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THE
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TUFTS
UNIVERSITY
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T HE T UFTS DAILY
VOLUME LXXII, NUMBER 11
tuftsdaily.com
Friday, September 23, 2016
MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE, MASS.
‘Senior Pub Night’ cancelled, Senior Night restructured ENVS program introduces new environmental humanities track by Joe Walsh News Editor
The Office for Campus Life (OCL) has discontinued the practice of transporting students to a nightclub in Boston for Senior Night, colloquially known as “Senior Pub Night,” in response to disruptive behavior at past events. According to the Senior Class Council, also known as Tufts University Social Collective (TUSC) Seniors, the claims that Senior Night itself has been cancelled are inaccurate. Senior Nights will still take place this year and are currently being planned by the Senior Class Council. However, “Senior Pub Night” will no longer be offered. “There will no longer be a sponsored university event that had happened in the past of seniors taking buses to a bar in Boston,” Director for Campus Life Joe Golia said. Golia cited numerous reasons for the OCL’s decision, including an incident
at a Senior Night last year in which a few students confronted and acted aggressively toward an OCL staff member. Golia explained that his staff was present at the events because clubs typically require a paid employee to be present. He added that OCL staff, including himself, had been confronted by students on numerous occasions at past Senior Nights, but that the incident last year was the last straw. “I will never send a staff member to an event like that again,” Golia said. “I can’t … feel comfortable having a staff member, a university paid employee, be put through that.” In addition to that particular incident, Golia noted that some, but not all, students have caused problems every year at Senior Night. Last year, Golia said, students began arranging their own transportation in the form of party buses, causing some students to arrive at the venue already intoxicated and cause trouble while waiting to enter.
According to a Sept. 2015 Daily article, the first Senior Night of last year was shut down early because students damaged equipment, attempted to steal alcohol and acted rudely to staff. In reaction, the Senior Class Council sent an email to the Class of 2016 warning them that negative behavior could cause Senior Night to be cancelled in the future. “If behavior at senior events does not improve, future Senior Nights and events during Senior Week will be in jeopardy,” the email said. Golia argued that there is no compelling reason to host events at clubs, especially considering the risks. He said that many students do not enjoy the events, that the environment is not always welcoming and that most other schools have discontinued them. “It’s not about class unity … it’s not about Tufts tradition or building some kind of
News Editor
Chief Diversity Officer Mark BrimhallVargas and LGBT Center Director Nino Testa are creating a new campus committee to discuss all-gender bathrooms, according to Jill Zellmer, director of the Office of Equal Opportunity. Zellmer told the Daily in an email that she will also serve on the committee, which will largely focus on the Medford/Somervile campus. “The restrooms and facilities that we have on campus now are not really equitable in terms of who has access to them across campus,” Testa said. Testa said that the LGBT Center has worked to expand access to more suitable restroom options on campus for all Tufts community members, such as by
NICHOLAS PFOSI / THE TUFTS DAILY
All-gender bathrooms in Richardson Hall following its summer renovation, pictured during move-in day for the incoming Class of 2019 on Wednesday, Sep. 2, 2015.
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changing historically gendered signs on single-occupancy restrooms into all-gender restrooms. According to Testa, not every Tufts building has an all-gender restroom. He stressed the importance of ensuring that students know which buildings do have all-gender restrooms and added that a map with this information is available on the LGBT Center’s website. To accommodate more all-gender bathrooms on campus, existing bathrooms could be converted and additional bathrooms could be built based on the feasibility of each option, Dean of Student Affairs Mary Pat McMahon told the Daily in an email. Efforts to create more all-gender and single-occupancy bathrooms on campus continue, Testa said. He noted that in Dowling Hall, one of two single-occupancy staff bathrooms was recently changed to an all-gender bathroom for any member of the Tufts community or guests to use. “So many visitors use that building,” Testa said. “That’s a high-need building.” According to Testa, the next high-need building is the Mayer Campus Center, which does not currently have any all-gender bathrooms. Testa said that facilities and university administrators are mindful of including all-gender bathrooms when constructing new buildings.
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According to Zellmer, having all-gender bathrooms was a consideration when building 574 Boston Avenue. “It has standard bathrooms with multiple stalls available to all genders and has clear signage that makes that apparent to the building’s occupants and visitors,” Zellmer wrote. Additional all-gender bathrooms would likely be single-occupancy, due to the discomfort that students have with the level of privacy in multiple-occupancy bathrooms, Testa said. “I would love to see more multiple-occupancy all-gender restroom options on campus,” he said. “But if we were to do that … those bathrooms would need to be constructed differently.” Testa envisions multiple-occupancy bathrooms with stalls that are completely enclosed from floor to ceiling and a possible communal sink space outside of the private bathrooms. Zellmer expressed pride over the all-gender bathroom on the third floor of Ballou Hall because of the significance in creating change at the upmost level of an organization. “Many buildings on the Medford campus are older, making it difficult and, in some cases, impossible to convert some bathrooms, although we strive to do so
Starting this semester, the Environmental Studies (ENVS) program at Tufts is offering a new track to students called environmental humanities. The track focuses on how ideologies have influenced humans’ interactions with the environment, according to the program’s website. Harriet H. Fay Professor of Literature Elizabeth Ammons, who was part of a core group of faculty members working to create this track, explained that the environmental humanities track was created due to a need for it in the ENVS program. “[Environmental humanities] is really filling a gap in our environmental studies offering of tracks,” she said. “Thinking about the environment from a science point of view is important [and] thinking about it from a policy view is important, but it’s equally important asking what the humanities and what the products of the human imagination yields for us if we think about the environment.” The track was also created in part due to appeals from the faculty working in the ENVS program as well as interest from students, ENVS Professor Ninian Stein said. “There’s a lot of demand on the faculty perspective, and I understand from folks who’ve been here longer than me … that there is demand from the student perspective,” Stein said. “There’s definitely faculty demand; there’s a number of faculty members who are very seriously committed to and excited about this program.” The new track is now one of six options offered to students in the ENVS major, according to Ammons. “Environmental science gives us a lot of data and information, but environmental humanities is interested in the values and belief systems, [and] the ideologies that shape and actually determine human beings’ attitudes toward the earth,” Ammons said. Stein, who teaches the introductory course for environmental humanities, explained that this new track prepares students, particularly those looking to go to graduate school and work in universi-
see BATHROOMS, page 2
see ENVIRONMENT, page 2
see PUB, page 2
Advocacy efforts increase for more all-gender bathrooms on campus by Gil Jacobson
by Hannah Uebele
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