lifestyle
The Owlery The features blog of The Temple News
PRODUCING NEW MUSIC
QSU HOSTS INCLUSIVE PROM
The Boyer Electroacoustic Ensemble Project creates electronic music previously absent in the curriculum. PAGE 14
About150 people attended Queer Student Union’s “Come As You Are Prom” in Mitten Hall on Friday Night. PAGE 8 TUESDAY, MARCH 22, 2016
PURIM CARNIVAL
The Hillel at Temple will host its first Purim Carnival to educate students about the Jewish holiday. PAGE 16
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EVENTS
people you should Know
A focus on community building Randy Duque graduated from Temple in 1998 and works for the City of Philadelphia. By JOE BRANDT Chief Copy Editor
EVAN EASTERLING TTN
W.E. Moerner won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2014. He gave a presentation to students and faculty in the SERC on Thursday.
MIXING ‘KNOWLEDGE AND PASSION’ W.E. Moerner spoke to students and faculty last Thursday. By LIAN PARSONS The Temple News
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obel Laureate William E. Moerner has felt like he’s under pressure since winning the highest award in science two years ago. “People seeing new research projects we undertake have extremely high expectations,” he told the The Temple News. “Some people attach a certain aura to Nobel laureates, but we’re still nor-
mal people.” “As my wife says, I pull on my pants one leg at a time,” he added. The Provost Lecture Series hosted Moerner’s talk on his work Thursday afternoon in the Science and Education Research Center to a full house and then some— many attendees had to stand or sit on the floor. Moerner, currently a professor of chemistry at Stanford University, received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2014 for developing a technique to see smaller
molecular structures and their processes by using fluorescent light. Moerner said the Nobel Prize has afforded him new opportunities, particularly for speaking engagements. In 2014, he gave 54 talks around the world and said they were “a great opportunity to talk about and explain science to the broader world.” “There’s a little bit more freedom to explore some areas I didn’t want to explore before,” Moerner said. “I’m very excited
At a conference in the Philippines in 2008, Randy Duque saw an attorney struggling when teaching conflict resolution to uninterested members of the island nation’s Marine Corps. “To me, it seemed like they were looking at him as some tree-hugging hippie,” he said. Duque realized that he wanted to better understand how to resolve conflicts involving the military and relate to that side. So when he returned to the United States from his parents’ home country, he joined the Pennsylvania Army National Guard as an infantryman. He’s since risen to the rank of sergeant in the branch. “I did everything backwards,” the 1998 and 2004 alumnus said. “Instead of going into the Army first, I went after I
DUQUE | PAGE 16
NOBEL | PAGE 16
“I’m very excited and motivated by questions that haven’t been answered yet. … There’s a great feeling of pushing back the frontiers.”
KAIT MOORE TTN
Temple alum Randy Duque is the Human Deputy Director for the Philadelphia Comission on Human Relations.
W.E. Moerner | 2014 Nobel laureate
STUDENT ORGANIZATION
Honor society giving books to local school By GILLIAN McGOLDRICK The Temple News Last year, 100 percent of the students at Paul L. Dunbar Elementary School, located near Weiss Hall at 1750 N. 12th St., were at an economic disadvantage, and less than 20 percent of students from third to eighth grade scored advanced or proficient in their reading performance on the PSSA exams in 2014. Phi Beta Kappa, an honor society on Main Campus, has partnered with Duffy Books in Homes USA to combat these problems. Duffy Books, a nonprofit dedicated to improving literacy rates in the United States, plans to adopt Dunbar as a school they will donate books to annually. Together, the two organizations hope to raise $3,000 to provide each student with three brand new books from
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Scholastic so they can begin their own personal library at home. “The need [at Dunbar] is enormous,” said Deborah Drabick, the vice president of PBK and Temple associate psychology professor. “The goal is to provide students with high quality books that they can keep at home so they can start building their own library and really try to cultivate this love of learning throughout their lives.” The organization launched a GoFundMe on Feb. 29 which will run through the end of April. The campaign has raised $1,030 as of yesterday, about 34 percent of PBK’s goal of $3,000. PBK is the nation’s oldest honor society, and it’s specifically geared toward students with a commitment to liberal arts education. It was established at Temple in 1974. According to United Way of Hays County, Texas, two-thirds of children who cannot read proficiently by fourth grade will end up in jail or the welfare system in their lifetime. With a correlation between academic success and books in homes, personal libraries for students like those proposed by PBK and Duffy Books could create change for economically-disadvantaged Dunbar students.
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PSSA READING PROFICIENCY 35%
Average percentage of students scoring in advanced or proficient categories 31.9%
30% 25%
19.3%
20% 15%
FINNIAN SAYLOR TTN
Phi Beta Kappa teamed up with Duffy Books to donate to Dunbar Elementary School.
10% 5% 0%
School District of Philadelphia
Dunbar Elementary School