The Tufts Daily - Thursday, March 8, 2018

MAHA program offers realistic education for humanitarian practitioners see FEATURES / PAGE 3

MEN’S TRACK AND FIELD

Tufts capitalizes on final qualifying opportunity

Evaluation is the theme of upcoming “re:Vision” TEDxTufts conference see ARTS&LIVING / PAGE 4

SEE SPORTS / BACK PAGE

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VOLUME LXXV, ISSUE 29

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Thursday, March 8, 2018

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Students, staff, administration respond to TUPD counterterrorism training

by Jessica Blough

Assistant News Editor

Two hundred and one members of the Tufts community, including 39 faculty and staff members, 111 students, 47 alumni and four community members, signed a letter addressed to University President Anthony Monaco, outgoing Provost and Senior Vice President David Harris, Dean of Arts and Sciences James Glaser and Director of Public and Environmental Safety (DPES) Kevin Maguire that expressed their concern over Maguire’s recent trip to Israel for a National Counter-Terrorism Seminar (NCTS) training. Associate Professor of Anthropology Amahl Bishara drafted the letter, circulated it, garnered signatures and sent it in an email on Friday. This Wednesday afternoon, March 7, the Tufts administration responded with a letter to Bishara signed by Monaco, Harris and Executive Vice President Patricia L. Campbell to address the concerns voiced in the letter.

The original letter sent to the administration made three requests: that Harris, Maguire, Chief Diversity Officer Amy Freeman and

Dean of Student Affairs Mary Pat McMahon meet with members of the Tufts community to address concerns about the training and discuss improving transparency between the Tufts University Police Department (TUPD) and the Tufts community; that Tufts admissions actively recruit Palestinian and refugee students in the West Bank, Gaza, Israel, Jordan and Lebanon; and that Tufts support its undocumented and DACA students and employees, as well as employees with Temporary Protective Status.

After learning of Maguire’s NCTS training, Bishara began writing the letter, showing it to several colleagues and students to suggest revisions. The letter began circulating by email to gain signatures around the week of Feb. 14, according to Bishara.

Bishara said the letter arose as a community-wide response to the trainings.

“I think a lot of people were upset when they learned about this visit,” Bishara said.

“And we thought about, you know, what can we do? And I think there’s a sense that there needs to be more than one way of responding,

Pass/fail deadline extended to ten weeks for all class years

SOPHIE DOLAN / THE TUFTS DAILY

The Tufts Police Department offices are pictured on Jan. 23. and the way that I felt that I could pitch in best about DACA students’ experiences and a Tufts was by writing this letter.”

Observer about the policing of people with According to Bishara, the letter aims to crit- marginalized identities on campus, published icize Maguire’s trip to Israel and provide sug- last December and September respectively, gestions on how to increase a sense of security on campus. The letter cites a Tufts Daily article see TUPD TRAINING CONCERNS, page 2

Dean of Cummings School Deborah Kochevar to serve as provost ad interim

by Austin Clementi Staff Writer

CHRISTINE LEE / THE TUFTS DAILY

TCU Class of 2021 Senator Sharif Hamidi poses for a portrait in Sophia Gordon Hall on Feb. 27.

by Abbie Gruskin Staff Writer

The faculty of the School of Arts and Sciences and the School of Engineering voted to extend the pass/fail deadline to 10 weeks into the semester for sophomores, juniors and seniors on Feb. 7 after approving a proposal from the faculty-student Educational Policy Committee (EPC), according to Dean

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of Undergraduate Studies Carmen Lowe.

This follows a Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate resolution calling on the EPC to push the deadline, approved in a Jan. 29 Senate meeting.

This extension of the deadline now matches the 10-week period allotted to first-years see PASS/FAIL DEADLINE, page 2

For breaking news, our content archive and exclusive content, visit tuftsdaily.com @tuftsdaily

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Deborah Kochevar, the Dean of the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts, will serve as provost ad interim after Provost David Harris assumes his new role as president at Union College.

University President Anthony Monaco said he was pleased to appoint Kochevar to serve in Harris’ place.

“Debbie has been an outstanding Dean for [the] Cummings School, committed to academic excellence and actively engaged in cross-School initiatives,” Monaco told the Daily in an email.

Monaco also emphasized his hope that the appointment of Kochevar, who has been at Tufts since 2006, would make for a smooth transition from Harris’ tenure as provost.

Kochevar echoed this sentiment.

“David Harris has done a fabulous job as the provost, so my goal will be … to continue some of the initiatives that are in the works and to be open to new ones,” Kochevar said.

According to Kochevar, these initiatives include the implementation of the Data Intensive Studies Center (DISC), a plan which will emphasize the use of data across all disci-

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plines on campus. She emphasized her plan to continue the initiatives Provost Harris has undertaken, such as Tufts’ summer programs, and mentioned that she would like to support interdisciplinary studies.

Kochevar mentioned that she was excited to assume the role because it contrasts with her previous career, which focused on graduate and professional education.

“My realm to date has been veterinary students and graduate students because I’ve trained both,” she said. “The interim provost position will allow me to be in an environment where a new group of students can be part of my priorities.”

Kochevar spoke of her teaching career at Tufts, a small amount of which she hopes to keep upon assuming the role of provost ad interim. Courses she has taught include a first-year veterinary class on ethics and animal welfare. In addition, she plans to participate in an Experimental College course in fall 2018 that is part of Tufts One Health, a program Kochevar currently chairs that seeks to find common ground between human and animal health. see PERSONNEL CHANGES, page 2

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COMICS....................................... 7 OPINION.....................................8 SPORTS............................ BACK

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THE TUFTS DAILY | News | Thursday, March 8, 2018

THE TUFTS DAILY Catherine Perloff Editor-in-Chief

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Administration responds to letter about TUPD training in Israel TUPD TRAINING CONCERNS

continued from page 1 and states that pressing security issues on campus include anti-immigrant and racist rhetoric, as well as increased policing of students of color.

“What I wanted to think about was how to rebuild a sense of safety and security on campus, and also how to orient priorities around things that we know are big concerns,” Bishara said.

Bishara stated that for many people on campus and for herself, the knowledge that Maguire attended the NCTS training in Israel made them feel less safe on campus.

“You know, people who are Arab, people of color, are profiled by Israeli security police regularly, and so the sense that our police force has been trained by them, or that at least a leader of our police force has been trained by them, does not make me feel more secure. It makes me feel less secure,” she explained.

The letter states that training under Israel’s model would contribute to the militarization of police forces like TUPD. “Adoption of Israeli approaches to security would endanger our students, staff, and faculty,” it states. “At a moment when U.S. police forces have come under scrutiny for brutality and discrimination against minority communities of many kinds, it is not the time for Tufts Police to be taught by institutions like these that routinely disregard civil and human rights.”

The letter also criticizes the priorities of DPES, stating that the signers have little reason to believe that terrorism is a pressing threat to the Tufts campus.

When asked if she knew of an incident where TUPD or the administration approached faculty about a necessity for counterterrorism training, Bishara responded that to her knowledge, such an incident has not occurred.

The response letter signed by administration members addresses this part of the original letter.

“Terror attacks in cities throughout the U.S., including Boston, and on college campuses have demonstrated the need for local and university police departments to prepare for potential terror attacks, to know how to prevent and respond to them, and to learn to work effectively and seamlessly with local, regional, and national authorities,” the letter states.

The response letter cites a May 2016 bomb threat to the Medford/Somerville campus, as well as other crises in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing, as reasons to engage in counterterrorism training.

The response letter defendes Maguire’s trip to the NCTS training and listed the other New England agencies that attended the training, including the United States Secret Service and the United States Department of Homeland Security, New England.

“The seminar was a valuable source of information that will enhance the uni-

versity’s readiness to address emergency situations,” it says.

The letter also responds to concerns over the status of DACA students at Tufts, citing statements from Monaco in November 2016 and September 2017 that promise to protect and provide legal services to students with DACA status. In response to worries voiced in the original letter about how staff should respond to demands about a student’s immigration status, the letter from the administration references a new protocol instructing university faculty on how to respond to these requests.

“We have very clearly stated that the university will not provide information about our students or assist in the enforcement of immigration laws except as mandated by a subpoena, warrant, or court order. We will continue to cooperate with law enforcement investigations that involve serious criminal activity or threats to public safety or security,” the response explained.

The administration’s response did not address the request to commit to recruiting Palestinian and refugee students.

“We can assure you that we are committed to continuing to make Tufts a safe, supportive, and inclusive environment for all members of our community. We look forward to constructive conversation with you on these and other issues,” the response letter concludes.

According to Bishara, the original letter to the administration is still open for new signatures.

AS&E faculty extends pass/fail deadline

Liam Knox Investigative Editor

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PASS/FAIL DEADLINE

continued from page 1 and will go into effect in fall 2018, according to first-year TCU Senate Assistant Treasurer Sharif Hamidi, the writer of the resolution.

Anne Mahoney, the chair of the EPC, presided over the faculty vote on the proposed change, which Hamidi attended.

“I was asked to briefly discuss the resolution in front of the faculty … and then I addressed some questions and concerns.

Following that, the faculty voted 17-7 to make the change,” Hamidi, a first-year, told the Daily in an email.

The possibility of a pass/fail deadline extension for sophomores, juniors and seniors was a topic of discussion in the EPC even before the resolution was presented, according to Mahoney.

“We had been discussing it long before the Senate’s proposal – in fact, the EPC proposal was on the faculty meeting agenda before the faculty became aware of the Senate resolution,” Mahoney, a senior lecturer in the department of classics, said in an email.

TCU Senate unanimously passed Hamidi’s resolution.

“I think the fact that the resolution passed Senate unanimously indicates that the people representing the undergraduate student body understand that this is a worthwhile policy change,” Hamidi explained.

The extension of the pass/fail deadline will give students more time and flexibility in selecting their courses, according to Phil Miller, Chair of the TCU Senate Education Committee.

“With a later pass/fail deadline student will have a better idea of how they are doing in their classes before they make the decision to pass/fail a class,” Miller, a sophomore, said in an email. “The decision to pass/fail a class can be important when a student is deciding their major because pass/fail classes usually cannot be counted towards your major. This may also encourage students to take classes they initially wouldn’t take.”

Hamidi also said the extension will promote students to explore different classes and subjects.

“I think that this resolution was warranted since college students, especially Tufts students, are encouraged to explore new academic fields during their time as undergraduates,” Hamidi said.

The faculty of the EPC, however, are wary of the negative impacts an extension of the pass/fail deadline could pose on students’ work ethics while also recognizing the positive implications, according to Mahoney. She said the faculty on the EPC and the Arts, Sciences and Engineering faculty at large are concerned that students might abuse pass/fail by switching as soon as they think they are getting a

bad grade, or disengaging from a class they are taking pass/fail.

“But we do recognize that sometimes it’s appropriate for a student to take a course this way,” Mahoney added after expressing these concerns. “Sometimes a class starts out difficult … but then feels easier once students make the conceptual breakthrough. Ushering out the pass/fail deadline may mean that some students will wait until that breakthrough, recognize that in fact they are learning … new ways of thinking and get a letter grade in the course, while with an earlier deadline they might have opted for pass/fail.”

The extension will be officially announced to students and faculty in the fall, according to Lowe.

“Because the new policy will not go into effect until fall 2018, the new deadline will be posted on the Academic Calendar and in the Bulletin,” Lowe said. “This change will also be included in training for advisors, and will be announced in information sent to students the fall.”

Hamidi said that he was pleased that TCU Senate was able to affect policy change.

“I’m incredibly happy with the results,” Hamidi said. “Policy change projects are quite a big undertaking in Senate and I’m very proud that I was able to deliver this benefit to the student body.”

Outgoing Provost Harris' move to Union prompts personnel changes PERSONNEL CHANGES

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continued from page 1 Joyce Knoll, associate professor and chair of the Department of Biomedical Sciences at the Cummings School, will serve as dean ad interim of the Cummings School while Kochevar assumes Harris’ role.

Knoll, who has also served as the director of the Clinical Pathology Laboratory, stated that she was excited to assume the role of dean ad interim.

“Honestly, it is an honor to have been asked, and to know that the other department chairs have faith in me,” she told the Daily in an email.

Knoll said she was asked to fill this role after Kochevar consulted with the Dean’s Council, a body which includes all the department chairs, associate deans, the hospital director and the senior advancement director at the Cummings School.

According to Kochevar, the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) requires that any accredited veterinary school has a dean who has a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) degree.

Knoll wrote that between Wednesday and Sunday she attended an Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges

(AAVMC) meeting in Washington, D.C., to be introduced to other administrators of veterinary schools and the veterinary educational community at large.

Kochevar expressed her faith that Knoll would be fit for her role as dean ad interim.

“The attributes that are really important for Dr. Knoll [are] she’s extremely collegial and collaborative and takes … a team approach,” she said.

Monaco stated in his email that he plans to put together a search committee for a new provost later this spring, with the goal of an appointment no later than July 1, 2019.

Thursday, March 8, 2018

Features

Humanitarian professionals get a mid-career boost from Friedman, Fletcher joint master’s program

by Laura Barley

Contributing Writer

For Samuel Girma (F ’17, N ’17), there isn’t anything unusual about famine.

Growing up in southern Ethiopia exposed him to numerous droughts and acclimated him to the constancy of food insecurity endemic to his region. He remembers seeing the hunger in the faces of the people that would pass through his village and his own compassion that rose to meet it.

“When my mother gave them some food to eat, they became so pleased.

When I saw them feeling very happy and blessing my mother in return, I was filled with a great joy,” Girma said.

These experiences have inspired Girma to devote his life to the humanitarian profession, one that he believes has the power to uplift the lives of those unfairly afflicted with destitution and displacement. It is unsurprising that along the way, he chose to stop at Tufts for a Master of Arts in Humanitarian Assistance (MAHA).

As a one-year joint degree between The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, the MAHA program has served as a mid-career accelerator since its inaugural graduating class of 1999. Practically, the program is designed to advance mid-career professionals towards senior managerial positions, and it requires candidates to have a minimum of three to five years of experience in the humanitarian field to matriculate, according to the program’s website.

Current MAHA student Paul George, who formerly worked for Save the Children, was drawn to the program

by Tufts’ evidence- and practice-based approach to humanitarian research.

“The Feinstein [International] Center at Tufts is what really brought me here — it produces a large body of field-based research meant to inform and influence responses to humanitarian crisis across the world,” George said.

Daniel Maxwell, Henry J. Leir Professor in Food Security and MAHA program director, noted that many of the program’s 105 alumni have gone on to work for large international aid organizations like Médecins Sans Frontières, CARE, Oxfam, the United Nations (UN) Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the World Food Programme (WFP).

Prior to enrolling in the 2016-17 MAHA cohort, Girma worked for the aid organization World Vision as a humanitarian practitioner for drought-affected people in his native southern Ethiopia. He now works for the Danish Refugee Council (DRC), a humanitarian aid organization that operates relief programs in 30 conflict-affected countries around the world.

Girma currently works as the deputy area manager at the DRC’s refugee response program in Gambella, Ethiopia. Ethopia currently supports over 400,000 South Sudanese refugees that have fled across the borders. Political instability has plagued South Sudan since it declared indepen-

COURTESY SAMUEL GIRMA

Samuel Girma, graduate of the Master of Arts in Humanitarian Assistance program, poses for a portrait. dence in 2011, resulting in a severe lack of security for all ethnic groups across the young country.

While the government of Ethiopia is ultimately responsible for managing the refugee camp’s conditions, as deputy area manager, Girma must observe and respond to the changing needs of a populace already extremely scarred before they arrive at camp.

“All refugees have already experienced one or more traumatic and horrific event during the conflict in their flight — family separation, death of parents, abduction of children, forced recruitment, burning of their home and properties,” he said.

Though the refugee camp that Girma works in is designed to be a safe haven for those fleeing violence, the sheer mass of arrivals into Ethiopia continually complicates the level of basic provisions such as food, water and shelter that aid organizations can provide, as a March 7 press release from the WFP showed.

Dauntingly, the South Sudanese mass exodus represents just a minuscule portion of the 22.5 million refugees, which makes up only a third of the 65.6 million forcibly displaced people worldwide as of 2017, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. Internal conflict and prolonged periods of drought have become increasingly common throughout sub-Saharan Africa and parts of the Middle East, further exacerbating the ability for aid organizations to meet the needs of swelling displaced populations.

Notably, these geographic trends also mirror the MAHA student population.

Though students come from all over the world, representation has recently skewed toward East African countries like Ethiopia and Kenya, according to Maxwell.

The MAHA core courses strongly emphasize the importance of standardized metrics in the field, including the Core Humanitarian Standard and the Sphere Handbook, which practitioners use as a baseline for implementing standards of optimal water and sanitation practices, shelter materials and construction, as well as calorie provision.

These courses prepare students with a framework of metrics and standards to

confront the rapidly evolving humanitarian landscape. The program also offers courses that provide critical insight into forced migration and nutrition in emergencies, taught by faculty members from across the Friedman and Fletcher schools, including Professors Karen Jacobsen and Erin Boyd.

Maxwell explained that while standards and principles remain crucial throughout the duration of a crisis, complex emergencies most often require a skill set skewed toward human ingenuity and adaptability — in other words, skills that are incredibly difficult to teach. He noted that MAHA students often feel stretched by the sheer complexity of what they are learning about, but to date, everyone has successfully completed the program.

“Often, the students are in for a rude awakening when they realize the program is like running a marathon at sprinting speed,” Maxwell said.

To enlighten students to the realities and hardships of a humanitarian career, MAHA students can also enroll in the course International Humanitarian Response, which immerses students in a weekend-long field simulation.

Political and climatic shifts in the humanitarian landscape have begun to warrant broader course offerings in protection principles, food security and internal management, which the program and the Feinstein International Center are working to bring to fruition, according to Maxwell.

Out in the field, Girma shared about the actual, life-threatening dangers that he and other humanitarian workers face while separated from their families for months on end and confronting the most destitute of circumstances that humanity has to offer. “[The] lion is real, crocodile is real,” he said.

Beyond the intensive education that he received in the MAHA program, Girma spoke of the importance of possessing a special combination of hope and grit, not only to make positive change, but to believe that his effort is worthwhile.

“It is really rewarding to be there and making changes happen in their lives,” he said.

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Dorothy Neher How Tufts Works

Mechanically inclined

F

inding the Facilities Services office in 520 Boston Ave. was nothing short of a major discovery. On top of the fact that the entire facade of the building has been stripped away, the interior is an active construction zone.

After spending an embarrassingly long time searching, I finally arrived at the Facilities office to meet Kenneth Person, director of building operations.

Kenneth seemed perfectly comfortable amidst the chaos around him.

That’s probably because he has had a long and fruitful career in mechanical engineering and facilities management. But even before formal training and fieldwork, Kenneth says he was always mechanically inclined. He was the type of kid who would “break things to fix them.”

Growing up, Kenneth experienced hardships associated with being a student at recently-integrated inner city public schools.

On top of the fact that teachers chronically underestimated him, school environments were often not conducive to his success.

However, with the help of his mother fighting on his behalf, Kenneth was able to excel both socially and academically in high school. At the age of 16, he graduated as the write-in class president with an academic scholarship to Boston University.

After finishing college with a degree in mechanical engineering, Kenneth spent the next few years building propulsion systems for aircraft and submarines. Then, as the plant manager for Worcester Public Schools for 16 years, he was in charge of running the facilities of the entire school district. Microbursts displacing school roofs and exploding boilers are just some of the crises that he had to handle in his time working for the city.

In the second part of his career, Kenneth traveled throughout the country to implement computerized systems of preventative maintenance. After working for various universities, Chicago Public Schools and Harvard Medical School, Kenneth landed at Tufts.

Kenneth lights up when talking about the state-of-the-art preventative maintenance system that he has helped to implement here. According to him, though, the level of skill and pride his colleagues bring to their jobs is what makes working at Tufts special.

“We have some of the best tradesmen in the business,” he said.

Although Kenneth spends the vast majority of his time at work, he dedicates every Wednesday evening to singing in his local church’s choir. On top of the two singing groups he is already in, Kenneth expressed his disappointment that his height barred him from participating in the children’s choir as well.

Besides his weekly forays with notes and pitch, though, Kenneth’s top concern on a daily basis is ensuring the safety and well-being of the Tufts student body.

“I really care about everyone’s safety,” he said.

This simple statement inspires a great deal of gratitude within me. In a time when schools are increasingly unsafe, it is heartwarming to know that there exists a cadre of people who are primarily concerned with our well-being.

Dorothy Neher is a sophomore majoring in international relations and Spanish.

Dorothy can be reached at dorothy.neher@tufts.edu.

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Arts & Living

Thursday, March 8, 2018

TEDxTufts 2018: “re:Vision” preview

COURTESY TAYLOR FASOLO

Alyssa Rivas speaks at TEDxTufts on March 12, 2017.

by Ruijingya Tang Staff Writer

Ten speakers will turn the Cohen Auditorium into a space of compassion and education by sharing private experiences and passions on March 11, when TEDxTufts hosts “re:Vision,” its fourth annual TED event since 2015.

From a 1984 conference that celebrated the the interdisciplinary nature of technology, entertainment and design, TED has developed into a non-profit organization that has sponsored over 2,000 TED Talks celebrating the sharing of knowledge in more than 100 languages. TEDxTufts operates with a license from TEDx, a special TED pro-

gram that allows local communities to independently organize events that foster information exchange and empathy under the TED brand.

The organizing committee for “re:Vision” consists of 49 Tufts undergraduate students from all four class years, including one SMFA five-year combined-degree program student who will graduate in 2022. According to Amy Sokolow, the publicity director on the committee, the team has been holding three-hour weekly meetings since September 2017.

Sokolow, a senior, explained that TEDxTufts is a friendly, intimate and accessible forum that allows the sharing of otherwise esoteric ideas.

“The importance of TED is that it’s a very easily digestible medium for people to understand complex ideas,” Sokolow said. “For example, we have a [speech] on multiverse, which is something I would have never thought to look up a paper on. The speaker coaching team does a very good job at making the speeches humanistic. And because [the speeches] are published on YouTube, they are really easily shared.”

According to Taylor Fasolo, the creative director for TEDxTufts 2018, the title for the event, “re:Vision,” is a wordplay in which the insertion of a colon in the word “revision” is meant to speak to the the event’s dual purposes.

“The first [purpose] is the word as a whole, ‘revision,’ so to look again,” Fasolo, a senior, said. “A lot of our speakers are asking [their audience] to reevaluate common understandings of basic principles, whether that’s about how we understand urban design or how we understand the multiverse theorem.”

Fasolo went on to explain that the usage of the colon serves to emphasize “vision” within the word “revision.”

“The second way that the theme can be understood is ‘regarding vision’ — understanding vision itself and how one’s own positionality toward a certain see TEDXTUFTS, page 5

3Ps’ ‘Red’ plunges into the mind of Mark Rothko

by Tommy Gillespie Arts Editor

Visionary 20th-century artist Mark Rothko once claimed, “Art is an adventure into an unknown world, which can only be explored by those willing to take the risk,” in a letter to the New York Times written with artist Adolph Gottlieb. Indeed, American playwright John Logan’s “Red” (2009), which is being performed on Balch Arena Theater by 3Ps (Pen, Paint, and Pretzels) tonight through Saturday, provides an intense view of exactly what that risk costs. Starring a two-man cast of Josh Gitta as Rothko and James Williamson as Ken, his young assistant, “Red” is as sparse and unsparing as the painter himself.

The play is set in Rothko’s New York studio in 1958. He has just been offered the biggest commission of his career: a set of large murals for the Seagram Company to hang in the new Four Seasons restaurant on Park Avenue. He paints them in deep browns and reds, for which the play is named. As they work to complete the murals, Rothko constantly exhorts Ken to understand what truly makes a work of art and belittles him when he does not match his own lofty conceptions. As Ken builds up the courage to stand up to him, Rothko slowly comes to a reckoning of his own.

For Gitta, a senior, stepping into the esoteric and convoluted mind of the artist was no easy task.

“I read a lot of his writings and watched documentaries,” Gitta said.

A portion of the play’s dialogue is drawn from the painter’s real quotes and writings. Initially, Gitta found difficulty locating exactly who the character was behind the constant train of historical, literary and philosophical references peppered throughout Rothko’s dialogue. Soon, however, with the help of Associate Professor of Drama & Dance Noe Montez, he drew inspiration from his own heritage.

“We’re pretty sure that from all the productions [of ‘Red’] we’ve seen, this is the first time the roles have been played by two black men,” Gitta said.

Tapping into their own history, both Gitta and Williamson found parallels

to the contemporary black experience in the United States in Rothko’s life as a Russian immigrant.

“There’s one scene where Rothko says to Ken, ‘Be civilized,’ and he’s constantly comparing himself to all these dead white guys,” Gitta explained. “We wanted to combine the history of Mark Rothko with the pressure to conform as black men.”

Williamson, also a senior, was equally enthusiastic about locating his character in a wider context.

“I think Ken represents the new, the next generation,” he said, citing a scene in which Rothko denigrates the see RED, page 5

Arts & Living

Thursday, March 8, 2018 | Arts & Living | THE TUFTS DAILY

TedxTufts 2018 committee expanded applicant numbers this year, attempted more alumni outreach TEDXTUFTS

continued from page 4 subject can affect their understanding of that idea,” Fasolo said.

The 10 speakers that will speak at TEDxTufts 2018 are diverse in both the themes of their talks and their affiliations with Tufts. The list of speakers includes four Tufts undergraduate students, four Tufts graduate students, one PostDoc fellow at the Tufts Institute for Cosmology and an alumna from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. And among the four Tufts graduate students, two are from The Fletcher School, one is from Tufts School of Medicine and the other is from the School of Museum of Fine Arts. The topics that these speakers will address also range widely, including the refugee crisis, the multiverse and the psychology and neuroscience behind advertisements.

The application process for prospective speakers at TEDxTufts 2018 was simple but competitive, reflecting the increasing popularity of TEDxTufts.

“We have tremendously grown not only in our own membership, but also in our applications,” Fasolo said. “This

year, we have experienced an increase of over 100 percent in our application numbers, which is very exciting.”

He also explained that TEDxTufts 2018 received 108 applications, each of which included an application survey and an interview.

Sokolow described having diverse applications as one of the pillars that makes for a good TED talk.

“Something that we look for is not just the [amount of ] information, but why does it matter?” she said. “And also something that might be transferable to larger themes. Even if you don’t necessarily connect with the content of the talk, the takeaway has to be very tangible.”

Maya Pace, the marketing director for TEDxTufts 2018, mentioned that the growing influence of TEDxTufts is also evident in people’s expanding participation in the organization’s community-based art project this year, which had people respond to the question, “What shaped you?” in the campus center from Feb. 19 to March 2.

“I was very moved when I saw people pausing throughout their day for a moment to engage with this project about people who have inspired you,”

Pace said.

According to Fasolo and Jake Moran, the head of speaker coaching, the organizing committee for TEDxTufts 2018 had improved in the ability to facilitate interdepartmental communication and reach out to alumni, which have been two large and enduring challenges for the organizing committee in the past.

“Both in previous years and the start of this year, there [have] generally been issues with communication across departments,” Fasolo said. “But at this point in the year, we have become very communicative with each other and have been able to run as smoothly as I have ever seen it in TEDxTufts.”

Moran, a senior, explained how TEDxTufts used communication with alumni to increase the number of applicants this year.

“This year, we were able to use different methods of communication with Tufts to reach out to a lot more alumni, and that gave us a really great pool of alumni applicants year,” Moran said.

“The office of alumni relations at Tufts has been really great at helping us.”

TEDxTufts 2018 is March 11 from 12-4 p.m. in Cohen Auditorium. Tickets are on sale for $10 via Tufts Tickets.

The setting of 'Red' features murals, motifs inspired by Rothko's work

PHOTO COURTESY PHOEBE CAVISE

The set of Red, a 3P’s production by John Logan, is pictured here.

RED

continued from page 4 emerging style of pop art, while Ken embraces it.

The two characters’ struggle to find common ground is made even more interesting by Ken’s ambiguous background.

“There are theories that Ken isn’t actually real, that he’s just a mirror image of Rothko,” Williamson said.

“Red” has only two speaking characters, but there is a third character looming over everything they say and do: the art itself. The setting prominently features murals and motifs

inspired by Rothko’s unique work.

Scenic designer Pan Moncada sought to recreate Rothko’s intense inner reality in the setting.

“We have muslin frames painted in Rothko’s style, to surround him with his artwork,” Moncada said. “He was all about life in his paintings.”

Visually depicting the experience conveyed in Rothko’s work was not only the set designer’s job.

“In one scene, the actors will actually be painting and priming a canvas onstage,” Moncada said.

Since the nature of his art was so all-encompassing, the set is designed to reflect the totality of his vision —

and to portray the anticlimactic banality that goes into bringing his vision to life.

“He crafted his own studio, name and style as a colorist,” Moncada explained. “We wanted the set to ask, ‘What do certain reds mean?’”

One hopes the answer to that question does not take the same toll on the audience of “Red” as it did on the legendary genius it portrays.

“Red” plays Thursday, March 8 through Saturday, March 10 at 8 p.m. in the Balch Arena Theater. Tickets are pay-what-you-can on Thursday night and $8 on Friday and Saturday.

5

Julian Blatt Tufts Creatives

Food for thought

T

amas Takata has always enjoyed creating things. Having planned on graduating early, Tamas is currently a thirdyear senior majoring in biochemical engineering and will continue his education at Tufts graduate school with the hope of receiving his master’s degree in mechanical engineering. Tamas’ creative streak also manifests itself in his passion for cooking, as he is an experienced member of the Tufts Culinary Society. He helped host its highly anticipated Rice Bowl, serving food from different culture clubs on campus, this past Tuesday.

Julian Blatt (JB): Why do you like to cook?

Tamas Takata (TT): When I was younger, I loved playing with Legos. As I grew up, I realized that my passion for creating things translated to the kitchen, with the additional benefit of being able to eat my constructions. Even when I’m following a recipe, I like to provide my own personal twist. However, my favorite aspect of cooking is undoubtedly the looks of joy on people’s faces when they taste your food; knowing that people crave something you made is one of the best feelings in the world and makes all the blood, sweat and tears worthwhile.

JB: How did you first become interested in cooking?

TT: My mom has always cooked for us; I’ve been served home-cooked meals since I was a kid. My family rarely eats at restaurants because my mom can make the same foods, with an extra layer of comfort. I started helping her in the kitchen when I was in high school, and cooking became our go-to bonding activity.

JB: Where do you do most of your cooking?

TT: I love cooking at home. My mom never fails to make the experience more enjoyable, and she always has the pantry stocked. I also like cooking on the grill outside because you can make a mess without having to worry about the consequences.

JB: Do you have any cooking partners at Tufts?

TT: My housemate Nick and I cook together once a week, and we come up with the most outlandish recipes. I remember once we made M&M-stuffed pierogies (Polish dumplings), which were actually pretty good — M&M’s make everything taste better.

JB: Any embarrassing cooking blunders you wish to share?

TT: I make ridiculous mistakes all the time. One time I was trying to clean the grill, and I didn’t have a brush to clean it with, so I cleaned it with one of the steaks I was cooking. Needless to say, nobody wanted that one.

JB: Why is it important to you to bring together food from different cultures?

TT: I’ve had the privilege of being able to travel a lot, and I love food from all different cultures. I love Indian food, I love Japanese food; we just went to a great Argentinian place. Just seeing how the same exact foods can be used in different ways and given such different flavors is inspiring. And I think it’s important to see how these different cultures express their histories in their foods. It’s an art form.

JB: Any restaurant recommendations?

TT: When I first arrived at Tufts, I was determined to visit all the local restaurants mentioned in “Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives” (2007–). I would recommend Kelly’s Diner, Boston Burger Company and Rosebud to everyone who enjoys classic American cuisine.

Julian is a first-year majoring in cognitive and brain sciences. Julian can be reached at julian.blatt@tufts.edu.

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Thursday, March 8, 2018 | Comics | THE TUFTS DAILY

tuftsdaily.com

Comics

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LATE NIGHT AT THE DAILY Cathy; “I love this sauce. It really hits the sauce.”

Comics

SUDOKU

Ask the Daily: Is it worth it to go for my friend’s housemate?

Q

ANSWER BY SAM CROZIER

: I really like one of my friend’s housemates. My good friend lives with a guy who I think is pretty much perfect. He’s funny, smart, nice, and cute — basically the full package, but I’m not sure how to navigate making a move (or if should even make a move). He is definitely out of my league and I don’t think my friend wants me to pursue it (he hasn’t out right banned me from it but hasn’t expressed any desire to help make it happen).

I’m not sure what to do. Should I pursue a guy that I’m not even sure I could get, possibly risking a friendship for the perfect boy?

A Difficulty Level: Seeing your ex on Tinder 2 days after you’ve broken up with them.

Wednesday’s Solution

: First off: You refer to your friend’s housemate as “perfect” twice. This immediately reveals the fact that, to some extent, you’ve idealized this person in your head. We all tend to do this when we have a crush; suddenly, even someone’s dirty sheets or habit of only eating ranch dressing seem like endearing little details that make you like the person even more. But remember that no one — especially not a college-aged boy — is perfect. It’s totally normal and exciting to have a crush on someone, but I think you should keep everything in perspective. There might be a reason why your friend is hesitant about you pursuing him. If your friend is someone who you really rely on, then you should be able to have an open and honest conversation with him before considering pursuing his friend. Be honest and tell your friend that you’ve developed a crush on his housemate and see how he responds. After all, if he lives with him, he probably knows him better than you do. It’s important that you have all the facts. Who knows — your friend could be hesitant about you dating this guy because he thinks that he’s actually a jerk. Or maybe he thinks that you two just wouldn’t click. Either way, it’s definitely important to have a conversation with your friend first. And finally, you’ve referred you to your friend’s housemate as “out of your league.” Remember: leagues don’t exist!

Chemistry does. The idea of classifying people into “leagues” is just a way that we play into society’s lookist (and often sexist) ways of stratifying and excluding people. Don’t ever feel like you are inferior.

RELEASE DATE– Thursday, March 8, 2018

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle Edited by Rich CROSSWORD Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis

CARROLL'S Monday- $1 Oysters & Clams Tuesday- $2 Tacos & Sliders (Bar Only) Wednesday- $7 Burgers.

Add a beer for $3 (restrictions apply) Thursday- Select 1/2 Priced App's (Bar Only) Friday- $1 Oysters & Clams (Bar Only) 4-6 Saturday-$18.95 Prime Rib w Mashed

ACROSS 1 Vaccine pioneer Salk 6 Biblical verb 10 Sever, with “off” 13 “The Good Wife” wife 15 Irrawaddy River locale 16 Hubbub 17 Grilled sandwich 18 *Hobbyist’s broadcasting equipment 20 Checked out 21 Gather 23 Domestic sock eater?

24 Storied climber 26 Little limb 27 *Drama in the Nielsen top 10 four times during the ’70s 32 Special __ 35 Mets modifier of 1969 36 Noggin 37 Case in Lat. grammar 38 Twit 39 Cuts and pastes, say 41 Trellis climber 42 Corner PC key 43 Expert 44 Mysterious girl on “Stranger Things” 46 “Zip it!”

47 *Ball of fire 49 “No __!”: “Sure!”

51 Lose one’s coat 52 Moves to the melody 54 “__ Encounter”: SeaWorld show 56 Shakespearean “You as well?”

60 *“Oh boy, it’s starting!”

62 First words 64 Muffin grain 65 Believe 66 Wind farm blades 67 Like some grins 68 People 69 Liquid whose chemical formula is a homophonic hint to the answers to starred clues

DOWN 1 Zinger 2 Body wash brand 3 Largest singledigit square 4 Genre incorporating elements of funk and hip-hop 5 Transgression 6 “LOL” 7 “Right away!”

8 Dickens boy 9 Taxing and successful 10 Coventry rider 11 Dog that licks Garfield 12 Low-quality 14 Where many missed connections occur 19 MLB’s D-backs 22 2003 holiday film 25 IV lead?

26 Bouffant feature 27 Flame-haired villain in Disney’s “Hercules” 28 Mennonite sect 29 Super Bowl gathering, e.g.

30 Mediterranean vacation island 31 Zoo doc 33 “The Hunger Games” land 34 __ pad 40 Barely lit 41 Blood feud 43 List of notables 45 Soap chemical 48 Defense advisory gp.

50 __ whiskey 52 Thing to put on 53 Put on 54 Look bad?

55 Slender cylinders 57 Budweiser Clydesdales’ pace 58 Shredded 59 TASS country 61 Many years 63 “Spring the trap!”

Wednesday’s Solution ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

By Brian Thomas ©2018 Tribune Content Agency, LLC

03/08/18

03/08/18

Opinion

8 tuftsdaily.com

Thursday, March 8, 2018

EDITORIAL

Students should take advantage of bipartisan resources On Feb. 21, U.S. Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) came to speak about the importance of bipartisanship in government and of ideological diversity on college campuses. Introduced by Dean of Tisch College Alan Solomont as “one of the last survivors of a once-common species of moderate New England government officials,” she has voted on both sides of the aisle on divisive legislative issues, extracting key concessions on the recently passed GOP tax bill to help make insurance coverage affordable for thousands. Despite her immeasurable political capital during polarized times, often acting as the make-or-break vote in Congress, Collins’ visit did not garner much attention among our typically political student body.

Unlike recent talks held in Cohen, Senator Collins’ talk took place in ASEAN, a smaller auditorium in Cabot.

Even though the event was not ticketed and seats were not reserved, students petered in late. The auditorium was full,

but there was a relatively high proportion of adults compared to other Tufts speaker events.

A U.S. Senator of over 20 years, amidst the current chaos in Washington, took a break to talk at our university in Medford, Massachusetts. You’d think students, particularly politically engaged ones, would jump at the chance to hear from and debate with her. Yet it seemed like the student body didn’t really care much at all. There are a lot of possible reasons why, but the most obvious is the “R” beside her name.

Tufts’ political slant is no secret, nor is it a problem in and of itself. The large volume of liberal voices in campus discourse is not an anomaly; Tufts’ liberalism follows other trends that have shown bodies of higher education growing increasingly progressive.

The real issue is the disconnect between Tufts students’ supposed goals of open-mindedness versus the actual steps we take to achieve them. Tufts’

undergraduate population is made up of over 5,500 intelligent students with the intent to grow and expand their horizons throughout their time here. We all know that ideological homogeneity does not foster the same kind of debate as a variety of perspectives would, and often we hear students pleading for a civil platform to enter bipartisan dialogue. The thing is, we already have a lot of those resources.

The Susan Collins event was just one of many outlets the university has provided to engage in bipartisanship.

Other speaker events such as Governor Charlie Baker and Republican political analyst Bill Kristol provided similar outlets to hear perspectives of accomplished conservatives and a platform to directly challenge them in conversation. Current opportunities to get involved on campus include joining CIVIC, a student organization supported by Tisch College, which hosts weekly political conversations, providing a space for bipartisan debate.

As students at a university that strives to promote active citizenship, polarization is an issue that the entire Tufts student body should care about, not only the politically inclined.

So when we are presented with voices like Collins, divergent from our own but not abhorrent or irrational, we should show up, listen and engage with enthusiasm. Even the student who thinks Collins’ politics are repugnant should be able to challenge her positions at the Q&A. Susan Collins poignantly noted that “Even for those that I vehemently disagree with those on the far left and the far right, I recognized that though they have a very different viewpoint, that they still love this country, they still want what is best for Americans.” We should recognize these qualities in speakers like Collins. Instead of just paying lip service to the virtues of bipartisanship, we should seize opportunities to engage in mindful discourse.

The Tufts Daily is a nonprofit, independent newspaper, published Monday through Friday during the academic year, and distributed free to the Tufts community.

The content of letters, advertisements, signed columns, cartoons and graphics does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Tufts Daily editorial board.

EDITORIALS Editorials represent the position of The Tufts Daily. Individual editors are not necessarily responsible for, or in agreement with, the policies and editorials of The Tufts Daily.

OP-EDS The Op-Ed section of The Tufts Daily, an open forum for campus editorial commentary, is printed Monday through Thursday. The Daily welcomes submissions from all members of the Tufts community; the opinions expressed in the Op-Ed section do not necessarily represent the opinions of the Daily itself. Opinion articles on campus, national and international issues should be 600 to 1,200 words in length and submitted to opinion@tuftsdaily.com. The editors reserve the right to edit letters for clarity, space and length. All material is subject to editorial discretion and is not guaranteed to appear in the Daily. Authors must submit their telephone numbers and day-of availability for editing questions.

ADVERTISING All advertising copy is subject to the approval of the Editor-in-Chief, Executive Board and Executive Business Director.

Opinion

Thursday, March 8, 2018 | Opinion | THE TUFTS DAILY

9

Alexa Weinstein The 617

CARTOON

Gun Control

O

BY REBECCA TANG

Call for Submissions!

Beyond the Classroom Student Forum for Research on Women, Gender, and Sexuality to be held on NEW DATE & LOCATION

Friday, April 20, 2018 12:00PM – 4:30PM Cabot Center, Rm 702

NEW DATE & LOCATION

(Refreshments will be provided)

Open to all students

This forum is an opportunity for students to share their work on women, gender, and/or sexuality with the wider Tufts community.

Undergraduate and graduate students from a range of disciplines present on research (includes creative projects) done in classes or independent studies during the year.

• Students each present for 5-7 minutes.

• We welcome submissions of any length.

• Please consider submitting your work:  A paragraph description of the research  Part or all of the project

NEW!

Submission Deadline: Thursday, March 8, 2018 ***Decisions will be announced: Monday, April 2, 2018***

**Applications should be submitted to the WGSS office at 111 Eaton Hall or by email to wgss@tufts.edu**

Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Program, 5 the Green, 111 Eaton Hall, Medford, MA 02155 Ph: 617-627-2955/http://ase.tufts.edu/wgss

n Dec. 29, a cleaning crew at the McGlynn Elementary and Middle School in Medford found a loaded magazine in the school’s auditorium. The finding went unreported to police until Feb. 16, and parents were not alerted of this until Feb. 20, when Medford Superintendent Roy Belson released a statement. Belson chose not to tell parents at the time because he believed it was an “isolated incident.” School personnel decided to recently disclose the information because of the mass shooting at the Parkland, Fla. high school that killed seventeen. Once the information was relayed to the public, the school was shut down for a day to conduct a full security sweep. Additionally, the School Committee held a professional development day for faculty and staff and a committee meeting to discuss school safety for the community. Parents were outraged that the finding of a loaded magazine went unreported for so long.

Medford Police Chief Leo Sacco has advised for a new protocol to be put in place, such as calling 911 immediately if a weapon, drug or ammunition is found instead of going through the school’s chain of command. Because of the incident, the school superintendent will retire two months earlier than originally planned.

As a whole, Massachusetts has been at the forefront of the fight for gun control. Republican Governor Charlie Baker said that he “would like to see the federal government pursue many of the strategies and the policies that we have here in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.”

Assault weapons are already banned in Massachusetts. Massachusetts also banned bump stocks after the shooting in Las Vegas.

The Chief of Police is also able to deny someone from buying a weapon if they deem the person too dangerous. According to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, Massachusetts has the 4th strongest gun laws in the country. Additionally, according to that same source, Massachusetts has the fewest gun deaths per capita out of the entire country.

While Massachusetts is already well into the fight for gun control, there’s still more that can be done. In the state, there is no limit to the number of firearms a person can purchase at a single time.

There is no waiting period for purchasing a weapon. Lastly, Massachusetts does not require unlicensed firearm sellers to conduct a background check on anyone buying a weapon. According to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, the majority of guns used in crimes in Massachusetts in 2014 were purchased in other states.

While Massachusetts gun laws could still use improvement, it’s evident that federal laws also need to be improved.

On Feb. 28, more than 400 students at Somerville High School staged a walkout to protest “a lack of competent gun control laws across the country.” The students proceeded to bombard the inboxes of state representatives with calls for more gun control.

The students plan to turn these into weekly walkouts until the Massachusetts state legislature passes the Extreme Risk Protective Orders, which would allow household members or petitioners to report people with firearms who are an immediate dangers to themselves or others.

To get involved with the fight for gun control, participate in the Tufts University Walkout and Rally to End Gun Violence on March 14th from 10-10:17 a.m.

Alexa Weinstein is a sophomore majoring in political science and history. Alexa can be reached at alexa.weinstein@tufts.edu.

10

THE TUFTS DAILY | Sports | Thursday, March 8, 2018

Yuan Jun Chee On the Spot

Arsène, oh Arsène

A

rsène, oh Arsène. How times have changed.

If the Carabao Cup final from a fortnight ago and last week’s game at the Emirates were anything to go by, it’s almost evident that the baton for the most innovative coach in the Premier League has now most certainly passed on from Arsène Wenger to Pep Guardiola. The 3–0 scoreline was the biggest margin that Arsenal has ever lost by in a cup final. The kind of exciting football that we’ve always come to expect of Arsenal in years past has a new successor in Manchester City.

One could have perhaps forgiven the Gunners if they played entertaining soccer but failed to win trophies like in the past — at least they’re fun to watch, right? But in recent weeks, maybe months, and as embodied in those two games, Manchester City look inspired, dominant, hungry and ready to win. Arsenal is simply looking for answers.

Arsène Wenger reminded everyone that he has “turned down the whole world” so that he could honor his contract at the Emirates. In the era of disloyalty in sports, that’s very romantic. But sports is also a results business. The Arsenal board had a chance to move on and start planning for the future this past offseason, and it took the easy option out by simply betting on Wenger’s historical legacy.

Many Arsenal fans keep telling me, “Well, if you do sack Wenger, who would you appoint?” I’m not denying that appointing a manager is a difficult decision. But Arsenal should make a move while it is still considered a top European club at which managers want to test the team’s skills. One almost wonders what coaches like Eddie Howe could do with more resources. What about Thomas Tuchel? And despite Frank de Boer being damaged goods after his spells at Inter and Crystal Palace, or Peter Bosz at Borussia Dortmund, it’s still interesting to ponder if Arsenal’s traditions might be the best fit for the Dutch philosophy of soccer.

Season in and season out, we keep asking ourselves if Wenger’s time is up. It’s almost as if the Arsenal board is just content to be “best of the rest.” The problem is that the pool of “the rest” is becoming smaller and smaller. We’ve seen how it’s becoming harder and harder to restore clubs who are in decline. Look at Leeds; look at how long or how much it’s taken Liverpool and Manchester United to continue to restore themselves to relevancy again.

And as I watched the Cup final, or just Arsenal games in general this season, I keep wondering if one was to form a team of players from the top six teams, how many Arsenal players I would pick? Probably only Mesut Özil would make that team, and even then that’s a tough choice given the general quality of players at all other clubs.

Wenger’s time might not necessarily be ticking, but Arsenal’s relevance to the English and European elite sure is.

Yuan Jun Chee is a junior majoring in history and international relations. Yuan Jun can be reached at yuan.chee@tufts.edu.

tuftsdaily.com

DeBari sets new school record, secures qualification to national meet and the Jumbos officially qualified six meters. The DMR team, in the tenth WOMEN'S TRACK AND FIELD

continued from back Sherwill notched her season-high distance with a 13.69-meter mark.

The final qualification positions for the NCAA Championships were announced at midnight on Saturday,

athletes, their most since the 2010-11 season. Bowman, who will look to secure All-American honors for the fifth straight season, will have to deal with a packed schedule. The Camden, Maine native ranks fourth in the mile, fourth in the 3,000 meters and seventh in the 5,000

spot, holds the other top-ten position.

The foursome’s qualifying time is only 0.07 seconds behind the ninth-seeded team from the Coast Guard Academy.

The Tufts athletes will travel to Birmingham, Ala. for the culmination of their indoor season this weekend.

EVAN SAYLES / THE TUFTS DAILY

First-year Olivia Schwern vies to pass a Williams competitor at the Cupid Challenge on Feb. 3.

Join the Tufts Community Health and Tufts Premedical Society for a screening of this documentary on Monday, March 12, 2018 in Cohen Auditorium. 40 Talbot Avenue, Medford, MA from 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm.

The screening will be followed by a panel discussion. *This event is free and open to the public.* Puentes de Salud is a volunteer-run clinic that provides free medical care to undocumented immigrants in south Philadelphia. Along with revealing these patient stories, this documentary also looks at the heroic doctors and nurses who work pro bono to ensure these people receive care, offering a deeply moving look at the limitless potential of humanity.

Tufts Health and Wellness

Sports

Thursday, March 8, 2018 | Sports | THE TUFTS DAILY

11

SAILING

Jumbos withstand weather to begin spring season

RAY BERNOFF / THE TUFTS DAILY

Senior Molly Pleskus (left) and junior Sabrina Van Mell sail in a regatta hosted by Boston University on April 16, 2017.

by Jeremy Goldstein Staff Writer

The Tufts sailing team braved tumultuous weather in announcing its return to competitive racing over the weekend.

Unfortunately, the “bomb cyclone” that ripped across the East Coast forced the cancellation of many of the Jumbos’ scheduled regattas. Due to these circumstances, Tufts was unable to compete in the Thames River Team Race at Conn. College, the Women’s InterConference at Old Dominion or the Women’s Invite hosted by the University of Rhode Island.

The opening weekend, however, was not completely bogged down by the unfavorable forecast. The Jumbos sent six sailors to the Sharpe Team Race Trophy at Brown for a New England Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association (NEISA) team-scoring regatta, featuring a round-robin style of competition in Flying Junior (FJ) boats. Junior skippers Chris Keller, Jackson McCoy and Sammy Shea were accompanied by senior crew Michelle Chisdak and first-year crews Jacob Whitney and Juliana Testa. The group finished fifth overall in the eight-team event with three wins and four losses, only one spot outside the final-four round robin tournament. After recording a perfect 7–0 record in the opening round, MIT defeated host Brown in the final to take the victory.

“It was pretty cold for the first few races, and the wind chill didn’t help,” Whitney said. “The regatta was mostly everyone brushing off the rust, since we haven’t raced since early November.

[Senior] Emily Shanley-Roberts knows a lot about team racing. She came with us to the Sharpe Trophy as our coach.”

At Harvard, Tufts sailors competed in another team-scored NEISA regatta — the Harvard Women’s Team

Race — which was also raced in FJ boats.

The Jumbos’ squad featured significant class diversity, as it was comprised of four skippers (senior Molly Pleskus, sophomore Charlotte Lenz, first-year Talia Toland and first-year Lindsay Powers) and three crews (senior Lucy Robison, junior Taylor Hart and firstyear Hanna Brush). The Jumbos picked up two victories over the host Crimson to finish in third place. Brown took first place with an 8–1 record, while MIT (7–2) finished second.

The two opening-weekend regattas serve as an introduction to what could be a long and fruitful season for the Tufts sailors. The fall season featured both Toland and senior Alp Rodopman competing individually at the Laser Performance Singlehanded Nationals (where Rodopman finished sixth overall), as well as a bevy of other strong showings from the Jumbos. Nonetheless, there are some adjustments to be made in order to transition from fall to spring.

“The vast majority of the regattas in the fall were fleet races,” Whitney said. “Team racing is a little different because it’s three-by-three [competitions]. I think the fall prepared us pretty well for having our pairs of people in the boat, [getting] to know each other and being able to work together and move faster.”

The sage influence of some of the team’s more experienced sailors certainly aids this transition. Whitney noted that skippers such as ShanleyRoberts, McCoy, junior Florian Eenkema van Dijk, junior Cam Holley and others often close practices on Mystic Lake with hour-long debriefs on technique, tactics and new skills — all drawing from their wealth of experience. In a world of haves and have-

knots, the younger Jumbos appear to possess a vast amount of knowledge from which to draw.

“Time on the water is vital for improvement for any sailor, but doing so at a high level competition is even better,” Van Dijk told the Daily in an email. “Sailing against good teams is a benefit for inexperienced sailors, as they hope to emulate what they see. Making mistakes is a great way to learn, and good sailors often force you into making mistakes.”

Weather-permitting, the sailors will battle on throughout the always-inviting New England spring to continue getting back into the swing of competing, especially for those who did not compete due to poor conditions. Tufts will host the appropriately named Icebreaker Invite over the weekend, while also sending teams to the Wood Trophy Team Race at Harvard and the Team Racing Invite at MIT. Van Dijk

touched upon some of the regattas later in the season that the team is also anticipating.

“The Graham Hall at Annapolis [on] the first weekend of spring break is a big regatta we’re looking forward to,” Van Dijk said. “New England schools race against the best Mid-Atlantic and Southern schools. Right after that is our classic spring break camping trip at St. Mary’s College in Maryland, where we race all week long and spend nights around a campfire singing songs and providing many forms of entertainment.”

Practicing in the cold has not been easy for the Jumbos, but they will look to continue brushing off the rust in the upcoming regattas. As the team’s first-years become equipped with valuable information from experienced upperclassmen, the challenge may prove to be no match for Tufts sailing.

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Applications must be received by March 15, 2018.

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12 tuftsdaily.com

Sports

Thursday, March 8, 2018

MEN'S TRACK AND FIELD

Jumbos qualify for NCAA Championships at Tufts National Qualifying Meet

by Liam Finnegan Sports Editor

The Tufts men’s track and field team hosted and competed at the Tufts National Qualifying Meet at Gantcher Center on Saturday. The competition was the last chance for the Tufts athletes to post qualifying times for selection to NCAA Championships in Birmingham, Ala., and many seized the opportunity. Only the top 15 athletes in each event nationwide are selected for Nationals, so the meet allowed some of the Jumbos who were on the edge of the top 15 to improve their scores. A handful of Tufts’ individual athletes and one of its relay teams improved their season-best times and climbed the national rankings.

One Jumbo who improved upon his national ranking was junior Anthony Kardonsky. The Tenafly, N.J. native won the 200-meter dash in 22.13 seconds (which was adjusted to 21.74 seconds in to compensate for the banked track at Nationals), a time that places him 13th nationally. Kardonsky will compete at an NCAA championship event for the second time, having run in the Jumbos’ 4×100-meter relay at Outdoor Nationals last May. “I’m really excited to see my hard work on the track pay off,” Kardonsky said. “I’ve definitely improved my technique. I can feel that I run more explosively now. The training program we go through has helped tremendously with that, but I’ve also been focusing on improving the mental aspect of racing. Meditating and also artificially inflating my confidence so that I truly believe I’ll win every race has helped a lot.”

Senior Stefan Duvivier also improved upon his national ranking in the high jump on Saturday. He posted a 2.10meter jump in the event, matching his school-record indoor mark. Duvivier’s jump ended up tied for fifth in the country. It was critical that the senior post a good result because his previous season-best, 2.06 meters, would have placed him in a tie for 17th — outside the cutoff for Nationals.

MADELEINE OLIVER / TUFTS TRACK AND FIELD

Junior Christian Swenson runs alongside the pacer in the mile race at the Cupid Challenge on Feb. 3.

Tufts’ distance medley relay (DMR) team also put up a nationally ranked time on its home track. The squad — consisting of junior Christian Swenson, senior co-captain Drew DiMaiti and juniors Hiroto Watanabe and Colin Raposo — ran a second-place time of 10:00.62 that converts to a 9:52.58 mark on a banked track.

The latter time currently ranks eighth in the nation, sending the group to the national championships.

On Saturday, Kardonsky, Duvivier and the DMR team joined an alreadystrong pool of Tufts athletes going to Birmingham. Watanabe’s time of 1:58.98 in the 800-meter dash is currently third in Div. III, making the Yarmouth Port, Mass. native a favorite in the event. DiMaiti made the cut by the smallest of margins in the 400-meter dash, as

his time of 48.29 seconds from the Last Chance Qualifier at Boston University on March 25 placed 15th in the nation.

The Jumbos are fortunate to have such an experienced group of athletes going to the NCAA Championships this year. Last year, Watanabe earned All-American honors in the 800 meters, finishing eight out of all the competitors. Duvivier also competed at Nationals last year, finishing 10th in the high jump with a mark of 1.97 meters. The team will be without the contributions of Tim Nichols (LA ’17), who won last year’s 5,000 meters by 3.07 seconds, contributing a large number of points to Tufts’ overall score. However, the Jumbos will still be bolstered by many athletes who have been competing at high levels throughout the season, such as Kardonsky and DiMaiti.

“We are very fortunate that almost all

of the guys going to the Championships have been multiple times before,” Tufts coach Joel Williams said. “The two guys going that have never been to NCAAs — [senior] Tom DePalma and [sophomore] Matt D’Anieri — both have plenty of championship experience and have been preparing for this opportunity for quite some time. This entire team is incredibly competitive and really knows how to show up when it matters. I would say I am equally confident in every guy heading to the Championships.”

Williams, who on Tuesday was named U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association New England Indoor Coach of the Year for the second consecutive year, will lead Tufts at the NCAA Championships on March 9–10 at Birmingham-Southern College.

WOMEN'S TRACK AND FIELD

Tufts athletes climb national rankings in preparation for NCAA Championships

by Patrick Wang Staff Writer

On Saturday, the Tufts women’s track and field team competed in a qualifying meet at the Gantcher Center.

The purpose of the meet was to give athletes a final chance to improve their positions going into the NCAA Championships, which will begin on March 9 in Birmingham, Ala. The national meet will include the top 17 athletes in individual events and the top 12 relay teams in Div. III. Hopeful qualifiers outside of the top 17 also have a chance to compete, depending on the NCAA’s decision.

In Saturday’s meet, Tufts senior co-captain Annalisa DeBari bested her own school record in the 60-meter hurdles with a time of 8.80 seconds.

The Melrose, Mass. native had set a new Tufts record with a mark of 8.83 seconds at the New England Div. III Championships on Feb. 17. With her

improved time, DeBari will compete as the fourth-highest qualifier at Nationals. The captain noted that she was very pleased with her record-breaking performance from the weekend.

“Breaking the school record again is definitely exciting for me,” DeBari said.

“Qualification is not my top concern. My primary goal is to advance my championship position. Every school will hold a qualification meet of their own, so if you don’t compete hard enough, other athletes will result in a higher-seeded position than you. I’m happy with the result and will try to advance even more in the championship.”

DeBari’s record-breaking performance was not the only highlight of the Tufts-hosted meet. The Jumbos’ distance medley relay (DMR) team also improved its national standing during the qualification meet. Sophomore Rhemi Toth, sophomore Julia Gake, first-year Olivia Martin and senior co-captain Brittany Bowman com-

bined to run the 4,000-meter event in 11:53.52. When adjusted to account for Birmingham-Southern College’s banked track — where the NCAA Championships will be held — this mark equates to a time of 11:45.96. Toth kicked things off in the 1,200-meter portion of the race with a time of 3:37, followed by Gake’s mark of 59.50 seconds in the 400 and Martin’s 2:18 in the 800. Bowman then anchored the squad to a fourth-place finish by running the 1,600 meters in 4:51. The foursome now goes into the championship meet ranked 10th in the DMR in Div. III, although Bowman will be replaced by junior Sarah Perkins so Bowman can focus on her individual events.

Tufts coach Kristen Morwick expressed her excitement for the team’s performance at the qualifying meet.

“The distance medley relay squad really put on a show under pressure,” Morwick said. “If you are the No. 1 squad [in qualifying], then you don’t

have that much pressure. But for them, they had to do their best in order to secure a position in the top 10.”

Morwick offered further perspective on the DMR team, as well as on Bowman, who qualified for three individual events at Nationals.

“Now that [the DMR has] secured the 10th seed, I would expect them to further challenge themselves when competing against other, better athletes,” Morwick said. “The level of competitiveness in the championship will definitely push them forward. Bowman is our star — I don’t worry about her too much. She is self-motivated and will want to earn a top-three finish at the Championships because the gap between her and athletes ahead is not so big.”

While none of Tufts’ field athletes qualified for Nationals, they still competed hard in the qualifying meet.

In the weight throw, senior Jennifer see WOMEN'S TRACK AND FIELD, page 10