spaces where a college student may be using a platform to search and learn more about colleges.”

In November 2023, the college partnered with ZeeMee, a social networking app designed for students applying to colleges and universities. The app enables prospective college students to connect with each other and gives the school another platform to push information.

Graduate enrollment at the college increased by 3.3% between Fall 2021 and Fall 2022 despite a 4.7% decline in graduate enrollment in 2022 nationally. Total enrollment at the college has been falling for several years, with 6,517 students enrolled in Fall 2018 and 4,767 in Fall 2024, a 27% decrease according to the Office of AI .

The Class of 2024, which enrolled in 2021, had approximately 700 graduates in May, according to an October 2023 report. The school’s target enrollment for Fall 2024 was 1,380 to 1,420, roughly twice the size of the 2024 graduating class.

Shackell said the school needs to reach prospective students early to boost enrollment in graduate programs and emphasized the importance of students gaining practical experience through internships.

“First of all is reaching out to high school students, getting in front of them early before they decide their major,” Shackell said. “Another strategy is changing how we teach the accounting intro classes. … So, trying to change it up and make it more interesting and relevant. [Lastly,] working with companies in the industry [and getting] students to job shadow or intern.”

Plans to increase enrollment Eyerly said that each year, the school purchases the names and demographic data of approximately 200,000 high school students, primarily from the College Board’s Student Search Service, which gathers this data through administering the PSAT, SAT and AP exams. Ithaca College also purchases student information from Naviance and Sage Scholars.

The College Board’s Student Search Service is voluntary for students. Students can choose to opt in and agree to receive communications from colleges and universities when they take exams administered by the College Board.

Nicole Eversley Bradwell, executive director of admission, said the school reaches out to the purchased names of high school and middle school students to get them thinking about enrolling at the college early.

Because higher education enrollment is down nationally, the pool of prospective students has shrunk. Eversley Bradwell said the college is not intending to boost enrollment back to pre-pandemic levels, but instead stabilize enrollment by focusing on student retention.

“The plan is not to grow back to over 6,000 students,” Eversley Bradwell said. “The plan is to be a little bigger than we are now and sustain that.”

Eversley Bradwell said the college is accepting both students with or without an undergraduate degree from Ithaca College into the Physical Therapy Doctorate level portion. She said students would have to apply to be accepted into the program.

Eyerly said the school is making efforts to determine an ideal and sustainable student population and emphasized the importance of finding the right balance of undergraduate to graduate students.

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Rakin “Rock” Hall, vice president of enrollment management, said the college’s graduate program is underutilized. To attract more graduate students, the college needs to make its programs more flexible and more widely known.

“We know that we can’t ask someone to stop their life and come back to Ithaca,” Hall said. “With the hybrid option, [we could] create some online platforms where students could work asynchronously three-fourths of the time, and they come in person for a week-long, or two week-long intensive in-person.”

Beyond adjusting student outreach strategies and modernizing degree programs, the school has increased spending on marketing for both undergraduate and graduate programs to accomplish these aims.

“If we get away from emphasizing campaign slogans and get into a steady drip of great stories that [students] want to be a part of, I think that’s going to help,” Eyerly said. “We’re just launching the storytelling part of this, but it’s going to be interesting to see what kind of an effect it has this year.”

Eversley Bradwell said the school hopes to stabilize enrollment by bringing in and graduating approximately 1,200 students each year. The school brought in 1,140 students this year, falling short of its enrollment target by approximately 240 students.

It will take time to see the results of these new strategies, but the team is confident they can begin reversing the steady decline of enrollment.

“It’ll be about a three year process, but this next year I want to see some gains,” Hall said. “I think we have to make a little bit of noise to remind people that we’re here.”

Prakriti panwar/the ithacan

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Year In Review

Professor makes medical strides in adhesive inspired by slugs by sebastian pickford Published sept. 11 For over 20 years, Andrew Smith, Dana professor in the Department of Biology at Ithaca College, has been researching the Arion subfuscus, an invasive species of slug originally from Northwest Europe that is now commonly found across most of Eastern North America. His research has been featured as the cover article of issue 24 of the scientific journal Soft Matte .

The slug has a defense mechanism and produces a unique glue-like secretion when under threat. Smith said he discovered this quality within his first couple weeks of moving to Ithaca in 2000.

“There was definitely an ‘a-ha’ moment because it was when we first got here, probably within the firs couple weeks,” Smith said. “I picked up [the slug] and it just started oozing on me. It got on my finger and I rubbed my fingers together and couldn’t get it off. I was like, ‘This is incredible. This is amazing.’”

Smith’s curiosity gave him the inspiration to create an artificial product in the lab based on the chemistry of the slug’s natural properties — a medical adhesive that could replace the need for stitches or staples.

years. Smith started his research by studying the slug’s mechanism to produce its secretion, which was done by taking micron-thin slices of the slugs.

Since then, Smith has been working with students in his lab to attempt to synthesize a glue based on the slug secretion. The glue could, in theory, be used in medical settings and would be more compatible with the human body than the available medical adhesives.

“The reason I’m excited about this is because gels, from a medical point of view, are really, really useful,” Smith said “We say our body is 70% water, but it’s not water that’s flowing around, it’s water that’s trapped in a gel … A lot of our structures are gels, so it’s very compatible.”

Medical adhesives are becoming more common, with Dermabond being among the most popular according to the National Institute of Health. It is incredibly sticky and durable and sets quickly, but its main drawbacks are that it is inflexible and expensive One of Smith’s students, junior biochem major Caitlyn O’Dell, has been working in Smith’s lab since Spring 2023.

“At first, we were making these blocks of gel and running them through cheesecloth to try and make

Andrew Smith works in his lab studying the natural adhesiveness of the Arion subfuscus slug.

Smith has been attempting to create a medical-grade adhesive inspired by the slugs’ properties.

kai lincke/THE ITHACAN

“I think most people would say it’s disgusting, it’s an orange slime all over your hand and you can’t get it off,” Smith said. “But I was a material scientist, and I knew that something that stuck like that and wouldn’t come off and that set so quickly was really special.”

The research has evolved drastically in the past 20

small gels that could later be put together,” O’Dell said.

“But we were finding that we needed more surface area and the way you do that is you make the gel smaller.”

O’Dell approached this challenge with the idea of using an emulsion: a mix of oil and water. She and the other lab students conducted many trials, changing

variables and recording differences in their findings Sophomore biology major Artan Isom began working on the slug adhesive in Smith’s lab in Spring 2024.

Isom intends to pursue a medical degree and has already seen how a biomedical product like this could be useful through his experience in Fall 2022 working as an EMT. There are similar products already on the market, like Traumagel and Dermabond, but these products have their own shortcomings.

“In a lot of surgeries they use super glue or some sort of plastic, but it’s generally not the best solution,” Isom said. “[Medical superglue is] toxic. It’ll stay in your body and can cause inflammation, but your tissue can grow through [a gel] and use it like a vessel.”

Sophomore biochem major Alys Pop has also been working in Smith’s lab since Spring 2024 and the research has altered her postgraduate goals.

“I was initially in between going the medical route and going the lab route,” Pop said. “With this experience I learned that I want to work more in a lab setting or go into biomedical engineering. I’d love to be able to work in a lab and be able to synthesize materials and work alongside medical professionals.”

The pace of research in Smith’s lab has become more rapid recently, but because of the nature of the work, it is unclear when the adhesive will be commercially available. Once the medical adhesive is made, it still has to undergo human trials and get approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

“It was probably a year and a half ago that I really started aggressively trying to make a glue,” Smith said.

“It could happen in two months, or it could happen in five years. I feel like if I don’t have it in five years, somebody else will.”

Last year, O’Dell presented her part of the research at the American Chemical Society in New Orleans in March 2023, soliciting opinions from people in the scientific community to build future research off o .

“I spent the whole conference with a notebook,” O’Dell said. “I got a lot of suggestions from that conference. It’s amazing how people work together like that, and it’s nice getting together with a large group of people who may not know exactly what you’re talking about because your research is specific to you, but because they have a better idea of science at large, they have ideas.”

O’Dell said that lab research can be repetitive and lonely at times, but that Smith’s passion is contagious and inspires his students to persevere.

“He’s extremely excited about his research, and he’s very excited to tell other people about it, and that makes a huge difference,” O'Dell said.

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News - Academics

CNS students combine diverse skills in ongoing research project by trey nitza Published oct. 29 In a small lab on the second floor of the Center for Natural Sciences, students in the Department of Physics and Astronomy have been working on a unique project: studying colloidal particles, microscopic particles that are held in water, using optical tweezers — a microscope combined with a laser to hold and trap particles.

Sophomore Fiona Lorenzen, an applied physics major, and junior José Rojas, a mathematics-physics major, are the students now working on the ongoing project with the oversight of Jerome Fung, associate professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy. The process starts by diluting particles, mainly silica, so they can be seen better under a microscope.

Optical tweezers then pinpoint and trap the particles to examine them.

Silica is one of the main components of glass and also makes up 59% of the Earth’s crust, according to Britannica. Rojas and senior Yash Mohod developed a computer program during summer 2024 that controls the camera that takes pictures of the particles’ seemingly random movements. The camera connects to the microscope and a computer monitor, which Fung said is necessary for safety purposes.

“Because there’s lasers involved, it is not safe to have eyes go down the stream [of the microscope],” Fung said.

Fung said the goal is to learn more about glass by studying the behavior of silica particles and why glass acts more like a solid, even though it has a liquid composition. He said the project has been underway since 2019, after the department purchased the large optical table that the experiment sits on. Since then, students from other classes have been involved in the project and have worked to integrate new components, like code development.

Rojas said he got his start in the project over the summer after talking with Fung, his physics adviser.

“He said something about coding and something about microscopes that I was really interested in,” Rojas said. “So I said, ‘Yeah, why not?’”

Rojas said the code he initially started working on during summer 2024 helps the different components, like the camera and spatial light modulator, work together simultaneously. Fung said over email that the spatial light modulator controls the position of the microscope. Rojas said that while he learned some coding basics in classes at the college, it was still challenging for him to learn how to understand and work with all the equipment.

“I think that’s why I like [the project], because I

From left, junior José Rojas, a mathematics/physics major, and sophomore Fiona Lorenzen, an applied physics major, study colloidal particles using optical tweezers to hold and trap particles.

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

was starting to understand a little bit more of everything,” Rojas said.

Lorenzen said she became involved because she was interested in the chemistry and coding aspects of the research.

“I saw this setup and I thought, ‘Oh, that’s fun,’ even though this is pretty complicated stuff,” Lorenzen said.

Lorenzen said she was able to get hands-on experience because of the small size of the department.

There are 10 faculty members and 36 students in the department, which offers three undergraduate majors: physics, applied physics and mathematics physics. She said this helped her build relationships with her peers and professors, which made it easier to work together.

“It’s given me way more opportunities than I would’ve gotten at a bigger state school,” Lorenzen said. “You’re closer with your professors, and it feels more like a tight-knit community.”

Fung has helped host events for the Department of Physics and Astronomy, like Retro Rewind Day, which gave students and professors an opportunity to interact by playing retro video games together.

Another aspect of the department that Fung is involved in is its anti-racism and inclusivity plan, which was developed by members of the faculty in December 2020. Fung said women and racial minorities are underrepresented in the physics field.

“We, as a department, decided that we wanted to do what we could do about that here,” Fung said.

The plan states that the department has brought in female physicists as seminar speakers and overhauled the search procedure for department faculty to include a more diverse range of professionals.

Regarding the issues involving inclusivity that the department experiences, Fung said not all students have foundational knowledge of the subjects taught in the introductory classes from high school physics courses.

“If you had the opportunity to take a good high school course, a lot of that stuff is just going to be review, whereas for folks who have never seen that stuff before, it’s all overwhelming,” Fung said. “You would see these gaps open up between students in a way that I personally think was not healthy.”

Fung said he and other faculty in the department modified the curriculum so that students had a more equal starting point, where the topics were new but also helped develop students’ foundational math skills, required in physics work. Fung said via email that even the optical tweezers project can be accessible to newer physics students because it involves elements that are taught in introductory classes.

While it incorporates elements of things she learned in her classes, Lorenzen said that she does not necessarily see the project as schoolwork and that she is glad that she is getting hands-on research experience.

“I’m getting to do this really cool research that’s preparing me for research in the real world and exposing me to a bunch of new concepts,” Lorenzen said.

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Year In Review

Leadership works toward making media literacy more accessible at IC

By Sarah Payne and Prakriti Panwar Published DEc. 4 At the beginning of Fall 2024, the Park Center for Independent Media at Ithaca College hired its third director. Mickey Huff, distinguished director of PCIM, is a well-known media critic and scholar in independent media and came to the college with plans to make media literacy more accessible across campus.

Since September, Huff has organized three events around the themes of critical media literacy: a panel discussion on censorship and intellectual freedom, a conversation outlining strategies to combat fake news ahead of the 2024 election and a book launch for “State of the Free Press 2025.”

Huff is also the director of Project Censored, a national organization focusing on critical media literacy, independent journalism and democracy. In Fall 2024, Huff taught a course about independent media and in Spring 2025, he taught a course about fightin fake news.

At his events, Huff invites known media scholars and makes it a point to collaborate with other departments on campus. Huff said this is an intentional effort to integrate media literacy more seamlessly into education.

“Higher education has a very terrible pattern in history of compartmentalizing everything,” Huff said.

“But look, media literacy [and] independent media, these are very interdisciplinary areas.”

While Huff is new to the college, efforts to promote media literacy on campus have existed since 1996. Project Look Sharp is the college’s nonprofit media literacy program and aims to provide materials to teachers and students that promote critical thinking and a deeper understanding of media.

Cyndy Scheibe, professor in the Department of Psychology, is the cofounder and executive director of Project Look Sharp. With the influx of available media, Scheibe said she wants the school to have required media literacy courses and become more intentional with how they promote the concept.

“I think just having that common language is probably the most important thing,” Scheibe said. “O nce [media literacy is] a college priority, then people think about that when they write courses, and when they create new courses, even if they’re temporary courses, or when they use language, when they’re promoting stuff. …That’s what I would love to see here, that it just becomes part of the language.”

Scheibe also coordinates the college’s 18-credit media literacy minor, which first started in 2019. The intended purpose of the minor is to teach students

From left, Mickey Huff, director of the Park Center for Independent Media, and Cyndy Scheibe, professor in the Department of Psychology, hope to integrate more media literacy into education.

Robert Daniels/THE ITHACAN

how to ask the right questions and think about media credibility. According to Scheibe, there have been around 20 students that have graduated under this minor. Some of the other schools that offer similar minors include UCLA, Metro State University and the University of Iowa.

Scheibe said she has noticed Huff ’s efforts and hopes that more people engage with PCIM’s programming. “[Huff] just got here in September … and he’s already held these [three] major events, which were terrific,” Scheibe said. “I would have liked to have seen more people at both of them.”

Huff said he hopes to work with Project Look Sharp to give students more access to media literacy education through Ithaca College's pre-existing foundation.

“I came here because I didn’t have to reinvent a wheel,” Huff said. “I can work with [Project Look Sharp], I can plug in with them. And the work I do with media literacy … compliments the kind of work that they do.”

Junior Camie Purdy said via email she believes media literacy is inherently a part of people’s lives. While new efforts to teach media literacy on campus are being made, Purdy said she hopes to see it included more naturally.

“I think instead of teaching this relatively nebulous idea of media literacy, we should just teach students to think critically about all information they consume, whether that’s things they see in media, read in books, hear from friends, family, even professors,” Purdy said.

“When most people say that ‘media literacy is dead,’ what they really mean is that people have stopped practicing these sorts of critical thinking.”

Huff said that in the future, he wants to create a critical media literacy course that is open to all majors at Ithaca College, not just students studying communications or psychology.

“I want to figure out: How do I be part of that media literacy minor, but how do we blow that up and make it such that it’s not just a sub course in psych or it’s not just in journalism?” Huff said. “How do we get a general educational course on media literacy that speaks to the whole campus?”

Media literacy courses have increasingly become a part of graduation requirements at higher education institutions. Although the college does not have a media literacy requirement, both Huff and Scheibe want to make media literacy an integral component of the college’s academic approach.

A national survey conducted in 2022 found that though 84% of adults surveyed thought that media literacy education should be required in more states, only 38% of respondents indicated that they learned how to analyze media messaging in high school.

“I’d love to see that being something that people are thinking about: if Ithaca College is going to become well known in media literacy in the same way that the college has had as priorities [like] sustainability and diversity education,” Scheibe said.

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News - Academics

Emergency relief fund aims to support faculty and staff by kaiden chandler Published Dec. 4 In January 2025, Ithaca College opened up applications to a new resource for some college staff and faculty. The Employee Emergency Relief Fund, managed by the college’s Office of Human Resources, distributes money to the college’s employees in times of need and is entirely supported by voluntary donations from other employees.

Kimberly Lieb, employee relations and training and development consultant in the Office of Human Resources, said the program is aimed at ensuring that every employee has a roof over their head and food on their table. “[The fund] will help employees that have experienced a catastrophic event or a temporary emergency that really [impacts] their ability to survive,” Lieb said.

Events that qualify for funding include disasters like storms, building fires, domestic abuse and onetime medical expenses not covered by insurance.

O ther situations, like credit card payments, rent and ongoing medical bills, do not qualify for funding.

Unless it is connected to an employee’s sudden disability or the death of a family member living in their household, loss of employment is another scenario excluded from the program. This prevents employees laid off or fired from the college from receiving money.

To apply, employees must provide evidence of the catastrophic event, show that the event is a financial hardship and explain how it is impacting their basic living.

After receiving applications, HR staff remove any identifying information to protect the applicants’ privacy.

The applications are then reviewed by a volunteer committee of college employees, who have the final say on whether or not the application meets the requirements. Employees can reapply for up to $500 in funding every 12 months, though first-time applicants are given priority.

Susan Whittier, a food service employee at the college, said she liked the direction the program was taking. She said she has personally seen how these funds can benefit employees “I have been on the receiving end of that kind of thing — not here, but at one of my other jobs,” Whittier said. “I hope [employees] would realize that it’s not any reflection on them if they happen to have a shortfall of cash at that point.”

Not all employees of the college are eligible to receive money. Lieb said applicants to the funds must be benefits-eligible, which prevents some part-time employees from applying. They also need to have

completed a full year of continuous work at the college and have not received any disciplinary actions that resulted from violating policies outlined in the Ithaca College Policy Manual within the past year.

The college has had a Student Emergency Relief Fund since 2020 and the new fund for faculty and staff has a similar purpose and application requirements.

However, the faculty and staff program and student program are entirely separate. The student fund is run by the Office of Student Affairs and Campus Life and the fund for faculty and staff is managed by HR. The employee fund, which can provide up to $500 to applicants, relies on one-time donations or recurring contributions from an employee’s paycheck. Unlike the student fund, the employee fund does not have donations from non-employees that it can rely on. College donation campaigns like Giving Day — which are generally reserved for student-focused programs — will most likely not include a way to contribute to the employee fund, according to Lieb.

Edd Schneider, associate professor in the Department of Strategic Communication, has taught at the college and lived in the Ithaca community for 10 years.

Schneider, who moved to Ithaca to teach at the college, said that relocating for a job in academia can be financially challenging “You have people who aren’t really starting out with a lot of money living in towns where they don’t have a lot of support,” Schneider said.

Schneider said Ithaca is a difficult place to live

because of the area’s high cost of living. The amount a full-time worker needs to earn to meet their basic needs has increased from $18.45 an hour in 2023 to $24.64 in February 2024 for a single person, according to Tompkins Weekly.

While the college’s new fund does not directly provide support for basic living expenses, Schneider said it does create a buffer against the stress of unexpected financial hardships caused by emergencies Robert Corna, lecturer in the Department of Media Arts, Sciences and Studies, said he also has felt the financial difficulty of living in Ithaca.

“It’s incredible how high the cost of living is here,” Corna said. “[Professors] basically have a fixed salary. … If something happens, it’s hard to recover from.”

Neither Whittier, Schneider nor Corna said they had previously heard of the emergency relief fund. Lieb said that publicizing the program will be a focus after the January launch, with outreach centered on the Office of Human Resources and Intercom newsletters.

Lieb said she has seen firsthand how employee contribution programs can benefit fellow employees.

She said she used to work at Macy’s, where there was a program that allowed the department store’s staff to donate paid time off.

Corna said he hopes the program will make a difference for those in need.

“I think that that is important to have something in place for faculty in case of an emergency or difficult situation,” Corna said. “I hope it continues.”

The Ithaca College Emergency Employee Relief Fund gives money to employees in times of need.

Managed by the college's Office of Human Resources, the fund is supported through donations.

Photo Illustration by Kaiden Chandler and Lucia Iandolo/THE ITHACAN

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Year In Review

IC facilitates study to reduce deficit, eliciting concerns over possible cuts

by Kai lincke Published Dec. 5 Ithaca College started working with the Huron Consulting Group in O ctober to conduct a budget and resource planning study, which aims to address declining enrollment and decrease the budget deficit.

Administrators will share a study update in February 2025 and incorporate some of Huron’s suggestions in the Fiscal Year 2026 budget, which is due in May 2025.

Some staff and faculty members feel concerned that the Huron study will recommend cuts to reduce the budget deficit President La Jerne Cornish said she wanted to emphasize that the Huron study is not just about cost reduction when she announced the study during the State of the College meeting.

“The college cannot cut its way to success,” Cornish said during the meeting.

Tim Downs, vice president for Finance and Administration and chief financial office , said Huron will help the college understand its enrollment assumptions to make accurate budget adjustments. Huron will also help the college reduce the deficit by identifying areas to decrease expenses and increase revenue.

Huron David Gondek, chair of the Faculty Council and associate professor in the Department of Biology, said many faculty members were surprised and concerned when Cornish announced the college was working with Huron, especially because of Huron’s past work

with the college.

The college previously hired Huron in 2012 to recommend ways to improve efficiency and reduce costs so the college could avoid raising tuition, room and board. Huron’s suggestions included conducting a staff workforce analysis and closing the physical therapy program’s Rochester Center to fully move the program to main campus.

Through the staff workforce analysis, the college cut 47 position lines, including eight occupied positions, during the 2014-2015 academic year. The college cut 20 staff positions, including filled and unfilled positions, in 2015-2016 and planned to cut 20 more staff positions from 2016-2020 as they became vacant.

After working with Huron, institutions like The New School, the University of Wisconsin Parkside and the University of New Hampshire announced plans to reduce their employees.

“Cuts — that’s what people think of when they hear Huron,” Gondek said. “Right after the October [State of the College] meeting, there was a lot of anxiety about it.”

Gondek said Melanie Stein, provost and senior vice president for Academic Affairs, met with Faculty Council in an executive session after the council reached out to ask for more information. Stein told the council that the Huron study is examining the staff workforce, as the college already examined the faculty workforce through the Academic Program Prioritization process in 2020. Stein also gave an update on the study during the Dec. 3 Faculty Council meeting.

Gondek said he thinks the study can provide a

Huron Consulting Group will help identify some services that are not critical to Ithaca College.

Photo Illustration by marissa Moschella/The Ithacan

necessary external perspective to help the college determine how to balance the budget. However, he said he feels the study timeline limits opportunities for feedback from the campus community.

Gondek noted that Huron has about four months to analyze college operations and make recommendations to close the deficit. Administrators will include some of Huron’s suggestions in their plan to balance the budget by FY 2028, which Cornish will share during the February Board of Trustees meeting.

Marilyn Dispensa, chair of Staff Council and senior instructional designer in the Center for Faculty Excellence, said many staff members feel unsettled about the study, especially because there has been minimal communication from the college. She said staff have only heard about the study from the State of the College and Oct. 30 Dollars and Sense meetings.

Dispensa said Staff Council sent a letter to Cornish to ask for more information, more transparency and a voice in the study process.

“We’re not saying we have to be at all the meetings … or we need to see drafts of all the reports,” Dispensa said. “We just really want to talk to administration about the process and how we can partner on providing the staff perspective.”

Dispensa said via email that Staff Council has not received an official response to the letter, but Cornish told Dispensa staff members will have an opportunity for input in the study.

Downs said via email that the timeline of the study has streamlined communication between the college and Huron. He said campus community members can talk to their divisional leadership to share feedback or ask questions about the study. Downs said the college will unveil a website within the next few weeks for campus community members to share input directly with Huron.

Downs said he recognizes the campus reaction to Huron and wants the community to know that administrators chose to work with Huron after an extensive research and interview process to find a consulting firm. He said Huron’s team includes experts with specialized knowledge about topics in higher education, like financial aid and enrollment, who can help administrators understand their options and make informed decisions about how to rebalance the budget.

However, Downs said the college will not necessarily act on all of the suggestions Huron provides.

The defici The college has had a budget deficit for the last three years because it is carrying a higher expense base than it can generate in revenue from enrollment.

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The college previously enrolled 1,600 to 1,700 new students each fall, but new student enrollment dropped after the start of the CO VID-19 pandemic in 2020. Downs said the college did not decrease its expense base as smaller classes enrolled after the start of the pandemic; administrators expected that the college would return to normalized class sizes, so the college would need the resources included in that expense base. Downs said that after four years of lower enrollment the college expected enrollment to normalize to around 1,400 new students in Fall 2024.

However, 1,128 new students enrolled at the college in Fall 2024. Downs said he projects the deficit will increase to $12 million in FY 2025 because the college missed its enrollment target by about 200 students.

Enrollment Nationally, undergraduate enrollment increased by 3% this fall according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, but first-year student enrollment dropped by 5% overall from Fall 2023 and by 6.5% at private institutions like IC. The U.S. faces an enrollment cliff, as the nation’s number of high school graduates is expected to peak in 2025.

Robert Kelchen, professor and department head of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, said there is also a declining share of high school graduates who go on to college and older students who go to college after entering the workforce.

Kelchen said private liberal arts colleges are especially struggling to enroll students, as students often perceive them to be more expensive than public colleges even though they may be a similar price after financial aid. Kelchen added that students are increasingly planning to enter pre-professional fields instead of the liberal arts and social sciences.

“Unless they’re sitting with a billion dollar endowment, most small private colleges are running pretty tight budgets right now that enrollment as a whole is either fla or down and costs are rising,” Kelchen said. “So it’s not just a one college thing; it is really most of the sector.”

Downs said Ithaca College had a $373.7 million endowment and $99.2 million in cash reserves in 2023. The college has used some of its endowment and reserves to cover the deficit, but Downs said the college cannot depend on these assets each year or they will eventually deplete.

Downs said via email that Huron will help administrators understand the enrollment assumptions they use to calculate revenue in the budget, including new student enrollment, retention and the discount rate.

Downs said administrators recognize that the college is unlikely to enroll their previous target of 1,400 new students each fall. The college hopes to enroll 1,200 new students each year. However, Downs said he considers 1,100 new students to be a lower guardrail for enrollment, as the college has enrolled at least 1,100 new students each year since 2020.

Study execution Downs said that when enrollment sharply declined during the pandemic, the college had to quickly cut $40 million in expenses. The college furloughed or laid off at least 264 staff members in 2020 and 2021.

During the Dollars and Sense presentation, Downs said administrators want to take the time now to understand what the college needs to align the budget and develop a thoughtful plan. Downs said administrators hope the plan will allow them to

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critical to the institution. The college may choose to cut these services and their associated staff positions.

“It’s not about doing more with less, it’s … just [that we] may not be able to do things we were in the past,” Downs said. “The whole reason we’re doing this is to make this institution a stronger institution at the end, even if that means we have to be a little bit smaller and we have to offer a little bit less.”

During Dollars and Sense, Downs said the college could reduce staff positions through layoffs, vacancies,

During the Oct. 30 Dollars and Sense presentation, Tim Downs, vice president for Finance and Administration and chief financial officer, said the college wants to develop a thoughtful plan.

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

make smaller changes instead of large course corrections as the market continues changing.

Downs said that since the Huron study started in early O ctober, Huron has been meeting with several college leaders to understand how different sections of campus operate and which components of campus are critical to the institutional mission. Interviews with Huron cover the structure of each organization, the work they execute, any opportunities that the administrators see to increase revenue or decrease costs and challenges the administrators see.

Downs said he and Stein serve as the executive sponsors of the study and meet with the Huron team every week. Huron meets with Cornish every two weeks; with individual members of the steering committee about once a week and as a group once a month; and with the President’s Cabinet and deans of each school a few times.

According to Downs, the study’s base cost is $700,000, but this could increase based on reimbursables like travel fees.

Study focuses Downs said the college must reduce the budget by $10 million to close the deficit. He said Huron will help the college identify some services that are not

or other means. He said administrators do not have a definitive answer yet because they are waiting to see Huron’s analysis and suggestions.

Dispensa said some staff members are concerned that reducing staff positions will add to remaining staff members’ workload and stress.

“Say the student body decreases by 10% or 15%, but that doesn’t always mean that there’s 10% or 15% less work so you need 10% or 15% less people working on it,” Dispensa said. “I think there are some staff that feel like due to cuts in the past of staff within a department, it does put a bigger load on the staff already there.”

Downs said that if the college cuts services and the staff positions associated with them, the workload will not shift to other staff members because the college will stop providing the service.

Downs said administrators are trying to make thoughtful changes that ensure the college’s long-term sustainability, but he recognizes that efforts to reduce the budget deficit will likely have an impact on the campus community.

“It is our responsibility for the seats we’re in at this point in time that we have this [deficit] and we have to deal with it, and it’s our responsibility to deal with that as popular or unpopular as it may be,” Downs said.

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Year In Review

ICLA starts classes safe from wildfires

by Eamon Corbo Published jan. 22 As wildfires continue to spread throughout the greater Los Angeles area, the Ithaca College Los Angeles Program is preparing for Spring 2025.

Located outside of Burbank and Hollywood, ICLA is an internship-focused semester for juniors and seniors in the Roy H. Park School of Communications.

Orientation for ICLA was held Jan. 16 — after being pushed back one day to accommodate travel delays — and classes began Jan. 21.

Impact of wildfi es on ICLA Junior Carson Mrozinski was in the middle of the transnational drive from his home in Maryland to the ICLA campus when he learned about the wildfires.

Mrozinski said he and his roommate had to spend an extra night in Nashville Tennessee, before heading to the ICLA campus because of the wildfires “I was shocked,” Mrozinski said. “We were packing up, getting ready to leave and then I knocked on my roommate’s door and he was like, ‘Hey, our parents are really concerned, the fires have gotten out of hand.’

Stephen Tropiano ’84, ICLA program director and professor of the Integrated Studies platform, Screen Studies, said the wildfires do not pose an immediate threat to the ICLA campus. As of Jan. 21, ICLA is outside the Palisades and Eaton fire evacuation zone. The Sunset fire — which was under six miles from the ICLA campus — has been completely contained.

Tropiano said the ICLA program is prepared to handle natural disasters and has been dealing with them since the start of the program in 1994.

“We actually opened the day of the Northridge earthquake,” Tropiano said. “The first day of school was the biggest earthquake that we’ve had in the last 50 years. So there’s always the possibility of earthquakes and there’s always a possibility of wildfires.

Samm Swarts, assistant director for Emergency Preparedness and Response in the Office of Public Safety and Emergency Management at the college, went to the ICLA campus in Spring 2024 to make sure it had the resources to be connected to the main campus and was in communication with the College Emergency Response Team.

Swarts said he has been in communication with ICLA program staff since the wildfires broke out and has been working with them to ensure they have N95 and KN95 masks to give to students.

“Right now, there’s not any immediate fire super close by to the campus,” Swarts said. “But again, there is still smoke and things like that in the air that is driving

down the air quality overall.”

Mrozinski said that once he got to the ICLA campus, he realized students in the program were lucky to be a safe distance away from the fires. He said that d spite the one-day delay, orientation went on as usual. “[ICLA staff] didn’t even talk about [the fires] really,” Mrozinski said. “So it’s like we’re just pushing past it.”

Impact of wildfi es on Californians Caleb Malis, a sophomore at the ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena, said he evacuated the city when the fires began. Pasadena is located near the Eaton fire, which has destroyed over 7,000 structures — making it the second most destructive California fire in histo y.

Malis said his college shifted to hybrid classes to discourage students from commuting up to Pasadena because of concerns over the poor air quality.

“It’s weird to come back and see a damage assessment: How many roads have been closed off, how many buildings have been taken over [and] how dirty the streets were,” Malis said.

In a Jan. 8 press release, California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office said Los Angeles was receiving additional firefighter and resources from neighboring counties because of the severity of the fires.

Kile Graf, a fire captain for the Orange County Fire Authority, said his department has been sending firefighter to Los Angeles County to help with the wildfires. Graf said that despite not being sent to Los Angeles, the wildfires have still taken a toll on the firefighters remaining in Orange Coun .

“People [at the department] are a little stressed

because of the fires,” Graf said. “We’re all working a ton of extra shifts, so we’re not getting home to our families.”

Graf said he has been able to work through the anxiety and tension created by the fires by being thankful for his own family’s safety and understanding his department’s responsibility to public safety.

“I realize that we just need to kick in extra to help out for all the people that are up there that are suffering,” Graf said. “There’s over 5,000 structures that were destroyed, so potentially 5,000 families have been affected or more.”

Next steps for ICLA Swarts said he is continuing to monitor the fires in case they spread to the ICLA campus. He said he encourages families to check in with students over the evolving wildfire situation “California has its own sets of natural disasters that they deal with on a regular basis: wildfires, earthquakes, things like that,” Swarts said. “We have preventative measures. We have plans in place for if any of those situations do happen to make sure that our students, faculty and staff are protected.”

Tropiano said the ICLA campus is currently safe from the wildfires but that he recognizes how the fires will continue to impact the entire community of Los Angeles.

“The sad part of the story is that there’s entire neighborhoods like in the Pacific Palisades and Altadena that had things wiped out,” Tropiano said. “There’s going to be a lot of rebuilding going on in Los Angeles, but it hasn’t had a direct effect on the program.”

Assistant News Editor Julian DeLucia contributed reporting.

As of Jan. 21, ICLA is outside the Palisades and Eaton fire evacuation zone. The Sunset fire — which was under six miles from the ICLA campus — has been completely contained.

DATA VISUALIZATION BY KAIDEN CHANDLER AND CAL FIRE

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Ithaca College implements new scheduling grid for Fall 2025 classes

by Kai Lincke Published feb. 1 Ithaca College has implemented a new course scheduling grid after several years of collecting data and feedback and considering revisions to the grid. Departments will use the new grid to plan their Fall 2025 course meeting times.

The schedule grid provides common meeting times for all undergraduate classes. Melanie Stein, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, said the old schedule grid did not effectively reduce time conflicts as intended because many departments scheduled course meetings outside of it. She said this was because the old schedule grid had limited meeting pattern options for departments to choose from. The old grid was primarily designed for 3-credit courses and did not include meeting patterns for labs and studios.

“There was a schedule grid that only accommodated, I would say, roughly 40% of our courses,” Stein said via email. “There were whole parts of the college that were scheduling courses completely off grid, meaning they were using their own meeting times which overlapped the official grid slots. Students majoring in those places, it was much harder for them to incorporate courses that were outside of where they were majoring and then the flip side of that, it was very hard for students outside of these areas to take courses in them because nothing matched up.”

Stein said that as administrators collected feedback from the campus community during the strategic planning process in 2018-19, many students shared that the courses they wanted to take overlapped by 10 or 15 minutes. The provost’s office recognized that course scheduling created a barrier for students who wanted to experience both liberal arts and pre-professional curricula. “[We realized] this is … not a student centered way of doing things, and we need to try and develop a more … common scheduling mechanism to reduce these barriers for students and enable them to fully take advantage of the curriculum,” Stein said.

The Office of the Provost formed an action group to revise the schedule grid during the 2019-20 academic year and reassembled a schedule grid committee in 2021-22 after the campus reopened from distanced COVID-19 pandemic learning. The Offices of the Provost and Registrar released a draft schedule grid in 2022.

However, Stein said the campus was already adjusting to a new credit hour policy, redesigning curricula and degree requirements, and changing some courses from 3- to 4-credits. Implementation of the new grid was

Ithaca College has gathered data and collected feedback for the creation of a new schedule grid.

Developed by a faculty working group, the schedule grid will be used to schedule Fall 2025 courses.

file photo/THE ITHACAN

delayed to allow faculty to adjust to these changes and to gather more data about how the changes impacted the campus’ scheduling needs.

Stein said her office worked with the registrar’s office to collect data about what times departments requested to schedule courses, which meeting patterns faculty felt were most pedagogically effective — like one long class meeting versus three shorter class meetings — and how faculty changed meeting times for courses that shifted credits.

Stein said she and the registrar decided in Fall 2024 that they had gathered enough data and were ready to move forward with revising the grid. They launched a call for faculty volunteers to serve on the Schedule Grid Working Group. The group presented a draft grid to faculty members during listening sessions in December 2024 and used the feedback they received during the sessions to further refine the grid Stein said the Division of Information Technology and Analytics created a simulation to project how the classes scheduled during Fall 2024 and Spring 2025 could be scheduled using the new grid.

“We were thrilled because the results were really, really positive,” Stein said. “We were able to accommodate incredibly high percentages [of courses]. When we looked at things that fell off … there were things that could easily be worked around, and they were tiny in

number. So that gave us a lot of confidence.

The college asks departments to schedule courses within the meeting times on the schedule grid as much as possible, but departments can request an exception using a form on the Office of the Registra ’s website.

Stein said the biggest change to the new schedule grid is adding meeting patterns for labs and studios and increasing meeting patterns for 4-credit courses.

The new schedule grid maintains the campus-wide common hour on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but blocks off noon to 1 p.m. compared to the old grid which blocked off 12:15-1:05 p.m.

The grid also continues to mandate that required courses with one section offered during a semester cannot be scheduled during the 4-6 p.m. athletic practice time block, and classes must end by 5:15 p.m. on Friday to allow athletic teams to travel for competitions. The new grid also asks departments to avoid scheduling classes on Tuesday evenings to allow athletics and extracurricular activities to meet.

Stein said she wanted to ask students to be patient and understanding with faculty members as they try to adjust to the schedule grid changes.

“The entire reason for doing this … has to do with reducing conflicts for students and making it more possible for students to move more freely across the college’s curriculum,” Stein said.

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Year In Review

Faculty and student researchers reflect on federal cuts Sophomore biology major Ava Remoll said NIH funding helps the college support events where students can get experience in scientific work like Published march 19 the Department of Biology’s annual undergraduate Driven by federal efforts to reduce government research conference. spending, cuts to federal research funding from the “Getting hands-on experience is crucial for students National Institutes of Health and for the National Scilike me who want to pursue research in the future,” Reence Foundation have impacted faculty and student moll said. “That’s a really good opportunity for us to get researchers. Some researchers at Ithaca College said comfortable presenting and talk to other people who this could limit opportunities for practical research, do similar work. … Without the NIH, we would have a disrupt ongoing projects and potentially discourage hard time paying for that kind of stuff.” future scientists from entering the field Sophomore biology major Sophia Politano said As part of a broader initiative to reduce spending, research experience is crucial for students planning to NIH has lowered its reimbursement rates for funds apply to graduate programs as the admissions process that help maintain lab facilities and administrative is competitive. She said that without these opportunisupport. Simultaneously, NSF has faced budget reducties, students may struggle to differentiate themselves, tions and hiring freezes. making it harder to secure spots in graduate programs.

Lisa Corewyn, associate professor in the Depart“I plan on getting a higher education, a Ph.D., ment of Biology, said federal research funding is soon after I finish my undergraduate … and those essential to affording resources like specialized lab sorts of degrees help students such as myself who equipment in need of maintenance or travel funds for want to have better positions in the STEM field,” Politano said. “So, the possibility of me not being able to get that is pretty stressful, and it just kind of not only impacts students who want those higher up positions in the field, but anyone who wants to even just go to school.”

Corewyn said it is important for students to not lose hope despite the uncertainty around research funding making it harder for students to decide whether they want to stay in science.

“Fight, fight, fight,” Corewyn said. “You have a voice, we need to fight against these kinds of actions as a scientific community, whether we’re undergraduates, graduate students or faculty researchers. I think a lot of … potentially brilliant students and scientists will probably not even enter the field or any of these fields, given the current landscape Sophomore biology major Ava Remoll said NIH funding helps the college support events where students can get experience in scientific work like the Department of Biology’s annual undergraduate research conference. going forward, and that will

Daniella Thompson/THE ITHACAN be a huge loss.”

by Angel Pandey

fieldwork in research projects.

“Much of our research that we do in the sciences costs money to conduct,” Corewyn said. “I particularly do research in both a field setting in Costa Rica, for example, I study wild howler monkeys … and I do lab work. We collect fecal samples and other biological samples and analyze them in our lab. So, students get an opportunity to do two things, and that is rare.”

Te-Wen Lo, associate professor in the Department of Biology, said research initiatives could be forced to shrink or close entirely. She said this could especially be concerning for students looking to gain research experience before applying to graduate or medical school.

“The grants … help contribute to the resources that are used in the lab,” Lo said. “It helps support students to go to conferences, present their work. Some research would have to be scaled down or stopped, and some graduate programs … they would not be able to accept as many graduate students.”

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2025 Women of Distinction Award ceremony highlights four IC women

by Mila Ventura-Rodriguez Published march 25 The seventh annual Women of Distinction Award ceremony at Ithaca College was held March 21 in Klingenstein Lounge. The award, which is part of the Women Leaders Series organized by the Office of Student Engagement, is handed out to members of the IC community each year in recognition of the contributions of four women leaders on campus. The 2025 winners are Sumru Atuk, assistant professor in the Department of Politics; Crissi Dalfonzo, director of the Center for LGBT Education, O utreach, & Services; Diane Gayeski, professor of Strategic Communication; and Melinda Quigg, head coach of the IC women’s soccer team.

Sophomore Josie Thomson, student leadership consultant and member of the Women Leaders Series planning team, chose the theme and helped plan the ceremony. She said this was her first year leading the Women of Distinction Awards.

“We started back in February where we accepted nominations opened to the campus,” Thomson said. “We got the most nominations we’ve ever received. Then myself and two other members of my planning committee sat down and we read through all of the nominations and ended up selecting our four women of distinction.”

O n the day of the ceremony, the walls of the lounge were decorated with superhero-themed details,

including a photo wall with the silhouette of a city being saved by superheroines. The theme for this year’s Women of Distinction Award ceremony was “Step Into Your Power.” Songs like Beyonce’s “Run the World (Girls)” and Shania Twain’s “Man! I Feel Like A Woman!” played over the speakers.

President La Jerne Cornish gave the opening remarks, speaking to how women mentored and guided her throughout her career.

“When another woman sees you, gives you a tap on the shoulder, gives you a suggestion about what you could be, that might be all you need to take it to the next step,” Cornish said. “So it is incumbent upon us, as women leaders, to recognize talent in others, to give them a tap on the shoulder, and encourage them, to inspire them to be all they can be.”

Four students from the Office of Student Engagement were then called up one by one to speak on the qualities and actions that earned each woman the prize. Atuk and Gayeski’s roles as educators, Dalfonzo’s work at the LGBT Center and the Gender Affirming Closet and Quigg’s leadership on and off the field were all highlighted. Each speech conveyed the recipients as great mentors and role models.

Seniors Jasmine Williams and Olivia Valdez, first year student Tamia Silvera and Thomson each spoke about how the women have mentored them, as well as the women’s commitment to their careers, their students and the Ithaca community.

From left, Crissi Dalfonzo, Sumru Atuk, Diane Gayeski and Melinda Quigg all won the 2025 Women of Distinction Award in recognition of their leadership contributions to the IC community.

Alexsis Elliott/THE ITHACAN

“I think that taking the time to recognize, acknowledge and celebrate leadership, community engagement and the love of connecting with other people is so important, especially in trying times like these,” Williams said. “I think that saying, ‘We are proud of you,’ is something that we don’t do enough, and that’s what this event is. It’s just looking at these women and saying ‘We see you and the work that you do is so extremely important and we love you for it.’”

In the speeches of each recipient, they had been asked to grant words of advice. Atuk listed four personal mantras she wished to share with everyone else, the fourth being a quote from Emma Goldman, a writer and leader in the early 20th-century women’s movement: “I don’t want to be part of your revolution if I can’t dance.”

“We’re tested with very depressing reality, and sometimes it’s hard to be happy, but I think if we suppress our laughter, if we dim our colors and if we give up on dancing, it means we lose,” Atuk said. “So, I think it doesn’t matter how sad and depressed we feel sometimes, we should not forget to reclaim our right to be happy and bubbly.”

Gayeski advised that the best way to understand one’s self was to be a mentor. Dalfonzo urged the crowd to, “Be Gay, Do Crime,” which she explained as acting based on one’s moral code, rather than just following the law.

“Especially with the state of the country right now, with laws and borders being changed to reflect not necessarily what is just and true, but what a small section of the government believes, it’s more important than ever for us to do the right thing,” Dalfonzo said.

“Whether you are staying here at IC for a few more years or you’re on the precipice of graduating and going out into the wide world, my advice remains the same: center your values.”

Quigg spoke to learning from failure and from those around you.

“Life is too short for mediocrity,” Quigg said.

“What I would recommend is you choose growth, you choose resilience, most importantly choose joy.”

The political climate around the country was a large shadow over the event, especially given the specific fields each of the women work in. Each speech made mention of the urgency of maintaining joy in the face of growing fear.

“I think everybody recognizes that it’s a difficult time in the world and in the United States particularly,” Gayeski said. “It’s a time of uncertainty. But I think all of us who are a little bit older, as we look back … if there are any regrets, it’s that we didn’t take the opportunity to be joyful, to recognize and to be appreciative for what we do have.”

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Year In Review

College Affairs

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BIPOC Unity Center pauses search for director

by Prakriti Panwar Published Sept. 11 Ithaca College’s BIPO C Unity Center has not yet hired a permanent director since undergoing a name change in Spring 2023 and a merger with the First-Generation and MLK Scholar Center in Spring 2024. However, it now has the largest staff it has had since before the changes. At this time, the center plans to focus on intersectional programming to continue engaging students meaningfully.

In an Aug. 26 Intercom post, Stanley Bazile, vice president of Student Affairs and Campus Life, announced updates within the center. Cliff-Simon Vital and Shadayvia Wallace are now co-leading the center as interim associate director and associate director, respectively. McKenzie Murry joined as the new program coordinator and Erin Foster is the administrative operations coordinator.

The college launched a national search for a permanent director in May, but Bazile said the college decided to pause the search because it could not find a qualified candidate. Bazile said the college wants to be intentional and thoughtful about the process and will relaunch the search in the coming months, but did not specify when.

Bazile said the search could have been extended to identify a candidate who was a good fit. However, instead of looking for a new director — which would not be filled until November or December — he said the college is focusing on fortifying the existing leadership within the center.

“We wanted to make sure [to] get this to get the semester [started] off correctly,” Bazile said. “The last thing we wanted to do was start the semester, not have someone and then we’re waiting … to fill that position. That’s not what the students need, and that’s not what the students deserve. … That, to me, would have been irresponsible on our part, considering the importance of the work that happens in the center.”

Luca Maurer, executive director for Student Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging, provides supervision to the BIPO C Unity Center. While the search for a director has been paused, Maurer said the center is still supporting students efficientl .

“This structure right now provides continuity at the beginning of the school year,” Maurer said. “I am just delighted to have [Wallace and Vital] in co-leadership roles because … they have their finger on the pulse of what students need.”

Junior Leticia Rebelo de Oliveira is a student employee who has been working at the center since Fall 2022.

From top left, Stanley Bazile, Shadayvia Wallace, Luca Maurer, Cliff-Simon Vital, McKenzie Murray and Erin Foster. The BIPOC Unity Center has paused the search for a director indefinitely.

Kaeleigh Banda/THE ITHACAN

Rebelo said that although there is no permanent director, it does not feel like the center is lacking support.

“We call it fully staffed right now [among ourselves] because we have … four professional staff working in the office,” Rebelo said. “When I started, it was only the director. It seems fully staffed even though at the end of the day … we are not.”

In November 2023, The Ithacan reported that Angélica Carrington, former director of the BIPOC Unity Center, and Radeana Hastings, former program coordinator of the BIPO C Unity Center, were no longer employed at the college. At the time, many students expressed their frustration with the lack of clear communication from the center.

Rebelo said that during the uncertain phase in Spring 2023, many students did not feel like they had a resource to turn to, but that the center feels more equipped now.

“I feel like I never received the answers I wanted, but I accepted what happened,” Rebelo said. “I think we are now fully prepared to support the students again. It was challenging as a student of color to feel supported when everyone was coming and leaving.”

Bazile said the college is still in discussions about when to resume the search for a director but is cognizant of how students want to be involved in the process.

“We do recognize that when you lose a member of the campus community that has developed

relationships with faculty, staff and students, there’s an impact there,” Bazile said. “And when we get to the point where we are looking to [resume the search] for a director position, I will be sharing that [information] again with constituents around campus. … There’s no secret in terms of what we’re doing.”

The campus climate survey, conducted in Spring 2024, showed that underrepresented communities on campus, like first-gen students and students of color, reported lower levels of comfort on campus. Maurer said that going forward, the Center for EIB and the BIPOC Unity Center want to work together by focusing on intersectionality.

“The way that the Center for Equity, Inclusion and Belonging is able to propel the work forward of the BIPOC Unity Center is in part, by serving as a reminder to the campus community that people don’t live their lives in individual silos,” Maurer said. “People don’t show up just with their Black or brown self in one space, or their gay self in another. … People are intersectional.”

Rebelo said she is excited to see how the BIPOC Unity Center will emphasize intersectionality.

“I’m an international student and I’m a BIPO C student, but at the same time I’m a white-passing …

Latina,” Rebelo said. “So I think we have a lot to learn from each other and a lot to learn on how to fin belonging all around … and it will be very good for our community.”

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Year In Review

Contingent faculty find solidarity as higher ed unionization increases Contingent Faculty Union, said the union can help amplify contingent faculty members’ voices.

Published sept.11 “The administration has been listening and is attentive to our organizing power and their responAs Cornell University students traveled to Col- sibilities as an employer,” Lia-Kloppel said. “And when legetown for the start of Fall 2024, many Cornell employees know their own rights, I think it helps clarstaff members headed to the picket lines. The UAW ify how they can be treated.”

Local 2300 strike and Cornell graduate students’ According to the Contingent Faculty Union’s CBA, all unionization in Fall 2023 are recent instances of part-time and full-time contingent faculty are required to union negotiations or unionization in higher edujoin the union.

Emily Rockett — vice president, general cation that have captured national attention. counsel and secretary to the Board of Trustees — said At Ithaca College, some faculty members are new full-time contingent and part-time faculty receive represented in the Contingent Faculty Union, which ratified a new collective bargaining agreement with forms to join the union during their onboarding process.

They can opt out of the union, but still must pay dues and the college in July. are governed by the Collective Bargaining Agreement.

Ithaca College Contingent Faculty Union Brian Teucke, union representative with the SEIU The Ithaca College Contingent Faculty Union represents faculty in part-time and full-time con- who works with the Contingent Faculty Union, said tingent positions — both of which are not eligible the union has 125 members in Fall 2024.

According to the Fall Employee Headcount, there for tenure. According to the 1980 Supreme Court case NLRB v. Yeshiva Univ., full-time tenure or were 386 full-time faculty members and 123 part-time tenure-track faculty who work at private institu- faculty members in Fall 2023.

The Ithacan requested more specific information tions, like Ithaca College, are considered managers about faculty in each kind of appointment in Fall in their institutions and thus cannot join unions.

2024, including full-time contingent appointments, but this data is not available in reports accessible to students and therefore cannot be shared, according to the Office of Analytics and Institutional Research’s policy.

Staff and unions Rockett said members of the Office of Public Safety and Emergency Management are part of the United Government Security Officers of America, but other college staff GUSTAV BAUERLE AND MOLLY TESKA/THE ITHACAN members are not represented by a union.

Pete Meyers, coordinator of the Tompkins County The Contingent Faculty Union is affiliated with the Service Employees International Union as SEIU Local Workers’ Center, said some staff members sought guid200 United. The union works to develop a collective ance from the center to start the unionization process bargaining agreement — an agreement between the approximately two years ago.

“We had three workers come to us from staff [at] union and the college that outlines terms for union members’ employment and compensation — and can Ithaca College, and I was able to set up interviews for raise grievances on behalf of members who feel their them with three different unions,” Meyers said. “They realized they were too small a group of people and it rights outlined in the CBA have been violated.

Amber Lia-Kloppel, lecturer in the Department of ended up not going anywhere.”

Marilyn Dispensa, senior instructional designer Art, Art History, and Architecture and steward of the

by kai lincke

within the Center for Faculty Excellence and chair of Staff Council, said the council has received a few anonymous requests from staff over the last few months to look into staff members’ interest in unionizing. During its July meeting, Staff Council discussed polling staff interest in unionization and drafted a statement in response.

“We do not have sufficient information to pursue a poll of employees regarding interest in unionization, and without sufficient information, staff members would not know what they are voting for or against,” the statement said. “In addition, since we are an official entity within the college (Policy Manual 1.6.4), we do not know if we can legally poll employees. We invite any staff member or group to speak to and inform the Staff Council Executive Committee and/or Staff Council concerning this matter before any next steps can be taken.”

Dispensa said New York State labor laws prevent the college from encouraging or discouraging people from unionizing, which means that, as an entity of the college, Staff Council cannot suggest an opinion on unionization.

Dispena said Staff Council wants to hear staff members’ concerns, but it will not interfere between staff members and their supervisors. Staff Council is drafting a proposal for a Staff O mbuds Team, which would mediate conflicts between staff members and the college.

At Cornell University, administrators and the United Auto Workers Local 2300, a union chapter that represents about 1,200 university employees, could not reach a contract agreement after months of bargaining.

UAW Local 2300 authorized a strike Aug. 18, the night before the university’s move-in day for first-year students. During the strike, the university faced staffing shortages and had to close dining halls and reduce meal options. UAW Local 2300 and the university reached a tentative agreement Aug. 27, which included a 21-25.4% wage increase with a cost-of-living adjustment and benefits. It was ratified Sept.

National Trends in Unionization According to a 2023 report from the American Association of University Professors, the higher education workforce is becoming more dependent on contingent faculty. The report found that 68% of faculty at U.S. colleges had contingent appointments, meaning that they are not eligible for tenure, in 2021.

In 1987, 47% of colleges’ faculties were contingent.

The National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions found that 402,217 faculty members, or 27% of faculty, belonged to a union by the start of 2024.

The total number of unionized faculty has increased

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12.5% since 2012. During that time frame, the number of faculty increased by 2.3%, which means that there is a net 4.5% increase in the rate of faculty unionization.

Jordan Harper, assistant professor in the Department of Advanced Studies, Leadership and Policy at Morgan State University, studies working conditions and unionization for contingent faculty in higher education. He said part-time and contingent faculty are critical members of campus communities who often carry the teaching load, and unionization gives them a collective voice to raise concerns.

“Because [contingent faculty are] piecing together this wage and they’re trying to make a full–time job out of contingent or adjunct circumstances, we really find that they end up being burnt out,” Harper said.

“All the things that they don’t have — retirement benefits, livable wage … really ends up kind of taking a toll on faculty’s mental health, their position within colleges and universities.”

Harper said that as discussions about unionization continue, it is important to recognize how both faculty and staff contribute to higher education’s mission and appreciate their labor.

“We do an awesome job thinking of [higher education]

News - College Affairs as an educational institution but … some of the discussion and the issues that are popping up on campuses around labor have really started to put us in that position where we have to think about higher education as a workplace,” Harper said. “We have a lot of work to do in that space.”

Contingent Faculty Union History In April 2015, part-time faculty at Ithaca College filed a petition to unionize with the National Labor Relations Board. Faculty voted to unionize in May 2015 and the part-time faculty bargaining committee began bargaining with the college in October 2015.

The committee asked the college to give part-time professors increased job security and fair compensation, as well as benefits; longer term contracts; clear and fair pathways to full-time positions; more professional development; suitable office space; transparent and fair evaluations; and more inclusion at the college.

Full-time contingent faculty asked the college to allow them to join the part-time faculty union in April 2016. The college said it believed a union was “not appropriate” because it preferred to directly communicate with faculty. Full-time contingent faculty filed with the NLRB and established their own unit within the union in May 2016, which created the Contingent Faculty Union.

The union voted to authorize a strike in March 2017 after negotiations stalled, but canceled the strike when they agreed to a contract with the college two weeks later. The union ratified the contract in May 2017.

Negotiations Rockett said representatives from the college and the Contingent Faculty Union schedule meeting times to exchange proposed changes to the CBA. Each side compromises on their initial proposals and they reach a tentative agreement. Union representatives share the contract with members who vote on whether to ratify it and college representatives share the CBA with the president for approval.

The college and the union agreed to the 2024-27 CBA in July. In the new CBA, union representatives received a 3% increase for wage minimums per credit hour taught for every year of the contract.

Part-time unionized faculty members who have more than three years seniority at the college are eligible for a two-year appointment. The new CBA requires that faculty with three years seniority and at least three consecutive semesters teaching must receive a contract to teach for both fall and spring semesters for two years instead of a single semester. The college will start counting semesters in Fall 2024.

Rockett said one of the college’s considerations when selecting a collective bargaining team is picking administrators who represent the departments that union members work in.

“I think that the college tries really hard to do right by all its employees,” Rockett said. “I think you can see that in the negotiations with both unions, as well as with the college’s relationships with its non-unionized employees.”

Lia-Kloppel and Teucke said the union’s dynamic with the college has been positive and professional, but they hope that union members will get more involved in future negotiations to gain more wins.

“We think that there’s more economic benefits that [the college] could probably open up to our folks because of how vulnerable they are, and we believe that they could probably take some more steps to make them less vulnerable,” Teucke said.

Lia-Kloppel said she hopes people see how the union can benefit the greater campus community by protecting the college’s integrity.

“The pushes that we make for our members are not only for individuals, but for strengthening the community as a whole,” Lia-Kloppel said. “Meeting with the administration throughout negotiations really gives us some oversight onto what is happening within enrollment, the financial health of the institution, and increasingly, as we see these sudden closures of colleges and universities around the country. … I think it’s increasingly important that we as faculty have some oversight, and as adjunct faculty, in particular, we’re really attentive to the spending of these institutions.”

STATE OF THE UNIONS

ILLUSTRATION BY EILE GUENEGO, FILE PHOTOS/THE ITHACAN

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Year In Review

MTD orchestrates search for permanent dean

by Kaeleigh Banda Published oct. 9 Ithaca College’s School of Music, Theatre, and Dance started its search for a permanent dean at the end of summer 2024. The school appointed two interim deans for the 2024-25 academic year after Anne Hogan, the inaugural dean of the unified school, departed at the end of Spring 2024.

At the beginning of July 2022, the Center for Music and the Center for Theatre and Dance officially combined into one school with one dean under Hogan’s leadership. Hogan was the dean from Fall 2022 until Spring 2024, when she left to accept a position as dean of the College of Performing Arts at Chapman University in Southern California. This change adds a new layer to the upcoming dean’s job, which is to continue to unify the three programs.

“It has truly been an honor to serve as the inaugural dean of the School of Music, Theatre, and Dance at Ithaca College, and to witness the talent, team spirit and commitment to ensuring an inspiring and transformative learning community that makes MTD so special,” Hogan wrote in an email announcing her departure.

For the search committee, Melanie Stein, provost and senior vice president for Academic Affairs, chose Crystal Peebles, associate professor in the Department of Music Theory and History Composition, and Marc Gomes, associate professor in the Department of Theatre and Dance Performance, as the committee’s co-chairs. Junior Amanda Haussmann and senior February Schneck are the committee’s student representatives. Besides the chairs and the students, there are 10 other staff and faculty members on the committee.

Peebles said the rest of the search process will tentatively take place through March 2025. After the leadership profile is solidified, candidates can apply for the job and then the committee will begin to sort through applications. Finalists for the position will come to the college, where students can meet them and give feedback to inform a decision.

The committee works with the search firm WittKieffer and MTD community members to write a leadership profile. A leadership profile acts similarly to a job description but it focuses more on describing the kind of candidate they are looking for beyond just the scholarly qualifications. The profile will help the committee narrow down the candidates to three to five people and Stein will make the final decision after open sessions on campus.

Peebles said a dean’s job is not as noticeable to students as it is for faculty, but if the dean is doing

Anne Hogan, former dean of the School of Music, Theatre, and Dance left the college in Spring 2024. It was announced March 3 that Steve TenEyck had been selected to be the new dean.

illustration by grace vanderveer/THE ITHACAN

their job correctly, everyone will flourish.

“I like to think of any dean as having two hats,” Peebles said. “One role that the dean has is an inward-facing role where they work closely with faculty, students and staff to make the institution as strong as possible. The other big part of a dean’s job is very outward-facing.

They’re basically the face of the School of Music, Theatre, and Dance because they interact with alumni, they interact with donors and they do a lot of traveling to get the name of Ithaca College out there and tell our story and show how great of an institution we are.”

The current interim deans are Steve TenEyck and Luis Loubriel. TenEyck was previously the associate dean and has worked at the school since 2001. Loubriel started working with the school in Spring 2024.

TenEyck and Loubriel said via email that their roles are not very different from a typical dean but they are also working to prepare for a permanent dean.

“We hope that students know that our job is to support the faculty, staff and students in their work,” TenEyck and Loubriel wrote. “We want our community to know we are here, we are available and we hope that folks will reach out.”

Gomes said the role of the new dean will be to further unite MTD by making efforts to increase collaboration.

“The whole college is like a little organism that works together, so I think [the dean is] an important position and an important step in the right direction for MTD in terms of having somebody to offer a unifying vision and voice for the school,” Gomes said.

Schneck said students in the theater programs want more rehearsal spaces and since one of the dean’s main jobs is fundraising, having a permanent dean would help create a long-term fundraising plan for the new spaces.

“It would be great to have a leader who can implement some of the long-term initiatives because a lot of the challenges that we are having right now don’t have short-term solutions,” Schneck said.

The two schools have been unified for three years, however, sophomore Jada Soltau, an acting major, said the schools do not feel like one.

“We hear very little about the Whalen stuff, and I know it’s still new and they may not know necessarily how to combine the two or make us collaborate more often,” Soltau said. “I think having [a dean] who is willing to advocate for us like a wider MTD program is important to help us grow.”

Haussmann said the lack of consistent leadership was visible when there were major changes.

“Since I got here there’ve been big shifts like with the grad programs going away,” Haussmann said.

“But, there hasn’t been consistent support from higher up … so we’re at a point where having a dean would make all of these changes be so much easier.”

Haussmann said it would be easy to pick someone who looked good on paper, but they need to be a strong cultural fit for the MTD program.

In March 2025, it was announced that Steve TenEyck would take over as the next dean for the school.

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news - college affairs

IC's only staff union promotes OPS advocacy and community engagement

by Kai Lincke Published oct. 30 Ithaca College’s only staff union — The United Government Security Officers of America Local 507 — advocates for fair working conditions, compensation and disciplinary procedures for some employees within the Office of Public Safety and Emergency Management. The UGSOA’s current contract with the college lasts through June 2026.

History: The college’s first unio Amy Noble, master security officer and the president of the union, said employees from OPS’ Department of Patrol and Security Services started discussing a union in 2003. They were concerned about scheduling conflicts promotion procedures and inconsistent discipline for OPS employees, and believed a union could give them a collective voice to advocate for fair working conditions.

Noble said the college told OPS administrators to discourage employees from unionizing and instead work with employees to address their concerns.

“We were the first union ever at the college, so this was a big thing, and there was a lot of union busting,” Noble said. “Sometimes you were approached [by OPS administrators] off to the side saying … ‘You’re going to ruin a good thing that’s going on here. The college has always been loyal to its employees.’”

Within the Department of Patrol and Security Services, the union has included sergeants, master patrol officers, patrol officers, master security officers, security officers and communications specialists since it was formed. The department also includes lieutenants, the associate director and director of OPS, but employees who work in management positions cannot join unions according to the National Labor Relations Act. Within the Department of Parking Services, parking services assistants have been eligible to join the union.

Eligible employees voted 18-7 to unionize in December 2003. Since the majority of employees voted to unionize, the National Labor Relations Board recognized the union as an official collective bargaining unit associated with the UGSOA as local chapter 507.

Peggy Ryan Williams, president of the college at that time, said in a 2003 Intercom post that she was disappointed O PS employees chose to work with an outside organization to discuss working conditions.

“We have not had any unions at Ithaca College because the college is viewed by most as a good place to work and the majority of employees have concluded that they are better off maintaining a direct working relationship with their supervisors, managers and administrators,” Williams said in the Intercom post.

Emily Rockett — vice president, general counsel and secretary to the Board of Trustees — said she cannot speak to the past, but the college has worked with employees to establish and maintain fair procedures and working conditions.

How the union works The union negotiates a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) — a written agreement between the union and the college that outlines terms for union members’ employment and compensation — with administrators from the college and O PS. The union also represents members in disciplinary meetings; provides legal support and advice; communicates between its members and the college and assists members through the grievances process if they believe the college has violated the CBA terms.

Collective bargaining agreement The union’s CBA is not posted publicly, but the union shared it with The Ithacan. The CBA includes guidelines for all aspects of employment, including seniority, layoffs, discipline, departmental investigations, hours of work and scheduling.

The National Labor Relations Board recognized Ithaca College’s only staff union in 2003. It was recognized as an official collective bargaining unit associated with the UGSOA as local chapter 507.

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

The CBA has a right-to-work clause, which means that employees are encouraged but not required to join the union. Eligible employees who choose not to join the union still receive benefits and protection from the union and must pay dues, but they cannot vote on contract negotiations or union elections.

Noble said all eligible employees have chosen to join the union, and the union has 24 members as of 2024.

The CBA includes progressive wage increases year-to-year: a 1% increase from 2022 to 2023-24, a 1.5% increase from 2023-24 to 2024-25 and a 2% increase from 2024-25 to 2025-26.

The CBA has a no-strike clause, meaning that union members cannot strike or support other striking workers on campus.

According to the CBA, parking services employees’ normal work week will be 37.5 hours and all other union members’ normal work week will be 40 hours.

Employees will not work more than 16 hours consecutively unless in an emergency.

Patrol Officer Steve Hutchison, vice president of the union, said the CBA helps ensure that the college respects OPS employees’ work-life balance.

“There’s not always an understanding of the 24 hour … 365 [days per year] demands of employees here [in OPS],” Hutchison said. “When you’re working in a larger system of a college that has generally nine-to-five, 40 hour week employees, those policies don’t always translate to fair treatment for people who are working a much more varied schedule.”

Community engagement Noble said union members are sometimes seen as “the bad guys” who disrupt the flow of OPS’ work. She said the union advocates for changes that improve officers’ working conditions and the entire campus’ safety.

“We want to change the perception and we got a lot of positive people here that are willing to do that and go out, do the extra things outside their scope of their duties,” Noble said. “We got officers that’ll sometimes go out and change tires for people, and technically, they’re not really supposed to do that, but they do and sometimes that just doesn’t get noticed.”

Scott Garin, executive director and chief within the Office of Public Safety and Emergency Management, said union members and employees from the four nonunion eligible O PS departments share a common purpose and work together to support the community.

“From an office’s point of view, [there is] collective engagement from more than just the union,” Garin said.

“We really make significant efforts to have positive experiences with the community that are developmental, educational and hopefully socially fun in nature.”

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Year In Review

Return to Trump-era raises alarm for transgender Title IX protections

by Eamon Corbo Published feb. 19 The U.S. Department of Education’s 2024 Title IX regulations, which expanded protections for LGBTQ+ students, were rescinded after a Jan. 9 federal court ruling. The changes in Title IX along with President Donald Trump and his administration’s return to Washington, D.C., have created concerns among Ithaca College students and faculty over the protection of transgender students.

Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 is a national law that protects against discrimination based on sex in educational institutions. All educational institutions that receive federal funding — including Ithaca College — must comply with Title IX regulations.

On April 29, 2024, former President Joe Biden's administration released Title IX regulations that explicitly state that discrimination based on gender identity is included under the definition of discrimination on the basis of sex. The regulations were in effect from Aug. 1, 2024, until Jan. 9, 2025, after a federal judge in Kentucky ruled that the regulations exceeded the Department of Education’s authority and violated the First Amendment by requiring teachers to use students’ preferred names and pronouns.

Timeline of gender identity under Title IX In 2016, former President Barack Obama's administration issued guidance that expanded the scope of sex-based discrimination to include gender identity.

The Department of Education under the first Trump administration interpreted Title IX’s prohibition on discrimination based on sex to not include gender identity.

Biden issued an executive order Jan. 20, 2021, that used the precedent set in Bostock v. Clayton County — the landmark 2020 Supreme Court case that expanded Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964’s prohibition on discrimination based on sex to include gender identity and sexual orientation — to expand the definition of sex-based discrimination in Title IX to include gender identity and sexual orientation.

On Jan. 20, 2025, Trump signed an executive order, “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government,” which nullified the executive order from Biden that expanded the definition of sex-based discrimination On Feb. 5, Trump signed an executive order, “Keeping Men O ut of Women’s Sports,” which interprets Title IX as prohibiting transgender women from participating in women’s sports. The order also threatens to rescind funding from programs that do not comply with the order.

Trump’s pick for the Secretary of Education and former administrator of the Small Business Administration, Linda McMahon, said she supported Title IX regulations being struck down.

REUTERS/VIA SNO SITES/TIERNEY L CROSS/KEVIN LAMARQUE, PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY KAIDEN CHANDLER/THE ITHACAN

Title IX at Ithaca College Title IX Coordinator Linda Koenig wrote an Intercom post following the Jan. 9 decision informing the college of the changes in Title IX. She said that despite the changes in Title IX, students and faculty can still report discrimination by following the guidelines in section 2.7 of Ithaca College's Policy Manual.

“I want students to hear, and I want employees and faculty to hear, that if they experience discrimination based on their gender identity or expression, that should continue to be reported to my office,” oenig said.

Junior Marshall Long, a transgender athlete on the college’s club softball team, said that playing his sport has helped him find a sense of community since he was a kid. He said it is a shame that the rollback of regulations protecting gender identity has discouraged trans people from being unapologetically who they are.

“I am afraid and a lot of my peers are afraid,” Long said. “But the thing is, in instances like this, joy is one of the most important acts of resistance. Continuing to play your sport, continuing to partake in whatever activity you choose to partake in, is so important in the longevity of trans people as a whole.”

The college provides resources for transgender students like a voice and communication modification program and a booklet on the legal name change process and gender marker changes on identity documents. Crissi Dalfonzo, director of the Center for LGBT Education, Outreach and Services, said the college’s nondiscrimination policy prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender identity.

“Our support of trans students will continue,” Dalfonzo said. “We were ranked the number one school in the country for LGBTQ+ students for a reason, and we will continue to do all of those things to maintain that status, but more importantly, serve our students.”

Following Trump’s executive order “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports,” the NCAA announced a policy change Feb. 6 prohibiting student-athletes assigned male at birth from competing for any NCAA women’s team.

Student-athletes assigned female at birth who have begun hormone therapy are not allowed to compete for any NCAA women’s team. Student-athletes assigned male at birth and student-athletes assigned female at birth who have begun hormone therapy can practice on and receive the benefits of being on an NCAA women’s team, but cannot participate in games. The NCAA regulations for men’s teams regarding sex and gender identity state: “Regardless of sex assigned at birth or gender identity, a student-athlete may participate (practice and competition) in NCAA men’s sports, assuming they meet all other NCAA eligibility requirements.”

Emily Rockett, vice president, general counsel and secretary to the board of trustees, said the college is subject to these NCAA regulations. She said the college will still continue to allow transgender student-athletes to participate in club sports, however, clubs that take part in competitions overseen by a governing body may have their own regulations that restrict participation.

USRowing is an example of a governing body that has specific policies about participation regarding gender identity and hormone therapy.

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“USRowing has certain rules about who can participate in which gender category and that was the guidance [before] the executive orders,” Rockett said.

Rockett said that because the executive order prohibiting transgender women from participating in women’s sports and changes in NCAA policy are so new, it is still uncertain how they will affect the college.

“There’s a lot of uncertainty around the state in particular and around the country on what that’s going to mean for intercollegiate sports,” Rockett said. “Regardless, Ithaca College has long been and will continue to be committed to supporting all of our students, regardless of their gender identity and expression.”

Concerns over gender identity under Title IX Trump’s pick for the Secretary of Education Linda McMahon, former administrator of the Small Business Administration in Trump’s first term, had her confi mation hearing Feb. 13. When asked about Title IX, she said she supported the 2024 Title IX regulations being struck down.

“I was very happy to see those [rules] vacated,” McMahon said. “So that we are really back to what Title IX was originally established to do, and that was to protect [students from] sexual discrimination.”

In the 2024 election cycle Republicans spent over $65 million on anti-trans ads, many of which focused on transgender athletes. Charlie Baker, president of the NCAA, said to a Senate panel that out of the over 500,000 athletes in NCAA schools, he is only aware of fewer than 10 transgender athletes.

Ellen Staurowsky, professor in the Department of Media Arts, Sciences and Studies with a specialty in gender equity and Title IX, said there is a concerted effort to promote misinformation and disinformation about transgender athletes.

“The idea that we could have hundreds of bills proposed at the state level and at the federal level targeting one of the most vulnerable groups in the United States, to me, is something that should not move forward without some critical examination,” Staurowsky said.

Staurowsky said she believes pushback against transgender women in women’s sports is more about power than protecting women.

“I think there’s something fundamentally wrong with manufacturing a problem and promoting it, putting so much money into it and creating so much fear for a problem that did not exist,” Staurowsky said.

Staurowsky said it is sad how at the same time as record-breaking attendance and viewership in women’s sports, so much attention is being placed on “protecting” women from transgender women in sports.

“I can’t imagine what transgender people are feeling,” Staurowsky said. “I’m not personally in that space, but I guess I’ve lived long enough that I certainly know when a marginalized group is getting targeted in a very specific wa .”

Melanie Stein, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, said at the college’s Feb. 4 faculty council meeting that discrimination against gender identity is prohibited in New York state under the state’s Human Rights Law. “As interpretations of individual rights are changing rapidly at the federal level, it’s important to remember that we’re in New York and state law continues to apply to us,” Stein said.

Senior Lily Seyfert, a thrower on the women’s track team, said she does not think people understand how hard it is for transgender athletes to openly come out and compete in a sport in the current political climate.

“We’re there to compete against the best of the best,” Seyfert said. “And whether that’s a trans athlete or a cis woman, I don’t think it matters.”

Long said that in the face of the 2024 Title IX regulations protecting gender identity being rescinded, people need to continue to keep hope and cannot be complacent.

“I want this to be a motivation for people to continue to be themselves and to continue to advocate for those whose rights are being targeted right now,” Long said. “Because you’ll never know when it’s going to be your rights next.”

On Feb. 5, Trump signed an executive order, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports,” which interprets Title IX as prohibiting transgender women from participating in women’s sports.

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

news - college affairs

Editorial: Title IX is an unfulfilled promise

Illustration by atticus jackson/the ithacan

Title IX has been a beacon of protection since it was passed in 1972, but it is also a rather weak promise. Students are at the whim of rotating administrations who use policies like Title IX as cannon fodder for their own interests.

In the 2024 election cycle, Republicans spent over $65 million on anti-trans ads, many of which focused on transgender athletes. Yet, the NCAA president has said that of more than 500,000 student-athletes in NCAA schools, there are fewer than 10 transgender athletes. This begs the question: Why are conservative politicians spending so much money and effort tearing away athletic competition from fewer than 10 students? Not only are their motivations discriminatory, they are also confusingly moronic.

We could solely blame President Donald Trump for motions like signing executive order, “Keeping Men O ut of Women’s Sports,” on Feb. 5 that rescinded previous protections for LGBTQ+ students that the U.S. Department of Education brought forth in 2024. However, former President Joe Biden ran a campaign in 2020 on promises of reversing the harm Trump did in office — yet Title IX did not recover from Trump’s grasp until Biden and his administration were already walking away from the Oval Office. Without people in the presidential administration to uphold and bolster Title IX and other human rights advancements, Biden finally followed through on a promise at the worst time.

Biden has exemplified an important lesson about change-making: never write the defense of people’s needs in paint when you don’t know if there is time for it to dry. Ithaca College generally does an admirable job at being ahead of the curve and making proactive progress rather than reactive change. However, we do need to find better ways to support LGBTQ+ students in a way that expands their access rather than toes the line in fear of loss of federal funding. It is complacent to repeat that we are allies or we live in New York so our school will be fine every time a national issue knocks on our door.

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Year In Review

State of the College discusses deficit and the impact of executive orders

by Kai lincke Published feb. 14 Ithaca College administrators shared updates about their efforts to close the college’s budget deficit — guided by the administrative analysis study conducted with the Huron Consulting Group — at the State of the College meeting Feb. 11 in Emerson Suites.

Addressing the defici The college has carried a budget deficit for three fi cal years. After enrollment did not increase in Fall 2024 as projected, the Board of Trustees charged President La Jerne Cornish with delivering a plan to balance the budget by fiscal year 2028 Tim Downs, chief financial officer and vice president of the Division of Finance and Administration, said administrators hope the Huron study will help improve efficiency and make the college more nimble so it can better adapt to changing industry conditions and avoid returning to a budget deficit within a few years Downs said Huron has conducted six quantitative analyses to identify potential actions to balance the budget. According to Downs’ presentation, three of the quantitative analyses used external metrics — or data from outside of the college. Huron compared the college’s performance with benchmarks from peer institutions and the industry as a whole. Huron also identified several industry trends to guide the college’s strategic priorities.

Melanie Stein, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, explained that Huron has identifie

more than 60 actions the college can consider to reduce the budget deficit. Stein said many of the actions center around stabilizing and increasing enrollment; expanding existing and adding new revenue streams; restructuring across the divisions of the college; and investing in staff and faculty compensation.

“As we all know, we must reckon with faculty and staff compensation,” Stein said. “That’s not a cost cutting measure … but it’s critically important, because the faculty and staff are our best resource, and it’s the faculty and staff that are going to help move this institution into the future.”

Stein also noted that the college is working with Hanover Research to identify new academic offerings that the college can develop in the coming years.

Stein said administrators are now vetting each of Huron’s proposed actions and determining which actions to incorporate into a budgetary roadmap for FY 2026-28. Cornish said she will present the roadmap to the Board of Trustees’ finance and investment committee in April and will present it to the full board in May if the committee approves.

Stein said she understood audience members were likely wondering when they would learn about any changes to their area.

“When we get to that point — and I have to note we are not there right now — if your area is directly affected by some part of this plan, you are going to find out from your area’s leadership,” Stein said. “We are going to work with the vice presidents and the leadership underneath them to filter things down.

President La Jerne Cornish spoke to members of the campus community in Emerson Suites about budget balancing and ways the college can support vulnerable members of the community.

Mateo Berman-Sample/THE ITHACAN

During the question and answer portion of the event, Peter Johanns, associate professor in the Department of Media Arts, Sciences, and Studies, noted that one of the presentation slides said there was an opportunity for “policy and benefit changes” and asked if administrators planned to decrease benefits Cornish said administrators were still vetting options and did not have that level of detail yet.

“Let me be clear, there’s nothing that’s not on the table,” Cornish said. “From every level of this institution, from the top to the bottom, we must align our expenses with our revenue and beyond for the future of the institution.”

National events Cornish said it is unclear how federal executive orders, particularly those related to research grant funding and diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging, could impact the college. Cornish said the college remains committed to equity, inclusion and belonging on campus.

“Much is uncertain, including what proposed changes to the Department of Education might mean for Ithaca College and other institutions like us,” Cornish said. “We are monitoring these developments and we are working with departments and employees who may be impacted.”

Junior August Culhane asked if the college has plans or policies to protect transgender and gender nonconforming students from potential federal actions targeting those groups.

Cornish said New York state law and college policy both prohibit discrimination on the basis of protected characteristics like gender identity and expression.

“While I cannot say what can happen in the rest of the world, I can say that you are welcome here, that you are safe here and that we will continue to make sure that all of our community feels like they belong, because you do,” Cornish said.

Ruth Barber, assistant professor in the Department of Theatre Production and Management, asked how much the college relies on federal funding.

Downs said the college receives about $40 million each semester in Title IV funding. Downs clarified via email that the college receives about $44 million per academic year in Title IV funding.

Marc Israel, associate vice president for Business and Finance, said via email that federal research grants are generally reimbursement based.

Downs said administrators are monitoring executive orders and congressional actions that could impact the college’s funding or students’ ability to pay for college.

“We also want to be very careful not to be too reactionary,” Downs said. “We are heavily dependent on federal aid, so we want to be very cautious about any changes.”

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news - college affairs

IC to build new outdoor track facility by jacob gelman Published march 5 Ithaca College announced a new outdoor track after receiving funds from anonymous donors. The eight-lane, 400-meter track is scheduled to be finished by September 2025 and is projected to cost an estimated $4 million.

The track will be built on Yavits Field by Clark Companies after the project and location pass approval from the Town of Ithaca. Construction is scheduled to begin in late April, during which Yavits Field and Lot N, a lot for student parking, will be blocked off during the construction process. The construction project will add a bus loop to the end of the parking lot, so buses can easily turn around when transporting people from the Athletics and Events Center to the new field Susan Bassett ’79, associate vice president and director for intercollegiate athletics and campus recreation, said the idea of building a new track began in 2015 when she was assessing the quality of the outdoor facility. The old track was located around the football field in Butterfield Stadium and was torn up in 2023 “I felt the … urgency to make the track project happen mostly because our students didn’t have an appropriate facility to practice on,” Bassett said. “[Not having an outdoor track] left a gaping hole in our intercollegiate sport offerings.”

Bassett said the track torn up in 2023 had disadvantages like being a six-lane track, which was constrained by the wall and the building.

“It had long runways and a really tight turning radius and that is not optimal for collegiate track,” Bassett said. “Their preference is to have as wide a turning radius as possible.”

Tim Downs, chief financial officer and vice president of the Division of Finance and Administration, said the college surveyed campus for an ideal location for the track.

Downs said the college could not build the track by the Ithaca College Natural Lands behind the Athletics and Events Center because it is protected through restrictions, taking that location off the map. According to the Ithaca College Natural Lands Management Plan, it is recommended that all logging in the Natural Lands be prohibited. After a brief consideration of the parking lots — which were not large enough for the track — the college landed on the west side of campus.

The location for the throwing fields will be moved to behind Emerson Hall, but Downs said there is not a completed plan for that process.

Jennifer Potter, head coach of the women’s track and field team, said she loves the track’s chosen location “It’s still in close proximity to the [A&E],” Potter

The plans for the track were shared Feb. 3, showing a multipurpose facility to be built on Yavits Field.

Courtesy of Clark Company

said. “The throwing area will be less than 800 meters away from it, and we’ll have a place for buses to turn around and people to park and it’s still close to the academia on campus. I like that it’s not miles off-campus; it’s right in the thick of things.”

Sophomore Cayden Kuhns, a pole vaulter on the men’s track and field team, said he believes the track will give a reason for people to visit the west side of campus. “[The track] is definitely going to catch people’s attention,” Kuhns said.

Monica Bertino Wooden ’81 contributed funding in 2022 for the lights and synthetic surface of the track.

But for the completion of the track, more donors were needed. Bassett said she searched for donors willing to contribute funds to finish the project “We went about the process of refining the track project,” Bassett said. “[We talked] to different donors about, ‘Would you be interested in funding this?’ Ultimately, we found alumni who wished to remain anonymous who are funding the majority of the project. … The project is funded mostly through donations from these anonymous donors with some support from the college capital fund.”

The amount of money donated versus the amount of money that the college is contributing is not disclosed to the public. Funding provided by the college is from the capital program, which is meant for larger projects. The operating budget — funded through renewable sources like tuition, room and board — is not impacted by this project.

Laine Norton, vice president of Ithaca College’s Division of Advancement, said Bassett being an alum of the college was a helpful asset in finding and talking to donors. Norton said the Division of Advancement helps support the college’s priorities.

“This can include asking for money from alums and finding ways for alumni to get involved with the college, like hiring or visiting or giving back to help sustainability,” Norton said.

Potter said she found out the project was official when Bassett showed her a mini glass portable toilet. Potter found a note inside the toilet, and said she teared up while reading it.

“The message roughly read: ‘Dear Susan, congratulations on your new track. And, unfortunately, you’ll have to use porta potties until we can build permanent restrooms,’’ Potter said.

Downs said one of the most often asked questions about the new outdoor track was about restrooms.

Between hiring utilities, heating water and plumbing, restroom management is expensive. After consideration, the board landed on portable toilets, for the time being.

First-year student Lizzie Andrus, a thrower on the women’s track and field team, said she hosted meets in high school and is looking forward to doing it again at college.

“It’s been awesome to host the bomber invite [indoors] and another quad invitation that we had, so I’m just excited to experience outdoor home weeks on our home turf,” Andrus said.

In the current absence of an outdoor track at Ithaca College, most members of the track and field team practice at Cornell University. Junior Cece LaBonte, a multi-event athlete on the women’s track and field team, said she is excited about practicing on campus.

“It’s a hassle [going to Cornell.] … We have to bring all of our stuff there and back,” LaBonte said. “Our schedule is a little bit unstable because if they say, ‘Oh, you can’t use it today,’ then we gotta find a place to practice. The new track will fix a lot of those problems.”

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Year In Review

IC investigated for alleged racial discrimination in scholarships

Following a complaint by William Jacobson’s Equal Protection Projection, IC is being investigated for alleged impermissible race-based scholarships.

ILLUSTRATION BY KAIDEN CHANDLER/THE ITHACAN, FILE PHOTO/THE ITHACAN

By Kaeleigh Banda and Eamon Corbo Published march 27 In a March 14 press release, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights announced that over 50 colleges and universities, including Ithaca College, are under investigation for alleged racial discrimination.

IC is under investigation for alleged impermissible race-based scholarships following a complaint filed by the Equal Protection Project on June 24, 2024, alleging that the Rashad G. Richardson “I Can Achieve” Memorial Scholarship and the African Latino Society Memorial Scholarship were discriminating against students based on their race by only being available for students of color.

The complaint claims that the scholarships violate Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which forbids discrimination on the basis of race, color or national origin in programs and activities receiving federal financial assistance At the time of the complaint, the individual descriptions for the African Latino Society Memorial

Scholarship and the Rashad G. Richardson “I Can Achieve” Memorial Scholarship stated that they were awarded to select students who exemplify leadership in BIPOC Unity Center programs or other programs across the college.

The complaint cited a description of both scholarships, stating that they are intended to recognize students of color. The descriptions of both scholarships were changed at some point after the complaint to the current descriptions.

In the Intercom post that announced the applications for the scholarships for the 2024-25 academic year, the post stated that the scholarships are awarded to students of color. The same criteria is present in the announcement for the scholarships for the 2021-22, 2022-23 and 2023-24 academic years.

Emily Rockett — vice president, general counsel and secretary to the Board of Trustees — said she does not know when the criteria for the scholarships changed or the specific details of why the scholarship changed from being intended to recognize students of color to being awarded to select students who exemplify leadership in

BIPOC Unity Center programs or other programs across the college.

William Jacobson — clinical professor and director of the Securities Law Clinic at Cornell University and founder of the EPP — said via email that IC changing the scholarship requirements on its website does not negate the civil rights violation.

“The titling of scholarships and conditions for receipt are important and may signal racial and ethnic exclusion,” Jacobson said. “That violates the law regardless of whether some races were physically excluded because the promotion of a segregated scholarship would dissuade, in this case, whites from even applying.”

Rockett said she does not believe the past language of the scholarship descriptions will impact the outcome of the investigation because the OCR typically proposes a resolution agreement aimed at establishing compliance going forward. She said that generally, the parties enter into a resolution agreement — a formal agreement to resolve a conflict.

“If there were a finding of noncompliance, then there is a procedure that OCR would go through and we would

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go in front of an administrative law judge, and it would be adjudicated whether the college would continue to be eligible for Title IV [financial] aid,” Rockett said. “That process is extraordinarily rare.”

There is no law or court ruling that prohibits scholarship criteria from being based on a protected class status, including race. Antonio Ingram II, senior counsel at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, said the complaint was based on an argument that the scholarships violate the Civil Rights Act, rather than legal precedent.

“I would say that based on the present state of law … there’s not a current legal precedent that makes those scholarships prohibited,” Ingram II said.

The investigation follows the DOE’s Feb. 14 Dear Colleague letter that threatens to revoke federal funding for all schools that do not remove Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives. The letter applies the decision of the 2023 Supreme Court case, Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College — the landmark case that declared race-based affirmative action programs in college admissions to be unconstitutional — to all aspects of student, academic and campus life, including scholarships.

Ingram II said SFFA v. Harvard did not include a fact pattern that entailed scholarships for racial minorities.

He said the DOE is attempting to make universities comply with the mandates of the executive branch.

“We see the Trump administration trying to expand that precedent to encompass facts that were never before court,” Ingram II said. “And I think that’s quite troubling because as a civil rights lawyer, that’s not how the law works.”

Rockett said it is unlikely the college will lose Title IV funding because it would have to go through a long court process. However, she said that federal grant money could be pulled.

“It wouldn’t be as financially crippling as it is for institutions that have built up entire operational centers around the availability of federal funds,” Rockett said. “For us, it would really put a [damper] on some faculty research that is federal grant funded.

But we don’t have a ton of faculty or staff whose entire salaries are funded by federal grants.”

Jacobson said his goal and the goal of the EPP at large is to end discrimination and seek accountability. He said that without compliance from schools, he believes repercussions are necessary and should be based on the severity determined by the Department of Education’s assessment.

“IC should apologize for these discriminatory programs and implement measures to compensate students who were excluded based on the racially discriminatory promotion,” Jacobson said. “IC would do

better to admit what it had done and explain that it has changed its practices, rather than potentially misleading the campus by talking only in the present tense. The community deserves better.”

Cliff-Simon Vital, interim director of the BIPOC Unity Center, said he received messages from students after the investigation was first in the press.

“I think there’s a sense of panic, there’s a sense of dread, there’s a sense of fear,” Vital said. “I want to reiterate that we continue to comply and our scholarships … are not based off of race. It’s not a question we ask. It’s not a determining factor.”

Junior Duda Formoso, the recipient of the African Latino Society Memorial Scholarship for the 2023-24 academic year, said the scholarship helped support her as an international student from Brazil paying her own way through college.

“When I got the scholarship, I was so happy because I felt valued and included,” Formoso said.

According to the Office of Analytics and Research, 70.5% of the student body at IC in Fall 2024 was white.

Formoso said scholarships for students of color can help them find belonging at predominantly white institutions “It shows us that we deserve to be here and we can be here,” Formoso said.

Vital said he and the staff at the BIPOC Unity Center were sent an email March 14 from the college informing them that they cannot speak about specifics of the investigation on any public platform.

Any press inquiries should be directed to Rockett. The email also informed him that he is not allowed to delete or change any past correspondence related to the scholarships or investigation.

“It’s not just Ithaca College,” Vital said. “It’s, ‘Can we apply for FAFSA in a couple of weeks?’ and ‘Will there be a Department of Education in a couple of weeks?’ So it’s not just this. It’s the state of the world.”

Duda Formoso was the community outreach manager for The Ithacan in Spring 2024.

news - college affairs

Editorial: Scholarships for minorities level the playing field Over 50 universities across the country, including Ithaca College, are under federal investigation for alleged racial discrimination. IC is one of at least six schools being investigated for scholarships that potentially violate federal anti-discrimination laws.

Race-conscious scholarships are necessary to address the systemic educational inequities minorities face, and eliminating them would be a major setback.

Critics argue that they discriminate against white students, but this stance ignores the persistent racial disparities in education. Approximately 28% of Black adults and 21% of Hispanic adults over the age of 25 hold college degrees, compared to 42% of white adults. These scholarships aim to level the playing field, and create an equitable environment on campus.

Many students from underrepresented communities rely on scholarships, like the ones under fire, to have access to higher education. Without these scholarships, students from disadvantaged backgrounds could be financially and socially discouraged from attending college, decreasing the number of students that reach university. White students already carry an endless amount of privilege that people within marginalized communities do not. These scholarships provide students of color with additional support so they can access the same opportunities as their non-marginalized counterparts.

If higher education institutions are forced to end race-conscious scholarships, the consequences will be severe. Universities will become less diverse because some students of color will face additional barriers to reaching graduation, and therefore their overall success. Ithaca College scholarships also do not state that they are awarded only to students of color. The Rashad G. Richardson “I Can Achieve” Memorial Scholarship and the African Latino Society Memorial Scholarship are awarded to students who exemplify leadership in programs, including but not limited to, the BIPOC Unity Center. Instead of giving in to political pressure, institutions must fight to preserve programs that promote educational equity.

Colleges and universities must resist the challenges facing race-conscious scholarships and continue advocating for policies that support and lift up marginalized students. The fight for racial equity in higher education is ongoing, and the outcome of this battle will shape the future of diversity in academia for years to come.

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Year In Review

Student Affairs

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News - student Affairs

IC to initiate background checks for some student employees

by Prakriti panwar Published Sept. 3 In July, Ithaca College expanded the scope of its background check policy for its employees. Background checks will now be initiated for all benefits-eligible employees, as well as in January 2025 for some student employees who might have access to sensitive data or financial assets Kirra Franzese, associate vice president and chief human resources office , said some examples of student employees who will be subject to these checks include resident assistants and anyone who has designated responsibilities, like holding a master key to important locations on campus. Franzese said background checks involve looking at information like criminal records or sex offense registries.

“We’re just ensuring that we’ve done all of our due diligence to ensure the safety and security of … students, as well as people that are working on campus, but also … all the data that we have on campus, as well as the financial resources that we maintain utilizing that data,” Franzese said.

Some examples of sensitive data include race and gender identifiers, Social Security numbers, grades, budgets and finances. Franzese said the checks are carried out by HireRight, a third-party background screening vendor in higher education. Franzese said the college has worked with HireRight for at least 10 years.

She said that until July, the college had only been conducting background checks for very specific roles, like those within the Office of Residential Life, the Offic of Information Technology and Analytics as well as the Office of Public Safety and Emergency Se vices.

“The scope previously … was somewhat limited to individuals who had special roles at the institution,” Franzese said. “[Now], you don’t necessarily have to have one of those responsibilities … to have a background check that’s completed.”

Franzese said the policy for student roles has not been implemented yet because the college is working on identifying which roles will be subject to a check.

Once these roles are identified, background checks will be initiated.

According to the policy, the background check will be initiated when a prospective employee is offered a job, an employee is promoted or transferred into a role that requires screening and when roles that were not previously subject to background checks are identified in the policy update Senior Preston Tompkins is an RA and said he believes background checks are important.

RAs at the college have not had to go through a formal background check process. To apply, they submit a resume, answer some open-ended questions and are required to list two references. Students are then interviewed by professional ResLife staff and another RA. However, Tompkins said he feels split on the college’s

Some examples of student employees who will be subject to background checks include resident assistants and anyone who has designated responsibilities, like holding a master keys.

Photo Illustration by kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

decision to expand its background check policy to other employees. He said the background checks might make the application process seem exclusive.

“I’m not sure if I would like that, just because I always liked having an RA that kind of resembled myself,” Tompkins said. “I like to know that people have flaws because it makes me relate to them more. Because if I see someone who seems to be completely flawless — they’ve had a completely clean history, nothing has ever happened to them, nor have they ever done anything — it might also make me trust them less for some reason.”

Tompkins said criminal records might not always be the best judge of the character for a potential employee.

“They could be judging an entirely different you at that point, which would be my biggest concern,” Tompkins said. “They might not even be looking at [the] current you."

Franzese said that if a prospective employee has a criminal background that comes up in the check, the college will work with them depending on the nature of the offense. Franzese said, for example, that the college could place them in a position where they can perform duties that are not connected to their previous criminal record.

“The intent is also not to … discriminate,” Franzese said. ““We understand people can be rehabilitated.

We understand that and we want to be an employer where we can also support someone who has had some remediations and can continue to do work and good work.”

Tim Downs, vice president for finance and administration and chief financial office , is the chair of the audit committee that looks over risk controls and assessments. Downs emphasized the importance of communication between the employee and the college during the background check process. The policy states that prospective employees who do not agree to have a background check initiated will not be considered for the role.

Downs said that if a concerning incident comes up in a background check, it is reviewed by HR and the college’s legal counsel. Downs said this means the prospective employee’s direct supervisor might not be informed of an employee’s background — unless required upon review, depending on the nature of the offense — and thus aims to eliminate hesitation on the employee’s end.

“We encourage conversation between the potential or prospective employee and the manager to say, ‘Hey, if there are issues, please let us know,’ and we can certainly talk about them,” Downs said.

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Year In Review

IC community volunteers to protect butterflies by removing invasive plant by vivian rose Published Sept. 20 Students and staff picked and gathered vines growing in the bushes in front of the Roy H. Park School of Communications parking lot Sept. 16. Some climbed into the bushes to grab the vines of the invasive swallow-wort, a plant harmful to monarch butterflies.

In September, monarch butterflies make their annual migration from North America to their Mexican overwintering sites. However, the swallow-wort plant makes it harder for the insects to make their yearly trek by interfering with monarch butterfly reproduction.

The swallow-wort plant is in the same family as milkweed, which monarch butterflies use to lay their eggs on and which the caterpillars will use as their primary source of food. Monarch butterfly caterpillars eat the milkweed leaves when they hatch but cannot feed on the swallow-wort plants, according to the U.S. Forest Service.

Marney Lieberman, administrative assistant for the Center for Counseling & Psychological Services and a member of Nature Rx, organized a removal of invasive swallow-wort seed pods to teach students how to properly remove the plant from the soil so they can do it anytime during the semester.

“IC doesn’t have a dedicated team of partners to take care of it, unfortunately,” Lieberman said. “So, I do what I can. It’s not a lot. … It’s a very vigorous plant. It’s one of the first plants to come up in the spring.

The invasive plant is prohibited in New York state and has a Tier 4 abundance according to the Western New York Partnership for Regional Invasive Species Management (PRISM). PRISM indicates the plant can only be locally controlled because of the plant’s widespread abundance, making complete eradication of the plant impossible.

The plants use the bushes to grow in more direct sunlight for photosynthesis. The swallow-wort plants can grow under varying conditions, from flooding to drought, and grow on other plants to survive, according to the College of Agriculture, Health and Natural Resources at the University of Connecticut.

Six students joined throughout the noon hour. Ernie McClatchie, associate vice president of the Office of Facilities, supplied the event with bags and gloves.

McClatchie said in an email that Lieberman approached him about the event. He said the task of removing the invasive plant from across campus is hard on the grounds team.

“When I was approached by Marney and Nature RX, I was very quick to accept their assistance, as any action can play a positive role in the control,” McClatchie said.

Skye Krehbiel, a fifth-year physical therapy student, was one of six students who joined the Sept. 16 event that aimed to teach students how to properly remove invasive swallow-wort seed pods.

vivian rose/THE ITHACAN

“The grounds team has been fighting the battle for quite some time, as it has invaded areas all around campus.”

Lieberman told each person to dig the plants up by their roots. When the plant is cut above the root, it may cause a denser regrowth and the plant to reflo er, according to the University of Connecticut.

The plant can be sprayed with herbicides to be eradicated in small areas. Lieberman said she was an organic farmer before working at the college, and spraying should always be the last resort because herbicides are known to leach into ecosystems and contaminate them, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

“So, what really needs to happen is they need to get dug up, or IC needs to do some kind of, like, really specific spraying, which I don’t see that happening,” Lieberman said. “The last thing I would want to do is spray, but sometimes it needs to happen.”

As the students and staff picked and dug the plants from the soil, the soft, white seed pods would drop and blow away in the wind. When they drop, the seed pods dry up and split open and release an innumerable amount of seeds, according to PRISM. Lieberman said this is what makes the plants impossible to control.

“Ideally, you want to unwind it gently, so that the pods don’t drop off, because if they drop off, they’ll dry out and then just split open,” Lieberman said.

“They spread very easily. They spread by wind.”

Most of the students who attended the event heard about it after planting native trees on campus with an

event partnered by Trees Up Tompkins. First-year student Rob Wintsch said he helped at the tree planting and enjoys chances to help do volunteer work outside in nature.

“I am really interested in volunteer work, community service,” Wintsch said. “It’s really invigorating and it feels really good to be able to come out and help.

I’m really grateful for opportunities like this.”

Sybil Conrad, Director of the Campus Center, said she is working with Jake Brenner, Ithaca College Natural Lands reserve manager and professor in the Department of the Environment, to advertise more volunteer opportunities in the natural lands.

“We’re going to try to amplify anything we hear about through the IC engage community service page,” Conrad said. “So anyone who’s interested in making sure they know about things that come together, either with a great deal of planning or something last minute like this, you have the opportunity to see what’s out there.”

Lieberman said this is the first seed pod removal of the semester, but may be the last because of the lack of resources available at the college, as well as the overabundance of the invasive plant. Despite the work the students and staff did to remove the plants outside of the Park school, Lieberman said their efforts act as a small fix for a greater problem “The removal of the seed pods is going to encourage more of these to form underneath, unfortunately, but this is just like a band aid on a bigger process,” Lieberman said.

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News - student Affairs

Psychology research group join a romantic preference study

by Sarah payne Published Sept. 25 In Fall 2023, 12 Ithaca College students embarked on a team research project under Leigh Ann Vaughn, professor in the Department of Psychology. The international project, in which students played a small part, researched preferences of romantic partners, crushes or people an individual might be interested in. They also investigated differences between what people want in a partner versus what they say they want.

The study, “The reality of romantic preferences: Large-scale study reveals surprising truths,” was officially approved July 3 by reviewers at the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology and will be published in their journal of the same name. The study results were built by a culmination of research in 43 different countries and 10,000 participants.

After analyzing many traits, characteristics like warmth, loyalty and honesty were found to be prioritized and generally liked the most — a general trend throughout the multiple research teams. Especially in gender contexts, the idea of women valuing status and men valuing attraction was overstated.

While much of the work was done in Fall 2023, the approval for the study’s publication was officially announced in August.

Senior Grace Lill, a psychology major, acted as

a mentor for other student co-researchers, as this is her third research team study. As a mentor, she helped first-time researchers succeed by giving them prompts and answering questions. She said she was proud that the work she contributed was approved for publication.

“You get to look at and be like, my name’s there,” Lill said. “I actually did this. I can put this on my [curriculum vitae] and be like, ‘I really did this, which is really cool for something like grad school.’”

The study’s principal investigator, Paul W. Eastwick, professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of California, started this research with an interest in the differences in romantic preferences, related to gender, as he mentioned in an interview on the Modern Wisdom podcast. Eastwick said he wanted to investigate the accuracy of the claim that women tend to be more attracted to economic status whereas men focus more on physical attractiveness.

Eastwick explained the understanding and analysis of a trait, focusing on the trait of attractiveness.

“Liking [someone or something] can be measured in a million different ways,” Eastwick said on the podcast. “But it’s some sort of association, some sort of predictive relationship between the attribute and some fort of evaluative experience that you have for a set of potential partners.”

Professor Vaughn heard about this study through the Psychological Science Accelerator, an organization

From left, Grace Lill, Leigh Ann Vaughn, professor in the Department of Psychology, Rachel Brody and Allie Richter helped conduct an international study focusing on romantic partners.

Aidan Azarowicz/THE ITHACAN

that allows researchers to connect worldwide to assist with big team science projects that cannot be successfully completed in a single research team.

“If we want to take a look at, for example, romantic partner preferences around the world, no one person can do that,” Vaughn said. “But if a bunch of people get together, then we can.”

The opportunity to be on these research teams is often what attracts these students to the college. Participating on the research team for two semesters is required for the psychology major. Vaughn said that finding students willing to help with this study was easy. She said it also helped that students were engaged with the topic.

O ne of the students who helped with this study was senior Allie Richter, a psychology major, who said this was her first large-group research project.

“So many people are in romantic relationships, including myself,” Richter said via email. “I think it is really interesting to see and learn about what types of traits people care about the most when looking for a romantic partner and if it is similar versus different to what I looked for in my partner.”

Senior Camden Kelley said the angle of this research and the opportunity to be involved in an international study resonated with her.

“I just thought it’d be interesting to be a part of this major international study,” Kelley said. “And it just seems like something that’s relevant to young people.”

Vaughn and her students’ role was to collect data by conducting surveys. They recruited other students at the college to participate, assisted in data collection and worked on troubleshooting any mishaps that might come up. Vaughn led the students and helped create Institutional Review Board proposals, which involves submitting the intended research methods to the board and handing in consent forms from participants.

The findings also revealed that most people are influenced by “consensually desirable” or universally attractive traits rather than “distinctive” or more specific traits. Generally negative traits, such as “easily upset,” had a significant influence on partnerships or potential partnerships.

While the study has already been approved for publication, the work for the team is not done. Vaughn and some of her students will be attending the 2024 New England Psychological Association in October to present their findings to other study groups “I am really excited to present our findings at NEPA,” Richter said via email. “I definitely am a bit anxious but I think the anxiety is more of an excitement for being able to be part of something so cool.”

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Year In Review

Banned Books Week 2024 discusses public awareness of censorship by kai lincke Published sept. 25 As the U.S. experiences a wave of increasing book challenges and bans, members of Ithaca College and greater Ithaca communities gathered Sept. 24 in the Clark Lounge to listen to a panel discussion on censorship and intellectual freedom for National Banned Books Week.

Mickey Huff, distinguished director of the Park Center for Independent Media and professor in the Department of Journalism, hosted panelists from the college and national organizations that advocate for intellectual freedom.

Judith Krug, former director of the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, founded Banned Books Week in 1982 in response to an uptick in book bans. Banned Books Week 2024 runs from Sept. 22-28 and focuses on the theme “Freed Between the Lines.”

Huff started the panel by noting that Banned Books Week increases public awareness of censorship and encourages people to protect access to books.

“Banned Books Week celebrates the right to read,” Huff said. “It particularly celebrates your right as a student … to have access to different perspectives and different reading materials without outside interference of censors.”

Joyce McIntosh, assistant program director of the Freedom to Read Foundation at the American Library Association, said the U.S. has seen an alarming increase

in book challenges since 2020. Book challenges are attempts to remove books from classrooms and libraries.

Book bans occur when books are actually removed.

McIntosh cited a report from the ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom, which showed that the office recorded an average of 343 challenges per year from 2010-19. The OIF recorded 729 challenges spanning 1,597 book titles in 2021; 1,269 challenges spanning 2,571 titles in 2022; and 1,247 challenges spanning 4,240 books in 2023.

The OIF website notes that these statistics reflect only the challenges reported to the agency or covered in the media and do not include cases of soft censorship, when libraries purchase books but restrict access or hide them.

McIntosh said local, county, state and federal governments have attempted to restrict students and community members’ legal right to seek information from school and public library books.

“Our government sets aside our public libraries for one purpose, and that is for each American citizen to be able to access information from birth until death,” McIntosh said. “Students have that First Amendment protection to access information as well. Their rights are not removed when they walk in the classroom door.”

Panelist Jennifer Spitzer, an associate professor in the Department of English who taught a class on book banning in Fall 2024, said book bans often target topics that individuals or groups consider to be dangerous, including LGBTQ+ identities, BIPOC individuals’ experiences with racism and discrimination

From left, associate professor Jennifer Spitzer, librarian Cathy Michael and Director of the Park Center for Independent Media Mickey Huff spoke to attendees about commonly censored authors.

mei dennison/THE ITHACAN

and women’s sexuality. The ALA reports that 47% of the books targeted for censorship in 2023 centered on BIPOC and LGBTQ+ people’s experiences.

Spitzer said many individuals and groups who push for book bans say they are trying to protect children and ensure books are age-appropriate. However, she said she believes most book bans are actually motivated by desires to control what topics can be discussed in the U.S. “Books that have been banned are banned because they have meant something to people,” Spitzer said.

“They start conversations. They reflect on difficult and unflattering parts of our history … and they make us think and feel.”

Communications librarian Cathy Michael said the college’s library has held Banned Books Week events since 2013, and the events have become increasingly important as book challenges increase.

“Have I experienced book banning?” Michael said.

“Not so much in the collegiate sphere. But what I am doing is speaking out for public librarians and school librarians, who have more at stake. A lot of them are undergoing a lot of name calling and having books removed and their jobs are at stake.”

Gianmarco Antosca, Youth Free Expression Program coordinator at the National Coalition Against Censorship, said as book challenges have increased, there are too many for the NCAC to offer direct support or advocacy for each individual instance of book challenges or bans.

“The soft censorship, the kind of chilling speech that we’re seeing, it’s a lot harder to address it head on,” Gianmarco said. “It’s become so important to identify advocates, people in their communities to support them. Those are the people that are actually really changing the culture.”

Julia Garnett, a first-year student at Smith College and the youth honorary chair of Banned Books Week, said there are several barriers to activism for young people and it is critical that leaders include them in discussions and decisions about book review and book banning. “[By] enabling students to go out to school boards, to use their voices on social media platforms, [write] letters to your state legislature, things like that, we need to make sure that high school students feel heard,” Garnett said. “It’s so, so important, especially at the high school level, to have students represented because we are the ones reading these books.”

Huff closed the panel by encouraging attendees to read and share banned and challenged books.

“Reading is literally an exercise in liberation and censorship has no place in that vital process,” Huff said.

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news - student affairs

Ne w club c re ate s s af e s p ace fo r wo m e n in te ch by julian delucia Published Oct. 9 Girls Who Code at Ithaca College is a student-led computer science club that began in Fall 2024. It focuses on community and portfolio building for women and non-binary students in the field. Currently, there are 24 members, including five executive board members ICGWC was founded by senior Surya Sharma, a computer science major, who is also the club’s president. Girls Who Code is an international nonprofit organization that has set out to increase the number of women in computer science. It has a number of programs, including summer camps, college chapters and after-school programs at K-12 schools.

Ali Erkan, associate professor and chair of the Department of Computer Science and club adviser to ICGWC, said the initial goal was only to start a coding club, but with his encouragement, the club began to focus more on women in the field and partnered with Girls Who Code. The club is open to non-computer science majors as well.

“Computer science has historically been skewed in terms of gender,” Erkan said via email. “Female students [in my classes] have always been very successful, but they also occasionally express doubts about themselves.

Having a space like this will be helpful for them.”

Erkan said that roughly seven years ago, there was a separate club dedicated to women in computer science that was not connected to Girls Who Code, but it disbanded because most of its leaders graduated.

Senior Simret Melak, a computer science major and the vice-president of ICGWC, said the goals of Girls Who Code are to build community and support among women computer science students, as well as help them build their skills and learn more about fields within computer science. “[GWC has] connections with a lot of companies,” Melak said. “Last week, there was a hiring summit organized by Girls Who Code … so you can create networking and connections through that.”

Senior Kat Freeman, a computer science major and the marketing manager of ICGWC, said she believes the club will help its members get comfortable and prepare for the next steps in their programming careers.

Senior Cassandra Raineult, a computer science major and financial manager of ICGWC, said the members shared similar experiences and stories in their first meeting. Raineault said many members expressed feelings of inadequacy and isolation, both of which the club seeks to address.

“It’s good for us to come together and be able to

From left, seniors Vannesa Mpofu, Kat Freeman, Cassandra Raineault, Surya Sharma and Simret Melak make up the executive board of the new club, Girls Who Code, at Ithaca College.

Noa ran-ressler/THE ITHACAN

share our problems with other women or non-binary [people] … as minorities in the field,” aineault said.

Raineault said that when it comes to opportunities outside the major, it is difficult not to compare themselves to others.

“I think [the major] is fairly collaborative and cooperative, but when it comes to opportunities, it can feel like other people are doing better than you and will have better opportunities than you,” Raineault said.

Only around 21.3% of bachelor’s degrees in computer science are earned by women. A similar trend is reflected in the Department of Computer Science at Ithaca College, where there are 43 men in the computer science BA compared to nine women, and 31 men in the computer science BS compared to 14 women, according to Fall 2024 data from the Office of Analytics and Institutional research. There are also no women-identifying professors in the department.

In May 2024, a major figure in the department, Sharon Stansfield, retired after 24 years as an associate professor of computer science. Stansfield was the only women-identifying computer science professor.

Also the co-founder and vice president of Assistance in Motion, Stansfield said unequal opportunities and fitting in among male colleagues are still major obstacles for women in computer science.

“There are still attitudes out there that women don’t belong in [science] fields and that they can’t do that kind of work,” Stansfield said. “Computer science particularly tends to sometimes draw in people like that.”

Senior Vanessa Mpofu, a computer science major and creative manager of ICGWC, said the lack of women figures to look up to and get advice from makes being a computer science major difficult. Mpofu said she wanted to surround herself with people who can relate to the struggles of being a woman in such a male-dominant field.

“It’s [like] a blurry road,” Mpofu said. “When you get to the end of it … you’re now trying to figure out what’s next. If we had a few female professors, they can relate to our struggles because they’ve been through the path that we’re taking.”

Freeman said the purpose of the group isn’t to divide from or unite against the male-dominant space.

“One of the big ideas is … to kind of do away with that idea that we aren’t good enough because we see a lot of our male counterparts surpassing us in the classroom or in the job field,” reeman said.

Stansfield said women in computer science often struggle with impostor syndrome, and part of that belief begins in grade school, where math and science are often thought of as masculine fields of stud .

“To get through, you need to believe in yourself, and you need other people to believe in you, and sometimes, even when the faculty believe in you, it’s hard to believe they do,” Stansfield said. “What they can do for each other is … say you can do this. I’ve seen you, I know you’re smart. You know what you’re doing.”

Senior Surya Sharma, president of Girls Who Code at Ithaca College, was the web director for The Ithacan.

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Year In Review

Ithaca College community remembers Oct. 7 attacks

by Vivian Rose Published oct. 9 On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas led attacks on Israeli citizens that killed about 1,200 people and took hostages, now marking a year of the Israel-Hamas war. To commemorate the events of Oct. 7, members of the Ithaca College community organized and attended gatherings to remember the tragedy and its aftermath.

A newly recognized club, Ithacans for Israel, gathered at the Free Speech Rock on the evening of Oct. 6 to hear from students, faculty and members of the college community about their experiences over the past year.

Cornell junior Mel Schwartz, a member of Cornell University’s Cornellians for Israel, was in attendance, as well as Chana Filler, a director of Chabad at Ithaca College.

Along the wall of the Free Speech Rock, the club taped posters of the hostages taken by Hamas, hung the Israeli flag behind where they stood and lit small candles toward the end of the vigil.

During the vigil, seven speakers addressed the 30 people in attendance about their experiences since Oct. 7, 2023, and the impacts the attacks had on them.

The club’s president, sophomore Ben Epstein, began the gathering and said the past year has been hard for him and other members of the Jewish community on campus.

“No amount of hatred, no amount of erasure of our history, no amount of antisemitism, no number of tents on our campus lawns, no level of intimidation of our students and faculty and no number of defamatory attacks on our people will ever stop us from being here because the Jewish spirit is unbreakable,” Epstein said.

Between 2022-23, Hillel International recorded 290 instances of antisemitism on North American college campuses. In 2023-24, the organization recorded 1,854 instances. At Ithaca College, all hate crimes reported in 2022 were labeled as religious bias. In 2022, eight swastikas were found, as previously reported by The Ithacan.

Four swastikas were found on campus in 2023, and there was one swastika found on campus in Spring 2024.

While the vigil was organized by Ithacans for Israel, members of other local Jewish organizations, like Filler, spoke.

“Unfortunately, the Jewish people have a lot of experience when it comes to having to deal with these types of situations,” Filler said. “When we talk about the continuity of the Jewish people … our legacy is in the joy that we experience … and in praising God and focusing on the ways of hope rather than focusing on the past.”

After she spoke, Filler passed around a coin jar and a wallet of pennies. She said that when the Oct. 7 attacks initially happened in 2023, campus community

Students, faculty and staff gathered to remember the events that occurred since the Oct. 7 attacks in Israel.The space did not invite political discussion, but did encourage people to grieve together.

Nicola Ruffini/THE ITHACAN

members gathered in the Muller Chapel. She said they passed around the same coin jar to symbolize tzedakah, a Hebrew word for charity.

O n O ct. 7, Hillel at Ithaca College organized a gathering where about 20 attendees painted stones and sang prayers of remembrance. After gathering inside Muller Chapel, attendees headed out to the pond where Cantor Abbe Lyons led the group in prayer.

Lyons chanted Psalm 118, which is chanted as a part of Hallel typically on celebratory holy days. Students then painted stones of remembrance. In Jewish tradition, stones or pebbles are typically left on graves for remembrance. According to the document, the stones serve as a physical reminder of the people who died Oct. 7, 2023.

On Oct. 8, the Office of Religious and Spiritual Life organized an interfaith gathering for the campus community in the Muller Chapel. During their speech, Lauren Kelly Benson, director of the Office of Religious and Spiritual Life, said that while the gathering was to acknowledge the Israel-Hamas war, it was also organized to hold a space for any and all grief.

Benson led the event and welcomed people to speak from a wide range of faiths, like Hinduism, Christianity, Islam, Judaism and Paganism. After a member from each faith spoke, a moment of silence was held by candlelight.

Sophomore Emerson Cook said he has felt stuck hearing his own thoughts about the Israel-Hamas war and attended the gathering to see how other people

had been coping and what other peoples’ experiences of the past year have been.

“I think that we’re all allowed to feel what we feel, because we’re human, and we’re allowed to have our feelings, our politics and just be very angry, as long as we can come together like this,” Cook said.

First-year Juliet Mitchell said they grew up as an activist and are part of the Unitarian Universalism faith, which encourages its followers to find their own beliefs and truths through values of interdependence, pluralism, justice, transformation, generosity and equity. Mitchell said the faith is also dependent on the idea of human dignity.

“When I see war, when I see genocide … it’s a mix of anger and sadness,” Mitchell said. “Coming here, it’s a feeling of hope and commitment to people, and also experiencing other peoples’ faith and prayer is so moving, and it’s very important to show that and to show support through all religions that have a common peace and love and wanting the world to be better.”

President La Jerne Cornish was the first to speak and asked that all those in attendance use the gathering as a way to communicate and hear from others.

In an interview with The Ithacan, Cornish said the gathering served as a gift for campus community members to sit with others, no matter faith or tradition, and hear about each others’ grief.

“We talk about wanting to be a model for diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging,” Cornish said. “This is a reflection of who we are and what we can be. This is us.

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news - student affairs

SGC holds first town hall of the Fall 2024 semester

by Eamon Corbo Published nov. 6 The Ithaca College Student Governance Council held a town hall meeting Nov. 4 in IC Square, to hear from students and give updates to those in attendance.

The SGC held the town hall to boost engagement with the student body.

Jason Starkman ’22 and Sam Edelstein ’22 came to the town hall to talk about their civic education startup Poliquicks. Then, Junior Quincy Fireside, president of Ithaca College Students for a Free Palestine, spoke about the college divesting from Israel. The council also heard from sophomore Ben Epstein, president of Ithacans for Israel, about combating antisemitism on campus.

Civil education startup Starkman and Edelstein are the creators of their startup Poliquicks. Edelstein said they created Poliquicks to raise voters’ awareness on who they are voting for.

The app, which officially launched Sept. 9, compiles information from the three branches of government into a reader-friendly daily guide. The app is interactive, and gives daily updates for voters to stay educated about politicians and the policies they put in place.

“Politicians [and] their decisions are impacting you and your community,” Edelstein said. “These are people who we are voting into office. And then we don’t always entirely know who these people are, what their stances are and if what they say they do aligns with what they’re actually doing.”

Starkman said the app is free and generates revenue from advertisements, working with political offices and working for schools. Starkman said the app does not sell user data to third parties and only collects user information needed to make the app functional, like what state the user lives in.

“I think that the most valuable piece of data that we might ask a user for is their home address,” Starkman said. “We don’t sell it to anybody. We’re just using that so that we can display your full [representatives].”

Edelstein said he found it important to have worked on the app with a team of people who came from diverse backgrounds and held different perspectives to remove personal biases from it.

“When you’re creating an app [we] might have a vision of what we want it to look like,” Edelstein said.

“But then we might add our own biases into it. It’s important to make sure you’re talking to people from different backgrounds and political views.”

ICSFP demands disclosure and divestment from Israel Last spring, ICSFP’s demands for divestment were rejected by President La Jerne Cornish. The demands

Junior Caleb Cackowski presents at the Nov. 4 town hall. Back row from left, junior Dante Conde, sophomore Evan Wasserman, junior Baneet Pukhrambam and first-year student Manan Maini listen.

Julian DeLucia/THE ITHACAN

included: “a school-wide statement acknowledging the genocide of Palestinians, a statement of support for Palestinian students and an apology for not making the statement sooner; a Boycott, Divestment and Sanction (BDS) audit which would provide access to information about if the college receives funding from any Israeli or Zionist corporations; and for Birthright trips to stop being run through Hillel at Ithaca College.”

Fireside said during the town hall that ICSFP published an online petition in April for disclosure and divestment regarding the college’s financial ties to Israel. They said the petition — which has gotten 784 signatures as of Nov. 5 — is representative of over 10% of the student body. They asked the council if there is a referendum process at the college they could use to encourage administration to disclose and divest from any financial ties to Israel “If you have been following Cornell Students for Justice in Palestine, they recently passed a referendum, which was a student vote to encourage [Cornell] administration to … disclose their divestment of financial ties to Israel,” Fireside said. “It’s something that we’re interested in doing at IC, and I wonder if there’s a process for that in place?”

Junior Rishabh Sen, president of the student body, said there is no formal process for a referendum in the SGC’s Constitution. He said students can create recommendation legislation — a piece of legislation or a bill written by students outside of SGC — to give a

recommendation to the college administration.

“If you feel that the student body needs [referendum], we can help y’all get in touch with the right campus partner, the right administration person, or even work with us in order to host an event or a vote,” Sen said.

Combating antisemitism on campus Epstein spoke at the town hall about antisemitism at college campuses over the past year. He read a quote from former Cornell University student Patrick Dai, who was sentenced to 21 months in prison for antisemitic threats made online against Jewish students at the university.

Epstein said one way to combat antisemitism is for the college to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance working definition of antisemitism, which he said is based on 11 examples of antisemitism.

The examples help institutions determine what languages and behaviors are antisemitic. He asked the council to denounce antisemitism.

“At this moment right now,” Epstein said. “Condemn any and all antisemitism on this campus.”

According to the SGC Constitution, no member is allowed to make a statement on behalf of the SGC. Junior Senate Chair Nikki Sutera said members of SGC can make personal statements but cannot make statements on behalf of their constituencies.

“We can make statements as people,” Sutera said.

“So for example, I, and this is true, condemn hate crimes on campus, especially toward Jewish students, and that is on behalf of me.”

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Year In Review

App created by Ithaca College alums educates people about U.S. politics

by Aela Shaw Published nov. 12 Jason Starkman ’22 and Sam Edelstein ’22 said that while studying at Ithaca College they noticed that for them and their peers, making sense of the complexities of politics was intimidating and time-consuming.

This observation called them to action and in 2023, the pair joined a tech startup with a vision to create an accessible civic education app. On Sept. 4, Starkman and Edelstein, chief technical officer and chief operating office , helped launch Poliquicks.

Once downloaded from the app store, Poliquicks users are met with an onboarding questionnaire. They are asked to gauge their extent of political knowledge, place themselves on the U.S. ideological spectrum and choose which issues are most important to them.

Starkman said the responses are used to personalize the educational content on each user’s app.

Included in the Nov. 2 update to the app, the “Today’s Feed” tab includes polls, issue-related content quizzes, Supreme Court cases, and Congressional bill action that is personalized according to each user’s interests. Starkman said his and Edelstein’s goal is to make the feed tab even more personalized by incorporating hyperlocal data.

“What we’ve done so far is we’ve made this really generalized app that no matter where you are, [it] can show you your representatives and you can track federal action every day,” Starkman said. “But it could still be improved in that if we’re working with [political]

offices directly, they can give us very specific information to your area [and] your local candidates.”

While the Poliquicks team is working to fill in gaps about state and local candidates and bill action, users are able to learn about their state representatives in Congress and Congressional candidates that will appear on their ballot when they vote in the general election.

The app’s “Poli-Match Quiz” also recommends users who to vote for based on their stances on various political issues, which Edelstein said he hopes will enable users to make better-informed decisions at the polls.

“By using our matching quiz, we hope that users can get a better picture of who these candidates are without having to go through all the confusion surrounding politics,” Edelstein said.

Starkman said their goal ahead of the 2024 election was to help bridge the hyper-partisan gap within the U.S. “People are generally more aligned than they think,” Starkman said. “O ften you’re pushed to one side or the other, and everything in between gets muddled. We’re hoping that [Poliquicks] can create a way around that where hopefully you’re voting for people and not just your party.”

Poliquicks’ structure is reminiscent of popular social media sites. Similar to Instagram, users navigate through five tabs at the bottom of the app’s interface, with the “feed” and “search” tabs located in the same positions on both apps. Starkman and Edelstein said this was intentional.

A Pew Research poll published in September found that 54% of U.S. adults get at least some of their

Jason Starkman ’22 and Sam Edelstein ’22 attended the Nov. 4 SGC town hall to present their startup.

Julian DeLucia/THE ITHACAN

political news from social media sites, a trend that has increased since 2020. Edelstein said the pair wanted Poliquicks to be a better alternative.

To prioritize unbiased information about representatives, Starkman said Poliquicks features a direct verification process. Artificial Intelligence is used to collect candidate information from public sources like Congress.gov and FEC.gov, and private data-collection institutions that partner with Poliquicks like the Center for Tech and Civic Life and the U.S. Vote Foundation. Then, Starkman said the profiles are sent to their respective politicians, who then have the opportunity to verify or add to the information.

At a Student Leadership Initiative event held at the college, Starkman and Edelstein spoke to a group of six students about the development of Poliquicks and their goals while creating the app. Sophomore Andrew Huntsberger attended the SLI event and said that finding nonpartisan news sources is becoming increasingly difficult in the polarized U.S. political sphere “CNN has gotten even further left and Fox News has gotten further right … and there’s no middle ground,” Huntsberger said. “I think it’s especially evident in the last two presidential terms, how [much] further apart polarization has gotten.”

Huntsberger said he tries to avoid getting political information from social media sites because of its partisan nature. He said Poliquicks could be a viable alternative to such platforms, but that he thinks the company needs time to grow.

Starkman said about 15 people make up the Poliquicks team now, both on the software development side and the business and marketing side. When the project started, the team comprised Starkman, Edelstein and Vienna Mott, an engineering business manager for the semiconductor manufacturing company Advanced Micro Devices who founded the tech startup that became Poliquicks.

Usership has also increased since Poliquicks launched. Starkman said about 300 people use the app, with the largest user bases located in New York, California and Texas. Users ages 25-49 make up 40% of the user base, ages 18-24 make up 33%, ages 13-17 make up 17% and ages 50+ make up 10%.

Starkman said the business side of the team has plans to partner with high schools to train teachers on how to incorporate Poliquicks into the classroom.

“You don’t always know what the source of that information [on social media] is and if it’s being spun in any biased way,” Edelstein said. “We thought there needs to be a big focus on keeping [Poliquicks] unbiased and nonpartisan.”

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news - student affairs

Angela Davis speaks to Ithaca College about social justice

by Kaeleigh Banda and Julian DeLucia Published feb. 6 Angela Davis –– an author, political activist and professor –– spoke Feb. 4 in Ford Hall for a conversation event titled, “We Are Because They Were: An Evening with a Living Ancestor.” Over 600 people filled the concert hall and over 700 people watched the livestream.

Davis has been a member of the Communist Party of the United States of America and the Black Panther Party. In her work as a professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz, she teaches courses on the history of consciousness and feminist studies. She has written many books, including “Angela Davis: An Autobiography” and “Abolition. Feminism. Now.” Omar Stoute –– director for Staff Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging –– gave the opening remarks. Stoute said that when he was younger, his dad would read books by Black thinkers and revolutionaries like James Baldwin,

They inquired about Davis’ motivations for coming to speak at Ithaca College, especially after already giving a lecture at Cornell University the night prior.

“Well, first of all, teaching is my passion,” Davis said. “I really appreciate engaging with younger people. … Teachers can’t be good teachers unless they are lifelong students, so I consider [these events] part of my ongoing education as well. Besides, I’ve always loved Ithaca College.”

Benson opened the formal questioning section with a question by Grace Lee Boggs, author and activist.

Boggs is known for asking the question, “What time is it on the clock of the world?” in her book that she wrote with her husband James Boggs, “Revolution and Evolution in the Twentieth Century.” Benson asked Davis what time she thinks it is on the “clock of the world.”

Davis said that there was no easy answer but that the next four years will be formative and much will change. However, she said it is only four years and

Angela Davis –– an author, political activist and professor –– and Ithaca College President La Jerne Cornish spoke Feb. 4 in Ford Hall. Lauren Kelly Benson led the Q&A portion of the event.

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

Marcus Garvey, Martin Luther King and Angela Davis.

“I didn’t know when that moment would come when I would care about others more than I cared about myself,” Stoute said. “It didn’t happen until much later in my life, but I know the seeds were planted when I was six. So I really hope today is some seed planting for you all.”

Lauren Kelly Benson, director of the Office of Religious and Spiritual Life, led the Q&A with Davis.

much of deciding where we are on this world clock must be decided by society collectively.

“It’s our own action that helps to move the hands of the clock to a certain place,” Davis said.

Benson asked Davis about how young people could get involved in activism and organizing, to which Davis said there is no formula, and that everyone has to come to it naturally. She advised young activists to find something they love and truly care about to advocate for and

never to be an advocate just because it feels like one must. Davis also spoke about the dangers of individualism –– a philosophy that emphasizes the worth of the individual –– and how it can hurt a social movement.

“Individualism is a hell of a thing,” Davis said. “It’s so dangerous. It messes us up. When we begin to believe that we’re brilliant by ourselves, that we did all of that work, we don’t recognize how much we owe to so many others.”

President La Jerne Cornish spoke next and reminded students that even in the current times, everyone is welcome at the college and no one should be ashamed of who they are.

“I need my students to see what is possible,” Cornish said. “I can’t hide who I am. I don’t want you to be ashamed of who you are. I’m glad to be here at such a time as this, because you are welcome here.

And we’re not gonna let anybody stop you from feeling welcomed here.”

The next question Benson asked Cornish and Davis was about how they have personally been misunderstood or misheard. Cornish talked about how cancel-culture is detrimental to appreciating differences and allowing them to help society become more unified “I think it is so important to treasure difference,” Davis said. “Differences of opinion. Differences of identification. And we tend to think we want to be with like minded people … but you’re not going to learn something new from that person. That is damaging our capacity to think and be critical.”

After the event, senior Ricko Martin said that it was incredible to hear someone with such a storied legacy in activism and feminism.

“I do struggle honestly to put into words honestly how grateful we are to have the opportunity to hear [her] experiences,” Martin said. “It feels very unreal.”

Sophomore Eudmarly Letrois Gedeon –– one of the BIPOC Unity Center peer leaders –– said the event almost made her cry multiple times.

“It was a great feeling to have Angela Davis here,” Letrois Gedeon said. “She still influences people and still inspires people. Even at 81, she is still fighting for human rights and that is very impressive to me.”

The last question that Benson asked Davis was what advice she has for Benson and Cornish as leadership at the college. Davis said she does not feel qualified to give advice because she does not believe in the idea that older people should tell young people how to create change: they will create it in their own way.

“If you want to figure out what time it is on the clock of the world, it is young people that are going to determine what time it is,” Davis said.

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Year In Review

First-year students will be required to live in themed communities

by Trey Nitza Published march 5 In the 2025-26 academic year, residential life will see a significant change. All incoming first-year students will be put into themed living units, based on an interests survey, to foster more community between students in residence halls. While housing assignments for themed living units is mandatory, student participation in theme-related activities will be optional.

Beginning in Fall 2025, all incoming first-year students will pick a themed residential community to live in with other students with similar interests. There will be 11 themes to choose from, including Sustainability Central, Study Sanctuary, Naturally Adventurous and one for the LGBTQ+ community called Lavender Living. The plan was announced at a Student Governance Council meeting Feb. 3. It was presented in part by Laura Davis, director and interim assistant dean of students in the Office of Residential Life. Davis said one of the main reasons for implementing the themed housing plan was to foster greater social connection among students. She said a recent assessment revealed that 37% of students did not feel a sense of belonging in their residence hall.

“Theme living aims to address this by providing students with a built-in community centered around shared interests facilitating connections with peers both on their floors and within their residential neighborhoods,” Davis said via email.

While RLCs focus more on academics and faculty-student relationships, themed living units are more intended to build greater connections among students, according to the Ithaca College website.

Although the themed housing system is meant to coexist with the active RLCs, some members of the Shared Journeys RLC, run by the BIPOC Unity Center, expressed concern that it would be discontinued.

The goal of Shared Journeys is to provide a space for BIPOC students to discuss the history of civil rights and systemic racism. There are currently no planned culturally-based themed living communities similar to the Shared Journeys RLC. Cliff-Simon Vital, interim director of the BIPOC Unity Center, said he worried about Shared Journeys’ future because he did not know if the new themed-housing model was intended to fit in with RLCs, and he heard some were at risk of being phased out. Vital said he did not think Shared Journeys was being specifically targeted After being invited to a residential life meeting Jan. 27 to give his input on continuing Shared Journeys, Vital asked members of the RLC to fill out surveys

Beginning in Fall 2025, all incoming first-year students will pick a themed residential community to live in with other students with similar interests. There will be 11 themes to choose from.

Photo illustration by Oslene Vanyanbah and Kaeleigh Banda/THE ITHACAN

to demonstrate that students supported it being continued next year.

Vital said he received confirmation from Residential Life that Shared Journeys will return for the 2025-26 year. He said he believed his input on the matter made a difference.

“I don’t know if, without our feedback, it was gonna come back,” Vital said via email. “We wanted to make sure that our voices were heard, and they were, so I’m thankful for that.”

Eileen Roth, assistant director for residential education and assessment, said the changes to residential life next year were not swayed by any outside infl ence, although President Donald Trump signed an executive order Jan. 20 banning diversity, equity and inclusion policies in federal agencies. The Trump administration then gave federal schools and universities a deadline of Feb. 28 to remove diversity practices or lose federal money. Many colleges moved to remove diversity practices, including the University of Iowa, which discontinued RLCs for students of color and the LGBTQ+ community.

“These changes [at IC] were not influenced by external executive orders,” Roth said via email. “Our commitment remains to fostering an inclusive community that supports all students.”

First-year student Smeena Gill, a member of Shared Journeys, said the RLC helped better her sense of community on campus, especially with other people of color. “[IC] is very predominantly white so it’s nice being

able to live on a floor where I look around and I see people of color from different backgrounds,” Gill said.

Sophomore Grace Commisso, a resident assistant in Upper Quads, said she supports the implementation of themed housing and that it could be a relatively harmless way to address declining enrollment.

“It’s definitely worth a shot,” Commisso said. “Even if it doesn’t work out, it’s not going to make things worse.”

Commisso said she thinks she could have benefi ed from having more sources of connection her first year on campus and thinks themed living could foster other students’ sense of community.

“I did feel quite detached from people,” Commisso said. “I think having that overlap for these themes that don’t involve or don’t overlap with majors and stuff like that could be really beneficial.

Senior Ishmeet Kaur, an RA in East Tower, also said she agrees that themed housing could benefit the social lives of students, and the college has good intentions behind the plan.

“I think [Ithaca College] wants to create a better space for people so that it feels more like home,” Kaur said.

Kaur said she enjoyed her time as a member of the Outdoor Adventure RLC. While Kaur is graduating next year, she said she is hopeful that a similar system of themed living could benefit students “I don’t want to be negative from the start,” Kaur said. “I want to see how this works. It might work for some people, but it might not work for others, right?

So you don’t know until you try.”

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news - student affairs

South Hill Sweets set to reopen in Fall 2025 after repairs

by Isabel Alasio

produce baked goods for the remainder of the retail dining locations and dining halls on campus.

Published March 26 “Now we’re kind of scrambling, using ovens, mostly in Terrace Dining Hall, to keep up with the normal, everyAfter a grand opening Sept. 10, Ithaca College’s day output that’s required for the bakery,” Golden said. newest retail dining location, South Hill Sweets, temSeveral students have noticed the prolonged closure porarily closed Jan. 30 due to maintenance repairs. of South Hill Sweets. First-year student Felix Aguayo said The shop, in Egbert Hall within Campus Center, is set he visited the shop weekly in the fall semester as it was a to reopen for Fall 2025. convenient stop on his walk back to his dorm from class.

South Hill Sweets sells some baked goods that can“I went like once or twice a week, probably,” not be purchased at any other retail dining location, as Aguayo said. “I was in a class with other people who well as pastries, coffee and tea. The shop gained popuwould go to South Hill Sweets after the class. I would larity in Fall 2024 upon its soft opening Sept. 5, when usually get a cookie or something. It was nice.” free samples were offered to students who attended First-year student Natalie Bencivenga said she walks during their operating hours, which is displayed on

by South Hill Sweets often and notices its closure as well, the dining services page of the college’s website. Until despite never purchasing a baked good from the shop. its closure, the shop was open Monday through Friday “I walk by pretty often and I noticed that it’s been from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. closed recently,” Bencivenga said. “Sometimes I feel Jeffrey Golden, associate vice president of Auxiliary like I am in need of a little sweet treat. But it’s been Services, said the shop was added to the dining program closed for so long, and I vaguely remember it being as an outlet for the bakery, providing baked goods for open for different hours than Ithaca Bakery or Scribe the dining halls and retail dining locations on campus. might be open. So if I’m in need of a coffee, sometimes “The inclusion of another retail location wasn’t a bad South Hill Sweets might be the only place to get it.” thing,” Golden said. “It was intended to be baked goods, Both students said they were under the assumpwhich were not necessarily meant to be part of your three tion that the shop was not going to reopen as the square meals. The intent is that it was a fun thing, and it maintenance repairs are taking longer than expected. was a way for us to showcase what we think is a cool part “It’s been closed for so long, you would think that it of the [dining] program, which is the bakery.” would have been fixed by now already,” Bencivenga said.

After Ithaca College Dining Services announced Part of the delay is due to the long delivery time of one of the oven’s fundamental pieces. With the oven and gate being fixed in the coming weeks, South Hill Sweets should be back up and running by the beginning of the Fall 2025 semester.

“We’re still literally waiting on parts,” Briggs said. “By the time those get fixed and we’re back, we would probably have three weeks of the semester left. It doesn’t make sense for us to repurpose the staff and try to revamp all of the logistics of getting the products baked here, carted up, traded up, transported down to [South Hill Sweets] just to Ithaca College Dining Services announced South Hill Sweets will be temporarily closed until further notice due to sell it. It’s not going away. It maintenance repairs. The shop remains gated with a sign specifying its closure but is expected to reopen Fall 2025. will be back in the fall [in] one

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN version or another.”

South Hill Sweets’ temporary closure, the shop was gated with a sign specifying its closure.

“If you look at the gate, it’s broken, and we’re in the process of repairing that,” Golden said. “But on the ensuing day [after the gate broke], the principal oven in the bakery broke, which is a far more extensive undertaking to fix. The fundamental internals of the oven are what’s broken, and so parts are in order.”

Reginald Briggs, senior director of Dining Services, said the cost of the oven repair is estimated at $37,000 because of its size. He said it is not a type of oven that the bakery has, as it has 36 shelves that hold five to six trays each.

Briggs said the cost of repairs would not directly affect the dining budget because the repair costs are coming out of the capital budget as opposed to the day-to-day operating budget.

“It’s a bummer because there’s so many other things that we would like to invest our auxiliary services capital into, but now we won’t be able to because we’re obligated to fix the oven first before … we get to have the things we want to improve the program,” Briggs said.

Parts for the oven repair have been ordered and they are expected to arrive and be repaired before the end of the semester, however, there is a chance the shop will not reopen until the fall. With South Hill Sweets’ oven in need of maintenance, Golden said it has been challenging to

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Year In Review

Greater Ithaca Affairs

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4/6/25 7:35 PM

News - greater ithaca Affairs

Local environmental groups express concerns over synthetic turf fields

by Vivian Rose Published Aug. 28, Updated Sept. 6 In 2023, Ithaca College faced objections from the local community while constructing a synthetic turf field approved by the Town of Ithaca’s Planning and Development Board. The City of Ithaca’s planning board met Sept. 3, 2024, to determine the next steps of Cornell University’s proposal of constructing two synthetic turf fields on its campus.

Were the City of Ithaca's planning board to decide that the turf fields might cause a high environmental risk to the surrounding area, Cornell would be required to research these impacts, according to Yayoi Koizumi, founder of Zero Waste Ithaca, a local environmental organization that is vocal about resisting synthetic turf projects.

However, the City of Ithaca Planning and Development Board issued a unanimous negative environmental impact on Cornell’s Meinig Fieldhouse proposal during its Sept. 3 meeting, finding no significant environmental concerns from the proposed project. As a result, the turf fields will be const ucted as planned.

Koizumi said in an email that ZWI and other environmental groups in the Ithaca community will continue to fight the decision. “[The] Cornell athletic department flooded the room with about a hundred Cornell student athletes keeping [protesters] squeezed out,” Koizumi said in an email. “We expect nothing less from Cornell and we will not stop at this.”

Organizations like Zero Waste Ithaca have been protesting synthetic turf since Ithaca College converted Bertino Field at Butterfield Stadium from natural grass to artificial turf in 2023. The college upgraded the field after receiving a $3 million donation.

Koizumi said the protests have been necessary to fight for the local communit ’s health.

“At what expense are we going to pollute our community and other communities … for this?” Koizumi said. “Why can’t we have natural, organically managed grass fields that have better drainage and players have a reasonable playtime?”

Cornell's plan to add two synthetic turfs includes constructing the fieldhouse ​​on Tower Road as well as a 91,950-square-foot outdoor multipurpose synthetic turf field located between the proposed Meinig Fieldhouse and Weill Hall, and a field hockey pitch on Game Farm Road.

Fred Wilcox, chair of the Town of Ithaca’s planning board, said that because about 83% of Cornell’s land is located in the city and about 17% is located in the

Cornell University's two proposed turf fields have caused objections from the local community.

Sammie Macaranas/THE ITHACAN

town, both the City of Ithaca and the Town of Ithaca decided that the city should do the environmental review. The review determines the environmental impact of the proposed fields and Meinig Fieldhouse Wilcox said that Ithaca College received similar controversy when synthetic turf was installed on its campus, but that he has noticed more outcry regarding Cornell’s Meinig Fieldhouse proposal. He also said the planning boards of each municipality are unsure if the environmental impact is low enough to approve the project.

ZWI plans to rally outside the Ithaca City Hall before the Sept. 3 planning board meeting. Koizumi said the group has also been collecting signatures for a petition against the Meinig Fieldhouse proposal, with a goal of reaching 1,200 signatures, which they will provide to the planning board as evidence for lack of community support.

Koizumi said other environmental organizations have been fighting the turf proposal like Mothers Out Front New York, Cayuga Lake Environmental Action Now! (CLEAN), Sustainable Finger Lakes, Seneca Lake Guardian, Sunrise Ithaca, Extinction Rebellion Ithaca and Cornell on Fire. They take issue with chemicals involved in turf manufacturing as well as chemicals, like polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAs), microplastics and crumb rubber that can leech from the fields into the environment. A test done on a sample of a synthetic turf blade from 2017 showed the presence of PFOS, a type of PFAs, in a study done by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection.

Susan Allen, professor and chair of the Department of the Environment, said crumb rubber can negatively affect the environment if it gets into local waterways because of the chemicals within each piece.

“The real issue is trying to make sure that the tire wear particles stay put by the engineering techniques that are hopefully being applied [on turf fields], because we know that those can be directly toxic,” Allen said. “We want them to stay put. We don’t want there to be a lot of tire wear leachate.”

Turf fields are made of plastic fibers to resemble grass, backing material and an infill — typically of crumb rubber — to balance each fiber in place. Each fiber is made of nylon, polypropylene or polyethylene and can cause potential health risks like heat stress, infection and chemical exposure, according to the New York State Department of Health.

The chemicals in synthetic turf include PFAs in the dye that makes each blade green. Allen said when crumb rubber is used as an infill for synthetic turf fields, they can get washed away from stormwater and can also be brought off the field on people’s shoes.

She said she will be conducting research on crumb rubber during fall 2024 with the ecotoxicology lab to determine their impact on water systems.

One way of decreasing the amount of crumb rubber that can enter the environment is through drainage systems. The fields will be equipped with filters and detention chambers for stormwater flo , according to Cornell’s proposal that was submitted to the planning board. However, these drains will only be able to filte out the large crumb rubber particles, not PFAs, as previously reported by The Ithacan.

Koizumi said that although Cornell has already received approval for other turf fields in the past, she will continue protesting against synthetic turf fields.

“Plastic is toxic,” Koizumi said. “So why are we letting it into our environment?”

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Year In Review

Tompkins County experiences lack of transitional housing and support

Housing assistance resources in Tompkins County like the Village and Sunflower House have faced multiple financial and resource-related challenges.

Courtesy of Ithaca Times, illustration by Gustav Bauerle/The Ithacan, photos by Lucia Iandolo, Sammie Macaranas/The Ithacan

by prakriti panwar, vivian rose Published oct. 30 If you are facing a housing emergency, contact the Department of Social Services at 607-274-5348 between 8:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. or in person at 320 W. Martin Luther King Jr. Street.

Over the past month, housing assistance resources in Tompkins County have faced multiple financial and resource-related challenges. While the county is working on adapting to the immediate challenges of the shelter system, two key housing programs that help individuals transition out of homelessness — the Village and Sunflower House — are struggling to remain afloat O n O ct. 2, Tompkins County’s only transitional housing program for unhoused youth — the Village House — learned that its funding will be discontinued effective Oct. 31. The closure of St. John’s Community Services, the only emergency shelter that is operational all year, was announced Oct. 18. On Oct. 29. The county said SJCS residents under the Temporary Housing Assistance through the Department of Social Services will be moved to motel rooms, the contracts for which are still

being negotiated. The Sunflower House, a low-barrier housing program for formerly incarcerated men, was allocated $45,000 over three years in the proposed 2025 budget, though it annually costs over $150,000 to run.

In a press statement released O ct. 29, the county said it decided not to declare a state of emergency because it has identified additional temporary shelter and housing resources.

The Village House The Village House lost the national funding it receives from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and will not have enough funds to sustain itself beyond November.

The Village at Ithaca was established in 2002 and serves the youth and families of Tompkins County. The Village House is an offshoot program within the Village at Ithaca that was established in 2022 and serves unhoused youth ranging from ages 14-24.

In 2022, the Village House applied for and received a pilot two-year grant of about $1 million from HUD to operate the house, pay its staff and provide services for up to nine residents. Meryl Phipps, executive director of the nonprofit, said the Village received an email in February

that said the Village House was able to renew its funding until September 2025. However, on Oct. 2, the Village received information from HUD that its funding would officially expire Oct. 31, 2024 Phipps said that after a day’s notice, HUD did a site inspection of the Village House on Aug. 6 and 7, and it found nine areas of unsatisfactory compliance, including documentation of homeless eligibility and failure to submit a spreadsheet of its finances.

HUD told the Village to find transfer opportunities for its five remaining residents by Nov. 1. Phipps said the Village will also need to find a transitional housing program open to youth by that date to transfer any remaining HUD funding to, but that it cannot continue to be the Village.

Phipps said the Village has met with two alternative programs, Family and Children’s Service of Ithaca and The Learning Web. However, she said neither organization has an established transitional housing program and it would be impossible to create one with such short notice. “[The Village House] can’t operate without funding,” Phipps said. “Even if the HUD funds go to another

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news - greater ithaca affairs agency, they’re not going to run the same kind of transitional housing program that we run because the whole reason we opened the program the way we did was to meet a gap in services.”

Sunflower Hous As a part of the 2025 budget development process, the Tompkins County Legislature asked all departments and funded nonprofits to submit budget proposals for 2025 with a 5% reduction. The county did so to stay within the parameters needed to keep the fund balanced, which means it will be prioritizing capital and one- or multi-year requests over target requests.

The Sunflower House is an affordable housing program under Opportunities, Alternatives, and Resources of Tompkins County. Dave Sanders, executive director of OAR, said that even though the Sunflower House will face the consequences of these cuts, receiving minimal funding will allow the program to survive without cutting it.

Sanders said he might have to let go of a part-time weekend outreach coordinator and has already cut the position of a peer navigator who helped residents navigate the court systems.

“It was tough,” Sanders said. “[For funding] to be cut — is it discouraging? Yes. … [But] I just said ‘OK, it’s not personal.’ They have budget issues, they have to make cuts. … We’ll make do and have to find alternative resources.

Wraparound care services Bethanie Keem-Calhoun, case manager at the Village, said the Village House provides wraparound resources. Wraparound services take a person-firs approach and focus on the individualized, holistic development through career mentorship, mental health care and legal services that extend beyond just providing them with basic sustenance needs.

Keem-Calhoun said the wraparound services provide a sense of stability.

“If it is something that has to do with your housing, your health, your future, well-being, you can count on us that we are giving you wraparound care, support, compassion and wraparound love,” Keem-Calhoun said.

Wraparound services are necessary for people like Nani King, 18-year-old former resident of the Village House. After finding permanent housing, she messaged Keem-Calhoun for help getting to a local food pantry.

Keem-Calhoun shared this message with The Ithacan after obtaining King’s permission. Keem-Calhoun said services like the Village are always open to any young person in the community.

“Hi, Bethanie, I love you and I miss you,” King’s message said. “I was wondering if you were busy saving the city because you’re Batman, or if there’s any way you could come get me and take me to today’s food pantry.”

Sanders said the county generally lacks sufficient wraparound care services, which are important for helping individuals transition out of homelessness. This is not an issue unique to the county. While the number of people exiting from temporary to permanent housing increased in 2023, the number of people entering homelessness

outnumbers exits from temporary to permanent housing.

Sanders said wraparound services are crucial for individuals who might be struggling with substance abuse and mental health. “[If] you run a housing program for vulnerable people and you don’t have the wraparound services, it’s not fair to the individuals, it’s not fair to your neighbors, it’s not fair to all the people involved,” Sanders said.

Next steps The Tompkins County Continuum of Care system (CoC) facilitated research for a homelessness and housing needs assessment for the county, which was released in Spring 2022. The results showed that the county struggles with helping people transition out of homelessness and had a higher rate of homelessness per capita when compared to other CoCs in New York state.

Dominick Recckio ’16, communications director of Tompkins County administration, said via email that the county is planning to build a permanent emergency shelter. In July, the county issued a request for qualifications to begin assessing the development and building of the shelter.

The former Key Bank building, located at 300 N. Tioga St., will serve as the Code Blue shelter starting in early November. Code Blue is a mandated program that funds New York counties to provide shelter to people during cold months.

The Code Blue shelter at the former Key Bank building will offer services between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m.

O utside of those hours, clients will have to access alternate communal locations for warmth, like the Human Services Building Lobby at 320 W. Martin Luther King Jr. St. In August, the Ithaca Common Council formally created an encampment response coordinator position. City Manager Deb Mohlenoff ’92 said the position will be part-time, non-benefits eligible and is not a role that is dedicated to outreach within the unhoused population specifically.

Mohlenoff said the coordinator will be in a text thread with representatives of local nonprofits the city partners with and will coordinate for further support if they find a new encampment. Mohlenoff said the city contacts three local nonprofits: OAR, REACH and Second Wind Cottages.

“It’s really grassroots,” Mohlenoff said. “Whoever can respond, responds. We start the communication.”

Mohlenoff said she also hopes to establish a working group at some point to reflect on the state of homelessness in Ithaca and send a list of recommendations to the Common Council.

“The city is in an incredibly tough spot,” Mohlenoff said. “We don’t have human service agencies that provide services that people need. But a lot of the people are looking at the city, like, ‘Hey city, why aren’t you solving the problem?’ We don’t have the right tools in our toolbox. … We still have a lot of work to do, but I am trying to publicly demonstrate that the city is committed to putting significant resources into the issues.”

Editorial: Ithaca’s unhoused population requires assistance The Village House is one of the only initiatives attempting to provide resources for unhoused youth in Ithaca, and many people will lose their housing and employment if the space closes. If Ithacans are truly committed to the safety and well-being of young people, then supporting initiatives like the Village House is imperative in order to further that collective goal.

Systemic issues like these prompt fervent discussions, but actions taken in order to actually help can be few and far between. Keeping the Village House open until the end of the year is a cause that the community should support if they have the means. Homeless youth in particular need the support of the community in order to thrive. If community members cannot donate, spreading the information throughout their personal and social networks or donating time are other ways to assist the organization.

Currently, the organization has enough money to keep the house open through November because of a grassroots funding campaign launched at the start of October. While Sunflo er House has not advertised its own goal for fundraising, Opportunities, Alternatives, and Resources of Tompkins County has a page for donations. Community members can help by raising awareness and urging action by the city.

The construction of a Code Blue temporary shelter in Ithaca is a band-aid for a deeper problem. Additional assistance is necessary in order to help a problem that has long been an issue in Ithaca, as well as nationwide.

Issues like rising cost of living as well as a lack of wraparound care services are problems that need to be prioritized. Based on 2023 data from the United States Interagency Council on Homelessness, only 37 homes are available per 100 extremely low-income renters. In Ithaca, 74% of the population are renters and 50% of that population is cost-burdened, according to a report by Ithaca Times journalist Matt Dougherty.

Unhoused individuals deserve wraparound care services and the assistance of those who are able to give. In the absence of government funding, it is up to the community to support the least fortunate in the area. The unhoused crisis across the U.S. is a frustrating systemic issue, but anyone can help through local community service initiatives or donating to Ithaca-based organizations, like Sunflower House and the illage.

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Year In Review

Climate Action Plan for Ithaca to be rewritten justice communities. According to a budget summary released Nov. 6, the Common Council allocated $550,000 Published nov. 14 to capital projects to Justice50 initiatives in 2025.

According to the National Institute of Health, racialIn September, Rebecca Evans, director of sustainly and socioeconomically marginalized communities in ability for the City of Ithaca, posted on LinkedIn that the U.S. experience greater impacts from flood events, she scrapped the city’s Climate Action Plan she wrote extreme heat and infectious diseases. Ithaca has a poverin 2023 and will rewrite it over the next six months to ty rate of 33.1% and according to a Cornell International include more climate justice-oriented goals.

Labor Relations Study in 2023, 58.8% of Black residents While Evans said she is unsure what the next steps make less than a living wage in Ithaca. of the new CAP will be, residents have been urging for Next steps for the CAP and Justice50 a community-focused plan that would bring in local Kayla Matos, deputy director of the South Side Comclimate and social justice organizations to help plan munity Center and Ward 1 alderperson, said an initiative and combat climate change. was approved for a $550,000 capital project to help fund Evans announced in her LinkedIn post that she a low-barrier navigation center for people experiencing changed the five sectors of resiliency in the CAP to the homelessness in Ithaca. Matos said the project allowed five sectors of climate justice: labor, housing, racial equity, for the city to reach its Justice50 goal of allocating 50% electrical reliability and emergency response and evacuaof capital funds to climate justice communities. tion. Evans said that although she is rewriting the CAP, the Savannah Vega, sustainability planner for the City original version of the CAP was not adopted by the city of of Ithaca, said the South Side is not officially desigIthaca and is not available to the general public. nated as a climate justice community and Ithaca will Evans said the previous Ithaca Green New Deal and conduct community surveys to be able to designate CAP did not resonate with many communities in Ithaca. which neighborhoods are categorized as such.

She said it ignored struggles people in Ithaca were fac“We did a preliminary look at some existing data ing that were amplified by the C VID-19 pandemic like … to help inform the current budget season decijob loss and struggles with maintaining housing. sions,” Vega said. “Would I be surprised if South Side “The truth was that most people didn’t have the [was a climate justice community]? No, but we can’t capacity to have climate change as even on their top designate any [community] yet.” five priority list, which is totally valid,” Evans said.

Matos said that listening sessions and focus groups Evans said she is both excited and intimidated to are an ideal way to build the new CAP. She said it is important to use institutions in the Ithaca community like the SSCC to host the listening groups.

“Within our Justice50 framework, 10% of our budget … essentially would go to participatory budgeting and [we could pay] folks to interact with us and interact in these focus groups and share these thoughts and that could go a long way [with the CAP planning],” Matos said.

Vega said the city has not made any firm decisions on how to conduct the participatory budgeting process yet, but said that paying residents to give their input on what to fund through Justice50 could be a possibility.

Matos also said the SSCC could be turned into a resiliency hub for The new Climate Action Plan ensures living wages, safe housing for all, racial justice and improving public health. climate-related issues. Matos said the

lucia iandolo/THE ITHACAN SSCC wants to purchase heating and

by ryan johnson

figure out how to structure the CAP, which will include an emergency response plan for climate disasters like flooding and power outages “How do we put the resources in place so that we can evacuate people if we need to, so we can get people the resources they need?” Evans said. “We’ll be doing some risk assessments to figure out how exactly climate change is going to impact [our community].”

Evans said the previous CAP focused on racial justice, energy efficienc , decarbonization of grid fuel, electrification of transportation, waste reduction and carbon capture. The new CAP focuses on ensuring good living wages, safe housing for all, racial justice, improving public health, rapid emergency response plans and electrical reliability.

“So what does [the new CAP] mean to all of the strategies that were encompassed in that previous climate action plan?” Evans said. “They’re still there, just further down the list [of climate needs]. All of those mitigation strategies are now just packed into those different sectors. So for example in order to provide safe, affordable housing, we need to ensure that cooling is accessible, the best way we can do that is electrification.

The change comes after the Common Council unanimously passed Justice50 on May 1. Justice50 is a climate justice policy that allocates 50% of the city’s capital funding per year to climate justice communities.

It will also require 40% of participants in future city workforce development programs to be from climate

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news - greater ithaca affairs cooling stations so Ithaca residents who do not have access to those resources can shelter during extreme heat or cold.

“Where [the resiliency hub] ties into the [CAP] is that city resources are being used to essentially develop an institution [that] provides to these marginalized communities … and through these resources, they will be able to better serve the community’s needs,” Matos said.

Matos said the new CAP will serve as a more equitable framework for the IGND and the city will be able to achieve more climate justice action in disenfranchised communities.

Sustainability and Climate Justice Commission Meeting In a slideshow titled “Dignity Toward Decarbonization,” Evans presented her plans to change the CAP to the Sustainability and Climate Justice Commission on Oct. 21.

“All of the concerns about climate change have always come down to how they will ultimately impact people,” Evans said during the presentation. “So why don’t our climate goals reflect that? Localities, cities, states … all over the world have climate-related goals and they all frame it within the context of a net reduction in carbon as the number one priority.”

Evans said that framing the CAP in this way was problematic because it focused on the parts of sustainability that people are less likely to relate to, like emissions.

“It’s often really hard to grasp for the average person to understand the impact for future generations,” Evans said. “That’s often how we’re talking about climate change but for most people, we’re not worried about future generations. We’re worried about putting food on the table.”

Sioban Hull, a board member of the Sustainability and Climate Justice Commission, said during the Oct. 21 meeting that many of the public comments made by community members at the meeting were about the lack of community involvement from Ithaca residents. Many public comments urged the commission to create a CAP that includes community involvement from various organizations and individuals in Ithaca. “[They feel that] the city is pursuing these large projects that are perhaps decreasing carbon but aren’t really tangibly connected with their lives in any way,” Hull said.

Hull said in an interview with The Ithacan that she has been doing organizing work with the Sunrise Movement Ithaca since 2021 and that the commission has been meeting for over a year now to provide input to the city about climate action.

Hull said the city and climate organizations have been struggling to get information initiatives out to community members, particularly the ones who are most impacted by climate change.

“When we are talking about the [IGND], it feels really disconnected from people’s lives,” Hull said. “I think this shift in the CAP is … a direct effort to try and engage these communities who aren’t already being reached.”

Two Cornell students found in Fall Creek Gorge in unrelated incidents

Two Cornell University students were found in Fall Creek Gorge on Nov. 10 in what first responders believe are unrelated incidents — one was found dead and the other was hospitalized.

courtesy of ithaca fire department

by lorien tyne Published nov. 12 On Nov. 10, Cornell University sophomore Winter Knutson was found dead in Fall Creek Gorge. Earlier that morning a woman — only identified as a Cornell student as of this time — was found unresponsive after falling into another section of the Fall Creek Gorge.

The unidentified student was airlifted from a field on Cornell’s campus to Robert Packer Hospital in Sayre, Pennsylvania. First responders have stated that the two incidents are not believed to be connected.

According to the IPD and IFD press releases, at around 10:39 a.m. Knutson’s body was found in the water shortly after first responders were dispatched at 10:30 a.m. The Ithaca Police Department, along with the Ithaca Fire Department, Bangs Ambulance and Cornell University Police Department responded to the report of a “possible deceased individual in the water below the bridge in the 800 block of Stewart Avenue.”

The IPD report said that upon arriving at the scene, first responders observed someone in the water “obviously deceased.” The body was then removed from the gorge over the course of three hours as first responders rappelled down to the water, placed the person in a carrier and used a rope system to bring them out of the gorge.

As of Nov. 12, all police reports state there is no indication of foul play apparent at this time but that the investigation is ongoing.

Knutson’s identity was not made public until a

message was released Nov. 11 by Ryan Lombardi, vice president for student and campus life at Cornell.

The unidentified student’s condition is unknown as of 11 a.m. Nov. 12 and the incident is being investigated by the Ithaca Police Department.

The Tompkins 911 Center received a call around 1:10 a.m. Nov. 10 that an individual had fallen near the Stewart Avenue bridge, according to the Ithaca Fire Department’s statement. Ithaca Police, Bangs Ambulance and Cornell Environmental Health and Safety also responded. The student was stabilized by first responders and recovered from the gorge within an hour-and-a-half, according to the IFD’s statement. The student was transported to Jessup Field by ambulance and brought to the trauma center by a Life Net air ambulance.

The IFD also stated that at around 10:50 a.m. Nov. 10 — during the recovery of Knutson’s body — a passerby reported they thought they saw a person jump into the gorge by the Giles Street pedestrian bridge. No person was located after first responders searched the area.

Emergency resources Ithaca College emergency resources Office of Public Safety: 607-274-333 On-call counselors are available from 5 p.m. to 8:30 a.m. Monday-Friday, and 24/day on weekends, holidays, and during campus closures: 607-274-3136 General emergency resources Trevor Project suicide hotline: 866-488-7386 National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 988

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Year In Review

Museum of the Earth faces closure

by Kaeleigh Banda Published feb. 5 The Paleontological Research Institution and its connected locations — the Museum of the Earth and the Cayuga Nature Center — are at risk of shutting down after the institution’s donors, who have not been revealed publicly, did not fulfill a large donation. In an effort to save the museum, Cornell University students, senior Emily Cavanaugh and doctoral candidate William Hooker, started a petition and letter-writing campaign to gather support for the museum to get the attention of prospective donors.

The PRI has been building its platform since its founding by Cornell alum Gilbert Harris in 1932. Harris created the PRI because he wanted to have a space to publish his paleontological journals and store his fossil collections. It has since expanded to house over 7 million fossils.

Warren D. Allmon, director of the PRI since 1992, said the donors made pledges of over $30 million, but stopped giving money in late 2023. Allmon said the PRI has received community support since it first lost its consistent donation, but it still needs a large amount of donations to stay afloat.

“The donor was giving us more than $1 million a year, and it just disappeared,” Allmon said. “Every dollar has helped us enormously to keep the museum open and keep functioning the way our audiences want us to.”

Petition to save the Museum of the Earth The Museum of the Earth is a public museum located on 1259 Trumansburg Road in Ithaca. After it was created in 2003, the museum has continued to expand its exhibits and add more art to the building. The museum’s exhibits showcase prehistoric life through murals and fossil displays that take guests on a chronological journey from the big bang to climate change’s impact on the future. The museum also serves a dual purpose as a community science education center and a research hub for college students.

Cavanaugh and Hooker started a petition to save the museum Jan. 20, and as of Feb. 5, the petition has received 3,817 signatures. Cavanaugh said she and Hooker reached out to as many people as they could through their networks at the Pangea Club and Cornell.

“We knew everything that was going on for the museum and we were just really upset by it,” Cavanaugh said.

“We started a letter-writing campaign because we knew that that was a concrete way that could make changes. …

Not everyone has the time or the access to write a letter, so we thought that a petition would be a really effective way to get people involved without a lot of effort.”

Hooker is in his first year of pursuing a doctoral degree in geological sciences. He said he originally transferred to Cornell in his sophomore year of undergrad.

Before he committed to Cornell, Hooker said he learned about the museum and thought it was a cool place.

“What really attracted me to transferring to Cornell was the Museum of the Earth,” Hooker said.

Online educational resources In addition to the local spaces in Ithaca, the PRI has a global reach because of its online scientific resources. Amanda Schmitt Piha, associate director for philanthropy and communications at the PRI, said many teachers were concerned about how outdated their textbooks were, so the PRI made the books widely accessible and free to anyone who needs it.

“We’re really determined to help educate the educators,” Schmitt Piha said. “The educators of the world have a lot of power to educate the next generation of learners and the next generation of explorers. So, [we are] making sure that they have up to date scientific resources.

Jansen Smith, assistant professor at the University of Minnesota Duluth, has been collaborating with Cavanaugh and Hooker on their efforts. Smith got a doctorate degree from the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at Cornell in Spring 2018 and was a guest lecturer at Ithaca College from 2018 to 2019.

Smith said climate change education helps create an informed citizen base, which will impact what people buy and what decisions they make in their daily lives.

“Climate change is impacting you every day whether you notice or not,” Smith said. “And until somebody helps you see that, you might not appreciate it or understand what the big deal is. [The museum] really fills

this critical need in society to give people information, so that they can make an informed decision.”

The Cayuga Nature Center In addition to the museum’s closure, the Cayuga Nature Center has been impacted by this financial loss. The center became part of the PRI in 2013, but has been hosting summer camps independently since the 1980s. Ithaca College sophomore Allison Lewis, a camp counselor at the Cayuga Nature Center, said she received an email Jan. 21 that informed her of the center’s changes. The email wrote that the summer camp would not be held in the summer of 2025 and that the remaining animals at the center will be rehoused.

“It is all really sad,” Lewis said. “Growing up here, my field trips were to the museum and the nature center. A piece of my childhood won’t be around anymore. … This really impacts a lot of people.”

Next steps for the PRI Allmon said the next step to achieve long-term stability for the PRI is to find another organization or donor to partner with. Until then, Allmon said the short-term goal is to raise the money to pay off their $3 million mortgage.

“What we need is breathing room to retire that mortgage and to have these partnerships figured out,” Allmo said. “And that means time. That means that donations of any size — even $5 — are important.”

It is uncertain how long the museum will remain open and what the future of the PRI looks like. Hooker said that despite the museum’s financial challenges, it is still committed to remaining affordable for visitors.

“No matter what your career is or what your intended path is, [the museum] teaches you to think critically and to question the world around you,” Hooker said.

Cornell University students Emily Cavanaugh and Will Hooker started a petition to save the Museum of the Earth on Trumansburg Road on Jan. 20. As of Feb. 5, it has 3,817 signatures.

Lucia iandolo/THE ITHACAN

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Cayuga Health and Arnot Health merge to expand medical services

by Jessie Romero Silver Published feb. 19 On Jan. 7, Cayuga Health and Arnot Health announced their merger, now known as Centralus Health. The goal of the merger is to provide a streamlined health care system and a larger community reach. Because Ithaca College’s Student Health Services merged with the Cayuga Health System in 2022, students will be able to access new resources and technologies from Arnot Health.

Centralus Health will provide health care services to people in the Southern Tier, Finger Lakes and the Central New York Region. It will provide care for five hospitals in New York state including Cayuga Medical Center. The partnership between Arnot Health and Cayuga Health was made in order to provide these regions and hospitals with a wider array of services, the

Stallone, Cayuga Health’s current CEO, will be the CEO of Centralus Health while Jonathan Lawrence, CEO of Arnot Health, will be the executive vice president of Centralus Health.

“As health systems face increasing financial and workforce challenges, this partnership enables us to leverage shared resources, increase efficiencies and ultimately lower operational costs,” Lawrence said in a press release.

Jennifer Metzgar, director of Student Health Services for Cayuga Health at Ithaca College, said the main change students will see on campus is that the Cayuga Health System, including the Hammond Health Center, will be implementing EPIC, an electronic health record system.

“EPIC will help patients have more access to their health care providers and to their medical information, but it will also help providers share information amongst each other,” Metzgar said. “So I see that as the major benefit to Ithaca College students.”

On Jan. 7, Cayuga Health and Arnot Health announced that they will be merging. The Hammond Health Center will now be implementing EPIC, an electronic health record system.

Courtesy of WETM 18 News, Courtesy of the Ithaca Times, Kaeleigh Banda/The ithacan

ability to reach underserved populations and support local health care delivery.

Melissa Tourtellotte, vice president of Marketing and Communications at Cayuga Health, declined to comment. Danielle R. De Souza, senior public information officer at the New York State Department of Health also declined to comment.

The plans for Centralus Health are awaiting official approval from the New York State Department of Health before the new system and administration changes can be implemented. Upon approval, Martin

Original merger of Hammond Health Center and Cayuga Health Employees of the college’s Student Health Services used to be completely independent of the Cayuga Health System. In August 2022, IC joined the Cayuga Health System’s network. The partnership was created in hopes of providing IC students with wider access to services — including expanded hours and mental health services — and to take some of the financial burden of rising health care costs off of the college.

Both organizations are working toward expanding

their services such as providing more access to emergency services, critical cardiac care, cancer care, labor and delivery and NICU long term care.

Despite the change, not all students feel confident in Centralus Health’s promises. Senior Chris Morris said he has been going to the Hammond Health Center as well as the Cayuga Medical Center –– a hospital within the Cayuga Health System –– since coming to IC in 2021, which was before the merger.

Morris said he has not had issues with the quality of care at the Hammond Health Center except that he gets referred off campus to the Cayuga Medical Center more now since they partnered with the college.

“The process from going from Hammond to Cayuga has not been beneficial to me,” Morris said. “Every time I go to Hammond they’ve told me this is what’s wrong, here’s your medication. But when it’s time to … go to Cayuga, that’s where my problems lie.”

Morris said he visited the Cayuga Medical Center earlier this month and experienced poor treatment while seeking immediate care.

“They’re either understaffed or they definitely have a system that’s flawed,” Morris said. “So [I’m] not the biggest fan.”

National concerns Due to the rising cost of providing health care, mergers between health care systems are becoming more frequent. In 2022, at the time of IC’s partnership with Cayuga Health, there were 49 hospital mergers in the U.S. compared to 72 in 2024.

Mary Bentley, associate professor in the Department of Health Sciences and Public Health, said she is not surprised by the merger between Cayuga Health and Arnot Health.

“It is a trend nationally,” Bentley said. “Many little hospitals can’t make it and are subsumed under a larger corporate structure.”

Following the previous merger students are now required to show an insurance card and pay a copay in order to access the Hammond Health Center’s services.

IC no longer subsidizes the whole cost of services and instead charges students through their insurance provider.

Metzgar said she wants to assure students that mental health services provided by the Center for Counseling & Psychological Services will not be affected by any future changes to the Hammond Health Center following this merger.

“I think that the merger is more about planning [for] the health care needs of the community,” Metzgar said. “[Cayuga Health and Arnot Health] have a very large vision in mind … which should help us so we can all bring each other’s strengths to the table.”

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Year In Review

Local ICE presence prompts community action

by Noa Ran-Ressler Published feb. 6 O n Jan. 30, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement conducted operations in Ithaca. According to a press release from the Department of Justice, ICE arrested Jesus Romero-Hernandez at Tompkins County Department of Social Services.

Romero-Hernandez, 27, is a Mexican citizen who has been charged with entering the U.S. illegally seven times. Romero-Hernandez was serving time in the Tompkins County jail after being locally convicted of assault in late 2023. On Jan. 8, 2024, Romero-Hernandez was federally charged with illegal reentry into the country — the eighth instance. Romero-Hernandez completed his local assault sentence before the DOJ moved forward with federal prosecution.

Romero-Hernandez completed his time served and was released from local jail Jan. 28, despite a federal warrant and the DO J calling for the Tompkins County Sheriff ’s Department to hold Romero-Hernandez until ICE could detain him. The Tompkins County Sheriff and the Ithaca Police Department — as a sanctuary county and a sanctuary city — did not aid federal immigration authorities in their targeted pursuit of Romero-Hernandez.

County Sheriff Derek O sborne has come under scrutiny from the DO J for the decision made by county law enforcement not to aid ICE in its pursuit of Romero-Hernandez.

Shannon Alvord, public health communications coordinator at Tompkins County Whole Health, released a statement to the media Jan. 30 to dispute the DO J’s claim that Tompkins County law enforcement disrupted ICE operations: “The Sheriff and his staff acted consistently with New York state law and judicial decisions, county policy, guidance of the New York Attorney General’s Office and guidance of the New York State Sheriffs’ Association. There was no interference with federal immigration enforcement efforts. Moreover, DOJ’s assertion that the Tompkins County Sheriff did anything to put federal law enforcement officers in danger is false and offensive. The safety of all law enforcement is our top priority. In contrast, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) knew exactly when the individual in question was going to be released and had every opportunity to come to the Tompkins County jail to obtain the individual in question without any need for a pursuit or other incident.”

What we know about Jesus Romero-Hernandez Romero-Hernandez appeared in court via Zoom on Jan. 31 to set plans for his next hearing. He was

Following an ICE arrest of an undocumented immigrant in Ithaca, more than 100 community members gathered on The Commons on Feb. 2 in support of the county’s sanctuary status.

Marissa Moschella/THE ITHACAN

held in O neida County jail until his set hearing on Feb. 4, when he appeared in federal court in Syracuse. The federal judge determined that he should remain in custody due to four outstanding misdemeanors and a record of resisting arrest.

Romero-Hernandez’s public defender, Gabriela Wolfe, declined a request for comment. Tamara Thomson, public information officer for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Northern District of New York, also declined a request for comment.

National context Ithaca has been a sanctuary city since Feb. 1, 2017.

According to the Center for Immigration Studies, there are 16 sanctuary counties in New York state, including Tompkins County, which declared sanctuary status in its Feb. 21, 2017, resolution “Public Safety For All” — 20 days after the city’s declaration. Albany and New York City are also listed as designated sanctuary cities.

There are approximately 600 sanctuary jurisdictions in the U.S., according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform. The exact definition of a sanctuary city is dependent on the individual city’s policy. Ithaca, for example, outlines its policy in its city code. The precedent for sanctuary jurisdictions comes from the 10th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which states that the federal government cannot force state or local governments to enforce federal regulations. This makes compliance with federal immigration entities, like ICE, a voluntary act rather than a compulsory one.

President Donald Trump has a history of targeting sanctuary cities. In his first term, he restricted sanctuary cities’ access to federal funding, an order which former President Joe Biden rescinded. Since taking office for his second term, Trump has extended federal immigration enforcement’s scope. The president signed an executive order, “Protecting the American People Against Invasion,” which explicitly addresses sanctuary jurisdictions in Section 17: “The Attorney General and the Secretary of Homeland Security shall, to the maximum extent possible under law, evaluate and undertake any lawful actions to ensure that so-called ‘sanctuary’ jurisdictions, which seek to interfere with the lawful exercise of Federal law enforcement operations, do not receive access to Federal funds.”

Trump also signed the Laken Riley Act, which expands the power of federal agencies to report and detain undocumented immigrants. O ther immigration-related executive orders include denying citizenship to the U.S.-born children of undocumented immigrants and enforcing border protection.

Other sanctuary jurisdictions have felt the effects of recent policy changes. Heightened ICE presence has been reported in sanctuary cities with significant immigrant populations, including Chicago, New York and Los Angeles.

Community Response On Feb. 2, about 100 Ithaca community members

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news - greater ithaca affairs gathered on The Commons to protest ICE’s presence in Ithaca. Gatherers sang songs and chanted along with drums and small instruments.

Joanna Green, a local community organizer, attended the outdoor rally with fellow organizer, Amala Lane. Lane said that, together with Green, she is working on starting a Tompkins County branch of Indivisible, a hyper-local movement to support democracy.

Green said the rally was organized by the First Presbyterian Church of Ithaca in collaboration with other groups like Catholic Charities of Tompkins/Tioga.

“It’s so hard to know what’s going on,” Green said.

“We don’t have our [organizational] network set up yet to watch [ICE] very well.”

Ralliers then walked to the church for a forum, where the number of people increased to over 250.

The forum included speeches from Senior Pastor Kirianne Weaver, 1st Ward Alderperson Kayla Matos and members of the community.

“It’s really important for us to remember the people that can’t be here today, because they’re not feeling safe to come out to an event like this where you’re putting yourself on the line,” Weaver said.

Weaver said at the forum that the Trump administration’s immigration policies have already started to affect members of the community. She said she has heard of kids not going to playgroups and students not going to school out of fear. “[Families are] afraid that something’s gonna happen to them on the way,” Weaver said. “They’re afraid somebody’s gonna be waiting outside their school. We are here, in part, because we are trying to dispel that fear that’s been building.”

Matos said at the forum that the city’s Common Council would vote to reaffirm Ithaca’s status as a sanctuary city Feb. 5.

“Ithaca is still going to continue to maintain our

The First Presbyterian Church hosted a forum Feb. 2 where senior pastor Kirianne Weaver spoke. Weaver is one of several organizers working with the community to support immigrants.

Lorien Tyne/THE ITHACAN

status as a sanctuary city, even though we are recognizing that this could put a target on our back,” Matos said. “However, our elected officials are willing to take that fight.

In an interview with The Ithacan, 4th Ward Alderperson Patrick Kuehl said that the first time he heard of ICE presence in Ithaca was when the public found out via local publications and X. “We were informed about the presence of ICE in Ithaca, and the Ithaca Police Department, of course, followed all rules and regulations set forth for the city,” Kuehl said. “We’ll do everything … to make sure that people are protected and feel that Ithaca is

Protestors held up signs with phrases like “Melt the ice” and “No human being is illegal.”

Marissa Moschella/THE ITHACAN

a welcoming place for all people, regardless of where they’re coming from.”

Casey Verderosa, executive director of Ithaca Welcomes Refugees, said that although she has no legal expertise in sanctuary city laws, she is conscious of the timing of ICE’s presence in Ithaca.

“I wonder, since we are a sanctuary city, if the reason why this person was targeted at this time could have had something to do with the new administration,” Verderosa said.

Verderosa said she is concerned that ICE will not follow the law, citing instances of ICE purposely misleading people.

“I have a concern that [ICE] would maybe sweep people up who are not in these targeted categories of people with a criminal history, that they might just deport people who are good people, who came here on legal programs,” Verderosa said. “It feels like a lot of the newer ICE activity [is] very racially motivated and just out of a fear of people who are foreign and look different.”

For non-citizen members of the Ithaca community who do have documentation, Verderosa recommended that they carry documents with them, whether that’s a green card or a copy of the visa page from their passports.

Verderosa also said Ithaca Welcomes Refugees has arranged for some of its clients on temporary programs to get their asylum claims filed. She said that while the decisions on claims are pending, families can stay in the U.S. legally.

“We’re trying to prepare everybody — from the people we work with to our volunteers and our staff — on how to face ICE,” Verderosa said.

Editor-in-Chief Lorien Tyne and Assistant News Editor Julian DeLucia contributed reporting.

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Year In Review

Ithaca City School District under investigation for diversity event

by Kaeleigh Banda Published march 5 Diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives are being targeted by President Donald Trump’s administration, which has led to threats of federal funding cuts and restricted programming for educational institutions across the United States. The Ithaca City School District is under investigation by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights after the Equal Protection Project filed a complaint against ICSD for allegedly intentionally excluding white students from a DEI event.

In a letter sent to Luvelle Brown, superintendent of ICSD, and Sean Eversley Bradwell, the president of the ICSD Board of Education, on May 28, 2024, the EPP claimed that the Students of Color United Summit 2024 at Ithaca High School, scheduled for May 31, was limited to staff and students of color. The letter outlined why the EPP believes all the summit events held from 2021-24 are a form of racial exclusion. The EPP wrote that the event violates Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination based on race, color and national origin in programs that receive federal financial assistance. ICSD receives federal funding, which means it is at risk for funding

cuts if the district is found to be noncompliant with Title VI. O n Jan. 27, 2025, the DO E opened the investigation into whether or not ICSD treated students differently on the basis of race or ethnicity and if there was an intentional exclusion of white students.

Before the 2024 summit, the EPP wrote in the letter that the official SOCU Summit website required that students who register acknowledge that the event is a student of color only event. ICSD responded by sending a mass email to the school community.

“Please know that SOCU is open to all of our secondary students,” the statement said. “We apologize for any previous communication that included exclusionary language about the event. Anyone who wishes to attend on Friday is welcome!”

O n Jan. 20, Trump signed an executive order titled, “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing.” The federal DO E has been supporting the efforts of the Trump administration by removing or archiving over 200 web pages from the DO E website that contained DEI resources that were identified for removal. Also, some DOE employees that lead DEI initiatives were put on paid administrative leave.

“The U.S. Department of Education has taken action

to eliminate harmful Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives,” the DOE wrote in the press release.

“These actions are in line with President Trump’s ongoing commitment to end illegal discrimination and wasteful spending across the federal government.”

O n Feb. 14, the DO E released a Dear Colleague letter threatening to revoke federal funding for all schools and universities that do not remove all DEI initiatives. Sara Levy, associate professor and chairperson in the Department of Education at Ithaca College, said that even though the anti-DEI sentiments in the letter are not backed up by law, it is still threatening. “[Anti-DEI actions] are an attempt from this administration to violate the civil rights of a whole host of students and to really pull back on some of the initiatives that we know are important for student success, both at the higher education level and at the K-12 level,” Levy said. “It needs to be taken seriously.”

William Jacobson, clinical professor and director of the Securities Law Clinic at Cornell University, founded the EPP through the Legal Insurrection Foundation. Jacobson said DEI initiatives on college campuses should not be funded by taxpayers. He said support should be given to students based on background and circumstances, not their skin color.

Ithaca City School District is under investigation after a complaint was filed for allegedly intentionally excluding white students from a DEI event.

photo illustration by Oslene Vanyanbah and Lucia Iandolo/The ithacan

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Editorial: DEI programs are crucial for education

Sara Levy, associate professor and chairperson in the Department of Education at Ithaca College, said the college’s DOE is committed to its mission grounded in social justice and equity.

File pHoto/THE ITHACAN

“DEI at its core is a group-identity ideology, which treats students not as individuals, but as proxies for racial, ethnic or other identity groups,” Jacobson said.

“In this way it is dehumanizing to the individual, and frequently plays upon negative group stereotypes.”

The EPP wrote that it is requesting that the Office for Civil Rights hold ICSD accountable for its unlawful conduct. This includes imposing fines, initiating administrative action to suspend or terminate federal financial assistance and referring the case to the Department of Justice for judicial proceedings.

Levy said she feels the complaint against ICSD is wrongfully targeting the district.

“ICSD has done a really good job of trying to have a culturally responsive district,” Levy said. “I think that the district was well within the law and I really appreciate their efforts to address issues within the school and within the community.”

Levy said that despite pressure from the federal government to erase DEI initiatives, the college’s Department of Education is helping students learn strategies to build connections in classrooms and talk to each other with respect.

“Our mission and our department is grounded in social justice and equity,” Levy said. “Our students are asking all of these [questions about DEI] … and so we’re doing our best to help them find resources to learn more. We want to support them. We want to help them think critically about the world they live in.”

Shuzhan Li, assistant professor in the college’s Department of Education, said via email that even though policies impacting education are constantly shifting, it is important to resist restrictive policies.

“The scholarly and advocacy work that we do as educators does not cease,” Li said. “We just have to fi ure out how to navigate current climates with strategy and solidarity with each other.”

The anti-DEI sentiments also extend to higher

education. According to data from The Chronicle of Higher Education, 125 bills have been proposed across the U.S. to create legislation that would prohibit colleges from having diversity, equity and inclusion offices or staff, diversity statements in hiring processes, mandatory diversity training or race, sex, ethnicity or national origin considered in admissions or employment.

According to The New York Times, colleges that continue to offer scholarships and grants for students on the basis of their race or ethnicity are at risk of receiving funding cuts. Sophomore Marvin Juarez Espinoza, a music education and performance major at IC, said many DEI policies have made college accessible for him.

“It makes me a little nervous, especially as a person of color and coming from a low-income background, for how I’m gonna even afford school,” Juarez Espinoza said.

Juarez Espinoza said his music education classes at IC are preparing him for the DEI pushback by teaching him how to make his classroom adaptive to all kinds of learners and backgrounds. However, he said not all of his education classes go as deeply into DEI topics as they need to.

“I feel like we’re glossing over it — learning vocabulary, but not really learning about what truly goes on behind the scenes and how all those operations work,” Juarez Espinoza said. “One of the most important things that teachers can do is establish a community within their classroom where people respect each other.”

Levy said DEI initiatives work toward a society where all people are valued and make room for a wide range of knowledge.

“Either we believe that all students have value in the classroom, or we don’t,” Levy said. “Education must be paying attention to the way things have been and acting in ways that work towards equity, that work towards inclusion, that work towards belonging with an understanding that we are not there yet.”

Photo Editor Lucia Iandolo contributed reporting

Diversity, equity and inclusion has increasingly been coming under scrutiny by President Donald Trump’s administration, terminating former President Joe Biden’s Executive O rder 13985, “Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government.” In the wake of the removal, many businesses and schools no longer provide DEI training and education to their employees.

The official White House website calls the programs a “public waste and shameful discrimination.” But DEI programs are meant to do the exact opposite; DEI is the generic label given to the wide-ranging efforts that help ensure people of all backgrounds and abilities, specifically minority groups, have equal opportunities as their majority counterparts.

Despite narratives being pushed by the federal government, DEI programs are beneficial for everyone. Without knowing, everyone benefits from DEI initiatives throughout their daily life.

DEI makes sure that as a woman you get paid the same as a man doing the same job. In the same realm, it makes sure that you can’t be fired from a job based on your age, race or sexuality. DEI is the reason why your building has a ramp beside the stairs, and an elevator, so that those in wheelchairs can access the same spaces. While these are only a few examples, there are so many ways that each and every person in the U.S. benefits from DEI initiatives.

DEI programs in public schools ensure that every student has a fair chance to succeed. DEI aims to create learning environments that embrace and represent multiple different identities and perspectives. The role of DEI teachings is to build a more globally connected educational system that develops empathetic, diverse thinkers and allows students to not only recognize, but appreciate our increasingly diverse world.

Without DEI, we would not have special education programs, a crucial reason many students make it to graduation.

Diversity, equity and inclusion is not some scary concept coming to take away your rights, despite what some people may say. DEI in public schools is a necessity. Without it, our children may become sheltered. They need to see different types of people in real world contexts, not just on a screen. DEI teaches empathy, something that our country is currently greatly lacking.

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Year In Review

Election 2024

Lucia iandolo/the ithacan

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State and national ballot results PRESIDENT

DONALD TRUMP

KAMALA HARRIS

Trump’s economic plan outlines policies like cutting spending and making tax cuts permanent through the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. He plans to protect Medicare and promote competition between drug companies to decrease costs for citizens and lower energy prices like natural gas, coal and oil beyond record levels.

Harris’ economic plan includes expanding the child tax and a tax cut to help families pay for a child’s first year of life. According to her campaign, cutting the costs of expensive drugs will help make them more accessible. She also advocates to protect Americans from the climate crisis by maintaining the values of the IRA.

Winner U.S. SENATOR THE ECONOMY

HEALTH CARE

ABORTION

KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND Gillibrand’s campaign focuses on job growth and the establishment of small businesses through the Main Street Employee O wnership Act and increasing the minimum wage. She prioritizes hiring people from local communities.

Gillibrand opposes the privatization of Social Security and prioritizes health care for all New Yorkers.

In June 2023, Gillibrand passed the 9/11 health bill, which helps to ensure that first responders and 9/11 survivors can get access to health care.

In 2021, Gillibrand established efforts to fight for reproductive rights. This included a statewide public information campaign and the development of a patient bill of rights to inform women of their rights and legal protections.

Winner MICHAEL D. SAPRAICONE Sapraicone’s policy includes the restoration of a state and local tax deduction and the reversal of a $1 billion cut from the NYPD. Sapraicone supports blocking the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s congestion pricing program implemented in June.

Sapraicone supports Social Security and Medicare benefits for seniors. In 2021, he was appointed to the board of directors of Mount Sinai South Nassau.

In this role, he helped finance and develop projects at the hospital and oversee hospital functions.

Sapraicone is in favor of a seven-week abortion ban. He believes New York’s laws are too liberal but does not support a national abortion ban. Sapraicone thinks that abortion restrictions should be made by individual states.

O n Aug. 13, Sare protested the closure of the Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital in the Lower East side of Manhattan and spoke to the press about the closure being an example of big corporations looting vulnerable populations, like the sick and the elderly.

Sare does not have a clear stance on reproductive rights. Instead, the LaRouche party favors focusing on other issues, like implementing nuclear fusion energy as well as building electric rails that can connect the entire U.S.

DIANE SARE Sare’s plan states that commercials and investment banking should be separate from each other and that the National Bank should replace the Federal Reserves. Sare has proposed projects the U.S. could take part in that help develop the nation’s infrastructure.

N.Y. SENATOR THE ECONOMY

HEALTH CARE

EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT

LEA WEBB Webb's campaign said she helped pass $350 million for the Refundable Child Tax Credit in the NYS budget. She said she delivered $150,000 for workforce development initiatives with the Broome, Cortland and Tompkins County Chambers of Commerce.

Webb said she helped eliminate copays for insulin in New York. Her campaign site said she passed medical debt reforms that protect people from denial of care. She said she is committed to protecting access to reproductive and maternal health care.

Webb voted in favor of the Equal Rights Amendment in the New York Senate.

“When New Yorkers go to the polls to vote this coming November, they will have the opportunity to protect the right to abortion,” Webb said via email.

Winner MIKE SIGLER Sigler’s campaign site said he has experience making job creation easier through his role on the Industrial Development Agency in Tompkins County. He said he prioritizes giving funds to local governments, citing that the state withholds federal aid for Medicaid.

Sigler said he wants to provide resources to figh opioid addiction, suggesting putting a detox center in every county. His campaign site said he would like to see the state put forward bills that would fully cover cancer treatment in the New York state budget.

Sigler said he sees Prop 1 as a “Trojan horse” that uses abortion protections to pass protections on gender identity and gender expression.

“They’ve attached a bunch of other things to it, like allowing boys into girls sports,” Sigler said.

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Year In Review

Community discusses proposal aimed to protect against discrimination

by Trey Nitza Published oct. 2 The only proposal on the 2024 New York state ballot is an amendment to protect against unequal treatment.

Prop 1, also referred to as the Equal Rights Amendment Act, would expand legal protection against discrimination based on ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, gender identity and expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes and reproductive autonomy.

Caitlin Hunter, community organizer for Planned Parenthood’s region three, which includes Ithaca, said she has worked with local politicians on establishing legislative protections for LGBTQ+ individuals in Ithaca. Hunter said she thinks it is important for citizens to vote for Prop 1 because national abortion rights are no longer guaranteed by the federal constitution since Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022.

“The important thing to remember is that resolutions and laws can be overturned by whoever’s in power,” Hunter said. “When rights are cemented into our state constitution, it has more permanence and is harder to change, and that’s why we are working so hard to get this passed.”

If passed, this would be the first time discrimination against pregnancy or pregnancy outcomes would be explicitly defined as sex discrimination and protected against by a state constitution, according to the NYCLU. In 2017, Nevada adopted an amendment to its state Constitution that outlawed discrimination on the basis of sex and in 2022, it ratified an expansion of the ERA to ensure equal rights on the basis of race, color, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, disability, ancestry and national origin. Neither of the amendments included protections against sex discrimination based on pregnancy and pregnancy outcomes.

Prop 1 was passed by the state Senate and Assembly in two consecutive sessions in July 2022 and January 2023. In May 2024, a state Supreme Court Justice ordered that it be removed, citing that Democrats had made errors during the process of adding the ERA to the ballot, according to the New York Times. A New York appeals court heard the case and a panel of judges said those who filed to block the ERA missed the deadline to bring a lawsuit. Prop 1 was put back on the ballot in June.

According to a study from the Pew Research Center, 64% of the New Yorkers surveyed support abortion rights in all or most cases. First-year student Ana Kirsch said that even though New York largely supports abortion rights,

The Equal Rights Amendment protects against race, ethnicity and reproductive discrimination.

vivian rose/THE ITHACAN

she is concerned about the issue.

“I think that there’s a very real possibility that things like this could be taken away,” Kirsch said. “So it makes me feel safer to have something like this on the ballot to kind of reinsure that things like that, like reproductive health, won’t be taken away.”

Tompkins County Legislator Mike Sigler said Democrats are using the abortion issue on the amendment to push other agendas.

“No Republican in the state legislature is testing a change to [abortion] right now,” Sigler said. “And yet, they’ve attached a bunch of other things to it, like allowing boys into girls sports that a lot of people don’t support.”

Republicans have also claimed that Prop 1 would allow for minors to receive gender-affirming care without the need for their parents to give consent, calling it the “Parent Replacement Act,” according to the New York Times.

Linda Hoffmann, chair of the Tompkins County Democratic Committee, said these arguments do not accurately represent what the goal of the proposal is.

“People … in the opposition … feel that the amendment will allow minors to consent to a gender-affirming surgery [without parental approval],” Hoffman said. “That’s what we hear from the opposition, and those particular claims are very false. …

We do not want politicians controlling our rights and what we are entitled to. And this is extremely important across the board for all people in our county.”

According to the New York Board of Elections,

there is no mention of gender affirming surgery or parental approval in the amendment. The amendment will provide equal protection to trans people under law, but does not have any language about increasing minors’ privileges or taking away parental rights.

Kirsch said she feels reproductive rights might be so hard to guarantee because the opposition can overshadow the majority support.

“I think because the people that vote against it are so much louder in their opinions … [it] makes it a lot harder to hear the people that are for it … and that’s all the media talks about,” Kirsch said.

Hoffman said voters need to be made aware about Prop 1, and this can be done through simple reminders.

“In our particular county … poll workers will hand you your ballot in a folder. They will state to you there are two sides to your ballot, [so reminding people] they need to turn it over is very important,” Hoffman said.

Hunter said the most important aspect of Prop 1 is guaranteeing rights for as many people as possible.

“The key piece here is that it’s talking about protecting New Yorkers against state government discrimination,” Hunter said. “So in New York State, this moment is really important to protect all New Yorkers, no matter who you are, where you come from, who you love. This is the chance to protect them from government discrimination, because nobody should be discriminated against.”

Staff writer Eamon Corbo contributed reporting.

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news - election 2024

Task force leads voting registration initiative at Ithaca College

by Aela Shaw Published oct. 2 Ithaca College students, faculty and staff are heightening efforts to give students the tools and resources they need to vote. The Voter Registration Task Force is an ad hoc committee that promotes voter education on campus and is leading these efforts.

The idea to form the task force was born in Fall 2023, when members from the Tompkins League of Women Voters reached out via email to Communications Librarian Cathy Michael, now the chair of the task force. Michael said the league asked her to set up a voter information table on National Voter Registration Day. Doreen Hettich-Atkins, executive director of the Office of Student Affairs and Campus Life, said she helped form the task force in Spring 2024 with Dan Rogers, associate director of student involvement in the Office of Student Engagement Hettich-Atkins said she was in charge of promoting voter registration on campus more than a decade ago.

Her role was later taken over by the Office of Civic Engagement, which closed in 2016. The office reopened as the Center for Civic Engagement, which played an active part in voter registration during the 2020 election cycle. The center has not taken on that role in the same capacity preceding the 2024 elections, according to Hettich-Atkins. When Michael reached out in Fall 2023, Hettich-Atkins said she decided to take on the role on a large scale again.

“Some of us [in Student Affairs and Campus Life] looked around and went, ‘You know, there’s really not anybody managing this, and [2024] is going to be a big year,’” Hettich-Atkins said.

Hettich-Atkins said the committee receives a small stipend from the Office of the Vice President of Student Affairs and Campus Life to fund its outreach efforts. She said its main activities — tabling, putting up posters on campus and sending out Intercom posts — cost relatively little. A larger expense will be needed on Election Day, when the task force will provide a campus van that volunteers will use to drive students to the college’s designated polling location at Longview Senior Living.

Sophomore Joslyn Forcione recently joined the task force committee, hoping to create a social media presence for the group. She said she does not think students are aware that the committee exists or that they can become members.

“It’s not posted very much anywhere, [how to] join. It doesn’t seem, at least to the general college student population, like something they can be involved in,” Forcione said.

Committee members are engaging students with the topic of voting in the most direct setting: the classroom. Michael Trotti, professor in the Department of History and legal studies coordinator, said he delivers voting-related talks to first-year students in Ithaca Seminars and other classes with a wider variety of students.

Starting Sept. 16, Trotti said he gave a voter preparation talk to 24 required Ithaca Seminar classes. Trotti

From left, librarian Cathy Michael, junior Maria Lesser and Doreen Hettich-Atkins, executive director of the Office of Student Affairs and Campus Life, engage in the session "Be Vote Ready."

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

said he reached over 450 students during the noon-hour discussion periods on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

“As first-year students, this is, for all of them, going to be the first election they’re voting in,” Trotti said.

“So, it’s especially important to reach them.”

In 2016, Trotti began teaching a one-credit history course during federal election years called Voting: U.S. Elections in Historical Context. The course teaches students about historical voting patterns and the evolution of the U.S. party system. In Fall 2024, the course is being taught by his colleague Michael Smith, professor in the Department of History.

Tatiana Patrone, associate professor in the Department of Philosophy and Religion, was one of the ICSM professors who signed up her class to attend one of Trotti’s presentations. After the noon-hour discussion, Patrone said she spent her next class period debriefing about what they had learned and said students who had previously expressed disinterest in voting seemed more likely to vote.

“I think that going into the conversation, most of my students … were not interested in voting at all, and not because they had their minds not made up or anything like that, but literally because it’s a headache, and that’s sad,” Patrone said.

First-year student Angelina Caldo, one of Patrone’s students, said she went into Trotti’s presentation confused about registering. Afterward, Caldo said she and her classmates are prepared to vote for the first time “We were very excited,” Caldo said. “We had conversations … to help each other figure out how to register to vote, and we had a small group discussion after it [about our] thoughts, and it was all good vibes.”

For students studying at the college’s London Center, the U.S. Vote Foundation is assisting students in voting while abroad. The foundation is a nonprofit that consolidates election data and voter services for public use. The London Center held voter information events to teach students how to register and apply for absentee ballots.

Susan Dzieduszycka-Suinat, president and CEO of the U.S. Vote Foundation, said via email that the organization’s goal is to help every citizen participate in the democratic process, including overseas voters.

“If you care about your future, you should vote,” Dzieduszycka-Suinat said. “Don’t stand by and watch it when you have the power to participate.”

Forcione expressed a similar feeling and said students have the power to shape their future with their votes, and should not feel apathetic.

“There are a lot of people in this election that are counting on students not voting, and it’s very important to at least get our voice out there,” Forcione said.

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Year In Review

Tompkins County works to make voting more accessible

The Tompkins County Board of Elections has worked to make voting more accessible through accessible voting machines and in-person events.

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

by Taylor Borash Published oct. 9 As voters across the nation prepared to head to the polls Nov. 5, Tompkins County advocacy groups took extra steps to make the voices of marginalized populations heard by preventing roadblocks specific to each community.

Voters with disabilities The U.S. Election Assistance Commission reported that 17.7 million adults with disabilities cast their vote in the 2020 general election. The commission also reported that about 11% of these voters had some type of difficult voting. There is no available data on the turnout of voters with disabilities specific to ompkins County.

Andrea Champlin, advocacy and support specialist at the Finger Lakes Independence Center, said that even if voting is physically accessible to voters with disabilities, it is not always a primary concern on top of other daily needs.

“At the end of the day, it kind of is another chore that you have to do,” Champlin said. “When you are already struggling to meet your basic transportation needs, medical needs, any of those things, voting can just be one of those things that doesn’t get prioritized.”

Champlin said there are also physical roadblocks, like a lack of accessible transportation, that may be preventing adults with disabilities from accessing polling locations.

“We are a rural county,” Champlin said. “Folks in the city might have an easier time, but [in] those rural areas, it’s really tricky to get around and there’s limited transportation.”

Despite these barriers, the Tompkins County Board of Elections increased accessibility for voters with disabilities who are able to make it to polling locations by installing new accessible voting machines for the March 2024 village elections. These ClearMark voting machines will also be used during the 2024 general election.

Champlin said these machines have multiple different functions for voters with a variety of disabilities, including hearing impairments, visual impairments or script impairments.

“There are so many options,” Champlin said.

“There’s a sip-and-puff option, they have a joystick, almost like a video game controller. The screen was a touch screen, so if that worked better for people, they could do that. … You could also change how the screen tilted, so if someone was in a wheelchair … they could adjust it. … It was really, really cool.”

The machines also include headphones for voters with visual impairments to listen to their ballot options and a touch screen feature to allow voters to adjust the size of their ballot.

Jeff Boles, advocacy specialist at FLIC, said that although these machines are a step in the right direction for Tompkins County, it is hard to come up

with a solution that will be perfect for every person with a disability.

“It depends on the person and the disability involved,” Boles said. “It’s pretty difficult to come up with something that’s 100% accessible to everyone.”

Older voters In the 2020 general election, voter turnout was reported to have increased with age, with adults ages 65-74 having the highest voter turnout at roughly 76%, according to the United States Census Bureau.

The only exception to this was the turnout for adults ages 75+, which was roughly 72%. There is no available data on older voter turnout specific to Tompkins County, which is home to approximately 11,525 residents over the age of 75.

Breelan Nash, recreation and community partnerships director at Longview Senior Living Community, said that in her experience, the older adults she works with are highly interested in voting.

“We have residents who are over 100 years old, so they were around when women … didn’t have the right to vote,” Nash said. “They remember … their mothers talking about not being able to vote. So it is incredibly important to provide opportunities for residents to both register … and to go out and vote.”

Nash said the staff at Longview communicate with residents through newsletters and flyers when elections are approaching to make sure they know how

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and when to vote. Nash said the Tompkins Board of Elections has also helped spread the word. “[The Board of Elections has] bent over backward,” Nash said. “They’ve done an amazing job offering to come to Longview to … set up tables before lunches just to make sure that people have the opportunity [to register].”

For the 2024 general election, Longview is the main polling location for South Hill, meaning that Longview residents will have an easier time casting their votes because they will no longer have to travel to a different location. Nash said both the residents and staff at Longview are excited for the opportunity.

“We received a call from the Board of Elections asking … to have a discussion about Longview being a polling place,” Nash said. “In talking with staff and residents, there was very positive feedback. … We are happy to be able to do it.”

Unhoused voters The most recent available data on how many adults experiencing homelessness turn out to vote each year is from 2012, and there is no newer data on this topic currently available. Between the months of May and September, there are approximately 60 people experiencing unsheltered homelessness in Tompkins County.

Simone Gatson, housing specialist and coordinated entry lead at Continuum of Care, said via email that there is no existing voter advocacy group for people experiencing homelessness in Tompkins County.

“Creating, funding and implementing a program to help unhoused people to vote has not come up as a priority for the people with lived experience we engage with,” Gatson said via email. “People are struggling with their day-to-day survival and ability to meet their basic needs of food, water, sanitation, and shelter with dignity. We lack the programs and funding locally to support these basic needs, so expanding access to meet that need is our primary focus.”

Gatson also said the Continuum of Care would support a program to help unhoused people vote if there was access to necessary resources like funding,

News - election 2024 staffing and programming People experiencing homelessness can register to vote in New York state by listing a nearby shelter, religious center or P.O. box as their mailing address and indicating a street corner or park as their residence instead of a traditional home address. These descriptions cannot be used as mailing addresses, but the same address can be used for both a home and mailing address if it is for a community building like a shelter or religious center.

Student voters In the 2020 general election, 55% of voters ages 18-29 turned out to cast a vote. This is the highest recorded percentage for the age group since 1972. O f all the youth who voted in the 2020 general election, about 70% did so either through mail-in voting or early in-person voting.

This year, the polling location for Ithaca College students who list the college as their residence when registering to vote is at Longview. The college’s Voter Registration Task Force is working to improve student access to the location by implementing a van system that will allow faculty and staff volunteers to drive students to and from Longview from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Nov. 5.

Sihaya Moraleda, assistant director in the Office of Access, Opportunity & Achievement at Ithaca College, said she volunteered to drive students to and from Longview as a way to give back to the community.

“I’ve worked with a lot of students on campus who don’t have their own transportation, so I didn’t want … anything to be a barrier for them to vote,” Moraleda said.

Ellie Fulmer, associate professor in the Department of Education and co-director of the Center for Faculty Excellence, said she volunteered to be a driver because she thinks it is important to increase accessibility for student voters.

“As the education department, we sent out a reminder to all of our students … to register to vote,” Fulmer said. “Part of the messaging … that we sent to students is just to encourage a demographic who historically has had less voting representation than other groups.”

Sally Grubb, co-president and chair of the voter services committee of the League of Women Voters of Tompkins County, said that if enough people come together to vote for a person or cause, their votes will have more impact than they realize.

“If you don’t shout loud enough, people can’t hear you,” Grubb said. “If six people get together and push for something, they can make a difference. If 20 people get together and push for something, they’ll molly teska/THE ITHACAN make more difference.”

Editorial: Diversity of opinion on campus must be encouraged Ithaca College is well-known as a liberal leaning space — it was ranked as #22 in Princeton Review’s list of “Most Liberal Leaning Students.” This does not mean that we should discourage academic discourse that includes conservative voices. In fact, the opposite is necessary. When students are constantly hearing the same ideas or talking points, this means that they are existing in an echo chamber that narrows their viewpoint of the world.

The fact that The Ithacan could not find conservative students to speak to regarding the election process on this campus for this election issue does not mean that conservative students do not exist: instead, it points to a pattern that is dangerous in any political context, which is a reluctance to divest from group patterns of thinking because of the fear of retaliation. This is also true for many people who hold leftist ideas, although those are often more welcome on college campuses.

According to the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, students’ concerns about self-censorship have declined — 17% of students surveyed in 2024 said they were afraid to speak their mind because of responses from peers, faculty and administration, compared to 22% in 2022. But conservative students expressed the highest rates of self-censorship, with 34% stating that they self-censored “very often” in comparison to 15% of liberal students.

However, censorship of other peoples’ voices have increased on college campuses. Also according to FIRE data from the same report released in September, 68% of students said that intimidating a speaker into stopping their speech, also known as the “heckler’s veto,” should occasionally be allowed.

These statistics show a concerning rise in practices that inhibit free speech on college campuses across the U.S., and an increasingly tumultuous climate in relation to political speech on campuses.

Hot button issues often lead to a silencing of campus voices in favor of one seemingly united ideology. If the college is truly a place that wants to facilitate learning and open conversation, the attitudes of students regarding each others’ political stances must lose their rigid partisanship and burning polarity. If an opinion is more prevalent, that does not mean it is the correct one. If an opinion stands out in a crowd of similar voices, that also does not make it revolutionary. But if an opinion is never heard at all, it cannot be considered and will not create an opportunity for growth.

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Year In Review

Campus Commentary

Here’s what the campus is saying about the election MAREN NAZAR

FIRST-YEAR STUDENT “Third party voting is not a good idea right now. It seems like a great idea because you might vote for the camp that you align with more. But right now, where we are in the process, it’s impossible for a third party to win, so you will be granting votes to the party you like the least. If you do vote for a third party, I think it’s possible someday, but [not] in this election.”

“I’m worried about how it is going to go for me as a woman, for my friends who are women and just in general for [legal] rights. It’s very stressful, because the [outcome of the presidential election] could be significantly different both ways.”

CHARLY SLUSSER SENIOR

“I think there’s a lot at stake, no matter who you’re planning on voting for, and so youth involvement is really important in this election. It’s really easy for me to vote for who my parents or friends are gonna vote for. When you’re going in to vote for such an important figure, [you need] to have background knowledge and understand what they stand for.””

SAMANTHA FUNK JUNIOR

MARLEY SOLEIL

FIRST-YEAR STUDENT “As a gay Black woman, I feel that if Donald Trump gets another term, my life would be in danger. I feel like my reproductive rights would be at risk from a national ban. I wouldn’t be able to marry who I want to marry, and I fear that a lot of the laws that have been put in place to make sure that Black people have equal footing in this country would be taken away and seen as [diversity, equity and inclusion].”

SAM ALDRIDGE

ADMISSIONS COUNSELOR “If you don’t vote, that is still voting. I call that “boo” voting. This is your one time to throw it back at the powers that be and make your voice heard. You should do so...

I’m voting for Harris, although I’m not super excited. I don’t like her unquestioning support of the State of Israel. I don’t like what she says about expanding fracking in Pennsylvania. I don’t like how she is giving more and more over to right-wing policies.”

“I’m very excited to vote for [Kamala Harris] and not an older white man; I feel like voting in Indiana, in a red state, means my vote matters.

There’s millions of those who feel like [their] voice doesn’t matter. But it’s the foundation of our country, it’s the foundation of our entire governmental system. So it’s important, and you should be proud to participate.”

JILAYNE KISTNER FIRST-YEAR STUDENT

Editor’s Note: These responses were selected through brief, impromptu interviews. They are not representative of the entire Ithaca College community.

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News - election 2024

Campus community reacts to results of 2024 general election

by Vivian Rose, Prakriti Panwar, Julian DeLucia, and Matthew Telyczka Published nov. 7 On Nov. 6, voters across the U.S. were informed that Donald Trump won the 2024 presidential election. Senate Republicans have the majority and as of Nov. 6 gained three seats, while House Democrats lost one seat. As of Nov. 7, the house majority still remains unclear as races continue to be tallied.

In New York state, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand got reelected to the state senate and Josh Riley took District 19 in a close congressional race. Lea Webb also won reelection as the New York state senator for District 52, and Anna Kelles won as state assemblymember. Everyone elected to office in the state is affiliated with the Democratic Party.

The state passed Proposition 1, also known as the Equal Rights Amendment, which will expand legal protection against discrimination based on ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, gender identity and expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes and discrimination based on reproductive autonomy. About 62% of voters voted in support of Prop 1.

Sophomore Lucia Carucci Villano said results for the state were largely what she expected them to be.

Carucci Villano is from Westchester, NY, but said she chose to vote in Tompkins County because she wanted to vote in person. She said some key stances she cared about were gun rights, LGBTQ+ rights and reproductive rights.

“I voted yes on Prop 1,” Carucci Villano said. “It did remind me … of the era of the Equal Rights Amendment. … A lot of the rhetoric was similar. That was definitely interesting. I mean, ensuring that there’s no prejudice and mistreatment based off of those factors is always something that’s important to consider.”

Students watched the results of the presidential election crawl in on Nov. 5 at an election watch party organized by the Department of History. Michael Smith, professor in the Department of History, switched

Students watch the results of the presidential election at an election watch party in Textor Hall.

Mateo Berman-Sample/THE ITHACAN

among different media outlets that were predicting the outcome of the election and following updates.

During the watch party, Smith spoke about historical political trends the country has seen, like the concentration of Democratic voters in urban and educated areas like Tompkins County.

“History makes more sense and has more meaning if you attach it to something,” Smith said. “It’s not just 2024, but there are these patterns that we can observe, these changes that are important.”

Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said in a press release that New York state came together and rallied behind each other to pass Prop 1.

“Tonight, New Yorkers stood up for women and LGBT, immigrant and disabled New Yorkers by approving the most progressive and comprehensive state Equal Rights Amendment in the country,” Lieberman said.

“With this vote, New York enshrines the right to abortion in the New York State Constitution and expands anti-discrimination protections to those who have been excluded for far too long.”

Carucci Villano said that in the future, she wishes to see more young people vote and participate in civic engagement.

For Carucci Villano, who is a

first-time vote , being able to cast a vote is personal.

“I think about the people who fought and gave their lives for women and people of color to have the right to vote,” Carucci Villano said. “[My great-grandmother] was alive at a time when women didn’t have the right to vote.’”

On Nov. 6, students gathered at IC Square for Open Mic Night, searching for community and distraction. Junior Bella Joyner, one of the hosts of Open Mic Night, said the goal of this particular night was to offer open support and give students a place to express themselves freely.

“It has been a really long day with a lot of big feelings for everyone,” Joyner said. “People are always welcome to have fun and bring some good vibes amongst all the bad news.”

Joyner said she receives much of her news from her social media feeds and social groups and that they led her to believe that the Harris campaign would succeed.

Joyner said the Trump campaign victory surprised her.

“All my surroundings are very liberal,” Joyner said.

“I guess I had higher hopes.”

Cyndy Scheibe, Dana professor in the Department of Psychology, said she made class optional Nov. 6 and informal so that students could choose for themselves whether to return to class after a long night of waiting.

Scheibe said 25 out of 90 students attended class.

“We talked a lot about our system of government and the way it works and what we know about what’s likely to happen,” Scheibe said. “I gave them some of my thoughts and advice on moving forward.”

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Year In Review

Community expresses concerns about issues under Trump administration

By Eamon Corbo and Julian DeLucia Published nov. 14 President-elect Donald Trump will become the 47th president of the United States after winning both the electoral and popular vote in the 2024 presidential election. In the wake of the results of the election, many local groups in the City of Ithaca are expressing concerns about the implications of Trump’s second term.

On Nov. 8, local groups marched from Ho Plaza at Cornell University to The Commons for a rally called Unity Against Fascism.

Fascism is a system of government marked by centralized authority under one figure, a capitalist economy susceptible to government control, suppression of political opposition and a policy of aggressive nationalism and racism.

Cornell first-year student Sam Poole, campaign committee chair for the Cornell Young Democratic Socialists of America, opened up the demonstration by asking the crowd to describe how the results of the election made them feel.

“Call out a word that describes how you’ve been feeling or what brought you here,” Poole said.

Shouts of “angry,” “mad” and “afraid,” among many others, rang out from the crowd.

Graduate students union Maggie Foster, a member of the Cornell Graduate Students Union, said she is concerned about grad students workers’ rights under the Trump administration. In 2019, the National Labor Relations Board under the Trump administration threatened graduate student workers’ right to unionize by proposing a rule that would limit the rights of graduate students at private universities to organize and collectively bargain.

The rule was withdrawn under former President Joe Biden's administration.

Foster said the CGSU will continue to fight for better working conditions despite possible anti-union appointments Trump could make to the NLRB. “The purpose of a union is not just a good contract,” Foster said. “It’s building solidarity and community so that when fascism is on the rise, we turn to each other, we keep us safe. That always has been and will remain CGSU’s mission regardless of who is in power in D.C.” Project 2025, a presidential transition project led

by The Heritage Foundation — a D.C.-based conservative think-tank — is a 900-page policy list designed for the second Trump term. While Trump has denied any relation to the project, vice president-elect JD Vance wrote the foreword for Project 2025.

Chapter 18 of Project 2025 calls for stripping away

Members of the Ithaca community gathered Nov. 8 to participate in a “Unity Against Facism” rally to discuss what might be at stake after Donald Trump won the 2024 presidential election.

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numerous worker and union protections and reversing progress in diversity, equity and inclusion in labor policy.

“This is in direct opposition with CGSU’s organizing priorities,” Foster said. “We at CGSU are fighting for strong protections against workplace discrimination on the basis of race, national origin, sexual orientation and gender identity, among others.”

Environment Sunrise Ithaca, a local chapter of the national youth-led Sunrise Movement, helped pass the Ithaca Green New Deal in 2019. Ace Dufresne, leader of Sunrise Ithaca and junior at Ithaca High School, said the group would continue to push for sustainable energy policy in Ithaca through local government.

“I think people often forget that the federal government isn’t the only [form of] government that exists,” Dufresne said. “We have very strong state-level climate legislation, especially those representing our district … and on the local level, we have really strong climate legislation like the Green New Deal.”

After passing the Ithaca Green New Deal, Ithaca became the first city in the U.S. to commit to replacing all fossil fuel infrastructure with electric equivalents within a decade, according to WSKG. As of now, the full implementation of the Green New Deal is not on track to be completed by 2030.

Dufresne said he believes young people need to get involved in their local governments, and that the

youth should have a voice. He said a goal would be to get youth positions on climate committees.

“It’s our future,” Dufresne said. “It’s our city.”

Democrat Lea Webb was reelected as the state senator for New York State Senate District 52. Webb helped pass the fracking ban in March in New York state and has expressed support for clean air and drinking water measures as well as renewable energy development.

Trump said he will appoint former Republican Congressman Lee Zeldin as the head of the Environmental Protection Agency. Zeldin opposes the fracking ban in New York and has voted against climate laws put forward by the Biden administration.

Mike Sigler, Republican Tompkins County legislator, who ran against Webb, said he hopes for her to change her views on energy. Sigler said he believes the state is heading in the wrong direction with energy policy.

“It’s not as easy as [saying] we’re going to do renewable [energy sources],” Sigler said. “You can’t rely on solar in February in upstate New York. … It’s not a matter of snow or cold or anything like that, it’s really that we have about nine hours of daylight.”

Local involvement In Tompkins County, 74.6% of the votes cast in the 2024 presidential election were for Harris, according to the Associated Press. In surrounding counties like Cayuga, Seneca, Tioga and Cortland counties, between 50–62% of voters voted for Trump.

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News - election 2024 Despite high support for Harris from Tompkins County, New York state as a whole slightly shifted to the right, with Harris getting fewer votes than both Biden in 2020 and Hillary Clinton in 2016. Sigler said he believes Trump’s increased support in New York is due to the Democrats shifting further to the left.

“I think the Republicans are starting to go to areas and communities they maybe hadn’t gone to in the past,” Sigler said. “We have a pretty strong Democratic Socialist Party here, but that doesn’t play very well outside Tompkins County.”

Poole said Trump’s win could be explained by Harris’ attempt to win over moderate and Republican voters by walking away from progressive positions she previously held. Harris’ positions on fracking, the electric vehicle mandate, and decriminalizing border crossing have all changed from those stated in the 2020 primary. Harris also de-emphasized single-payer health care in her campaign.

“I think we need to abandon the idea that we’re going to win by catering to the right by catering to fascists,” Poole said.

In response to people at the Unity Against Fascism rally, Sigler said that calling Trump a fascist is a dangerous exaggeration.

“He may not be the best person in the world,” Sigler said. “He may not be the person that I would want my child to emulate. But calling somebody Hitler is pretty bad. It actually does a disservice to history.”

Donald Beachler, associate professor in the Department of Politics at Ithaca College, who specializes in U.S. politics and Holocaust and genocide studies, said that one fascist element of Trump was his disregard of the law displayed on Jan. 6, 2021.

“Call it fascism or not,” Beachler said. “I think it proposes genuine threats to traditional American liberty.”

At Ithaca College, the Office of Religious and Spiritual Life (ORSL) organized election grief circles from Nov. 12-14 where the campus community could come and process their feelings after Election Day. Lauren Kelly Benson, director of ORSL, said the office wanted to first focus on people’s current emotions before they move on to future plans.

“Knowing that we have a very queer campus and a lot of BIPOC students, there’s going to be feelings about [the election results],” Benson said. “I think it’s really important to create spaces that are relatively safe. …

There are a lot of people who are feeling not just a lack of belonging but a lack of mattering or safety.”

Benson said O RSL staff spent the days following the election going to various offices and spaces where students were looking for support, offering care and community.

“O ffer [love and compassion] to your neighbor, and offer it to the greater world,” Benson said. “I just think that whenever and however, we can slow down and be compassionate with ourselves … with our fellow humans … that’s the foundation of how we relate to each other.”

Commentary: Election fears highlight need for working class unity

by Giovanni Machado Published dec. 4 Editor’s Note: This is a guest commentary. The opinions do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial board.

Lately, I’ve heard all kinds of responses when talking to people before and after the election. I’ve heard people afraid of the current state of the world, I’ve heard people afraid of deportation, environmental catastrophe, economic downturn, discrimination and the decline of democracy. I’ve heard that people are afraid.

O ne of our many missions at the Leftist Study Club is to point out the real culprit to people’s current fears and circumstances, as well as the rise of fascism: a system that values the profit for billionaires and corporations over human lives, i.e. our current neoliberal capitalist system.

We must never forget, however, that there would be no fascist movement if there were no real crisis and economic hardship and no real reasons to fear these issues.

I am afraid. I am afraid I won’t be able to get a job when I graduate. I am afraid I won’t be able to build a prosperous life for myself and my family. I fear I won’t be able to afford the simplest of human rights.

I fear for my friends, and I fear for my family.

Republicans have the exact same fears, and that is what fascism preys on. Fascism gives false answers to real problems. We are all watching corporations making record profits; Amazon could give its 1.5 million employees a $10,000 bonus and still have a potential $40 billion profit. Amazon profited $50 billion last year. The middle class is disappearing as 35% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck, according to CNBC. We see groceries and rent prices going up and homelessness becoming a looming possibility and reality to many. According to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, when median rents increase by $100, homelessness rates rise by 9%. The average monthly rent has increased by $400 in the last five years.​ People are financially hurting The crumbling American economy is now being blamed on immigrants, transgender people and all forms of minorities who are being used as scapegoats and pose no real threat to American society.

The dominant class has historically utilized the same fear mongering tactics instead of placing blame on the real culprit. History is repeating itself.

From some Democrats, I’ve heard mockery and a belief in moral superiority over those who voted for President-elect Donald Trump or third-party

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candidates. This belief does nothing for the crumbling working class. It further reinforces this “us vs. them” that currently separates people who all wish for security and freedom.

Most of Americans’ fears have nothing to do with the election itself; they were only brought to the surface by it.

Our actions must be moved by a deep sense of love. Love for all races, genders, sexualities and peoples. Love for the blue-collar Republican, who is also a victim of the current system. Freedom for all means freedom for all the working class, and that is what we are fighting fo .

In the LSC, we do not fight for the rights of leftists, liberals or Democrats. We fight for the rights of the working people of America and the world — freedom from fear and freedom from the failed two-party system, a system that allows for a fascist figure such as Donald rump to be in power.

One might say that it simply was “the will of the people” to elect Donald Trump. This assertion is partially true, but it ignores the fact that the current system legally allows for corruption under the name of lobbying. The current system allows for lies about immigrants, queer people, people of color and all minorities in the form of propaganda on the internet, on news broadcasts and from the mouth of a billionaire President of the United States. The current capitalist dominant class favors having a billionaire as president. The working class does not.

At the LSC, we do not accept this. We refuse this system. Its power shall not reach us and our loved ones.

The current system has failed and separated us, so let’s build a new system of dialogue and solidarity.

We will work against fear. We will work for love. And we will work for each other. Let’s talk to each other, and most importantly, let us listen to each other.

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Year In Review

The Ithacan's Diversity Report Fall 2024 In The Ithacan’s Fall 2024 Diversity Report, we examine the demographics of our editorial board and questions about diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging within our workplace.

Last year, we expanded our diversity report to include more questions about our DEIB efforts and board members’ comfort level in our workplace related to their identities. Community outreach manager Kai Lincke used the same questions in the survey for this year to compare data and identify changes and improvements from last year.

This year’s survey included 12 questions, with some multiple-choice and some open-ended questions, as necessary, to fully show our board members’ identities. As we have done in past reports, we kept all answers anonymous and compared answers to Ithaca College student population data when available and applicable.

We sent the survey to the 26 members of the Fall 2024 editorial board, and

Our Findings

21 members filled out the survey. This is a similar completion rate to Fall 2023, when 21 out of 27 board members completed the form. While we recognize that this does not fully represent our editorial board, we hope that this data provides a starting point for us to understand how we represent the student body and how we can improve our efforts to make our workspace inclusive, welcoming and affirming As a student-led media outlet, The Ithacan strives to represent the voice of students across campus and values students’ lived experiences and identities.

We are committed to elevating underrepresented voices and understand the importance of ensuring diverse representation in our editorial board and our coverage. We also strive to be fully transparent about our team’s makeup and our organizational culture and will work to address gaps in representation. We will use the results from this report to track our progress as an organization and guide our efforts to develop strategies to improve inclusion and representation.

O ur population of disabled board members has decreased from 4.8% of respondents in 2023 to 0% in 2024. The college does not share publicly available data about ability, so we cannot compare the larger student body with The Ithacan’s board.

The editorial board is primarily composed of upperclassmen, with 19% of survey respondents indicating that they are seniors and 38.1% of respondents indicating that they are juniors. This is a slight change from 2023, when 33.3% of respondents were juniors and 23.8% of respondents were seniors. The share of first-year students and sophomores on the board is the exact same as 2023, at 4.8% and 38.1% of respondents, respectively.

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Following the U.S. Census Bureau’s standards for collecting racial and ethnic background data, we included six multiple-choice options for students’ race in this survey. We also added an option for mixed-race identities and allowed respondents to select as many options as apply to their racial identity.

The Ithacan editorial board continues to be predominantly white, with 18 out of 21, or 85.7%, of respondents identifying as white. The share of survey respondents who identified as Black, Indigenous or People of Color was 19.1%. This is a decrease from 23.8% in 2023 and 28% in 2022.

The Ithacan board continues to be predominantly composed of cisgender women. Cisgender women made up 57.1% of respondents in 2024, compared to 76.2% of respondents in 2023 and 65.2% of respondents in 2022. The share of cisgender men on the board increased from 14.3% of respondents in 2023 to 33.3% in 2024. The share of non-binary board members remains the same as 2023, at 9.5% of respondents.

None of the respondents identified as transgender or selected the “prefer not to say” option.

diversity report

For this survey question, each board member wrote their response in a text box. This means that the categories for sexuality data reflect how each respondent defines their sexualit .

Our findings show that 33.3% of respondents identify as heterosexual, a decrease from 52.4% of respondents in 2023. This year, 19% of respondents said they prefer not to share their sexuality, an increase from 4.8% of respondents in 2023.

We also found that 19% of respondents identify as queer, 19% identify as bisexual and 9.5% identify as lesbian. In 2023, 4.8% of respondents identified as queer, 19% identified as bisexual, 14.3% identified as lesbian and 4.3% identified as pansexual

The college defines first-generation as “students (and their siblings) who are the first in their family to attend and graduate from a four-year residential college in the U.S.” According to the college’s website, approximately 15% of students in each incoming class identify as first-generation students.

Our survey results show that the share of first-generation survey respondents increased to 14.3% in 2024, from 9.5% in 2023 and 4.5% in 2022.

Graphs by kai lincke/the ithacan

The Ithacan is committed to supporting diversity and inclusivity and elevating marginalized voices. We recognize that we must make changes to improve representation on the board and ensure that board members feel their identities are valued in our workplace. We will continue to work on building resources to help our Editorial Board and staff make The Ithacan a workplace and an organization that supports and advances diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging.

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Year In Review

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Year In Review

Backyard Flea brings small businesses outside by georgie gassaro Published Aug. 28 The Backyard Flea, Ithaca’s new night flea market, gave the Ithaca community a summer of shopping, eating, drinking and dancing under the stars.

Located outside the Northstar House, this outdoor shopping extravaganza includes more than 15 vendors with local handmade jewelry, handbags, vintage furniture and an abundance of secondhand clothes, alongside fresh food, drinks and music performances from local DJs. For patrons over the age of 21, the market features a bar with its own mixologist. In the summer, the Backyard Flea began June 12 and ran every other Wednesday from 5-9 p.m. until Aug. 21.

Given its success over the summer, the Backyard Flea will be extending into the fall season. Starting Sept. 4, the market will be every Wednesday until Oct. 23.

Samantha Blum — Backyard Flea co-founder alongside her friend and Ithaca College sophomore Ella Hamilton, Ellamae Robinson and local photographer Ava Thomas — frequently walks around the market to check in on the vendors and see how everyone is doing. While the market is open to all ages, Blum and Hamilton curated the time frame specifically for individuals who may work during the day.

“We are a late night flea market, which I’ve never really heard of before and I think that’s where we hit the very specific niche,” Blum said. “We’re in Fall Creek, where there are a lot of families coming through. We wanted to have it at night specifically to give people that work during the day an opportunity to come out after they’re done working to hang out, have a drink, have a burger, walk around, meet some people and get some cool new stuff.”

Vanessa Weber, owner of the antique store Found in Ithaca, located behind Wegmans, also identified the Fall Creek location as a particular strength of the market.

Weber heard of the Backyard Flea through Hamilton, a frequent customer of Found in Ithaca.

“Fall Creek is a fabulous neighborhood and it’s always been a student destination,” Weber said.

As a vendor during the summer season of this market, Weber enjoyed seeing neighborhood friends walk around the market. She also appreciated the opportunity to witness colleagues from her antique store run their own booths.

“I’ve seen some musical instruments get sold recently,” Weber said. “That, to me, is so impressive, because we’re trying to sell some furniture, which is a little hard, because carrying a chair up to college is not that easy.”

Rocco Leone, owner of Salt City Vintage, travels all the way to Ithaca every other Wednesday to be a vendor at the Backyard Flea market. Salt City Vintage offers consumers a variety of items.

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Alongside running a vintage booth of their own, the young entrepreneurs were involved in administrative preplanning and public outreach to make the Backyard Flea a reality. Blum and Hamilton created a vendor contract to ensure everyone was aligned on proper conduct during flea market nights and what to expect from participating as sellers.

Weber identified the Backyard Flea as having a unique grasp on branding toward the younger population of Ithaca. As a first-time vendor at a market like this, the small business owner said she was impressed with how young some of the other vendors were.

“What I think is really special about this is that it’s quite young in energy,” Weber said. “Something about that youth and newness gives this whole atmosphere zest.”

While outside of this younger demographic, Ithaca resident and social media strategist Cydney Wixon heard of the market from a friend of hers who forwarded an Instagram post from the Backyard Flea page. As a mother, Wixon said she enjoys the Backyard Flea as both a family-friendly weeknight activity and a melting pot of differing age groups.

“Apple Fest is fun in its own way because it celebrates the core of Ithaca, but this really brings together different people that wouldn’t have otherwise been together,” Wixon said.

In an effort to gain more public awareness, Blum and Hamilton went beyond their online presence and used word-of-mouth communication.

“There was a lot of footwork where we would just hit the streets of Ithaca and walk up to people and be like, ‘Hi, are you local?’ and they would look at us like we were absolutely insane,” Blum said. “Once we told them we were having a flea market, they would be like, ‘Oh wow, that’s great!’”

Many of the vendors were connected to the market through Instagram, which allowed the Backyard Flea to reach the radar of businesses as far as Syracuse.

Syracuse resident Andrew Saltz, owner of vintage shop Salty Vintage, was eager to make the drive down to Ithaca every Wednesday for the Backyard Flea. With more than 10 years of experience selling secondhand clothing, Saltz was very impressed with the Backyard Flea’s debut summer.

“For the first summer that they’re doing this, [Blum] and the rest of the crew definitely did an incredible job putting this together really fast,” Saltz said. “[Blum] is really passionate and it shows. There are a lot of markets I’ve been to in Syracuse and you can tell they’ve been thrown together.”

Fellow Syracuse resident Rocco Leone, owner of Salt City Vintage, also traveled from Syracuse to sell at the Backyard Flea. Leone identified the late-night hours as a possible barrier for some out-of-towners but also recognized the unique experience the Backyard Flea is looking to offer.

“You can tell that there is some sort of community here that has been established,” Leone said. “I think that will only increase as time passes.”

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life and culture

Film screening facilitates discussion of gentrification by mariana contreras Published Sept. 11 As the nation faces a housing crisis with some of the highest 30-year mortgage rates in decades and with elections right around the corner, Elizabeth Barrett’s documentary “Divisible” reminds audiences of a major housing factor: redlining.

Redlining refers to the practice in which residents of different areas are denied access to services such as mortgages, insurance and other financial resources, primarily based on the residency of people in minority neighborhoods. In the 1920s, the government developed color-coded maps depicting the loan-worthiness of neighborhoods. Red was used to mark areas not worthy of loans, which were predominantly Black neighborhoods. Redlining can also withhold crucial services, like grocery stores and health care.

On Sept. 12, Cinemapolis hosted a screening of the documentary “Divisible,” which focuses on the historical and contemporary impacts of redlining in the U.S., highlighting the city of Omaha, Nebraska.

As a first-time director, producer and cinematographer, Barrett said she started the filming process in summer 2020 with no idea what the end product would be. She said that through her conversations with many residents of Omaha and professionals in the area, her inspiration developed.

“When I started … I really didn’t know anything about [redlining],” Barrett said. “It was really eye-opening to me … [that] I was able to have a lot of conversations with people and talk about their life experiences.”

Barrett said that breaking into the movie industry with an independent film without any funding for the distribution of the film has become a big challenge in the post-production stage. “Divisible” has not been released anywhere officiall , but has been shown in several festivals across the country.

“There are huge hurdles to getting things, especially something that could be ‘divisive’ — such as a film about social justice issues — into a mainstream space without any kind of big names attached to it or big funders attached to it,” Barrett said.

A governing board was created for members to share their expertise and experiences with redlining throughout the creative process. The governing board includes Schmeeka Simpson, the Rev. Nikitah Okembe-Ra Imani and Terri Crawford, J.D. Barrett said the board discussed funding early on and was cautious about where money was coming from.

“We didn’t want to be tied to an entity or body that was going to dictate how we could tell the story,” Barrett said.

Barrett said she wanted to distribute her documentary throughout higher education. She said she wanted to focus on audiences who are already interested in having conversations about these issues.

“That’s where we’re putting our efforts to begin,” Barrett said. “Students who are eager to learn … and avenues for reaching audiences where people can opt in is likely where we’ll get the most traction.”

Barrett got connected with Jennifer Majka, director of Diversity and Inclusion at Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management at

On Sept. 12, Cinemapolis hosted a screening and panel for "Divisible," a film about gentrification.

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Cornell University, who learned about “Divisible” and wanted to help get the film off the ground.

The DEI offices of SC Johnson College of Business, Bowers College of Computing and Information Science, CALS Agriculture and Life Sciences, College of Human Ecology and the Cornell University library system sponsored the screening and the compensation for Barrett’s team.

The screening — attended by about 115 people –– was followed by a panel discussion with Barrett; Eldred Harris, graduate of Cornell Law School, who serves on the ICSD Board of Education; Tyrell Stewart-Harris, lecturer in management communication and the writing program coordinator at Cornell University; and moderated by the Rev. Ken Clarke, director of the Tompkins County Office of Human Rights Harris, who grew up in New York City, said that despite having experienced the effects of redlining in the city before, he did not know the extent of its reach.

“Divisible” opened his eyes to how it is reflected in Omaha and how Ithaca is not exempt from it either.

Harris said a good example of redlining is the West Village in Ithaca.

“I’ve had dreams for years of getting high school students — particularly at [Lehman Alternative Community School] because they’re right there — doing a project of redlining in Ithaca,” Harris said.

The panel also discussed housing and gentrificatio in Ithaca. For example the Southside neighborhood, which has historically been a Black community for over a century, has been seeing displacement of people of color to low income areas. The “Greater Southside Neighborhood Plan” was released Dec. 19, 2018, as a plan of action to address this issue. Residents have been urging government officials to address racism as a stem of gentrification in Ithaca to date In “Divisible,” Barrett highlights the need to reinvest in affected communities and address the ongoing effects of discrimination, whether in policies or access to resources. Barrett said it is important that the impacted communities are involved in reinvesting.

“I think the other part is not just what you’re reinvesting in, but who that’s for,” Barrett said. “If you can’t afford to pay rent … they’re not buying groceries out of Whole Foods.”

Majka said that lending practices are still problematic, and she hopes that “Divisible” can help people see the present day impacts of redlining.

“I think a lot of people think this is a policy of the past and it has no relevance today,” Majka said. “But we are still seeing the impacts of what redlining has done to our communities.”

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Year In Review

Hupstate Circus: A local weekend of international talent by nolan sheehan Published Sept. 9 For Labor Day weekend, Hupstate Circus came to Ithaca, bringing talent from all across the world.

Performers and performances inspired by Canadian, Australian and Ecuadorian cultures are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the mass appeal brought on by Hupstate.

The members of the Hupstate Circus Board of Directors introduced every show, speaking on their passion for the performers and the art of circus. Four years ago, the Hupstate Circus was born with the goal of bringing circus art to the United States. Emerging as a not-for-profit organization in 2023, the circus’ board gained sponsorships from a multitude of organizations around Ithaca. As a result, the foundation was laid for the festival to grow in size, which allowed Hupstate to pull in a large amount of international talent. Natasha Shatzkin, the treasurer of Hupstate Circus and a member of the board of directors, said her work in gaining financial support from across town has allowed for Ithaca to become more involved with the circus as a whole. She said the biggest sponsors were Visit Ithaca and Urban Core LLC, which runs the Press Bay Alley downtown.

“We had so many people help out monetarily, but also in kind donations and support in general,” Shatzkin said. “Every year, it feels like we’re getting more and more established. This year especially, it's been getting more and more huge. Our

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sponsorships have really allowed us to do so much more with the festival.”

Across every show seen over the course of the weekend, multiple events required extra seats, trying to fit everyone into the small venues. Hupstate moving to non-profit designation as of last year was perfect to combat the growing popularity, with more event spaces across Ithaca opening up for the performers as a result of direct sponsorship.

The Cherry Arts Artspace, for example, offered its open- and closed-air performing space and gallery to Hupstate this year through their sponsor status. As a result of this wide selection of shows and events across Ithaca, the community has shown support tenfold, taking every ticket that could be found according to Polly Solomon, the accessibility coordinator behind Hupstate. Solomon said she was over the moon about the local commitment.

“We have people traveling from farther away not just to perform, but to see the festival as well,” Solomon said. “As much as this is an Ithaca event, the word seems to be getting out and more and more people are coming to town to see it. Getting to put that little sold-out sticker in front of every show is a great feeling.”

The international aspect within the circus holds

lucia iandolo/the ithacan a clear weight amongst the performers, seen through the display of their artistic freedom regarding personal histories and heritages.

“A lot of the artists that are performing are coming internationally, and they have a lot more experience with the circus scene there,” said Daia Bromberg, board member and co-producer of Hupstate. “Many places in Europe — or the world for that matter — have a different type of arts scene than the United States in general. We feel it’s important to shine a light on every performative art we can.”

Hupstate made sure to shine the brightest light they could on all of their performers. Each one offered their own unique story, perspective and art form to the Hupstate Circus. “Play Dead,” performed by the traveling theater troupe People Watching, explored surreal stories regarding reality and social connections with body contortionism and acrobatics. “Be Like Water,” performed by a Chilean and Ecuadorian partnership, demonstrated the cultural significance of water to neighboring nations, giving a unique insight into its importance through dance numbers and cyr wheel performances. “Vertical Dreamscape,” otherwise known as “Dusk/Night/Dawn,” starred a pair of aerial pole dancers enacting the dreamscapes that entangle the lives of all people. “Black Joy,”

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Life and culture

kaeleigh banda/the ithacan a multidisciplinary journey through Black history and pride with two gymnasts, exposes Ithacan natives and visitors to multiple works of art honoring and inspired by the actions of activists and writers of the Black community. Finally, Sweden’s Jay Gilligan performed “Stories About Gravity,” a juggler’s routine combined with a philosophic lecture about the workings of the universe and how human beings fit into the cosmic landscape Each hour-long performance overflowed with artistic vision and freedom, while also maintaining a story at its core. Black freedom, cosmic understanding and the questioning of constructed reality are just a few of the many introspective narratives Hupstate offered this year.

“We’ve just been working with the artists personally to get the show here, and they’ve been really amusing to pull through,” Shatzkin said. “We’ve been doing a lot of work, but so have they. The sheer amount of stories being told under our tent really gets me excited for what we have to offer going forward.”

Building on the stories themselves, the amount of diversity brought through Hupstate and its performers was a major focus for the event. The narratives themselves dive deep into the experiences of marginalized groups.

Placing this focus within the circus — which according to Soloman, stands as a marginalized art form in and of itself because of how small its representation is in the states — builds on the foundations of what Hupstate is truly about. Throughout the entire process, the non-profit tells stories that normally do not get mainstream recognition. This factor remains a priority for board vice president Avi Pryntz-Nadworny, who strives to create an expansive circus community for all.

“Opportunities are critical, but the diversities under the name ‘circus’ are essential,” Pryntz-Nadworny said.

“It’s this tent that everyone falls under. … Some artists come from all over the world, and each show brings in their own unique cultures for others to experience. It’s brought in a lot of shows and perspectives that don’t really get told: the diversity in circus and the narrative within that.”

Pryntz-Nadworny, in addition to promoting strong diversity, especially made it a concern to allow all shows within Hupstate, from acrobatics to comedy routines, to work deaf accessibility into the program. In every show attended, sections of the available seating were reserved for deaf audiences specificall , covering every viewing

angle in theaters and performance rooms. American Sign Language interpreters were present at every performance.

Coming from a background as a child of deaf adults, Pryntz-Nadworny made this a priority for the event.

“Growing up, I would go to shows with my family and constantly be witness to the producers not thinking ahead for the barriers my parents or any other deaf attendees may have faced,” Pryntz-Nadworny said. “When I joined the board, it was a huge thing for me to reach out to the deaf community and make sure things were accessible. This will pave the way for more shows in the area to follow suit.”

Collecting all of these elements of performance together, the community was given a tremendous opportunity to experience a true circus for those who had not before. The members of Hupstate are continuing to dream bigger.

“We’ve really experienced some exponential growth.

Every year, we can do better,” Solomon said. “We’re getting a little tired, but to see the audiences, to see the amazing standing ovations the performances have gotten, is truly a special feeling. We can’t wait to see everyone back for next year’s performances.”

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Year In Review

As one door closes, Ithaca’s bar scene expands

by Kellyanne Kearney Published Sept. 11 The Range, a beloved bar located on the Ithaca Commons, closed its doors for good Aug. 3, 2024.

The bar was first opened in 2016 by owners Andrew Schreck and Tommy Grozier.

The Range was both a bar and a music venue that hosted a variety of themed nights, including “ThursGays” on Thursdays and Salsa nights on Wednesdays.

On “ThursGays,” the Range would host a variety of weekly queer events with local drag performers. On salsa nights, anyone was able to come and learn to salsa dance and listen to Latin music. The Range also showcased local Ithaca bands and DJs weekly.

Many students went to The Range because it catered to many people with live performers, dancing, areas to socialize and play darts.

Senior Lilly Tollin said there was more to do at The Range than other bars in The Commons. “[The Range] felt a little bit nicer than Moonies,” Tollin said. “Compared to Moonies, there seemed to be more space to just be and talk to other people — they had tables, they had a dartboard sometimes, so there was just more to do.”

Senior Lilli Zimmerman enjoyed the social aspect of going to The Range, where the music was not too loud and it was easy to have conversations with friends and the surrounding people at the bar.

“Everyone loved The Range,” Zimmerman said.

“On a Saturday night, I’ll be in the library studying and then I see people and they’re like, ‘Oh, you’re coming out with us, right?’ I’m like … ‘Where are you even going, The Range?’”

Senior Sebastian Rocha said he was very surprised that The Range closed.

“Everyone always talked about how much better The Range was than most of the other bars and

Illustration by molly teska/the ithacan

From left, performers Queen Tessential and Butch Lite hosted the weekly event “ThursGays” on Sept. 5 at Lot 10. Originally held at The Range, “ThursGays” now live on at a new location.

alex benowitz/the ithacan

clubs,” Rocha said. “Especially downtown … nine times out of 10, people would prefer to go to The Range, not Moonies.”

Many people have their opinions on why The Range had to close its doors. According to the Ithaca Voice, Schreck said the bar had to close because it was not financially sustainable Schreck did not respond to multiple attempts to contact him for an interview.

The biggest reason mentioned as to why The Range may not have been successful was the cover fees they would charge; a regular night would have a $5 entry fee, while nights with musical guests would have a higher entry fee. Many other bars on The Commons only have cover charges after a certain time of night. The Range also only accepted cash at the door for its covers most nights, whereas Moonies would accept Venmo payments, making it more accessible for patrons.

“If there’s no way to digitally accept any kind of cover, then that will turn a lot of people away, especially because nowadays not a lot of people carry cash on them,” Rocha said.

Zimmerman said she feels like The Range’s fina cial issues occurred because people do not want to pay a cover at all. Paying a cover is something many people are not a fan of because it is an additional charge they have to pay along with transportation to the bar and the cost of the drinks.

Another reason that may have contributed to

The Range not being self-sustaining is the music.

Tollin said she and her friends were sometimes disappointed by the music, but they stayed because they had already paid a cover.

The current bar scene Whether people liked The Range or not, many have agreed that the absence of The Range has affected the two other largest bars in the area –– Moonies and, recently, Lot 10. Rocha said he likes the back-and-forth between Moonies and Lot 10 because he thinks it will improve Moonies. “[Moonies is] not going to be the default bar you go to,” Rocha said. “That’s going to be Lot 10, so [Moonies] will have to be really smart about how they improve their services, and hopefully that will make them a much better competitor, one that I might actually want to go to one day. Healthy competition is healthy competition, and it will make both of the bars better, or it will kill off the worst bar.”

Shakawat Hossain is the owner of three Ithaca bars: Moonies, Level B and Hideaway. Hossain bought Moonies in 2020 and said what sets Moonies apart from his other bars is its location on The Commons, which makes it an “Ithaca College bar.” He also said the summer and the beginning of Fall 2024 have been unusually slow, prompting Moonies to come up with promotions to retain customers.

“When students are back after summer, students are [going] out,” Hossain said. “Everybody’s pretty

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much packed, you know, but this year is kind of slow.”

Hossain said he does not think The Range closing has had any effects on Moonies, given it was already experiencing the “slowest summer ever.”

The future of “ThursGays” One of the events that The Range was most known for was “ThursGays,” where drag performers would go to the bar and put on a drag show every Thursday. “ThursGays” nights have become a staple for the Ithaca LGBTQ+ community. After The Range closed, Lot 10 became the new venue for “ThursGays” and now hosts the drag performers in the downstairs portion of the bar on Thursdays.

Tilia Cordata, head producer of “ThursGays” and drag performer herself, started “ThursGays at The Range” in 2022 as a way for members of the LGBTQ+ community to come together. Cordata looked at different venues before finally landing on Lot 10 to host “ThursGays.

“The Range was home,” Cordata said. “It had been kind of a drag home for a long time."

Cordata said she did not know The Range would be closing, as there was no warning despite having events lined up months in advance. Though she is still mourning The Range, Cordata said she is excited about the future of “ThursGays” events at Lot 10. The performers are now on the bottom floor of Lot 10, making their shows more accessible for both performers and patrons, as The Range only had an upstairs and no alternative way to get there other than stairs.

Cordata said she is hoping that their new location can attract a new crowd of people who have never attended a “ThursGay” event before. “[Lot 10] seems to open up a different crowd that maybe wasn’t coming to our shows quite as often, and so it is nice to see some fresh faces and different

groups of friends come and hang out in the space,” Cordata said.

Butch Lite, a drag performer and Ithaca College alum, who has performed at “ThursGays” events and started doing drag at The Range, hopes that the new venue will not deter any of the crowd that previously attended “ThursGays at The Range.”

“I like having the street view,” Lite said. “I think it’s really good because it kind of invites people. … It’s interesting because, from a student angle, if I was still at IC, I would be stoked that this bar was kind of turning into a student space. … As someone who has lived here now for years not as a student, the culture of this bar has changed, but I think it’s really good that we’re taking up [the Lot 10 downstairs] space and showing the queer nightlife hasn’t gone anywhere, like we’re still here and we’re still gonna do our best to show out every week.”

Queen Tessential is a drag performer, an Ithaca College alum and an Ithaca College staff member who works at the Center for Student Success as a success coach.

Tessential said she is still processing news of The Range closing while also adjusting to the new venue.

She likes Lot 10 because she is able to man the door and greet people who are going to attend the show.

“I definitely encourage anyone that isn’t participating in a ThursGays yet but still coming to Lot 10 on a Thursday night to consider coming downstairs and enjoying a ThursGays here at Lot 10 ,” Tessential said.

“If you pay for ThursGay, you get access to the whole Lot 10 experience on a Thursday.”

Though the loss of The Range is felt by many Ithaca locals and students, it is clear that other bars in the area have been putting up a good effort to win over the affections of the demographic who attended The Range.

Queen Tessential is a regular host at “ThursGays." The performer works as a success coach at the Center for Student Success and made the transition to Lot10 after the closing of The Range.

Alex benowitz/the ithacan

life and culture

Editorial: Communal LGBTQ+ spaces need to be celebrated With the closing of The Range in downtown Ithaca, many patrons of the beloved ThursGays events were concerned about the survival of what has become a pinnacle of the LGBTQ+ community in the area. In 2024, there are few designated spaces for social events that cater to LGBTQ+ clientele in upstate New York. ThursGays has since moved to Lot 10.

Ithaca used to have a designated LGBTQ+ nightlife and community center in Common Ground, which had a location on Danby Road close to Ithaca College and closed in 2009. Felicia’s Atomic Lounge, while not technically a gay bar, often served as a hub before closing in 2015.

These closures follow a national pattern of the closure of gay and lesbian bars. As of Sept. 10, there are only 32 lesbian bars left in the U.S. In its place, members of the Ithaca community host a rotating “guerrilla queer bar” that partners with various establishments in the area each month.

But Ithaca has a reputation for supporting LGBTQ+ expression and education. The former home of lesbian press Firebrand Books still stands in the Commons, now memorialized by a historical plaque. Ithaca College has consistently been ranked as “Best of the Best” on the Campus Pride Index and innovations in housing created one of the nation’s first residence learning communities for transgender and nonbinary students. The LGBTQ+ community has a strong voice here.

With the creation of the Ithaca Pride Alliance last year, more structural support has begun to appear.

Historically, most of these community spaces are restricted to 21+ venues or only serve students.

While ThursGays is a 21+ event, it helps to create a welcoming space for LGBTQ+ individuals even if they do not create structural support. This type of support and camaraderie is equally important. While it is sad that The Range is closing, the fact that events like ThursGays have found a new home is vital for the community.

Marginalized communities must often find their own spaces. They must often carve out areas for their own joy. In the face of increased violence directed toward the LGBTQ+ community in general and the transgender community in particular, events that celebrate them are vital.

Spaces that uplift and center LGBTQ+ voices must be protected and serve as a sign of hope.

They remind us that experiences are diverse, beautiful, powerful and important.

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Year In Review

Film Festival projects stories on reproductive rights by gianna izzo Published Sept. 25 The second annual Reproductive Rights Film Festival opened to an enthusiastic crowd, uniting students, activists and community members eager to delve into pressing issues surrounding reproductive justice. The festival aimed to use film as a medium for critical dialogue about reproductive justice, setting the stage for meaningful conversations on a topic that has become increasingly central in national discourse. Attendees were drawn in by the stories reflecting the complexity of reproductive rights in today’s society.

The festival lineup included five films that were shown from Sept. 19-22 at Cinemapolis. Each addressed different aspects of reproductive rights. “Power Alley,” “Preconceived,” “Plan C,” “Belly of the Beast” and “Never Rarely Sometimes Always” explored topics ranging from access to safe abortions to forced sterilizations in women’s prisons.

End Abortion Stigma, Grandmothers for Reproductive Rights and Cinemapolis played pivotal roles in organizing the Reproductive Rights Film Festival by leveraging their unique missions to combat stigma and promote access to reproductive health care.

Elayne Richard, education coordinator for GRR, said she expected the films to provoke new insights in the audience. Her activism dates back to the 1970s, including attending the National Women’s Conference in Houston and working at an abortion clinic.

“People are going to have their eyes wide open after watching all these films because they reveal things we don’t normally talk about,” Richard said. “Reproductive justice is [also] the right to have children and to raise those children in safe and sustainable communities.”

Cait Vaughan, interim executive director for GRR and a community-rooted doula, said the films speak to the realities of people in the U.S. Vaughan moderated two talkbacks following the documentaries “Preconceived” and “Belly of the Beast.”

“All of these films convey things about the realities of people capable of pregnancy,” Vaughan said.

“Whether they’re seeking abortion or whether their right to get pregnant in the future is being taken from them by the state through forced sterilization.”

Kate Donohue, executive director of Cinemapolis, played a key role in organizing the festival. Cinemapolis serves as a community hub, showcasing socially and culturally relevant content. Donohue addressed the importance of opening these kinds of dialogues.

“I think that very often we think we talk about everything, that there are no silences or taboos that

Five different films were featured at the second annual Reproductive Rights Film Festival, which was hosted by Cinemopolis from Sept. 19-22. Two virtual panels were also held earlier in the week.

Eile Guenego/THE ITHACAN

still affect life as it is lived now,” Donohue said. “But in reality, there is still so much limited knowledge and discussion around the realities of pregnancy, childbirth and the decision to have an abortion.”

Each showing at the festival featured discussions by local experts and activists, offering opportunities for deeper engagement. Richard emphasized the transformative power of these conversations, highlighting how the films helped participants confront and break down the stigma surrounding abortion.

“You watch them, and some of that really agitates you,” Richard said. “Part of our goal is to agitate people to action.”

Sue Perlgut, a local filmmaker known for her documentary on Connie Cook and one of the festival’s founders and a member of EAS, echoed this sentiment.

“What’s important, too, about a film festival is that there are people in the audience,” Perlgut said.

“You’re sitting there in a community with lots of other people. After the film, you’ll talk about it, walk away wondering about it ... [and] learn even more or hear information you might not have heard.”

Prior to each screening, videos of personal abortion stories were shown in place of traditional trailers.

Perlgut’s story from 1965 was among them.

“There wasn’t even a question to me that if I was going to have a life, if I was going to be the person I wanted to be, I had to have an abortion,” Perlgut said.

Abortion was prohibited nationally until 1973, forcing Perlgut to have the procedure performed illegally when she was 21.

“I was in my first job,” Perlgut said “I was on my own. I was very lucky that I found a medical doctor, and I had a pretty safe abortion, as I found out later, listening to people talk about their terrible stories.”

In recent years, efforts to limit reproductive rights have intensified across the U.S. Legislative actions have aimed to impose stricter regulations, making it increasingly difficult for individuals to access necessary health care. These efforts often disproportionately affect marginalized communities, exacerbating existing health care inequalities. “[A total abortion ban] could happen again,” Perlgut said. “It’s part of this whole movement to limit and stop reproductive rights. It’s going to move into stopping queer rights. … It’s starting here, but its got a much broader agenda.”

Vaughan said personal narratives are important to understanding the impact of reproductive experiences, especially in the current socio-political climate.

“One of the most important things is to hear from people who are having these experiences,” Vaughan said. “Particularly in the post-Dobbs landscape we’re living in, and also to leave with ideas about what they can do locally.”

The festival is only in its second year, already having fostered conversations about reproductive justice and marking a new beginning for community engagement and advocacy. Richard connected this sentiment to the misconceptions surrounding abortion.

“Abortions are not endings. They’re beginnings,” Richard said.

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life and culture

LGBT Center opens specialized clothing program by virginia bentley Published sept. 25 In Fall 2024, the Ithaca College Center for LGBT Education, O utreach, and Services opened a new program to help students: the Binders and More program, also called BAM! Using internal funding and donations, the BAM! program offers a special-ordering system where students can order one gender-affirming undergarment per academic year for free.

BAM! offers different types of gender-affirming undergarments, including chest binders, chest fla tening tape and tucking/gaff underwear. The chest binders are offered in sizes XS-5XL and in many different shades: white, black, gray and eight different skin tones. In order to access the program, students fill out an interest form to set up a meeting for questions and to sample undergarments. This form can be found on the LGBT Center website or Instagram, as well as QR codes posted in the Gender Affirming Closet.

Lee Tyson, LGBT Center pride fellow, said BAM! also aims to provide students with correct and important information on how to safely wear the clothing and make the LGBT Center a place where anyone can visit to discuss safe use.

“Now that these types of garments are more widely accessible, there is more information going around,” Tyson said. “So we’re really excited to, with each order, provide safety information handouts and be able to share what we know with students.”

Crissi Dalfonzo, the director of the LGBT Center, said this program is a more specialized version of the Gender Affirming Closet. “[The BAM! Program] is more of a special way to get brand new items,” Dalfonzo said. “Students can get exactly the one they need, and they don’t need to depend on somebody else having donated a binder, or, you know, for us to magically have the size or the color that they need in stock.”

The LGBT Center officially opened its doors in November 2001 with the mission of creating a positive environment for all students on campus, especially those in the LGBTQ+ community. One of its services is the Gender Affirming Closet: a place for students to receive gender-affirming clothing at no cost.

Tyson said the BAM! program was launched to help students who cannot safely or financially obtain gender-affirming undergarments do so.

“This need really came out of students who were coming to the closet and wondering if we had any binders in stock,” Tyson said. “Gender-affirming undergarments tend to be expensive and available in limited places, so not everybody has that kind of access.”

Junior Pierre Field is the president of Prism, a social gathering club for LGBTQ+ students. Field said the program allows for experimentation without it being a financial burden “I think it’s just a really good resource that we are able to have,” Field said. “[It's] an open environment where you don’t have to feel like you must purchase this. You can try it out and get a feel for it.”

The BAM! program differs from the Gender Affirming Closet because the Gender Affirming Closet is donation-based, while BAM! is order-based and delivers directly to students. Dalfonzo said that even in its early stages, the program has already been successful with receiving student engagement.

“We have a lot of first-year students who were like, ‘When’s the forum going live?” Dalfonzo said. “And the excitement on people’s faces when they’re like, ‘I could get this thing that is going to be really affirming to me.’”

According to a national survey by the Trevor Project, transgender and nonbinary individuals with access to gender-affirming undergarments reported lower rates of attempting suicide than those without.

Junior Payton Romance said the program can be students’ first queer experience “For many queer and trans folks, it can be a huge joy in receiving your first binder,” Romance said. “I’m really grateful the LGBT Center can be part of the process in soliciting trans joy here.”

Both Dalfonzo and Tyson said BAM! is also for students who are not sure about their need for a gender-affirming undergarment. Tyson said the center welcomes any student who is interested in what this program could do for them.

“If there are any students who are curious about what these garments even are, or if they are right for them, come in and have a chat,” Tyson said. “We’re happy to share as much information as we can.”

The Ithaca College LGBT Center launched its Binders and More program to offer students a chance to order free gender-affirming undergarments.

Eile Guenego/THE ITHACAN

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Year In Review

BIPOC retreat crowns students with confidence in their natural hair

by Mila Ventura-Rodriguez Published Oct. 10 Taughannock Falls room was packed with students murmuring among themselves Sept. 28. It was a gray and cloudy Saturday, but inside there was a spectrum of bright, eye-catching colors. Many hairstyles populated the conference room, including braids, twists, afros, straight hair and wigs, all with different colors and adorned with accessories.

This was the first Protect Your Crown Retreat organized by the BIPOC Unity Center. Inspired by the passing of the CROWN Act, first in California and then in New York state in 2019, the retreat was organized

by McKenzie Murray, then-program coordinator and current assistant director of the BIPOC Unity Center, along with the rest of the center's staff. Now, 27 states have adopted the CROWN Act. The CROWN Act is a law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of hair. In the opening presentation for the retreat, Murray explained the importance of placing protections on the right to wear one’s hair in culturally significant styles. Murray described this significance as hair that is aesthetically, historically, socially and spiritually valuable to particular cultures.

Murray opened the retreat with a presentation on the significance of the CROWN Act, with the hopes of encouraging discussions about hair discrimination.

“What are the issues surrounding Black hair or

BIPOC hair?” Murray said. “Beyond just getting products, but also in the workplace, in schools, because we wanted to make it educational as well. Our office is all about empowerment and fighting injustice.

The idea for the retreat was pitched by Cliff-Simon Vital, then associate director and current interim director of the BIPOC Unity Center. He said he had been wanting to create something like this for the past two years and this semester, suggested it as an option for new programming.

“The Crown Act [retreat] was my brainchild,” Vital said. “We’ve had, historically, something called the Student of Color Retreat, and with the affirmative action changes, we thought that that just wasn’t an appropriate name for it. We also thought that the retreat didn’t really do anything to help empower students to understand their Blackness.”

Murray said she knew she wanted a panel for students to be able to meet and speak with faculty to gain some perspective, and she ordered products from a wholesale beauty supply store for the goodie bags. In addition to Vital and Murray, the panelists were Nia Nunn, associate professor in the Department of Education, and Stephanie Nevels, a social worker at CAPS. The panel was moderated by Omar Stoute, director of Staff Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging. The students asked about how to have more confidence as well as ways to find community on campus and in town After the panel, a hair-themed bingo was organized.

Students rushed around the room, trading bingo cards and stories. Once the prizes — Ithaca College tote bags — were given, Vital gave the attendees goodie bags, half with bonnets and half with durags, before everyone left for the van ride to Syracuse for the final event of the retreat.

Students visited two beauty supply stores in Syracuse: BSW Beauty and Ultimate Beauty Supply. In the stores, students consulted with each other on what products worked best. Many had baskets filled with hair for braids, shampoo and curling products. The students were then taken to two more beauty stores.

First-year student Glenda Galloway said she appreciated growing her connections with other students at the retreat.

“I just feel relieved that there are people on campus who share similar experiences with me,” Galloway said. “The fact that I just got here six weeks ago, it’s just very inviting and very comforting knowing that I have people that I can talk to about situations that we’ve all been through.”

Sophomore Giovanna Moro said she hopes that, going forward, more students will attend the event.

“This is a really important topic, and I feel like if you’re part of this community, you’re gonna feel more embraced by it and feel like you’re welcome to be there,” Moro said. “But if you’re not, I feel like everyone should just come, just to learn. It’s really important to know what this is.”

Sophomore Sabeena Mori picks out items at Ultimate Beauty Supply in Syracuse, one of the stops featured on the Protect Your Crown Retreat.

Mariana contreras/THE ITHACAN

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life and culture

Finger Lakes Crossword Competition celebrates 12th anniversary by nolan sheehan Published Oct. 4 As four dozen contestants put their pens to the massive checkered grids before them, the clock began to tick down. The room was nearly silent — not a word spoken. The only thing heard across the large cafeteria was the scribbling of lead onto clean paper, with players writing and erasing combinations and patterns of letters until the winners found their matches.

On Sept. 28, Boynton Middle School hosted the 12th annual Finger Lakes Crossword Competition, which brought in community talent from across Tompkins County and beyond. With a roster of a dozen teams and several top-level individual competitors, this year’s contest showed a dedicated community intent on promoting a positive cause. Ever since its inception, the competition has raised funds for Tompkins Learning Partners — a local organization that provides free literacy tutoring to over 100 community members in the region. Each competitor paid $50 to participate or what they were able to donate comfortably.

The main beneficia y of this event is the TLP, which was established in 1976 to promote tutoring services for reading and writing. Gary Weissbrot, event chair of the Finger Lakes Crossword Competition, said that supporting the competition is a good way to promote the program in an engaging and rewarding way.

Weissbrot said the event brought in the funds and community outreach necessary to promote new learning for adults trying to gain citizenship, learning how to vote and even understanding how to read and write.

As a board member of TLP and coming from a teaching background, Weissbrot said that he feels a strong commitment to promoting TLP’s services and that the competition is a great opportunity to demonstrate the value of literacy and the importance of TLP’s work.

“Every year, I’m constantly reminding people why we’re doing this,” Weissbrot said. “It’s not just because I love feeding crossword junkies their fix. I really want TLP to make as much money as possible. This is what TLP does. We have some grants, but our outreach and the upkeep of our building on Buffalo St. and its subsequent materials is what this all goes to.”

The competition has a virtual component and following that generates more outreach, and none contribute more in the virtual realm than Rex Parker, a daily blogger who solves the New York Times’ puzzles every day. Parker has developed a strong online following for those seeking commentary regarding the daily puzzles. Parker said his influence has had a notable impact on the contest’s publicity.

To support adult literacy, Gary Weissbrot, event chair and one of the founders of the Fingerlakes Crossword Competition, created the crossword competition with Tompkins Learning Partners.

Courtesy of Ithaca times

“I’m not used to the recognition, as I don’t feel too famous,” Parker said. “It’s a really good cause, and I’m happy to do it. The tournament is a small, local event, but honestly it has been gradually growing in size for the past couple years coming out of COVID. People are really showing up to support, and I’m happy to promote it in any way.”

The annual event was founded by Weissbrot and his fellow crossword connoisseur Adam Perl, the creator behind the competition's crossword puzzles.

Perl has decades of experience doing crosswords, creating his first at the age of 40. Now in his late 70s, Perl said he knows crossword puzzles from the inside out, using his decades of experience submitting through the New York Times to craft three levels of the competition for all crossword enjoyers.

“It’s a way for me at age 78 to keep my mind sharp and to keep my wits going,” Perl said. “I love how I’ve been able to take a compelling hobby and turn it into something that really helps the community.”

Participants had the option to take on the crosswords individually or in groups of two, three or four.

Weissbrot said the competition was designed to appeal to every age group and drew on the heavily-popularized style of the New York Times’ daily crossword game that has captivated American audiences.

One hour was given to every crossword competitor. The individual winner of the Toughest Puzzle at the Finger Lakes Crossword Competition this year,

Jacob Lehman, is now a five-time winner of the event.

Weissbrot and the other judges reported that he fi ished the puzzle in nine minutes and 47 seconds.

“You don’t do crosswords if you don’t enjoy language and believe in literacy,” Lehman said. “To be able to affect people in a positive way and have fun doing it — can’t get much better than that.”

The new executive director of TLP, Donna Ramos, was present at the event. Despite the bustling nature of the event, she stressed that promotion of TLP and its free services was the key motive of the event. Going forward, she said it is ideal for TLP to use these events to garner more volunteer support within their organization, like peer tutoring and other assisted learning activities. Ramos said volunteers help those taking classes through TLP to graduate through the program in order to achieve citizenship, high school equivalency diplomas, interview techniques and GEDs. “Part of the reward in volunteer work is the relationship developed between students and their learning partner,” Ramos said. “These funds from the event registration pay our program staff that supervises many volunteers that work one-on-one with our students. It means a lot.”

At this time next year, the competition will resurface with the same familiar faces. Weissbrot, Ramos and Parker said they will continue to promote the event in any way they can. Promoting adult literacy will be the fundraising event’s goal for every year to come.

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Year In Review

Mocktails and music fill Nabenhauer Hall for BAU Live Jazz Fundraiser

by Sheelagh Doe Published oct. 9 Nabenhauer Hall was glowing with excitement Oct. 6 when Black Artists United hosted “An Evening of Jazz” where 14 performances by BIPO C student singers were spotlighted amid a cocktail attire night of food and fun. BAU is an organization at Ithaca College that aims to showcase the talent of the BIPOC community on campus by hosting events and performances, such as its annual cabaret fundraiser.

Attendees were able to dress up and listen to jazz performances by students of the BIPO C community while enjoying mocktails inspired by two jazz songs.

The event had a live band backing the singers who chose to take advantage of it. Senior Jasmine Williams,

when it was on the rise and people were going there to seek solace, to seek freedom, to seek creative freedom.

We wanted to do jazz because not only is Black culture so deeply steeped in it but it would give classical singers, it would give [musical theater] singers, it would give people who aren’t trained … one night to explore that other side of their creativity.”

Sophomore Abigail Monteagudo, a musical theatre major, sang “Unforgettable” by Nat King Cole at the event, but she said she does not consider herself a jazz singer.

“I’m really lucky that I get to perform with these amazing talented people,” Monteagudo said. “I’m usually a musical theater song kind of girl. This is stepping out of my comfort zone.”

Junior Jayna Simeon, community liaison for BAU and a vocal music education major, said the most important

The Black Artists United jazz fundraiser featured 14 different live performances from student musicians. The event encouraged a cocktail attire dress code and offered food and drinks.

Nicola Ruffini/THE ITHACAN

co-president of BAU, said she came up with the idea of hosting a jazz night fundraiser over the summer.

“There’s no way I could’ve imagined what it could have been with a whole team of students who are excited to do it,” Williams said. “It’s surpassing my expectations so much and I’m just so happy.”

By buying a ticket to BAU’s Evening of Jazz, attendees are supporting the cost of BAU hosting more events.

Williams said BAU chose to showcase jazz music at this event because of its ability to invite diverse types of artistic talent through its representation of freedom.

“Jazz represents freedom for a lot of people,” Williams said. “And especially during the Harlem Renaissance

thing to her when it comes to making a performance successful is channeling the emotion behind the music.

“The way the performer connects to a piece in their own way is very important and you can definitely tell when a performer is just singing versus when they’re understanding the song and they’re sharing their emotions through the piece,” Simeon said.

Monteagudo said feeling the emotions behind the song allows her to shed some of her performance nerves.

“When you settle into the song, or when you feel the music and you just sort of let go of those nerves, when you stand there it’s nerve wracking, even when you’re a performer,” Monteagudo said. “But when you

kind of let go and feel the emotions and feel what you’re saying, that’s when it’s successful.”

Destiny Carrion, president and founder of a capella group Nuvo, said she was super excited for the group to have their debut performance at the fundraiser.

“The BIPOC community on campus has been really excited about [Nuvo] and has been really supportive and I just know it would be a really great space to launch our work,” Carrion said. “It feels like a safe space.”

Nuvo sang “Daydreaming” by Aretha Franklin at the event, and Carrion said it was a challenging five-poin harmony song.

Williams spoke about how much it mattered to have a safe space for people of color to share their artistry on campus.

“If you paint, if you write short stories, if you do nails — whatever your artistry is — we are a safe space for you to explore that,” Williams said. “I think sometimes artists think when you make your art your career it’s no longer fun for you, and so BAU is also meant to be a space where you can go and breathe.”

When Williams first joined BAU as its president when she was a sophomore, she said the group had two to three people showing up to their events. Williams said that upwards of 60 tickets were sold for this evening.

“It makes my heart so happy and so big because I got to watch this club grow,” Williams said.

Before the show had even begun, Sydney Wilson, co-president of BAU, made an announcement to reuse the cocktail cups because they had already run out.

Shortly after, more people flooded in and the performers stood backstage instead of sitting in the back two rows. Not too long after that, seats were squished together and they stopped accepting people at the door.

Senior acting major Bella Woody, said before the event started that she was good friends with many of the performers and she knew it was going to be a great show. At the end of the show, Woody said how proud she was of the work they had all done.

“People here are so talented,” Woody said. “I cried so many times.”

Williams emphasized that while the organization’s goal first and foremost was to show the artistry of students of color on the college’s campus, it is great to create space for dialogue and community among all students.

“Our focus first is students of color, but we are so much more focused on community,” Williams said.

“Yes the community is us, BIPOC students, but [there is] beauty of having non-BIPOC students also wanna be a part of our community, and also wanna support us, and also wanna listen to us and we wanna listen to them.”

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life and culture

Q&A: First-year student Ashton James energizes campus with yo-yoing by noa ran-ressler Published oct. 25 The Academic Quad outside of the Ithaca College Library is a bustle of activities in the warmer days leading up to winter. This fall, however, a new face has emerged as a frequent patron of the outdoors.

Almost every day — weather accommodating — first-year student Ashton James sets up on the quad with his yo-yo and a pair of AirPods. James said he listens mostly to pop, some rap and whatever his current favorite songs are. The music is essential because happy, upbeat songs get him ready to yo-yo to the rhythm.

James said he gets lost in the music, moving in unison with the beat. Although passers-by cannot hear the music themselves, they can see the result: a freestyle composition between James and his yo-yo.

Managing Editor Noa Ran-Ressler joined James out on the Quad to discuss how yo-yoing impacts his life and influences those around him This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Noa Ran-Ressler: How did you get started yo-yoing?

Ashton James: I started around 2019 at camp with a Dollar Tree yo-yo that I got sent in the mail. I genuinely fell in love with the art, and I’ve really started to get really into it. It was definitely something that was really unique to me. I never really see anyone yo-yoing, especially not in my style. It’s a very unique style to me.

First-year student Ashton James has been showcasing his yo-yoing skills as students walk to class.

noa ran-ressler/THE ITHACAn

I call it freestyle yo-yoing. There’s also another style called non-responsive yo-yoing, and that’s usually what you see on the internet, but you won’t see my type of yo-yoing. … I taught myself fully, and I slowly upgraded to metal yo-yos over the years.

NR: What about yo-yoing connected with you?

AJ: What really clicked for me about yo-yoing is that it’s a really great way for me to express myself. It’s a very unique thing that you don’t see many people do. And my yo-yoing is really an art form, it’s not just yo-yo up and down, like how you see many people. It’s a dance to me, and it’s a way I can really just relieve the stress and any negative feelings I have, and even positive feelings. It’s a really great outlet for me when I’m going through a lot of hard things, or if I just have energy. It’s all-around so, so important to me because of how unique it is to me, and it’s just beautiful. I love my yo-yo, and I love showing people that I can do more than a lot of people expect of me.

NR: What drew you to the Academic Quad to yo-yo?

AJ: What brought me out to the Quad is definitely because of how much community I can make without directly interacting with people. It’s a really great way to show off my skills and be somewhere where I can connect with people. As a freshman, it’s really difficult for me to get used to the environment and different social groups. I feel like [with] yo-yoing, I really found a lot of great people I’ve just said hi to. I’ve had people come up to me and be like, “You really make my day

whenever I see you,” and “I have had an awful day, I know where to go, and I know when you’re out here, and it really does change my entire day.” That’s what really keeps me coming out here, because there’s so many people who I make a really big impact on their lives, whether they say it or not. … It’s a really great way to get away from technology for at least a few minutes a day. I think it encourages people to be creative in their bodies and not just be stuck in the library or in their dorms. And I really like inspiring people to get out and do something creative and nice for their body.

NR: Did you come to campus and start yo-yoing right away?

AJ: Yeah. My orientation leader nudged me to get out there and yo-yo. They loved my yo-yoing and that really inspired me to have the confidence to go out and yo-yo. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to do that in college since a lot of people in my high school didn’t like my yo-yoing. They made fun of me for yo-yoing. …

Not everyone, but there was definitely people who didn’t like it, which really discourages me. My first time yo-yoing [at the college], I had like five people come up to me and say “I absolutely love it. Please never stop.” And all those kind words encourage me to keep coming out every single day and express myself. … I appreciate everyone’s support in my yo-yoing. It means, honestly, everything to me … that people love my self-expression so much, and I’m going to continue to yo-yo throughout my four years at Ithaca.

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Year In Review

IC soars into the Hangar Theatre by georgie gassaro Published OCT. 30 Ithaca College’s stage productions have worked with other external performance spaces in the past, but never before has Ithaca College joined forces with the Hangar Theatre, nor have two large-scale student productions shared a performance space over two weeks as they did with the productions of “Stupid F##king Bird” and “Fever/Dream.” From O ct. 24 through Nov. 3, these two comedic drama adaptations were in rotating repertory at the Hangar Theatre.

Directed by Marc Gomes, associate professor in the Department of Theatre Arts, “Stupid F##king Bird” opened Oct. 24 at the Hangar. The play is a loose adaptation of Russian playwright Anton Chekhov’s “The Seagull.”

“Stupid F##king Bird” is a play-within-a-play-within-a-play about love, life, yearning and challenging the traditional forms of 19th-century theater. The show had both matinee and evening performances and closed Nov. 2.

“Fever/Dream,” directed by professor Cynthia Henderson, is based on “Life is a Dream,” a 1636 play by Pedro Calderón de la Barca. “Fever/Dream” is a satirical telling of a man’s rise from a customer service role to a CEO in corporate America. This play opened Oct. 25 and closed Nov. 3.

Last year, Gomes and Amanda Spooner, assistant professor in the Department of Theatre Production and Management, were co-chairs for the Production Laboratory Planning Committee. This committe is responsible for curating each season of shows. The PLPC gave Gomes and Spooner the genre of comedic adaptations of classics as their guiding principle for the season. Although the decision was not solely up to Spooner and Gomes, the two did come into the committee with a specific passion for these two plays and presented them to the commitee.

Gomes said the vision for this season always included a collaboration with the Hangar since the CTD did a co-production of “The Liar” with the Kitchen Theatre in April.

“In the last couple of years, the Center for Theatre and Dance has been building bridges with the professional theater in Ithaca to have students experience [outside] theater … and build new kinds of audiences [for them to also] connect with Ithaca broadly,” Gomes said.

Bethany Schiller, management associate at the Hangar, said she has seen an increase in the amount of external programming and events since she started as an usher in 2017.

“This new arrangement is really exciting for us, especially because we value our partnership with Ithaca College,” Schiller said. “It’s a really valuable

“Stupid F##king Bird” is one of the two rotating student-run productions being presented at the Hangar Theatre by Ithaca College’s Department of Theatre Arts during the 2024-2025 season.

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

relationship and partnership, and we’re excited to deepen and expand that.”

An element of this season’s selection that was not always in the cards for Gomes and Spooner, however, was the doubling in size of the stage management and acting classes that needed credits. This led to the need to run both “Stupid F##king Bird” and “Fever/Dream” in the same week at the same venue.

The two main stage productions are part of the studio slot for McCarroll Theatre for the CTD. The productions are considered “unsupported,” meaning that other than the stage management crew who were students assigned to the production, design staff is not assigned. For this type of production, the directors are given the challenging opportunity of outsourcing their design staff, a process that can take months.

The CTD productions also serve as required rehearsal and performance courses for BFA acting and musical theater students.

Gomes said that this year, there were more juniors and seniors that needed main stage production credits to graduate because of students who could not do performances during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Gomes and his team were tasked with building a season to accommodate enough assignments for the stage managers and performance students who needed them.

The solution was to have rotating repertory shows.

Gomes said he had high expectations for “Stupid F##king Bird,” although the particular challenges were greater than usual given the circumstances.

Main stage productions typically get six nights to rehearse in-venue before opening night. This meant both plays had to split that time in half, so each production only had one complete run–through with all props, tech and lighting prior to opening night.

“When a play is under rehearsed, time is the only thing that you can’t ever replace, and we need time to groove what we’re doing, to have the actors have the confidence in what the ’re doing,” Gomes said.

Ellie Berry, senior stage management major and production stage manager of “Stupid F##king Bird,” said the experience of working in tandem with “Fever/Dream” at a new performance space posed an interesting challenge. Since the two productions cohabitate the same theater, the crews shared light and sound equipment. While it took some time for both productions to adjust, Berry said she thinks both cast and crews ended up satisfied with the first week of production “It went a lot smoother than I think we were expecting it to, which was so lovely, and all of our designers and casts were so flexible,” Berry said.

Senior acting major Jasmine Williams, who played Emma in “Stupid F##king Bird,” said the biggest focus throughout the rehearsal process was learning how to be adaptable.

“The first day we were in the space, I was extremely frustrated because we had this very deeply intimate play. . . and when we entered [the Hangar] it felt like a cavernous space,” Williams said. “But I am very lucky to be a part of a cast that knows how to rise to the occasion.”

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life and culture

Community bakes for a cause at the Sophie Fund’s annual contest

by Eva Leon Published oct. 29 An eager group of amateur bakers from Tompkins County gathered at the Bernie Milton Pavilion on Oct. 19 to show off their creative confections at the Sophie Fund’s 9th Annual Cupcake Contest.

Scott Macleod and Susan Hack, along with friends and family, founded the Sophie Fund in 2016 after their daughter, Sophie Macleod, died by suicide.

The Sophie Fund is a nonprofit organization based in Ithaca that aims to support mental health initiatives specifically aimed toward young people “We believe that there needs to be a lot more education in the society about mental health,” Macleod said. “We need to break down the stigma, which is one of the factors that prevents people from seeking help or admitting that they may have an emotional disorder or a mental health disorder of some kind.”

As an organization, Macleod said they focus on supporting suicide prevention initiatives like the Zero Suicide Model in Tompkins County, which increases suicide-specific screenings within healthcare while improving upon prevention treatments to make them more effective. However, Macleod said the Sophie Fund addresses other issues, including anti-bullying and sexual assault prevention through education.

“It was a natural thing for us to try and do something in Sophie’s memory, but also just help other people not experience what Sophie did and what we’ve experienced with her death,” Macleod said.

Macleod said they chose to host a cupcake contest because it was a way to honor Sophie and her love of baking. He said his and Hack’s vision for the contest was to create something that would be enjoyable for the community and make the subject of mental health somewhat more accessible.

“The contest is purely fun,” Macleod said. “You won’t find the word mental health in the contest promotions or anything like that, but we sneak it in by the fact that it’s the Sophie Fund sponsoring this.”

Starting at 10 a.m. that morning, cupcake submissions began flooding in. Macleod said anyone could participate in the event as long as they were amateur bakers. Cupcakes of all different colors and flavors with a variety of decorations were ready to be judged by local professional bakers, chefs and restaurateurs including Olivia Carpenter ’22, owner of Via’s Cookies, and Yoko Jingu, owner of Akemi’s Food.

Cara Nichols, owner of CRN Events, has been the event producer of the Cupcake Contest since 2021. She explained how each of the 29 contestants submitted a

tray of six cupcakes along with their recipe and a brief story about the inspiration behind their cupcakes.

Nichols said that while the event does spread awareness for mental health and suicide prevention resources, it is also a place where people can showcase their passion and abilities.

“We are looking to be able to connect with the Ithaca community to spread the word on resources to support mental health and suicide prevention, and also for the community to have a lot of fun,” Nichols said. “This is such a unique contest and the ways in which people showcase their baking abilities are just incredible.”

As everyone awaited the results of the contest, the crowd was occupied with live music performances by local musical duo Joe Gibson and Dan Collins, singer-songwriter Rachel Beverly and singing comedians Kenneth and SingTrece. Finally, after some brief speeches by local organizations including the Ithaca Free Clinic and Cornell Minds Matter talking about the resources they offer, it was time to announce awards.

The emcees for the awards ceremony were Carly Robinson and Gabriella da Silva Carr. They are both part of the staff for the local theater group, Civic Ensemble, and they are returning emcees for the cupcake contest. Robinson and da Silva Carr gave out awards to cupcakes that stood out to the judges, a few honorable mentions and one special Youth Award to returning baker Isabel Perkins for her chocolate peanut butter “Dream” cupcakes. There were only three submissions that made it to the finals, where they were judged by a panel of VIP judges.

Carpenter was among the VIP judges and had a table set up at the event where she was giving out free cookies. “[My favorite part] is definitely just being here,” Carpenter said. “It’s such a positive event. Everyone is so happy, like everyone is smiling. … It’s just joy, unadulterated joy.”

The finalists were: Marina Mahashin with Rasmalai and Tres Leches cake-inspired cupcakes; Grace Qi with Harvest Caramel Apple cupcakes; and Sadie Hayes with Orange Pomegranate cupcakes inspired by Middle Eastern flavors. As the judges tasted and rated the cupcakes, Robinson and da Silva Carr read the stories that went along with each cupcake out loud to keep the audience entertained. Hayes, a local acupuncturist, was announced as the winner.

Hayes said she has been baking since she was a child. She had previously participated in the event and said she was thrilled to finally take home the grand prize. Hayes said she believes the event is important because of the lack of conversations about suicide.

“Nobody likes to talk about suicide,” Hayes said.

“There’s a lot of taboo, there’s a lot of miseducation, and there’s a lot of secrecy.”

Macleod said the cupcake contest is only one part of what the Sophie Fund does along with other important community initiatives and partnerships with the Ithaca City School District, Ithaca College and Cornell and local mental health organizations.

“We’re trying to be a catalyst to create lots of conversations at the contest and beyond, to just keep this topic top of mind with people,” Macleod said.

The Sophie Fund hosts an annual cupcake competition to raise awareness for local mental health initiatives.This year, the 9th annual cupcake contest was held Oct. 19 at the Bernie Milton Pavilion. eva leon/THE ITHACAN

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Year In Review

Fake blood leads to very real conversations about safety protocols

Senior thesis films of the semester were screened at the State Theatre on Dec. 7. Some had safety conversations with the Ithaca Police Department.

Ian Lewono/THE ITHACAN

by Sheelagh Doe Published nov. 14 Senior Kevin Conover, a cinema and photography major at Ithaca College, embarked on the filming of an especially bloody scene for his senior film thesis titled “What Simon Said.” Numerous fake blood-covered props were discarded in dumpsters across Ithaca, which resulted in New York State police troopers inspecting the disposed materials.

The subject and plot of senior thesis films are left completely up to the students’ own creative abilities. The film department works with students to navigate relationships with safety and security both on and off campus.

Rob Gearhart, associate dean of the Roy H. Park School of Communications, said the college has an online film set safety course available to many incoming majors in Park to take before school starts. He said the school expects professors to continue enforcing the safety tools taught in the online course in their own classes.

Senior Ryan Williams-Abrams, a cinema and photography major at the college, said he had never been given direct instruction on how to go about communicating their film set safety protocols with the college for his own senior thesis titled “Greetings From America.” He said he knew there were risk management forms on the Park website and went to Gearhart for guidance on any safety concerns.

“I think [safety is] something that can be discussed a lot more in classes so that students can protect themselves in their productions,” Williams-Abrams said.

Conover’s film details the experience of a student who accidentally goes on a psychedelic trip and discovers that he does not know what he wants to do with his life anymore. For one of the scenes, 21 gallons of fake blood were used to plaster the walls of a hand-built set.

The set was built inside of a downtown studio in Ithaca that’s owned by Park Productions, which Conover and his crew reserved from Oct. 16-20.

“It was like 19.2 humans worth of blood we were using,” Conover said. “We were supposed to do it on Saturday, but the studio technically did not know that we were filming with blood, so that was really fun.

The studio had them fill out a safety agreement which had said no liquids, according to senior Ben Young, a writing for film, TV, and emerging media major who worked with Conover to write the film Williams-Abrams said safety plans are an important cautionary protection for the crew, cast and the location itself.

“Because we are often in public spaces, and we’re putting people potentially in harm’s way if they don’t know what’s going on, we, as independent productions, have to create a safety plan,” Williams-Abrams said.

Conover said he was producing this film but he was not a producer. He said he did not really have a safety

plan, so he decided not to mention the fake blood.

“So they kept asking me for [the safety plan],” Conover said. “And I was like, ‘I don’t know. I’m just not shooting with blood.’… It’s better to ask for forgiveness, right?”

The real issues began to arise when Conover and his crew realized they had to clean up the fake-blood covered studio in four hours before their reserved time was up.

“We have four walls that are eight feet tall, 12 feet wide, [we’re] smashing them down, breaking [them] up, throwing them into [a] pickup truck,” Conover said. “And this is where the problem started happening because we have all this junk, and it’s all bloody and trash. So where do we put it all?”

The first load of fake blood-soaked trash went to the dumpster at Emerson Suites, the second went to two dumpsters in Center Ithaca and the third went to Conover’s dumpster at his apartment off campus.

Usually, potential location hazards and their safety plans would be covered and addressed in the approval process. Gearhart said a student will first submit their film location proposal to their instructor, who must approve it. Then it will move onto the dean’s office, where Gearhart will approve or not approve it and decide if the Office of Risk Management or the Office of Public Safety need to be involved.

“I don’t think I understood from the request about

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Kevin Conover's senior film thesis titled "What Simon Said" was filmed in an off-campus studio.

Courtesy of kevin conover

Kevin that they were going to be doing this level of blood and gore,” Gearhart said. “We might have given them some guidance. We wouldn’t necessarily say no, but we might give them some conditions, like, you can’t just like, pour blood all over the place and then leave it scattered all over.”

Senior Jonah Alefantis is a cinema and photography major and was in charge of making the fake blood.

He said that prior to this film, he had only made one gallon in a single sitting.

“This was going to be extremely difficult, but I was very excited for the challenge,” Alefantis wrote via text.

“I needed to mix the materials in a trash can with a drill and a bent clothing hanger.”

The fake blood was made with corn syrup, cocoa powder, red food coloring and blue food coloring.

Young said they had made sure the mixture was edible.

Fake blood is not the only thing that film students have to be aware of when it comes to being safe.

Williams-Abrams said his own thesis film involved the topic of school shootings. He said he made sure to thoroughly cover his bases when using a prop gun on set and had a positive experience working with the Ithaca Police Department.

“We had to, obviously, alert the police to make sure that they were aware of what was going on,” Williams-Abrams said. “We met with them to discuss their safety plan. … Just that one little step can save you a lot of headache in the long run. Usually they’re going to be pretty adaptable. … They encourage you to take on these creative risks, but they also want to make sure that you’re doing it safely and professionally.”

Senior Justin Walsh, a cinema and photography major, who built the set for the film, is roommates with Conover and said he was home when a police office showed up and inspected a giant rug covered in bees

and fake blood poking out of their dumpster. The fake blood was mainly corn syrup, which attracted the bees.

Walsh was informed by the officer that the police had become concerned because of reports of each of the four dumpsters across Ithaca with their discarded set pieces. Walsh said the police asked about the bees because some bees are carnivorous.

Walsh said the officer said the next time they needed to be safer about it and to call them beforehand to let them know. The Ithacan requested information from the New York State Police about the reports but was unable to receive further information before publication. Trooper Ava Tinker said via email that the

life and culture

Tompkins County 911 Center received a call with concerns about a bloody carpet, which later turned out to be a prop, in a dumpster at Birdseye View Drive in the Town of Ithaca on Oct. 22. The trooper did some neighborhood interviews and learned that the liquid was not real blood.

“Corn syrup, cocoa and food dye also have a complete different consistency than blood in real life,” Tinker said. “On camera, it might look similar but not in real life.”

Cathy Crane, professor in the Department of Media Arts, Sciences and Studies, is Conover’s instructor and worked with him and his crew throughout the planning process.

“I would say that he successfully prepared and in the case of the more visceral scene staged in our downtown studio, he left the location cleaner than when he arrived,” Crane wrote via email.

Senior Byrne Mazella, a film, photography and visual arts major, said some things may not go as expected. Mazella was the producer for Williams-Abrams senior thesis and said they had an issue with a fake removable magazine for their prop gun.

“The lovely Lieutenant that was kind of overseeing our gun safety had to take me aside and go, ‘Hey, those magazines are illegal in the state of New York,’” Mazella said.

Mazella said the lieutenant did not arrest anyone, but held onto the fake magazines until they were returned to the place they were rented from in Virginia.

Despite the post-production conversation with Park Productions and police questioning, Conover, Young and Walsh were excited to relay their story and the thrill that came with making their vision happen.

All senior thesis films were screened Dec. 7 at the State Theater with free entry.

Junior James Moguin was one of the actors involved in the filming of Conover's senior film thesis.

courtesy of kevin conover

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Year In Review

Sophomore students dial up the downtown DJ scene by tess ferguson Published dec. 4 What started as a dorm room hobby turned sophomores Maddie Schnitzlein and Ari Klein into a dynamic duo at the helm of Ithaca nightlife.

The pair began DJing at the local venues Moonies Bar & Nightclub and Lot 10 Bar and Lounge in October and have since made a name for themselves on and off campus. Despite beginning their practices solo, Schnitzlein and Klein have been perfecting their craft together and performing most Thursday nights all semester.

Schnitzlein, an advertising, public relations and marketing communications major, said her love for house music drew her to the discs. After starting to play around with mixing music for her friends and family at parties, she realized she could take her skills to a crowd.

“I always see videos on TikTok and Instagram of people performing,” Schnitzlein said. “The second I actually started to grasp and understand what to do, I knew I wanted people to hear what I have to offer.”

Klein, a screenwriting major, began his DJing journey a bit differently. The concept turned from a running joke with his friends into a reality with one Instagram DM. “I just reached out to Moonies about wanting to DJ and they were like, ‘Yeah, can you play Thursday?’”

Klein said. “It was so funny because at that point I didn’t really know how to DJ at all. I have a few mutual friends

who put me in contact with Maddie; we started working together and we played our first set that week.

Going from mentor and mentee to partners in just a few days, Schnitzlein and Klein played their first set together at Moonies on Oct. 24.

“The first set that Ari and I did was the most memorable,” Schnitzlein said. “Every single one of our friends came. It was super packed. It was super nerve-wracking in the beginning because it was our first time, but then once we got into it I knew it’s what we were meant to be doing.”

Schnitzlein said the steepest point of the learning curve has been preparing for gigs. Each set requires a balance of creativity and technical skill; from curating playlists tailored to each crowd to fine-tuning transitions between tracks, every detail matters.

“Figuring out what music goes in takes so long,” Schnitzlein said. “If we’re performing Thursday or Friday, I’m going to start thinking of what music I want to play on Sunday. Sometimes we’ll spend the whole week thinking of what we want to play, curating it and seeing what goes well together.”

Not only have Schnitzlein and Klein been DJing at local bars and clubs, but they have also brought their skills to campus-sanctioned events. O n Nov. 15, the pair headlined the second-ever boiler room hosted by the college’s Bureau of Concerts.

Boiler room style sets began to explode in popularity in 2023 and reference a London-based music production of the same name. They often feature no separation between the crowd and DJ booth, creating

Sophomores Ari Klein and Maddie Schnitzlein perfect their original beats for their gigs downtown.

spencer baese/THE ITHACAN

a more intimate and interactive environment for both the performer and their listeners.

Sophomore Kiva Lucero, a television and digital media major and member of the BOC’s Logistics team, said that after Schnitzlein and Klein had made a name for themselves downtown, they were frontrunners to perform at the first boiler room of the semeste .

“House music and electronic music is really popular right now among students our age,” Lucero said. “At the time, everyone was kind of talking about DJ Maddie and Ari, so we knew that they would have a pretty decent pool of people that would come to the boiler.”

A DJ himself, Lucero said Schnitzlein, Klein and other student DJs have the potential to change local nightlife culture through their passion for music. By employing younger performers, bars and clubs can remain relevant to the town’s student audience.

“Having students perform and be in those spaces — they bring what students are actually listening to,” Lucero said. “A lot of the time when you go to a nightclub or bar around here, they play stuff that’s kind of — for lack of a better word — not trendy or not popular. I think with students, we bring the music that we’re listening to, songs that kind of resonate with our age group.”

Sophomore Chayse Shamleffer, a television and digital media major and Klein’s roommate, has attended many of Schnitzlein and Klein’s sets downtown and on campus. With a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into Klein’s process, Shamleffer said he most enjoys watching the technical work pan out on stage.

“I get to hear some of his steps or song ideas,” Shamleffer said. “Sometimes, before he’s actually going to add them to his set, he’ll be playing them out loud in our room. It’s definitely interesting to see it going from that to then seeing him actually performing at the boiler room and other gigs that I’ve been to.”

However, the journey has not been without its challenges. As young creatives, Klein said there are always people who doubt the pair’s abilities or disrespect boundaries at performances. Schnitzlein and Klein block out the noise by making more of it.

“People will always be pushy about requests, which can definitely be a little difficult and frustrating,” Schnitzlein said. “It’s just something you have to get used to.

It’s a reality of DJing and doing what we do.”

As the semester draws to a close, the pair said they plan to hit the ground running in the spring. Klein said that although he is still still new to mixing, the gig has been too much fun to take his foot off the gas.

“As I keep doing this for longer and longer, I do really enjoy it,” Klein said. “It’s very much something I could see myself doing for a while.”

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life and culture

Ithaca garners national praise on U.S. Arts Vibrancy Index by sheelagh doe Published jan. 22 SMU DataArts, the national center for arts research, ranked Ithaca No. 2 for most arts vibrant medium sized communities in 2024. The downtown art scene in Ithaca flourished in public support of the arts in 2024, leadin to this achievement.

Jennifer Benoit-Bryan, director of SMU DataArts, said researchers collect their own data and combine it with publicly available data about the financial and operational health of arts and culture organizations within a community. The Arts Vibrancy Index measures the kind of support communities give the arts, including how many awards or grants are distributed, revenues in ticket sales and contributions, what gets paid out to employees and total expenses amid other scores.

“Our indicator has 13 different measures,” Benoit-Bryan said. “We roll all of those scores up into an overall arts vibrancy metric and we really think about who’s providing arts and culture content in a community, like the artists, the employees, [and] the arts and cultural organizations themselves.”

Linda Luciano, property manager of South Hill Business Campus, built The Gallery at South Hilland Artist Alley, which has 54 studios and a year-long 20-person waitlist for new rentals.

Luciano said she gets a wide variety of artists renting spaces, from painters to puppet makers.

“Some people do this and this is how they make their living and some people just [have] a hobby and everything in between,” Luciano said.

Michael Sampson is the curator of The Gallery at South Hill and also runs Ithaca Gallery Nights, which showcases artists in Ithaca on the first Friday of every month. Ithaca Gallery Night is 25 years old and within the past year has gained 10 new venues. Sampson said that on average in 2024 there were 20 artist participants per month in the Friday gallery nights.

“As the program grows I think it’s bringing in a lot more people,” Sampson said. “So I’m noticing more attendance at Ithaca Gallery Night due to the fact that there’s more participation.”

While 2024 was a bustling year for art openings and a growing artist audience in Ithaca, there is one group of people that were largely missed: students.

Ed Brothers, president of the board of directors for State of the Art Gallery in Ithaca, along with Sampson and Luciano, expressed wanting to see more involvement from college communities.

“We try to get an intern every year, which is usually from IC or Cornell,” Brothers said.

Vincent Joseph, an artist at State of the Art Gallery, said there are some college students who come during gallery nights on Fridays, but not nearly enough. Joseph said that in his experience there has been a divide from college communities in the town as a whole.

“I would say that we have made a pretty good effort trying to engage the college students,” Joseph said. “It hasn’t worked out to the full capacity that it could.”

Sampson said it was one of his goals to increase college student participation and to make sure students knew they were able to participate in Ithaca Gallery Night.

“I think one solution is to have more student

grant called the strategic opportunity stipend, which supports local artists.”

These are just a sample of the grants they have to give out. Brothers said the primary grant that the State of the Art Gallery receives to help fund events is from CAP, which they have to apply for every year. According to the Arts Vibrancy Index, public support has been Ithaca’s strong suit.

“I think the place where there was the biggest leap from last year to this year has been in public support and in state arts funding,” Benoit-Bryan said. “But also in federal arts funding … which tells the nonprofit

“Youth Farm Mural,” located on Aurora St., is one of many murals facilitated by Ithaca Murals.

Marissa Moschella/THE ITHACAN

exhibitions at Ithaca Gallery Night,” Sampson said.

“With the opening of more venues, that’s more of an opportunity for students to exhibit their work.”

In 2024, Community Arts Partnership ArtSpace Gallery hosted two current Ithaca College students in its gallery, senior art major Safara Kalei Vaché and Jack Hassett ’24. Vaché said it was a learning experience as her first solo sho .

“This was the first time I needed to get measurements of all of my pieces and really document them,” Vaché said. “It was something that was going to be much more public and honestly it was just really exciting.”

CAP ArtSpace is the statewide community regrant partner for the New York State Council of the Arts. Megan Barber, the executive director of CAP, said its job is to redistribute the grants they receive for Ithaca from the statewide community regrant program to every corner of their county.

“This year we have $200,000 to give out to artists and arts groups for local arts programming for artists,” Barber said. “We have an artist and community grant, and then an arts and education grant. We also have a

organizations in Ithaca are really doing a great job of … getting those grants funded and it tells me that in the state of New York in particular, that you’ve got some really good public support going out to Ithaca as a community.”

Last year Ithaca placed No. 3 for medium sized communities on the Arts Vibrancy Index. Benoit-Bryan said there often is not a large space between rankings at the very top of the list, and that moving from a rank of three to a rank of two can be a pretty small change.

However, she said it was important to be able to celebrate the art vibrancy in communities and that they want the index to provide that.

Brothers has lived in Ithaca for 50 years and said the art scene has always been strong, but now he notices more of it.

“As you just walk around on the street, [there’s] more evidence of it because [of the] murals; I mean murals weren’t a thing 20 years ago,” Brothers said.

“Now, you turn around and in fact there’s a whole community in Ithaca. … They’re accumulating rather than disappearing.”

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Year In Review

IC alum presents original play, ‘Calling Bluffs’ at The Cherry Arts by eva leone Published feb. 4 As the lights come up at The Cherry Arts space, the audience will be immersed in an intense card game between four friends. These friends are played by Ithaca College students: senior Sylvia Grosvold, sophomore Jack Abba, sophomore Mikey Champion and senior Anna Riley. Their characters will experience a rollercoaster of emotions as this play captures their unforeseen reunion.

Sydney Pinhack ’24 decided to take on her passion project this past summer when she began writing and producing “Calling Bluffs,” an original play that will take the stage Feb. 14-16.

“Calling Bluffs” follows Thea, Henry, Evan and Hannah as they unexpectedly reconnect at a game night.

Thea and Hannah are hosting for the first time in their college apartment and Hannah’s boyfriend, Evan, brings Henry, who happens to be an old friend of Thea’s from high school. The characters will have to confront why their friendships ended and determine whether Henry’s complicity with an act of sexual violence is forgiveable.

“They now have to piece together whether or not there’s room for forgiveness and growth and they can maybe move forward as friends,” Pinhack said.

As well as exploring themes of friendship and forgiveness, the play deals with heavy subject matter like sexual violence. Specificall , how to navigate when a friend acts as a bystander in instances of sexual misconduct.

Abba, an acting major, plays the role of Henry.

Abba talked about how “Calling Bluffs” brings a larger societal problem to light by describing the prevalence of sexual assault on college campuses. According to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, 40% of students experienced at least one sexually harassing behavior in college. His character, Henry, is someone who struggles with holding someone accountable who has committed an act of sexual violence. “[My character] learns very quickly that action is the way to go, and he has to cut this man off, and he has to actively change his behavior, rather than just keeping empty promises and empty apologies,” Abba said.

For Pinhack, “Calling Bluffs” is a very personal project, as she said the play is inspired by her own experience in high school. She dealt with a similar situation; many of her friends turned a blind eye to an act of sexual violence.

She said that writing this play has given her an outlet to process that and learn more about herself.

“Sometimes you can’t forgive people, but that doesn’t mean you can’t move on,” Pinhack said.

“There are certain things and certain people in my life

From left, Sylvia Grosvold, Anna Riley, Mikey Champion and Jack Abba rehearse for the play "Calling Bluffs" written by Sydney Pinhack '24 and performed at The Cherry Arts space from Feb. 14-16.

Arthur Wawrzyniak/THE ITHACAN

that I just will never be able to forgive, and they will never be back in my life.”

The play is co-directed by Claire Gratto ’23 and senior Zoë Belle, a theatre studies major. Gratto and Pinhack also earned degrees in theatre studies.

Belle became a part of the project early on and supported Pinhack through the process of writing.

“It’s just cool to see a piece of work start from nothing, start from an idea in Sydney’s head and an experience from Sydney’s life, and build and build and build and build into something that requires collaboration and kindness,” Belle said.

Pinhack drew heavily from her experience as a theatre studies major during the process of writing and bringing “Calling Bluffs” to life. She came to the college with hardly any playwriting experience and ended up falling in love with the art after taking many courses on the subject.

“I feel like one of the big things that we’re taught over and over again is that if you’re a writer or director, things like that, you really have to kind of create your own opportunities,” Pinhack said.

Pinhack did just that. After graduating early, she said she wanted to take advantage of spending an extra year in Ithaca. She booked the space at The Cherry Arts before even finishing the script as a personal incentive to get her project off the ground.

“Suddenly, I was just here another year, and I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to take on a project,” Pinhack said. “It will be harder for me to do once I move to a bigger city and have a harder financial situation.

Pinhack said she chose The Cherry Arts space because they have provided support and been a positive environment for people bringing their work outside of the Ithaca College bubble in the past. Co-director, Belle, said she appreciates the intimacy of the space because the audience will be very close to the actors.

Belle said she hopes “Calling Bluffs” will inspire conversations about difficult topics like sexual assault.

“I feel like, especially in our social, political climate right now, it’s easy to feel trapped and to fall back into feelings of powerlessness,” Belle said.

Abba said he was originally not going to accept the role due to concerns of overworking himself, but after the election he changed his mind.

“I thought the show was pretty topical,” Abba said.

“I just thought it was a good moment to elevate theater as a way of actually trying to say something, rather than sort of shying away from certain topics.”

The space for collaboration that Pinhack has fostered makes “Calling Bluffs” different from other plays Abba has been a part of. He said that working in collaboration with Pinhack allows changes to be made based on the actors’ differing perspectives and interpretations of the characters.

“With the playwright in the room, it’s been a much more fluid and open-ended creative process,” Abba said.

“Everyone will take something different away from the piece,” Belle said. “They should absolutely come see it to discover what’s going to be relevant for them and what they can connect to.”

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4/7/25 1:04 AM

life and culture

Rust Cup encourages queer skaters to lace up for competition

By Sheelagh Doe and Haley Meberg Published feb. 19 Sheltered from street view, a skate shop on the side of an otherwise quiet hill in Jamestown, New York, holds a hidden world of exuberantly rowdy skaters, there to compete in Rust Cup 2025. Among the contestants and skaters taking advantage of the workshops and open skate times are a group of seven roller skaters and skateboarders representing Ithaca’s vibrant skating scene.

The Rust Cup, which began in 2022, is a non-binary, trans and women’s quad and board competition hosted at Jamestown Skate Products. It has created a safe space for queer skaters from all over to come together and share in their love for the sport. This tradition has carried over into its third year and continues to grow after each event.

Ithaca has been a hotspot for the skating community for countless years, with Ithaca’s League of Women Rollers opening in 2008. Over the years, this organization has expanded into two groups of women — the SufferJets and the BlueStockings — where they not only skate but create a haven for queer and women skaters in Ithaca. ​​The Rust Cup started as a collaboration between skaters from the Philadelphia area and Jamestown Skate Products. Clara Matton, a Cornell University graduate and judge at this year’s Rust Cup, started her journey as a roller skater in Ithaca five years ago. Matton discovered the Rust Cup its first year, where she attended as a roller skating participant.

Jamestown Skate Products has held skateboarding

competitions before on this site, but Matton said there had not been as much inclusion of queer people at these competitions in the past.

“Mostly cis straight white dudes are the stars of those shows,” Matton said. “It’s so fun to watch, and women and queer people were showing up to those events but not really feeling like, ‘I could be a part of this.’”

This all changed in 2022 when Mary Smith, also known as “Kid Ace,” collaborated with Jamestown Skate Products owner Pete Scheira to create a welcoming competition for women, trans and non-binary individuals.

Abeygail Mills, an 18-year-old Ithaca resident, has been immersed in the skating community throughout their entire life. Mills did not attend the competition but was a part of the Ithaca League of Junior Rollers from ages 10 to 17 and quickly found a home within the rink.

“I always felt that with roller derby, it was more than just my team members,” Mills said. “It was always like, these are my family.”

Ithaca’s robust and welcoming skating community has found a space within the Rust Cup 2025, where local skaters as well as skaters in and outside of the Finger Lakes area can show everyone what they can bring to the table.

Amanda Gates, a roller skater at Rust Cup 2025 who has skated at Jamestown Skate Products for many years, said this is the first Rust Cup where there have been competitors from all over, including Canada and California.

Mills emphasized the bravery of not being afraid to fail and the importance of community support.

“It doesn’t matter your level, you go out there and try your best,” Mills said. “If you succeed you succeed,

Sam Schulz, a competitor in the Rust Cup 2025, flies over the bowl while hitting a trick.

Sheelagh Doe/the ithacan

and if you fall on your face that’s ok because somebody will pick you up.”

First-year student Sam Robert has been roller skating since she was 10 years old and said derby specificall is a safe haven for many trans kids. Robert did not attend Rust Cup 2025, however, she spoke about the value of having access to queer-based skating environments.

“They get to use their roller derby names, whereas they don’t have to use their given names or deadnames,” Robert said. “Nobody will call you anything but that, and it’s just so accepting and I love it for that.”’

Self-expression is an extremely potent part of roller skating, and subsequently is a significant value within the LGBTQ+ community.

“Roller skating has always kind of been this place [where you can] be whoever you want to be, and just [express] yourself, and that goes hand and hand so well with queerness,” Matton said. “I want to see people having fun and throwing tricks that they are not sure if they are going to make it or not. I want people to take risks and do some showstoppers.”

At the competition there were beginner, intermediate and advanced sections, each with their own finale. It was an impressive feat for any skater — board or quad alike — to carve the tallest wall of the bowl and go over its ground-level entrance. Often, when a competitor did not land a challenging trick like this, the event's emcee would encourage them to try again, giving them a second chance to drop in the bowl.

In addition to providing a safe space for queer and trans skaters, the Rust Cup raises donations for Palestinian children affected by the war in Gaza.

Over the past few months, skaters in Ithaca have had to deal with the loss of the lease for the indoor practice space for roller derby. The Ithaca Roller Derby league itself relies on financial support of the participants’ families, causing local individuals to pay more to participate and keep the community alive. This lack of funding and available practice space affects all individuals in the queer skating community.

“There are queer children who are losing their safe space,” Mills said. “These are kids in school that are getting bullied for how they look and how they dress and how they feel, and their safe space is being taken away from them.”

The night before the competition, Matton and the other Ithaca skaters in attendance for the event went to check out the skate bowl and they each fell in love with the indoor skate park. On the drive back, the car was full of chatter: What if that was in Ithaca?

“If we get the word out that this is something people want, then maybe we can find the money,” Matton said.

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4/7/25 1:04 AM

Year In Review

Emerging magazine’s new ink promotes marginalized voices by eva leon Published march 6 Three new student-led magazines are emerging at Ithaca College this semester to highlight underrepresented voices, issues and subjects: Tinta Libre, ETRNL Magazine, and Her Campus.

Junior April Cascante had the idea to start a literary and arts magazine focusing on uplifting marginalized voices on campus, specifically voices of people of color. According to its social media page, Tinta Libre describes itself as a call to action, promoting justice and equity.

Tinta Libre is a Spanish phrase that can be translated to “free ink.” Cascante said they wanted the name of the magazine to reflect its mission to elevate Hispanic and Latino voices.

“It’s based on collective liberation and radical liberation and wanting it to be a place for people to envision a more liberated world, and so that’s where the ‘libre’ comes from,” Cascante said. “And then Tinta, just because it’s a publishing magazine.”

Tinta Libre has three different sections: written word, visual arts and voices. Written word consists of fiction pieces, translations and critical analysis on culture. Cascante said they hope the visual arts section will be very open and experimental, featuring any kind of art — physical or digital. Lastly, the voices section will focus on interviews and spotlights on students and faculty of color.

Her Campus is a national media platform dedicated to empowering, informing and connecting college women. There are campus chapters for many different colleges, including Ithaca College as of Fall 2024.

Sophomore Grace Reilly, editor-in chief of Her Campus, said Her Campus consists of a writing, social media and PR team. The writing team produces articles on topics like wellness, beauty, politics, fashion and entertainment. The social media team creates digital content and a public relations team pushes for brand deals.

“It’s so hard to put it into such few words, but Her Campus is so all encompassing for all types of people, people that want to do video and digital content or write,” Reilly said. “So that’s the thing that really intrigued me because it takes creative voices and blends them so well.”

The IC chapter was created in 2015 but ceased to exist in 2021 due to CO VID-19 and the lack of in-person interaction. However, junior Gianna Izzo restarted the chapter last semester and the magazine has just started holding meetings this semester.

Junior Leezum Regensburg is the secretary of

HerCampus. She said the magazine has a mission to provide an open space for women to share their college experiences.

“I feel as though for what Ithaca was missing out on in terms of college media was really a safe and open space for women to talk about things that they were going through, or college experiences that they were going through,” Regensburg said. “The general topic of women in college is something that I feel like is not spoken about.”

Regensburg, for example, wrote articles about what makeup one could wear to go out versus going to class and her experiences at Cornell University fraternity events.

Similarly, Cascante said they want Tinta Libre to focus on social issues in its content but also just be a space for students of color at the college to showcase their creative work.

“I think that just the fact that they’re writing and

creating as a POC person, that is a radical act in itself,” Cascante said.

Annette Levine, professor in the Department of World Languages, Literatures, and Cultures and the faculty adviser for Tinta Libre, said she is honored to be a part of a publication that spotlights the work of multilingual and multicultural authors.

“It’s an amazing venture,” Levine said. “I love literature in all its forms and languages and various cultures, and I think this is an amazing contribution to the campus community.”

Cascante said they also hope to engage the members of Tinta Libre with the outer Ithaca community.

Specificall , the Latino Civic Association of Tompkins County and the Cornell Farmworker Program, which works to address the needs of immigrant farm workers in upstate New York.

“I just want members of the magazine to also be volunteering, and spending their time in the community

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life and culture

with other Latinos, especially because things are scary right now,” Cascante said.

Cascante talked about increasing levels of policing, hostility and dehumanization being directed toward Latinos. They said it is crucial that Tinta Libre goes beyond engaging with other students and connects with Latino families and individuals throughout upstate New York.

ETRNL is a fashion magazine founded by sophomore Ayla Khosropour and junior O slene Vanyanbah. Its mission is to bring people together to share creative ideas, primarily through photography and graphic design.

Khosropour said ETRNL has a focus on sustainable fashion and reusing clothes. The magazine’s goal is to not use any new fabric and resist fast fashion. As part of its mission, the magazine promotes and sells its repurposed clothes through unique photoshoots.

“It’s more crazy content, odd angles, the angles that you don’t really see in photo shoots,” Khosropour said. “Not [just] standard poses, but unique style, with different types of people with different styles. We’re trying to show that clothes don’t have gender.”

Although the magazine is not directly affiliate with the college, they are trying to engage the campus community as much as possible. The magazine holds photo shoots that are open to all, regardless of experience.

“We really wanted this program or magazine to be inclusive and open to everyone, and very much diverse as possible,” Khosropour said. “Whenever I’m looking for models or photographers or even editors, I’m not saying you need experience at all. This is a place for people to get experience and learn and make content.”

HerCampus has a similar mission of inclusivity.

Although the content is centered around women in college, Reilly and Regensburg assured that the magazine is not limited to only female-identifying creators.

“We really just want to be a fun community and organization that encourages all voices to be heard about entertainment and news, but also, just the fun little parts of college,” Reilly said.

Khosropour said she wants to create a space to showcase out-of-the-box, sustainable and genderless fashion. The current project she is working on consists of using the same pieces of clothing to style four different people in different ways.

Although each of these magazines have their own unique visions, they all collectively strive to expand the range of the voices and issues being spotlighted in student media.

“Journalism is an everyone thing, media is an everyone thing,” Reilly said. “It’s not about gender guidelines, it’s something that we really want to break down, creating a space for everybody to have all their interests heard.”

Izzo is a staff writer and Vanyanbah is Design Editor for The Ithacan.

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Year In Review

‘Anora’ is an independent film classic just in time for awards Rating

universal pictures

by Logan Thompson Published nov. 12 “Anora” is part comedy, part drama and all heart. The runtime of nearly two-and-a-half hours flies by thanks to writer-director Sean Baker’s emotionally riveting and hilarious narrative. It follows Anora (Mikey Madison), a young Brooklyn sex worker of Russian descent whose Cinderella fairytale might actually be a nightmare.

At work, Anora — who goes by Ani — is incredibly confident, leading men to the ATM to withdraw cash, or slowly inching closer to them the longer they talk.

Vanya (Mark Eidelstein) is no Prince Charming. He’s the 21-year-old son of a Russian oligarch who shows up at a strip club looking for a lap dance, preferably from someone who speaks Russian. Anora speaks and understands it well enough to keep Vanya’s attention and that lap dance becomes a one week, Pretty Woman-style arrangement that leads to a Vegas wedding.

It’s an explosive beginning to the film, moving rapidly and capturing the essence of impulsive young love.

Madison — a Manson family member in “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” alongside Margaret Qualley, Austin Butler and Sydney Sweeney before they became household names — seems destined

for stardom in this role. At first, Anora is clearly into Vanya because of the money, but Anora becomes more vulnerable as their relationship continues. Her confident bravado unravels, and she falls for Vanya.

Madison also ingeniously uses her character’s Brooklyn accent — the more frustrated she gets, the more prominent the accent becomes.

About half an hour in, the film cleverly shifts from a flowe y fever dream to a darker reality. Word of Vanya’s marriage to Anora gets back to his parents. Predictably, they freak out, wanting him out of the U.S. and Anora out of his life. Two Armenian brothers, Toros (Karren Karagulian) and Garnick (Vache Tovmasyan), are sent to have the marriage annulled and bring along a Russian, Igor ( Yura Borisov), as their “muscle.” The three have a hysterical dynamic and spend time with Anora, unveiling whether Vanya’s affections are out of love or not.

Baker is a widely celebrated independent fil maker whose previous films, including “Red Rocket” and “Tangerine,” frequently focused on sex workers.

“Anora” has become the crown jewel of his filmogr phy, winning the Cannes Film Festival’s top prize, the Palme d’Or and blowing away festival attendees. Not only as the director but also as the writer and editor, his choices are fascinating. The scene introducing Toros, Garnick and Igor is 25 minutes long and flips the

entire story upside down. The fun-loving, sex-fille mantra of the first act slips away like a lost memory.

From there on, most interactions take their time, conversations linger and the comedy nails its landing.

The film is a love letter to Brooklyn’s Russian and Eastern European communities. Streets are familiar and lived in, and interactions switch between languages. The cinematography is grainy but beautiful, reminiscent of other modern independent New York City-based films like “Uncut Gems.” There are some standout shots of the group — Toros, Garnick, Igor and Anora walking past the Coney Island Cyclone roller coaster as it towers behind them.

The side performances are terrific as well. Eidelstein as Vanya brings the perfect energy for how the rich spoiled son of a Russian oligarch would act. He’s childish but brings the right amount of heart to appear loving. Borisov as Igor is also a scene-stealer. He conveys so much judgment and thought just with his eyes, rarely speaking. When he does, it’s much softer and gentler than expected, given that he’s supposed to be the scary member of the group. His intentions and loyalties are confusing, making him a fascinating character to follow. If there is one movie to pry audiences away from the comfort of streaming apps and get to a theater, this is it. “Anora” will not disappoint.

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life and culture - reviews

A24 terrfies with captivating characters in ‘Heretic’ season Rating

A24

by Will Caron Published nov. 13 “Heretic” was released by A24 on Nov. 8, marking directors Scott Beck and Bryan Woods’ latest terrifying contribution to the horror scene following “A Quiet Place” and other lesser-known horror films The film stars Hugh Grant as the endlessly captivating yet bone chilling Mr. Reed, Sophie Thatcher as Sister Barnes and Chloe East as Sister Paxton.

From start to finish, “Heretic” proves itself a gem amid the slew of horror movies already released this year. While this year has heralded some truly great horror films, this film takes it a step further through its unique blend of horror, intrigue and questions it poses to the audience. Whether through its extremely clever use of tension or the genuinely thought-provoking questions Mr. Reed forces you to ponder, “Heretic” remains a captivating film through and through The premise is simple: Two Mormons arrive at the sinister Mr. Reed’s house after he inquires to learn more information about the Mormon religion.

His house, lined with metal in the walls, prevents phone signals, and the dead bolted door assures these unknowing captives will remain inside. His mission is simple: enlighten these girls as to the true

meaning of religion — the one true religion. He will go to any means necessary to have them see his way.

This film is very clever in the way it executes its realistic horrors. The first and most important thing this film does to execute its horrors is to instill fear is through its protagonist’s decisions; these girls are smart. Unfortunately, Mr. Reed is always ten steps ahead.

Hugh Grant is captivatingly haunting throughout this movie. He is imposing not physically, but mentally. The way he exudes power feels so effortless. Grant’s performance is captivating, making even the simplest of conversations feel suffocating.

The way he studies the girls’ choices and actions under pressure –– all the while making casual remarks and never losing his cool –– is what makes him so gripping. He carries a certain preparedness about him — the type of preparedness that suggests he’s done this song and dance many, many times before. This sense of calm lends to a feeling of utter hopelessness, and amplifies every stressful situation tenfold. All these girls can do is stay strong and adjust to the predicament they are in, modifying their goal from simply escaping their captor to proving him wrong and hoping to God they can outsmart him.

Questions of religion are brought up throughout

the movie, placing into question the girls’ own beliefs as well as the beliefs of everyone who practices religion. At the same time, it comments on those who do not believe in religion, stating both sides have their flaws and problems. Reed’s theory on religion is cynical, and the girls must hold true to what they believe deep down and question what they actually think is awaiting them on the other side. Reed’s comments on every mainstream religion from the perspective of a madman prove extremely interesting and allow for some very outside-the-box theories and metaphors that the girls must dissect.

The cinematography in this movie is superb. One shot that stuck out in particular was when the girls were trapped behind the basement door and had to use a rug to pull a matchbox toward them. The cinematography elevated this scene tenfold as the camera panned for an extremely long time to the other side of the room. Overall, the film was extremely pretty, and Mr. Reed’s house, despite being almost exclusively shown throughout the entire film, proved to never get stale. Its use of layering set design-wise was very intriguing and added to the visuals.

“Heretic” proves to be a terrifying, funny and thought-provoking movie that has something to say and will be remembered as unforgettably chilling.

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Year In Review

‘Wicked’ is holding space for fans but not for musical-cynics Rating

universal studios

by Mariana Contreras Published dec. 3 One of the most awaited films of the year made its debut in theaters Nov. 22, with fans restlessly preparing to see the green-pink duo in “Wicked.” Ironically and a little tediously, the movie opens with a voiceover where Glinda addresses the Munchkins, and the audience, to address any rumors and speculations and “tell [them] the whole story.” It’s hard to measure the movie’s success and mass appeal without accounting for the existing fanbase.

The film picks up toward the end of “The Wizard of Oz” as Munchkinland celebrates the death of the Wicked Witch of the West. In the first song, “No One Mourns the Wicked,” audiences meet Glinda the Good played by Ariana Grande-Butera and Elphaba Thropp played by Cynthia Erivo. For the remainder of the film, it flashes back to the witches’ formative years at Shiz University. Ultimately, the film leaves several plot points loose to address in part two, set to be released Nov. 21, 2025.

One of the most unrealistic qualities of this fantasyland is the fact that all of the supposedly early 20-year-old students at Shiz University are played by actors who are at least 25 and look their age.

But, this is easy to forgive thanks to the compelling performances delivered by most of the actors.

This is especially true for 36-year-old Jonathan Bailey, who is perfect in the role of the Land of Oz’s dreamboat, the rebellious Prince of Winkie Country Fiyero Tigelaar. Bailey’s charm and talent make it easy to get lost in his charisma and pay little to no attention to anything else on screen. He perfectly captures the character and steals the spotlight in every scene he is in, starting from his introduction in “Dancing Through Life.”

“Wicked” is carried by two powerhouse leads.

While ‌lacking diction during her songs, Grande reinvents Glinda while also paying homage to Kristin Chenoweth’s original rendition on Broadway, invoking the character’s same loveable sweetness in spite of her vanity. Erivo’s performance as Elphaba goes beyond what many would have expected, surpassing an already very high bar set by Idina Menzel, who played Elphaba in the original Broadway cast.

The practical sets and locations in “Wicked” transport viewers into a magical land. Director Jon M. Chu — best known for his work in “Crazy Rich Asians” — brought the allure of the theater sets into the film especially for musical numbers such as “Dancing Through Life” and “I’m Not That Girl” where the characters physically interact with the world around them

but feel underused in songs like “The Wizard and I” where Elphaba wanders without direction. It lacks that dreamlike, technicolor iconic look that is so memorable of the original 1939 “The Wizard of Oz.” The same cannot be said for the soundtrack. The soundtrack was produced by the original “Wicked” composer Stephen Schwartz, Greg Wells and Stephen Oremus. For the most part, songs were recorded while filming, but were adapted from their stage version to match Chu’s rendition of the world. In this process, the songs lost some of their theatrical appeal and leaned more mainstream.

In the end, “Wicked” has lost some of its charm in attempting to become more palatable for a larger audience. While Chu and Schwartz’ proposed changes were mostly shut down, the film still sometimes feels harmed by Grande’s popularity: would the changes in Glinda’s songs be necessary if someone without such unique signature vocals was cast in the role?

It is hard to fully capture the magic of a live performance in a film, risking the wow factor of the story, but “Wicked” conquers this challenge.

Despite all of its greatness, “Wicked” may not resonate with everyone, particularly those who prefer traditional film narratives over musical theater adaptations, and that is perfectly fine

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life and culture - reviews

Ridley Scott plays with cinematography in ‘Gladiator II’ Rating

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by Logan Thompson Published dec. 3 “Gladiator II” is the highly-anticipated sequel to 2000’s “Gladiator.” Ridley Scott brings the heat with bigger battles, rabid CGI animals and the flawless cas ing of Denzel Washington as the film’s lead antagonist.

While earlier scripts had Russell Crowe’s Maximus fighting through the underworld to reclaim his life, this sequel includes only a few flashback clips of the original protagonist. Maximus’ bold presence is instead filled by Lucius (Paul Mescal), Lucilla’s (Connie Nielsen) son from the first film. Unlike Maximus, general of the vast Roman army and an established leader from the get-go, Lucius commands his village’s small artillery that tries to fend off the Roman ships. He grows as a leader when he has to start from scratch and gain the respect of his fellow gladiators.

Mescal gives a strong performance, revealing sadness behind his stone face. Lucius was the rightful heir to the empire but was exiled from Rome and hunted from city to city until he finally ended up safe in an African oceanside town.

The film opens in this town, where Lucius feeds chickens and tends to a farm while his wife, Arishat ( Yuval Gonen), hangs sheets to dry. The two are happy and at peace but suddenly, horns sound,

warning of an impending Roman invasion from sea.

Led by General Acacius (Pedro Pascal), the Romans swiftly claim the town, killing Arishat in the battle.

Lucius is taken as a prisoner of war and bought as a gladiator by Macrinus ( Washington).

Washington steals the whole movie. Everything from his posture to his outfits to his dialogue is irresistibly captivating. Macrinus is a flamboyantly cunning character, his likable facade concealing darker, power-hungry intentions. It’s reminiscent of Washington’s role as Alonzo in “Training Day.” As the film progresses, Macrinus uses Lucius’ gladiatorial strength to get to Rome and try to pull political strings with senators and the twin emperors, Geta ( Joseph Quinn) and Caracalla (Fred Hechinger).

Once his ship docks, Lucius returns to Rome and the plot rushes forward. Lucilla, the only returning character, is reintroduced as the film’s emotional core. She slowly works on regaining Lucius’ trust as his mother and is part of a plot to reinstate Marcus Aurelius’s “Dream of Rome.” Nielsen is fine in the role, but the story doesn’t give her enough time to shine. Geta and Caracalla are clearly out of their depth as emperors, making rash, uncalculated decisions left and right. Quinn and Hechinger each give strong performances but are never menacing like

Joaquin Phoenix, as their characters are constantly pampered and aren’t calculating.

“Gladiator II” plays it safe by sticking with a similar story structure to its predecessor. The movie sometimes feels a little too familiar, like “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” does to “A New Hope.”

In the third act, however, “Gladiator II” finall stands on its own. Before that, the only key difference was the action, with the first film rapidly cutting around every impact, making it dizzying to witness.

The sequel uses many more wide shots — not cutting on every punch — that allow viewers to see gladiators take hits and get thrown into things. The arena brawls also feel more immense, as they all feature some sort of vicious animal, whether monkeys, a rhino, or sharks. Although the animal CGI is sometimes repulsive, Scott’s direction caters to this gravitas with each fight growing more monstrous than the next As the credits roll, “Gladiator II” ends satisfactorily with an interesting direction for a potential third installment. Not all the performances live up to expectations and the CGI of the sharks and monkeys was video game quality and sub-par, but Washington, Mescal and excellent action sequences keep the fil highly engaging. Although it’s not on par with its predecessor, this sequel is just as entertaining.

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Year In Review

A horror classic worth retelling in ‘Nosferatu’ Rating

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by will caron Published jan. 23 “Nosferatu,” released Dec. 25 by Focus Features, proves to be a visually stunning and interesting take on the age-old tale. The film was directed by Robert Eggers, who directed “The Lighthouse,” “The Witch” and many other acclaimed horror movies. “Nosferatu” is a retelling of the original 1922 silent fil “Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror,” which was, in itself, a ripoff of the novel “Dracula,” meaning this film is adapting a nearly 130-yea -old story.

Nosferatu stars Lily-Rose Depp as Ellen Hutter and Nicholas Hoult as her husband Thomas Hutter.

The film also stars Emma Corrin and Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Friedrich and Anna Harding, as well as Willem Dafoe, who plays Professor Albin Eberhart Von Franz, and Bill Skarsgård as Count Orlok, otherwise known as the monstrous Nosferatu.

Depp does an exceptional job in portraying Ellen.

Her emotions are palpable, and her sudden mood swings feel unnatural in all the right ways. Hoult also did a great job as Nicholas and brought a surprising amount of heart to the terrifying medieval nightmare world that Eggers crafted. Dafoe shines in this film as always. He is incredibly captivating and breathes life

into the movie around the halfway point, when he is introduced. With that being said, the actors are not given too much to work with aside from Depp, and to a lesser extent, Hoult. Most of the characters feel incredibly standard and one-note. Nicholas and Ellen are the most interesting characters in the film Nosferatu’s character is portrayed as a completely evil, malicious force. Nosferatu is a plague, Nosferatu is a demon, and Nosferatu is a part of nature itself. Yet, the film also insists on Nosferatu having very human emotions. Without getting into spoilers, the movie certainly implied Nosferatu to be more of a metaphor for evil than a character.

“Nosferatu” serves as a very faithful retelling of the 1922 silent film, albeit with a few strange choices thrown in. This film revels in the uncomfortable and makes it very well known that it is willing to tackle mature content, almost to a fault. Yes, this film is meant to be disturbing, yet it tackles its heavy themes and undertones in a way that can feel lacking in nuance.

This movie deals with sexual assault, however, it did not spend the time necessary on the subject to grant it the depth it deserved beyond simply being scary.

As for the plot itself, if you have read Dracula or watched the original Nosferatu film, this film does not attempt to completely rewrite anything. Whether

through Orlok’s very strong Transylvanian accent that sounds ripped straight out of “Dracula,” or the way he moves and bends others to his will, this film certainly wants audiences to know it is a vampire film The best part of this film was by far the coloring.

“Nosferatu” plays with many stark warm and cold colors. Not a second of this movie is shot in black and white, yet half of the shots look as if they are.

The way natural lighting is played with to cast that same effect of having a black-and-white film is astounding. There were multiple scenes where it felt as if everything was in black and white, building suspense and tension, only for a fireplace or a ray of light to shine in the shot and illuminate the frame.

The coloring was utterly spectacular to watch and served to deepen emotion and immersion.

Overall, this is a good, bone-chilling, very well-shot film that has just a few big enough flaws to hold it back from being perfect. With its overreliance on vampire tropes, some overall one-note characters and dark subject matter that should have been granted more nuance, this film certainly is not for everyone.

However, it serves as a very faithful, well-shot and well-acted retelling of one of cinema’s most important films. This film is scary, leaves its mark on the viewer and definitely dese ves to be seen.

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life and culture - reviews

Adrien Brody delivers winning performance in ‘The Brutalist’ Rating

the tribune

by logan thompson Published jan. 23 Indie sensation and multi-Golden Globe winner “The Brutalist” is a grandiose spectacle that deserves to be seen on the biggest screen possible. It tells the story of a Jewish-Hungarian architect who flees postwar Europe amidst the Holocaust to start fresh in the United States. Although it’s structured like a slice-of-life film its ideas are complex and touch on legacy, immigration, love, classism and much, much more.

Adrien Brody is a tour de force as renowned architect, László Tóth. After arriving on Ellis Island, he is welcomed with open arms and is invited to live in their Philadelphia home by his cousin Attila and Attila’s wife, Audrey. He quickly finds success as a designer for their furniture business. But even in the U.S., antisemitic and anti-immigrant prejudices threaten László’s success.

Upon hearing László’s distaste for Attila converting from Judaism to Catholicism and for the furniture they sell, Audrey’s fondness for him fades. Soon, László find himself on the street and his cousins out of his life.

László’s journey is a rollercoaster ride that’s sometimes hard to watch. Brody is the film’s anchor, providing a performance that’s as captivating as it is authentic, careening between jubilation and

depression at a dizzying pace.

In a three-and-a-half hour runtime, “The Brutalist” covers 33 years and is split by a perfectly placed 15-minute intermission. Although intermissions are commonplace in live theater, films rarely employ them. Here, it provides a chance to stand up, use the restroom, refill drinks and popcorn and reflect on the film’s first half. The final scene before the intermission teases new characters and what’s to come. By the time intermission ends, there is a pungent sense of audience anticipation as the movie kicks back off.

While homeless, László develops a heroin addiction and barely gets by as a coal miner. His infamy as a Hungarian architect gives him an opportunity to commission a private library where he is noticed

by Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce). Van Buren hires him for the design, oversight and construction of a community center in Doylestown, complete with a theatre, gymnasium and church.

“The Brutalist” feels like a cinematic blast from the past. The attention to detail is astounding with numerous vast, sweeping shots that capture beautiful locations, like the Statue of Liberty, Van Buren’s mansion and Italian marble quarries. It’s a sweeping American Epic shot on VistaVision, a format famous for its use in Hitchcock’s “Vertigo” that has not been

used in an American movie for decades. Despite its scale, writer-director Brady Corbet made this film with a mere $10 million budget — a rarity in today’s Hollywood landscape where most major motion pictures cost 10 times as much. But not once does the film feel constrained by minimal finances While the first half builds up the American Dream — the second half burns it to the ground. The fil goes from a rather conventional story to one with plenty of twists, turns and tragedies. Spearheading this second half of the film is Erzsébet (Felicity Jones), László’s wife. After years of being stuck at the border of Austria, she finally makes it to the U.S. to join him.

She is strong-willed, knows exactly what she wants and is willing to fight for it. Jones’ electrifying presence dominates the screen even in scenes with the equally talented Brody or Pearce.

“The Brutalist” is much more than any other film it is an experience. One that explores whether the U.S.’ capitalist regime is any better than the fascism László escaped. By the end, the audience is left baffled by the film’s darker directions. It is grotesque in cognitive anguish, capturing the U.S.’ beauty and brutality. It is a celebration and a funeral. At the very least, this film is — to steal one of Van Buren’s favorite phrases — “intellectually stimulating.”

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Year In Review

Tyler, the Creator connects with fans in ‘CHROMAKOPIA’

by Kellyanne Kearney Published nov. 12 Tyler, the Creator dropped his most personal album to date O ct. 28. “CHRO MAKO PIA” explores themes about Tyler’s struggles with love, sexuality and the idea of fatherhood.

The album opens with “St. Chroma,” which features whispering and stomping noises all throughout the beginning, like a marching army. Vocals from Daniel Caesar toward the end signal hope as he sings “Can you feel the light? Inside? / Can you feel that fire?” — inspiring Tyler’s journey of self-discovery.

This introduction sets the tone for the rest of the album as Tyler explores his light by acknowledging his dark past.

In “Hey Jane,” Tyler tells a story about getting a woman pregnant and making the difficult decision to keep it or not. The song is a serious conversation between the woman and himself, but the beat and drums give it a softer, almost jazzy sound.

“Like Him” is one of the most personal songs on the album as Tyler asks his mother questions about his father who wasn’t around in his childhood. The piano beat and soft singing are intensified by the guitar, synths and background vocals from Lola Young, who adds to Tyler’s sadness as he asks his mother, “Do I look like him?” It is revealed by his mother at the end of the song that she is the reason his father could not be in his life.

This song is emotional and becomes more hard-hitting with every relisten because of the realization that Tyler’s mother is the reason for much of his trauma and personal issues discussed earlier in the album.

The album closes with “I Hope You Find Your Way Home” in which he concludes he is not ready to have children yet. The song ends positively as Tyler talks about his pride in himself and his achievements. Listening to “CHROMAKOPIA” is like reading Tyler’s diary, where his past experiences are coming to light as he takes his fans on an introspective journey. While this album deals with serious personal issues for the most part, there are two songs that are drastically different sonically compared to

Rating columbia records the rest, “Judge Judy” and “Sticky.” “Judge Judy” has a catchy tune and melody that is a pleasant break from the seriousness of the rest of the album. “Sticky” sticks out in the album like a sore thumb in the best way possible, with features like GloRilla, Sexyy Red and Lil Wayne who make this song perfect for fans of more energetic rap songs. This album differs from his past projects due to the in-depth content about his struggles and the softer synth beats with jazzy instrumentals.

‘Short n’ Sweet’ wittily explores relationships in a raunchy way

by Mariana Contreras Published Aug. 27 Former Disney Channel star Sabrina Carpenter released her sixth studio album “Short n’ Sweet” on Aug. 23. This release followed the success of summer hits “Espresso” and “Please Please Please,” which are the two singles of the album. She delivers an album

Rating island island records records

that is diverse in themes and genres, with lyrics touching on lustful mistakes, passionate love, infidelity and even heartbreak. Her songs are not only catchy, but surprising as listeners are met with an experimental genre blend of R&B, pop and folk-country, giving it a nostalgic but timeless melody.

“Short n’ Sweet” showcases Carpenter’s vocal and lyrical talents, accommodating different styles.

“Lie To Girls” is more jazzy, different from the mainstream pop songs on the album. Lyrically, she shows her relatable vulnerability without losing her charm.

“Dumb & Poetic” feels like an intimate conversation with a friend. Carpenter rants about her taste in men and how self-sabotaging it can be. This song stands out as the tune matches her rage, slowly building up and showcasing her high notes until it collapses into a softer tone — perhaps mimicking the desperation of not getting enough from a partner and coming to terms with their departure.

The album’s final track, “Don’t Smile,” is fittingl about a breakup. Carpenter starts the song by singing, “Don’t smile because it happened baby / cry because it’s

over,” presenting a fresh take on the familiar saying. The tune is also one of the slower ones, with a soft guitar and a relaxing tempo, making it a surprisingly soothing heartbreak song.

The album shines because its range allows Carpenter’s personality to shine through in each song. It’s a memoir and exposé of contemporary dating culture and it is full of sarcasm that’s raunchy enough to bring out a laugh without feeling vulgar. Although she is open and playful when describing her romantic experiences, Carpenter employs Gen Z’s seemingly preferred coping mechanism of making pain funny, which shows listeners that pop star or not, she’s just a girl.

As Carpenter says in her song “Good Graces” — where she praises herself for “turning lovin’ into hatred” — this album shows her versatility, offering something for everyone while leaving her exposed to those who might not enjoy the potpourri of genres.

With “Short n’ Sweet,” Carpenter delivers a mix of Taylor Swift, Gen Z Dolly Parton and some notes of Ariana Grande, becoming both an image of those who came before her and a distinct icon of her own.

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life and culture - reviews

Bad Bunny shows Latin American unity in ‘DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOTos’

by Mariana Contreras Published jan. 23 Almost a decade after Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio— known as Bad Bunny— started to gain recognition in the U.S. Hot Latin Songs lists, he released his sixth album, “DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOTos,” on Jan. 5. Bad Bunny returns to his roots with a thoughtful homage to his home country, Puerto Rico.

Even when dropping the album, the reggaeton star was intentional; Jan. 5 is a date in which some Latin American families celebrate Dia de Reyes. It is also a week that holds historical significance to Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and Cuba as part of the revolutionary revolt against Spanish rule.

The album goes beyond his usual trap and reggaeton sound, it dives into salsa, merengue, old-school perreo, bomba and plena –– rhythms that originated and are a staple of Puerto Rican culture. With multiple features in the album, Bad Bunny shows his love

and admiration to his nation not only through genres and lyrics but through collaboration with Puerto Rican artists like Boricua singer RaiNao, O mar Courtz, Dei V, the uprising band Chuwi and the plena group Los Pleneros de la Cresta.

A highlight of the album is “BAILE INoLVIDABLE,” which starts as any other trap song. Bad Bunny laments losing a meaningful relationship as salsa softly fades with clear, silvery trumpets before turning into a Caribbean salsa. The song moves your body and heart with everchanging melodies that keep the track feeling fresh.

From track 10 onwards, Bad Bunny shows no fear using his platform to make a statement about the new presidency of Donald Trump and what that meant for the Puerto Rican Independence Party.

The second to last song and the most popular, “DtMF,” caused commotion on social media, starting an emotional trend. The background chorus singers’ call and response chants make listeners feel a sense of community and appreciation for loved ones –– in fact Bad Bunny himself includes a message thanking his fans.

There is no doubt that it is Bad Bunny’s prime with his most vulnerable and raw album yet, which makes it all the more enjoyable as not only music that touches your soul but inspires in times of despair. While not all of the 17 tracks are bangers, their impact is undeniable and the album’s reach is clear as it bridges solidarity among the new generation and the older generation. Bad Bunny is setting the standard for all Latin artists reaching global stages to honor the sounds of their people.

Rating

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The Weeknd dives personal and deep in ‘Hurry Up Tomorrow’ Rating

universal pictures

by billy wood Published feb. 5 When The Weeknd released his fourth studio album “After Hours” in the spring of 2020, he set off what would become his most ambitious project yet. What we know now is that “After Hours” was just the introduction for the

story that is perfectly capped off by his new 22-track album “Hurry Up Tomorrow,” released Jan. 31.

The opening track, “Wake Me Up,”starts with a haunting first verse with faint beats in the background.

The Weeknd’s soft vocals stretch the lyrics and convey a vibe of uncertainty and despair, presumably after coming out of his intoxicated state seen in “After Hours” and “Dawn FM.” The lyrics “All I have is my legacy / I been losing my memory / No afterlife, no other side / I’m all alone when it fades to black,” in the first verse evokes the mental state The Weeknd is in, certain that there is nothing for him after the fast life he is living. He references recurring themes of time slipping away seen in the songs “Blinding Lights” and “Out of Time” in “After Hours” and “Dawn FM,” respectively, with the lyric “And I can’t find the horizon (horizon) / I’m running out of time (time).”

“Baptized In Fear” continues The Weeknd’s descent into past trauma. The lyrics allude to TheWeeknd being at the brink of death andt trying to make up for

what he has done before it all comes crashing down.

“Reflections Laughing” enjoys a captivating and lengthy feature from Travis Scott, while “Enjoy The Show” features Future in a similarly long feature.

“Without a Warning” sets up the outro track of the album, with deep expressions of The Weeknd’sinner struggle with his past and if he can ever move on from The Weeknd’s persona into who he wants to be seen as.

The Weeknd sings “Wash me with your fire / Who else has to pay for my sins? / My love’s fabricated, it’s too late to save it / Now I’m ready for the end,” as if he is making his last plea to God in a gospel-esque piano ballad — which is unusual for him. In these lyrics, he is asking God to purify him in punishment for his past sins.

“Hurry Up Tomorrow” acts as the quintessential end to the journey that The Weeknd has taken his fans through since he released the dark and drug addled “After Hours” in 2020. The Weeknd utilizes his deepest and most emotional lyrics yet, which are accompanied by some of the best production his albums have ever had.

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Year In Review

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sports

sammie macaranas/the ithacan

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Year In Review

Fresh coaching staff brings a new era

by Flynn hynes Published AUG. 29 As the academic year kicks off, so does a new athletic season. For the 2024-25 season, six teams — men’s cross-country, men’s track and field, volleyball, sculling, women’s rowing and women’s tennis — have a new head coach. In addition, four teams — men’s basketball, men’s rowing, sculling and women’s rowing — have new assistant coaches.

Susan Bassett ’79, associate vice president and director of intercollegiate athletics, said she is looking forward to seeing where these new promotions and hirings can take Ithaca College athletics.

“It’s almost like a whole infusion of new energy and I’m really excited about this year and all the people we’ve hired,” Bassett said.

Volleyball: During Spring 2024, the volleyball team saw long-time head coach Johan Dulfer announce his retirement after seven seasons with the program. Replacing him is Tara Stilwell ’19, who was an assistant coach with the Bombers from 2019 to 2021 and an assistant coach with Cornell University volleyball for the 2023 season. Stilwell also spent three seasons as a star player on the Bomber’s volleyball squad. She emphasized how much Dulfer impacted volleyball at the college, but said the team is entering a new era.

“I learned a lot from coach Dulfer,” Stilwell said.

“He is one of my mentors. He is one of my friends. I love him dearly. … But what I’ve tried to tell a lot of people is this is a new team. …While there’s always going to be leftovers, it is new, and it’s a new era, and we’re trying to change things just as the game develops and we’re just going to continue to get better.”

Women’s Rowing and Sculling: Head coach Becky Robinson ’88 retired over the summer marking the end of a long career at Ithaca College. Robinson left a lasting impact on the college’s women’s rowing and sculling program, spending 30 years as head coach of the program. Beth Greene ’00, who was an athlete at the college and has been the assistant coach for 14 years, has replaced Robinson.

Greene said she is going to try to replicate some of Robinson’s strategies in her own work.

“She’s been one of the most important mentors in my whole life,” Greene said. “Both as an athlete — she was my coach — and as a coworker. I think some of the biggest things that I’ve learned that I always wanted to absorb from her are: don’t be afraid to be the one speaking up and being the squeaky wheel, find people’s positives, find what people are doing right and emphasize and celebrate what people are doing.”

Joining Greene as assistant coach for both women’s rowing and sculling is Greg Siez ’23, who has served as co-captain as a student and competed in the men’s program’s first varsity eight for his entire rowing career at the college. He was selected to the 2023 Liberty League

First Team. Seiz will primarily work with the novices to bring them up to speed, while Greene works with the varsity squad. Greene said some of the goals she has in mind are to upgrade the recruiting and bring more attention to detail to the program.

“The trickiest part is trying to figure out something new that I want to do [because] what we’ve been works,” Greene said. “To be competitive we’re going to step up our recruiting game a little bit. I think that this is an opportunity with the new coaching staff to [change] some of the patterns, even when it’s like the warmup that we do, to tweak it a little bit so it’s a chance to get people paying more attention to detail.”

Men’s Cross Country and Track and Field: Erin Dinan, the women’s cross-country head coach, has taken over for Jim Nichols, who retired after spending 37 years on South Hill, as the head coach of the men’s cross-country team and will now coach both teams. Dinan, who is now working full-time with the college, said she is looking forward to the opportunity to coach the men’s squad and also the opportunity to get closer with the Bombers’ staff.

“I’m really excited to be here and be here more than I was in the past [and] to be able to work with both of these teams,” Dinan said.

In addition to this, senior cross-country and track and field member James Hughes said Nichols’ retirement pushed the team to take on more responsibility.

“With [Nichols’] retirement, I think it just took

The men’s cross-country, men’s track and field, volleyball, sculling, women’s rowing and women’s tennis teams will have a new head coach.

Illustration by Molly teska/THE ITHACAN

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Mari Mitchell is the new women's tennis coach. courtesy of ithaca athletics

Erin Dinan is the men's cross country team's coach.

Sports

Stargell Williams is the men's track and field coach

Beth Greene is the women's rowing and sculling coach.

courtesy of ithaca athletics

courtesy of ithaca athletics

Tara Stilwell is the new head volleyball coach.

Mike Sasso is the new men's basketball coach.

courtesy of ithaca athletics

courtesy of ithaca athletics

courtesy of ithaca athletics

a lot more accountability from us, especially the seniors and captains and leadership group, in terms of stepping up and making sure that we can transition as smoothly as we can and just making sure that everyone’s on the same page,” Hughes said.

To fill in the vacancy for the men’s track and field head coach position is Stargell Williams. Williams was at Ursinus College for six years, holding numerous positions like associate head coach, throws coach and recruiting coordinator. Williams also has experience as an elite student-athlete, becoming a two-time All-American at Coffeyville Community College and a three-time national champion thrower at Florida State University, where he graduated in 2015. Williams said his goal is to get everyone to put in their best effort and focus on personal improvement.

“My coaching philosophy is not anything complex,” Williams said. “I just want to help each kid reach their full potential or be the best they can be. That looks different for every kid. … So wherever you’re on that spectrum, I want to help you reach your best.

Women’s Tennis: After spending one year as the assistant coach, Mari Mitchell was promoted to women’s tennis head

coach as head coach Tom Rishcoff will only be coaching men’s tennis this season. Mitchell has 30 years of experience coaching tennis, most notably at Cornell University and Ithaca High School. She was named ESPN Ithaca Coach of the Year after her 2020 season as head tennis coach at Ithaca High School. In her promotion announcement, Mitchell said she is looking forward to the promotion.

“I am thrilled for the promotion to head coach of the women’s tennis program, and excited for the support we have received from the athletic department,” Mitchell said in the announcement.

Men’s Basketball: The men’s basketball team has brought in assistant coach Mike Sasso, who spent the past eight years at Division I Rutgers University. From 2016-20, Sasso worked as a student assistant at Rutgers. From 2020-22, he served as a graduate assistant for two years, which prepared him to become a video coordinator for the previous two seasons. Sasso said he is eager to get to work and wants to leave a mark on the program.

“I just got here to Ithaca, and the way I’ve kind of aligned things with me and my other half is, like, we plan on being here for years on end,” Sasso said. “And coach

[Waleed] Farid’s ultimate goal of building this program into a national powerhouse at the Division III level — I want to be a part of that.”

Men’s Rowing: On the men’s rowing team, Jake Lentz ’23 has been brought in as the assistant coach after Crista Shopis stepped down. During his time with the college, Lentz was a two-time co-captain in his junior and senior seasons. In 2023 he was selected to the Second Team IRCA All-American and the Liberty League First Team. In his hiring announcement, Lentz said he is excited to get started.

“I am incredibly grateful for the opportunity to be returning to the Ithaca men’s rowing program,” Lentz said in the announcement. “I had such memorable experiences as a student-athlete and can’t wait to give back.”

Bassett said the college will always try to bring in new coaches that are experts in their sport and well-fit for the school.

“Anytime anybody leaves, we’re sad to see them go, but we’re always going to recruit with the idea that we’re going to hire an excellent professional who’s knowledgeable in their sport, has a track record of success, has good communication skills and strong values that we feel fit within our program,” Bassett said

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Year In Review

Men’s tennis star shines bright for the Bombers Head coach Tom Rishcoff also detailed the rookie’s mixture of strengths on the court.

Published oct. 5 “He’s really dynamic,” Rishcoff said. “I don’t think there’s many holes in his game. He’s kind of an all-court Ivan Kisic, a first-year student-athlete on the Ithaca player. So he’s got a big serve, great forehand, his backCollege men’s tennis team, exploded onto the scene when he took home the “B” singles title at the St. Law- hand is consistent, he can play the net pretty well.”

It is a rare sight to see a first-year student-athlete rence University Fall Classic on Sept. 8. No other Bomber come into a program with this kind of success. Accordhas claimed a singles title at this tournament since 2016, when Minos Stavrakas and Nathan Wolf won the “A” and ing to Kisic and those close to him, his impressive start can be attributed to his time spent at the Emilio San“C” flights respectivel .

“When I first came here, my motive was to try to chez Academy, a high school in Naples, Florida.

Founded in 1998 by tennis legends Emilio Sanchez win every match,” Kisic said. “I feel pretty determined to win. I don’t really like losing. I’m more focused on Vicario and Sergio Casal, the Emilio Sanchez Academy has positioned itself as an elite tennis school that staying confident and just pushing through.

Kisic has a wide range of on-court skills that have churns out professional and collegiate players every allowed him to make an immediate impact for the year. As a junior in high school, it was at this sprawling, Bombers. After his performance at the St. Lawrence tennis court-filled campus where Kisic developed the Fall Classic, Kisic was named Liberty League men’s ten- most as a player and a person.

“Training with a bunch of players who are all siminis rookie of the week. Sophomore doubles partner Emiliano Pedrero described the steady and energetic lar in level to you, it’s fun, it’s competitive,” Kisic said.

Oscar Rodriguez, Kisic’s high school coach, deplay style that has allowed Kisic to stand out.

“He has a really big serve,” Pedrero said. “He’s pretty tailed the young athlete’s development while at the tall, and he accelerates really well ... Once the match academy in a letter sent to The Ithacan.

“In 2021, he started to play on the high school starts, he’s able to play long points at a pretty high level.

Just the way he plays — he plays aggressively, but consis- team and I think that kind of competition and those matches helped to improve his character as a player tently, which is the most difficult part. and the way he was competing,” Rodriguez said in the letter. “He was able to be a leader and became a player who was difficult to beat.

The countless hours spent on the tennis court in high school are proving worthwhile for the rookie, giving him an edge and a strong sense of confidence that not many other first-year athletes experience.

Originally committed to play tennis at Division I Sacred Heart University, Kisic switched course in late May to become a Bomber.

“The coach here at Ithaca was really simplistic,” Kisic said. “He made it easy for me. It seemed like he really wanted me, so that’s what ultimately made me choose Ithaca.”

Recruiting high-level players is crucial for college coaches looking to make an impact in the Liberty League.

But landing a recruit with Division I talent like Kisic was no easy task.

“I think when you’re recruiting, First-year student Ivan Kisic became the first Bomber since you kind of try to create your own luck 2016 to claim a singles title at the Fall Classic on Sept. 8. lucia iandolo/THE ITHACAN a little bit,” Rishcoff said.

by peter nowlan

Establishing and maintaining contact with high school coaches and players is key for any college head coach during recruitment, which is usually a year-round effort. However, Rishcoff had not yet set up a connection with the Emilio Sanchez Academy’s coaches and players prior to watching Kisic play for the first time “It wasn’t like I had him on my list or anything like that,” Rishcoff said. “He’s an academy player from Florida. So it was an event that I went down to see, a showcase in Florida. I actually met him down there and saw him on the sheet of players.”

Kisic’s success at the St. Lawrence tournament has given him the opportunity to represent his team as its No. 1 singles player in matches going forward; in the Lions Tournament on Sept. 13 and 14, Kisic was slotted in as the No. 1 singles player on the Bombers’ depth chart. However, this role is hotly contested by fellow teammate Gijs Fidler, a sophomore who was awarded Second Team All-Liberty League honors following the Spring 2024 season.

As the season goes on, iron will continue to sharpen iron between the two.

“We play a lot of practice sets with each other,” Kisic said. “I think throughout the season, we’ll keep playing sets to determine who’s going to be the No. 1.”

However, this competition on the court does not seem to affect the group’s chemistry.

“When I play, they definitely give me confidence to keep going forward,” Kisic said. “I hang out with [my teammates] pretty much every day.”

The close-knit bond that is evident in this year’s team provides a road of promise going forward.

This year, [the culture is] super positive,” Pedrero said. “We’re excited. We’re mentally rejuvenated.

We’re working twice as hard as last year. There’s more accountability. There’s more compromise from everyone. So we’re a team that’s actually pursuing a goal.”

In the Northeast ITA Regional on Sept. 27-29, Kisic and Pedrero gained an impressive victory over former Bomber and First Team All-Liberty League player Nicolas Luis ’24, now playing for Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, in a doubles match to advance to the round of 16. In singles matches, Kisic posted a 4-1 record for the Fall 2024 season.

While hopes are high, time will tell if Ivan Kisic and the new-look South Hill squad can build off of their success from the St. Lawrence Fall Classic and the Northeast ITA Regionals.

“We graduated four players last year, so I think we’re just trying to find our identity,” Rishcoff said.

“It’ll be a fun season. I think we’ve got a lot of young talent, so I’m looking to kind of build from there.”

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Former national champion vaults into coaching role by sierra gabriel Published oct. 23 Once a dominant force for pole vault for Ithaca College, national champion Dominic Mikula ’24 has returned to campus to begin his coaching journey, mentoring the student-athletes following in his footsteps.

Mikula ended his pole vaulting career at the college as an eight-time All-American who was named Liberty League Outdoor Field Performer of the Year twice, a seven-time NCAA Qualifie , and Indoor Niagara Region Field Athlete of the Year. He set pole vaulting records for the Bombers 10 times with his most recent indoor and outdoor marks at 5.13 and 5.11 meters in 2023.

After graduating with his Master of Science in May 2024, the Trumansburg native said he looks forward to returning as an assistant coach for the men’s and women’s track and field teams at the college “This was not the original plan that I had,” Mikula said. “I always wanted to get into coaching, but I didn’t know where I would end up. … It’s been very surreal, very wholesome, but also very exciting at the same time, to be able to come back to a system that I already know. … It’s such a huge thing for a young coach like myself.”

Matt Scheffle , former assistant coach of the men’s and women’s track and field team at the college, said he admired Mikula’s work ethic, drive and passion, which separated him from his competition while he was an athlete. Scheffler said he hopes that as Mikula starts his new position at the college, the athletes he coaches will adopt his strong character and mentality.

Under Scheffle ’s leadership, the team’s pole vaulters have taken 44 conference titles. In the last nine years, he has coached 28 All-Americans and seven national champions — one of them being Mikula. Scheffler spent 12 years coaching the former student-athlete at Charles O. Dickerson High School and Ithaca College. Mikula said Scheffler was a large influence in how he saw pole vaulting and how he performed throughout his career.

In the last few seasons, Scheffler said he was challenged with the decision of when the best time to retire would be. As a father of two, Scheffler said he wants to be more present in his childrens’ lives, specifically mentioning that he feels that he misses his nine-year-old daughter’s journey in athletics.

“When I’m over there coaching, when I’m traveling on the weekends, I’m working with everyone else’s kids, but mine are going by the wayside,” Scheffler said. “You don’t get another chance for that, so I think that was probably the biggest factor for me, just being able to spend more time with my family.”

Former pole-vaulting national champion Dominic Mikula '24 has returned to start a new role as an assistant coach for the Ithaca College men’s and women’s track and field teams.

Robert daniels/THE ITHACAN

Scheffler said that he calls Mikula his “mini-me” and that he is confident the team is in good hands “Ithaca pole vault[ers] have a great legacy of success,” Scheffler said. “[Mikula is] someone that wants that to continue, so he’s the guy to do it. I can’t think of anyone else that I would put in that position.”

Now that the national champion has also claimed the title of coach, he plans to model Scheffle ’s philosophies, including prioritizing personal guidance over standardized techniques.

“Pole vault is such an event where if you don’t trust your coach, it’s never gonna end up well,” Mikula said.

“The trust and the relationship and the rapport between a coach and its athlete makes a huge difference.

I want to continue that type of coaching into the future with the student-athletes.”

Mikula and Scheffler are not the only ones that share these values. Jennifer Potter ’92, head coach for women’s track and field, joined the coaching staff at her alma mater nearly a decade after graduating. Potter said she knew that she wanted to be a coach since seventh grade and that her passion for the sport is a fundamental part of her role that goes beyond a single event. She said that, like her, Mikula was an athlete who supported all events in track and field. Aside from being Ithaca College graduates, the head coach said she and Mikula share similarities in their coaching styles and their passion for the sport.

“I think I kind of call myself a track dork,” Potter

said. “Dom is the same way when it comes to track in all the events. … We want to see people succeed, and we want to challenge them to do things they didn’t think they could do, and I definitely feel that Dom and I have that kind of very similar personality or skill set when it comes to coaching.”

Potter described the shift as a natural transition, expressing her confidence in the former athlete’s coaching ability not only because of his knowledge of the sport, but because of his comfort with the facilities and athletes.

Senior pole vaulter Shaun Herlihy shared two seasons with Mikula and said he and a few teammates were excited about the transition. With Scheffler leaving, Herlihy said the team had concerns of who would take his place. He said it was the confirmation that their former teammate would be joining the coaching staff that gave them a sigh of relief.

“He’s always taken a leadership or captain-coach role on the team, so it doesn’t feel too different than it was,” Herlihy said. “The biggest difference is calling him coach, but we’re all very excited.”

Herlihy said his outgoing, hard working and caring nature inspired him to do the same and pass on what he’s learned from Mikula to future Bomber athletes.

“I think [the program] has a lot of potential,” Herlihy said. “Two years ago [the team had] what I would say was one of our best years for pole vault. … I definitely think that with him being the coach, we’ll see the program rising.”

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Year In Review

Field Hockey shuts down Thoroughbreds in liberty league showdown

by Tess ferguson Published Oct. 26 In a midday matchup Oct. 25, the Ithaca College field hockey team extended its winning streak to four games in a Liberty League victory against the Skidmore College Thoroughbreds. The 2-0 victory improves the Bombers’ in-conference record to 5-1 and 10-5 overall.

The first quarter saw little action on either side of the field, with both teams’ defensive units setting the tone for the game by shutting down any scoring opportunities. Senior defender Bella McCollister led the Bombers’ press from the backfield, consistently redistributing the ball into Thoroughbred territory.

McCollister was the first to find time and room on the offensive end, but she fired the ball just wide of the cage. Her shot would mark the only one in the frame.

The Bombers entered the second quarter with a new fire, immediately adjusting their offensive approach to find more scoring opportunities. Senior striker Juliana Valli put her first shot of the day on goal just under two minutes into play, which triggered a penalty corner for the Bombers. Junior striker Brenna Schoenfeld was able to notch a shot on goal, but Skidmore’s goalkeeper stifled the attack The Thoroughbreds found their first and only penalty corner of the afternoon about three minutes into the frame. McCollister and the rest of the Bombers’ defensive unit quickly regained possession and redistributed the ball into Skidmore’s territory.

With 32 seconds remaining in the half, the Bombers earned their fourth penalty corner of the game.

Sophomore midfielder Brooke Snider fired one from

The Ithaca College field hockey team celebrates its shutout victory against Skidmore College on Oct. 25. The Bombers finished their season Nov. 11 by claiming their first Liberty League title.

Giancarlo messina/THE ITHACAN

the left side of the cage that Skidmore’s goalkeeper made a diving effort to repel, but sophomore midfiel er Payton Yahner capitalized on the rebound.

Yahner forced the ball right back over the goal line to put the Bombers in the lead and close out the half 1-0. The goal marks the first of ahner’s career.

“It was really an accumulation of all the hard work our team has put in and all the corner reps we’ve taken,” Yahner said. “Brooke sent a beautiful ball that just

Senior midfielder Meara Bury weaves around the Thoroughbred defense pushing the ball upfield.

Giancarlo messina/THE ITHACAN

happened to rebound right into my stick and I was able to finish it.

The start of the second half operated similarly to the start of the first — this time with the Thoroughbreds’ defensive strength on display. The Bombers dominated possession time but struggled to find many scoring opportunities. Ithaca earned three penalty corners and notched two shots on goal throughout the third quarter yet could not convert before the end of the period.

The Bombers continued to melt time off the clock well into the final quarter. Senior striker Natalie Descalso found time and room off a penalty corner just over four minutes into play, but she struck the boards just wide of the right side of the cage.

With 21 seconds remaining in regulation, however, Descalso drove the final nail into Skidmore’s coffin. From the top right side, just outside the arc, she uncorked a drive past the Skidmore goalkeeper’s left hip. Her third goal of the season concluded the Bombers’ 2-0 victory.

“We had that momentum going and I saw that sliver in the cage,” Descalso said. “Having all of my teammates rush up to me is what it’s all about. It’s a great feeling. [Associate head] coach Mo [Ordnung] was telling me I was hot so I kept my stick ready. It wouldn’t have happened without her.”

The Bombers outshot the Thoroughbreds 16-0, marking their first t ue shutout of the season.

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Women’s soccer advances to Liberty Leagues with shutout win by flynn hynes Published Nov. 10 The Ithaca College women’s soccer team dominated early, scoring within minutes against the Skidmore College Thoroughbreds on Nov. 8. The Bombers’ 2-0 win secured a spot in the Liberty League Championship.

“We’re starting to now execute what we’re training, it’s becoming a bit more strategic and tactical, which is really nice to see the women are doing that,” head coach Mindy Quigg said.

Going into the matchup, the Bombers looked to be the better team. On Oct. 19, they beat Skidmore 2-1, and the Bombers were sitting in the No. 1 spot of the Liberty League while Skidmore had the No. 4 spot.

The Bombers opened the game with high energy, taking three shots — two on target — within the first eight minutes. They capitalized on the third shot attempt at the 7:11 mark, when senior defender Allison Heft was positioned slightly behind the box on the right side of the field for the free kick. Her free kick was crossed close to the net, where graduate student forward Rosie Bostian jumped into the area and headed the ball to the right side past the Thoroughbreds’ junior goalkeeper Avery Rogers.

The Bombers kept these scoring opportunities up

through the half and by the 30-minute mark, they had six shots — three on target — while the Thoroughbreds only had one shot — none on target. The Bombers’ next best opportunity came at the 17:26 mark when graduate student midfielder Sarah Sinott crossed the ball to junior midfielder Devin Sylvia at the top right of the box. Sylvia fired a powerful shot, but it went wide left of the net.

The Thoroughbreds gained momentum shortly after the 30-minute mark with two shots from senior midfielder Ella Stone at 30:05 and 32:23. Stone’s second attempt was the Thoroughbreds’ only shot on goal in the first half — a high shot from the left to the right side of the net. However, Bombers senior goalkeeper Grace Hickey tracked and caught the ball.

This momentum wasn’t enough to overcome a high-energy Bombers squad, which recorded eight shots by halftime — three on goal — and maintained constant ball movement that successfully wore down the Thoroughbreds’ defense.

“I thought we did a really nice job moving [the ball], knocking it around and playing two touch when we could,” head coach Mindy Quigg said. “Our balance was good for one another, so we were able to knock [the ball] around a bit more.”

The Bombers maintained their edge for the rest of the game, with Sinott scoring at the 46:59 mark.

Junior defender Ali Amari lasered a precise pass to Sinott at the top right of the box. Sinott took a touch to lift the ball in the air, then fired it into the left side of the net past a diving Rogers. The shot sent the Bombers’ fans into a celebratory cheer as the South Hill squad led 2-0 against the Thoroughbreds.

Just 20 seconds of gameplay later, Thoroughbred sophomore midfielder Ellianna Caporusso chipped the ball over Hickey’s head, but the Bombers’ defense sprinted in to clear it just milliseconds before it crossed the goal line, giving the South Hill fans a sigh of relief.

The Bombers kept their dominance for the rest of the match, only letting the Thoroughbreds get one shot on goal. With the win secured, the Bombers went on to host the Nov. 11 William Smith College Herons in the Liberty League Championship game Nov. 10 at Carp Wood Field.

The Bombers share a long-standing rivalry with the Herons. Heading into the game, the teams were evenly matched with identical 12-2-4 records. William Smith was ranked No. 11, but the Bombers had defeated the Herons 1-0 Oct. 2.

During the Nov. 10 game, the Ithaca College Bombers defeated the William Smith College Herons.

They won 3-2 in a penalty shootout and claimed the Liberty League Championship.

The Ithaca College women's soccer team celebrates its shutout win over the Skidmore College Thoroughbreds 2-0 and its advancement into the Liberty League Championships on Nov. 8. The Bombers claimed the Liberty League title Nov. 10 after defeating the William Smith College Herons.

erin soltano/THE ITHACAN

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Year In Review

Alum scores deal with the Canadian Football League’s Toronto Argonauts by khari bolden Published Oct. 30 From Division III football to the big leagues, former All-American safety Derek Slywka’s ’23 football journey took a turn, landing him on the radar of the NFL and ultimately signing with the Canadian Football League’s Toronto Argonauts.

At the start of the 2023 college football season, 240 teams competed at the NCAA Division III level. For most of the programs, the thought of having a player on their roster receive an NFL Pro Day invite, much less a spot on an NFL training camp roster with a team, was wishful thinking. For Ithaca College, that dream became a reality for the first time in nearly 60 years.

Following rookie mini-camp invitations from both the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers, it was announced that former All-American safety Slywka signed with the National Football League’s Indianapolis Colts on June 6 in a much different position than he expected. The Waterloo, New York, native was invited for a workout at defensive back for the Colts after their 2023 fifth-round safety Daniel Scott suffered an Achilles tear during offseason team activities. However, it was announced Aug. 25 that Slywka was waived from the Colts. Then, the Argonauts announced Sept. 24 that they signed Slywka.

Slywka said he believed the same athleticism that made him one of Division III’s best ball-hawking safeties

is what led to the Colts taking a chance on him, but not at the position he expected.

“My high RAS [Relative Athletic Score] and just being a raw athlete — I think that’s what led them to being interested in me taking that next step at trying [wide] receiver,” Slywka said. “They had me do some receiver drills, and then they ultimately decided to let me come to their mini-camp as a receiver, and they liked what they saw, so they signed me.”

He got the chance to show that athleticism during the Colts’ second preseason game against the Arizona Cardinals. After coming in during the fourth quarter, Slywka turned in a respectable performance where he tallied two catches for 27 yards, including a third-down conversion that saw him break open deep over the middle of the field for a 24-yard gain Michael Toerper, head coach of the Ithaca College football team, said he bought NFL+ just to watch Slywka’s games and was able to watch that play as it happened.

Toerper had been Slywka’s head coach and position coach during his junior and senior campaigns with the Bombers, and he said that catch made him feel proud.

“My heart was full and I was ready to explode with excitement,” Toerper said. “I did explode with excitement, screaming at the television for him, because that’s a moment. … That’s a moment of a lot of hard work, and I don’t care if it’s a preseason game. I don’t care what it is. The kid caught a ball in an NFL game.”

Derek Slywka made history as the college’s first alum in nearly 60 years to sign an NFL contract.

It was announced on Sept. 24 that Slywka had signed with the CFL’s Toronto Argonauts.

Courtesy of Rich Barnes

Slywka said he felt a similar sense of elation.

“I’m running the route, and I break off at the top,” Slywka said. “I see the quarterbacks step up in the pocket, and it was one of those things you see him start to follow through and your eyes get real big because you’re like, ‘Oh, he’s about to throw it.’ It was a surreal moment looking back at it.”

All of this emotion could be seen in his celebration after the play, which served as a culmination of all of his hard work and effort on the gridiron to that point.

Unfortunately, it was not enough to stay with the organization. Slywka was waived during the final weekend of cuts and left unattached. He said that being cut was a difficult experience, but that he always had reasons to keep pushing forward in the face of uncertainty.

“This is your career, this is your profession,” Slywka said. “When there’s that unknown, you’re just walking through the desert and trying to stay positive in your thought process. It definitely can be tough, but I think a lot of the self-work that I’ve done throughout the years [and] also focusing on mental health, I think it allowed me to approach that and find positives in that.

From an outsider’s point of view, it seemed like things went quiet after Slywka was waived by Indianapolis, especially on social media. Those close to him, like his brother Kyle Slywka, said Derek Slywka was doing everything he could to stay prepared during that time.

“He came back [to Waterloo],” Kyle Slywka said. “We picked up right where we left off. ... [He] got in really good shape again and just stayed ready for any opportunity.”

Pete Costanza, pass game coordinator and wide receivers’ coach for the Argonauts, gave Slywka the opportunity to play with the team. Costanza, who also played northeastern Division III football for the William Paterson University Pioneers, said the Argos scouting department first took notice of Slywka midway through summer 2024 and shared his first impression of the Bomber alum “You could tell he was very athletic,” Costanza said.

“For a guy that just transitioned [to wide receiver], he didn’t look out of place. He had good size, caught the ball very well, transitioned in his routes really well.”

Slywka’s foray into the highest level of the sport in North America has resulted in a significant increase in national attention on the Bombers. Toerper said that as many as 15 different NFL scouts have come up to South Hill to inquire about players.

Toerper said the tremors from the impact he has made could make ripples within the program for years.

“He’s put Ithaca on the map as a place that’s going to have potential pro prospects,” Toerper said. “You can accomplish all of your dreams at Ithaca academically, socially, athletically, and if you’re good enough, they’re going to find you.

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Sophomore walk-on provides spark for men’s soccer team by jacob infald Published nov. 13 Sophomore forward Jack Carney burst onto the scene this season for the Ithaca College men’s soccer team. The walk-on phenom led the charge offensively for the Bombers with five goals, which tied with junior forward Jared Krasnove for most on the team.

Carney, who joined the Bombers last spring after being left off the roster the previous fall, credits his teammates for putting him in a position to succeed.

“You know, I can do all I can do at the end of the day, but I can’t score, can’t pass without my teammates doing their part,” Carney said.

Carney has been a star athlete his entire life, playing both varsity soccer and basketball at Framingham High School in Massachusetts. He said that after not making the team last fall, he took some time to rest and focus on classes. He said it was odd but also a nice break, as it allowed him to take a step back from competitive sports. “[It was the] first time in my life not really being an athlete and I feel like I definitely should have because in the spring my touch wasn’t as good as the other guys,” Carney said. “But it was definitely good for rest, considering right now we’re all banged up.”

Ithaca head coach Garret Eldridge said Carney’s development has been a process and he is proud of the strides Carney has made so far.

“I [give] credit to his work rate and his commitment to getting better because when he showed up last spring he would not have been a contributing player to our group,” Eldridge said. “He’s worked incredibly hard on his technical ability and his finishing to get himself an opportunity now where he’s doing well.”

Carney’s success at the collegiate level is no surprise to his high school coach Jeff Parrish. Parrish said that he and Carney both knew that he was talented enough to make the Bombers’ roster, and he encouraged his former athlete to keep at it during some rough patches last year.

“There’s not many guys I would rather have out there battling for me,” Parrish said. “He’s just a tremendous athlete and someone you want on the team, someone that’s going to certainly push your buttons at times, but he’s going to give everything he has for you and his teammates.”

Unfortunately, despite Carney’s surprising offensive production, this season was a disappointing one for the South Hill squad. After going 8-6-4 in the 2023 season and making it to the Liberty League Championship game, the Bombers dropped to 7-7-4 and lost in the first round of the Liberty League tournament to Skidmore College 0-0 in penalty kicks Nov. 5.

Sophomore walk-on forward Jack Carney, who tied for the team lead in goals this season, moves the ball forward during the Oct. 30 match against the Rochester Institute of Technology.

robert daniels/THE ITHACAN

This zero in the scoring column was a common theme throughout the season for the Bombers. The playoff defeat was the Bombers’ sixth time being shutout this season. However, Eldridge said he does not believe his team has a weak offense. The team outshot opponents 294 to 208 and averaged 16.3 shots per game compared to their opponents’ 11.3 shots per game average.

“We missed a lot of chances in front of the goal,” Eldridge said. “Some of that is soccer and this year being unfortunate.”

This season marked another season where the Bombers came up short of a Liberty League Championship. Since transitioning to the Liberty League from the Empire 8 in the 2017 season, the Bombers have yet to capture a conference championship.

Despite only being immersed in the Bombers’ culture for one season, Carney is ready to dedicate the next two-to-three years to making history for the South Hill squad. He said that his main goal for the remainder of his career is simple: to win.

This winning attitude is nothing new for Carney, according to Parrish. Parrish said Carney was a two-year captain in high school and would do anything it took to get the job done for his team.

“He wants to be that guy and I don’t think he views that as pressure,” Parrish said. “I think he thrives on being there for his teammates and doing what he does best.”

Fortunately for the Bombers, Carney is part of a strong young core. Sophomore defender Nick Dignazio

started 15 games for the South Hill squad, and first-yea student Emmett Enriquez started 13 and contributed one goal and three assists.

Eldridge said the team is only graduating three starting players and is excited about the abundance of talent that his squad is returning for next season.

“We think we have a tremendous future ahead of us,” Eldridge said. “I think Jack’s part of that future and we’re really excited about what we have going on.

We have a lot of talent, but talent only goes so far. So the work rate and what we do this offseason will prove to be really important come next fall.”

Eldridge said he believes that Carney has the capabilities to be one of the best players in Division lll.

He said that if Carney can continue to work on the technical aspects of his game, he has all of the physical tools to be elite at the collegiate level.

“He’s very committed to being a great teammate and a great leader, so we’re really excited that he’s part of our team and we’re proud of his development so far and look forward to what he does in the future,” Eldridge said.

Carney said that while there were some bumps in the road, he has no regrets and is happy he ended up as a Bomber.

“I couldn’t have asked for a better spot to be in,” Carney said. “You always think about making the right decision of where you want to go for the next four years. It didn’t exactly turn out the way I expected but the outcome was definitely great.

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Year In Review

Newest varsity team expands field of women’s sports by tess ferguson Published nov. 13 This fall, Ithaca College became the first institution in the Liberty League to take the next step in expanding women’s sports.

On July 29, the college’s athletics department announced the addition of women’s wrestling to the varsity sport agenda. The team will begin competition in the 2025-26 season and will mark the 14th women’s sport offered on campus.

After conducting a nationwide search, Ryan Ciotoli ’02 was hired Oct. 17 to lead the new program. Ciotoli competed for the college’s men’s wrestling program from 1998-2002 and following his graduation, Ciotoli was an assistant coach for the men’s team. He mentored 10 All-American wrestlers during his five-year tenure with the college before taking his coaching to local club teams in Ithaca.

“Watching women’s wrestling grow has been so exciting and I thought this would be a great opportunity to come back to college coaching and lead the Bombers to some success,” Ciotoli said.

Ciotoli said it was head men’s wrestling coach Marty Nichols who referred him to the position when the team’s conception was announced. Nichols, who coached Ciotoli through his time at the college, has led the men’s wrestling program since 1996.

“We have so many really good alums out there,” Nichols said. “I reached out to a bunch of them and he was at the top of my list. We had some other really good candidates as well, but I think we got the best available coach for the women’s program.”

In preparation for the team’s inaugural season, Ciotoli said that his experience coaching club wrestling in the community has aided in his recruitment plan, and that connecting with other club, college and high school wrestling coaches in the Northeast has been the primary method of getting the word out to prospective athletes for recruitment.

The number of women who wrestle in high school has grown from 800 to more than 50,000 since 1994, according to the Associated Press. In 2023, participation in high school women’s wrestling exceeded the numbers of rowing, fencing, skiing and rifle at the collegiate level.

Susan Bassett ’79, associate vice president and director of Intercollegiate Athletics, said rugby, fencing and triathlon were also in consideration for women’s varsity sports, but the athletics administration landed on wrestling because of its exploding popularity.

The college now joins 47 other institutions that host the women’s sport at the Division III level, which is expected to have its first NCAA championship in

On July 29, Ithaca College’s athletics department announced the addition of women’s wrestling to the varsity sport agenda. The new team will begin competition in the 2025-26 season.

kaeleigh banda/THE ITHACAN

winter 2026. Sitting at the top of the Division III rankings is North Central College, which head coach Joe Norton has led since 2019.

“There are no scholarships at the Division III level so we had to dig in to build our program,” Norton said. “In the very beginning, we sold the successes that our men’s team was having. If we can coach the men to win, we can coach [women] to win, too.”

Similar to North Central, Nichols said the success of Ithaca College’s men’s program will provide a blueprint for Ciotoli as he navigates getting his team off the ground — even giving the college an advantage over other institutions that do not have men’s wrestling teams to build off of. The similar rules in men’s and women’s wrestling will allow both teams to feed off each other’s success.

“A lot of these [women’s] teams don’t have a men’s program that’s established, and it’s hard to start something where you don’t know what success looks like in wrestling,” Nichols said. “We already have somewhat of a plan. Obviously, women’s wrestling is different from men’s wrestling in a lot of aspects, but it’s very similar in a lot of ways as well. I think they can take off really, really quickly.”

Ciotoli said Ithaca’s extensive alumni network on the men’s side will help to bring a strong starting reputation for the women. The college’s men’s wrestling team boasts three NCAA national championship team titles, 12 individual national champions and 83 All-American athletes. The team’s coaching staff — one head coach and four assistants — is made up entirely of program alumni.

“Since day one, Coach Nichols and the other coaches on staff — before I was even hired — were showing athletes around campus and doing tours for them,” Ciotoli said. “For that incoming coach, they already had a list of interested athletes. Their support has been great.”

Although an NCAA tournament will be introduced in 2026, the team will not compete in conference play for its inaugural season. The college is the only Liberty League institution with a men’s wrestling team and will be the first to add wome ’s wrestling to its repertoire.

Because the Liberty League does not have any other wrestling teams, the college’s men’s program joined the State University of New York Athletics Conference ahead of the 2023-24 season. Bassett said she hopes the women’s team will be able to find a conference of its own as more institutions develop programs.

“Those kinds of opportunities are absolutely going to come,” Bassett said. “I’m just glad that we’re in the mix and we’ve put a stake in the ground and made a commitment to women’s wrestling. I hope that encourages other schools to do the same.”

Regardless of what the team’s initial season looks like in the scorebook, Ciotoli said the growth of women’s wrestling has the potential to change campus cultures and provide opportunities for women athletes that they might not have been afforded otherwise.

“These girls in college wrestling right now are the torch bearers,” Ciotoli said. “They’re gritty, they’re tough, but they are also great academically and socially. You need those types of people on campus and I’m excited to bring them in.”

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Sports

Building a legacy: The role of women leaders in NCAA growth by david schurter Published dec. 4 As of the 2024-25 academic year, there are 425 colleges and universities that fall under the NCAA’s Division III for athletics. Among those schools, 147 have female directors of athletics, which represents the highest ratio across every division in the NCAA. Compared to the data from the 2011-12 NCAA records, the number of female athletic directors saw a 5% increase from 2012 to 2024. As of 2023, approximately 85% of Division I institutions are led by male athletic directors, with the number of female directors sitting at 57, compared to 308 male counterparts. Division I presents an underwhelming number of female athletic directors compared to the percentage of Division II at 25%, where that number sits at 76. Both are lower than the numbers from Division III. Patti Phillips is the CEO of Women Leaders in Sports, an organization dedicated to empowering women’s careers. She said she has seen the organization reach new heights since she took over the position in 2010, watching women’s leadership roles in sports gradually increase during her tenure. Phillips said that outside of sports, it is essential for women’s work to be displayed in every field, emphasizing strength in numbers “It’s not uncommon for sports to lead the way in making society a more inclusive and representative space,” Phillips said via email. “The rise of women leaders is an essential part of this narrative. Women have always shown their commitment and ability to do the work. Now, it’s time for their leadership skills to be recognized.”

Phillips said the increase in women assuming leadership roles in college athletics provides a powerful opportunity for women’s voices to push Women Leaders in Sports’ agenda forward.

“As long as women are given a chance to lead, I have no doubt their success will result in more women getting opportunities,” Phillips said. “Women leaders also know when to reach back and lift another woman up — giving her an opportunity she might not have gotten otherwise.”

On the coaching side, 26% of head coaches at the Division III level are female, also the highest number across all three divisions, with Division I and II not far behind with 25% and 22%, respectively.

Maureen Ordnung, associate coach of the Ithaca College field hockey team, has worked with head coach Kaitlyn Wahila for the past eight seasons. Ordnung said Wahila’s goal-oriented mindset and her abilities to lead the program set her apart from other field hockey head coaches “I watched her build a foundation of connection,

team cohesion, team unity and team love within our program and making sure that we started there,” Ordnung said. “Not many coaches and not many assistants stick around for a decade, but I don’t have any plans to go anywhere else because I don’t really see a better culture than what we have here.”

Ordnung said Division III provides the best chance for female coaches looking to break into college athletics, along with several different roles available outside of coaching.

“I think Division III is a really great place to get involved and grow,” Ordnung said. “I really like it because I think you have more with the Division III model of philosophy. It’s more personal, and you get to really connect with people and help them grow, also in the leadership position.”

Susan Bassett ’79, director of intercollegiate athletics at Ithaca College, previously worked as the president of Women Leaders in Sports in 2010. Bassett was the first president of the organization Bassett said that promoting the idea of women head coaches in both men’s and women’s sports at the college is attractive to prospective student-athletes and future coaches.

“I do believe that it’s wonderful to have … women leaders as head coaches of our women’s sport programs to the best extent possible,” Bassett said. “And then in some cases, as we just did with [men and women’s cross country head coach Erin Dinan], elevate somebody who’s really excellent to coach both men and women.”

Bassett said Women Leaders in Sports empowers

women to take on leadership roles and prepares them to be successful once they assume those roles.

Before she became the first president, Bassett shaped how Women Leaders in Sports prepares women for their careers in sports leadership roles. Previously, she was the director of athletics, physical education and recreation at Carnegie Mellon University from 2005-2013, a Division III institution. Bassett was also a head coach for multiple Division III institutions in swimming and diving, where she was named the NCAA Division III Coach of the Year in 1993 at Union College.

As part of her role at Ithaca College, Bassett works with athletic directors at other Division III schools. One of those athletic directors is Kristie Bowers, associate vice president and director of athletics at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, a Liberty League competitor.

Bowers previously worked at the Division I level at Boston University. She said that working at the Division I level prepared her to transition into her current role at RPI. She said coordinating with the other female athletic directors across the Liberty League, including Bassett, has improved her understanding of how to run a collegiate athletics program.

Bowers said she saw openings in athletic departments at the Division III level as a message for women to take their shot at becoming leaders in sport.

“It opened the door a little bit to those that were maybe considering getting out of the profession,” Bowers said. “I certainly hope that it helps to elevate others and to help them see this as a career path, especially women within our athletic department.”

Susan Bassett ’79, director of athletics, will retire Spring 2025. Bassett was the first president of Women Leaders in Sports and has held leadership roles in collegiate athletics for over four decades.

file photo/THE ITHACAN

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Year In Review

Cortland dominates the 65th annual Cortaca Jug by rory mastine and Flynn hynes Published nov. 16 The Ithaca College football team lost its final game of the season Nov. 16, giving defending national champion No. 2 Cortland and their dominant run game all they could handle in a 28-17 dogfight. Despite going back and forth between bitter rivals for 60 minutes, the 65th Cortaca Jug remained on Red Dragons soil among thousands of rowdy fans.

This loss puts an end to the Bombers’ hopes of earning an at-large bid for the NCAA playoffs and therefore ends their 2024 season.

The Bombers announced their presence in the Dragons’ lair early, forcing a three-and-out on the firs possession and then immediately bringing the heat on offense. On a third and long from their offense’s 44-yard line, Bombers’ sophomore quarterback Matthew Parker baited the Dragons’ defense before dumping the ball off to senior running back Jake Williams on a screen play.

Williams, with room and blockers, bolted down the fiel untouched before capping off the 56-yard run by forcibly planting a Dragons defender into the end zone to put Ithaca up by a touchdown.

Unfazed, the Red Dragons retaliated during their next possession with a deep cut from their playbook.

Senior quarterback Zac Boyes fired the ball on a lateral pass to sophomore wide receiver Sam Cotton, as he had done multiple times already that game. Instead of running upfield, this time, Cotton put the ball in the air, allowing senior wide receiver Jaden AlfanoStJohn enough time to adjust to an underthrown pass and

arrive in the endzone for a 42-yard touchdown.

Parker began to find his stride during the next possession, completing passes in some tight windows to march the Bombers down the field. But it was the ground game that would earn the Bombers their next score, as senior running back Jalen Leonard-Osbourne turned the corner on the right side of the field before letting the afterburners carry him 58 yards downfield to put the Bombers back on top 14-7.

After struggling to run the ball effectively on their first two drives, the Red Dragons decided to focus on the ground game. When Boyes was not running the rock himself, it was in the hands of sophomore running back Ethan Gallo. Gallo did much of the heavy lifting during a long scoring drive, including the final three-yard rush into the end zone to tie the game once again at the beginning of the second quarter. Gallo would finish the game with 183 yards on the ground, making himself a huge problem for any Bomber who met him in the open field After allowing touchdowns on four straight possessions, both defenses started to settle in. As the Red Dragons made their way into the red zone, the Bombers managed to keep the game even, with senior defensive linemen Owen O’Neill and Josh Miles slamming Gallo back on a crucial fourth down conversion attempt on the Bombers’ own 5-yard line. On the Dragons’ next offensive series, senior Bombers defensive back Danny Portas exploded through the line on an errant snap, pouncing on the ball as it bounced into the air and winning possession back for his team.

Although a sack on Parker by senior defensive lineman

Head coach Michael Toerper hypes up senior defensive back Jake Connolly during the game.

sammie macaranas/THE ITHACAN

Max Llewellyn killed the ensuing drive, a perfect punt to the 1-yard line by Williams ensured that the Red Dragons would not make the Bombers pay for it.

The Bombers started the second half with the ball, advancing far enough for senior placekicker Derek Baldin to split the uprights from 42 yards out and break the tie once again, putting the Bombers up 17-14.

Red Dragons head coach Curt Fitzpatrick made his second-half adjustments, and they paid off almost immediately. A dominant drive was capped with a five yard strike to senior receiver CJ Messina, beating the Bombers’ zone defense for the first Red Dragons lead of the game. Offensively, the Bombers could not replicate the success of the first quarter, but the defense, led by their senior standouts, stopped a threatening Dragons drive as the third quarter expired.

The Bombers could not capitalize on their first possession of the final quarter, giving Cortland the ball back. Once again, the Bombers’ defense bent without breaking, as the Red Dragons made it all the way to the two-yard line. Sophomore running back Tyson Taylor tried to punch it home, but the ball was dislodged from his hands before ending up in the hands of Bombers standout senior defensive back Jake Connolly.

An apparent injury to Parker derailed the ensuing Bombers drive, and the Cortland offense finally capitalized on their defense’s efforts. After asserting their will on the ground, Boyes faked the handoff and ran for three of his 132 rushing yards as he scampered into the endzone, finge -rolling the ball in celebration before climbing the chain link fence to celebrate with his classmates behind the end zone.

With Parker unable to stand in the pocket, the Bombers sent out sophomore quarterback Colin Schumm to try and pull a season-saving win out of thin air. He found a shred of magic in a strike to senior receiver Sam Kline, whose will to extend his football career was stronger than the vicious contact to his helmet from the recovering corner. Ultimately, Schumm and the Bombers could not pull off the unthinkable, surrendering possession on downs before watching as Cortland ran out the clock on the 2024 season.

Bombers head coach Michael Toerper spoke about his team’s effort, commending his players for the heart they showed in a bitter rivalry game.

“The only way you give yourself a chance is to work as hard as you possibly can in your preparation and play as hard you possibly can on game day,” Toerper said. “And they definitely did that, but we just didn’t make enough plays in the critical situations in some of those games this year to get the result to be in our favor.”

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Sports

The Ithaca College and SUNY Cortland football teams renewed their rivalry in the 65th annual Cortaca Jug game and the Bombers fell to the Red Dragons, 28-17.

Sammie macaranas/THE ITHACAN

ing erlead e Che mi g m e ll E o aca C junior Mia h It 6. e .1 h Nov i and r s of t Jug on E ITHACAN embe n Yezz a e c m t a , t is r ft r K le e Co as/TH From ophomore ring th ammie macaran s S er s du b m Team o B on the cheer

Ithaca Co llege offe nsive lin Ellor cha eman firs rges the SUNY Co tnual Cort rtland Dra year student Luk aca Jug e gons duri game, w ng the an hich took

place at Grady Fie ld. lucia iandol o/THE ITHACA N

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4/11/25 3:40 PM

Year In Review

Three-Peat: Volleyball claims third straight Liberty League

The Ithaca College volleyball team celebrates its victory over William Smith College and claiming its third Liberty League title victory in a row.

Ava Suffredini/THE ITHACAN

by Khari Bolden Published nov. 19 It was truly a great day to be a Bomber as the No. 22 Ithaca College volleyball team on Nov. 16 dismantled the William Smith Herons for their third straight Liberty League title in three sets by scores of 25-10, 25-15 and 25-15.

Just like the prior day’s match against RIT, the excitement in the building was palpable, but this match had hardware on the line. In contrast to the Bombers’ bombardment of the Tigers, the Herons went to five sets in their semi-final matchup against the Clarkson University Golden Knights. However, William Smith was Ithaca College’s only Liberty League matchup to go to five sets, so a competitive game was still expected.

The signs of a close match were present initially.

The first set began as a back-and-forth affair, but something clicked when the score hit 9-7 in favor of the Bombers. A combination of extremely well-placed kills and errors from the visiting side put the Bombers on a 7-0 run and not even a William Smith timeout could stop the bleeding. A later 8-1 run fueled almost entirely by Heron attacking and receiving mistakes ended a shockingly dominant set.

If the 9-2 lead the Herons jumped out to in the second set meant anything, it was that they would not go down without a fight. Then, one of the Bombers’

biggest weaknesses this season became their biggest strength. For context, the team has conceded more blocks than they have produced this season. Even in the previous match between these two teams, despite losing, the Herons out-blocked the Bombers 8-5. The biggest difference between then and now was the reintroduction of junior middle blocker Ella Graper.

“Ella was healthy, she came in, and she made an impact,” head coach Tara Stilwell said. “She had [seven] blocks and didn’t have an error all weekend, so she was unreal.”

The Bombers parlayed three blocks and a kill from Graper into a comeback that saw them go from down by seven to up by 10 by the end of the set. They ended the match with nine blocks to the Herons’ three, seven of which came from Graper alone. The third set seemed to be nothing more than a formality, but that did not make the winning moment any less special. When senior right side Faith Sabatier’s right-handed spike dug only as far as the underside of the net for the final Bombers’ point, the home stand erupted. The six Bombers on the court embraced on the floor as teammates ran off the sideline to join them. Stilwell embraced her staff. All of the blood, sweat and tears this season had led up to that moment.

The night prior, Stilwell said her expectations for the match were just to see her team play good volleyball, a bar that Graper seemingly surpassed at the middle blocker role. After putting up a double-double

of 10 kills and 10 blocks across the past two games, Graper was named the Bombers’ most outstanding performer in the Liberty League Tournament.

“It’s honestly just amazing,” Graper said, plaque in hand. “Coming back from injury is so hard, so I’m just proud of myself for working through it and then just being able to play for my team and play for all my seniors and Julia [Costa] who’s not coming back, and I just love the team.”

With her south Florida-based family in attendance, sophomore outside hitter Gabriela Gonzalez-Abreu led the team in kills on the day with 12 kills and three service aces. She said the team’s success this weekend came from a love of the game.

“It was so much fun,” Gonzalez-Abreu said. “We played such good volleyball. I think that goes hand-in-hand and it really proved it on the court, and then everyone was all smiles. Everyone was high-intensity and high-energy.

It was just a great thing to be a part of.”

While it was likely that the Bombers would be going to the NCAA Tournament regardless of this match’s result, the win guaranteed them an automatic bid and potentially a high seed. The South Hill squad found out just how high after their bracket shook out during the NCAA selection show, and the now-No. 4 seeded Bombers will face No. 13 Lasell University Lasers on Nov. 21 in Johns Hopkins’ Goldfarb Gymnasium. In the meantime, they get a chance to digest their win and celebrate.

“It’s my first one,” Stilwell said. “I’m gonna enjoy it.”

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Sports

Lacrosse alum takes his talents to the pros by jacob infald Published dec. 4 Eli Gobrecht ’16, Ithaca College men’s lacrosse alum, is leaving an impact on the sport by playing with two professional lacrosse teams, representing his country on the global stage and coaching the next generation of lacrosse players.

Gobrecht said he began playing lacrosse when he was in the second grade, but the Ithaca native had his sights on playing professionally in a different sport.

Growing up around Cornell University ice hockey, the lacrosse star said he had his professional aspirations on the ice rather than on the field After graduating from Ithaca High School in 2011, Gobrecht played on the junior ice hockey circuit for a year and said he found that playing professionally was a much steeper challenge than he originally thought. He said he had a change of heart, so he went back home and committed to playing lacrosse at Ithaca College under head coach Jeff Long.

“I think [hockey] gave [Gobrecht] a lot of maturity, taught him the physicality of the game,” Long said.

“That warrior mentality you need on the ice plays very well over to the lacrosse field and that’s how he played, with amazing passion and intensity.”

When Gobrecht got to the college, he said that playing professionally was something that was in the very back of his mind.

“I think the priority getting on campus was I wanted to play right away,” Gobrecht said. “[The] first year went pretty well for me; [it became] something I thought was maybe a little more realistic, just kind of looking at what other D-III guys had been able to make that transition to play professional and keeping that in mind as a possibility.”

Gobrecht was primarily a close, long-stick defender in college, but he was actually new to the position.

Growing up, Gobrecht was mainly a midfielde , but this led to him sitting low in the depth chart on the Ithaca High School team.

Mark Wenham, who was Gobrecht’s defensive coach at Ithaca High School, said he had asked Gobrecht to play defense his senior year to allow him to get on the field and to fill team positional needs. He said he and the other coaches saw how confident and tenacious of a player Gobrecht was and thought he would be a great fit in the new position.

“He had a high ceiling, there was a lot for him to grow into that position, which he did and he was just spectacular at IC,” Wenham said.

The 2016 season was Gobrecht’s final one at the college, and it saw him lead the Bombers to a program-best 20-2 record, as well as an NCAA Division III quarterfinal appearance. Gobrecht was one of four seniors on the

team and Long said those four seniors did a great job of leading the team and allowed him to be much more hands off as a coach. He added that Gobrecht was one of the greatest captains in his coaching career.

“I think by my senior year we were definitely a player-led team, which is what you need to be successful at the college level,” Gobrecht said.

Gobrecht’s leadership is something that has not gone unnoticed at the professional level either. Bill Tierney, who has coached seven national championship teams at the Division I level, is Gobrecht’s current head coach for the Philadelphia Waterdogs of the Premier Lacrosse League. Tierney described Gobrecht as a player that sets the tone during the PLL season.

“The biggest compliment I can pay is he is a great

to win another title in 2022 with the Waterdogs, this time as a team leader as he was named a league All-Star in the 2022 season, his first of two All-Star selections Gobrecht was able to make his box lacrosse professional debut in 2020 when he made the San Diego Seals’ roster, where he still plays today.

However, Gobrecht said his greatest experience playing indoor box lacrosse was representing the United States at the 2024 World Lacrosse Box Championships in Utica, New York.

The tournament saw the United States secure a silver medal, its highest finish in the tournament’s history.

The United States took down Haudenosaunee twice, both in pool play and the semifinals, before eventually falling to Canada in the championship game.

In white, Philadelphia Waterdogs’ defender and former Ithaca College defense Eli Gobrecht ’16 approaches Utah Archers’ Mike Sisselberger, a two-time All-Star faceoff specialist, from behind.

Courtesy of Nick Ieradi/Premier Lacrosse League

leader, but he picks his spots,” Tierney said. “There’s lots of guys who can lead, a lot of guys who can talk, but Eli, when he does talk, guys listen.”

Before joining the Waterdogs, Gobrecht began his professional career with the Denver Outlaws of the PLL in summer 2018. After graduating from the college, Gobrecht went overseas to get his master’s degree in financial management at Durham University in England.

When he returned to the states, Gobrecht was able to earn a try-out with the Vancouver Warriors of the National Lacrosse League. The NLL is box lacrosse played indoors and has competition from December to May. While Gobrecht ended up being cut, it led to him getting another opportunity with the Outlaws and he made the team as a short-stick midfielde .

In his first season with the team, Gobrecht helped contribute to a league championship. He would go on

Now, Gobrecht is preparing for the 2024 NLL season with the Seals and despite being 31, he said he has no plans of retiring any time soon. He also coaches lacrosse at Bellevue High School in Bellevue, Washington and said he hopes to continue coaching past his playing days.

Gobrecht said he is privileged for all that the sport of lacrosse has given him, but he could not have done it without his native town of Ithaca. He said he is grateful for the wonderful teachers, coaches and teammates he had growing up and the beautiful outdoors of Ithaca that allowed him to play outside and enjoy his childhood.

“I think the community has been awesome,” Gobrecht said. “It was pretty special to have my family be able to come to pretty much every home college lacrosse game I played and it’s something I’ll never forget growing up there. I remember my roots and I remember them fondly.”

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Year In Review

Like father like son, senior defensive back earns All-American nod by david schurter Published jan. 22 With his recent First Team All-American selection, senior defensive back Jake Connolly followed in the footsteps of his father, Scott Connolly ’96, who earned his All-American selection in 1995. The Connolly’s became the second father-son duo in program history to both earn All-American honors.

In his senior season, Jake was recognized as the Liberty League Co-Defensive Player of the Year, leading the team with 86 total tackles and two forced and recovered fumbles. Jake also tallied five-and-a-half tackles for loss, one sack, one interception and six pass breakups.

Scott said the Connolly family would not be who they are without their ties to Ithaca College and their time as student-athletes.

“I’m not where I am today, and Jake is, for all kinds of purposes, not where he is without the Ithaca College football program,” Scott said. “It’s a special honor to be represented by a very special institution in Ithaca College. To be the second father-son duo to do that is just such a special moment for us as a family.”

Head coach Michael Toerper said Jake’s unquestionable commitment to the team goes back to the beginning of his career, when he was waiting for his chance to take the field “He had a great opportunity to learn from a lot of guys that came before him that played a similar role, so he didn’t take that for granted,” Toerper said. “When

that moment came to be a starter his junior year, he seized it and was instantly one of the best players in the program.”

Toerper said that Jake was the backbone of the team and that his work ethic is something that inspired others on the team to follow in his footsteps.

“When your best players are your hardest workers, then it is a great beacon for the culture of your program,” Toerper said. “When other guys watch Jake and the work that he puts in, it raises the level of everybody else because the results match the work.”

With the Connolly family’s ties to the college, Toerper said Jake’s parents’ support of the program has built an everlasting relationship between the family and the college’s coaches and players.

Before committing to the college, Jake was a multisport athlete. He said he was torn between whether he wanted to play basketball or football in college.

Jake eventually chose football and picked his father’s alma mater. He said the college was one of the last to recruit him, but that the Roy H. Park School of Communication’s curriculum became the driving factor in his decision to commit.

Jake said that joining the long list of All-Americans to play for the program was something that was always in the back of his mind when he took the field. He said that seeing his vision fulfilled was an hono .

“Adding my name to that wall and into that list of legendary names means a lot to me,” Jake said. “Just

From left, father Scott Connolly and his son senior defensive back Jake Connolly after a football game. After having both attended the college, they will now also both earn All-American honors.

Courtesy of Scott Connolly

knowing all the hard work that I had put in over the four years paid off, and I was able to do everything that I could in my ability to just produce at a high-level on Saturdays.”

Scott, the athletic director at Bishop Fenwick High School in Peabody, Massachusetts, works with student-athletes interested in competing in college.

He said that playing in college was never a question for Jake, but rather if the school he chose would be his new home.

“It’s about the best fit for you,” Scott said. “As parents, we look back now and just say Ithaca College was the best fit for Jake without question.

Scott, who played defensive end for the Bombers from 1992–95, also earned his All-American selection his senior season, when he totaled 10 sacks, 66 total tackles and 15 tackles for loss.

The only other father-son duo to both earn All-American honors in program history is offensive lineman Bob Garone ’87 and his son Nick Garone ’20 at the linebacker position.

During his senior season in 2019, Nick was named to the Liberty League First Team for the second time in his career, as well as the All-East Region Second Team.

On the field, Nick Garone led the Bombers with 101 total tackles, five interceptions and two blocked kicks Nick, like Jake, said his family ties run deep with the college. After his father, his older brother Bobby ’15 also played for the program. While watching the Connolly family join that short list of father-son All-American duos, he said it was a great boost for the football program and the college to foster a greater sense of community.

“I think Ithaca as a whole is a great place to spend your college years,” Nick said. “Ever since I was a little kid, I wanted to go there because my dad went there.”

Jake said that before he began his playing career, he thought about the idea of joining his dad among the list of All-Americans in the program’s history. On Jan. 2, that thought became a reality for the Connolly family.

“It’s super cool and I had known that my dad was an All-American when I was a freshman going here,” Jake said. “I had always thought it would ... just [be] an honor to be able to share being All-American with him, especially the father-son being the second time in program history, which is pretty crazy.”

Toerper said Jake’s playing career epitomizes the strength of Bombers football, providing a glimpse into what it takes to build a successful football career.

“He’s grown in a leadership standpoint, but the work ethic was always the foundation of success,” Toerper said. “And then, just a great story, as far as what it takes to be a captain, a leader and eventually, an All-American here.”

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Sports

Graduate transfers making noise on the field and in the classroom by jacob infald Published feb. 5 When many athletes would be forced to give up their sport, Ithaca College gives student-athletes the chance to transfer to the college in pursuit of an exercise science master’s degree while finishing out their NCAA eligibility with a varsity sports team.

Graduate student Andrew McDermott knew he wanted to play one more season of collegiate baseball before hanging up his spikes. His college career began with adversity, as he tore his labrum and missed his rookie season in 2021. However, this gave him one more year of eligibility. After playing the 2022 season at Quinnipiac University, he transferred to Queens University of Charlotte for the 2023 and 2024 seasons.

McDermott said he knew he wanted to find a program where he could finish his eligibility while being able to become a certified mental performance consultant.

McDermott said that through the struggles of his prior injuries, he found the field of sports psychology.

He said that for the first time in his life, he discovered something he has the same passion for as baseball.

“I can get a really good education in the exact program that I want toward the exact certification that I want and win while doing it,” McDermott said. “No matter what level it is, that was very appealing to me.”

Graduate student Johnathan Wendt is another student-athlete pursuing his CMPC certification. Wendt, a graduate transfer from Alfred University, is a sprinter on the men’s track and field team. Typically, students in an exercise science master’s program will join a varsity sport as a graduate assistant coach. This can be seen with two of Wendt’s own coaches, Matthew Stasiw and Christian Noa, who are graduate assistants for the track and field program.

Justine Vosloo is a professor in the Department of Exercise Science and Athletic Training at the college.

She said that being a student-athlete in the mental performance program offers the opportunity for students to apply techniques learned in the classroom to their day-to-day routines as an athlete.

“It’s really helpful for them to see the theories in action,” Vosloo said. “That comparison to be able to be in it and talk about what they’re learning in class and how they’re experiencing it as an athlete is really valuable to both them individually, but also for the grad program overall.”

A different department is the college’s exercise performance master’s degree program which has also attracted a talented student-athlete. For the past three seasons, graduate student Emma Waite, point guard on the women’s basketball team, was a familiar foe to the South Hill squad. She played her undergraduate years at

Rochester Institute of Technology, one of the Bombers’ Liberty League Championship Tournament rivals.

This season, Waite has found a new home on South Hill as she is leading her former rival ball club in assists with 64 as of Feb. 4. Waite said that while the adjustment of joining her former rivals was an odd one at first, it was one she could not pass up because of the human performance program.

“In the human performance side of things, the classes are very intimate,” Waite said. “I get to have a lot of hands-on experience, which differs a lot from my experience at RIT.” On top of the coursework, Waite is getting hands-on experience through her job as a teaching assistant in multiple exercise science classes. Waite said that knowing she would get an opportunity to be a TA while being able to play was one factor that drew her to the college.

“I felt like I got the best of both worlds,” Waite said.

“I got that financial help and experience and then I also had the opportunity to play.”

One of the professors Waite has been a TA for is David Diggin, associate professor in the Department of Exercise Science and Athletic Training and program director of the strength and conditioning concentration. The class was an O lympic weightlifting course, and Diggin said Waite had the opportunity to not only get hands-on work with students, but she also gained some tangible skills that will translate over to athletics.

“Oftentimes that requires us to improve our observation skills, improve our communication skills, but understand exercises at a deeper level in terms of what

they should look like mechanically,” Diggin said.

Waite said she does not know what path she will be taking after graduate school, but she hopes basketball will be part of her future. She said that next fall, as she completes her coursework, she plans to be a volunteer coach with the women’s basketball team.

“I’d love to be involved as much as possible,” Waite said. “I’ve always been interested in coaching after I’m done playing, so I’m excited to be able to dip my toes into that.”

McDermott said that while he always wants baseball to be a part of his life, it is nice being able to put academics first for a change as he is now studying something that he is interested in. He studied marketing in undergraduate years and he joked that he used to major in baseball and minor in marketing.

“I think it’s a good transition for me personally as I transition out of the sport and into a coach or a CMPC role,” McDermott said.

After the 2024-25 academic year, student-athletes will no longer have extra COVID-19 eligibility, and the only graduate student-athlete transfers will be people like McDermott who have injury eligibility. However, Vosloo said the program’s balanced education with theoretical background and field work will continue to attract athletes both in the undergraduate and graduate levels.

“I think what we’re seeing with athletes choosing to complete their athletic career at Ithaca College and do a master’s degree program at the same time is really reflective of the close partnership that academics and athletics has at Ithaca College,” Vosloo said.

From left, graduate students Emma Waite and Andrew McDermott balance the workload of being both graduate students and atheletes as the two transfers strive for academic and athletic success.

PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY LUCIA IANDOLO AND KAIDEN CHANDLER/THE ITHACAN

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Year In Review

First-year duo adds depth to women’s track team by farrell Hudson Published feb. 7 Inside the walls of the Ithaca College Athletics and Events Center, one word immediately comes to mind: success. Championship hardware lines the walls like tapestries, echoing generations of collegiate athletic success. According to head coach Jennifer Potter ’92, the Bombers’ 2024 recruiting class was the largest first-yea class since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Two contributors who have been instrumental to the Bombers are first-year students Aynisha McQuillar and Eliana Barnett, sprinters who have caught the attention of both veterans and coaches alike. At the Ithaca College Quad on Jan. 18, McQuillar notched an impressive 7.84 seconds in the 60-meter dash prelims for the top overall time.

McQuillar continued her impressive streak with a 7.78 in the final round. She won the 60-meter dash, contributing to the Bombers victory against SUNY Cortland, SUNY Oneonta and The College of New Jersey.

Just six days prior, Barnett made noise in the Cornell University Southern Tier Invitational on Jan. 11.

She measured out 11.07 meters in the triple jump to place fourth overall.

The intrinsic motivation and dedication are two exceptional factors of both McQuillar and Barnett that have made the loudest contribution, something that caught the attention immediately of Potter.

“We sought them out and highly recruited them based on their success, but they also met our culture.

They’re hard workers, they want to get better, they’re great teammates,” Potter said. “I feel like that started back in the recruitment process and that’s what we look for.”

Potter said that being clear with expectations from the beginning makes for an easier recruiting process.

“The type of people that they are is more important to us than what they’ve done athletically,” Potter said. “We are not looking for the fastest 400-meter runner in the country if you are a pain [to be around]; we want a great representation of our program and someone who can run a fast 400-meter.”

The culture sentiment stuck with both McQuillar and Barnett, as McQuillar said that following the championship history of the program has helped her improve her focus and attack her goals.

“I feel like my mindset especially has definitely matured,” McQuillar said.

McQuillar also assisted in setting a new school record in the 4×200-meter relay at the Nazareth Challenge Cup on Jan. 25. The tandem of McQuillar, senior sprinter Natalie MacArthur, first-year student Marykate Rudnicki and sophomore Ava Butler ran the

relay in 1:44:85, topping the college’s previous record of 1:45:49, which was set in 2012.

Additionally, Barnett made an immediate impression in the Greg Page Relays at Cornell University on Dec. 7, placing seventh overall in the triple jump at 10.55 meters.

Barnett expressed her gratitude for what the program provides to help its athletes continue to grow.

From the equipment to the coaches and the strength and conditioning regimens she said she is grateful for all that the college provides.

“The program is great, we get a lot of really good training opportunities and our facilities are really good, so it’s just maximizing what we’re getting to the

execute, it’s been amazing.”

MacArthur joined a program that was largely dominated with upperclassmen leadership, something that is of help to any newcomer.

“Logan Bruce took me under her wing,” MacArthur said. “Katelyn Hutchison was one of my training partners as a first-year and her energy, positivity, and that winning spirit … took me from a high school athlete with minimal training to someone who can compete at higher levels.”

Bruce enjoyed an illustrious career on South Hill as a multiple time NCAA All-American in the hurdles, along with Hutchison, who reached the new balance nationals,

From left, first-year sprinters Eliana Barnett and Aynisha McQuillar have established themselves as leaders of the Ithaca College women’s track and field team through their many accomplishments.

Lucia iandolo/THE ITHACAN

best of our ability,” Barnett said.

Another facet that plays an instrumental role in delivering success is leadership. There are only five seniors, but enough to mentor the team’s youth. MacArthur has had her fair share of experience on South Hill. Recruited in 2021 from Locust Valley High School in Long Island, MacArthur arrived on South Hill with a loaded resume, being a two-time all-conference runner in the 5k, 300-meter indoors and the 4×200-meter relay.

“I’ve had three different grades of underclassmen that I’ve had to teach to be at the collegiate level and guide them through that process,” MacArthur said.

“The first college meet they were so calm, and it’s just super cool to see two first-years not doubt themselves and not get worked up under pressure and just

placing seventh nationally in the 400-meter dash.

Both McQuillar and Barnett look ahead toward further strengthening the program, but are primarily focused on keeping their goals short-term.

“I’m just trying to PR for myself,” Barnett said. “I don’t have super high goals I am trying to hit other than continuing to improve.”

McQuillar echoed a similar sentiment.

“I came in with more of an open mind,” McQuillar said. “I didn’t have any set personal goals or records I wanted to achieve. I wanted to make sure I was putting my best effort and to stay in my own headspace, focus on myself rather than my competitors and make sure everytime I step out on the track, I’m just happy with my performance.”

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Sports

Back on the mound: Pitching trio set to make anticipated return to action

by Jacob Infald Published feb. 11 The Ithaca College baseball team has had plenty of success in recent history since it has won the last three Liberty League Championships. However, a trio of pitchers have been working in the shadows, waiting to return so they can contribute to more victories. This season, they will finally get their chance.

Junior left-handed pitcher Reed Bailey has only pitched one inning in his collegiate career: in March 2023 when Bailey was a first-year student. He had surgery in August 2023 to repair his UCL — an injury he said can be traced all the way back to 2020.

Despite persistent pain in his elbow, he said doctors kept telling him there was no damage and that he could keep pitching. Bailey, who wanted to pitch at the collegiate level, said he felt like he needed to pitch through the discomfort, especially since there was no diagnosis.

“I’m just waiting for that feeling of, ‘Oh yeah it’s paid off,’” Bailey said. “All I want to do is play, that’s why we do it, that’s why we compete.”

Sophomore right-handed pitcher Ryan Kane was one of the best pitchers in his high school class. The Massachusetts native was ranked No. 83 in the state and as the No. 33 right-handed pitcher in the high school class of 2023 rankings.

However, similar to Bailey, Kane was having elbow pain during the latter half of his high school career.

Doctors told him it was just a sprain, and Kane said he thought he would be ready to pitch for his first collegiate season. However, despite doing platelet-rich plasma treatment — a regenerative treatment that uses platelets to promote healing — Kane also needed UCL repair surgery, which he received in February 2024.

Kane said that the last year of rehab was a tough test, but that he was able to put his injury into perspective.

“Everyone’s got their own story with getting to the point that they’re at,” Kane said. “It sucks having to actually go through the rehab process and getting the surgery, but it definitely helps you get closer with your teammates.”

Junior right-handed pitcher Sean Minnick felt the support of his teammates during a game against Vassar College on April 12, 2024. The right-hander was 1 2/3 innings into his third appearance of the season when he felt a pop in his elbow while throwing a curveball.

He attempted to stay in the game but he said he felt excruciating elbow pain on the next pitch and knew something was wrong. He got surgery two months later to repair a torn UCL. Minnick said that having teammates such as Bailey

and Kane who had been through the same surgery and rehab process helped make things easier for him.

“You got to learn what you can control at a certain point,” Minnick said. “There’s things that are out of your control like this and … you just got to move forward. Not that it helps but it definitely does make me feel a little bit better that other people have had this surgery. … It definitely gives me brothers that can help me out.”

Head coach David Valesente said that unfortunately, with the amount that pitchers throw with their high school and travel teams, elbow injuries are becoming way too common at the collegiate level. According to Chicago’s Rush University Medical Center, the biggest age group that needs the surgery in the country is from ages 15-19. However, Valesente said that when any player goes down with injuries, he wants them to know he and the other coaches are there for them on a personal and athletic level.

“They were recruited to be on the team so we want them to feel welcome and a part of us at all times, no matter if they’re on the injured list or unable to play,” Valesente said.

With a recovery process as long as Kane and Bailey’s, many athletes would have thrown in the towel.

Bailey said there have been times when it was difficult to focus on the repetitive rehab tasks, when all he wanted to do is get back on the field.

“The feeling of playing is unmatched for me,” Bailey

said. “One of my favorite things in the world is the feeling of getting a batter out and that itch to get that feeling again has been super motivational.”

Valesente said Bailey and the other players dealing with injuries are constantly working out with the team and doing everything they can to be ready for this season. “[Bailey is] throwing live at this point and feeling good,” Valesente said. “He made some mechanical adjustments and is working his butt off in the offseason. So we want to see him get on the field and start competing and put those injuries and past challenges behind him.”

Kane said there were some hiccups during his return to throwing off the mound when he began incorporating his off-speed pitches.

“The toughest part was seeing places where you could have contributed to, but you couldn’t because of surgery,” Kane said.

With Bailey expecting to be healthy for the start of the fast approaching 2025 season, he has one goal in mind: stay healthy. He said this process tested him exponentially, but he knew he could not give up and live with the regret of not trying all possible avenues to return to the field “I just want to be able to pitch,” Bailey said. “That’s what I truly love. … What brought me up to Ithaca College was baseball and wanting to throw and compete for our coach and for my teammates.”

From left, pitchers juniors Sean Minnick, Reed Bailey and sophomore Ryan Kane all have experienced and recovered from elbow injuries and now look to make an impact on the baseball team.

Robert Daniels/THE ITHACAN

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Year In Review

Rowing teams break the ice with preseason training

by David Schurter published Feb. 20 Winter on South Hill can bring below-freezing temperatures and poor weather conditions, leading to a frozen Cayuga Lake, impossible to launch a boat onto. For the Ithaca College rowing teams, the task of training outside of the water is a long process, but a path that the teams are willing to take each season to reach the highest levels of success.

O ver the past few seasons, the teams have consistently finished at the top of the Liberty League Championship Tournament. Beth Greene ’00, head coach of the women’s rowing team, said that keeping the fundamentals and the team’s training consistent keeps the athletes engaged and motivated.

“Some days, it’s like, ‘Ok, sit here and take more strokes,’” Greene said. “We’re giving them the reminder of how what they’re doing today is going to pay off in a few months. … I think that that’s the key, is to try to make a connection between monotonous training and their future success.”

The women’s team is coming off its sixth consecutive Liberty League Championship, as well as a fifth-plac team finish at the NC A DIII rowing championship.

The men’s team is fresh off its first ever Liberty League Championship under head coach Justin Stangel in 2024.

He said the two teams have consistently worked closely with one another to balance each other’s training loads

and often conduct joint workouts because the success often rubs off on each team.

“We’re fortunate enough to have the rowing machines [in the Athletics and Events Center] and at the boathouse,” Stangel said. “Honestly, getting 114 days instead of weeks has been nice. We’ve been able to draw out the season a little bit more so we get a couple more touchpoints, and [we are] really continuing to build off the foundation that we set in the fall.”

When the team is not in the boat, it is working individually on rowing machines. Stangel said that training out of the boat allows him to check in with each athlete on their strength and help them work on their form.

“I really think that the rowing machine is a great tool,” Stangel said. “When we’re in the boats, there’s nine people in boats, eight rowers and the coxswain. I can’t individualize what those guys are doing. It gives me a little bit more opportunity to tweak where people are at.”

O utside of the physical training leading up to the season, both teams emphasized the mental preparation that takes place during the offseason. Graduate student Wesley Hoglin worked under previous head coach Dan Robinson ’79 during his first two seasons with the team in 2021 and 2022. He said the team’s approach toward training has changed since Stangel took over the program because Robinson’s training regiment was more intense during Hoglin’s second season.

“Coach likes to say ‘We ride the lightning’ when we’re working hard,” Hoglin said. “When your muscles

The Ithaca College rowing teams split practice times between the boat house and on campus. The women’s team practices at the Kelsey Partridge Bird Natatorium, an alternative for winter weather.

lucia iandolo/THE ITHACAN

are screaming, when your lungs are screaming, like halfway through a piece, you just have to keep holding it and trust your fitness.

Greene said she emphasizes to her athletes the idea of visually preparing for the season.

“Sometimes that looks like learning how to listen to your own thoughts without having to believe them,” Greene said. “We’ve talked a lot about identifying which thoughts are useful to you and which ones aren’t, and that your mentality is something that can be practiced the same way that your physical skills can.”

Senior Lily Babcock is one of the athletes on the team in the varsity eight who competed at nationals in 2024. She emphasized the team’s use of the erg machine, a rowing machine designed for rowers to work on their form outside of the boat. Babcock said this is how the team locks in and helps them stay on course for later in the season.

“I feel like this is the time that’s really preparing us for being on the water,” Babcock said. “We’re building our fitness every single day, and once we get on the water, we’re still working.”

Hoglin emphasized the mental side of training while out of the water. He said the team’s work ethic and mindset are enough to carry them into the season.

“When we’re in winter training, it’s really nice to have those guys on the left and right of you who you know are going through the same thing you’re going through, so you’re able to pick yourself up off of them, lean on them a little bit,” Hoglin said.

He said the captains bring a welcoming environment to practice when the team is not officially in season by inviting everyone to work out together.

“I think sometimes erging can be a love-hate relationship, because it’s hard [when] you’re by yourself,” Hoglin said. “In a boat, you know that everyone’s working together.”

Hoglin said the erg machines have screens that provide the statistics — including strokes per minute and distance — that are only provided on the boat in intervals.

“It’s psychologically different, because on the water, the coxswain has all that data, and so we don’t know how we’re doing,” Hoglin said. “There’s a level of unknown, just mental[ly] keep pushing until we hear a number, and then keep pushing more.”

Despite its challenges, Stangel said that training outside of the boats for long periods of time, such as during the winter, is the best way to fully prepare the team for the upcoming season.

“It takes a little bit of time to knock the rust off, but that’s part of the fun [and] the challenge of coaching in a northern school,” Stangel said. “It’s definitely a challenge, but one that we’re always up for.”

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Sports

Women’s swimming and diving wins sixth straight Liberty League title

by David Schurter published Feb. 28 The Liberty League Championship Tournament returned to South Hill from Feb. 19-22 with high expectations for each school. Several team and association records were shattered on the way to crowning the 2025 Liberty League champions: the Ithaca College women’s team and the Rochester Institute of Technology men’s team.

The four-day championship meet welcomed nine schools: Bard College Raptors, Clarkson University Golden Knights, Hobart and William Smith College Statesmen and Herons, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Engineers, Rochester Institute of Technology Tigers, Skidmore College Thoroughbreds, St. Lawrence University Saints, Union College Garnet Chargers and the Vassar College Brewers.

Combined, the Bombers men’s and women’s teams broke three Liberty League championship records, highlighting a week of strong individual and team performances. The women’s team pulled away from the Engineers while the Tigers held on to defeat the men’s team for the fourth straight year.

Day one Both teams led the meet after the first session Feb. 19. The men’s team held a slim margin for firs place over RPI with 461 points, while the women’s team tallied 349 points to lead over RIT’s 307 points.

Junior Ryan Cooke led the men’s team into action.

Cooke, the defending Liberty League champion in the 500-yard freestyle, earned the team’s first individual win of the meet with a time of 4:32.32. He also broke the Liberty League record from 2019. Upon touching the wall, the Kelsey Partridge Bird Natatorium exploded with cheers, from the fans to Cooke’s teammates.

Junior Matthew Janssen also joined in on the scoring action. Janssen finished fifth in the 200-yard individual medley, swimming a time of 1:54.77. After watching many of his teammates swim their personal best or season-best performances, he said the times serve as extra motivation for a team that is hungry for a championship following a second place finish the last four seasons.

“That’s what we’re all about,” Janssen said. “We just want to be better than we were last year. We have young guys who [we have] seen how they’ve done this year and they’ll try to do [even] better next year.”

For the women’s team, sophomore Kathleen Papiernik clinched the win in the 200-yard individual medley, touching the wall with a time of 2:06.10, beating out the defending champion from the Engineers, senior Shannon Brown.

The coaches for the Ithaca College women’s swimming and diving team celebrate the team's success on Feb. 22, which meant claiming its sixth consecutive Liberty League championship.

Arthur Wawrzyniak/THE ITHACAN

Day two Senior Kailee Payne, the defending Division III national champion in the 1- and 3-meter dives, continued her dominant season by winning both events.

Payne reset her own championship record in the 1-meter dive from a year ago with a score in the finals of 553.65 for 11 dives, ranking her third in the nation.

Papiernik also hopped on the team’s championship record-breaking train in the 100-yard butterfl . Papiernik won her second straight league title in the event, touching the wall at 55:70, bringing the crowd to its feet.

Papiernik earned an NCAA B-Cut time with her league-winning swim. She said self-confidence pushed her through the wall to repeat as the event’s champion and set the new record.

“I knew it was the last time I was swimming this season and I wanted to give it all I had,” Papiernik said.

“I think that was what got me to where I am.”

Day three Going into day three, the women’s team had a comfortable lead for first place, while the men’s team was in a close battle with the Tigers, the defending Liberty League champions for men’s swimming and diving.

Both Bombers squads placed several athletes on the podium, but the highlight of the night was the women’s 4×800-yard freestyle relay. Junior Naomi Fry, Papiernik, junior Ava Palfreyman and sophomore Samantha Bender ran away with the win over Vassar by about five seconds, swimming a time of 7:40.65,

as well as earning the team an important 64 points to build upon its lead.

Day four On the fourth and final day, the finals began with a tribute to all of the Liberty Leagues graduating seniors.

The emotional tribute soon turned over to an exciting 1,650-yard freestyle.

The Tigers’ first-year swimmer Josh Berty broke the Liberty League Championship record with a time of 15:57.71. Senior Matthew Stevens and sophomore James Kissel were side-by-side at the wall to earn second and third place, respectively, garnering huge team points for the Bombers to draw closer to the Tigers, but it was not enough to steal first place Despite falling short at the hands of the Tigers, head coach Mike Blakely-Armitage said it was a year to rebuild for the men’s team, but that the athletes and coaches came away with several positive takeaways. “[There is] a lot of confidence for what they have next year,” Blakely-Armitage said. “They’re going to be [hungrier] for next year. Big time.”

As for the women’s team, the South Hill squad captured its sixth consecutive Liberty League Championship.

With that, diving coach Chris Griffin celebrated by making his annual plunge off the 3-meter board.

“I love seeing it every year,” Blakely-Armitage said.

“It’s great that he’s so energetic, and I love coaching with him. He’s one of the best diving coaches in the country and having him on our staff is just phenomenal.”

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Year In Review

IC hopes to see continued involvement of women in sports media

by Isabella McSweeney Published march 6 Ithaca College’s sports media and sport management programs have been majority male for as long as the college has collected enrollment data. Despite a small population, the college’s community of female students in sports media is on the rise.

In Spring 2022, The Ithacan examined the growing gender divide in Ithaca College’s sports media major.

Since Fall 2017, the number of female students increased from 10 to 27 in Fall 2024. However, the percentage change is not statistically indicative of a trend as the percentage in Fall 2017 was the same (19.6%) as in Fall 2024 (20.2%). This is because overall enrollment in the major increased.

The School of Business’ Department of Sport Management — consisting of sport management, as well

DATA FROM THE ITHACA COLLEGE OFFICE OF ANALYTICS AND INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH, GRAPH BY KAIDEN CHANDLER/THE ITHACAN

as management concentrations for business administration majors — yielded a decrease in the number of female and male students in the major.

Since Fall 2017, the percentage of women in sport management — including both the major and the concentration — relative to total students in the program has increased from 12.9% to 18.8% in Fall 2024. Despite a decrease in overall enrollment in the program, the number of female students increased from nine to 15 in the same time frame.

Mead Loop, director of the sports media program, said it can be hard to attribute this growth to a single factor. He said a possible influence may be aftershocks of what he called the “Caitlin Clark effect.” Clark, the first overall pick in the 2024 WNBA draft, brought new attention to the league and other professional women’s sports. The 2024 season had a 170% increase in viewership from the year before.

“We have rising attendance in person at [national] women’s sporting events, and we have increasing viewership,” Loop said. “That might produce more interest among prospective students.”

Professional women’s sports have also seen the creation of the Professional Women’s Hockey League in 2023, as well as the Women’s Lacrosse League and Women’s Elite Rugby in 2025.

Senior Sara Hunter, a business administration major with concentrations in sport management and marketing, said professional sports were a large influence on her decision to enter the industry. A lifelong New York Mets fan, Hunter said she had vague dreams of becoming manager of the Mets until her season ticket representative made her realize it was a real possibility.

“My ticket rep ended up telling me about how she went to [Syracuse University] and got her sport management degree,” Hunter said. “I realized, ‘She went

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to school for this, and now she works for the New York Mets, maybe I could do that.’”

Data collected by the Office of Analytics and Institutional Research highlights a gap between the proportion of female students in sport majors and the college. The Spring 2025 undergraduate student body 57% female students, with the Roy H. Park School of Communications and School of Business coming in at 51% and 27.4% female students, respectively. Of the total female students enrolled in the college, 5.2% are in the business school and 26.5% are in the communications school. Only 0.7% of students who are female major or have a concentration in sport management, while 1% major in sports media.

Hunter said that when she walks into a sport management class, she expects to be in the minority.

“Last spring I took Sport Analytics,” Hunter said.

“There were [24] people in the class, and I was one of two girls. It has been something that I’ve become used to. … It’s unfortunate that that’s what it’s like.”

Senior Belle Adams, a sports media major, said she faced similar experiences. Adams said that when she starts a new semester, she immediately notices the lack of other women in the room.

“Because I’m in the upper level courses, there’s maybe two or three girls in each class,” Adams said.

“But this semester, I’m in Sports Publications, and I’m the only girl in the class. I want to know that there are more girls out there.”

Rachel Madsen, associate professor and chair of the Department of Sport Management, said she has been part of North American Society for Sport Management workshops dedicated to addressing the gender divide. Regarding IC, Madsen said a major problem seems to be a lack of awareness about the department.

“A lot of my female students tell me that they didn’t even know this was a major until they got on campus,” Madsen said. “They were often in a different major and transferred in.”

Madsen said one difficulty in educating prospective students is the way open houses are held. There are specific events for each school, which limits the pool of students and discourages many from exploring programs across multiple disciplines.

Madsen said her next move is to directly reach out to high school athletic departments. She said she hopes educating current high school athletes about the industry will help increase interest.

Adams said that maintaining a support system is an important aspect for increasing the number of women in sport majors. When students enter the sports media program, they are required to take Introduction to Sports Media with Ellen Staurowsky, professor in the Department of Sports Media with specializations in social justice issues in sports, including gender equity.

“Dr. Staurowsky gets to mentor the students in the intro class,” Loop said. “I bet that’s a big boon for retention.”

Senior Natalie Descalso, a sports media major, said Staurowsky makes every sports media student feel welcome by sharing internship opportunities, offering advice or having a casual conversation.

“She’s almost like a mom in the sports media department,” Descalso said. “She’s spent a lot of time working with the girls in the major because she’s female, and she’s done so many amazing things in the sports media community. She’s been really amazing for all of us.”

Throughout her tenure at IC, Staurowsky has acted as a graduate chair and professor. When she began teaching, sports media was part of the Department of Sport Management and Media in the School of Health Sciences and Human Performance. Staurowsky recently announced her phased retirement, with a final retirement date in December 2026. Staurowsky declined to comment.

O n the student side, Descalso said she provides advice to younger sports media majors as the vice president of the college’s Association for Women in Sports Media. She said she feels encouraged by AWSM’s growth throughout her time at the college.

“A lot more people are coming to club meetings, which is really awesome,” Descalso said. “I remember my first couple years doing it, there were maybe five people coming, which was still great, but we obviously wanted more people.”

AWSM’s GroupMe, formed at the start of Fall 2024, currently boasts 26 members. Madsen said IC used to have a dedicated club for women in sport management before decreased enrollment numbers at the college led to its dissolution. As of Spring 2025 there are 73 undergraduate students in the sport management department, excluding the sport marketing major, which is down from 120 in Fall 2019. Descalso said that while AWSM began as an organization for only sports media majors, students’ majors are irrelevant as long as they are contributing to the community and preparing themselves for the professional world.

In 2021, The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport (TIDES) gave the Associated Press Sports Editors an “F” rating in gender hiring, with the APSE’s staff being only

Sports

19.3% women. TIDES’ assessment of gender hiring in Major League Baseball has worsened in the past decade, going from a “C+” to a “C.” In addition, Women’s Media Center’s 2021 Status of Women in the U.S. Media reported that the top 100 sport radio personalities were men.

Despite TIDES’ low rating, the industry shows signs of hope. The number of women employed by APSE almost doubled between 2021 and 2011, when they made up only 11.4% of the total staff. In 2023, the NFL reported “all-time highs” of women assistant coaches, team vice presidents and professional staff.

Madsen said she believes this trend will continue.

“The very interesting thing that I’m seeing right now is that [sport] organizations specifically want to hire women,” Madsen said. “It’s been happening over a few years, but all of a sudden, it’s happening. We need to get this info to high school girls and say, ‘Not only is there a place for you, they really want you.’”

The college’s institutional data uses the term gender for its data collection, but was collecting data for sex assigned at birth. Gender identity data was not collected prior to Fall 2022, so to reflect the available data, this article will use the terms “male” and “female” to reflect enrollment based on sex assigned at birth from Fall 2017 through Fall 2024.

This article is only taking into account the two sport degrees that currently exist at Ithaca College as of Spring 2025: the sport marketing concentration — which was a major in Fall 2017 and Fall 2024 — in the School of Business, and the sports media major in the Roy H. Park School of Communications, which began in Fall 2017.

However, until Fall 2018, there was a sport management major in the School of Health Science and Human Performance. There was also a sport media major in the School of Health Science and Human Performance until Fall 2019. Both have enrolled students who are women, and neither major is included in the data in this article.

METHODOLOGY To show the number of female students in Ithaca College’s sports media and sport management programs, The Ithacan relied on the college’s public database.

The database uses the term “gender,” but was collecting data for sex assigned at birth. The college did not start collecting gender identity data until Fall 2022.

This article uses the terms “male” and “female” to reflect enrollment data based on sex assigned at birth.

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