The Phoenix
The Official Campus Newspaper of Swarthmore College Since 1881 VOL. 136, ISSUE 4
TODAY: Sunshine and clouds mixed. High 74, Low 57. TOMORROW: Chance of rain, wind. High 77, Low 60.
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 20, 2012
Let’s Make Some Noize
SWARTHMOREPHOENIX.COM
Nude Models Bare All Q&A with Nicholas Witchey and Jae-hyun Oh By ZOE WRAY Living & Arts Writer
JULIA CARLETON/PHOENIX STAFF
Julian Randall, Brian Foster, Jabree Reeves, Chris Hulk and Due Ho sit for a photo outside the WSRN studio. Ho, the current head of The Noize, has high hopes for the program’s future.
Interactive media project rebuilds for new semester
The Noize, a collaborative media friend familiar with hip-hop audio proproject between Chester High School duction to bring in Chester students and Swarthmore students that airs and instruct them in the production weekly on WSRN, will seek a charter studio. this semester, expand on-campus inWhile Symonds wanted to construct volvement and reinvigorate its original a program that balanced resource-sharoutreach aspect with on-site recruiting ing between Chester and Swarthmore, in Chester. he placed more emphasis on actual in“We’ve been kind of under the ravolvement in Chester by Swarthmore dar for a long time,” said Due Ho ‘13, the current on-campus students, primarily through a mentoring program. “I always head of The Noize. “But as soon as Student Council elects felt that it was paramount that Swarthmore students made a their Student Group Advisor, we’re going to try to bring it real commitment to their Chester mentees, that they went out there and get it chartered.” Ho also mentioned that The to Chester and learned about how these kids were living,” he Noize hopes to hold a concert in a space such as Olde Club to said. promote the group. Symonds saw this approach as different from the usual in“The outreach aspect has kind of died down and this year volvement of college students with Chester residents. “This we would like to bring that was opposed to the tradiback,” Ho said. tional one-sided dynamic Daniel Symonds ‘11, a and the frequently lopsided founder of The Noize, exuse of resources by Chester, Not only did we talk about hip-hop, plained, “Right now we’re at and not as much involvea big turning point and forbut we talked about world issues and ment in Chester by Swarthmalizing a lot of what we’ve more students,” he said. how we should approach them. They learned. We’re giving the Brian Foster, one of the program the legs it needs played their part in educating us about original Chester High School to survive in the years to students involved with The come.” Symonds continued, Noize who now studies film the world and how we should react. “Outreach is definitely goat the Art Institute of PhilaBrian Foster ing to be a bigger part now. delphia, certainly felt the We want to revitalize the impact of the mentoring initial mentoring aspect of program. “It was more than the program and bring back just a Swarthmore student a lot of that resource-sharing component.” hanging out with a Chester High student,” Foster said. “It was Symonds created The Noize during his freshman year. “I’d more of a big brother role, more like a family relationship.” always had a strong interest in music and radio,” he said. “I Foster described the role of Swarthmore students in Chessaw it as a vast shame that this studio was just sitting there ter as highly beneficial. “Not only did we talk about hip-hop, and no one was using it. Classic Swarthmore: so many re- but we talked about world issues and how we should apsources and not enough people.” proach them. They played their part in educating us about Symonds reached out to Lang Scholars working in Ches- the world and how we should react,” Foster said of the college ter to gain access to the high schoolers, who he saw as the participants in the program. The education and interaction opposite of Swarthmore students. “These are students who went both ways. “Chester kids put Swarthmore kids onto the are really neglected and don’t have the same opportunities or music from our city and what we would listen to. When we even half as many resources,” Symonds said. With the money would have events in our city, we would invite Swat people. from his Evans scholarship, Symonds hired a high school We definitely built relationships and friendships with each
“The human form is a very complex form [through which] to study light and value and volume… every drawing lesson you could possible desire to teach a student could be taught by that subject.” Such is the reason, according to Logan Grider, Assistant Professor of Studio Art at Swarthmore, for the Life Drawing Studio Art course and its employed student models, including Nicholas Witchey ’15 and Jae-hyun Oh ’15. Through the use of student models, which Grider emphasizes as “crucial” to the class, students learn to push past the notions in their heads of what human figures look like and to see the uniqueness of forms found in each and every individual. Using live figures that are actually present in the class is vital because if the students only drew from photographs, they would not be able to “constantly reevaluate what they’re looking at, because it’s always in a state of flux,” explained Grider. “What we’re all fighting against in the world is just seeing sameness.” By the end of the course, Grider hopes that students have a refreshed visual perspective of the world that demonstrates sensitivity to the fluctuations of figures. The class isn’t about technique, about achieving depictive perfection of the eyebrow; in fact, Grider approaches the class with the idea that “technique is a filter you put between yourself and the subject. Everything has to adhere to that filter, and, in my opinion, that makes for less interesting drawings because there’s always something that’s sacrificed to the filter, in order to make it the way that you were taught.” With this in mind, it becomes clear that the availability of student models isn’t just a nice accoutrement, but a vital, Continued on Page 10
JULIA CARLETON/PHOENIX STAFF
Nicholas Witchey and Jae-hyun Oh work as nude models for the art department’s Life Drawing class.
Continued on Page 5
INSIDE THIS ISSUE
NEWS MEAL PLAN PART II: CROSS COMPARISON
LIVING & ARTS PLENTY OF FISH: OUSIDE THE BUBBLE
OPINIONS LACK OF EDUCATION AND INDIA’S FUTURE
SPORTS CROSS COUNTRY AIMS FOR NATIONALS
We all know about Swarthmore’s meal plan options, but what about those at other similarly sized liberal arts colleges, such as Vassar, Sarah Lawrence and Amherst? Find out about them on PAGE 4
Seeking off-campus romance, Swatties turn to online dating sites to jump-start area love affairs. Hear from students who’ve successfully naviagted the ins and outs of first dates... outside Sharples. PAGE 11
Harshil draws attention to a fundamentally flawed education system in one of the world’s fastest growing economies, arguing that an uneducated population cannot sustain India’s potential. PAGE 14
The Garnet men’s and women’s cross country teams, each having run in two meets, have set their sights on qualifying for the 2012 NCAA Division III Cross Country Championship. PAGE 19