Oct. 24, 2018: Liz Robinson ’90 chosen to chair board of trustees

ARTS P. 9 Feminist tale 'Colette' comes to Images

SPORTS P. 10 The Independent Student Newspaper at Williams College Since 1887 VOL. CXXXIII, NO. 6

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 24, 2018

Rugby celebrates 60th anniversary with alumni

Liz Robinson ’90 chosen to chair board of trustees

By RACHEL SCHARF MANAGING EDITOR During last weekend’s annual fall meeting, the College’s Board of Trustees elected Liz Robinson ’90 as its next chair. Robinson, who will begin her term on July 1, will succeed current board chair Michael Eisenson ’77.

In an email sent to the College community, President Maud Mandel praised Eisenson for his dedication during his four-year term as chair. “Under Michael’s leadership, the board announced its landmark sustainability commitments – goals toward which we’re continuing to make progress,” she wrote.

“He also guided the creation of our Investment Office, which has done such an extraordinary job of generating support for financial aid, among other programs. And he led the search process that brought me to Williams as president, for which I’m especially grateful!”

Robinson retired in 2016 after 25 years at Goldman Sachs, the last decade of which she served as the firm’s global treasurer. Since then, Robinson has served on the Board of Directors of the Bank of New York Mellon and Russell Reynolds Associates, as well as the director of Every Mother Counts, an organization that works to provide maternity care in developing countries.

In addition to serving on the College Board of Trustees since 2011, Robinson is an associate agent for her class and was a member of the presidential search committee, as well as a member of her class’ 25th reunion fund committee. Her extremely

PHOTO COURTESY OF WILLIAMS COLLEGE. On July 1, Liz Robinson ’90 will replace outgoing board chair Michael Eisenson ’77. She has served on the College board of trustees since 2011. positive experience as a student, during which she majored in economics and served as a Junior Advisor (JA), inspired her to remain involved in the College as an

alum. “I loved my four years at Williams,” she said. “The experiences I had in and out of the classroom, the friendships I made and the lessons I learned all shaped the per-

son I am today.” As a board member, she has appreciated the opportunity to contribute to many important conversations and moments in the College’s development.

“Over the last seven years, my board service has enabled me to participate in the dialogue on topics like educational access and affordability; and last year it was

a privilege to be part of the team that identified Maud as our 18th president,” Robinson said. “Williams continually evolves, but what has not changed is the focus on the liberal arts and the value of learning and living in a small and intimate community of people who are involved in that work. One of the things I’m proudest of as a trustee is the work we’ve done to nurture and support that learning community.”

Robinson is excited to continue this work and take on a new leadership role as board chair. “Being a trustee has given me the extraordinary chance to work alongside my fellow trustees, administrators, faculty, staff, students and alumni on issues that impact the College and its community,” she said. “I’m delighted that starting in July I’ll have the opportunity to contribute to those efforts in a new way as board chair.”

Between now and the beginning of her term in July, Robinson is looking forward to working with Eisenson to ensure a smooth transition.

In addition, she is excited to work with President Mandel as the College embarks on a strategic planning process.

“It’s rare and quite special that a school like Williams offers us the chance to step away from our everyday lives and think big thoughts about where we want to be in 20 or 30 years, and then how we want to get there,” she said of the possibility to be involved in larger visions for the College. “It’s a way of making sure we continue doing our best work in changing circumstances and making our already great institution even stronger!”

Massachusetts to vote on initiatives Neighborhood Leadership Team

By SAMUEL WOLF NEWS EDITOR

On Nov. 6, Massachusetts voters will have the opportunity to vote on three statewide ballot measures. The result of each measure has the potential to both alter Massachusetts policy and affect the College, but only students who are registered as Massachusetts residents will be eligible to vote on the measures.

Any of the three measures can be passed by a simple majority of voters in the election.

Question 1: Nurse-Patient Assignment Limits The first measure, also known as Question 1, would mandate limits on the number of patients who could be assigned to a nurse at one time.

The exact limit would depend on the condition of the patient receiving treatment. For instance, a nurse would only be able to care for one patient at a time if that patient were under anesthesia or had given birth within two hours. However, when caring for those with only minor conditions, the measure would allow for a nurse to be tasked with up to six patients at a time. Under the language of the measure, facilities would have to comply without reducing nursing or any other staff. In addition, any retribution against nurses for following these guidelines would be strictly prohibited.

These restrictions would apply to all Massachusetts hospitals, including Berkshire Medical Center, where College students frequently go for medical attention.

The measure has been highly contentious; groups both in favor of and against the initiative have spent millions of dollars promoting their opinion. U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey have both endorsed the measure, while Governor Charlie Baker opposes it.

“Nurses work hard to take care of all of us when it matters the most, and we should do the same for them by establishing

standards to ensure they have the help they need to do their job safely,” Warren said in a Boston Globe article.

Opponents have argued that some hospitals may try to force nurses into night shifts or hire inexperienced nurses in order to get around these regulations.

They worry that some hospitals could be forced to halt certain services because of the regulations. The Health Policy Commission, a Massachusetts health watchdog group, estimated the cost of the initiative to the health care system as ranging from $676 million to $949 million. Nurses themselves are somewhat divided; the Massachusetts Nurses Association endorsed the measure, but the American Nurses Association of Massachusetts came out against it. The measure is contentious among voters as well.

In a September poll, 44 percent of Massachusetts voters favored the measure, while 44 percent opposed the measure.

Question 2: Advisory Comission for Amendments to the U.S. Constitution Regarding Corporate Personhood and Political Spending Question 2 of the ballot measures would create a citizen commission compromised of 15 members to propose amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

The intended amendments would include overturning the Citizens United v. FEC Supreme Court decision that allowed for virtually unlimited political spending in campaigns, as well as an assertion that corporations are not entitled to inalienable constitutional rights. If approved, this commission would come into existence on Jan. 1, 2019 and issue its first report on Dec. 31, 2019. The governor, secretary of state, attorney general, speaker of the Massachusetts House and president of the Massachusetts Senate would each appoint three of the 15 commission members. Any Massachusetts resident would be eligible to apply to join the commission, but the position would be unpaid.

The commission’s powers would be largely informal, and it would not have the power to pass a constitutional amendment, which requires approval by a supermajority in the U.S. House and Senate and ratification by 38 states. Nevertheless, most major Massachusetts political figures have come out in support of the initiative, including Baker, Warren and Markey.

The measure also does not have a strong organized opposition, unlike for Question 1, and most political observers believe that it is likely to pass.

Question 3: Gender Identity Anti-Discrimination Veto Referendum Question 3 concerns a law that was passed in 2016 that prohibited discrimination on the basis of gender identity, in regards to access to any “public accommodation,” meaning any location that is open to the general public. For example, this law outlawed denying transgender people the use of public restrooms. Opponents of this law, entitled SB 2407, have placed a repeal referendum on the ballot. Opposition is being spearheaded by the Massachusetts Family Institute, a socially conservative group, and a group called Keep MA Safe, which was created in response to the initiative and calls the law a danger to women.

Most elected officials in Massachusetts, including Baker, Warren and Markey, favor the law. Groups favoring the law have spent approximately $4 million promoting it, whereas those opposed have spent closer to $500,000. Public polling shows the vast majority of Massachusetts residents favoring the law, with support averaging approximately 70 percent. The measure is phrased such that a “yes” vote is a vote in favor of the current law and a “no” vote is a vote in favor of repealing the law. Notably, Question 3 is the first statewide referendum on transgender rights in U.S. history.

restructures responsibilities

By REBECCA PARK STAFF WRITER

neighborhoods is led by a NLT, consisting of a student Neighborhood Director This year, the Office of Stu- (ND) and six or seven HCs. dent Life (OSL) modified its In addition, an assistant dineighborhood programming rector for residential life model for on-campus upper- and housing from the OSL class residences in each of the helps to oversee manageCollege’s four neighborhoods. ment for each team. Each This year, the student Neigh- HC is responsible for helping borhood Leadership Teams’ with programming for their (NLT) responsibilities have neighborhood and the camshifted to include existing pus as a whole, ranging from campus programs: Williams bi-weekly house snacks to After Dark (WAD), Intra- events such as Homecoming murals, Life After Williams and Winter Carnival.

(LAF) and Lyceum dinner.

The prior structure providIn the past, these programs ed a vague definition of the were coordinated separately NLT programming. “NLT’s from Residence previous proLife and Housgramming “Overall responing, but each of model stated these committees that house sibilities for HCs are now comcoordinators remain the same; prised entirely were expected of House Coorto complete however, the prodinators (HCs) programs in and chaired by the following gramming model a Neighborhood areas: Health/ under which the Director. They Wellness/Spirhold weekly ituality, DiverNLT operates has meetings to plan sity/Inclusion/ their programs.

Cultural, Art/ been revised” Assistant DiExpression, rectors for ResiCommunity Madeline Polidaro dential Life and Service/Susand Patricia Housing Madtainability and Leahey-Hays eline Polidoro Winter Study/ and Patricia House Cup,” Leahey-Hays Polidoro and Assistant Directors for explained that Leahey-Hays Residential Life this change has said. “These foand Housing come from a cus areas were reformatting very broad and of NLT events, open-ended, rather than a change in the resulting in HCs having a HC role itself. “There actually lack of direction when planhaven’t been any changes to ning events for their houses the House Coordinator (HC) and neighborhoods.” position specifically,” they That is the reason why OSL said. Overall responsibilities changed the structure and for HCs remain the same; format of NLT's programhowever, the programming ming responsibilities. “This model under which the NLT year, the NLT’s programoperates has been revised.” ming model is broken down The College has four resi- into three distinct parts: dential neighborhoods: Cur- house-level programming, rier, Dodd, Spencer and neighborhood-level proWood. Each of these four gramming and campus-wide

programming,” Polidoro and Leahey-Hays explained.

While house-level and campus-wide programming have remained the same as in past years, the neighborhood-level programming has changed to provide more structure, encompassing WAD, LAF and Lyceum.

“NDs and HCs were able to provide their preferences for SEE RESPONSIBILITIES, PAGE 5

WHAT’S INSIDE 3 OPINIONS Students voice support for affirmative action 5 NEWS Professor Matt Carter receives $369,000 grant 7 FEATURES Cari Naftali discusses work with refugees 9 ARTS Lecture series explores Cuban creative scene 11 SPORTS SAAC starts new chapter for studentathletes of color

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2 OPINIONS

The Williams Record

Editor-in-Chief Tesnim Zekeria

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Executive Editors Shaheen Currimjee, Nicholas Goldrosen, Rachel Levin and Jane Petersen News Editors Rebecca Tauber and Samuel Wolf

October 24, 2018

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DARIN LI ’21

CONVENTIONAL WISDOM

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Word on The Quad Where is the most haunted place on campus?

By KATIE BRULE AND SOPHIA SHIN PHOTO EDITORS

,

TRICK OR TREAT WITH MAUD

Time with Maud? Yes, please!

PARENTS WEEKEND

I guess if parents are in for a scare, they should definitely check out Hoxsey Street.

SPRING PREREGISTRATION

It feels like this semester just started?!

EMMA DRAPER ’22

My mind.

MIDTERMS

What's worse than taking midterms? Getting them back.

FILM + LIVE MUSIC

MAJDA MURATI ’21

Schow. Because that's where dreams go to die.

I AM A SEAGULL Saturday, October 27, 8pm

CLUB B10 | $12 STUDENTS + ADVANCE | $22 DAY OF

OLIVER YANG ’20

Second floor of Greylock.

JUSTINAS BANYS ’19

My room.

TICKETS: massmoca.org or 413.622.2111 | North Adams, Mass.

The opinions expressed in signed columns are not necessarily those of the Williams Record editorial board.

Op-Ed and Letter Submission The Record welcomes op-eds and letters from all members of the College community. The Opinions section is designed to reflect the varied views and ideas of the College community, and the publication of any letter or op-ed does not indicate an endorsement of the views contained therein.

Submissions should be sent to hy3@williams. edu by Sunday at 5 p.m. for inclusion in the next Wednesday issue. Op-eds range in length from 650-800 words, and letters are 500 words or fewer. The Record will not publish pieces that have appeared in other publications. Pieces submitted to the Record are not guaranteed a spot in the upcoming issue.

For Record policy information, please see our website, williamsrecord.com.

MATTHEW ROYCHOWDHURY ’21

OPINIONS 3

The Williams Record

October 24, 2018

On the College endowment

In support of affirmative action

Looking back and beyond

Members of Asian American Students in Action speak out

By OSAMAH QATANANI AND DAVID SHAKIROV Next month, the Williams Investment Office (WIO) will release the 2018 Investment Report for the College’s endowment. An endowment is a pool of financial assets that is invested to grow and provide additional income for re-investment and operational expenditures.

What differentiates most elite institutions, like the College, from other schools is a remarkably high endowment value per student. From the dining hall food to professors’ salaries and financial aid, nearly half of the school’s operational budget is supported by the endowment.

The College spends about $110,000 per student every year (clearly above the payable tuition of ~$70,000), with a significant part of the student body on financial aid. The college’s impressive ~$2.5 billion account, or $1.24 million per student, allows it to engage in initiatives and projects that most schools cannot (NYU, with an undergraduate body of 25,000, has a $4 billion endowment, or only $150,000 per student.)

The WIO, like most endowments, holds a long-term strategy for its portfolio. Rather than investing directly in assets, it invests in managers who then invest in assets (a.k.a. a “fund of funds”). Without the pressure of shortterm performance, the longevity of the office’s investment strategies, the school’s reputation and the leveraged personal relationships of the investment office has given the endowment access to some of the premier managers and firms in the industry.

A pivotal part of the endowment is its asset allocation. This is key as each asset class has individual risk and return characteristics and could significantly influence the magnitude of both the downturns and upswings of returns. In 2017, the College’s endowment invested in asset classes. The general distribution of the endowment includes a 61% allocation to stocks (higher risk), a 12% allocation to bonds (lower risk), 11% to real estate/assets (long-term and relatively illiquid) and the remainder (16%) to buyouts and venture capital. This distribution reflects the endowment’s assumption that stocks would strongly outperform other asset classes in 2017, as over half of the funds are allocated to equities, and so little are in buyouts (although both had similar returns in 2017). The continuity of this into 2018 is in question as the allocation distribution

is a reflection of the college’s outlook on macroeconomic, financial and geopolitical forces and will be revealed later this year as the 2018 report is released.

Around 46 percent of the College’s spending is supported by the endowment (while tuition contributes to only 36 percent of the budget). With a smaller endowment, the budget of the college is compressed and becomes more reliant on sources including external donations or higher rates of tuition.

As the 2018 report is to be released next month, it’s important to analyze the relationship between the actions of the WIO office and events over the last fiscal year. In 2018, we observed higher volatility in the financial markets and rising economic tensions between international powers (i.e. trade wars). We expect this to have changed the equity returns of the endowment for 2018, as the increase in volatility may have run some of the fund’s managers off-track.

In the long term, the endowment office must consider the effects of the trade war and escalating political tensions between the United States and China.

Finally, the interest rate environment has and will continue to affect the endowment’s returns (as interest rates rise, a decrease in the price of equities may follow suit unless the portfolio is rebalanced). Domestic policy including tax cuts and their effects on asset prices should have been considered.

Building off the endowment’s long term strategy, the WIO did not make many significant changes in asset allocation year over year (in the 2017 report, the WIO points out a mere two percent change in their asset allocation distribution). We believe the investment office’s strategy is not cautious or flexible enough – as the aforementioned forces continue to shape the markets, the WIO should have taken proper steps to protect the funds it manages, while keeping in mind the dependence of the budget and the success of students on its consistent and high-yielding performance. The release of the 2018 College Investment Office report next month should answer some of these questions and concerns.

Have a question or concern about the Williams endowment? Shoot us an email at dms6@williams.edu and omq1@williams.edu.

By ASIAN AMERICAN STUDENTS IN ACTION The Asian American Studies Movement at the College stands firmly in support of affirmative action. We recognize Michael Wang ’17, who has voiced support for ongoing efforts to dismantle affirmative action, as a former member of the Asian American community at the College; consequently, we realize the importance of holding those in our community accountable for their anti-Blackness and classism.

We will not stand for Michael Wang’s egregious actions, and we are taking the necessary steps to address them, both within the College community and at large.

The history and philosophy of Asian American Studies (AAS) is premised on challenging hegemonic structures of thinking. As part of the umbrella of ethnic studies, AAS traces its origins to the student activism at San Francisco State University and UC Berkeley the late 1960s, when coalitions of Black, Latinx, Indigenous and Asian American student activists recognized the disciplinary violence of their Euro-centric curriculum, and organized strikes to push for its dismantling. As a discipline, ethnic studies challenges white privilege and interrogates instruments of racial violence. Thus, it is inextricably linked with the restorative project of affirmative action, which considers race in the college admissions process, for not only does it seek to incorporate the knowledges of those marginalized, but it also aims to mobilize higher education in a project of reparations. Any representation without redistribution is then but a guise that upholds the status quo.

The first wave of Asian American admissions into academic institutions is directly indebted to the efforts of Black and Brown activists in the 1960s and 70s. Pushed by the leaders of the Black Panthers, NAACP, Third World Liberation Front and many others, the U.S. government in 1964 signed into law the Civil Rights Act, which prohibited discriminatory practices based on race.

Institutions of higher education were required to develop affirmative action

programs specifically geared towards hiring qualified “minorities,” which, as defined by the Department of Labor, included Black, Latinx, Native American, and Asian American people. As designated beneficiaries of affirmative action, many Asian Americans gained admission to reputable schools in the 1960s and 70s. Helen Zia, a prominent Asian American activist, writes in her memoir Freedom Dreams that affirmative action — and the legacy of coalitional, Black-led activism during the Civil Rights era — allowed her, and many others like her, to go to college.

Claiming that it would be fairer if colleges did not consider race during admissions because only the highestachieving and “worthiest” students should get into top schools, opponents of affirmative action dangerously neglect the problem of structural inequality. The notion of an “equal starting point” is hardly realistic in a country founded upon genocide and enslavement. Structural inequality — whether that be racist zoning laws or financially inaccessible extra- and co-curricular activities — means that many students are not afforded the opportunities to discover their passions and fully develop their academic strengths. Countless studies have shown that these inequities lead to unequal outcomes.

It is often remarked that all people are born equal, but it is patently wrong to claim that all people grow up under equal circumstances, and it is egregiously wrong to believe that all people will achieve their full capacity without access to the same resources. The point of affirmative action is not only to be fair, but is also to enact justice in a systemically unjust and unequal society.

Affirmative action enables people of all races and of all socioeconomic statuses to represent themselves in society by claiming positions of power.

Asian Americans have long occupied a place of instability and contradiction in our country’s racial matrix, characterized by Claire Jean Kim in Racial Triangulation as a wedge, in service of white people, to divide minorities against each other. Anti-affirmative action activists echo this logic when they claim the primary beneficiaries

of affirmative action, like Black and Latinx folk, are taking Asian Americans’ spots in the college admissions process. However, ample research suggests that it is in fact white applicants who would benefit the most from abolishing race-conscious admissions, not Asian American ones. Despite the language of affirmative action opponents, which characterizes college admissions as a “zero sum game,” as Michael Wang puts it in an interview with Buzzfeed, and requires someone “to lose for someone else to win,” in fact, the only real winners of anti-affirmative action are white applicants.

The flagrantly anti-black rhetoric which has surrounded Asian American complaints against affirmative action — that affirmative action benefits Black and Brown students at the cost of Asian American students and that all recipients of affirmative action are somehow “lazy” or “unworthy” — reveals a dangerous failing on the part of our community. The collaboration between Edward Blum and the “Asian American Coalition for Education,” of which Wang is a part, sees the alliance of a white supremacist with a group of predominantly upper-middle class, light-skinned, East Asian American men. Their efforts have the effect of maintaining a strict order racial hierarchy not only in the academy, but the world at large. Their unsubstantiated claims — about “merit,” “worthiness” and “equality” — display ignorance of structural injustice.

On behalf of Asian American Students in Action, we stand for students of color — especially Black, Brown and Indigenous students, who have historically been denied the promise of higher education — and reaffirm our commitment to working with members of our community to dismantle anti-blackness and classism. In line with our mission and ethics, we firmly uphold affirmative action.

This op-ed was written by the members of Asian American Students in Action: Lilianne Au ’22, William Chen ’19, Jonathan Deng ’21, Rhea Jiang ’20, Serapia Kim ’19, Audrey Koh ’21, Amber Lee ’21, Suiyi

Osamah Qatanani ’21 is a prospective political economy major from Paterson N.J. David Shakirov ’22 is from Fort Lee N.J. His major is undecided.

Expanding local transport When the BRTA is not enough

By KRISTEN ALTMAN A few weeks ago, I rushed onto the Barrington State Company website, eager to seize free tickets to The Glass Menagerie play offered to all students at the College. I made an account, put in my email, and prayed that there were seats left. I did end up getting my free ticket; I didn’t, however, make it to the show. Though free tickets had been offered to all students, free transportation was a different story. The show was in Pittsfield until 9:00 p.m., the last bus with the Berkshire Regional Transit Authority (BRTA) left at 5:25 p.m., and I, being a first-year, had no car on campus. I was left with the frustrating sense of having both the diverse opportunities in the local community and the lack of infrastructure to get to these opportunities.

My relationship to transportation at the College is inevitably restricted: due to parking limitations, no first-year is allowed a car on campus. Yet transportation is an issue faced by more than just first-year students. Bringing a car to college can be costly for students, and it’s also a decision that is much more difficult the farther one lives from the College. The alternatives – including ZipCar, Uber and private taxi services – project a financial barrier that can be prohibitive for many in our community. For students coming to the College from outside of New England, or those unable to foot the bill of paid transportation services, there is a definite gap between the events offered in the Berkshires and the transportation available to bring students to them.

Free rides on the BRTA – courtesy of a pilot program initiated by the Center for Learning in Action (CLiA) – is a good start. But even this program demonstrates the gap. The last Williamstown/North Adams bus on the BRTA system runs at 5:25 p.m., which aligns almost exactly with the end of class and sports for Williams students. Seeing a Friday night movie, getting a dinner with friends or attending an evening play are not possible when using the BRTA. BRTA also does not operate on Sundays, and while the College offers its own Sunday shuttle system, it does not go beyond North Adams and has

similar limitations on evening activities: the last College-operated Sunday shuttle returns at 5:55 p.m.

For students hoping to explore resources in the local area, then, transportation options are limited to daytime use of BRTA or college-provided transportation for select student activities. This does not provide room for attending an evening concert at MASS MoCA, catching a Sunday train on the Pittsfield Amtrak or grabbing essentials at Stop & Shop after the class day has ended. Limited public transportation options mean that there is little space for students to use our surrounding resources as students.

Granted, Williamstown is a small community; a robust public transportation system shouldn’t be expected.

But for the college community, further efforts should be made to connect students with their surrounding area. Any off-campus event publicized on Daily Messages should include a note describing where the event is and provide a suggested public transportation route to get there; if there is no public transportation available to the event at that time, the postings should also include on-campus resources that would allow for students to request transportation.

Additionally, the College shuttle system should be expanded beyond Sunday shuttles; through a broadening of the shuttle system, the need for public transportation after 5:30 p.m. could be easily resolved. Even a shuttle that runs to Stop & Shop on weekday evenings would be a vast improvement for students. Most of all, though, the conversation around local opportunities should not be contingent on whether one has a car on campus, has signed up for ZipCar or is hoping for College transportation: we should be able to focus on the events themselves, without having to worry about transportation logistics.

I didn’t make it to The Glass Menagerie in the end. But that doesn’t mean we can’t improve access and infrastructure to connect students to future opportunities. After all, Ragtag Theatre’s Cinderella is playing in Pittsfield next month, and I’m not about to miss the show.

Kristen Altman ’22 is from Killingworth, Conn. Her major is undecided.

DARIN LI ’21

Respecting a cappella performances On audience conduct during Mountain Day events

By MANUEL MATOS On Mountain Day, a massive crowd formed in front of Paresky around 9 a.m. Within the lot, there were voices joyously celebrating their successful Mountain Day roulettes. Some complained about their suitemates who refused to accompany them to Stony Ledge later that day. Others discussed how they felt about the article published a week earlier about changing campus perceptions of Mountain Day (“Stony Ledge is not Mountain Day: On changing campus dialogue and perceptions of Mountain Day,” Oct. 3, 2018 ). A few actually bothered to ask their friends if they felt pressured to join them on their hikes. Soon enough, leaders from the Williams Outing Club urged the masses to move forward. Groups both big and small shuffled up the trail to Stone Hill.

Upon finally reaching the top, they ate doughnuts and drank apple cider and talked about the midterms before them, while they waited for … I honestly don’t know what they were waiting for.

I can’t say that I know what they were waiting for because when announcers tried to call attention to the Octet and other music groups invited to perform that day, no one could really hear anything. The fall wind carrying their voices away sure didn’t help, but that wasn’t their main source of strife – it was the audience members who didn’t want to stop talking. Not even our president was safe from their muttering, with most of her speech going unheard. Some of the more conscientious audience members near the front kept shushing others in the back. But this only seemed to embolden the perpetrators to speak more softly, who apparently didn’t think or

care about whether others were whispering too. Inevitably, the whispers were louder than a capella members struggling to sing against the wind.

This wasn’t a particularly noisy audience, at least Mountain Day-wise.

There’s a reason why the Octet blew a conch shell at the beginning of their performance. Unless they intentionally wanted to blow everyone’s ears off, I suspect they did so because it allowed them to draw the undivided attention of an audience they already suspected would be mostly apathetic. Part of their success can be attributed to being one of the music groups thought to have a “good reputation” around campus. While the audience was relatively quiet for the Octet, other groups didn’t get much help from anyone. The effects of this indifference were felt much more strongly on Stony Ledge. Traditionally, once everyone has reached the top a moment of silence is held for the community to envelop themselves in the sounds of nature. To say there were even ten seconds of silence this year would be a stretch.

This sort of behavior is unacceptable.

I’m not sure whether people kept talking during performances because they didn’t care about them or because they gave up on trying to hear anything. The fact remains that everyone who performs on campus deserves the same amount of dignity and respect. Their hard work deserves to be recognized with at least some degree of quietness.

Yet, I don’t believe this behavior necessarily comes solely from self-centeredness. Some of the problem lies, I think, in the social expectation of attending Mountain Day events. As much as I hate to admit this as an a cappella group member, a number of people don’t care

about hearing our groups sing. Some people only go on the hikes because members of the community frame these events as something that’s expected for them to do during Mountain Day. Since what they really want is to share in some sort of joint social experience with their fellow Ephs, they would rather spend the time talking instead of trying to listen to wind torn singing.

Of course, this isn’t the case for everyone. Most simply use the day as an excuse to partake in activities they love, but don’t have time for during school; others just want some of that good ol’ cider at the top. Yet why would you go up a mountain for cider when you can get it in front of Paresky? Why would you go hiking with a massive crowd covering your view instead of during the weekend or reading period?

If we want Mountain Day events to be respected, we have to change our attitudes around them. We have to realize that the traditional hikes to Stone Hill and Stony Ledge are supposed to connect us with the outdoors, not social obligations. In other words, if someone doesn’t enjoy hiking and doesn’t want to hear anyone perform, don’t pressure them to go to these events. If you don’t want to go but everyone else you know does, encourage your friends to hang out with you at some other point during the day. If you want to see your friends perform, by all means go for it, but don’t interrupt or disrespect others’ performances. If moments of silence make you uncomfortable, take a moment to listen – you will hear the beauty that’s being drowned out.

Manuel Matos ’21 is from Caracas, Venezuela. His major is undecided.

NEWS 4

October 24, 2018

The Williams Record

Rabbi Mike Moskowitz speaks on trans rights

By RACHEL LEVIN EXECUTIVE EDITOR Last Thursday, Rabbi Mike Moskowitz, a rabbi at Congregation Beit Simchat Torah (CBST) in Manhattan, spoke to a group gathered for lunch in the Jewish Religious Center.

During the talk, titled “Trans Inclusivity and Yes on 3,” Moskowitz spoke about the ways in which Judaism can become more gender inclusive. This event was supported by Congregation Beth Israel in North Adams, Knesset Israel in Pittsfield and the Williams College Jewish Association.

The conversation began with a discussion of the misleading wording for Question 3 on the Massachusetts November ballot. Voting “yes” would maintain anti-discrimination policies for trans people while voting “no" would repeal these protections. This is what brought Moskowitz to Massachusetts, and the topic served as an important backdrop for the conversation that followed.

“I only started thinking about gender about three years ago, when someone in my family said to me, ‘I’m not a girl, I’m a boy,’” Moskowitz began.

“And having since obsessively thought about gender, I can tell you honestly that I’ve reached what I think is a very evolved position of know-ing that I just don’t know.” Moskowitz’s journey with exploring gender in Judaism continued while he was a rabbi at Columbia, until he was fired for publicly taking a stance supporting trans Jewish students. This led to his involvement in broader social justice movements and his arrest for civil disobedience while fighting against the repeal of DACA in January. It was actually through this arrest that he got his present job at CBST, allowing him to participate in advocacy work publicly with institutional support.

After speaking about his background, he dove into Jew-

ish texts and the Hebrew language to find ways in which Judaism supports all genders.

“Who was the first person to transition in the Hebrew bible?” he asked the group. Confused faces stared back at him.

“Adam,” he said. “Adam is created as one person, with the different genders, because the verse speaks about [Adam] in the plural.” It is from Adam that the binaries, male and female, were created, Moskowitz said.

Moskowitz also discussed the biblical story of Noah, who builds an ark to escape the flood that destroys humanity. “I think that Noah’s ark is a wonderful framing and modeling of a failed allyship,” he said, pun intended. Noah saves himself, his family and some animals, but “he is not at all concerned with what is happening in the world around him,” Moskowitz said.

According to Moskowitz’s interpretation, to be an ally is to not just save or care about oneself, but to also be in tune with what is happening in the surrounding world, and if it is bad, to do something about it.

Moskowitz also discussed the ways in which one needs to be careful when being an ally.

“I think it’s important not to valorize allyship,” Moskowitz said. “Allyships exist because the world is broken. If people could see the most pronounced identity of any human being as being created in the image of the divine, and we didn’t dehumanize people, and we didn’t subjugate and oppress then there wouldn’t be a need [for allyship] because everyone would be respected and seen for who they are.” This was a theme that carried throughout Moskowitz’s talk. Moskowitz recognized that he is an ally because the world needs him to be, but if the world was an accept-ing place and did not need him to be an ally, he would be happy with that.

The second half of his talk delved deeper into how to define gender and considered

how a divine being can or cannot be gendered. The talk raised the question, where does gender lie in the divine?

Moskowitz argued that gender may lie in a person’s soul.

“If gender does exist on a soul level,” he said, “and we have all of the different pieces of all of the different souls in all of the different blends, it might provide a new kind of portal into having conversations about the

kind of spiritual fluidity that I think we all have.”

Moskowitz also pointed out that much of gender construction in Judaism was created by straight, white, cisgender male rabbis, and thus was not created by anyone who may be marginalized. There are still many rabbis who believe in traditional gender roles within Judaism, but on the other end, there are also rab-

bis who have not drawn any lines regarding gender.

“I think it’s important for cis[gender] men to use the word ‘identify,’” Moskowitz said. “I think it’s im-portant for cis[gender] people to use the word ‘identify.’ I think it’s important for married people to use the word ‘partner.’ I think it’s important for people who present as cis[gender], whatever that might look like, to talk about, ‘my pro-

nouns are.’” Moskowitz argued that this would normalize these terms and actions in a way that could elevate those who had been marginalized.

Throughout his talk, Moskowitz emphasized that this was his interpretation of Judaism and Jewish texts, and that he is still curious and still expanding his understanding, highlighting the importance of always being open and willing to listen.

RACHEL LEVIN/EXECUTIVE EDITOR.

Rabbi Mike Moskowitz discussed the intersection of transgender rights and Judaism. He considers himself an ally of the LGBT+ community.

(How)DoDoyou you Claim Claim Williams?

(How) Williams?

Monday 10-15-18 7:17 p.m., Lasell: Officers met with an athletic facility monitor concerning an issue with a student and access to the fitness center.

Tuesday 10-16-18 2:02 a.m., Faculty House: Officers responded to a report from the Williamstown Police Department (WPD) of a large tree branch that had fallen.

of safety and environmental compliance that there was an issue involving a gas leak at the off-campus facility on Simonds Road. The on-call mechanical tradesperson was contacted, and he advised that Berkshire Gas was already on the way.

10:55 p.m., Perry House: Officers were dispatched in response to a report of someone setting off fireworks.

Saturday 10-20-18

Wednesday 10-17-18 10:25 p.m., Currier Quad: An officer responded to a report of an ongoing problem with students smoking in an unoccupied but unlocked room.

1/31/19 1/31/19

11:40 p.m., Morgan Hall: Officers responded to a tipline submission that did not specify a complaint, just a location.

The anonymous complaint read, “Morgan basement right now.” Upon arrival, there was a small group of students at the kitchen table playing a card game. They were informed of the complaint.

Thursday 10-18-18

Proposals due due November 9 9 Proposals November claiming.williams.edu claiming.williams.edu On January 31, 2019 ClaimingWilliams Williams Day encourage the college com- comOn January 31, 2019 Claiming Daywill will encourage the college to reflect on the different ways ways underrepresented and underserved munitymunity to reflect on the different underrepresented and underserved groups have advocated for representation, support, and respect at a private, groups have advocated for representation, support, and respect at a private, wealthy, white-majority institution. We proposals that that highlight ways ways wealthy, white-majority institution.

Weseek seek proposals highlight Williams be inclusiveand andaccountable accountable to to itsits various communities, Williams can can be inclusive various communities, on campus and beyond. on campus and beyond.

10:25 a.m., St. John’s Church: Officers responded to a report of suspicious activity on Park Street. The caller stated that he noticed a man hiding near the bushes wearing what he described to be a mask constructed of metal. WPD was also notified. This turned out to be a theatre class exercise.

12:30 a.m., Sage Hall: Officers were dispatched to respond to a non-student who was intoxicated. Northern Berkshire Emergency Medical Services responded and transported the person to Berkshire Medical Center North.

5:33 p.m., 5:47 p.m., The power across the whole campus went out for approximately 10 seconds each time. Multiple alarms were received at Campus Safety and Security (CSS) dispatch. Power outage protocol was put into effect. The on-call electrical tradesperson and mechanical tradesperson were called and responded to campus to check the critical mechanical system. Extra CSS staff was called. Information Technology was contacted to check various systems. The Science Center safety manager was contacted to have sensitive equipment and freezers in labs checked. Facility operations and the utilities engineer were informed of the outages.

Sunday 10-21-18

10:41 a.m., Williams Hall: Officers responded to a report of a stolen sign in a common room. An officer responded and removed the sign.

12:53 a.m., Mission Park: Officers responded to perform a wellbeing check on a student at the request of a concerned student friend.

Friday 10-19-18 3:32 p.m., Library Shelving Facility: Officers responded to a report from the manager

3:30 p.m., Children’s Center: Officers responded to an intrusion alarm, caused by staff, originating in the lobby.

October 24, 2018

NEWS 5

The Williams Record

Matt Carter receives NIH grant to study hunger

By MAE BURRIS-WELLS STAFF WRITER In Assistant Professor of Biology Matt Carter’s lab, cutting edge breakthroughs can happen entirely by accident. “[My student and I] were following up on another study and we found this one brain region that seemed to be very active after an animal ate a big meal,” said Carter.

The region of the brain is called the parasubthalamic nucleus (PSTN), and in the two years since they discovered it, Carter and his students have been performing preliminary research towards the ultimate goal of determining its relationship to appetite suppression and general eating behavior.

In September, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) awarded Carter a $369,000 grant to conduct research on PSTN neurons and their role in regulating food intake.

The grant will cover three years of research and includes funds for equipment, travel and improvements to the College’s science facilities. Its primary aim is to catalyze the groundbreaking research that Carter’s lab stumbled into two years ago.

“Right now, it’s the year 2018 and we still don’t have a full understanding of why a person feels hungry or feels full,” said Carter. “Even just to have the basic blueprints of ‘how does hunger work?’ would be enormously helpful for a number of diseases and understanding human behavior in general.”

The experiments that Carter’s lab performs at the College explore instinctual animal behaviors, such as sleeping, eating and drinking. While they might seem simple because of their reflexivity, these behaviors are in fact controlled by complex mechanisms in the brain.

Olivia Barnhill ’19 was inspired to join Carter’s lab the fall of her junior year, when she was taking his 300-level “Neural Systems and Circuits” class. “The things that he talks about in his class are the work that he’s actually doing in his lab,” Barnhill

said. “I found it incredibly interesting and something that I would potentially want to do for a career after school.” For her senior thesis, Barnhill is working on the PSTN study, specifically with the experimental manipulation of PSTN neurons

which committee they were most interested in being part of, thus concentrating their energies and interests into programs they feel more excited about,” Polidoro and LeaheyHays said. “Overall, it is our hope that these structural enhancements will provide a more guided and passionate approach to the programmatic efforts of the Neighborhood Leadership Team.”

Anna Sun ’19, the current HC of Prospect and a HC for the past three years, explained her responsibilities for this year as a member of WAD. “We were informed of these new programming responsibilities over the summer, so I wasn’t expecting the increased time commitment or the responsibility of all-campus programming,” she said. “That being said, I've planned two events so far (Spa Night and Paint and Cider); they went well and I enjoyed planning them in the end.”

lates or suppresses the activity of the neuron it inhabits.

Carter’s lab has been working out how to plant these genes selectively in the brains of mice so that only their appetite-suppressing PSTN neurons are affected by light.

A small fiber-optic cable im-

KATIE BRULE/PHOTO EDITOR This fall, the NIH awarded Assistant Professor of Biology Matt Carter a $369,000 grant to continue his research on appetite suppression and eating behaviors.

HC responsibilities shift CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

in mice through a technique called optogenetics. Optogenetics uses light to control neuron activity. The process starts by placing a gene that encodes for a light-sensitive protein into a cell. When light is shined on the protein, it reacts and either stimu-

In addition to planning events, HCs are still expected to make residence life more convenient for students in ways such as maintaining the house bulletin board, addressing house damage and cleaning issues and resolving residential complaints.

HCs are also required to attend training to prepare them for their job. As a part of this training, HCs are required to arrive to school two weeks before the fall semester begins.

The intensive five-day program includes conflict resolution training, bystander training, diversity and inclusion training and meetings with administrative departments including campus safety and security, facilities, environmental safety and accessible education to fully equip HCs for their positions.

There has been discussion about implementing incentives for their work, such as stipends or conveniently located parking lots. This could further emphasize the responsibilities of HCs and keep them accountable, as

there have been problems in the past with HCs neglecting their duties.

Although being a HC is demanding, some HCs argue that there are benefits from taking on the role that cannot be measured by compensation. “Although not all residents choose to participate in house events, it makes me happy when people reach out to me and have a good time at events,” Sun said.

“When I was a sophomore, conflict resolution and resolving residential complaints were stressful tasks at first, but I learned to be assertive and confident in my responsibilities and ability to resolve issues.

I think being an HC suits me because I like to decorate, bake and plan events, and I care about making the house a nicer place to live.”

Leahey-Hays said. “Overall, it is our hope that these structural enhancements will provide a more guided and passionate approach to the programmatic efforts of the Neighborhood Leadership Team.”

PHOTO COURTESY OF JILLIAN JENKIN. The neighborhood leadership team structure has undergone programatic changes, affecting housing coordinators.

planted in the mouse’s head allows it to move freely and painlessly while allowing the experimenters to shine light into its brain and turn the relevant neurons on and off.

Gaining this control over neuron activity is crucial to answering major questions about the role of PSTN neurons in feeding behavior. “If you have a hungry mouse and then all of a sudden you turn on this appetite-suppression center, will that suppress the mouse’s appetite and get it to stop eating?” asked Carter.

“Or, if you have a full mouse and it’s done eating and you inhibit this area, will it all of a sudden keep eating because it doesn’t feel full anymore?”

Any medical applications coming out of the research are hypothetical at this point, but Carter is hopeful about the study’s potential for intervention in drug-induced appetite suppression.

“People lose weight on lots of pharmaceutical treatments like chemotherapy because one of the side effects is appetite suppression,” said Carter. “So if you could shut off appetite suppression in the face of those treatments, then people could get the treatments they need without losing an extraordinary amount of body weight.”

Barnhill appreciates that the rigor and the facilities of Carter’s lab rival those of graduate and postgraduate programs; in fact, they were what drew her to the lab initially. “The fact that I could get an experience working with these really cool tools that are being used in biotech companies, I thought ‘I can’t pass that up.’”

Carter also made sure to stress the impact of student involvement in this groundbreaking work. “If students had missed this, then I never would have known about it,” he said.

IN OTHER IVORY TOWERS NEWS ACROSS HIGHER EDUCATION

By REBECCA TAUBER NEWS EDITOR Affirmative action trial challenges Harvard’s admissions system On Monday, Oct. 15, a trial began against Harvard regarding its affirmative action practices (“Michael Wang ’17 takes part in advocacy related to anti-Asian discrimination lawsuit,” Oct. 17, 2018). The plaintiffs began their case by arguing that antiAsian discrimination occurs in Harvard’s admissions process.

The trial proceedings since have brought to light the inner workings of Harvard’s admissions committee meetings. Trial documents included application files and emails between Harvard Dean of Admissions William Fitzsimmons and donors.

These documents have revealed Harvard’s rating system for applicants, which assigns students a number from one to six, corresponding to the likelihood an applicant will gain admission, with one being the most likely. This rating is coupled with a “personal rating” and a written description of the applicant by the admissions officer. The plaintiffs argued that Asian Americans unfairly receive lower personal ratings. However, while testifying, Fitzsimmons suggested that applicants may receive lower ratings due to impersonal letters of recommendation.

The New York Times also described specific terminology defined through the trial: “‘Tips’ are bumps given to applicants, the ‘dean’s interest list’ is a compendium of applicants with clout and the ‘Z-list’ is a sort of back door into the college for students who are borderline academically.” These documents also brought up how Harvard specifically seeks to draw applicants from rural areas to get students from a larger variety of geographic backgrounds, which is said to largely consist of students who identify racially as “white” and “other.” While re-

leasing this information during the trial revealed admissions secrets, Harvard ultimately decided that divulging these details would help its case.

Survey suggests higher education administrators largely left wing Samuel Abrams, professor of politics at Sarah Lawrence, conducted research regarding the politics of administrators at a variety of colleges and universities. The survey gathered information about political affiliations from 900 people in roles that work with students.

The National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago helped Abrams create the group that was surveyed. Inside Higher Ed summarized the results: “Abrams found that liberal student affairs leaders outnumbered conservatives 12 to one, with only six percent of administrators indicating they were conservative, versus 71 percent identifying as liberal or very liberal.” Abrams conducted the survey to consider the effect the politics of administrators have on a college or university.

In an op-ed in The New York Times, Abrams labeled himself as “a conservative-leaning professor who has long promoted a diversity of viewpoints.” He explained that the lack of diversity in higher education administration worried him and prompted his research due to the large role administration plays in students’ lives outside the classroom.

Trump administration issues student visa notice Last week, the Trump administration put out a notice describing its plan to propose a maximum stay time for international students and other groups of people with nonimmigrant visas. The administration expects to introduce this plan,

titled “Establishing a Maximum Period of Authorized Stay for F-1 and Other Nonimmigrants,” in September 2019. The rule, posted on the government’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs website, states, “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will propose to modify the period of authorized stay for certain categories of nonimmigrants traveling to the United States from ‘duration status’ and to replace such with a maximum period of authorized stay, and options for extensions, for each applicable visa category.” Currently, international students’ visas provide them with “duration status,” which allows them to remain in the United States as long as they hold the statuses of students. This allows international students to study at multiple institutions throughout their academic career. However, this rule, if implemented, would create a maximum time for those with F-1 student visas, with the opportunity for extensions. The rule does not specify the maximum length of these periods of stay.

The government information regarding the rule also provides a “statement of need” describing the administration’s justification behind the proposed change. “The failure to provide certain categories of nonimmigrants with specific dates for their authorized periods of stay can cause confusion over how long they may lawfully remain in the United States and has complicated the efforts to reduce overstay rates for nonimmigrant students,” the notice states. In terms of the effect of the rule, the notice states that “ICE is in the process of assessing the costs and benefits.” This change could potentially affect colleges and universities’ recruitment of international students, which declined by 5.5 percent this past year after many consecutive years of growth.

FEATURES 6

The Williams Record

October 24, 2018

One in Two Thousand

By HAEON YOON OPINIONS EDITOR I first met Marshall in Fitch House’s basement when he was brewing a cranberry concoction. I later found out that he was my suitemate’s lab partner. I learned more about him and his various obsessions when I got to sit in on numerous conversations about rocks, rivers and tubs of peanut butter.

Marshall, I always see you working on geoscience projects in Goodrich! Can you tell me a little about that?

Yes, I’m a geos [geosciences] kid now. I picked it up last semester after taking one geos course.

I am still a physics major, and I was previously an [environmental studies] major, but the geos major is just much more fun. You get to go outside sometimes for a long, long time on Sunday mornings in freezing cold rivers. I like to call my major “rocks and rockets.”

Tell me about some of your food obsessions.

Oh boy. Well, I guess my big one was freshman year where I really rallied hard to get peanut butter. I tried to take one of those large tubs from Mission and walk out with it because I didn’t understand the rules of the dining halls at the time. So I tried to walk up the stairs and they were like, “You can’t take that.”

So I put it back. I started sending some emails to dining services about how I could acquire my own peanut butter. Next thing I know, within two weeks, I’m meeting with the head of dining services regarding my peanut butter usage. A lot of stuff happens, and they put a jar of peanut butter for me in the fridge in the back of Paresky that I could

go to any time. They also just gave me jars of peanut butter – like the head chef here pretty much walked me to the basement of Paresky and handed me jars of peanut butter. Last year, I was meeting with dining services again for a completely different thing, and they remembered me as “the peanut butter kid.” They didn’t remember my name; they just knew I was “the peanut butter kid.” So that one really stuck with me. Other than that, I have my food Twitter. I don’t know if there’s really any obsession here.

I have a lot of food restrictions – I’m celiac and lactose intolerant and vegetarian – and so that kind of requires you to get creative with your food. Especially when I’m home, I just have base supplies of bean and corn, and I just need to put those in different ways. Those are most of my “Eat Marshall Eat” [Twitter account] creations.

Don’t you have a listserv dedicated to nuts?

It started my freshman year, where I had a lot of things that I wanted to send out in email chains because I couldn’t text stuff quick enough. And on study breaks you check your email, and the next thing you know you’re writing an email. I realized that it’s really easy to just email and ask for a listserv. Next thing I know, I have a listserv. I think the description is like, “a discussion thread for trees, shrubs and other related matters.” But I don’t think we’ve ever talked about trees or shrubs. The first post was nuts. I sent a lot of links to nut oils. But since then, the conversations vary. It’s usually just when I find something interesting or exciting, I send it. When I got that video from Maud on Mountain Day, I sent that there because I didn’t know where else to post it. I sometimes just send updates when I get bored

MARSHALL BORRUS ’20

KATIE BRULE/PHOTO EDITOR MARSHALL'S HOMETOWN BRANFORD, CONN.

MARSHALLS'S RESIDENCE FITCH HOUSE

in the library. Last year, I sent a tea request where I was working in the library for like three days straight, and I asked people to just bring me tea, and within a day I had like 30 packets of tea.

It was great.

That’s a great group of people. And Maud sent you a video?

Because I was convinced it was Mountain Day, I stopped doing my work and went to Sawyer to pester people and make them stop doing their work. There I was typing away, and I was like, “How do I spend this time fruitfully?” And I was reminiscing and looking at Adam Falk’s videos. Well, Ari [Ball-Burack ’19]’s remix video of Adam Falk.

I was trying to find the original, and the original doesn’t exist

MARSHALL'S LATEST HOBBY MAKING KOMBUCHA

anymore because they took it down from the president’s page.

And so the “mountains greet us in their sun-dappled splendor” doesn’t exist anymore. I was, you know, heartbroken. This cultural institution is just, you know, vanished. So I emailed Maud with a lengthy email pleading and praying for her to make a similar or equivalent video the morning of Mountain Day when she woke up, in her kitchen preferably, because that’s where Adam Falk did his. And I wake up at 6:30 a.m. to this seven second video from Maud just wishing me a happy mountain day, and I was just dumbfounded.

You also hold some uncontested world records?

They are contested. [Laughs.]

So, I have the fastest 200-me-

ter race without taking a breath, or I guess, while holding my breath. There’s one other video on YouTube which contests it, but it’s this 60 maybe 70-year-old guy just trucking around the track in like a solid 50 seconds, which when you consider it, that’s a long time to hold your breath. So props to him, but I did him one better, and no one has topped me yet, so I hold the world record at this point. Another one was where I challenged Ian Mook [’18] last year. We were eating oranges, and I was trying to scarf it down in one bite, and then I recorded it and posted it. If you look on YouTube, there’s no faster time of someone eating an orange.

Yeah, it’s a “world record.”

I’ve heard that you make soap in your free time. How does that work?

I have a lot of hobbies. I pick up hobbies quick and drop them quicker. So last year, I got into soap making – I think I just needed soap at that point – but it turns out, it’s really easy to make soap. You just mix a bunch of oil with lye and within six weeks you have soap. But the issue is I was funding all of this on my TA pay check. I was a full-time TA at the time, but I couldn’t, you know, spend it all on soap. I spent 10- to 20-dollars a week on soap materials, and eight weeks into the process, I’ve amassed two boxes worth of soap oils and fragrances and weird things like gloves and goggles and lye and Pyrex mixing bowls and IR [infrared] thermometers. So, I made soap.

And you would say this is a better alternative than going to Stop & Shop?

[Laughs.] I don’t gain efficiency, and I’m not saving money. This is really expensive soap when you

consider labor costs and all that.

It’s also not great soap either; you know, it smells like rest-stop bathrooms and there’s not much to it. But it works!

Aside from soap, are you experimenting with anything else at the moment?

I got a scoby last night. It’s a symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast. It’s what you use to make kombucha. I can make homemade kombucha now. I did it in like eighth grade where I made one batch of kombucha, and then my scoby died. [Laughs.]

I’m looking to get restarted.

Before we end, you’ve been reading Harry Potter in front of Paresky lately.

What do you enjoy about it?

What a wholesome question.

This is somewhat tied to my YouTube channel, but I really like doing things for a long period of time. I’ve read an entire book in one sitting on livestream before just like in my basement. I read The Time Machine by H.G. Wells for just four and a half hours, and it’s such a different experience than just reading a book. And then I’m part of this new group now which plans fun things – WAFFLES [Williams Anarchists for Fun and Lighthearted Surprises]. One of the ideas was to read Harry Potter out loud, and I quickly hopped on it. It kind of feels like you’re a really good storyteller and you don’t need to come up with the story. It’s all the perks of storytelling, and you’re guaranteed that it’s good, because it’s Harry Potter.

Which Hogwarts house do you identify with?

Hufflepuff and Slytherin are diametrically opposed, but if you could draw a small circle between the two, that’s where I would be.

Just Visiting: Greta Snyder studies intersection of ecology and race

By SOFIE JONES STAFF WRITER

PHOTO COURTESY OF WILLIAMS COLLEGE.

At first-gen orientation during First Days, students collectively sign a banner with their names and a word.

First-gen students navigate the College

By JULIA CHIANG STAFF WRITER Between First Days presentations and admissions’ information sessions, being the first person of one’s immediate family to attend a four-year institution, or “first-gen,” is a label that most hear about, but few are actually privy to. Thus, this label deserves some clarification on what the first-gen experience is truly like – or not like – for the students who make up approximately 16 percent of the College’s enrollment.

For many first-gen students, the path to the College is filled with obstacles. Applying to college, for example, was sometimes exhausting due to a lack of resources. Argenis Herrera ’22 said that his high school, though helpful when applying to state schools, had little knowledge of liberal arts institutions. “They didn’t really know how to help me get here,” Herrera said.

Kayla Han ’22 said that her high school helped students prepare for the ACT, but the goal was to “help [students] get a 20, since going to a higher institution at all was an achievement at my school.” In addition, the most obvious resource for many high schoolers – parents or guardians – were unavailable to offer assistance, from filling out financial aid forms to tackling college essay prompts.

“My parents always assumed that a college application is just one essay that you turned in to every single college,” Han said.

“They also didn’t know the answers to questions about numbers and financial documents.”

But from here, their demanding journey has only just begun.

Students whose parents have attended college not only have an expectation for what the experience will be like, but also have parents who understood the difficult transition to college life.

For first-gen students, according to Associate Dean of the College April Ruiz, the story can be different. “They are taking a path that’s different from their family, home community, and getting to a place like [the College] where it seems like everyone has already understood what this would be like,” she said.

Michelle Lopez ’21, a First-Gen Pre-Orientation Leader who advised the first-gens of the class of 2022, agreed. “Communicating with my family who don’t really understand what going to college is like is still difficult, even as a sophomore,” she said.

Though many first-gen students share similar experiences, often of feeling different or alone, each student also has their own story to share. First-gen students sign their names and write a word on a banner during orientation. Students chose words that resonated with them, some reflecting the great costs that families have taken to help first-gen students get to college. For Han, it was “sacrifice:” her father, a refugee from the Vietnam War, first fled to Thailand before arriving in the United States. “Currently he and my mom both work six days a week. But because my mom works at night and my dad works during the day, they aren’t able to see each other much, but they still work overtime to help pay for college.”

Other problems may still arise after the first few semesters.

“Imposter syndrome, centering around the idea of someone feeling like a fraud, is still something that comes up from time to time,” Lopez said. “But for the most part, I’ve come to terms with most of the issues that I had during my first year, and now it’s my turn to help new first-gen students. ” Like Lopez, many first-gen leaders feel compelled to help the next generation of firstgen students. First-Gen Leader Christopher Ochoa ’20 said that his time at the College has entailed deep personal questioning. Now as a junior, he jumped at the chance to be a leader because he appreciated the role that he could have to first-years.

“I look back and say, ‘Wow, I wish someone had said that to me,’ or had shared ideas or practices that I either went without because no one had advocated it to me or just because I didn’t hear it enough. I wanted to be the person to pass that down to the new frosh who have so much potential,” Ochoa said.

The journey it takes to arrive at the College can be difficult, but often this very experience makes them uniquely capable to handle more challenges down the road, Ruiz said. “People outside the community talk about first-gen students being insufficient. But first-gen students have a lot of grit and are brave.

They have put themselves away from the path of their family, and that takes a whole lot of courage. So often it’s our firstgen students that are coming from a position of strength.”

This fall, Greta Snyder began her three-year tenure as a visiting assistant professor of women’s, gender and sexuality studies [WGSS], marking her return to the United States. after spending five years abroad teaching at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand. Although her love for New Zealand runs deep, Snyder is excited to be back in her home country and is eager to get involved on campus. Snyder’s courses this year, three of them in the WGSS department and one in political science, focus around questions of social ecology, the functions of societal power and structural inequalities.

Snyder, who grew up in a small town in Maryland, first became interested in issues of structural injustice and racial disparity in high school when she had the opportunity to work with communities from urban Baltimore. This experience, she said, led her to study political science and theory at Haverford. “I found that political theory gave me particularly powerful tools to both understand the roots of those inequities and also to think about how transformation might occur,” she said.

Her work as a professor and researcher of political theory and WGSS centers around the notion that changes can occur.

“It asks you to dream a better world, that's sort of what you’re expected to do,” she said.

“Thinking about how things ought to be, that isn’t necessarily something you’re empowered to do in other disciplines.”

Snyder has two main research projects at the moment. The first focuses on how ecology and race inequality intersect. “I’m interested in the way that thinking ecologically might inform or invigorate or shift the way that we think about race and racial inequity,” she said.

She is also exploring how power is conceptualized in transnational activism in a second research project. Snyder’s concern is how power is conceived based on what actors and actions are deemed most important and worthwhile.

While her academic interests have remained constant, the College’s environment is quite literally a world away from the Victoria University of Wellington where she worked for five years. The differing class sizes, Snyder said, are something she is still getting used to. In one of Snyder’s classes this semester, there are three students. This, she said, is a dramatic change from the 80- to 350-person lecture classes she taught at Victoria University.

This move to a liberal arts college is, in fact, part of what interested Snyder in coming to the

College. She attended Haverford, another small liberal arts college, and expressed excitement to “rediscover” a similar environment. “This is a kind of experience I know from student perspective,” she said.

Outside of the classroom, Snyder is adjusting to life in Williamstown. She and her partner, Ben Snyder, who is also new to the College’s faculty as an assistant professor of sociology, are very much enjoying life in the Berkshires thus far.

Alongside their son Elliot, who will be two at the end of October, the Snyders have been attending sports games, visiting nearby farms and exploring all the area has to offer.

The most surprising part of the move so far, said Snyder, was running into an old friend on Spring Street during her first weekend in Williamstown. “I was like, who could be yelling my name? We had just moved from New Zealand!” she said.

It was, it turns out, Katie Hart, assistant professor of chemistry and a friend from Haverford whom Snyder had not seen in 15 years. The two found themselves at the same college with children who are the same age, a decade and a half later. “[Williamstown is] small but still offers unexpected connections,” Snyder said. “Maybe you could say that’s the magic of small towns, right?”

KATIE BRULE/PHOTO EDITOR

Greta Snyder is a visiting assistant professor in the WGSS department for the next three years.

October 24, 2018

7 FEATURES

The Williams Record

Cari Naftali speaks on humanitarian refugee work in Greece

By SHAHEEN CURRIMJEE EXECUTIVE EDITOR It is nightfall in Lesbos, Greece. The temperature drops below 45 degrees. As the frigid water laps up against the rocks, a receding wave leaves behind the remains of a faulty life vest. Then, a small rubber dinghy – intended for 20 people, yet in actuality crowded by over 60 – appears over the horizon. A group of humanitarian volunteers waiting on the beach rush to the shore.

These refugees were lucky; they had survived traveling over the treacherous waters of the Aegean Sea for days without food. But their journey had only just begun.

Last Friday, on National Refugee Shabbat, the Williams College Jewish Association (WCJA) and Refugee Advocates: No Lost Generation (NLG) invited one of these volunteers, Cari Naftali from Stockbridge, Mass., to share her experiences. “[This Shabbat] is loosely organized by the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society … when congregations around the country create a shabbat experience dedicated to refugees,” Emma Lezberg ’20, Tzedek (community service) coordinator for WCJA and chair of NLG, said. The Parsha (the weekly Torah reading) for this Shabbat was Lech Lecha, which describes the experiences of Jewish people wandering in search of freedom, bringing to mind today’s global refugee crisis. “[We should] recommit ourselves more broadly to welcoming the stranger in whatever form that stranger comes – all ha’ivrim, all the people who cross over,” Lezberg said.

SHAHEEN CURRIMJEE/EXECUTIVE EDITOR

The Williams College Jewish Association partnered with Refugee Advocates: No Lost Generation to invite Naftali to speak this past Shabbat.

In an interview before the dinner, Naftali noted that she felt compelled to lend a hand to humanitarian groups after closely following the refugee crisis. In 2015, she raised enough funds to cover her travel expenses and found herself in the thick of the Syrian refugee crisis in Lesbos. For three and a half weeks, she volunteered with a Swedish organization called Lighthouse Relief.

Naftali explained that this was her most intense experience.

“It was my first direct exposure with this level of suffering in the world,” Naftali said.

Each day saw the arrival of thousands of refugees – Syr-

ians as well as Afghanis, Iraqis and Iranians – soaking wet, suffering from hypothermia and other significant wounds.

“Rarely anyone spoke English,” Naftali said, explaining the language barrier. “Once in a while there would be a young man who could speak English and translate, but [the situation] was chaos, and we were just scrambling to get people dry and warm.”

Due to the nature of the situation, there was no time or room to have philosophical or religious discussions with the other volunteers; however, Naftali found this significant. “Although we were

volunteers from all over the world with different religions, languages and cultures, we were all volunteers,” Naftali said. “We came there for the common purpose of wanting to help people.” There were only a handful of volunteers on the island, all of whom were running on a few hours of sleep. “As horrific as the situation was, the cooperation was amazing, and it gave me hope to be working together with these people.”

On her second trip, Naftali volunteered on the Macedonian border, specifically helping mothers increase their milk production for

breastfeeding. “Most people do not think about [infant feeding], but it is an important topic because in war, a baby who is bottle-fed is in danger of becoming very sick and dying,” she explained.

Not only is infant formula expensive, but, due to unsanitary conditions, it is difficult to make safely.

Where do these refugees end up? Most, if not all, believed that their stay in Lesbos was temporary, and up until 2015, they were able to move toward the opportunities they had hoped to find in Europe.

But in 2016, Europe and Turkey struck a deal to close the

border. “Since then, thousands of refugees have been stuck in overcrowded and inadequate camps on the island,” Naftali said. “And they keep coming in.”

The lack of U.S. coverage adds to the misunderstanding of the scope of the problem. Naftali noted that while the media underreports the plight of these refugees, the crisis continues.

“Doctors Without Borders declared a state of emergency [for] Moria refugee camp in Lesbos because both mental and physical conditions have gotten so out of control,” she said. These refugees suffer multiple layers of trauma, Naftali said, as a result of “escaping the war, horrific ocean travel, abuse from smugglers and being confined in these inhumane camps with no hope of getting out.”

Since 2015, Naftali has traveled to Greece three times to work firsthand with refugees.

Her work has affected her deeply, in part inspiring her to achieve certification as a lactation counselor. Naftali currently helps remotely; she stays in contact with some of the refugee families, and she shares stories of her experiences with organizations.

We are in the midst of the largest humanitarian crises in human history, with 68.5 million people forcibly displaced worldwide. “One person is forced to flee his or her home every two seconds. That’s 44,400 people per day,” Lezberg explained. Currently, the U.S. government is imposing even stricter immigration control and reducing the amount of refugee aid. It is in times like these that stories like Naftali’s need to be amplified.

WAFFLES spurs spontaneity on campus

By NIGEL JAFFE AND SHREYAS RAJESH CONTRIBUTING WRITERS If you’ve taken an evening stroll past Paresky recently, you may recall experiencing a moment of déjà vu upon hearing a few lines of Harry Potter blasted through a speaker on the front steps. These events, and many more like them, were the brainchild of Williams Anarchists for Fun and Lighthearted Entertaining Surprises (WAFFLES), a new student organization on campus. WAFFLES, a selfdescribed “wholesome underground prank collective,” aims to provide some relief from the day-to-day boredom of the College student experience in ways that eschew the pitfalls of events that may feel forced or overly planned.

Rather than attempting to escape from monotony, WAFFLES strives “to disrupt the monotony itself” through spontaneous, original events. Morgan Whaley ’20 summed up the club’s goal concisely. “In short, we’re working to make Williams a place where people don’t need to go out of their way to have fun,” she said.

Part of the group’s mission is simply to surprise people.

According to Marshall Borrus ’20, WAFFLES aims to “create a Williams where you wake up and you’re like, ‘I don’t know what kind of crazy stuff will happen today,’” he said. “We want to make people rethink how they can live at Williams.”

So far, the group has hosted several events. Aside from the ongoing quest to read the entire Harry Potter series aloud, the group at one point congregated outside Sawyer Library, gesticulating at the sky and shouting as though a UFO were passing over. Describing the club’s mindset in selecting activities, Jason Adulley ’19 said, “We go for stuff that’s really spontaneous and surprising and generally try to stay away from overly planned events.”

The group’s unusual name is a perfect example of the mindset it espouses. Ashley Villarreal ’20 reflected on the choice to describe the group as “anarchists” in the second letter of its acronym. “Well, anarchy gets some people’s attention, but the ‘FLES’ in WAFFLES – ‘Fun and Lighthearted, Entertaining Surprises’ – is more in line with what we do,” she said. WAFFLES distinguishes between the usually negative connotations of anarchy and what its members see as a more benevolent and fun “anarchy.”

Ari Ball-Burack ’19 described the “primal yell” event that inspired WAFFLES. “One of us organized a primal yell during finals last spring, and watching 60 people scream their hearts out on the marble blocks, laugh and go back to studying was a highlight of my Williams experience,” he said. “We want to recreate and expand that feeling in a sustainable way, and WAFFLES seems like an answer.”

Another way the club differs from more traditional groups is in its adherence to secrecy when it comes to coordinating events. The events the group plans, both in terms of frequency and type, vary. Surabhi Iyer ’21 explained the need for secrecy with that variety, saying that “the underground aspect is important because the last thing we want is for this club to become routine.”

WAFFLES is open to the idea of expansion and is actively recruiting new members. “We’d love to have anyone who wants to get involved to come through, whether it’s by coming to events or joining the team in a more permanent role,” Hallie Della-Volpe ’21 said. “The group is an assembly of really social, funny, positive people and we want to create events that surprise the community.”

Students interesting in becoming a part of WAFFLES can direct their attention to the WAFFLES of Williams Facebook page or to its new website, launched this week at bit.ly/williamswaffles. Events are ongoing, and the group hopes to establish itself as a part of the College’s social culture for good. Carlos CabreraLomelí ’20 noted that the specifics, however, are still under lock and key for now. “As for future plans, that’s a secret – spontaneous surprise is key to our work, so I can’t reveal anything now,” he said. “But I promise that we have a lot planned for this semester and beyond.”

PHOTO COURTESY OF BEN STANLEY.

WAFFLES has hosted several Harry Potter events, with students reading aloud the books for hours.

By KRISTEN ALTMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER PHOTO COURTESY OF GRACE FAN.

All-student listserv emails are approved by CC co-presidents Lizzy Hibbard and Moisés Roman Mendoza.

All-student listserv facilitates community transparency

By TREVOR WERTHEIMER CONTRIBUTING WRITER Every week, emails appear in student inboxes from accounts like “WILLIAMS-STUDENTS@listserv.williams. edu” with college-wide or class year-specific announcements. These weekly posts that touch on the goings-on around campus – upcoming events, lectures, available academic services – are both staples of students’ weekly routines and hubs of information for all community members.

But despite the predictable nature of the weekly emails, these announcements are not automatic. Instead, they rely on the contributions of students, organizations and community members who send in information to be disseminated via email. Individuals and campus organizations use a resource called the all-student listserv – a tool available for everyone at the College – to distribute information to students on a regular basis. Yet while the listserv is an integral part of the College’s community and messaging systems, little is known about what the listserv is and even less about how it is used.

The all-student listserv’s primary function is to improve communication and transparency around campus, providing a central outlet where community members can post and view announce-

ments. Rather than confining posts to only those already in a certain club’s listserv or forcing clubs and groups to send out individual messages to all students, the all-student listserv provides a forum for communicating with the entire College or specific classes.

This makes it easier for students to receive information and creates a more transparent campus environment.

Save for one minor rule, the process for sending announcements into the listserv is both an accessible and straightforward one for student organizations, according to College Council co-president Moisés Roman Mendoza ’19.

“The current formalized process is that any student group who believes their message is important enough to distribute to the entire student body can send their message to the general student list or the ones by class,” he said. “The requirement is that any email has to come from a Registered Student Organization (RSO), meaning the organization’s leadership or members have approved the message. From there, any message coming from an RSO will be approved.”

The RSO itself determines whether its message is important enough to distribute through the listserv and controls whether the message is delivered to a class or the

whole campus, highlighting the listserv’s role in improving communication between students and offering a degree of autonomy to those who use it.

Once a message has been approved by the RSO, the message is then sent to one of the five main listserv accounts. The general listserv, WILLIAMS-STUDENTS@ listserv.williams.edu, publishes messages for the entire student body.

Once the announcement is sent to the proper listserv, either of the College Council (CC) co-presidents – Lizzy Hubbard ’19 and Mendoza – or an administrator approves the message. It is then distributed to either the student body or a specific class year.

The all-student listserv regularly sees use with weekly social calendar updates and notifications about registration and academic deadlines from the Office of the Registrar.

Recent examples of the allstudent listserv in use for special events included a note to attend an open forum with the Board of Trustees, a reminder from CC to pick up absentee ballots and an invitation from President Maud Mandel to visit her house on Halloween for treats.

The CC presidents highlighted the relative ease of using the listserv, stressing the fact that groups can utilize it with few exceptions or restrictions.

8 ARTS

The Williams Record

October 24, 2018

Krens ’69 discusses Guggenheim’s future endeavors in Abu Dhabi

By PHILLIP PYLE STAFF WRITER Much of the rich art scene in the Berkshires can be attributed to Thomas Krens ’69. Previously director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, Krens has a resume bolstered with achievements in the arts.

The former director graduated from the College with a degree in Political Economy and continued on to get a Masters in studio art from SUNY Albany and a Masters in management from Yale.

Since then, Krens has worn many hats: he was appointed director of the Williams College Museum of Art in 1980, helped establish Mass MoCA, oversaw the expansion of the Guggenheim in New York, created a network of Guggenheim-associated museums and, most recently, is spearheading the development of the Guggenheim’s plans in Abu Dhabi.

This past Sunday, Krens spoke at the Clark Art Institute. His lecture, “Art, Money, Oil and Guns,” is the first of his four-part series at the Clark. In this particular talk, Krens focused on the Guggenheim’s ongoing projects in the Middle East and the Berkshire art community.

Krens has been in the art field for many years and has a broad understanding of the nuances of museum origins and purposes. “Museums have particular power,” Krens said. “They bear witness to particular times in history.”

PHOTO COURTESY OF GUGGENHEIM.ORG

Thomas Krens ‘69 was director of the Williams College Museum of Art in 1980 and is currently involved in Guggenheim’s plans in Abu Dhabi.

Krens’ interest in the power of museums and their ability to preserve culture led him to meet with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in 2005 to discuss the possibility of building a Guggenheim museum in Abu Dhabi. Later that year, in a meeting with the UAE Crown Prince, Krens drew out his plans for a development on Saadiyat Island off the coast of Abu Dhabi on a restaurant napkin.

The relationship between Krens and the UAE has since flourished. In 2005, Krens created the Guggenheim Motorcycle Club – comprised of actors such as Laurence Fishburne and Lauren Hutton – to cultivate meaningful cultural diplomacy between the Guggenheim Foundation and the UAE. In November 2005, the relationship between the two culminated with an agreement between

the Guggenheim Foundation and the UAE. The Guggenheim was to be built in the Cultural District of Saadiyat Island. Krens wanted the physical space to be divided into three parts – one third dedicated to the arts of Africa and the Middle East, one third to Asia and the rest to the Americas and Europe.

Krens’ ideal image of an art museum was, it seems, being manifested in his plans for

Guggenheim Abu Dhabi. “It is incumbent on art museums to act rigorously and responsibly as agents of agitation, social information and cultural change,” Krens said.

Krens’ ambitious dispositions began deteriorating two years later when a few specific events undermined Guggenheim Abu Dhabi and Krens’ overall plans in the Middle East. Namely, that the 2008 financial crash

in America led to a shrinking UAE economy, causing the plans to be temporarily halted. Along with this, the sudden resignation of Guggenheim Board Member and critical donor, Peter Lewis, jeopardized progress in Abu Dhabi. The resignation was in fact born out of a dispute around the foundation’s interests in the Middle East.

Finally, Krens described the Arab Spring as having also had a deep impact on the impending construction.

Not every art movement on Saadiyat Island halted in 2008 like Guggenheim Abu Dhabi did. In fact, the one billion euro Louvre Abu Dhabi opened there just last year. The Louvre’s magnificent spectacle of visual arts and architecture has garnered much attention, including being called one of the “7 Urban Wonders of the World.” The museum notably contains James Whistler’s world-famous oil painting Whistler’s Mother and will soon contain Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi in its permanent collection.

Despite the recent success of the Louvre in the Middle East, however, Guggenheim Abu Dhabi has yet to begin construction. Even so, Krens will not give up on his plans in Abu Dhabi. “Perhaps the best is yet to come,” he said.

Those interested in Krens’ projects are invited to return to the Clark on Nov. 18 for a lecture on the Guggenheim museum in Bilbao, Spain.

Microdramas pushes boundaries

By JULIA CHIANG STAFF WRITER

PHOTO COURTESY OF NERDIST.COM

Halloween tells the story of a serial killer as he stalks and kills teenage babysitters on Halloween night.

Halloween packs theater, remains just as popular on 40th anniversary

By LUKE VALADIE STAFF WRITER Rebooting classic film franchises has been a Hollywood staple for years, and the Halloween series is about to receive this treatment, with a critically acclaimed sequel on the verge of release. The line out the door at Images two Fridays ago, however, wasn’t for the latest Halloween film, but rather for a limited-run screening of the original 1978 slasher

by John Carpenter. In an era of countless reboots and sequels, classic films are still capable of drawing a crowd.

An Images staff member stood at the front of the packed theater to welcome the audience – students and community members alike – and introduce the horror classic. As the iconic theme music began to play, the audience cheered and applauded.

There’s a sense of community and positive energy that’s often present at screenings of beloved films, and this was certainly the case.

This was my first time seeing Halloween. Dedicated horror fans might scoff at me for this oversight, but it allowed me to go into this event with few expectations. I’d seen the film cited as a horror classic – beyond that, I knew little about it. I was curious to see if, being someone who watches horror

films fairly regularly, I would find it scary 40 years after its release. The answer was a resounding “no,” but to my surprise, that didn’t detract from my experience in the least. In fact, the emotions that supplanted sheer terror made Halloween one of the most enjoyable movie experiences I’ve had in a long time.

There were certainly plenty of scenes throughout the film that startled me, but this was mostly because they contained fairly standard jump scares. There was some real tension during the iconic Michael Myers chase scenes, but it never measured up to the suspense of Hitchcockian thrillers (Psycho or Vertigo) or some modern indie horror films (The Invitation or Hush). Perhaps most surprisingly, some of the classic horror tropes that are present in the film got the audience laughing. Halloween pioneered many of these features, but they’ve been overused and parodied so frequently that it’s hard to take them seriously. When the score swelled dramatically for tense sequences, the audience laughed at its lack of subtlety. A few viewers couldn’t help but crack up at a particularly outlandish murder sequence, in which Michael Myers suspends a victim from a wall with his signature kitchen knife. These elements prob-

ably ramped up the terror when the film was released; for an audience that has been subjected to constant abuse of these tropes, they’ve lost their sting.

Although the audience laughed at the frequent, now-cheesy horror techniques, I never felt like this laughter signaled derision of the film. On the contrary, it made the viewing feel like a celebration of the horror genre. Sure, it may have lost its edge for audiences familiar with the past 40 years of horror films, but that doesn’t mean that Halloween has outlived its relevance. We may not be able to crowd into a theater to feel sheer, collective terror at Michael Myers’ original outing any longer, but there’s still plenty of joy to be found in being around other horror fans, flinching at a few jump scares and laughing at horror clichés and late-70s dialogue.

It might seem like it cheapens Halloween’s stature as a defining film in the evolution of the horror genre, but that ignores the fact that audiences change, and so too does the way they perceive classic films. We were laughing at Halloween, but that doesn’t mean that we were disrespecting it; we were showing that it can still be enjoyed in a different cultural context.

That’s more than can be said of many 40-year-old films.

A series of five short plays under the collective title Microdramas premiered last Thursday in the ’62 Center’s Directing Studio, in a soldout venue on both Friday and Saturday evenings. The featured plays included The Lesson by Eugene Lonesco – a comedic parable of the dangers inherent in indoctrination; 90 Days by Elizabeth Meriwether, which centers on Elliott, whose girlfriend calls to check up on him; 508 by Amy Herzog, in which two ex-lovers meet in the apartment they once shared; Springtime by Fiona Semi, about the complications of memory; and The Moon Please by Diana Son, in which a young married couple argues over who is going to work and who will stay with their newborn baby on the morning of September 11, 2001. Unique because of their brevity, these performances broke the mold of standard theater productions in notable ways.

Microdramas represent a frequently overlooked genre in the world of theater; oneact plays are often dwarfed by their full-length counterparts. In addition to being extremely brief, there are several other unique characteristics that allow these plays to stand on their own.

One-act plays often better capture and highlight an isolated interaction between two characters, scenes that are more generalizable and not dependent on large overarching narratives. To fit within such a narrow time

frame, however, each production faces the challenge of being able to lay out a clear beginning, middle and end while maintaining a strong storyline.

When this is translated onstage, it means that every second of the performance counts. The dialogue and demeanor of the actors must engage the audience immediately, because in an eight or ten-minute production, a dull moment can cause the viewers to miss a crucial plot point. “You have so little time and you need to pack each of the moments with a huge amount of specificity,” Nadiya Atkinson ’21, student director of 508 and 90 Days, said. “We spend a lot of time discussing what each action and line means – there are no throwaway lines.”

For the theatre department at the College, Microdramas also offers a special opportunity for students to participate in a production with a lower time commitment, helping increase accessibility and expand the department beyond its core group of engaged participants. “A large amount of students in Microdramas are relatively inexperienced, which is unusual,” Angela Yu ’20, an actress from The Moon Please, said. “I’m really grateful to the department for the opportunity to have a role, even though I have never been in a production before.”

Theatre professor Robert Baker-White said that Microdramas was meant to target a demographic of students that might have been reluctant to make the very large time commitment demanded

of full length productions.

“We’ve been able to get some new students in because the demands from this project are a little less, and that’s really exciting,” he said.

In most traditional models of student productions there is usually a faculty member or a visiting guest artist who directs the show.

“This is a good model, and there are lots of educational opportunities when there is a professional at the lead,” White said. “However, while there isn’t anything wrong with this, we feel that this shouldn’t be the only model we use.” The integration of students in director positions while still under the mentorship of faculty finds a middle ground between the standard method and the student-run organization, Cap & Bells.

This grants students the freedom to be directing and designing within the context of departmental productions where faculty can still guide students, but to a more limited degree. Microdramas is the second production to emphasize students taking the helm in the artistic process. Last year’s Purple Valley Plays set a precedent using this new model, and the theatre department hopes to continue this trend and integrate it into the regular set of departmental offerings.

Microdramas pushes the bounds of theater both at large and at the College. The theatre department manages to both showcase a unique and underappreciated genre of theatre as well as leverage the opportunities it offers to broaden the mission of the theatre department.

PHOTO COURTESY OF ‘62 CENTER/KEITH FORMAN.

Microdramas featured one-act plays performed and directed by students and Professor Baker-White.

ARTS 9

The Williams Record

October 24, 2018

Plonskser lecture series surveys contemporary Cuban art

By KAIRA MEDIRATTA ARTS EDITOR Last Saturday, musicians Neil Leonard and Miguel Nuñez were joined by multimedia artist Nestor Siré in an unorthodox exploration of Cuban artistic production at home and at large. The event was organized as the annual Plonsker Family Lecture Series in Contemporary Art, established in 1994 by Madeleine Plonsker, Harvey Plonsker ’61 and their son, Ted Plonsker ’86. The series examines current issues in contemporary art. Past lecturers have included artists Sharon Hayes, Lynda Benglis, Kerry James Marshall, Jessica Stockholder and Jon Rubin.

In short opening remarks from WCMA director Pamela Franks and Deputy Director for Curatorial Affairs Lisa Dorin, the audience learned of the Plonskers’ initial trip to Cuba in 2002, which sparked their interest in connecting with emerging artists. The Plonskers were struck by the collaborative and entrepreneurial nature of creatives in Cuba, and this fascination ultimately led to the fruition of the lecture.

The program was kicked off by saxophonist Leonard and pianist Nuñez, who took to the stage to perform a series of jazz-tinged duets. Leonard would often step back to let Nuñez – a world-renowned pianist, composer and music director from Havana – take the reign. This was Nuñez’s first time presenting his music

PHOTO COURTESY OF ADI NACHMAN.

Neil Leonard and Miguel Nuñez were joined by multimedia artist Nestor Siré in an unorthodox exploration of Cuban artistic production. in the United States. The duo seemed to have a strong mutual understanding, rendering the compositions almost as a conversation in certain parts – each instrument crafting a response to the other.

Following this musical interlude, Siré approached the stage to play a short but illuminating video clip, which gave a simple description of the Cuban phenomenon of El Paquete Semanal, or “The Weekly Package.” For over 50 years, informational isolation and inaccessibility to basic re-

sources and goods have characterized daily life in Cuba; El Paquete, a reaction to this, is a one-terabyte collection of digital materials distributed since around 2008 on the underground market in Cuba as a substitute for broadband Internet. El Paquete contains a vast swath of content, for example: TV series, films, soap operas (Korean soap operas are currently popular), documentaries, music, video clips, reality shows, graphic humor, comics and cartoons, software, apps, antivirus software, lan-

Colette tells the novel truth of a controversial French author

By CECILIA MESSBAUER STAFF WRITER Just a few weeks after showing The Wife, Images Cinema has showcased yet another tense character drama revolving around a prodigal young female writer whose talents are stolen by her husband. In a refreshing twist, Colette, based on the true story of French literary legend Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, delivers visceral satisfaction by proving that – in this case at least – a true story can provide a measure of unexpected triumph.

As a focused turn-of-thecentury-period drama and a dazzling vehicle for superstar lead Keira Knightley, Colette is even more remarkable for unashamedly delivering the perspective that the past could be just as radical as the present. Combining themes of feminist, queer and even trans liberation, the film is spun from true stories years before these movements would take the familiar forms we know today.

The film, directed by Walsh Westmoreland from a screenplay by Westmoreland and Richard Glatzer, is less a biopic than an origin story. Colette lived a long and incredibly complex life that could probably fill a multipart documentary series, but the film finds its narrative arc in Colette’s early years and first marriage to Henry GauthierVillars (Dominic West), a wellknown writer and music critic under the pen name “Willy.”

Right away, the power dynamics of class mold the motivations of the characters – Willy gives up

a dowry to marry below his station. He, however, indulges in numerous affairs, while co-opting Colette’s emerging writing talents to bolster his brand and keep his financials afloat without having to forgo the luxuries of irresponsibility.

That writing, drawn from the deepest feelings and memories of her own life and conveyed with a blend of her love for literature, produces the Claudine stories, a series that flies off the shelves and enthralls young women everywhere. The books also serve to elevate the wealth and notoriety of the brand and the couple, especially after they devise a genius stroke of meta-marketing by having the stories adapted for theater and having Colette model herself as the image of “the real Claudine.”

Even as Colette’s writing transforms their world, the fragility of their not-quiteequal partnership quickly becomes too much for Colette to tolerate. Willy’s constant indulgences prevent them from ever being on stable financial ground, and his attempts to simultaneously apologize and make excuses for his behavior reveal a fundamental disrespect that is periodically brought to the forefront by angry outbursts when Colette pushes back against his dishonesty and hypocrisy.

While much of the film is mired in this emotional backand-forth, one byproduct of the two negotiating their fraught but initially loving marriage is Willy encouraging Colette to engage in her own affairs with other women, which

she instantly takes advantage of, determined to not let this compromise turn into a blank check for Willy to lie to her.

These scenes, notable for their frankness in their depictions of a sexuality that are often erased from narratives of the present as well as the past, lead to a whirlwind romance that reveals to Colette who she can be when she is not tied down to a man. Colette begins to form a loving relationship with Missy, a French noble and artist who dresses as a man and who Colette, at one striking moment, insists on calling “he.”

At every turn (and with the help of a radiant progression of bold period costumes), Knightley delivers a powerhouse performance that captures both the vulnerability of being a talented young woman in a hostile world and her determination to not settle for less than she deserves. Even in the happiest days of Colette’s marriage, she rebuffs Willy’s attempts to diminish her agency or deny her intellectual power. Indeed, his compromises only serve as a catalyst for her radical selfexploration that ultimately confirms for Colette how little she really needs him.

While the ending comes rather suddenly, and the chronological compression elides much of the literary icon’s life, Colette builds its emotional and thematic moments to a deeply affecting climax. The end-of-the-movie explanation of the ultimate fates of the key players confirms that Colette’s life was well-deserving of this moving and triumphant film.

guage courses, magazines in PDF format, advertising and an offline version of Revolico (a sort of Cuban Craigslist), among other materials. Many buyers only request certain parts of the package.

Siré was struck by the ways in which an entirely offline Internet could provide such expansive informational access to support leisure and livelihood, additionally serving as a platform that affords local participation.

On his website, Siré describes his mission as focusing

on “alternative ways of circulating information, piracy, social activities benefitting from legal loopholes, informal economy and phenomena resulting from social creativity and recycling.” This was made clear in the works that he talked about in his presentation, namely his collaboration with the American artist Julia Weist at the New Museum in 2017.

Since 2015, Siré has been in fact curating art into El Paquete through a project called !!!Sección A R T E, a series of folders updated

monthly with original projects. The folder follows the rules of the Paquete: it can be no more than five-gigabytes and must contain no pornography or political content. In early 2016, Siré invited Weist to contribute her work to the art folder, the beginning of an ambitious overseas partnership. The duo continued on to ultimately create 17. (SEPT) [By WeistSiréPC]™, a piece centered on a 64-terabyte server containing 52 weeks of El Paquete Semanal from August 2016 to August 2017.

It is the only comprehensive archive of the Paquete and was made possible by Weist and Siré’s joint quest to track down all of the Paquete distributors (or matrices, literally translating to matrix or womb) in every province in Cuba. The exhibition was a tribute to the depth and intricacy of the Paquete networks, including the extent of its economic impact.

Siré’s presentation was followed by a second musical performance by Leonard and Nuñez, and the lecture culminated in a short debrief facilitated by Dorin and Professor of Music Ileana Perez Velazquez, who also originally hails from Cuba. The effects of the event lingered long after we left the auditorium; the amalgamation of works was a provocative and all-consuming experience, leaving all who attended struck by the pervasive nature of Cuba’s unconventional creative scene.

WRITE FOR THE RECORD!

Come to weekly writers' meetings on Wednesdays at 8:15 p.m. in Paresky 209 OR Email tz4@williams.edu

4AD PRESENTS

TUNE-YARDS + U.S. GIRLS

Tuesday, October 30, 8pm HUNTER CENTER | $25 ADVANCE | $35 DAY OF | $45 PREFERRED

TICKETS: massmoca.org or 413.622.2111 | North Adams, Mass.

PHOTO COURTESY OF TIME.

Colette, an intense turn-of-the-century period character drama, features superstar lead Keira Knightley.

10 SPORTS

The Williams Record

October 24, 2018

Men’s rugby celebrates 60th anniversary, defeats Amherst

By MATT SCHLEIFMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER Williams men’s rugby has had an eventful two weeks.

Not only did the club cap off a markedly successful regular season last Saturday with a hard-fought 13-5 victory over Amherst, but it also enjoyed its 60th anniversary two weekends ago.

Roughly 100 alumni, over twice the number of players currently on the Williams Rugby Football Club (WRFC) roster, returned to celebrate the milestone. The alumni came to campus on the night of Friday, Oct. 12, and spent the night on Sheep Hill, catching up with old friends and meeting new players. Flyhalf and kicker Nick Sommer ’21 remarked on the tightlyknit Williams rugby community fostered by such an active alumni presence. “The 60th anniversary was such a unique event in the sense that we got to meet rugger alums from all years ranging from those who just graduated last year to the founder of the club himself and the first president of the club,” Sommer said. “Talking with the alums, it was easy to see how much the club has evolved over the years and how regardless of when one graduated, this sport and this club has created a bond within guys [which] defies the test of time.”

President Seth Goldstein ’19 also enjoyed meeting

PHOTO COURTESY OF SPORTS INFORMATION.

Last weekened, Williams Rugby Football Club (WRFC) defeated archrival Amherst 13-5 for the seventh consecutive time. some of the alumni, particularly remarking that he “talked to alumni about where the club is and how they can get more involved.”

The next day, the alumni cheered on their old team as they defeated MCLA, followed by a scrimmage between the alumni and current team. The club also commemorated the passing of their late coach, Bruce Stevenson, in a banquet the night of Oct. 13 , during which family members and former players spoke on his

love for the game and his players. To solidify his legacy and impact on WRFC, the rugby pitch was renamed the Bruce Memorial Field.

The weekend after the celebrate of rugby’s 60th anniversary and renaming of the pitch, Stevenson’s memory aided the club as they wrapped up their regular season against Amherst at home. Coming off of six consecutive victories against Amherst, expectations ran high prior to the match.

Goldstein remarked on the club’s successful track record

against their rivals in recent years. “If we can close it out next semester, my class will have never seen a loss against Amherst,” Goldstein said. A large crowd witnessed the victory as well, creating an exciting atmosphere. The match was intense and well-fought by both sides. Following an early score by Amherst, WRFC retained its poise and took control of the game.

“Just from watching the game, you could tell that the players were giving it 110 percent the entire time,” Sommer

said. “The fact that we had dedicated the field the prior week to former WRFC head coach Bruce Stevenson just added more weight to the occasion. We played this game for Bruce, and he is the reason we won.”

With the regular season complete, WRFC looks ahead to the playoffs. The team is not quite sure yet who they will face, but trusts that their success from the regular season will continue. “It’s going to be a long season,” Goldstein confidently stated.

Provided WRFC is not eliminated, they could play up to four more games. Sommer is also optimistic about the upcoming playoffs. “Our season has been one for the record books,” he said. “Even though our A-side song claims that ‘We just play for recreation,’ after tasting playoffs last year for the first time in two decades, it is clear that we have moved beyond that and that our team is dedicated to playing hard and to winning.”

As a whole, WRFC is not only looking forward to the playoffs, but to the spring and beyond.

Goldstein notes that the “deep and committed” first-year class has a high ceiling for growth and improvement, and that he is eager see how they continue to build on their progress in the spring. Sommer echoes Goldstein’s sentiments. “We have an incredible senior class who has provided amazing leadership, and we have been joined by a large class of passionate rookies who are already showing how they will contribute to the future success of the club,” Sommer said. “The spring season promises to be a continuation of this progress, and we are looking forward to many more years of great rugby.” It will be exciting to follow WRFC in the near future. With their best shot at the playoffs in two decades and a renewed passion for the sport, rugby looks forward to reaping the tangible results of their effort during the playoffs next month.

Men’s crew races at the 54th annual Head of the Charles Regatta

By CHARLES IDE TEAM CORRESPONDENT The men’s crew team traveled to Boston on Sunday for the 54th annual Head of the Charles Regatta. The regatta is the highlight of the fall racing season and draws crews from not just around the country, but around the world. Rowers and hundreds of thousands of spectators come to Boston for the weekend each October to participate in the historic race.

This year the men had two entries in the regatta, boats in the collegiate eight and collegiate four. In addition to

current undergraduates, Williams had numerous alumni crews competing in alumni and master’s events.

First up, the varsity eight raced in what was the first Head of the Charles for many members of the crew. Seeded sixteenth, the Ephs were in a strong position to hunt down crews ahead of them. Strong winds blustered through the Charles River Basin and down the length of the course, catching oars and knocking crews off balance. The challenging conditions were familiar but still challenging for the Ephs, who routinely face

such conditions and worse on Onota Lake.

The men in the varsity eight quickly hunted down Marietta as they turned around Magazine Beach, setting their sights ahead for the powerhouse stretch. At the end of the stretch, coxswain Piper Higgins ’21 handled the challenging turns of the course well – a valuable skill honed during her time coxing on the river for the club Community Rowing.

Coming around Eliot Bridge to the finishing stretch, the crowds grew and some of the spectating Eph supporters faithfully let their voices be

heard from the shore. In the final straightaway to the line, the men battled fiercely with rival Wesleyan, both crews laying out the last of their energy reserves to cross the finish line. The varsity eight finished in 15th with a time of 16:50, good for second in the NESCAC behind Wesleyan.

Ian Pultz-Earle ’21 thought Williams had some strong moments, and some moments to learn from. “I think the headwind created some issues with rhythm and composure at times, but we also had some good moments, including the end,” Pultz-Earle said. “We

were much less consistent throughout the race as we usually are, but some of that was probably due to the conditions. Overall it was a good experience, being the first time at the Charles for most of us. Piper [Higgins] also did a great job coxing."

In the collegiate fours, Williams had its first entry in the event in recent memory.

The four was bow number 24. Because they were in the unseeded part of the starting order, Williams dealt with a crowded course as they had to work their way through many slower boats with lower bow

numbers. Here Coxswain Alison Robey ’20 earned her ride down the river as she expertly steered the Ephs through the crews, the tight turns of the river and motivated her crew to overtake others. Williams finished 22nd in a time of 19:55.

“It was a solid race,” said Matthew Schleifman ’21. “We struggled with the conditions in the first half, but we were able to get it together later and hold off a few other crews.”

Williams will close out its fall season next Saturday at the Head of the Fish regatta in Saratoga, New York.

CAPTAINS’ CORNER: OLIVIA BARNHILL '19 Did you always play goalie?

PHOTO COURTESY OF SPORTS INFORMATION.

By CHARLES XU SPORTS EDITOR

Team: Women's soccer Hometown: New York, N.Y. Residence: Pera Apartments Major: Biology and Psychology Snack bar order: Nachos with smoked mozzarella, caramelized onions and a Lactaid pill What is your background in sports?

My dad played soccer at Trinity College, so he encouraged me and my siblings to play soccer.

I would grow up playing with him and on little recreational teams. So, he pushed me to always put soccer first rather than the other sports, which was easy – it was my favorite sport since I was a little kid. It was a very soccer family.

I didn’t play goalie until late middle school. When you are younger, you just rotate goalies. I would go in and I was kind of good at it. So, they were like, would you like to rotate in more?

I said sure. It was really fun. I enjoyed it. I was not as good at the field so this was perfect. So eventually I just stuck with it. No one said anything. I just started being the goalie. I was a goalie since seven grade.

Why did you decide to come to the College?

I was looking at a lot of different schools. I was actually looking at a lot of Div I. schools and then my friend was going to a Williams clinic and she asked me if I wanted to come. It's that stupid thing when you get onto a college campus you just know [you belong.]

It was so beautiful. It was a very nice day weather wise, so that helped. The team was so nice.

I really liked the [head] coach Michelyne [Pinard]. The vibes of the team are [that] we love each other; we want to do amazing things, but most of all, we want to have these great friendships. You can see that in the players. Soccer wise, I want to compete for a national championship while having the best team experience I can have. Academically, Williams is great.

You have experienced a lot of success, winning two National championships.

What is your favorite memory during the playoffs?

There are so many good ones.

When we travel to the Final Four, we all dress up in our cow suits. We go on a plane. First of all, we don’t travel on a plane for any of our events. so this was a

very special experience to be with your teammates, in cow suits, in the airport with people mooing at you. It was really funny. It's so much fun to be with your teammates, but then you start interacting with so many other people in the airports and all over because they think it's hilarious that you are in cow suits. It's fun to travel that way. You are bringing smiles to people and you are encouraged to do stupid funny things with your friends because you are all dressed up in stupid funny cow suits. Anytime we put our cow suits on, it's the most fun.

What is the story behind the cow suits?

The team has cow suits because we are the purple cows. The year before I came, they also traveled to the Final Four but they wanted to get on the Ellen DeGeneres Show. So, they thought what is the best way to get on the Ellen DeGeneres Show? So they dressed up in cow suits to get the attention of the media. They all wanted to meet Ellen. It hasn’t worked.

We tweeted at Ellen but she hasn't responded.

The team went to Fenway Park last year. What was that experience like?

I am a Yankees fan so there’s that. It was really cool to go onto the field even though it was like a five second [introduction]. It felt like a really special cool moment. Again, it was so fun to travel with my teammates and take a break from studying. It was during our offseason. It was good to take a break and celebrate all of our hard work that we did. Having the Red Sox and a club celebrate us was cool. My dad got to come and it was fun

to celebrate with him and watch some baseball.

Do you have any personal superstitions or rituals?

I don’t have any on my own. I am not a very superstitious person. We have team traditions.

We always sing “Church” by TPain before a game. So, that has been one of my favorite rituals before games. I personally don’t do anything.

What is your relationship with Coach Pinard like?

She’s great. I have enjoyed getting to know her. It's very clear how much she cares about the team and making us the best soccer players we can be. She also encourages us to be the best people we can be and be ready for when we graduate to start our lives in the working world. So, she wants to make sure that when we are learning about soccer we are also learning about how to treat your boss when you are in a working situation and how to maintain good relationships and get the most out of everyone. She’s been here for an absurd amount of years.

She built this team from nothing. It's clear that she cares a lot and works really hard to make sure we have the best chance we can have.

What is your dynamic like with your co-captains Sarah Hollinger ’19 and Lauren Brown ’19?

They are awesome. It's fun being a tricaptain because you have a lot of support. I think what is so special about our team is that nothing is really done just by the captains in terms of decisions. It is either the whole team or mainly just the senior class. Anything

that we do with Michelyne, we make sure that we are talking about it with our other seniors to make sure everyone is leading the team together rather than just us three. I have a great relationship with everyone on the team. Everyone knows that even though we have the title of captain, it doesn’t mean anything to not have that title because you are also expected to be a leader on the team and make sure that you are inspiring people and giving everything you have.

How have you progressed as a player over your years at the College?

I started playing more sophomore year when our senior goalie got hurt. She hurt her shoulder and wasn’t able to play as much so I jumped into that role not knowing that would happen at the beginning of the season. It wasn’t my best soccer. I was still trying to get used to the role of being a leader on the field rather than just off. That is a scary position to just jump right into. I think I learned a lot. Just by playing in more games you learn so much more about how to play the position. Being a goalie is a lot less like I’m going to work to go win that tackle. It's more about directing the team and making sure everyone is in the correct positions and telling them when to stack or not stack. It's more than your own individual play. It took me a while to get to the point of directing everyone. By the end of sophomore year, I think I got a lot better at that. Last year was when I really started progressing. I am still learning to be the best goalie I can be but I definitely got a lot better by playing more games. Junior year it started to click a lot more, especially

by the NCAA times. It felt so much easier.

What is crucial for the team in terms of defending the national championship?

Right now, we are talking about holding each other accountable and making sure that everyone feels that it's not only the team’s responsibility to achieve what we want but also personal responsibility. Everyone needs to put in as much as they can in every single moment and that then will come into a collective and we can do great things. It's about having that personal responsibility but also having a really great time. We have the most fun when we are out there competing and working really hard. Fun for us is just going after it. If we do that, we will have a good chance. Nothing is set in stone ever but going out there and playing how we know, we will be in a good position.

What is your proudest save to date?

Maybe last year's national championship game, I was able to save a breakaway situation and then we won 1-0.

If you had to pick which professor could beat you in a penalty shoot out, who would it be?

I am sure there are a lot of professors who could beat me in a penalty shoot out but Professor Steven Nafziger played in college and he is our faculty affiliate. I have seen him kick a soccer ball and he’s pretty good.

Do you have a professional athlete crush?

Megan Rapinoe is really cool.

October 24, 2018

SPORTS 11

The Williams Record

SAAC introduces new Gaius C. Bolin Chapter for athletes of color

By SAMUEL MERMIN STAFF WRITER At a small college in the Purple Valley, it’s easy to feel alone and without a home base. Being a student of color can make the feeling of isolation even worse. With this issue in mind, four student-athletes – Vince Brookins ’20, Julius Dodson ’21, Jaelon Moaney ’19 and Nehemiah Wilson ’21 – recently founded the Gaius C. Bolin Chapter of the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC), a space for athletes of color to meet each other and work towards solutions to issues they have experienced as a group.

The new chapter has its own function within SAAC, which more broadly works to get student-athletes involved in the College community and to dispel negative stereotypes about student-athletes. The new chapter works specifically to help athletes of color, who often, according to Moaney, a member of the football team, “get the short end of the stick.”

The chapter is named after the first black graduate of the College, a football player and future lawyer who was chosen by his classmates to speak at his commencement. Gaius C. Bolin, class of 1889, was a man of tremendous talent, yet he was forced to live off-campus due to his race and had to deal with the daily challenge of being the only black face in a student body that was all white, all male and generally quite wealthy.

PHOTO COURTESY OF SAAC.

The founders of the Gaius C. Bolin chapter of SAAC hope to create an inclusive community for student-athletes of color at the College.

Athletes at the College today have a different experience than Bolin did, but their experiences are perhaps not as different as they could be. Brookins, a member of the basketball team, noted that while the schools in the New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC) have become more diverse in recent years, the diversity of their athletes does not match the overall makeups of their schools. All four founders of the chapter have experienced some

degree of struggle with being black on predominantly white teams. The chapter will try to bring athletes of color together to make them feel less isolated.

The new chapter was inspired by similar groups that support student-athletes of color at other NESCAC schools, but this chapter is unique in that it’s more formalized. We are the first NESCAC school to have [our] own official constitution,” Moaney explained. “We are leading the way in terms

of establishing an arm of institutional leverage previously unprecedented for student-athletes of color. We’re starting this wave and coordinating with our peers at other NESCAC schools to build momentum.”

The founders see the new chapter as being in line with the goal of advancing the status of students of color in general.

They chose to focus on athletes because of the unique challenges that athletes face, and because focusing on athletes

can have an impact on the general student body. “Sports are visible and obvious and very quantifiable and public,” Dodson, who plays for the squash team, said. “Being a black athlete is very valuable.”

Wilson, a member of the baseball team, recalls being particularly impressed by a visit to another liberal arts college where he got to meet with a group of black athletes. “It felt like a black community,” he commented.

For now, the founders are focused on increasing membership and generating publicity, but there are no limits on what the chapter’s future impact could be. Wilson suggested that the chapter could eventually fight for changes in the recruitment process. The other founders agree that it’s important to revamp the recruiting process, which generally favors white students with connections to coaches and resources that many minority students don’t have. An integral mission of their work is to create more equitable pathways to success and social capital for people of color. “NESCAC schools can pretty much use athletics as another way to recruit legacy students,” Dodson explained. “All of a sudden, it’s not another legacy kid – it’s just an athlete.”

Wilson added that athletes of color are at a significant disadvantage in a recruiting process that is heavily dependent on knowing the right people. “Sometimes it’s very insular,” he said.

“If you don’t know someone, you’re not going to make it.”

The founders of the Bolin Chapter aim to add new members, establish a social media presence, connect with similar programs at other schools and ensure the longevity of the chapter.

If all goes well, the impact will be felt for a long time. Brookins stressed the goal of helping future Williams students in addition to current ones: “[The goal is to ensure] that if I come back at my 10-year anniversary, there’s [still] going to be a Gaius C. Bolin chapter of the SAAC.”

Women’s soccer beats Tufts 1-0, while men fall 3-1

By ALEXANDER CHRIST STAFF WRITER

PHOTO COURTESY OF SPORTS INFORMATION.

Sydney Jones ’21 scored her ninth goal this season, helping the Ephs take the lead in the 81st minute.

The Office of Communications recommends ...

The 2018 Davis Lecture with Beverly Wright The environmental justice advocate, author, and professor of sociology will present “Environmental Justice and Equity in the Face of Climate Change”

Thursday, October 25 7 p.m.

Paresky Auditorium

For more events, visit: events.williams.edu

Last Saturday, men’s and women’s soccer faced Tufts.

The women beat the Jumbos 1-0, while the men lost 3-1.

Women’s soccer (13-02, 9-0-1 in the NESCAC) struggled to score early on.

In the first half, Jumbo forwards Alessandra Saddler, Liz Reed and Sophie Lloyd dominated midfield and created havoc for the Ephs inside the penalty area.

In the 24th minute, Sadler sent a cross into the goal box, which was headed by Reed. The ball deflected off tri-captain goalie Olivia Barnhill ’19 and went in the net after an attempted clearance by Nkem Iregbulum ’20 – however, the referee waved the Jumbo goal off.

The Ephs had a great scoring opportunity in the 18th minute. After the ball rolled outside the penalty area off a clearance, Aspen Pierson ’21 rattled the left post with a booming shot. The ball ricocheted to Georgia Lord ’21, who had an open net but skied the ball high.

In the second half, play settled at midfield, an indication that the Ephs had recovered some momentum. Still, Tufts had the advantage after earning a number of corner kicks early in the half. The Jumbos failed to find the header, but their corner kicks were too close for comfort.

In the 81st minute, Sydney Jones ’21 received the ball at midfield, clipped a pass to Pierson and then evaded her defender. With the duo sprinting up-field, Pierson sent a brilliant pass to find Jones on a breakaway. Jones had a step on her defender, forcing Tufts goalie Emily Brower to rush forward to block the shot.

However, Jones struck the ball

by Brower, netting her ninth goal of the season.

Tufts had the advantage in shots on goal (13-7) and corner kicks (6-2). Barnhill had four saves to post a clean sheet. Brower had two saves and one goal allowed.

Meanwhile, men’s soccer (8-5-2, 4-4-2 in the NESCAC) lost to Tufts, the No. 1 seed in the conference. The Ephs came into the match in the midst of their best stretch of the season, but their fivegame unbeaten streak came to an end at the hands of the undefeated Jumbos.

In the 11th minute, Jumbo forward Joe Braun headed a corner kick past Eph goalie Aaron Schein ’19, a result of consistent forward movement, crisp passing and strong ballwinning by the Jumbos, midfield and defense.

Braun, who was relentless and seemingly everywhere at once, recorded two more shots within the next five minutes, but both were saved by Schein. A 14th minute strike from Jumbo midfielder Zach Lane hit the crossbar and bounced out of bounds.

The Eph defense stepped up for the remainder of the half and somewhat neutralized the Jumbos, but that unfortunately was only temporary. Braun extended the Jumbos’ lead to two on a fast break in the 56th minute.

Braun ran onto a wonderfully placed pass, took one touch and curled it past Schein.

In the 75th minute, Tufts midfielder Zach Trevorrow crossed a ball into the box that was headed by teammate Mati Cano right into the arms of Schein. However, Schein was behind the goal line when he saved the shot, quickly turning what was a terrific stop into a three-score lead.

The day’s scoring was completed with a 78th minute goal from Justin Adams ’21, who poked the ball in from the middle of a point-blank range scrum. Adams gave the Ephs their first point of the day.

Schein recorded six saves on the day, while Tufts goalie Connor Mieth saved three shots.

Both men’s and women’s soccer finished their regular seasons by hosting Middlebury on Tuesday. The women won another close match 1-0 on a free-kick goal from Pierson, culminating another successful NESCAC slate for the women.

The men fell 2-0 to the Panthers. The teams will next play in the NESCAC tournament, with the women currently ranked first in the conference.

ATHLETES OF THE WEEK “Ava is the heart of her

“ Sydney made a difficult

boat and of the team, really.

She commits to bringing her best to every practice and is a ferocious racer. But beyond that, she is the consummate teammate who cares deeply for the sport and the lessons that it imparts.”

finish look easy. Her ability to score goals at important times combined with her consistent work rate off the ball to create opportunities for us on Saturday was a huge reason for the positive result versus Tufts. ”

– Head coach Kate Maloney

– Head coach Michelyne Pinard

AVA PALMO ’19

SYDNEY JONES ’21

WOMEN'S CREW AUSTIN, TEXAS

WOMEN’S SOCCER BOCA RATON, FLA.

Palmo coxed the varsity eight boat through the gusty winds of the Charles all the way to a second-place finish.

Jones scored the go-ahead goal in the 81st minute in a nailbiter against Tufts. The Ephs would hold on to the lead and win 1-0.

12 SPORTS

The Williams Record

October 24, 2018

Volleyball wins one game in New England Challenge

By RACHEL NEUGART CONTRIBUTING WRITER Women’s volleyball (12-10, 5-4 in the NESCAC) played in the New England Challenge over the weekend, winning against Babson and losing to MIT and Springfield.

Coming into Friday evening’s match, MIT had 22 wins compared to only two losses. However, Williams appeared unfazed, with a total of twelve ties, contributing to an intense, backand-forth first set. However, MIT’s offense was overpowering as the Beavers broke an 18-18 tie and went on a three-point run led by a kill from Carly Staub, a double block from Staub and Abby Bertics and an ace from Margaret Wang. This rally gave MIT needed momentum to come out victorious, 25-22.

In the second set, Williams built on the positive aspects of their performance from the first set. A dynamic kill from tri-captain Mia Weinland ’19 gave the Ephs the lead 2019, and although MIT shortened the Williams lead to one point, Williams played together and utilized two clutch kills from Roxi Corbeil ’19 to surge to victory 25-22.

Erin Denham ’20 and Olivia Hindy ’22 both contributed two kills to bring the Ephs back into the fourth set.

An MIT error, an ace from Daiana Takashima ’20 and a double block from Weinland and tri-captain Tess Richman ’19 brought the score within

one point. However, the Beavers rebounded and ended up winning this set 25-22.

MIT was led by Bertics with 23 kills, senior Christina Liao with 50 assists and senior Carly Silvernale with 19 digs.

Williams was led by Weinland with 14 kills, Alex Newton ’20 with 38 assists and Takashima with 15 digs.

Head coach Christi Kelsey remarked on the first day of tournament play. “I was really proud of how the team battled,” she said. “They played incredibly well in the second set and then rebounded in a great way in the fourth but came up just short. We faced a couple challenges in the middle of the match, and they really rose up as a group and responded well.”

For the second day of play, Williams lost in four sets to Springfield. In the first set, Williams came back from an 11-17 deficit to go up by one point, led by two kills from Denham, two kills by Lydia Kurtz ’22, and an ace from Corbeil. Even so, Springfield refocused and their offensive power led them to a victory, 25-22.

Springfield led for most of the second set, but Williams would not quit. The Ephs utilized another mid-set rally to take the lead. All Williams players contributed to this overtaking, but Corbeil led the charge with three kills.

From here, the Ephs had enough energy to play loosely for the victory 25-23.

Establishing another quick lead, Springfield closed out

PHOTO COURTESY OF SPORTS INFORMATION.

Tri-captain Mia Weinland ’19 led the Ephs with 12 kills against Springfield and was named to the All-Tournament team. the contest with a fourth set win of 25-21. Springfield leaders were Jen Donnelly with 12 kills, Sara Labadorf with 38 assists and Jen Donnelly with 19 digs. Williams leaders were Weinland with 12 kills, Corbeil with 24 assists and Allison Frison ’21 with 19 digs.

Looking to stop the losing streak, the women took on Babson for the last match of the New England Challenge, and an intense first set proved to be the deciding factor in Williams sweeping Babson.

The first set began with Williams taking a lead, 7-2.

Three Babson errors and kills from Hindy, T. Rich-

man, Corbeil and Weinland contributed to the Eph lead.

Babson fought to get back into the set and succeeded in knotting the score at 13-13. the Ephs were unfazed by the kills down the stretch from the Beaver’s Kristin Carosotto and Shannon Roseen. Instead, the women showed extreme calm and confidence in their own playing, ultimately winning 30-28.

Williams was ready to build on the momentum from their big win in the first match. They went on a sixpoint run to bring them back into the set. From that point on, Williams cruised to the victory 25-21.

In the third set, the Ephs forged a lead of 19-7 behind five Beaver errors and six Eph kills. Babson, however, was not going away, and the serving of Abby Beecher closed the gap to four points. Williams took a timeout to regroup and was successful in refocusing to win 25-20.

Babson leaders were Allie Puccio with 10 kills, Elizabeth Cameron with 17 assists and Cassidy Witten with nine digs. Williams leaders were Corbeil with 12 kills, Newton with 20 assists and Takashima and Frison with 11 digs each. Weinland was named to the New England Challenge All-Tournament team.

Kelsey reflected on the last day of play. “Overall, we did some really nice things as a team,” she said. “We played hard against Springfield but lost a few points at critical times when Springfield made some key plays. I’m really proud of how the team came out and responded against Babson. From start to finish, they were gritty, focused, and played hard together. Even when there were some tight back and forth stretches, they really kept their composure and confidence to pull out the match.”

Williams will travel to Middlebury on Saturday to play at 2:00 p.m. to conclude regular season play.

Women’s crew requalifies to race at Head of the Charles

By GRACE CHAMBERLIN TEAM CORRESPONDENT Women’s crew had a strong showing this past weekend at the Head of the Charles regatta, racing a club four, a collegiate four and a collegiate eight, all of which requalified for the regatta next year, with the collegiate eight taking second place.

On Saturday, the club four requalified to race in the same category next year by placing 26th out of 52 competing boats. Stroke seat Fiona Yonkman ’20 led

Games this week Saturday Oct. 27 Volleyball vs.

Middlebury Away, 2 p.m.

Women’s crew at Head of the Fish Away, all day Men’s crew at Head of the Fish Away, all day Women’s cross country, NESCAC Champioship Away, 12 p.m.

Men’s cross country, NESCAC Champonship Away, 1 p.m.

Football vs. Bates Away, 1:30 p.m.

a boat of Catherine Powell ’22, Stephanie Brown ’20, Maddie Lacasse ’22 and coxswain Morgan Whaley ’20. “We prepared all week in really bad conditions on Onota [Lake], so we were well prepared and pleasantly surprised that Saturday’s wind wasn’t bad,” Yonkman said. “We had our best piece together as a boat and got to compare ourselves to some Div. I crews!”

On Sunday, the collegiate eight and collegiate four raced in tough conditions and faced some close calls.

The race commentators frequently noted that the wind gusts forced boats to take wider turns than desired.

That said, the commentators loved coxswain Ava Palmo ’20 and commented on her well-executed steering coming into the last 750 meters of the race.

Palmo tried to get her crew the best possible line. “[Sunday's] race was an amazing reflection of our hard work so far,” five-seat Julia Mini ’19 said. “We managed the conditions really well and when things got tight with

Wesleyan, Ava kept us calm and internal. It was so fun to race down the Charles one last time with this group.”

Palmo echoed a similar sentiment, noting how impressed she was with the focus and maturity of her rowers. “Our primary goal was to pass Wesleyan, and it felt great to live that out, even if it was a little dicey,” Palmo said.

The Williams eight caught the Wesleyan eight at the Weeks’ Bridge turn and clashed blades under the bridge; running on the adrenaline of a close call, Williams walked

through the Wesleyan boat in just ten strokes.

The collegiate eight’s calm management of the situation gained them a second place finish, 20 seconds behind the first-place finisher, Bates, improving in both place and margin over last year’s third place finish at the event.

The collegiate four finished off the day of racing. They had a dicey moment of their own when another boat collided with the Williams boat under the course’s Anderson Bridge.

The women were able to find some good water despite the

conditions and were able to regroup and gain momentum after the collision. Even with this setback, the crew requalified for next year.

Stroke Betsy Button ’21 commented about the overall weather conditions and the race. “Racing in a 25-30 mph headwind is never easy, but [Sunday] was certainly exciting,” Button said.

Women’s crew will race again next weekend in its final fall race. The walk-ons and first-years will compete in their first race at the Head of the Fish in Saratoga.

Football falters in second half, falls to Tufts

By JOE LAROCCA STAFF WRITERS A crucial goal-line stand, crucial defensive line contributions and a halfback pass for a touchdown propelled Tufts to a 28-21 victory over men’s football.

It was a tale of two halves in Medford on Saturday, as the Ephs and Jumbos scored 42 combined points in the first half but just seven in the second.

The Ephs’ offense continued to struggle in the second half, scoring just seven points on 12 second-half drives dating back to last week’s loss against Middlebury. But they were able to stay competitive until the very end because of a strong offensive first half in which they scored 21 points, accumulating 181 total yards in the process.

Unfortunately for the Ephs, the Jumbos matched each Eph touchdown drive with a score of their own, resulting in a streak of six consecutive touchdowns over the first and second quarters. Bobby Maimaron ’21 opened the scoring with his eighth rushing touchdown of the season.

Running back Carter Begel ’22 took it into the end zone twice, but Tufts countered with two touchdown passes from quarterback Ryan McDonald and a touchdown run by running back Dom Borelli, who threw the football for the game-winning score in the third quarter.

After recovering a fumble

by Begel – the game’s lone turnover – deep in Williams territory, Tufts ran a trick play that worked to perfection. Starting in the backfield, Borelli ran to his right and caught a lateral pass

from McDonald. Continuing to scramble right, Borelli then unfurled a picture-perfect pass to a wide open Jack Dolan in the end zone, giving Tufts the lead for good on a momentum-changing play.

Down 21-28 early on in the fourth quarter, Williams had a second-and-goal at the Tufts one-yard line, down by just one touchdown. But the Tufts defense was determined to hold the lead.

On second down, Begel was stuffed trying to run up the gut, and on third down, wide receiver Rashad Morrison ’21 was unable to break the plane on an end-around.

Down seven points and in prime position to score, Williams opted to go for it on fourth-and-goal, only for Maimaron’s drive to come up just half a yard short. In a tight, defensive second half, the goal-line stand made the difference as the Jumbos won by the same score.

The Ephs had one last chance with under five minutes to go, but Maimaron’s fourth-down pass from midfield fell incomplete and the Jumbos’ offense took over, converting two key third downs and running out the clock from there.

Head coach Mark Raymond reflected on the loss. “Yeah, I thought our kids played hard, real tough against a really good football team,” he said. “We just came up a little short at the end. When we had a chance to score late, we couldn’t cash in.”

Despite the loss, Williams performed well in a couple of key areas, converting 11 of 19 third- and fourth-down attempts and incurring only four penalties for 39 yards (compared to Tufts’ 10 pen-

PHOTO COURTESY OF SPORTS INFORMATION.

Bobby Maimaron ’21 rushed for 135 yards but only recorded 107 passing yards against the Tufts defense. alties for 80 yards). Led by Maimaron (24 carries, 135 yards, one touchdown), the rushing attack produced 176 yards and three touchdowns.

But the passing game left a lot to be desired, as even though Maimaron completed a solid 18 for 29 of his passes, those 18 completions only went for 107 yards, resulting in only

3.7 yards per passing attempt.

The Ephs’ offense was also shut out in the second half for the first time all season.

For the Jumbos, McDonald and Pedrini had standout games, scoring two touchdowns apiece. Tight end Jack Donohue led the receiving corps, registering four catches for 72 yards,

including a six-yard touchdown in the second quarter. Linebacker Greg Holt forced a key Begel fumble in the third quarter, which was then recovered by defensive back Nolan Ostmo.

Next Saturday at 1:30 p.m., the men will look to regain its winning stride on the road against Hamilton.