News
Tuesday, october 16, 2012
THE HOYA
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Policy Sets New Standards Work Remains for Initiative For Addressing Abuse DIVERSITY, from A1
MINORS, from A1 abuse or negative treatment of any individual under the age of 18. The policy applies to all buildings, facilities and areas owned and operated by the university. To enforce this standard, the policy requires all people over 18 who lead or participate in programs or activities involving minors to undergo training and a criminal background check. Training includes learning methods for recognizing signs of abuse or neglect and developing ways to protect minors from abuse. Non-university organizations must submit documentation proving that program members underwent training. The policy also highlighted the importance of a reporting system, which mandates that members of the university com-
munity call Georgetown’s Department of Public Safety or the Metropolitan Police Department if they notice suspicious activity. Community members also must inform the Office of Compliance and Ethics about concerns. According to Smulson, the university’s next task is to ensure that the campus understands the new policy. “It is very much an ongoing process because now that we have the policy in place, we have to increase awareness that we have the policy and that this is an issue,” he said. He added that the university hopes to bolster the policy’s message by bringing speakers to work with student groups and talk about child abuse throughout the year. “It is going to be a constant conversation to make sure people are aware of the issue of child abuse,” he said.
GSC Petition Influenced Committee’s Decision ADIDAS, from A1 contract with Adidas would render the termination irrelevant, but he also said that the size of the contract was not a major stumbling block in passing the recommendation. Margolis said that money should not be a factor in the decision. “While it might not make a huge impact financially for Adidas, I think the fact that Georgetown is making the stance that we care might make an impact for other universities,” Margolis said. “It makes a huge moral statement.” An online petition created by the Georgetown Solidarity Committee through change.org, which called for the university to sever its contract with Adidas, played a role in the decision. According to GSC member Julia Hubbell (COL ’15), the petition garnered 172 signatures between its launch on Sept. 18 and its submission to the LOC last week. “Certainly, the petition was a factor in
the LOC’s discussions,” Fleming wrote in an email. “The committee considered a variety of comments and perspectives throughout the time that the matter was before the committee since last academic year.” Though University President John J. DeGioia will have the final say in cutting ties with Adidas, Hubbell said that she expects the committee’s actions to weigh heavily on his decision. “It is just an advisory body, but the LOC recommendations are taken very seriously,” she said. “Up until Dec. 15 we are going to continue talking to admins from the student perspective and make sure the action is completed.” Fleming also expressed confidence that the university will follow through on the LOC’s suggestion. “The disposition of our recommendation rests with the university administration, and I can tell you that it is actively under consideration,” he wrote. “I would expect a decision in the not-too-distant future.”
students — other issues remain unresolved. Current students and alumni who were involved in the initiative are now voicing concerns about whether the university has acted on the remaining recommendations, particularly those of the academic working group. According to Saaliha Khan (COL ’13), a diversity fellow in the Office of Campus Ministry, the initiative has faded from the forefront of university policy over the past few years. “[The university] used to send out all-school blasts about the initiative, the working groups and the recommendations that were being implemented,” Khan said. “Recently, though, I haven’t seen anything.” SCU member Zenen Jaimes (SFS ’13) expressed similar concerns. “All the recommendations were kind of pushed aside, despite the fact that many students spent a lot of time on it to try to address a real problem,” Jaimes said. “[The school] simply moved forward without it, and the conversation about diversity on campus sort of ended with it.” Vice President for Institutional Diversity and Equity Rosemary Kilkenny pointed to several of the working groups’ recommendations that have already been enacted, including the hiring of more minority faculty members and the successful implementation of diversity fellowships for professors and students. According to Kilkenny, two Black professors, eight Asian professors and one Latina professor have been hired on the main campus since last winter. She added that the university is now in the process of diversifying other administrative areas, including chaplains- and facultyin-residence, professional staff and resident assistants. Additionally, the Doyle Initiative, a program that encourages faculty to discuss topics of diversity and tolerance during lectures, ensures that professors broach the topic of acceptance in the classroom. “Faculty [members] are continuing to take advantage of that
program by enhancing their pedagogical approaches to teaching,” Kilkenny wrote in an email. During the past two academic years, nine undergraduate diversity fellows — including Khan — have been assigned to the Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity and Affirmative Action, the Office of Campus Ministry, the Center for Multicultural Equity and Access, the LGBTQ Resource Center, the Women’s Center, the School of Nursing & Health Studies and the Center for Child and Human Development. “Diversity … is a collaborative effort that permeates the campus,” Kilkenny wrote. Kilkenny said that the initiative is still in the implementation phase but that students have expressed frustration about the initiative’s slow progress. “We were under the impression that the university would, in a timely and open fashion, let us know which recommendations would be accepted and which wouldn’t, but that hadn’t come to pass by the time I graduated,” said Ryan Wilson (COL ’12), a member of SCU and a co-chair of the admissions and recruitment working group. “We had no idea about what was being done.” Wilson pointed to components of the initiative that have stalled, particularly the academic working group’s recommendation that the university develop its minority studies programs. “The academics working group had put forth recommendations for expanding the African American studies department and creating formal African American, Latino and Asian American studies majors,” Wilson said. “The school has yet to act upon these recommendations.” According to the SCU’s 2008 report, 95 percent of Georgetown’s peer universities — defined as all other members of the Consortium on Financing Higher Education and all Jesuit schools — already have an African American studies major. Another two-thirds have a Latin American studies major and one-third offer majors in Asian American studies. Additionally, around 70 percent of these schools include diversity courses in their core curricula, another primary con-
cern for students involved in the initiative. “We don’t see a focus on diversity education curricula, and that is needed in order to foster respect [for diversity] on campus,” Khan said. According to Khan, a lack of student advocacy has allowed the university to stall on the implementation of the working groups’ recommendations. “[The university] needs to step it up,” she said. “I know that many students still care very much about the initiative, both for diversity in the university and to ensure that Georgetown becomes a more welcoming place. But in terms of the administration and holding them accountable, we as students need to push a little bit.” But concern about on-campus diversity is felt at the administrative level as well. Director of the Center for Multicultural Equity and Access and Associate Dean of Students Dennis Williams said that the Supreme Court’s ruling on Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin — an ongoing case challenging the constitutionality of affirmative action policies — could affect Georgetown’s efforts to recruit more minority students. “We should also be prepared to do what is necessary to continue to enroll significant numbers of previously excluded students if the U.S. Supreme Court rules that colleges cannot consider race in admissions,” he wrote in an email. But according to Jaimes, increasing minority enrollment will not address larger issues about tolerance on campus. “There’s a difference between having the diversity in the numbers and actually feeling that our campus is a place where diversity is valued,” he said. According to Wilson, this change will only happen if students ensure that the university keeps the initiative at the forefront of its agenda. “This is not the first time nor will this be the last time that [a diversity initiative] will be debated on campus,” he said. “The most important thing to do is to research and reach out to people so we stop doing the same work over and over again.”
HBO Writer Engages Students Minali Aggarwal Special to The Hoya
Georgetown students enjoyed a candid discussion with writer and producer the HBO series “Entourage” Doug Ellin in Lohrfink Auditorium Monday evening. Ellin began the discussion with stories about his early years as an aspiring stand-up comedian in Hollywood. His film career formally launched when he was 22 years old and wrote a short film called “The Pitch.” “Somebody saw the film and liked it enough to get me a job as a production assistant at New Line Cinema [film studio], so I worked in the mail room,” Ellin said. “But then the president saw my film and wanted me to go from working in the mailroom to producing a $35 million movie with him.” Ellin declined the offer and instead chose to attend film school to learn about the in-
dustry, after which he went on to direct films such as “Phat Beach.” After discussing his path to becoming the writer of a hit HBO series, Ellin entertained questions from many “Entourage” fans regarding his inspiration. “I wanted to do a show about me and my friends. I had to make it something I could relate to,” Ellin said. “I wanted it to be a show that showed how 18-to 34-year-old guys actually talk and act.” Despite the current popularity of “Entourage,” Ellin said that the show’s early ratings were shaky. “Based on the numbers, we didn’t know if people were even watching the show, so we were prepared to get hit by negative reviews,” Ellin said. “But surprisingly, The New York Times said we were the best show on television in 2003 and we even got Golden Globes for it.”
Ellin encouraged students interested in the film industry to go out and work hard to fulfill their goals. “There’s no structure to the business. You could make millions off of your first film or spend your entire career trying to convince people that you can do it; you never know,” he said. “But if you really want to do it, get yourself out there as quickly as you can, meet someone in the business, charm him and get him to read your stuff.” Much of the conversation centered on questions from the audience regarding specific scenes from episodes of “Entourage.” “I thought it was cool how down to earth Doug Ellin was with us,” Elliot Rosenfield (COL ’16) said. “He spoke to us like we were his close friends, which made it easy to see why so many people, myself included, love ‘Entourage’ and feel like they can relate to it so well.”
Profs Talk Innovative Learning Eitan Sayag
Special to The Hoya
University of California, Santa Barbara professors Linda Adler-Kassner and John Majewski spoke to Georgetown faculty about the different methods of utilizing innovative ways of thinking in the classroom in Lauinger Library Monday afternoon. The event was organized by Director of Writing Curriculum Initiatives Sherry Linkon and was sponsored by the Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship, a program that offers tools and resources to facilitate learning for students and faculty. Adler-Kassner and Majewski discussed the importance of understanding threshold concepts, which are unique lenses used to
analyze a specific discipline, so teachers can learn how to teach complicated ideas to undergraduate students. Majewski and Adler-Kassner applied their ideas in their respective history and writing courses at UC Santa Barbara. Adler-Kassner’s English students were all in Majewski’s history survey course, so the two collaborated when teaching the concepts. Both professors emphasized the importance of identifying, understanding and applying threshold concepts in their subjects. “One of the things we teach students [is] good taste,” Majewski said. “We are teaching them the values of how historians evaluate arguments and that, yes, there are different interpretations of history, but there are
certain evidentiary standards that historians use to evaluate arguments and competing narratives.” The event was part of a series of lectures that will contribute to an ongoing discussion concerning the revision of the general education writing requirements on campus, according to Linkon. “I wanted them to share the notion of threshold concepts and to give us an example of what happens when faculty in an academic discipline – a traditional discipline like history – start talking with people in writing as a discipline: What [do] they learn from each other?” Linkon said. “From my sense, just seeing what happened in someone else’s teaching can help all of us feel like … this would be a worthwhile thing to do.”