ESPN For the first time in program history, ESPN will cover Hillsdale Chargers football this weekend against the University of Findlay. A9
Michigan’s oldest college newspaper
Nobel Prize Hillsdale professors and an alumnus have connections to LIGO, the scientific collaboration whose leaders won the 2017 Nobel Prize in Physics. B3
Vol. 141 Issue 7 - October 12, 2017
Students splash each other with colored powder at Saturday’s Color Run. Matthew Kendrick | Collegian
Mayoral candidates promise to help police fight drug epidemic By | Madeline Fry Culture Editor As drug overdoses haunt Michigan and the City of Hillsdale, both mayoral candidates promised to empower the police force to address the opioid epidemic. In Michigan, drug-related deaths rose 18 percent from 2015 to 2016, according to the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services. Over the past couple years, at least four heroin-related deaths occurred in Hillsdale County, and patients frequent the Hillsdale Hospital seeking
treatment for drug-related problems. “On a daily basis, we see patients who are affected either by methamphetamine or opioid-related issues,” said Shirley Curtis, emergency department manager at the Hillsdale Hospital. Both mayoral candidates, Mayor Scott Sessions and City Councilman Adam Stockford, said they would address the problem by ensuring that the city police force has the resources and the funding to address drug-related issues. As mayor, Sessions appointed Police Chief Scott
Hephner, who he said has done an excellent job leading the force. Sessions said he plans to continue to put key personnel in place and to make sure the police force has proper training and equipment. Sessions said it’s important to pass the city budget “to make sure the funding is in place and available so Police Chief Hephner has enough staff to be able to protect the city and make sure that it stays safe for all of our citizens.” Stockford said the first item on his platform is economic mobility, and the second is
combatting the drug problem. “As the poverty in Hillsdale gets worse, the drug problem will get worse,” he said. “When I say economic development is my number one issue, it’s because all the issues in the community are tied to the economy.” Stockford said the police force needs more training and resources to approach situations in which overdoses occur to save lives, their first priority. The hospital already collaborates with the police department, offering training to the police See Drugs A7
Pub & Grub Here’s to You Pub & Grub is now offering a brunch menu on Saturday and Sunday mornings. A6
www.hillsdalecollegian.com
Mugs go missing By | Nicole Ault Assistant Editor For students desperate for a cup of coffee before dashing off to class, an empty mug rack beneath the coffee carafes in the cafeteria is a sorry sight — but all too common in recent weeks. Dining hall patrons have taken or thrown out around 450 plastic white mugs since the start of the semester. Bon Appétit Management Company bought 600 plastic mugs at the beginning of the year to replace an old set of ceramic mugs, said Bon Appétit General Manager David Apthorpe in an email, but by the end of September, no more than 80 were circulating. Only about 70 mugs had been taken from use by Bon Appétit because they were stained or broken, he said, which means the rest have been taken or thrown out by patrons. Bon Appétit Marketing Manager William Persson said they’ve found mugs around campus and in garbage cans within the dining hall. Mugs cost $4.60 each, Apthorpe said. That’s more than a $2,000 loss for Bon Appétit in the first month of school. “I am surprised at the speed which the mugs have vanished,” Apthorpe said. “It affects our ability to maintain our service standards.” Patrons aren’t just taking mugs, though. Silverware and dishes are often found around campus and in dorms, too, he said. “Students’ attitudes can be, ‘There’s thousands of forks, and I already pay so much,’” Apthorpe said, adding that people have a different attitude toward taking books from a library. The net effect of taking the mugs diminishes service for everyone, Apthorpe said, noting that replacing the disposable cups has allowed Bon Appétit to offer better food and customer service. “If we can save money on cups, glasses, waste, we can have a more robust program,” he said, estimating that Bon Appétit spent $8,000 on
disposable cups in previous years. Students may be taking out the cups in reaction to Bon Appétit’s decision to replace disposable to-go cups with reusable travel mugs for each student, according to Persson. Students have commented that they want the disposable cups back, he said, but that doesn’t excuse them for taking out the plastic mugs. “It is technically stealing,” he said. Junior Erik Halvorson said students shouldn’t take the white mugs, but the lack of disposable to-go cups encourages them to do so. “It seems like [the travel mugs] are not the best use of resources, because people forget them, they lose them,” Halvorson said. “It inevitably leads to people taking the white ones.” Students are allowed to take a piece of fruit, a cookie, a cone or cup of ice cream, or a beverage in a travel mug from the dining hall, Apthorpe said. Whether they’re inconvenienced by the lack of disposable cups, students who intentionally throw away or take mugs out of the dining hall break the college’s honor code, said Associate Dean of Men Jeffrey Rogers. “Of course it’s a violation of the honor code,” Rogers said. “It says something about us.” Rogers said some students might just be forgetful, but the fact that so many mugs have disappeared so quickly is “a problem.” “Is it serious?” he added. “It’s the little things that turn into the serious things.” Apthorpe said he is waiting on a shipment of 250 more mugs to replace some of the missing ones. “We hope that educational efforts and the challenges created by a mug shortage will shape guest behavior,” he said, noting that if the mug theft continues, Bon Appétit will have to institute stricter door monitoring. For now, Rogers has a strict warning for students who steal: “I pity the fool that I catch outside of the dining hall with a cup he threw away.”
Farewell to Angell: Director of Theater retiring at end of season By | Madeline Fry Culture Editor After a black walnut tree fell in his yard, Director of Theater George Angell carved the lumber into a dining room table and gave it to Professor of Spanish Carmen Wyatt-Hayes. “It has been one of my great joys,” Wyatt-Hayes said. “It’s my favorite piece of furniture.” Professor of Philosophy James Stephens has one, too, as does the lobby of the Sage Center for the Arts, where Angell taught, created, and directed for 33 years. This week, the Tower Players perform “All’s Well That Ends Well,” the last of nearly 70 plays he’s directed at Hillsdale. At the end of the school year, Angell will retire, leaving behind a growing theater department and a host of young actors who benefitted from his experience. Angell encourages students to study the performing arts. In fact, he recommends all students become theater majors. The discipline he spent his life studying encompasses all others, he said. “There is not a single subject, single moment that you study that doesn’t cross the stage at some point,” Angell said. “There are either plays about it or plays that incorporate that knowledge.” In addition to directing, Follow @HDaleCollegian
Angell acts, designs sound for shows, writes plays, and teaches courses on acting and directing to playwriting and film. Theater department chairman James Brandon said Angell gathered many responsibilities over the years. He has influenced every aspect of the department in some way, so much so that Brandon said he expects not to realize everything Angell does for some time. A few years down the road, he said, he’ll wonder who used to take charge of a particular task in the department. “And the answer will inevitably be George,” Brandon said. When Angell arrived at Hillsdale in 1984, the department was in danger of dissolution. Instead, the college hired one tenured professor and two part-time adjuncts. After Angell joined the department as an adjunct, he put his experience to work. Angell ran the theater department for 20 years, from 1996 to 2016. Besides promoting the performing arts at Hillsdale, he also introduced his students to the broader theater community. Angell took a student production of “Macbeth” to compete at the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival in 1999. Four times over the last 10 years, he has
brought students to the United Kingdom for Edinburgh Festival Fringe, the world’s largest theater festival. During the 2001 trip, he performed in a student-written one-act play, “Billy Bob’s Garage.” Another trip became an annual
rected “The Man of Destiny” last year. After she offered detailed instruction to each of the actors, she said Angell offered her his own instruction: “Let the actors act.” Giving artists freedom was one of the most valuable
George Angell will retire at the end of the academic year. Facebook
tradition—every year since 1990, he’s brought a group of theater students to see professional shows at the Stratford Festival in Ontario. The theater department now offers one dance performance and four plays annually, one of which is student directed. Senior Elena Creed di-
lessons he has taught her, she said. “You as a director aren’t supposed to control everything,” Creed said. “You’re supposed to be there to work alongside people and to shape the play into the vision that you have.” When he directs, even when he doesn’t like how
www.hillsdalecollegian.com
someone is portraying a character, Creed said, Angell often trusts that the actors will see for themselves what works — and what doesn’t. Senior Nikolai Dignoti also said he appreciates Angell’s hands-off approach, which allows actors to explore characters themselves. “You always do feel like it is your character,” Dignoti said. “And he’s very good at getting you there.” An unwritten part of his job also is to assuage anxious parents fretting over their potentially jobless theater major children. He once had to do the same with his father. During high school, Angell got a part in a local play in a town next to his. His mom had to drive him to rehearsal every day for six weeks. Near the end of rehearsals, his dad became angry that he was wasting his mother’s time. Then, he saw the show. “Afterward, he said to me, ‘I don’t care where you have to go. We’ll get you there,’” Angell said. Before Hillsdale, Angell directed the first stage production of The Who’s rock-opera, “Tommy.” After he arrived, he wrote and directed a musical about the Chinese annexation of Tibet, “Iron Bird,” which premiered at the Markel Auditorium in 1996. Angell also has traveled. He’s visited almost every
country in Europe, he said, as well as many in Asia, Africa, and Central America. He also spent several years growing up in Turkey. He can get by speaking Turkish, but he’s fluent in German. For his sabbatical in 2008, Angell spent two months in Bali, studying mask-making with an artist. He spent half his time on the island enjoying the culture and learning to speak Indonesian, and the other half sitting in the corner of a shop creating a theater mask, dark-colored with bright blue eyes, that sits now in a corner in his office. Near the end of his stay, his wife, Megan, and his son, Gwydion, joined to see what they thought of the country. He would be interested in going back, he said. Both of Angell’s children, Rhiannon ’07 and Gwydion ’15, attended Hillsdale, but only Rhiannon majored in theater. She knew her father would be tougher on her than other students. In addition to mask-making and carpentry, Angell has a host of other talents. “I’m a — I don’t know whether to say terrific or terrible — hobbyist,” he said. He enjoys boat building, fly fishing, stained-glass making, beer brewing, and cooking, from grilling at theater picnics to producing gourmet meals. See Angell A2 Look for The Hillsdale Collegian