Issue 4

THE AMHERST THE STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF AMHERST COLLEGE SINCE 1868

STUDENT

CROSSWORD page 11

VOLUME CLI, ISSUE 4 l WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2021

AMHERSTSTUDENT.COM

Employees Speak Up on College’s Casual Employment System Caelen McQuilkin ’24E Assistant News Editor

Photo courtesy of Ryan Yu ‘22

The pandemic has brought increased attention to and appreciation for the integral role of staff on campus. Casual employees express that “it never should have taken a pandemic” for people to see that they matter as well.

Campus Shaken by Possible “Roofies” Incidents Ryan Yu ’22 and Rebecca Picciotto ’22 Editors-in-Chief Rumors and reports of rohypnol (“roofies”) being deliberately slipped into alcoholic drinks at parties have circulated around campus over the past two weeks, prompting concern about safety at social gatherings. Obstacles to obtaining evidence that can confirm or deny the alleged reports have left the community at a loss of how to gauge the drug’s potential presence on campus. Potential victims have also been left without a full understanding of crimes that may have been committed against them.

An anonymous source, hereinafter referred to as Student A, came forward to The Student reporting her experience at a campus party on the night of Friday,

Sept. 10, which led her to believe she had been roofied. Student A does not remember anything from the night, except that she had consumed four standard drinks with friends and then woke up in the hospital. Friends who had been with Student A that night told her that she had attended a party at Jenkins Dormitory and had a drink from a Red Solo cup while there.

“Then like 30 minutes later, I couldn’t stand or do anything.

So then, someone took me back to my room. And then I puked in my bed and my roommates called ACEMS,” Student A said, relaying what happened based on the accounts of her friends.

Student A was escorted in an ambulance to Cooley Dickinson Hospital where her blood was drawn and tested for glucose levels, but a toxicology screening

— which would identify definitively whether roofies were in her system — was not issued. According to a source familiar with the case, toxicology tests are not normally issued in alcohol-related incidents at Cooley Dickinson due to the high volume of college students who come in with a form of alcohol poisoning.

After the incident, Student A filed a report with the Office of Student Affairs (OSA) to make the college aware of the potential presence of roofies on campus but was disappointed with the office’s response.

“I was like, ‘Hey, this is something that’s happening,’ because I also know that it wasn’t only me because there’s a lot of other girls,” Student A said.

The OSA responded by setting up a meeting for early October — later than Student A had

wanted due to the nature of the incident — to discuss Student A’s report but also address her violation of the Student Code of Conduct by engaging in underaged drinking.

After Student A was left dissatisfied with OSA’s response to her report, they received a call from an Amherst College Police Department (ACPD) officer who, according to Student A, said that “ACPD recognizes that the college is not really doing a lot so they’re doing their own little investigation. So he [the ACPD officer] was talking to all the girls who have been reporting this.”

According to Chief of Police John Carter, “we [ACPD officers] are following up on information we have received and will

Continued on page 4

Walk into Valentine Dining Hall on a crowded night for dinner, and some see panini presses, waffle makers and green containers waiting to box up their next meal.

Others see an elaborate system of moving parts, where one misstep could set off a ricochet of related setbacks. Food prep staff are in the lower kitchen, preparing food to feed over a thousand. Checkers are at the dining hall entrance, overseeing students as they scan them into the dining hall. Food servers are transferring food onto thousands of plates every single night. Within this system — not to mention the custodial and grounds work departments — there are hundreds of required roles and several different types of employment classifications.

This system, and the human experiences it shapes, deserve a closer look. This week, The Student looks into the system of “casual employment” at Amherst College, using interviews with nine anonymous facilities staff members and publicly available information.

Given the depth and breadth of this situation, The Student acknowledges that these nine interviews will certainly not be representative of the experiences of all casual employees. Still, many of the employees testified that individual stories need to be told because they provide insight into the class

Continued on page 5

News Sept. 14, 2021 – Sept. 21, 2021

>>Sept. 14, 2021

2:10 p.m., Morris Pratt Dormitory Residential Life (ResLife) staff reported an unauthorized entry into an unlocked room. >>Sept. 16, 2021

11:35 a.m., Service Building Lots An officer responded to a motor vehicle accident where no one was injured.

7:02 p.m., Moore Dormitory ResLife staff and Environmental Health & Safety (EH&S) responded to an issue with a water fountain.

The issue was resolved.

9:40 p.m., Nicholls Biondi Hall ResLife staff responded to a complaint of drinking games and loud music. >>Sept. 18, 2021

12:00 a.m., Hitchcock Dormitory ResLife staff dispersed a party and found broken furniture.

6:05 p.m., Campus Grounds Amherst Police Department (APD) and Amherst College officers responded to a report of someone who was unauthorized and cutting trees on Amherst College property. The person left the area upon officers’ request.

6:44 p.m., Plimpton House

Lena Lamer

ResLife staff responded to a report of a complaint of loud music reported to the town police.

9:10 p.m., South Parking Lot Officers responded to a report of an individual running and jumping around while possibly under the influence of drugs. The individual left the area prior to officers’ arrival. >>Sept. 19, 2021

>>Sept. 17, 2021 3:12 a.m., Merrill Lot An officer stopped a vehicle traveling at a high rate of speed on campus. The individual was not affiliated with the college and was directed off campus.

Thoughts on Theses

9:54 p.m., Morris Pratt Dormitory ResLife staff responded to a report of a group being loud and not following Covid guidelines. >>Sept. 20, 2021

6:11 a.m., Jenkins Dormitory An individual falsely activated a pull station after an officer cleared a large group of individuals from a room to investigate another fire alarm.

3:37 p.m., Campus Grounds An officer confiscated a fake state ID and an expired license that belongs to another individual and submitted them to the Registry of Motor Vehicles (RMV).

4:25 p.m., Campus Grounds An officer took a past report of an unknown individual possibly following the caller and mocking their walking gait. The caller then walked toward a residence hall and the unknown individual left the area.

>>Sept. 21, 2021

1:31 a.m., Service Building ​​An officer confiscated a fake state ID and submitted it to the MA RMV.

Department of Film and Media Studies

Lena Lamer is a Film and Media Studies (FAMS) major. Her thesis looks at scent as an underdeveloped and generally divisive sensory component of film and television. Her thesis advisors are Professors of English in Film and Media Studies Amelie Hastie and Joshua Guilford.

Q: What is your thesis about?

A: I’m doing a FAMS [Film and Media Studies] thesis. I’m one of the three people doing a FAMS thesis this year, and I’m talking about smells and film. So [it’s] half smells in films, and the other half — [involves the] 4D film experience. And then I’m hoping to make some kind of installation next semester to go along with it.

Q: When did you become interested in studying the perception of smell?

A: I worked at an amusement park in high school, which is kind of a terrible job, but part of [where my interest comes from] is that theme parks are really good at building the experience, [and] smell’s a very important part of it. I didn’t work at Disneyland or anything, which is a lot more intense, but scent memory is super important for theme parks. You also have stuff like 4D simulation rides.

I’m from the LA area, so I did that kind of stuff all the time growing up.

I’ve been doing more research into it this semester, [and] theme parks and film have evolved together, which is an interesting thing. Film began as this spectacle at a World Fair, and then they sort of diverged. But there’s a lot of media studies out there about film, museums and theme parks, which I’ve never taken a class on, but is a sub-genre.

Q: There are conspiracy theories that theme parks will put out fake scents to lure people in — do you know if that’s true?

A: Well, the [amusement park that] I worked in was pretty rinky. But there’s a reason you want to eat food

in certain areas of the parks: because the smell is there. It’s not as intense as malls, where each store has its own smell that kind of makes you want to buy things. When I’ve been reading, I have also fallen deep into conspiracy stuff. And then, [when I do], I [remember] to step back because of something that my advisor said that was very enlightening to me. She said, ‘These are all really cool ideas, but how do they relate to Film and Media Studies?’ I was like, ‘Oh, shoot, they don’t at all.’ But it’s been super interesting to kind of lose myself in that kind of reading.

Q: Who is your thesis advisor, and does she have any experience with your thesis topic?

A: My advisor is Professor [of English in Film and Media Studies and Elizabeth W. Bruss Reader Amelie] Hastie. She actually lost her sense of smell a few years ago, so she’s done her own independent research as a film historian and researcher, and also as someone who no longer has that sense memory. So she actually has quite a foundation in sensory film scholarship.

My second semester advisor will be Professor [of English in Film and Media Studies Joshua] Guilford, who I think specializes in stuff like putting together installations and experimental film. I’ve had one class with him, [but] I don’t know him super well.

Q: Would you ever manufacture your own 4D movie?

A: I think so. In FAMS, you have to do a written and a creative portion of your project. For the creative [portion], I’ve always thought I’d like to

figure out something that’s not super lame, where it’s just like ‘smell this apple and watch this clip, oh wow that’s crazy.’ But I’m going to maybe try over Interterms — there’s a place in LA called the Institute for Art and Olfaction, where you can take perfumery classes in conjunction with art making. I’ve been thinking that that would be a cool place to [study] because I feel left to my own devices here, I really don’t have the skills [that I would need to create a 4D movie].

Q: What do you hope to accomplish by writing this thesis?

A: Well, the [general] consensus right now seems to be that smells do not belong in movies. [Scents] are very off-putting, other than in a novelty sense. So I think just finding and maybe unpacking smell a bit, and negotiating the space in films in a way that it’s not traditionally experienced would be cool. Also just to have fun!

Q: Has your thesis made you more aware of scent in day-to-day life now?

A: Yeah, and also scent while watching movies [too]! I’m not sure if it’s putting me at a disadvantage now, though. All that I’m thinking about while watching movies now is scent.

I’m no longer a normal viewer.

Q: Is there anything else you want to share about your thesis?

A: If anyone can think of any good smells in movies, please let me know because I’m looking for them. They seem to be pretty [scarce], so I’ll take all that I can get.

— Eleanor Walsh ’25

News 3

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

UMass Covid Outbreak Prompts Student Concern

Sophie Wolmer ’23 Managing News Editor

UMass Amherst reported 371 positive Covid tests in the week of Sept. 8 to Sept. 14, a sharp increase from the 149 of the previous week.

The outbreak prompted Amherst College Chief of Police John Carter to send an email to the Amherst community on Sept. 17, calling on students, faculty and staff to adhere to the college’s safety restrictions.

Amherst students are concerned by the rise in cases at nearby UMass but concurrently dread the possibility of increased restrictions.

In a joint email sent on Sept.

16, Directors of the UMass Public Health Promotion Center (PHPC) Ann Becker and Jeffrey Hescock communicated that the increase in positive UMass cases has mostly come from students who are off-campus and vaccinated. They emphasized that those infected had experienced mild to moderate illness and were not hospitalized.

Hescock and Becker also stated that the outbreak has been linked to “indoor social” events, like gatherings at downtown bars and large parties, where students have not been masked. “Positive cases continue to be predominantly among undergraduate off-campus students connected to un-masked social activities,” they wrote. “We have not seen any spread in academic settings.”

In his statement, Carter noted that the Town of Amherst has also seen a rise in active cases, reporting 321 as of Sept. 17. Covid cases

at UMass and in town have risen in parallel, with both counts more than doubling this week.

The increase in positive cases has concerned many Amherst students.

Maclin Satz ’23 said she is worried by the outbreak at UMass. “It makes me nervous just because I know testing is voluntary at UMass, so the numbers that they are reporting are not entirely accurate,” she stated.

“I’ve seen [UMass students] walking around near Amherst’s campus,” Satz continued. “I want to hope that they’re being responsible and staying home if they don’t feel good, but I know that’s probably not the case. It would really suck for us to have to go under stricter rules, not because [Amherst students] weren’t following [the restrictions], but because UMass wasn’t being responsible.”

Tim Song ’22 is also unnerved by the rise in numbers because “students go to different campuses for social gatherings” and many “students will not mask up when going [in]to [the] town of Amherst.”

For Song, becoming infected with Covid his senior year is especially worrisome. “Catching Covid-19 would cause a lot of stress especially in senior year, and knowing that vaccination doesn’t completely prevent transmission worries me,” he expressed.

Despite the qualms of the Amherst community, UMass administrators report that they expected an increase in Covid cases early in the semester. Steve Goodwin, deputy chancellor and chief planning officer

at UMass, noted in a statement to the Boston Globe that he is confident in the ability of the university’s vaccination requirement, mask mandate and social distancing protocols to keep students safe.

Nevertheless, UMass is one of the few colleges in Massachusetts that is not requiring mandatory testing of its students. While the university is offering free vaccines and testing at the PHPC, testing is merely encouraged for those who believe that they have been experiencing symptoms of the virus.

Chief Communications Officer Sandy Genelius told The Student that various departments from each of the Five Colleges have been meeting virtually since the start of the pandemic to discuss their respective protocols and procedures. Leaders from the consortium have already set up a meeting to address the latest outbreak. “The Five College presidents meet September 21. Ultimately, since each institution’s circumstances are unique, each then makes its own decision as to what is best for its community,” she stated.

So far, the only change that has been made to UMass’s Covid protocols is a limitation of football tailgating to students with parking permits.

On- and off-campus students, faculty and staff of the university have also been advised to mask up and avoid indoor crowds. Selected students — for instance, in particular residential areas or social groups — were also asked to go for additional testing.

In light of UMass’s scant response, Carter wrote individually

addressed recommendations for students and faculty and staff. He expressed alarm at the high transmissibility of the virus and urged all community members to “make smart choices.”

For students, Carter warned that an increase in infection rates on campus and evidence of significant noncompliance will force the college to “impose stricter rules.” To minimize risk, he said, students must exercise extra precaution.

“We ask that [students] please think before you act and comply with our health and safety protocols: do not allow non-Amherst College students into your residence halls,” he wrote. Carter went on to encourage students to adhere to the college’s mask mandates.

Faculty and staff were advised to be cautious when off-campus. “For faculty and staff, please be aware of the elevated local numbers and do all you can to avoid potentially risky behaviors off-campus, such as indoor dining,” Carter wrote in his message.

Though students understand the motivation behind the warning, some were more alarmed by the prospect of increased restrictions.

Will Henderson ’23 was initially troubled by the email, but his fears were dispelled by the lack of communal spread. He remarked that “the recent jump in cases had me concerned for the first day or two after we heard about the positive tests, but once it became clear that there was not any community spread I was actually reassured that the combination of mandatory vaccinations and

the current guidelines are enough to prevent spread at Amherst.”

Satz was similarly frustrated by Carter’s email because she feels that the administration has consistently failed to clarify what is considered to be “noncompliance.” “I wish students were given a more objective understanding,” she said. “ For example, why can’t they say something like ‘if we see X many cases, then we will change the protocol to Y.’” Reflecting on last year’s stringent restrictions, Satz expressed worry that her personal well-being might be jeopardized if the college enhances restrictions once again. “Both my mental and physical health took a serious hit last year under those stricter restrictions. I really do not want to risk that.”

Similar to Satz, Henderson wished that the college would explicate the meaning of noncompliance. He thinks the college needs to be “more realistic” about its expectations for students. “I don’t understand why Chief Carter would make an empty threat, so I am very nervous that restrictions will be increased,” he said.

There are some students, however, who agree with the sentiment of Carter’s message. Song would much rather be safe than sorry in order to maintain the viability of having an in-person year and graduation. “It makes sense and is necessary for our health and safety,” he said. “I have many close contacts in classes and other commitments — one case of Covid-19 on campus would lead to a large spread.”

Yom Kippur Service Interrupted by CSO in Booking Mishap Ryan Yu ’22 and Rebecca Picciotto ’22 Editors-in-Chief On Sept. 16, a Community Service Officer (CSO) interrupted Yom Kippur services in the Powerhouse after a miscommunication over the booking of the space with the DQ, one of the college’s a capella groups, prompting alarm about the incident and the Amherst College Police Department’s (ACPD) role in it.

Yom Kippur, known as the

holiest day of the year in Judaism, completes the 10-day period known as the High Holy Days.

The holiday is traditionally observed through rigorous prayer, repentance and a 24-hour fast as Jews seek to atone the past year of sins. Many Jews who are otherwise secular attend High Holy Day services, in large part because of the days’ outsize importance.

Rumors quickly spread that the DQ, which had the space booked at the time, had called the Amherst College Police Depart-

ment (ACPD) to remove Hillel — the largest Jewish affinity group on campus, which was in charge of holding the service for around 40 students — from the Powerhouse.

Both groups, however, noted that the situation was a misunderstanding and that the rumors were exaggerated, with no ill intent on the part of the DQ. According to Javier Londono ’23, a member of DQ, the group had the Powerhouse booked at the same time that the Yom Kip-

pur services were happening due to issues with the virtual booking system, which prevented Hillel from booking the full time slot that they thought they had. The DQ went to ACPD to confirm their booking after seeing the ongoing services, and, though the virtual booking system showed that they had the space reserved, they asked ACPD not to interrupt the services despite the dispatcher’s suggestion to do so.

Ultimately, the group “turned to [a] CSO to ask the service how

long they would run over to see if we should push auditions back or find a new space.” The CSO, in turn, interrupted Rabbi Bruce Seltzer in his sermon.

“The interruption of the service was a genuine mistake and we, the DQ, are deeply sorry about it,” Londono said. “If we had been made aware that [Hillel] would need the space until 9 p.m., we would have found a new space immediately and would have avoided the interruption.”

Mason Quintero ’23, presi-

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

News 4

Students Urge Greater Recognition of Jewish Holidays Continued from page 3

dent of Hillel, confirmed most of Londono’s story, but lamented the “much bigger issue of people not understanding the significance of the holy days in Judaism.”

“The incident this week was a misunderstanding. We didn’t book the Powerhouse for as long as we intended to. The DQ didn’t know what to do, and my understanding is they tried to stop the CSO from interrupting services,” Quintero said. “Interrupting services was annoying, but I don’t think there was any ill will and would not have happened if people knew how important these days are to Jews.”

Quintero specifically criticized how a number of important school-wide events were set on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, including a mandatory Association of Amherst Students (AAS) Budgetary Committee meeting on the first night of Rosh Hashanah and a set of AAS Senate elections on the day of Yom Kippur. Both events were eventually moved to accommodate the holidays, but only shortly before they

were originally scheduled.

Other members of Hillel echoed the sentiments. One member, who asked to remain anonymous due to the sensitive nature of the rumors, noted that “I think this was more a crime of ignorance than malice, but it’s still frustrating, and it interrupted the time when I feel closest to God.” Another member, who also asked to remain anonymous, pointed to the pernicious mental effects that arose from the incident. “There seems to be no ill intent on the part of the student group who contacted the CSO, but the disruption of services from an employee of ACPD struck fear in many students given the rise in anti-Semitic hate crimes,” they said.

When asked about the incident, Chief of Police John Carter emphasized that it was not a police officer that interrupted the service, and that they hope to avoid similar situations in the future.

“Our understanding at this time is that there was a scheduling mistake. A Community Service Officer, not a police officer,

spoke with Rabbi Seltzer and the service continued,” he said.

“However, we’re in the process of gathering more information so that we can hopefully avoid this occurring again. I am in contact with Rabbi Seltzer and will keep him informed of what I learn.”

Looking forward, Quintero

hopes that this incident will allow non-Jewish community members to be more aware of the significance of these Jewish holidays.

“I want people to really understand that for many Jews these holidays are the only time they connect religiously to the Jewish culture,” he said. “I challenge

students to think about what it would be like to have classes on Christmas, Easter, or whatever their holiest days are depending on religion. What it would feel like to be reprimanded for missing a meeting in order to celebrate a tradition they have been celebrating their whole lives.”

Photo courtesy of Rob Mattson and David Lamb

Yom Kippur services taking place in the Powerhouse were interrupted due to miscommunication with the DQ over booking of the space.

Campus Responds Tentatively to “Roofies” Reports Continued from page 1 send a community update when we have more information to share. We continue to strongly encourage students to share information with us so that we can understand the situation as fully as possible.”

Despite ACPD’s independent investigation, Student A noted that the department has come up short in verifying the reports due to the under usage of toxicology screenings.

“The hospital hasn’t been doing tox[icology] screenings as much anymore even when it’s requested, which they’re [ACPD] not happy about.” Without a toxicology report, Student A continued, “I maybe was drugged or you could just say I was super super drunk.”

This sentiment of uncertainty has been mirrored in the cam-

pus’s response. A Sept. 17 post by the Amherst Muckrake, the college’s satirical publication, publicized the rumors around roofies that had been developing. The Muckrake wrote in the post’s comment section: “We know we’re funny, but this is not a joke: Multiple calls this weekend suggest that there is at least one individual on this campus using date rape drugs to prey on students.”

Soon after this post was released with little verifiable information, students were left wondering how to gauge the safety of Amherst’s social scene.

Despite the lack of information on the topic, Cece Hong ’22, the director of operations of Amherst College Emergency Medical Services (ACEMS), made a statement in the campus-wide GroupMe to address safety concerns.

“Let us all try to refrain from accepting random drinks at random parties,” Hong suggested.

But she still acknowledged the lack of available knowledge on the roofie reports: “While we aren’t completely sure what is going on … we want to let you all know that we are a resource for you all,” Hong wrote.

Following the eruption of discussion about roofies among students, ACPD, together with Dean of Students Liz Agosto and Title IX Coordinator Laurie Frankl, sent a community-wide email that echoed similar sentiments of uncertainty: “​​The college has not received information confirming rohypnol exposure in students, nor has the college received reports of drug-facilitated sexual assaults related to these rumors. We have very limited information and urge the community to share with us anything

that you know.”

The rumors and reports of roofie usage come at the same time as protests over sexual assault at UMass Amherst. According to some of the protestors, who gathered outside the UMass Theta Chi fraternity on Sept. 19 in solidarity with those who had alleged sexual assault by fraternity brothers, roofie usage is not uncommon at UMass.

“I’ve also been roofied, and I know a lot of other girls here who have been, so I think that we all have to fight for each other,” said UMass senior Shivali Mashar to the Daily Collegian. “I’m lucky because I woke up in my own bed, but not every girl was that lucky. I think that’s what drives a lot of victims, is that they’ve dealt with this experience and they’re strong enough to move past it and fight.”

Hundreds of students gath-

ered for a second protest on Sept.

20, where attendees took turns sharing their experiences with and opinions of the university’s culture around parties and sexual respect. A number of them, mostly women, recounted their experiences of sexual assault and harassment, and called for a systemic shift in the university’s approach to such issues.

The rise in cases of sexual assault at UMass and alleged reports of roofying at Amherst have served as a reminder for students like Student A about the threat of sexual misconduct on college campuses.

Student A said, “It’s weird to think that it does happen here.

It’s a small school, everyone kind of knows everyone in the grade, so I just figured that wouldn’t be a thing, but I’ve definitely been more careful with drinks and such.”

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

News 5

Staff Illuminate Experiences, Exploitation of Casual Employees Continued from page 1

struggle that underlies and defines our institution, as well as society as a whole.

Defining Casual Employment, Discrepancies The Amherst College employee handbook establishes casual employees as employees who “Typically … hold their positions as substitutes for employees on extended leave, to assist in completion of a special project or when there are delays in filling vacancies. Casual employees are usually employed for less than 20 hours per week.” Because of this, the handbook goes on to explain, “casual employees are not covered under the guidelines of the Handbook and are not entitled to employee benefits.” Because this category can apply to any employee and not just student workers, being a casual employee and working less than 20 hours a week are not one and the same. The handbook also notes that “Employees working less than 20 hours a week or less than 39 weeks a year, OR who hold casual positions, are not eligible for benefits.”

Some of the employees interviewed by The Student stated that this system works well for their individual needs. “Not everyone can be a benefitted employee. Not everybody wants that,” said one anonymous casual employee, hereinafter referred to as Employee A. “Right now, I don’t. Throughout my entire time with Amherst College, I’ve needed to ask for crazy amounts of time off during weird, inopportune times.” Others, many of whom are currently working the same 40 hours a week as full-time, benefitted employees, expressed frustration at the discrepancy that leaves them without health insurance and other key benefits. “I started working 40 hours a week my second month here,” said an anonymous casual employee, Employee B, who has now been working at the college for three years.

“I’m still getting paid less, and I’m not getting benefits.”

Referencing the weekly dining hall employee schedule, anonymous employees calculated that in

the past week, front-of-the-house staff at Val (that is, not including the kitchen and food prep staff) scheduled approximately 1,100 hours of employee labor. Of those 1,100 hours, approximately 50 percent were filled by benefitted employees and 50 percent by casual employees. These sources indicate that these numbers may vary week to week but sustain an approximate 1:1 ratio of labor hours filled by casual employees versus full time employees.

Those 550 hours of casual employee labor were filled by 17 casual employees, meaning that the casual employees working front-of-thehouse at Val this past week worked almost 32 hours per person, on average. The range within this average calculation of hours is large, anonymous employee sources stated, as some casual employees work the assumed 20 hours per week, and some work close to or over 40 in some instances.

The college’s system of employment does not allow for casual employees to be converted into benefited employees, so “you can’t just say ‘I’m willing to work 40 hours a week’ and get benefits,” explained an anonymous casual employee, Employee F. “You have to wait for a current full-time employee to leave.” Full-time positions don’t open up very often, employees reported, and when they do, it leaves all casual employees — in addition to any other person interested in applying for the job — to compete for the position. Regardless of the number of casual employees who do not fall under the Employee Handbook’s description of casual employees being those who work less than 20 hours a week and only for brief periods of time, the only time a switch from casual to benefitted can occur is when a position opens and an employee is hired to it. Employee B recounted a coworker who had worked at the college for several years who would “sometimes work up to 45 hours a week, and took as many hours as he possibly could, and he still would stay a ‘casual.’”

Because casual employees are not eligible for employment benefits or “covered under the guide-

lines of the Employee Handbook,” they do not receive a health care plan, a dental plan, retirement plan, vacation time, paid holidays off or other benefits such as the Educational Assistance plan — which assists in paying tuition for employee education — and Grant-in-Aid program — which assists in paying tuition for employees’ family members.

Another discrepancy between casual employees and benefitted employees is overtime pay. Casual employees start getting paid overtime if they work over 40 hours in one week — overtime pay starts at their 41st hour that week — while benefitted employees get paid overtime if they work over eight hours in one day — starting with the ninth hour worked in their day.

Employee A told of a repeated instance where he worked alongside a full-time benefitted employee who was making overtime and therefore making twice as much as he was, for doing almost the exact same tasks. “I knew one person who was so frustrated by the inequity of this — someone who was a part time employee with benefits, working next to a casual,” said Employee A. “He was so frustrated by the inequality that he was making more than her, that he quit.”

In addition, casual employees do not receive the merit and longevity-based raises that full-time, benefitted employees receive on an annual basis. Casual employees are not subject to performance review of any kind, and do not receive automatic annual raises, meaning that the only way they can obtain a raise is by negotiating with management.

The Bigger Picture: Class Struggle Many employees acknowledged the complexity this situation creates, one even stating that the topic of casual employment at Amherst College could be an entire thesis project.

Two employees drew comparisons between their experiences working at Amherst College and other colleges in the area, and acknowledged that their experience at Amherst College has been far better. “I was at UMass for three years [as an O3, UMass’ term for

casual employee], and I didn’t want to go back. Based off of how I was treated here, I am happier here. It is still rough, but it’s a lot better for me,” said one employee, Employee C. “There are aspects of working at this institution that are amazing,” Employee A similarly stated.

“There are these problems, right?

But there are also so many amazing things.” Other employees shared similar sentiments and appreciations of the overall workplace environment. “In general, I believe that the college does a far greater job in treating its employees than most workplaces,” stated one employee.

Regarding wages, “In comparison to everything else, the payment here … it’s fair. But that’s within the constraints of society,” reflected Employee A. “On the wider scale, [the college] has made it appear as though they are being fair and reasonable. That is a valid perspective … but it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t breed resentment on other levels.”

In addition, many employees attested to the fact that casual employment differs greatly between sectors of employment at the college. “I am talking from a very upstairs perspective. The situation downstairs is way different,” said another anonymous employee.

“The kitchen and the floor have totally different cultures. Way, way different. The casuals that are in the kitchen are taken advantage of in unique ways.”

Thinking about ways that the administration can better address their plights, some employees agreed that sweeping policy change would not be helpful. “Casual employees are not a singular entity with a singular plight,” said Employee A. “Individual casual narratives need to be heard, and their specific needs met in lieu of just some sweeping policy revision.”

Individual stories matter, employees said, because they are evidence of the working class struggle that is never uniform, but fundamental to understanding the culture that Amherst College students help create.

“The institution’s reliance on casual labor is the most apparent example of an inequitable and unjust

division of labor. It’s easily recognizable and relatively easily rectified and yet it still exists,” reflected another anonymous employee. “A campus that prides itself on its diversity, equity and inclusivity, does seem to have a problem adopting these ideals in earnest in regards to its own staff. This shouldn’t come as a surprise though. Amherst is a beautiful place filled with beautiful ideas and beautifully diverse peoples. It’s also a business. It’s cut and dry and it functions as a business,” they said.

“I feel like it took a pandemic for everyone to start seeing that casuals matter as well,” said another anonymous casual employee, Employee D. “I feel it never should have taken a pandemic to make people realize that us casuals play an important role as well, just as much as the full-time workers.” For Employee D, part of this role is helping uphold the staff ’s integral part of the college community, as parents and administrators “depend on us employees to make sure that you [students] are well taken care of … I do try to look out for you,” they said.

Employee D recounted a moment during first-year orientation where a group of three first years approached them and asked, “Do you guys get to eat this food as well?” “I told them yes,” said Employee D. “I appreciated them asking. I wish [people] knew that we are … important. We do matter as well.”

Others had similar thoughts about how their work is valued.

“Amherst College believes that anyone can do these jobs, and that is reflected in the casual pay rate, which until the pandemic was the state mandated minimum. The raise to $15/hour is a reaction to the labor shortage and larger cultural shift, not a fundamental change in how this institution views the value of casual labor,” said Employee A. “They believe that anyone can scoop food. That anyone can sit at the checker stand.

That anyone can wash dishes. That anyone can run green containers back and forth, in and out, because it’s ‘unskilled labor.’ It’s unskilled manual labor.” But the idea that

Continued on page 6

News 6

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

“That’s Quite Simply Class Struggle in a Nugget” Continued from page 5 such a thing as “unskilled manual labor” even exists, continued Employee A, has begun to unravel in light of the pandemic, as some have begun to see that “this is hard work.

Soft skills and tolerance are actually skills. These are actually skilled positions that most people are unwilling to do because they do not have the skills or the tolerance to hack it. I think that’s super important to change the conversation around food service employees.”

The notion that “anyone can scoop food,” said Employee A, may be right on one level. But “Would you do it? Could you actually do it?

Could you do it?” they said. “I think that the people who are making these decisions, that is the question that they should ask themselves.

Would you put yourself in this position? They might say, ‘If I had to.’

That’s just the class struggle. That’s quite simply class struggle in a nugget. We have to do this to survive, and you don’t.”

Employee E had similar thoughts. “The class struggle within the Amherst College community is not unlike any other place in the world. But it’s less pronounced for full-time, benefitted employees than it is for many full-time employees with different employers.

The most egregious form of this struggle is with casual employees on campus and that’s why it’s essential that the college rectifies this wrong,” they said.

“I grew up in a working class family with a parent who lost their job on more than one occasion due to efforts trying to unionize their workplace,” they continued. “I grew up acutely aware of the vast injustices of those that have and those that don’t. Stories of class divisions and labor battles were part of my upbringing. I believe in the value and importance of the human being, not just their output.”

The Casual Employees Left Behind Interviews with several current and former casual employees revealed a few central ways in which the system of casual employment leaves a large chunk of employees

in an odd-in between that they believe is unjust. Casual employees who work more than twenty hours a week — and often close to the forty hours a week that full-time benefitted employees work — are oftentimes assigned the same tasks as benefitted employees, despite not receiving equal pay or benefits.

“The fact that the college is still defining casual employment as someone who works around 20 hours a week is really dicey. That does sometimes apply, but it also really doesn’t in so many circumstances,” said Employee A. Employee B, the anonymous casual employee who has been working 40 hours a week for three years now and still remains a casual employee, said: “I just think it’s unfair, really.

I’m working almost twice as hard as some of the people here … and I’m still getting paid less and I’m not getting benefits.”

So many casual employees working close to full-time hours get stuck in this situation because the college’s system of employment does not allow for casual employees to be converted into benefitted employees. “You can’t just say ‘I’m willing to work 40 hours a week’ and

get benefits,” explained an anonymous casual employee, Employee F. “You have to wait for a current full-time employee to leave.” Fulltime positions don’t open up very often, employees reported, and when they do, it leaves all casual employees — in addition to any other person interested in applying for the job — to compete for the position. Regardless of the number of casual employees who do not fall under the Employee Handbook’s description of casual employees being those who work less than 20 hours a week and only for brief periods of time, the only time a switch from casual to benefitted can occur is when a position opens and an employee is hired to it. Employee B recounted a coworker who had worked at the college for several years who would “sometimes work up to 45 hours a week, and took as many hours as he possibly could, and he still would stay a ‘casual.’”

Casual employees report being assigned similar or identical responsibilities as their full-time, benefitted counterparts, which they say adds to the irony of their situation.

For example, the chart below

compares and contrasts some of the listed job responsibilities on the job advertisements for “Dining Services Assistant,” a full-time, benefitted position in dining services, and “Casual Food Service Assistant,” the casual equivalent of dining services assistant, according to dining hall employees.

There are some differences in the job expectations for casual and benefitted employees, including benefitted employees’ responsibility to “oversee” casual employees.

Casual employees are also expected to fill in and cover for other employees. “Your employment is contingent upon that flexibility,” said Employee A. Employee E, a casual employee, brought up this issue in his own schedule. “I wish the college would be more considerate of employees,” he said. “There are employees that have kids, there are employees that still take care of family, or employees that don’t have cars and take transportation such as buses … it would be a lot easier for us if [the administration] could work around that.” One potential change Employee A brought up is coordinating employee schedules with the PVTA schedule, which so

many employees rely on for transportation but is not synced with clock-in time.

Moving Forward As to the question of what the college should do to address this issue, employees had thoughts.

“I would want to see that if [employees] are working forty hours a week or are willing to work forty hours, make it easier to become full time with benefits. Don’t have a limit on how many benefitted spots there are, so that if you have more people who are willing to work forty hours but they want benefits, give them the benefits and then they’ll work,” said Employee F. “Amherst is a 2 billion dollar institution — but where is that money, actually?”

Similarly, asked another anonymous employee, “What’s the overall value of an equitable workforce to this institution?

Are the hundreds of thousands of dollars that are saved through limiting full-time benefitted roles on campus worth it, knowing that there is an inequitable division of labor on campus? That’s the question.”

This table compares the job responsibilities of a benefitted Dining Services Assistant and a casual Food Service Assistant.

News 7

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Five College Students Return to Campus Amid Challenges Spencer Michaels ’24 Staff Writer

For the first time since the pandemic began, the college has opened its classroom doors to Five College Consortium students. Enrollees of UMass Amherst, Mount Holyoke College, Hampshire College and Smith College are now permitted to take courses in person on the Amherst College campus.

Differences in academic calendars and the need to find transportation across the five schools have always posed challenges, but the pandemic has created new safety considerations that Five College students must consider. In light of the recent spike in Covid cases at UMass, the differing approaches that the Five Colleges take to Covid safety have become increasingly clear for students.

“I think there’s more hesitancy to take a Five College course — people are a bit more cautious — because of differing restrictions at different colleges,” said Michaela Flanders ’22, a bioethics and psychology major at Mount Holyoke who’s taking an anthropology course at Amherst. “For example, at Mount Holyoke, students are kind of apprehensive about the fact that UMass is not habitually

test[ing] [its] student populations.”

Mount Holyoke, Smith and Amherst require all students on campus to undergo asymptomatic testing at least twice a week; Hampshire has a similar but less intensive program.

UMass is encouraging students to get Covid tests but has no testing requirements for asymptomatic students. The university reported on Thursday, however, that “the number of tests this past week more than doubled to 8,836.”

Amherst is requiring all UMass students taking classes at Amherst to be tested on a regular schedule just like Amherst students, said Kevin Kennedy, the director of strategic engagement at the Five College Consortium.

“The other campuses did not choose to do that; at Mount Holyoke, Hampshire and Smith, UMass students can attend courses there,” he added. “[Students] need to be vaccinated at UMass, but they don’t need to be part of the local testing regimen.”

The uptick in positive cases in the Hampshire County area increases the chances of interacting with someone with Covid, particularly in enclosed spaces such as on the Pioneer Valley Transit Authority (PVTA) — the bus system which most Five College stu-

dents use to commute. Five College students, however, did not seem too concerned about the trip.

Lily Nemirovsky ’24, a student at Mount Holyoke taking two courses in Amherst’s Russian Department, said that she’s “not too concerned” about the PVTA. “Everyone who I’ve noticed on the PVTA,” she said, “has followed the mask guidelines very, very well, so I’m not hugely concerned. Also, the PVTA isn’t super full, so I usually have an empty seat next to me, and then social distancing is pretty reasonable.”

The PVTA requires all riders to wear a mask while waiting at bus stops or on-board PVTA vehicles.

Riders are also encouraged to maintain distance with other passengers and avoid using public transportation if experiencing Covid symptoms.

Flanders reported that the PVTA “started with a less robust schedule than usual.”

“For the past couple of weeks whenever I have come to Amherst [College], I have needed to find a way to get transportation [other than taking the bus], because if not, I would have come to class and then been stuck at Amherst for two to three hours after my class before the next PVTA bus,” she said. “And

of course, at Amherst, Five College students are not allowed to park anywhere on campus, so that piece has been a real struggle and definitely feels like a deterrent to Five College students.”

Due to a shortage of qualified drivers, some PVTA bus routes have been modified from standard full service, according to the UMass website. Route 39, for instance, which ran between Hampshire and Smith Colleges, has been cancelled for the Fall 2021 semester.

Despite these challenges, five college students described that their class registration process was calmer at Amherst than Mount Holyoke, even considering the hectic adddrop period.

“It was actually a lot easier than registering for classes at Mount Holyoke,” Nemirovsky said. “I thought this was normal, but I guess that Holyoke is unusually competitive with their classes. … I emailed the Amherst professors with the courses I was interested in [during the] week of [the] Add-Drop period, and both of them said it was totally easy for me to join in late, even though I hadn’t registered during the initial period.”

Cam Waters ’24, a student from Mount Holyoke, agreed: “When it came to the Five College process,

it was actually pretty easy. It wasn’t hard at all … the classes were available.”

Official registration numbers from the Registrar are not released until November, according to Kennedy, so the exact number of Five College students taking on-campus classes and the breakdown of school, department and schedule is as of yet unknown.

If pre-pandemic numbers and trends continue, it is expected that there will be around 5,000 courses this year “taken by students going to other campuses,” he said. The exact distribution of where these students go and are from varies, but Hampshire is typically the leader in cross-college courses — upwards of 90 percent of enrolled students will take a Five College course during their undergraduate career. On the other hand, only 7 percent to 8 percent of UMass students will take an off-campus offering.

The exact landscape of course enrollments across the Five College Consortium remains unclear — as does the role Amherst plays in that ecosystem. As the new Delta variant causes an uptick in local infections, Five College students will be facing new challenges as they navigate yet another pandemic semester.

on the Daily Mammoth. Any member of the community can bring concerns forward during the public comment period at the start of each meeting. The minutes from previous weeks are posted on our website.

ates discretionary funding for campus events, appoints students to serve on college governance and student-faculty committees, and engages in committee work centered on student life and well-being; • The Executive Board, which oversees AAS and helps communicate with administrators; • The Judiciary Council, which handles student complaints related to AAS, student clubs, and any actions that go against our constitution.

If you want to learn more about these parts of AAS or committees, please check out our website and read our constitution.

Feedback This year, the Executive Board is prioritizing inclusivity, anti-racism, and community. To ensure that we are able to support all students, we will evaluate our rules and our relationships with students and make changes where necessary. We are dedicated to becoming a better student government. If you have feedback for us — ways we can be more transparent, how we can include more voices, or even negative experiences with AAS — please email us at aas@amherst.edu or fill out this anonymous form.

Besides what we can do better, we also want to know how we can improve your experience on campus. Each year, in addition to their committee work, senators complete Senate projects to improve campus life. Past senate projects

include a water bottle cleaning station in Val, Late Night, free laundry, and free printing. If you have an idea for something you want to change on campus, let us know!

Don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any questions about Amherst, AAS, or general campus concerns. We are here to advocate and support you all. You can email us at aas@amherst.edu or look for us around campus — you can find your class senators and executive board members on our website.

And follow our Instagram @aas. amherst for the latest updates.

Introducing the Association of Amherst Students (AAS) The Association of Amherst Students

With over three weeks of the semester under our belt, we, the Association of Amherst Students (AAS), wanted to take a moment to introduce ourselves and say a little bit about who we are and what we do: Who We Are The AAS is the student government of Amherst College. Most of our business is conducted by the AAS Senate, a 33-member representative body composed of eight students from each class year and one transfer-student seat. We hold public meetings every Monday night at 8:30 p.m. in the Cole Assembly Room (Red Room) in Converse Hall. Zoom links to our meetings are also made available

What We Do We send you a lot of emails, but we promise we do more than just that. AAS’s most important functions on campus include funding student events and organizations, advocating for student needs with the administration, and placing student voices in key parts of the college’s governing bodies.

AAS is split into three parts: • The Senate, which discusses and acts on student concerns, approves club budgets, appropri-

For weekly updates on AAS, check out The Student’s new series “From the Red Room,” which will provide regular coverage on AAS meeting discussions and policies starting next week (Issue 5).

Op pinion

w

Lessons for the Next President On Sept. 13, President Biddy Martin announced that she will be concluding her 11-year presidency next summer. “The end of this academic year will be the right time for me to begin my next chapter,” Martin said in an email, expressing her gratitude for the Amherst College community. In her message, she listed the college’s current projects and voiced her expectations for the next president to “benefit from the vibrancy and promise that come with the mutual reinforcement of talent and diversity in students, faculty and staff.”

This change of the college’s leadership has inspired the Editorial Board to reflect upon Martin’s legacy, what we want to see in the next president and most importantly, how to ensure that the process of selecting our next leader is inclusive and reflective of the entire Amherst community.

During Martin’s term at Amherst, we’ve seen a great deal of physical change around campus that has helped to address the disparity between the student body and infrastructure we so often note — the opening of the new science center, the Greenway residence halls and shortly, the new student center.

She built a talented leadership circle (many of whom are so skilled they’re being poached left and right), supported new opportunities for faculty and student research, and as the college often reminds us, utilized Amherst’s sizable endowment to deliver a racial and socioeconomic diversification push quantitatively unmatched by any of our peer institutions. However, alongside these visible successes, there have been a handful of clear failures.

Her term has seen several notable protest campaigns — such as the calls for divestment from the fossil fuel industry and the prison-industrial complex, the Amherst Uprising movements and the #ReclaimAmherst campaign — many of which have been met with policy responses students agreed did not go far enough. Relations between the administration and the rest of the college community are at an all-time low, as students, faculty and staff chafe under opaque, authoritarian administrative policies. Students have struggled with the feeling that the college has prioritized media attention and public relations over real action and student-supported change, and staff have been left questioning why the college views oat milk a better target of endowment spending than hazard pay. And the school’s muchlauded diversification push, while impressive on paper, has never gone so far as to provide the institutional support and resources to help students of color and first generation, low-income students succeed once they reach campus.

Martin’s administration has thus been one of great success and great failure. And so, when we questioned what the biggest takeaways were for the next administration, we settled upon two major make-or-break traits that can help avoid the mistakes of the Martin administration while replicating some of its successes.

First, we need a president with a vision. There is no question that the goals Martin brought when she took up the position in 2011 played a significant role in guiding the administration’s priorities and helped address many issues that had been untouched under her predecessors. However, in recent years, much of the disconnect between the student body and administration can be attributed to the fact that those initial visions were in the rear view. Without a renewed vision, the administration took no clear stance on priorities and often resorted to surfacelevel responses to the host of demands presented by students.

And second, we need a president who will do more than just listen. Clash after clash between students and administrators came about in the past few years after the administration repeatedly unveiled policies with no student input but major impacts on student life. Each time, Martin held discussions to hear out student concerns, but came up short of allowing students to influence school policy. Faculty and staff have similarly reported difficulties working under an administration that often seems to believe it can work better alone. The next president should be mindful of these problems and work to incorporate students, faculty and staff into policy-making as it happens, rather than choosing to deal with the backlash that comes when policies are unveiled.

However, these concerns are not just something for a future administration to deal with. They matter right now, as we select our next president and determine where the college is heading, especially as the self-perpetuating Board of Trustees continues to dominate policy to the chagrin of the rest of the community. We want to be represented in decisions that impact our school and education, and the presidential search committee seems like a great place to start. We call on the college to substantially increase the representation of students, faculty and staff on the selection committee, giving the community as a whole a say in where we end up 10 years down the line.

Unsigned editorials represent the views of the majority of the Editorial Board — (assenting: 9; dissenting: 1; abstaining: 6).

THE AMHERST

STUDENT E X E C U T I V E B OA R D Editors-in-Chief Ryan Yu Rebecca Picciotto Managing News Zach Jonas Sophie Wolmer Yee-Lynn Lee Assistant News Caelen McQuilkin Tana Delalio Managing Opinion Scott Brasesco Skye Wu Assistant Opinion Kei Lim Managing Arts and Living Theodore Hamilton Brooke Hoffman Alex Brandfonbrener Managing Sports Ethan Samuels Liza Katz Liam Archacki Managing Podcast Sam Spratford Maggie McNamara Managing Design Anna Smith S TA F F Publishers Emmy Sohn Digital Director Sawyer Pollard Social Media Manager Emi Eliason

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The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Opinion 9

Seeing Double: Pay Up, Profs Cole Graber-Mitchell ’22 Columnist Ever since coming to Amherst, it had been my goal to do research with a professor. But everyone else wanted research positions too, and I wasn’t able to find one. In my first year, I made my tuition money by typing — on a typewriter — the spine labels for new books at the Jones Library in town. In my second year, I graded for the math department, finally landing a job related to my majors. Still, it wasn’t research, so when I managed to get into one of the few research colloquiums offered each spring semester to sophomores and juniors, I was extraordinarily excited.

That was the semester that Covid hit, but my little research team worked hundreds of remote hours over the summer to find out what nobody had found out before. I had a great time. I felt proud of what I was doing, happy with my team and grateful to the college’s summer research funding, which ensured that I could work on the project without the distraction of a summer job. Then, we found out that we wouldn’t be paid to continue our research during the semester — even though we had more work to do.

For a year now, I’ve continued to work on that research project for free. In order to do that, I had to turn back to grading for the math department, picking up extra hours as a tutor when I could. During the academic year, I was swamped; between classes, work, extracurriculars and my everyday obligations, I struggled to meet deadlines for what was now volunteer research. But this was what I had worked for the entire first half of my college experience, wasn’t it? A chance to share new knowledge with the world — and maybe even get my name on a paper. Plus, I enjoyed it. I couldn’t just quit.

My experiences with unpaid research aren’t unique. At Amherst, students do unpaid re-

search for professors in every division and many departments.

Anecdotes abound: I heard from students about professors who promise pay but don’t follow through, labs that require unpaid work before hiring students, professors that expect countless hours of unpaid overtime, and professors that present offers to do unpaid work as something to be grateful for.

Most of these students expressed gratitude for their research positions. None of them wanted their professors or labs mentioned in this column. They all enjoyed their jobs, just as I enjoy mine. But others were bitter about not being paid, especially when peers who worked for the same professors had paid positions. And it’s hard to take students’ gratitude towards — and reticence to expose — their bosses as a good sign rather than an indication of the absurd power differentials that make unpaid research so exploitative.

A graduate school application with bona fide research experience is a lot stronger

than one without, and professors are the people on campus with the power to give you that experience. If you’re having trouble finding such a position and someone offers you unpaid work, what are you supposed to do? And if you’re halfway done with a paper that will list you as a co-author, can you really quit? When professors present us with unpaid research opportunities, they ask us to make an impossible choice between our future on the one hand and our mental health and self-worth on the other.

Everyone deserves to be paid for their labor. If professors value our work on their projects, then they should show that by paying us. And that payment is more than symbolic: it allows us to feed, clothe and shelter ourselves with our research work. Paid research allows us to quit that second, third or fourth job and take care of ourselves.

Moreover, unpaid research cultivates inequity on campus.

It’s a lot easier for wealthy Amherst students to load up on

unpaid research opportunities when they don’t have to work to pay the bills. To me and other students who work, unpaid research is a burden we feel compelled to take up for any number of reasons. To the Canada Goose demographic, unpaid research is a chance to skirt around the campus’s limited number of paid research positions.

Unpaid research also poisons our minds. While we’re at Amherst, we learn far more than the theorems and definitions from class. How professors and staff treat us informs how we will treat other people in our future workplaces. When professors ask us to perform unpaid labor, the implication is that unpaid labor is normal in the workplace. And so when Amherst students go on to be the next generation of executives, academics and parents, we will perpetuate those harmful norms.

I’ve focused a lot on professors, but the blame doesn’t stop with them. Professors obviously want more research assistants than they can pay under the cur-

rent system, and students want the work. More funding needs to be set aside to provide for those additional positions. And academic departments and the administration often ask students to do unpaid labor, such as serving on search and advisory committees. Whose voices are heard in a system that privileges those with more free time? I bet it isn’t poor students of color. I bet it isn’t disabled students, or those with less institutional knowledge. I bet that it isn’t those working multiple jobs.

Unpaid research hurts everyone involved. Professors get overworked researchers able to commit less time to their projects. Students get cheated out of the value of our time. And Amherst College ends up elevating those with more — more resources, more privilege, more free time — over those with less.

A better system isn’t even hard to imagine. All it takes is a little more money, a little more care and a lot more willingness to accept that academia’s expectations are all out of whack.

Photo courtesy of Amherst College

Professors often want more student researchers than they can afford to pay. The Office of the Provost and Dean of the Faculty, housed in Converse Hall pictured above, approves all paid student research positions.

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Opinion 10

The Inherent Ableism of Calls for Normalcy

Charlie Niedert ’25E Contributing Writer

Covid-19 has killed nearly five million people. Yet, from the very start of the pandemic, every measure put in place to slow the spread of the virus has been met with criticism. People have claimed that the measures infringe on personal liberty and create an environment of fear.

They have promoted the sentiment that, since only certain kinds of people are at heightened risk of Covid, it shouldn’t be the responsibility of the entire population to mitigate the virus. These same complaints have been levied again and again. And lo and behold, it’s happening once more.

As a disabled person, I can hardly say that I’m surprised by this. There is a long history of the dehumanization and devaluation of disabled people.

These sentiments only grew during the pandemic, from comments about the virus weeding out the weak to expectations that the sick simply stay home to protect themselves.

Throughout the pandemic, people have erased our voices and disregarded the effects that the virus has on our lives as chronically ill people. Instead,

they prioritize a long-lost feeling of “normalcy.”

On campus, we see a similar rush to return to “normalcy,” even when the restrictions in place still allow for education and social interaction in person. While able-bodied students debate whether restrictions give them a “normal” educational experience or not, those who are at high risk, or have other extenuating circumstances, face being shut out of that educational experience altogether.

When the pandemic first hit, there was a great mobilization of resources to adapt to the new situation. Suddenly, accommodations, such as remote learning and further reduced course loads, that had once been deemed impossible were made available to the entire student body.

Even so, from the perspective of a disabled person, the words of unity and support that accompanied the transition to these accommodations rang hollow. I knew that the moment the college deemed it reasonable for able-bodied students to return, the rest of us would be left behind.

The tools that were introduced over that period were temporary — only worth the effort while it wasn’t an

accommodation for a disability or illness. The college has always made it very clear to its disabled students that it was not made with us in mind and that changing that is not a priority.

Amherst is not alone in this. The general attitude towards Covid has followed a similar pattern. As soon as those at low risk for the disease felt comfortable, or simply got tired of restricting themselves, all of the regulations started to disappear. Suddenly, people were expected to return to their workplaces, in-person activities and events resumed, mask mandates were lifted and people started acting as if everything was back to normal.

The problem is, things aren’t back to normal. While the vaccine is incredibly important and effective, it’s not perfect. Though less common, even vaccinated people can still get sick and spread the disease. Along with this comes the risk of vaccine-resistant strains, which will only increase the more we allow the virus to spread. It is true that the vaccine brought down the number of cases initially, but they have once again been rising. In the past month, cases reached the rate seen back in January of this year. This rise in cases, primarily among unvaccinated people,

creates an environment for the virus to continue to spread, evolve and potentially cause breakthrough cases.

The unfortunate reality is that Covid is still here; people are still getting sick and dying. Ignoring that for the sake of feeling “normal” will only increase the length of time that we will have to deal with this and further strain our medical system.

Yet, there are still many people who claim that those who are young and healthy should bare no responsibility to protect people from the virus. If it doesn’t directly affect them, why should they have to compromise their experiences?

Unfortunately, there is only so much that high-risk people can do to protect themselves. Maintaining quarantine and wearing masks is helpful, but wearing masks is most effective when used by not only the person trying to protect themselves, but also the people around them.

Additionally, those same people who are high-risk are more likely to need medical care for other reasons, which they won’t be able to access if the medical system is overwhelmed with Covid patients. This is not to mention the financial and psychological burden that they face from taking

more extreme measures without community support. It’s simply unreasonable to expect high-risk people to shield themselves from the virus on their own.

I understand why people want to forget about the pandemic. It is an incredibly stressful event that has put a strain on not only the medical system and economy, but also our mental health. However, the effects of the pandemic are felt most directly by chronically ill people, who are also disproportionately low income and people of color, and face an increased risk of mental health issues including suicide. These circumstances only make it more difficult to maintain the necessary level of safety, especially as federal aid also ignores the continued financial burden of the virus.

We need to be taking into account how changes in regulations will affect those most at risk. Chronically ill people may face the choice between exposure to the virus in order to make a living and homelessness.

We cannot forget about the virus and ignore the impact on chronically ill people. Not everyone can leave the pandemic behind, and we shouldn’t abandon disabled people in a race to normalcy.

We Must Think Beyond Ourselves Tara Alahakoon ’25 Contributing Writer On Sept. 6, I received a call between classes that my grandmother was hospitalized with Covid-19 in Colombo, Sri Lanka. My grandmother, who, having only experienced tropical temperatures, had braved winter to care for me in our Brooklyn apartment as my parents toiled through residency, desperate to preserve their green cards. She was now 90 years old and unvaccinated, and homebound amid the island-wide lockdown. She had contracted the virus from her housemaid.

With my mother overseas, I had been scheduling my calls between time zones. One week later, she told me over the phone that my grandmother had died. I took a minute to pause and then returned to my work, refusing to let myself dwell on it as I

was afraid of becoming fruitlessly angry. She had already been cremated.

Covid will dictate when the service will be — until the rest of our family can go back, her ashes will lie in the cemetery unclaimed.

I struggle and feel guilty to perceive the pandemic as ending. Hindered by the Delta Variant’s third wave, Sri Lanka’s vaccine rollout has no effective initiatives, leaving the population defenseless and prolonging the economic burden. Only essential services and export-oriented labor continue as the lockdown that was imposed by the government in late August and has since been extended four times stretches until Oct. 1. The island nation continues to suffer hundreds of thousands of cases and tens of thousands of deaths.

Some of us can’t distance ourselves from these statistics.

Despite the controversy surrounding the Covid restrictions on

campus, I’m sure many other students with ties to developing countries find it hard to see past the pandemic when their homes are still in the thick of it. I encourage the Amherst community to be mindful that some of its members are experiencing a particularly difficult time, unable to visit their families due to travel restrictions and left with heightened anxiety, depression and fear about the vulnerability of their loved ones.

As most students depend on their families to finance their education, I suggest that the administration consider providing greater financial aid to those whose countries’ economies have been disproportionately affected. Meanwhile, we as students must do all that we can to educate ourselves and advocate for one another instead of remaining divided by privilege.

For many of us, the crisis is not over.

Illustration by Scott Wang ’25

Many of our community members have loved ones abroad who are still deeply affected by the pandemic.

Amusements

w

Res Strife | Crossword ACROSS 1 Regal residence hall 5 Amherst’s own BnB 8 Site for differentiating Wahlberg from Damon 12 “Super Trouper” group 13 21st century note-taking device 15 Amherst abode nearest to PCRs 17 To love, in Madrid 18 Swinney of Clemson football 19 “mano ___” (confront directly) 20 Non-___ foods 22 Appear imminent 24 Writer Asimov 26 Wrestler’s initials and his signature move 27 Country-imitating RSO 28 Lack of light 31 Rebuke 34 Lyric poem 35 Moby Dick’s pursuer 37 “Star Wars VII” protagonist 38 What McConnell and Klobuchar have won

42 Zilch 43 Epsilon follower 44 Result of a day at the beach 47 “Star Wars” queen and senator 51 If nothing else 53 5 p.m., in a workplace memo 54 “Wow!”, over text 56 Campus’s boggy Bohemia?

57 College’s climateconscious quartet 61 Letters on a Cardinal’s cap 62 Incensed 63 Pandemic meeting place 65 Monet medium 68 “I though __” (“My feelings exactly!”)

69 Poet Pound 70 Knots or watts 71 If, in Munich 72 Org. for Nadal and Federer 73 End-of-week exclamation

Liam Archacki ’24 Managing Sports Editor

Solutions: Sept. 15 DOWN 1 “The Jungle Book” python 2 “Big Blue” 3 Events for Tatum and Doncic 4 Formerly Beta Theta Pi 5 YouTube clip, for short 6 “C’mon, be ___!”

7 Toil 8 Suffix with canon 9 NYC Gallery 10 Duty, in Hinduism 11 Capital of the Central African Republic 14 Count in “Attack of the Clones” 16 What a three-hour

lecture seems to have 21 South Pacific region 23 Across the Circle from 48 Down 24 Bachelor’s last words 25 Andy’s “Toy Story” neighbor 29 Like an impromptu grave, probably 30 Amherst applicant differentiator, maybe 32 Soothes 33 Reuben bread 36 Happy Mondays percussionist and dancer 39 Graduation, in a sense 40 ED alternative, in college admissions

41 Pursuer of Buffalo Bill, on film 45 Beast of burden 46 To the ___ degree 47 Athena’s shield 48 Across the Circle from 23 Down 49 Think, pretentiously 50 Stupefy 52 Go to a restaurant 55 Dumplings, at IYA 58 Prince William’s school 59 Inert gas 60 Talking “Harry Potter” hat’s function 64 Dora’s helpful friend 66 Half of CIV 67 Exceptional mil. unit

Arts & Living 12

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Amherst Symphony Orchestra Returns to the Stage

Photo courtesy of Eleanor Walsh ‘25

The Amherst Symphony Orchestra returns to the stage for their first concert in Buckley Recital Hall since before Covid, freaturing Brahms and Dvorák.

Nick Edwards-Levin ’25 Contributing Writer For their first in-person performance in more than a year, the Amherst Symphony Orchestra (ASO) performed a welcome concert for the class of 2025 on Sept. 18. Audience members filled Buckley Recital Hall at half-capacity and were treated to four works of varying length and popularity, from a short fanfare composition by a little-known contemporary composer to a well-known, grandscale symphony.

Quinn Mason’s “Fanfare for Horns, Brass & Percussion,” kicked the concert off to a lively start. Mason, a Dallas-based composer/conductor in his mid-20s, is a classical music wunderkind still crafting his compositional voice, according to Robert Xavier Rodríguez, one of Mason’s mentors.

Beginning with a thunderous outburst from the timpani and bass drum, the piece seemed to echo the ethos of this year: tumultuous at times but unabashedly triumphant and resolutely confident. It seemed to voice the idea that life on campus is back, and it is here to stay.

The second piece of the evening was Johannes Brahms’ well-known and often-played “Academic Festival Overture.” Popular among student orchestras — it’s a piece that

puts lively student drinking songs to music, so how could it not be a fan favorite? — it was not a particularly adventurous program selection. But the extreme precision of the strings more than made up for it. From the first downbeat, the strings remained sharp and distinctive. During the piece’s stormy moments, though, at times the orchestra lost its cohesion. Conductor Mark Swanson promptly guided the group back together.

Swanson’s long career as a conductor shined through in more ways than one. His skill allowed him to masterfully direct the audience’s attention where he saw fit, from the orchestra’s inner voices to the changing location of the melody. In the moments of full-orchestra fanfare, the brass and woodwinds maturely restrained their volume under Swanson’s baton to allow for a wonderful dialogue between the strings and winds.

As an overture — a musical form that is meant to establish a wide variety of moods and themes to be elaborated upon later — Brahms’ piece is a wonderful fit for the start of a new school year.

It allows the listener to reflect on what sort of overture we would compose for ourselves at the outset of a new year. Musically, too, the piece allows for each section to shine through, given the multiplicity of themes.

Florence Price’s “Adoration” was a far more restrained affair.

Price, the first African American woman t o have her music played by a major orchestra (the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performed the world premiere of her Symphony No. 1 in 1933), was recently rediscovered as a composer when hundreds of her compositions were discovered in a Chicago house’s attic. Price’s melody was calming, as opposed to the overt excitement of the Brahms, and it was played as such. If anything, the music was too calming; the tempo was relatively slow and at times dragged on. The inner voices were also often drowned out by the melody, which reduced the piece’s harmonic color. It was only in the final chord that the cellos and non-melody strings really shone through. Still, the violins were a pleasure to listen to given their beautiful tone and cohesion.

The night closed with Antonín Dvořák’s Symphony No. 8 in G major, a cheery, tuneful and popular work. Like Brahms’ “Academic Festival Overture,” Dvorak’s Eighth was composed for an academic occasion. In Dvořák’s case, it was to mark his admission to Prague Academy. As the only long-form piece on the program, the orchestra afforded it special attention, which allowed the sheer number of themes and the diverse

orchestration to take center stage.

The first movement of the symphony was the highlight of the evening as the cellos stole the show with a commanding performance.

Led by Swanson at a pace faithful to the often-ignored “allegro con brio” (meaning “fast, with spirit”), the cellos mustered a powerful and deep yet lyrical tone from the start. Rather than simply gliding through the movement and allowing Dvořák’s melodies and tone-painting to enthrall the audience, Swanson guided the orchestra as they barreled through the movement, indeed, “with spirit.”

Impressively, they remained balanced while still maintaining the electric energy that characterized this movement’s performance.

At times, though, some sections seemed a bit overexcited. The brass toed the line between cutting through the sonic ocean of the strings and overpowering the rest of the orchestra. Ultimately, a few cracked notes and squeaks notwithstanding, the first movement was a remarkable performance.

After such a phenomenal job in the first movement, though, the following three were simply not at the same level. Whether the other movements got less rehearsal time, or if the musicians had just exhausted themselves after the first movement, each instrument group seemed to have a

less clear understanding of its job.

The themes were slightly more muddled, the inner voices weren’t quite so pronounced and cracked notes popped out a few too many times. Despite Swanson’s best efforts to energize and keep the orchestra together, the group just didn’t seem quite so tight. In the moments of scripted musical confusion, the orchestra itself was a bit confused too.

That is not to say that the final three movements were devoid of highlights, though. The violin solo in the second movement was played masterfully by concertmaster Marie Leou ’22. The horns were well-restrained in the third movement, which allowed other voices to shine through. And the last bars of the finale were a wonderful last reminder of the zest of the full orchestra. After the final note, the audience allowed the sound to ring through the hall before breaking out into a well-deserved standing ovation.

With more rehearsal time to really perfect the finer details of their program, there is no telling how much higher this group will soar. The ASO will return to Buckley Recital Hall Oct. 23 for a performance of Edward Elgar’s “Enigma Variations,” Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s “Rhapsodic Dance” and Edwin York Bowen’s Viola Concerto.

Arts & Living 13

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Val 101: Upgrading Your Lighter Side Chicken

Sarah Weiner ’24 Contributing Writer

An email from Dean of Students Liz Agosto on Sept. 11 announced the reopening of indoor seating at Valentine Dining Hall (Val).

In honor of this event and the return of the panini press — actually, mostly the return of the panini press — here are some recipes, recommendations, tips and tricks for making the most of your indoor dining experience. The following Val hacks are simply suggestions and should be taken with a grain of salt, just like most things that come out of Val. That said, these ideas come from the fourth grader who squeezed lemon on her apple slices before putting them in her lunchbox so they would stay fresh until lunchtime. And it worked. Enjoy.

Breakfast Sandwich: You can’t go wrong with the combination of bread, eggs, cheese and meat. Get a scoop of scrambled eggs from the hot breakfast, as well as sausage or bacon if you wish, and a slice of cheese. Toast a bagel or English muffin. Sprinkle eggs

with salt and pepper and assemble the sandwich. Place in the panini press until the cheese has melted.

Jazz it up with tomato, spinach or arugula if available. Dip in hot sauce or ketchup and eat. (If you are in a rush, you can try melting the cheese by placing it on top of the hot eggs in a closed container.)

Spicy Mayo: One of my favorite sauces, spicy mayo is an easy combination of condiments. Mix one packet of sriracha with one packet of mayonnaise. Adjust these as you like depending on your spice preferences.

Add a bit of lemon or lime juice for some zing. Note: do not substitute hot sauce (or at least Texas Pete hot sauce…) for the sriracha. I learned that the hard way.

Microwave desserts and pastries: This is not a recipe as much as a brilliant and wildly unique suggestion. Stick muffins, pies, brownies, croissants and pastries in the microwave for about 20 seconds before consuming. Makes you feel super fancy and gives a warm feeling in your stomach (literally).

Peanut Butter, Banana and Honey Sandwich: Back to the panini press! Spread peanut butter and honey on bread and place banana slices on top.

Sprinkle on cinnamon too for some extra pizazz. Cover with another piece of bread and place it in the panini press to warm it up. This is delicious — and nutritious!

Mocha, Two Ways: Coffee. Chocolate. Two ways.

Oh my! Yes, this drink is available at the coffee machine, but here are some do-it-yourselfalternatives, including a vegan one.

Option 1: Combine two parts coffee (hot or iced) with one part chocolate milk. You choose the milk — I suggest chocolate almond. Adjust coffee and milk levels to your liking.

Option 2: Stir a hot chocolate packet into a hot cup of coffee. Add creamer or milk if you wish.

Peppermint Hot Chocolate: This recipe is already controversial among some of my friends, but give it a try and let me know what you think. Under the unfortunate assumption you make hot choc-

olate with a hot water base at Val, steep a mint tea bag in the water for a few minutes before pouring in the hot chocolate powder. Makes you feel like Christmas is near.

Coffee Float: Dessert for breakfast or coffee for dinner, the caffeine and sugar levels of a coffee float make it a great energy boost. Scoop out a dish of vanilla or chocolate ice cream from the cooler and place it in a larger cup. Pour hot coffee over the top. Enjoy with a spoon or straw. Or a fork if you are feeling bold.

throughout the film, which takes place over the course of five years.

At the start, Rutenbeck narrates an introduction about how a program called The Clemente Course impacted the lives of under-privileged adult students in Dorchester, a neighborhood in Boston, MA. The film goes on to explain that The Clemente Course is designed to provide low-income adults enriching experiences by analyzing classic literature. Later on, Rutenbeck’s narration evolves along with his filmmaking approach, as he realizes that the course is much less salient than it seems in the face of the systemic obstacles the students face.

But throughout the movie, Rutenbeck’s approach changes from being from distanced and spectatorial to more closely involved with the community of learners. This transition happens as Rutenbeck forms connections with some of the students, including Kafi Dixon and Carl Chan-

dler, two residents of Dorchester.

Rutenbeck follows Dixon as she lobbies the city to create a community garden in an empty lot, and Chandler as he taps into his intellectual potential and helps raise his grandson. This shift in perspective causes the film’s focus to contextualize The Clemente Course within larger, more systemic problems.

Over the course of filming, Dixon and Chandler — along with many of their peers — experience both the threat and reality of eviction, homelessness and racism at the hands of city officials. As Rutenbeck’s focus moves outside the classroom and into the personal lives of the Clemente students, he seems to realize that the course is only a single facet of the students’ intricate realities, which are affected by the systemic inequality around them. As viewers, we are witnesses to these obstacles and to Rutenberg’s ruminations on privilege. One of

the film’s questions is how a documentarian should best approach telling stories — whether it be giving Dixon and Chandler space to live on screen or stepping in when the use of his own privilege was necessary.

By the end of the film, we are witnessing Rutenbeck exercising the latter action much more frequently—like when he accompanies Dixon on a meeting with a government official and is able to easily get demands approved by simply providing his presence.

Rutenbeck makes the point that gentrification is a systemic problem that can only be fixed by the people who benefit from it, and this message ends up becoming much more impactful than the one he expresses in his original narration. Rutenbeck makes sure that this evolution is clear and There are many ways that “A Reckoning in Boston” could have been exploitative and condescending to the very people that

Salad Dressing on a Sandwich: Thanks to Sydney Ireland ’23 for suggesting salad dressing as a sauce for superior sandwich making. Ireland recommends balsamic on a vegetarian’s dream sandwich of cheese and loads of veggies. She also says Italian dressing does the job well.

We’ve reached the end of my modest cookbook, but that doesn’t mean your own culinary pursuits have to cease. Get creative in Val because you never know what might happen. Keep calm, keep cooking and dine on.

Photo courtesy of Brooke Hoffman ‘23E

Valentine Dining Hall reopened for indoor dining on Sept. 11.

New Documentary Chronicles Gentrification in Boston

Yasmin Hamilton ’24 Staff Writer Gentrification is something we are all either complicit in or affected by. For this reason, it is seldom spoken about in informal conversation at places like Amherst because to do this would be to acknowledge one’s complicity. Last week, I ran over to Amherst Cinema for one of my classes (“Race, Education, and Belonging”) to watch “A Reckoning in Boston,” directed by James Rutenbeck. As the start of the semester typically goes, I was a bit overwhelmed with work and hadn’t had time to research the movie beforehand. I would soon find out that this was a movie best entered blind. Without knowing what to expect, I settled into my chair surrounded by other Amherst students, also there for class.

The narrative focus of “A Reckoning in Boston” evolves

it tried to spotlight. If Rutenbeck had tried to film only how The Clemente Course impacted the students, he may not have formed the close connections to Dixon and Chandler, and the movie may have boiled down to just an advertisement for the organization.

He also would not have been able to help Dixon overcome some of the bias-related obstacles she ran into. As a movie that deals so heavily with gentrification, it is essential that it did so much of the boundary-breaking that gentrification discourages. “A Reckoning in Boston” reminds us that if we would like to move to fix large social ailments like gentrification, the first step is to be open to learning and to break the distanced point of view that many of us so easily hold.

Amherst Cinema’s screening of “A Reckoning in Boston” only lasted for one day, but you can find a list of upcoming screenings on their website.

Arts & Living 14

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Norm Macdonald Brought Levity Back to Comedy

Joseph Sweeney ’25 Contributing Writer

The comedic legacy Norm Macdonald leaves behind is best captured by his infamous moth joke, a clip that has been widely circulated after his passing last Tuesday, Sept.

14. It goes something like this: a producer sprung on Macdonald that he would have to stay for a second slot on “Conan.” This, however, was hardly a booking snafu.

Conan orchestrated the whole thing himself, “greedy” for more of the brilliant television Macdonald had to offer. Macdonald, left to sweat under the pressure, recalled a joke passed on to him about a moth who walks into a podiatrist’s office. But the version of the joke he’d heard was just a setup and a punchline — five minutes and thirty seconds too short. Macdonald was quick to the solution: if he could just extend the joke to six minutes, then all his woes would disappear! The resulting windup he improvises is an existential poem with the psychological detail of a Chekhov play. By the time Macdonald reaches the end of it, he’s won the crowd over too many times to count.

Macdonald was intelligent, inimitable and above all, hilarious. If he never held on to fame, it’s only because he was never interested in being a comedian. After all, being a comedian is not just about being funny. In our culture, a comedian must first and foremost be someone who can make people laugh. But many also see comedy as a vehicle of transforming pain into joy — or at least, making pain feel a bit less heavy.

For example, John Mulaney has struggled with addiction for over a decade and recently got divorced from his partner of seven years. Yet he is also one of the most successful stand-ups working today, and his 2018 Netflix special, “Kid Gorgeous,” is nothing short of a class act. What makes it so good is more than Mulaney being a funny guy.

It’s in the detailed character work, disarming observations, measured self-deprecation and, to top it all off, a Trump-joke centerpiece that feels like a classic.

The world is a hellscape. Along

with being funny, comedians often try to convert tragedy into laughter.

Now — and this is just my personal opinion on the matter — I don’t find the immense pain of others to be very humorous. Neither did Norm Macdonald.

Macdonald was an anchor on Saturday Night Live’s “Weekend Update” through a good chunk of the 90s. He was relieved from the position after he made one too many OJ Simpson jokes, and then he made a hundred more after that.

He hosted a podcast with Adam Eget, who is perhaps most famous for being incredibly unfunny. He starred for two years in an ill-fated sitcom; he appeared in a movie that, à la Chris Farley’s comedies, is pretty bad but has its moments. He played a sidekick role in the Adam Sandler movie “Billy Madison.” All things considered (even if we take into account the inordinate number of ManGrate sponsorships conferred upon him), we could hardly say that he ever saw Jerry Seinfeld levels of career success.

But Macdonald was funny. Really funny. If you’re unfamiliar with his work you might not be convinced of this. Moment to moment, Macdonald can come off as obtuse and unresponsive, everything a comic is not supposed to be. The point becomes moot, however, once you understand the unique comedic context he was working in.

Comedy, like most art forms, depends on its context. It relies on context first for its setup, and second for its execution or punchline.

It isn’t a stretch to say that the very essence of a joke is context — which is why hack frauds will continue to hold millions of followers by simply referencing menial events. Take Stephen Colbert, who was for years a brilliant satirist of conservative media personalities on “The Colbert Report”; during all that time, I don’t know if he ever lit up an audience like he has by merely saying Trump’s name on “The Late Show.”

If the soulless Hollywood sequel machine has taught us anything, it’s that people love to be reminded about things they know. And Norm Macdonald knew the thing that people know the most: people. He appealed to the wonderful possibil-

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Comedy legend Norm Macdonald passed away on Tuesday, Sept. 14. He is best known for his time on “Saturday Night Live” and his off-the-cuff improvisation. ity of simple human curiosity: the possibility of being amused by and fully valuing another person on the terms they present to you.

Macdonald never paid attention to the sometimes pretentious standards of comedy, breaking the convention of the unaffected joke-teller, for example. In an interview, David Letterman comments on Macdonald’s constant grinning even through his own jokes. Norm, grinning wider than ever, responds: “Oh yeah, I guess that’s not very good for comedians, is it?” Letterman, so disposed to acerbic takedowns, instead gives a little laugh. He says, with awe: “No, I guess not. But it works for you.” It does.

Norm battled cancer for nine years and he never told the public.

He never told most of his friends.

During that time he recorded a special called “Hitler’s Dog”. The joke is that dogs are so loving, there must have been a dog that loved Hitler more than anyone else in the world.

Norm imagines what must be that dog’s first thought every morning: “Where’s Hitler?” And the generals have to explain to this poor soul why Hitler’s not around, that he’s “doing some evil stuff.” The audience is left to their own devices in creating the happy ending; when the key turns in the lock, when the front door opens: “O boy, O boy! Is it really Hitler?

Hitler’s home!” Joy, unleashed.

If there’s a connection between suffering and comedy, it must be this: suffering happens, and sometimes it’s funny. Macdonald didn’t insert his suffering into his comedy because he trusted it was good enough without it. No more complicated than that, or only as complicated as the moral of the Hitler-dog parable: All people can be loved.

Not because they deserve it, but because it just happens, the way things happen to be.

Macdonald was one of the funniest people that ever lived, and I happened to love him for it. He was a real philosopher, a regular Socrates.

Only difference being, that Socrates guy. What a moron.

Arts & Living 15

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Modern Music: The Presence of Politics in Pop Centrist Right-Leaning

Leftist

5%

2.5%

5%

Left-Leaning

27.5%

Libertarian 2.5% Republican

Socialist

7.5%

5%

Communist

5%

Democrat

40%

Figure A: The political identities of the 40 participants who took the survey.

16 10 6

1

2

1

1

3

4

3 5

6

3 7

8

9

10

Figure B: How strongly students agreed with the politics of their music (scaled 1-10).

70%

70% 30%

55% Leftist

65% Libertarian

Republican

Socialist

60%

Centrist

80%

RightLeaning

70%

Communist

73%

Democrat

Whether it’s punk, rap or reggae, modern music is as political as ever. And while artists may sometimes express polarizing political views through their music, many listeners have no problem hearing music replete with political views they don’t agree with. From personal experience, I know several conservatives who listen to Kendrick Lamar, an artist who is most decidedly not conservative. How is it that people listen to overtly political music espousing views that they themselves don’t subscribe to?

I recently created a survey, and sent it to the on-campus GroupMe, “Amherst Bussin,” asking people to fill it out. I had hoped to get different responses from different political backgrounds, in order to have a variety of views, and perhaps see some patterns within different political groupings.

Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of the 40 responders identified as left-wing or Democrat, with very few conservatives and right-wingers responding (see Figure A) and with even fewer willing to be interviewed.

On top of that, for the most part, people agreed with the politics of their music, with more than 70 percent of respondents putting a 7/10 or higher when asked if they agree with the politics of their music.

In Figure C, it appears that, on average, people with politics on the right side of the U.S. political spectrum tend to agree less with the politics of their music, albeit only slightly. It is possible that this is only because of chance, and does not have anything to do with the individual’s political affiliation, especially considering the small sample size of the survey. However, assuming that it is not the case of random luck, the reason for it may be that there is simply very little largely popular right-leaning music. Of the top 10 most-streamed artists on Rolling Stone’s charts, only one (Kanye West) has outspoken right-leaning political views.

As such, people with right-leaning politics simply don’t seem to have as many options when it comes to

listening to political music.

When Jack Siegel ’22 hears a song pop up on his Spotify that he disagrees with, he says, “I might listen to it once or twice, and kind of laugh and roll my eyes and then just skip it.” I think this reaction is representative of a significant number of people when they find the artists they listen to releasing songs they disagree with politically. Unless they idolize the artist, to them, it’s just a bad song.

Another reaction people have when disagreeing with an artist they listen to can be examined through the lens of The Smiths and specifically their frontman Morrissey. There are lots of people who love to listen to the Smiths, but despise Morrissey for his xenophobic statements on immigration. They call him whiny, self-pitying and even racist. But they still listen to him. Why? Because they like it.

They listen past the lyrics, and simply enjoy music itself instead.

Sirus Wheaton ’23 mentioned how the political hypocrisy of many music listeners plays out in another way. He discussed people he knew that would listen to lots of Black artists and “call them their heroes and stuff. But then when there comes time for a literal walkout, like we had last semester, they’re nowhere to be seen.” The fact that people are woke for clout demonstrates an incisive point: white people often appropriate the genuine emotions, struggles and feelings expressed in Black music.

“It’s almost exploitative,” Wheaton said.

It seems to me that, for the most part, people tend to agree with the politics in their music and will not listen to artists that express opposite views. Or maybe they don’t listen to political music at all. And, if they do listen to music that disagrees with their views, it is usually because they can look past the intended message to the emotions and feelings the music conveys, and interpret things in their own way. But this can be harmful. By romanticizing and superficially supporting the struggles of an artist, listeners delegitimize the artist’s message and undermine the artist’s integrity.

Left-Leaning

Milo Leahy-Miller ’24 Staff Writer

Figure C: The average agreement between listeners of each political party and the politics of their music.

Sp ports

Abbey Kays ’25 Shines in 3-1 Field Hockey Victory

Photo courtesy of Amherst Athletics

Abbey Kays ’25 pushes upfield in the field hockey team’s Sept. 19 match against Hamilton.

Leo Kamin ’25 Staff Writer The field hockey team continued its perfect start to the season at home against Hamilton College on Sept. 19. In a breakout game, midfielder Abbey Kays ’25 scored or assisted all three goals in a 3-1 Mammoth victory.

The win against the Continentals was Amherst’s fourth

straight to begin the season. The Mammoths — ranked 15th in the nation in the most recent coaches poll — are now 2-0 in conference play, having previously beaten No. 7 Bowdoin.

The final score line perhaps understates the Mammoths’ dominance on the field. They outshot Hamilton 17-4, forcing Continentals goalkeeper Maggie Reville to make 10 saves in the

losing effort.

Amherst controlled the early minutes of the game, with the team’s first breakthrough coming less than four minutes into the contest. Kays completed a onetouch pass to Muffie Mazambani ’24 near the penalty dot, whose low shot found the back of the net to put the team up 1-0.

Ten minutes later, Kays logged her second assist of the

day, carrying the ball to the right side and firing a shot toward the net. Natalie Hobbs ’23 redirected the shot, beating the goalkeeper and doubling the Mammoths’ advantage.

Hamilton found an opening in the second quarter, but a kick save by goalkeeper Kaitlin Broda ’23 — one of two saves on the day — ensured that Amherst carried their 2-0 lead into halftime.

Five minutes into the second half, a tipped Hamilton shot found the back of the net. The Mammoths’ lead was back down to one.

However, Amherst’s precarious situation didn’t last long.

Two minutes later, Kays carried the ball from the left side to the top of the circle, and buried a shot in the bottom left corner of the net.

The Mammoths held comfortably to their two-goal cushion for the rest of the contest, denying the Continentals a single shot in the fourth quarter.

Kays, who has started the first four games of the season as a first

year, contributing 17 shots, two goals and two assists, says she pays little attention to statistics.

“I’m not a big stats person,” said Kays. “Even when you get a goal or an assist, it feels like it wasn’t just you. It’s a team effort.”

Kays attributes the team’s success to a welcoming culture that has brought together a large contingent of first years and the upperclassmen veterans — both on and off the field.

“After our first scrimmage, the team very clearly had a connection,” said Kays. “We could tell it was a special team this year.”

Head Coach Carol Knerr attributes her team’s success to a mix of upperclassmen experience, first year talent and overall confidence. These traits, she said, “have allowed us to set the tone early in each game we have played.”

The Mammoths will look to stay perfect at home against MIT today, Sept. 22, and away at Connecticut College on Saturday, Sept. 25 — their third NESCAC matchup of the season.

Bring Out the Brooms: Volleyball Stays Undefeated Ethan Samuels ’23 and Alex Noga ’23 Managing Sports Editor and Staff Writer The volleyball team continued their torrid start, sweeping Bates and Colby in their opening weekend of NESCAC play to improve to an impressive 5-0.

On Friday, Sept. 17, the Bates volleyball team was greeted by a packed LeFrak Gymnasium, eager to support the Firedogs as they looked to build on an undefeated start. From the opening serve, Amherst was in clear control, quickly jumping out to a 21-11 lead in the first set. Led by stellar play from hitter and captain Jamie Dailey ’22E, the Firedogs took the first set 25-15, the

second set 25-20 and then sent the Bobcats packing with another 25-15 final set.

Dailey led the squad in kills (12), digs (9), blocks (2) and aces (2). Setter Carly Cooper ’24 racked up the most assists (17), while Sophie Launsbach ’22 and Anaya Thomas ’25 lit up the scorecard with 8 and 6 kills, respectively.

The Mammoth faithful in the gymnasium described the game as a thrilling experience. “The atmosphere in LeFrak was electric,” said Jack Trent ’23, who was watching from the stands.

For Tylon Crump Jr. ’23, another supporter of the Firedogs, the crowd was just mimicking the team’s energy. “The crowd fed off the energy our team brought

into the gym. When they’re playing like that it’s easy to be excited,” Crump Jr. commented.

Saturday’s match against Colby was yet another display of dominance. The Firedogs outscored the Mules by a margin of 75 to 38 in a 3-0 sweep, winning 25-13, 25-16 and 25-9.

Like a monkey shot out of a cannon, the Firedogs went on a run of nine consecutive points in the first set and jumped out to an early 13-3 lead. Though the two sides traded points down the stretch like an old married couple bickering about where to have dinner, the Firedogs prevailed with a Dailey kill to seal the first set.

The second set started like Hitchcock’s common room on

a Saturday night — close and moderately uncomfortable. Like Usain Bolt in the 2008 Beijing Olympics, however, the Firedogs sprinted past their competition.

Sparked by a Thomas kill and a Lizzie Papalia ’25 service ace, the Firedogs rattled off an 11-5 run to put even more pressure on the already dejected Mules.

The final set began in a similar fashion to the second, though unlike Marlin in Pixar’s magnum opus “Finding Nemo,” the Firedogs were in familiar waters.

With the score 11-7, Amherst turned on the burners like Apolo Ohno coming down the home stretch, registering nine straight points before going on another six point unanswered run to close out the final set and finally

put an end to this slaughter of the mules.

The Firedogs posted an impressive .336 attack percentage for the match. Dailey once again led all players in kills with 17, and Cooper and Papalia were credited with game-high tallies in assists and digs, with 33 and 11 respectively.

“Being undefeated has been a product of our hard work during preseason but to continue our hot streak we need to continue to practice hard and work on the fundamentals,” Launsbach said.

The Firedogs look to continue their unbeaten start as they travel to Vermont this Friday, Sept. 24 to take on NESCAC rival Middlebury and out-of-conference opponent Brandeis.

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Sports 17

Ashleigh Johnson: Stopping Goals and Sparking Change Melanie Schwimmer ’23 Staff Writer

Two-time Olympic gold medalist Ashleigh Johnson is often the center of attention in the pool, as the dominant defensive force and shot-stopping anchor of the United States women’s water polo team. This past Saturday, Sept. 18, all eyes were on Johnson once again, as she starred in the new CBS Sports docuseries, “Beyond Limits,” which spotlights elite athletes in sports where their identities are traditionally underrepresented.

When Johnson made Team USA in 2016, she became the first and only Black woman to represent the U.S. in water polo, and joined a small group of Black athletes in the predominantly white world of water sports.

Johnson grew up around pools in Miami, Florida and, af-

ter taking free classes at a local gym, started playing water polo at the age of nine. She became a stand-out player from a young age for her skill and athleticism in the water. She was also often the only Black person in the swimming complex.

Recently, Johnson shared the aggressions she faced growing up. “When I was younger, I got questions from other kids in the sport, parents, and even strangers, asking questions like, ‘Can Black people float?’ or ‘Black people don’t swim, how come you know how?’” Questions like these reinforced the racist, hegemonic idea that Johnson did not belong in the pool and added additional pressure “to either act like race wasn’t something that was part of my reality or absolutely crush the expectations that people had for me.”

Opting to stay on the east

coast and attend an Ivy League school, Johnson chose to play water polo at Princeton rather than join one of the Big Four teams that dominate water polo — UC Berkeley, UCLA, the University of Southern California and Stanford. At Princeton, she earned the Collegiate Water Polo Association’s Defensive Player of the Week an impressive 19 times and earned the title of 2014 Female Water Polo Player of the Year by Swimming World. Now, photos of Johnson in the cage are plastered all around the Princeton Aquatic Center, sending a clear message of what excellence in the water looks like.

After taking a semester off from school to pursue her Olympic dream, Johnson earned the starting spot on Team USA in the 2016 Olympics. In Rio, she saved 64.6 percent of all the

shots she faced, an impressive average in a high-scoring sport, where save percentages generally hover around 45 percent.

This summer in Tokyo, Johnson almost exactly matched her Rio numbers with a save percentage of 64.5 percent. In the Olympic championship match, which Team USA won 14-5, she saved 11 of 15 shots she faced for a 73 percent mark, as compared to the Spanish keeper who logged a save percentage of just 19 percent. After her golden performance, Team USA Head Coach Adam Krikorian explained just how indispensable Johnson is to the team: “She just gave us a ton of confidence.

When she’s back there and you see that big smile of hers, it gives you the confidence but it also relaxes you a little bit and it helped to settle us in.”

A leader both in and out of

the pool, Johnson’s game has always maintained a two-fold mission: athletic excellence and promoting inclusion in water polo. When she is not training with Team USA or playing professionally in Greece, she runs the Johnson Sisters Swim Clinic in the Miami/Fort Lauderdale area, which aims to help teach water safety and provide pool access to all.

Known in the pool for her powerful eggbeater kick (a method of treading water), superb game vision and unparalleled shot-stopping ability, Johnson has become a star in her sport. She hopes to use this platform to “be a mirror that a young Black girl or young Black boy would look up to and see themselves in and I realized how powerful that was and how powerful that could be for someone who’s coming into our sport.”

Strong Defense Leads Football Past Bates in Season Opener

Photo courtesy of Damien Strohmeyer

The football team prepares for a game at Garcelon Field at Bates College.

Luke Padian ’24 Staff Writer The football team started off the season in winning fashion this weekend in Lewiston, Maine as they topped the Bates Bobcats 28-20. Down by three at half-time, the Mammoths

were able to mount a comeback and emerge with the win.

Amherst had an electric start to the game, scoring two touchdowns within the first seven minutes of play. Chad Peterson ’23 set up the first touchdown, throwing completions to both Joe Masterson ’22 and Michael

Immerman ’22, before Kellen Field ’22 rushed into the endzone for the first touchdown of the season. This was quickly followed by a blocked punt by Trey Doyle ’25 which was recovered by Jack Roberge ’25 in the endzone, putting the Mammoths up 14-0. According to

offensive lineman Frankie Kelley ’24, “It took everyone a few seconds to comprehend what happened, then everyone went crazy.”

At this point in the game, the Mammoths seemed unstoppable. However, a key interception by Bates near the endzone quickly shifted the momentum in the Bobcats’ favor as they went on a 17-0 run to close out the half. Scores by the Bobcats included a quick field goal, followed by two touchdowns initiated by the stellar passing of the Bobcats senior quarterback Brendan Costa who has been starting games at Bates since his freshman year.

Despite a grim ending to the first half, the Mammoths were able to rally in the second half, starting it off with a six-minute drive that resulted in a rushing touchdown by Peterson. This touchdown had been set up by another strong rush by Field, who recorded 103 yards on the day and 4.7 yards per carry.

Bates responded to this

drive, quickly marching down the field and nailing a 34-yard field goal. However, with 14 minutes left in the fourth quarter, the Mammoths were able to score again, as Peterson connected once more with Masterson for a 32-yard TD pass. This touchdown would go down as the winning score as Bates was unable to respond due to great red zone defense by the Mammoths.

This red zone hold included a crucial sack by Matt Albino ’22 and tackle by Ricky Goodson ’22. Matt Durborow ’22 was the Mammoths’ leader defensively, tallying 12 tackles in the victory. Other strongholds on the defense included Michael Jeffery ’22 who had seven tackles, captain Joe Kelly ’22 who had four tackles and sophomore safety Ryan Monteleone ’24 who had a crucial interception.

On Saturday, Sept. 25, the Mammoths will face Colby on Pratt Field in their 2021 home opener.

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Sports 18

Women’s Soccer Rebounds With 8-0 Victory After Loss

Photo courtesy of Amherst Athletics

Julia Ralph ’22 swerves around her opponent to keep possession of the ball.

Violet Glickman ’25 Staff Writer

This weekend was a busy one for the women’s soccer team, facing off against Hamilton College in their NESCAC home opener on Saturday, Sept.

18, followed by Keene State College on Sunday, Sept. 19.

Saturday’s game was wellmatched: the Mammoths and Continentals started the second half scoreless. This would change when Hamilton sophomore Olivia Morrow broke

the draw with a goal in the 78th minute of the game, but the Mammoths refused to let the score deter them. They continued to fight through the second half, dominating possession and keeping Hamilton on the defensive, taking eleven shots. Seniors Ruby Hastie ’22 and Kim Zhou ’22 and firstyears Patience Kum ’25 and Carter Hollingsworth ’25 kept the Hamilton defense on their toes with multiple dangerous crosses and driven shots, but it was ultimately Alexa Juarez ’23E whose penalty kick with five minutes to go put Amherst back in the running. Despite their unrelenting fight, the Mammoths conceded a goal to the Continentals’ Riley Mutton during overtime, allowing Hamilton to take home the win. Goalkeeper Mika Fisher ’24 played an incredible game, despite the final score, finishing the game with four saves and moving her record to 3-1 on the season.

The match proved to be a tough loss for Amherst women’s soccer, who have historically dominated when playing Hamilton. However, instead of letting this defeat ruin their momentum, the team took to the field on Sunday with a renewed energy and determination that more than paid off.

Right from the starting whistle, the Mammoths took control of the game, working well together as a team to create dangerous scoring opportunities for their midfielders and forwards.

Hastie led the charge for the Mammoths, tucking a right-footed shot inside the far post in the 19th minute, after an assist from Juarez. Amherst then scored two more goals in quick succession, the first by Natalie Landau ’22, then by Abby Schwartz ’24 in the twenty-second and twenty-third minutes, respectively. Landau impressively found the back of the net three more times in

the second half over the course of only six minutes, with Kum scoring shortly after.

Ally Deegan ’24’s 89th-minute goal marked her first collegiate score, and sealed the team’s dominating 8-0 win.

However the Mammoth’s defense was also not to be ignored, with Fisher and the back line working together flawlessly to maintain a shutout against the Owls. Despite a long battle against the Continentals on Saturday, Amherst women’s soccer showed up with an energy and determination that will carry them through the rest of the season.

With nine first-years joining the team this year and almost two years without games, the Mammoths are sure to still be finding their groove, but they are already off to a great start.

The team heads into the week with an impressive 4-1 record, and will face off against Connecticut College in New London on Saturday, Sept. 25.

First Years Lead the Way for Golf as Teams Tee Off Seasons Jackson Reydel ’23 Staff Writer The men’s and women’s golf teams are in full swing after competing in two tournaments over the past two weekends. On Sept. 11 and 12, the men’s and women’s golf teams opened up their slate of fall tournaments at Middlebury and Hamilton, respectively, before travelling to Williams and Middlebury on Sept. 18 and 19 to round out their first two weeks of play.

Women’s Team:

The women’s golf team had and exceptional opening weekend at Hamilton where they finished second in the field of 15 teams. Their combined scores over Sept. 11 and 12 left them 10 strokes back of Williams which finished fifth at nationals last spring. Gihoe Sihoe ’25 turned in a stellar performance after she took home

first place in her first college event, carding two exceptional rounds of 73 and 74 to win the overall medal by five shots.

Jessica Huang ’25 also had a strong showing her first time on the college links shooting a 154 over two days to finish in fifth place. The sophomore trio of Jenny Hua ’24, Priya Bakshi ’24 and Ivy Haight ’24 wrapped up an impressive team performance for the Mammoths placing 17th, 25th and 36th in the strong field.

After an exceptional first weekend, the Mammoths came out firing again on Sept. 18 and 19 at Middlebury where yet again they took second place behind Williams. This time Huang took home first place by a clutch win in a one-hole playoff. Huang was exceptional over the weekend, shooting an opening round 73 followed by a second round 79 to put her in a tie for first with NYU’s Nalinda

Wanikpun. With the pressure of a first-place finish on the line, Huang headed back to the first hole par-five. After knocking her third shot within 10 feet of the pin, Huang parred the hole for the win. At the team level, the event started well on day one, with the Mammoths tied with NYU for first place after the opening round. However, Williams put together a terrific second round as a team to take the event by twelve strokes over Amherst. Still, the Mammoths were electric across the board this weekend with Sihoe and Hua tying for 13th place, Bakshi finishing just one shot back of them to tie for 16th, and Jannelle Jin ’23 shooting 164 to finish in 22nd place, just two strokes back of Bakshi.

With two great finishes to start the season, the Mammoths will ride to Wesleyan next weekend with another opportunity to prove they belong with

the nation’s best.

Men’s Team:

The men’s team kicked off the season by heading to the Duke Nelson Invitational where the Mammoths took on a competitive 23-team field hosted

by Middlebury College. The Mammoths put out a consistent showing over the course of the two-day event, finishing ninth on the first day and tying for 10th on the second day, eventually finishing in 11th place overall.

First-year Steven Chen ’25 was outstanding in his collegiate debut, shooting rounds of 71 and 78 to finish 16th in a field of 111 competitors. Carding the opening round 79 and the final round 77, fellow firstyear Teddy Freking ’25 finished 49th overall as the Mammoths’ second-best finisher. Veterans Tommy Whitley ’24 and Brian Aslanian ’22 tied for 73rd place

with matching two-day totals of 164. Erik Zetterstrom ’22 was right on their heels shooting 165 over the course of two days to finish in a tie for 79th place.

The Mammoths then journeyed to the Williams Invitational for two days this past weekend, where they would finish 13th out of the 17 teams.

Zetterstrom, Whitley, Chen and Freking all finished within four strokes of one another. Leading the pack was Zetterstrom, improving by eight shots from the previous tournament, tallying a 157. Whitley also cut down on his score from Middlebury to 158 followed closely by Chen shooting 159 and Freking 160. Senior captain Aslanian matched his 164 from the previous weekend to round out the squad. The Mammoths beat out Bowdoin by seven strokes in this event and will travel there on Sept. 25 for their next tournament.

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Sports 19

Men’s Soccer Rebounds With 1-0 Victory Over Hamilton Cedric Skerlecz ’24 Staff Writer Following their Sept. 11 loss to Bowdoin in their opening match of conference play, men’s soccer rebounded with a triumph over Hamilton on Saturday, Sept. 18.

It comes on the heels of a win against Manhattanville the prior Wednesday, which saw the Mammoths score in the opening minutes and maintain their 1-0 lead via a powerful defensive effort.

Over 145 were in attendance for Saturday’s matchup against the Continentals at Hitchcock Field.

The Mammoths dominated the opening minutes by shots on goal, as Hamilton tallied a total of four saves before Kyle Kelly ’22E scored in the 16th minute off a corner kick from Ada Okorogheye ’23. Okorogheye’s cross was initially lost in a scramble within the penalty box, but Kelly quickly recovered and found the back of the net with his strike.

Hamilton did not receive a good scoring opportunity until the 30th minute, but the free kick was saved by Amherst goalkeeper Bernie White ’22.

The second half proved more

Photo courtesy of Amherst Athletics

Bernie White ’23 tallied five saves in the 1-0 win against Hamilton College, and was named NESCAC player of the week.

fortunate for the Continentals, but the team repeatedly failed to convert their opportunities into points — once again thanks to White’s command over his box.

In the 67th minute, for instance,

Hamilton back Luke O’Dowd shot the ball from deep on the right side towards the top-left corner, but White merely knocked the ball out of play.

Saturday’s match marks Am-

herst’s 10th victory over the Continentals in 10 years. The Mammoths finished last week’s play at 3-1 overall and 1-1 in the NESCAC following an early loss to Bowdoin — a show of strength

that confirms the team’s promising outlook this season.

The Mammoths will face Saint Joseph’s (ME) at 4 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 23 for a non-conference match at Hitchcock Field.

Women’s Tennis Opens Fall Season With Doubles Victory Maya Reiner ’25 Staff Writer

The women’s tennis team opened their fall season at the MIT Invitational over the weekend where they competed against Wesleyan, Tufts and MIT. Amherst left triumphant in the doubles tournament on Sunday, with an 8-2 win in the championship match, as well as a sportsmanship award.

Captain Jackie Bukzin ’22 and Mia Kintiroglou ’25 led the Mammoths to the victory against the Tufts Jumbos. To clench the victory, Bukzin and Kintiroglou defeated Tufts’ Elle Christensen and Casey Cummings.

“I think there were a lot of positive takeaways from this tournament,” Bukzin said. “Ev-

Photo courtesy of Melissa Martin

Jackie Buzkin ’22 reached the 2021 NCAA Championships last spring, and aspires to even greater heights now.

eryone battled very hard in singles and doubles.”

Bukzin and Kintiroglou opened up doubles play by beat-

ing Alexis Amy and Kriti Williams of Wesleyan University 8-2 in the round of 16. In the quarter finals, they defeated MIT’s Megan

Guenther and Yuka Perera 8-4.

To get to the championship, the duo took down Wesleyan’s Renna Mohsen-Breen and Katie Fleish-

man with a score of 8-2.

Playing solo, first-year Amy Qui ’25 won the sportsmanship award at the tournament, making the team even more excited for their upcoming season.

There were also impressive wins for the Mammoths throughout the singles and doubles tournament. However, although nine Amherst athletes participated in the event, the Mammoths fell in the singles tournament, not advancing past the quarter finals.

“We have a strong team this year with strong freshmen and great captains,” Kaya Amin ’24 said, “so we feel that they can lead us to the NESCAC championship and NCAA tournament.”

The Mammoths will continue their fall season on the road at the ITA Regionals on Oct. 1-3.

The Amherst Student • September 22, 2021

Sports 20

Cross Country Teams Heat Up Against NESCAC Rivals

Photo courtesy of Melissa Martin

First-year Sidnie Kulik ’25 races at the UMass Amherst Ken O’Brien Minuteman Invitational on Sunday, Sept. 11.

Anya Ramras ’22 Staff Writer On Saturday, Sept. 18, the men’s and women’s cross country teams competed in the Little 3 Championship in Williamstown, MA alongside Wesleyan and Williams.

On the men’s side, a total of 49 athletes across all three

GAME SCHE DULE

schools competed in a six kilometer race. As a team, Amherst finished second out of the three competitors, clocking in with an average time of 20:41, just under 40 seconds behind Williams who took first place.

Individually, the fastest runner for the Mammoths was Owen Daily ’23 posting a time of 20:17.9 to capture sixth place

WED Field Hockey vs. MIT @ UMASS, 7 p.m.

THUR Men’s Soccer vs. St. Joseph’s @ UMASS, 4 p.m.

in the event. Rounding out the top ten for the Mammoths was Keon Mazdisnian ’23 and Nick Edwards-Levin ’25 in 10th with times of 20:30.1 and 20:39.4, respectively. Just outside the top 10 and rounding out Amherst’s top seven runners were Theo Dassin ’24 in 12th (20:48.2), fellow sophomore Oliver Spiva ’24 in 18th (21:10.8), seniors Ajay Sarathy ’22 in 21st (21.23.3) and Bobby Innes-Gold ’22 in 25th (21.33.4).

Innes-Gold described how the Mammoths fought hard to improve from their Little 3 results two years ago: “It was exciting for us to get the chance to race against NESCAC competition again. On the men’s side, we did improve a bit on our performance at the Little 3’s two years ago despite injuries and off days from some of our top guys. The Williams course is very difficult and hilly, but everyone fought hard. Owen and Keon led the team off strong in the race, while underclassmen Nick and Theo also had great races. We’re excited to see what the team is capable of as we move up to the 8k for our remaining races.”

Spencer Davis ’22, who finished in 22nd place, spoke on the

FRI Men’s Tennis @ Bowdoin Volleyball @ Middlebury, 7 p.m.

race as well: “The Williams XC [cross country] course is known to be quite challenging, and this held true this year despite some modifications to the route. Amherst’s runners were able to pack up quite well and work together throughout the race. Hopefully we can do this again at our next race in two weeks.”

On the women’s side, a total of 41 athletes competed in a four-kilometer race. As a team, Amherst finished second out of the three competitors, with an average time of 16:20, just three seconds behind Williams.

Sidnie Kulik ’25 and Mary Kate McGranahan ’23 stood out as the first and second place finishers for the race respectively, with the first-year averaging a 6:19.7 mile to finish the 4000 meter with a time of 15:43.0 and the junior just behind with a time of 16:01.1. Sophia Price ’25 and Julia Schor ’25 took back-toback spots in 10th and 11th, respectively — Price finishing with a time of 16:27.9, and Schor three seconds after at 16:30.9.

Rounding out the scoring for the Mammoths were Eline Laurent ’22 finishing in 16th, Claire Callon ’25 finishing in 22nd, and Maggie Drew ’22 coming

SAT Football vs Colby, 1 p.m.

Women’s Soccer @ Connecticut College, 11:30 a.m.

Men’s Soccer @ Connecticut College, 2 pm Women’s Volleyball @ Brandeis, 1 p.m.

Field Hockey @ Connecticut College 11 a.m.

Women’s Golf @ Weslayan

in 26th with times of 16.58.1, 17.15.9 and 17.30.9 respectively. Laurent emphasized the hard work that the runners put in over the summer, and how that paid off during the race. “It was a difficult and gritty race (and course with all the hills) but everyone really fought hard and moved up in the race. We really put the work in this summer and that determination has continued into the early season …

The energy has been unmatched this season and I think people will be seeing big things from the cross country teams,” Laurent said.

Annika Paylor ’24, despite her 37th place finish due to tripping and falling during the portion of the race that was in the woods, said that “the race atmosphere was very supportive [with] lots of good energy from the other teams and parents …

The hills definitely made it more difficult; the terrain was also [a] bit unstable in the woods and the sharp turns definitely made it more difficult.” However, Paylor said that the race was “overall a fun experience.”

The Mammoths will return on Oct. 1st, for the Paul Short Run at Lehigh University.

Men’s Golf @ Bowdoin Men’s Tennis @ Bowdoin

SUN Women’s Golf @ Weslayan Men’s Golf @ Bowdoin Men’s Tennis @ Bowdoin