Heights 9-16-10

The Independent Student Newspaper of Boston College Established 1919

THE HEIGHTS THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2010

Vol. XCI, No. 27

www.bcheights.com

UGBC Demand for tickets ‘unprecedented’ Students brave seven-hour line for Fall Concert Senate tickets, 400 remaining tickets to be sold today approves budget FALL CONCERT

BY MICHAEL CAPRIO News Editor

Students hoping to obtain tickets to Saturday’s Fall Concert lined up before 8 a.m. on Monday morning in front of the Robsham Theater box office. By the time the office closed around 3 p.m., some of those students had their tickets, some didn’t.

Lines snaked around Robsham, down Campanella Way and into the Mods, early into the morning. The queue lightened around noon with the line ending at the entrance of the Mod parking lot by the time the office closed.

“The only thing I can say is that it’s unprecedented,” said Michael Kitlas, executive director of campus entertainment for the Undergraduate Government of Boston College (UGBC) and A&S ’12.

“We’ve never had this turnout.”

The UGBC has sold 4,400 tickets thus far, Kitlas said. The remaining 400 will be sold this morning at 8 a.m. in the Robsham box office.

As students shuffled back and forth to classes. the line fell into various states of disarray, students said. “There was no etiquette at all,” said Peter Hsin,

MICHAEL CAPRIO / HEIGHTS EDITOR

See Tickets, A5

The ticket line (above) as it appeared early Monday morning

SPO plots a new course

CECILIA PROVVEDINI / HEIGHTS STAFF

For The Heights

See SPO, A5

INSIDE SPORTS

Wide receiver Johnathan Coleman tell his story, A10

THE SCENE

KEVIN HOU / HEIGHTS EDITOR

CECILIA PROVVEDINI / HEIGHTS STAFF

Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick presented his views on both primary and higher education at Monday’s speaking event.

Made by his education

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The U.S. must find fresh ways to combat Mexican drug cartels, B10 Classifieds, A5 Crossword, C5 Editorials, A6 Editors’ Picks, B3 Forecast on Washington, D2 On the Flip Side, D4 Police Blotter, A2 Thumbs Up / Thumbs Down, A7 Videos on the Verge, C2 Weather, A2

The Undergraduate Government of Boston College (UGBC) Senate approved the executive branch’s budget last night following a proposal that would amend a contentious $63,021 executive discretionary fund.

The Senate failed to approve the budget in full at last week’s meeting due to disagreements surrounding a discretionary fund that, if approved in its original form, would have allowed the executive department of the UGBC to distribute the funds according to its own guidelines, bypassing Senate approval for each additional allotment.

After failing to achieve passage of the budget last week, Micaela Mabida, UGBC president and CSOM ’11, presented a renewed budget with UGBC finance directors Brendan Driscoll, CSOM ’12, and John Stanley, CSOM ’11.

The new budget included a renewed discretionary fund with line items for financial withholdings ($21,505), University speakers ($12,300), and traditional discretionary funds ($29,216).

“This amounts from our ‘trimming the fat’ from the budget,” Stanley said.

The financial withholdings will be held by the executive department for “foreseen costs,” or funds that specific departments expect they will eventually need but don’t have the paperwork to justify at this point in time. “Until we get those details from the groups, we won’t give them the full amount,”

See Budget, A4

Deval offers his view of education, sprinkled with anecdotes

BY MOLLY LAPOINT Heights Staff

Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick spent most of his youth living on welfare in the South side of Chicago.

Now, at the age of 54, he holds the title of the first African-American governor of Massachusetts. Now, he resides in Milton, Mass., the same neighborhood he used to deliver newspapers to when he attended Milton Academy.

Patrick spoke at Boston College about education on Monday in Robsham Theater. His talk is the first of the year in the Lowell Humanities Lecture Series, which brings distinguished writers, artists, and performers, and other dignitaries to speak at BC. Patrick opened the speech by discussing the effect education has had on his own life. “The power of education is real,” he said. “Now you hear that as

a rhetorical point, I’m sure, a lot, but I’ve thought a lot about it.”

Patrick recounted the story of his youth, sharing one bedroom of his grandparents’ two-bedroom tenement with his sister and mother. “You’d go from the top bunk to the bottom bunk to the floor,” he said.

“I went to big and broken, underresourced, sometimes violent public schools. I can’t think of a time when I didn’t love to read, but I don’t remember ever actually owning a book until I got my break in 1970, through a program called A Better Chance, to come to Massachusetts to Milton Academy, which for me was like landing on a different planet.”

He shared an anecdote about his first encounter with the dress code at Milton Academy. “The boys wore jackets and ties to classes,” he said.

“So when the clothing list arrived at

home, my grandparents splurged on a brand new jacket for class. Now, a jacket on the South side of Chicago is a windbreaker. And the first day of class everybody’s putting on their blue blazer and their tweed coats, and there I was in my windbreaker. I’d like to point out I have figured it out.”

His daughter, Katherine, has known a different life, he said. “[Katherine] has always had her own room, most of that time in a house that we lived in for about 22 years in a leafy neighborhood in Milton, where I used to deliver newspapers when I was a student at Milton Academy,” Patrick said.

“By the time she got to high school, she had already traveled on three or four continents, she knew how to use and pronounce a concierge, and she had shaken hands in the White House

See Patrick, A4

LOCAL NEWS

Landmark theater to be razed

Developer looks to build hotel at site of Cleveland Circle cinema By the grace of God, Zach Galifianakis is comedy’s king, C1

BY MICHAEL CAPRIO News Editor

BY CHELSEA NEWBOULD

Over the summer, the Student Programs Office (SPO) underwent a large organizational change. While still organized to provide guidance and advisement to registered student organizations on campus, the department restructured itself in order to establish a more efficient way to assist student groups and become a better resource for all students.

Most prominent among the changes to SPO is the division of its staff to fulfill two distinct functions: leadership development and student engagement.

Diverting from the previous system for handling clubs and organizations, SPO will be assigning its associate dean, Jean Yoder, and its assistant dean, Mer Ursula Zavko, to the task of creating more leadership opportunities, including training sessions and retreats, for club members.

Assigned to the student engagement sector of the SPO will be Mark Miceli, assistant dean of SPO; Karl Bell, assistant dean of SPO; Sharon Blumenstock, assistant director

Discretionary fund to remain

BY MICHAEL CAPRIO News Editor

The property hosting the vacant Cleveland Circle National Amusements Cinema and Applebee’s may soon be home to a “limited service” hotel with approximately 150 rooms and 24,000 square feet of retail space.

The property, located at 399 and 381 Chestnut Hill Avenue in Boston, is held

by National Amusements.

The movie theater was closed in the fall of 2008 and has since been unoccupied.

The potential purchaser, the Boston Development Group, recently filed paperwork with the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) to purchase the property from National Amusements.

David Zussman, CEO of Boston Development, told reporters that, pending approval from the City of Boston, the plan will be finalized in the coming weeks.

Boston Development submitted a letter to the City of Boston on Sept. 1

NICOLE CHOINSKI / HEIGHTS STAFF

Boston Development seeks to build a hotel on the site of the Cleveland Circle Cinema. requesting permission to begin the proposed plan, which includes demolition of the Cleveland Circle Cinema and construction of the hotel.

The proposal is currently under review. BRA officials told reporters that no timetable has been set regarding the construction of the project. 

AP FILE PHOTO

Barney Frank (D-MA) is one of several candidates for which students will campaign.

Candidates find campus support

BY PATRICK GALLAGHER Assoc. News Editor

When the dust settled following Tuesday’s primary elections, the results showed two major victories for Tea Party-backed candidates.

In Delaware, upstart Christine O’Donnell, a former abstinence counselor, took 53 percent of the vote to win the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate seat that was vacated by Vice President Joe Biden. O’Donnell beat out U.S. Representative Michael Castle, a longtime politician and former two-term governor of Delaware.

Carl Paladino defeated former congressman Rick Lazio for the Republican nomination for governor of New York in what amounted to a potentially debilitating blow to Republican hopes to gain traction in the state.

Both results place newcomers to the political scene in the spotlight for the Republican Party in nationallymonitored races with November’s general elections quickly approaching.

Kay Schlozman, a professor in the

See Campaigns, A5

TopFive

Thursday, September 16, 2010

THE HEIGHTS

things to do on campus this week

Necessary Secrets

1

Humanitarian Intervention

Today Time: 4:30 p.m.

Location: McGuinn 121

Gabriel Schoenfeld will discuss his new book, Necessary Secrets: National Security, the Media, and the Rule of Law, which looks at the current status of the government.

2

Today Time: 5:30 p.m.

Location: Higgins 300

A panel of scholars will discuss the debate over state sovereignty and military intervention, as well as the “responsibility to protect” and its effects on foreign policy.

First Year Convocation

3

Welles Crowther 5k Run

Today Time: 7 p.m.

Location: Conte Forum

Tonight, freshmen will be welcomed into the BC community by keynote speaker Daniel Wolfe, author of How Lincoln Learned to Read. The ceremony will also include a procession.

FEATURED ON CAMPUS

Web site helps students save

4

Saturday Time: 9 a.m.

Location: The Rat

Join the Crowther family and friends for the sixth annual Welles Crowther Memorial run.

Crowther, BC ’99, was a Sept. 11 hero. Registration will take place in The Rat at 8 a.m.

Kid Cudi / LMFAO

5

Saturday Time: 8 p.m.

Location: Conte Forum

For this year’s fall concert, the Undergraduate Government of Boston College (UGBC) presents Kid Cudi and LMFAO, this Saturday in Conte Forum.

Doors open at 7 p.m.

IntheNews

FOUR DAY WEATHER FORECAST TODAY

70° PM Showers 61°

FRIDAY

72° AM Showers 52°

SATURDAY

69° Mostly Sunny

University Faculty unions at universities shown to positively affect females In a recently published paper, Ann Mari May, an economics professor at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, showed evidence that having faculty unions at institutions of higher education positively affects women who are seeking faculty positions, according to a report by the Chronicle of Higher Education. The study, which surveyed 101 research institutions over a 12-year period, indicated that female professors at unionized campuses make up a larger share of the overall faculty than at colleges without unions.

54°

SUNDAY

73° Partly Cloudy 52°

SOURCE: NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE

A Guide to Your Newspaper The Heights Boston College – McElroy 113 140 Commonwealth Ave. Chestnut Hill, Mass. 02467 Editor-in-Chief (617) 552-2223

Local News Attorney Gen. Coakley to Mass.

DPU: Reject proposed rate hike

KEVIN HOU / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Sophomores Chase Mcaleese, Eddie Jonny, and Andrew Flynn are the creators of a Web site promoting student disounts.

BY DRAKE HAYWOODE

ber of great deals, including 30 percent off J. Crew items and one free item from El When Chase Mcaleese saw Pelon Mexican Restaurant. an excessive amount of flyBC students can visit the ers scattered throughout his Web site, www.textsu.com, Cushing Hall dormitory last and sign up for free. The only year, he had an idea – why expense comes from your cell not consolidate the informa- phone plan (however, any tion into one comprehensive free texting plan carries no collection. charge). Students can use Since then, Mcaleese, A&S their Eagle accounts to sign ’13, along with Andrew Flynn, up and create a TextsU proA&S ’13, and Eddie Jonny, file, which can be configured CSOM ’13, creto only receive ated a Web site messages from which does just “As more students businesses in t h a t . Newly join [TextsU], more which they are launched, www. interested. textsu.com pro- businesses will take They can also vides students part, and the deals d e c i d e h o w with informawill only get better.” many texts they tion about prowant to receive motions and a day, between discounts via —Chase Mcaleese, one and 15, to text message. avoid being TextsU creator and TextsU became spammed, and A&S ’13 fully operationcan opt out of al on Sept. 7. the service at The main objective of Text- any time. sU, the brainchild of Mcaleese, Texts from the Web site will is to send coupons and promo- always contain notifications tions from local businesses for upcoming sales. TextsU directly to students’ phones. also sends out information Stores in Cleveland Circle regarding upcoming ticket and in the Beacon Hill and deals for sporting events, as Back Bay areas are already well as for concerts in the on board, texting exclusive Boston area. discounts on items such as Mcaleese said his inspiraclothing and food to members tion for TextsU came last year, of TextsU. Students who have when he noticed that dorms signed up with the Web site were overcrowded with fliers have already received a num- and pamphlets that did not For The Heights

interest students. “I thought there had to be a better way for businesses to advertise that would benefit them and the students,” Mcaleese said.

“With TextsU, students will only receive messages from the businesses they want, and businesses can save money and paper through direct marketing.”

Tech and business savvy, Mcaleese designed and created the Web site, as well as contacted the businesses.

Mcaleese said that Flynn and Jonny were instrumental in helping spread the word throughout campus.

In less than a week, 200 students have signed up with TextsU, with more members joining each day, he said.

“As more students join, more businesses will take part and the deals will only get better,” said Mcaleese, who would like TextsU to be available at Boston University, Northeastern, Harvard, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology by the end of the year. Local business operators share this enthusiasm and hope that the exclusive text promotions will draw in students, he said.

TextsU is not Mcaleese’s first foray into the realm of entrepreneurialism. Last year he started a small social networking Web site for soccer fans, www.golposts.com, which is still operational. 

Today the office of Mass. Attorney General Martha Coakley called on the Department of Public Utilities (DPU) to reject National Grid’s proposed $104 million rate hike request, according to a release from Coakley’s office. The request, which would apply to its three local gas distribution subsidiaries, would be the largest gas distribution rate increase in Mass. state history if it were to be fully approved by the DPU. National Grid provides gas distribution service to over 850,000 residential, commercial, and industrial customers in Mass.

On Campus BC student plans to assist charity in Uganda, BC funds the endeavor In December, Peter Ferguson, A&S ’12, will be traveling to Uganda for the second time, where he is planning to make a documentary film and establish local contacts in order to benefit a local charity, the Nsambya Ex-Street Children Organization (NESCO), according to a report by ABC Channel 10 News in Sacramento.

On his trip, which will be funded by a grant from Boston College, Ferguson told Channel 10 that he hopes to meet with individuals and groups, such as a local Jesuit organization, through which he can later send donations to be forwarded to NESCO.

National Man awaiting homocide trial commits suicide, charges dropped BOSTON (AP) - Prosecutors will formally drop their case against a man who committed suicide while awaiting trial on charges of killing a masseuse he met through Craigslist. On the same day, the slain woman will be honored with a memorial stone in a memorial garden to homicide victims. Because of his death, authorities must drop the charges against Philip Markoff, the former Boston University medical student who was accused of killing Julissa Brisman last year. Prosecutors plan to file the notice Thursday in Suffolk Superior Court.

Editorial General (617) 552-2221 Managing Editor (617) 552-4286 News Desk (617) 552-0172 Sports Desk (617) 552-0189 Marketplace Desk (617) 552-3548 Features Desk (617) 552-3548 Arts Desk (617) 552-0515 Photo (617) 552-1022 Fax (617) 552-4823 Business and Operations General Manager (617) 552-0169 Advertising (617) 552-2220 Business and Circulation (617) 552-0547 Classifieds and Collections (617) 552-0364 Fax (617) 552-1753 EDITORIAL RESOURCES News Tips Have a news tip or a good idea for a story? Call Michael Caprio, News Editor, at (617) 552-0172, or e-mail news@bcheights.com. For future events, e-mail, fax, or mail a detailed description of the event and contact information to the News Desk.

Sports Scores Want to report the results of a game? Call Zach Wielgus, Sports Editor, at (617) 552-0189, or e-mail sports@bcheights.com.

Arts Events The Heights covers a multitude of events both on and off campus – including concerts, movies, theatrical performances, and more. Call Kristen House, Arts and Review Editor, at (617) 552-0515, or e-mail review@ bcheights.com. For future events, e-mail, fax, or mail a detailed description of the event and contact information to the Arts Desk.

Clarifications / Corrections The Heights strives to provide its readers with complete, accurate, and balanced information. If you believe we have made a reporting error, have information that requires a clarification or correction, or questions about The Heights standards and practices, you may contact Matthew DeLuca, Editor-in-Chief, at (617) 552-2223, or e-mail editor@ bcheights.com.

CUSTOMER SERVICE

Police Blotter 9/10/10 – 9/14/10 Friday, September 10 10:52 a.m. - A report was filed regarding a motor vehicle that was leaking gasoline. The motor vehicle was moved off campus and the spill was cleaned by facilities.

2:55 p.m. - A report was filed regarding the confiscation of a controlled substance from a non-BC party in More Hall. The party was identified, issued a written trespass warning, and escorted off Boston College property.

6:27 p.m. - A report was filed regarding the confiscation of a large quantity of alcoholic beverages from several underage parties on Commonwealth Ave. A report will be forwarded to the ODSD for review.

Saturday, September 11 3:23 p.m. - A report was filed regarding a party who was observed scalping athletic tickets. The party was identified, issued a written trespass warning, and escorted off Boston College property.

3:53 p.m. - A report was filed regarding an intoxicated party who was ejected from Alumni Stadium. The party was walked to the first aid room for medical treatment.

6:14 p.m. - A report was filed regarding three parties who were observed committing

larceny. A report will be forwarded to the ODSD for review.

Voices from the Dustbowl “What is your opinion of the cheer “First down, b—h” at football games?”

Sunday, September 12 10:31 a.m. - A report was filed regarding a an officer who provided medical assistance to an employee with a laceration in Conte Forum. The party was later transported to a medical facility.

4:50 p.m. - A report was filed regarding a party who momentarily lost consciousness on Commonwealth Ave. The party refused any treatment.

Tuesday, September 14 10:15 a.m. - A report was filed regarding the arrest of James Lombard by the Boston College Police Department on a default warning.

The party will also be charged with open and gross lewdness.

4:51 p.m. - A report was filed regarding a party who had their credit card stuck in a pay station in the Commonwealth garage. The party was advised to contact Parking and Transportation to rectify the situation.

—Source: The Boston College Police Department

“I think it’s terrible. I think it reflects horribly on the student body.”

—Claire Kairys, A&S ’12

“I hope when my mom comes for Parent’s Weekend that she doesn’t hear it.”

—Isabella Nascimento, A&S ’14

“I think it’s fine, whatever, let it out.”

—Martin Fallon,

CSOM ’13

Delivery To have The Heights delivered to your home each week or to report distribution problems on campus, contact John O’Reilly, General Manager at (617) 552-0547.

Advertising The Heights is one of the most effective ways to reach the BC community. To submit a classified, display, or online advertisement, call our advertising office at (617) 552-2220 Monday through Friday.

The Heights is produced by BC undergraduates and is published on Mondays and Thursdays during the academic year by The Heights, Inc. (c) 2010. All rights reserved.

CORRECTIONS Please send corrections to editor@bcheights.com with ‘correction’ in the subject line.

The Heights

Thursday, September 16, 2010

A3

Annual Career Fair draws students to Conte Forum

By Daniel Tonkovich For The Heights

With classes barely two weeks underway, Boston College students donned their professional attire, leather portfolios in hand, for the annual Career Fair held Tuesday in Conte Forum.

“The fair provides students the opportunity to start a dialogue with employers and recruiters and have their questions about companies and opportunities within those companies answered,” said Jessica Hartly, associate director of the Career Center. “It is a wonderful forum for networking. And, despite it being the second week of school, there has been a great turnout.”

Approximately 100 companies and organizations were present at the event, representing the accounting and financial services, insurance, computer software, consulting, biotech, health care, retail, social and human services, nonprofits, and higher education industries.

“The fair allows someone the opportunity to expose themselves to the employers and show their interest in a company by demonstrating their knowledge of the company’s operations to the recruiters,” said Shannon Lista, GCSOM ’11. “It is important to set up your network now and get practice with interacting with employers, as it is a skill requiring constant refinement.”

Employers also enjoy the fair as an opportunity to connect with students who have a genuine interest in their company.

“Throughout the day, I have met many qualified students with great character,” said Anna Kupik, recruiting associate at Grant Thornton. “I

have been discussing with students their terested in education related graduate desire to work with a developed, though studies,” said Adam Poluzzi, director of smaller, accounting firm that offers an graduate admission for the Lynch School array of services and fosters a spirit of of Education. “We have been visited camaraderie.” by not just arts and sciences students, Also represented were public service but also business students interested in agencies at the state and federal level, fields such as university management. searching for qualified applicants from Usually, many of those interested in our all backgrounds and areas of study. programs seek to bring about social jus“For the FBI, over 300 various types tice, whether that be through teaching or of positions are available, ranging from educational policy creations.” staff support to special agent in fields Though numerous companies atranging from financial tended the fair, not all analysis to linguisstudents were com“The fair provides tics,” said one FBI pletely satisfied with recruiter. “The bustudents the opportunity the fair’s offerings. reau, similar to most “While numerous to start a dialogue with quality companies companies, seeks a diverse applicant employers and recruiters are represented, I feel base from many varithat a much broader and have their questions range of companies ous backgrounds. In all of our applicants, f ro m va r i o u s i n about companies and we also search for should be opportunities within those dustries their spirit of service present,” said Ryan to the country.”

LaMontagne, CSOM companies answered.”

“As a BC graduate, ’11.

I know that various For those seek— Jessica Hartley, paths are available ing networking with Associate Director of the to students, especompanies and within cially immediately industries not repreCareer Center after graduation,” sented at the Career the agent said. “With Fair, the Career Cenmany employers, what matters is how ter plans to offer other events throughout well you can sell yourself as defined the year to provide students with netby not only your academic record, but working opportunities in their desired also your character. Fortunately, Bos- career fields. An arts night is scheduled ton College students are usually very in November for students to network with proficient at selling themselves, making alumni in the art fields, and a similar them attractive to the best employers event is scheduled in March for those in all fields.” interested in communication and the In addition to companies and orga- sciences. In addition, a post-graduate nizations seeking to employ students, volunteer and human service fair will be graduate programs were present to held by the center on Oct. 26. display their offerings to soon-to-be “The Career Center tries its very best graduates. to offer opportunities matching the di“There has been a great turnout of verse career interests of the BC student students, including many who are in- body,” Hartley said. n

Sang Lee / Heights Staff

About 100 companies were present, with reps available for questions, at the annual Career Fair.

Response to new policy is positive

By Taylour Kumpf Asst. News Editor

AP File Photo

The UGBC recently launched its sale of $20 Rex Sox tickets, encouraging students to attend.

UGBC sells Sox tickets at low price B y D an M orrison

that it could be of particular interest to them.

“We expect more freshmen because The Undergraduate Govern- they are not usually busy and haven’t ment of Boston College (UGBC) had as many experiences in the city,” launched its sale of $20 student Larik said. tickets to a Sept. 20 game between The directors of BC to Boston selectthe Boston Red Sox and Baltimore ed the Sept. 20 game because it was the Orioles. The tickets went on sale one game that allowed them to purchase Monday morning at the Robsham the most tickets at the cheapest price, Theater box office.

Larik said.

The tickets, of which no more In making their decision, the directhan two are available per BC ID, tors of BC to Boston investigated the entitle students possibility of providto seats in the ing transportation to right outf ield from the game.

“The overall goal was to and grandstand.

Ultimately, they deB e f o r e t h e get students more exposed cided against supplysa l e b ega n o n transportation in to Boston. It’s likely that ing M o n d a y, t h e order to allow greater we’ll have one Red Sox UGBC held 78 flexibility in students’ tickets. UGBC game this year, with more plans before the game off icials said and to have the moncultural outings in the they expect to ey necessary to buy have sold most more tickets. spring.” of the tickets by “By not providthe end of the ing subsidized trans—Mark Larik, week. portation, we [the BC to Boston, Co-Director of BC to Boston UGBC] could save the new, threemoney and buy more and CSOM ’13 person directortickets,” Larik said. ship within the “Transportation was UGBC that organized the ticket not offered because we believed that sale, is part of UGBC initiative to most students would want to ride the T improve student ties with Boston and have their own schedule.” attractions.

In addition to the Sept. 20 game, the “The overall goal was to get directors of BC to Boston have considstudents more exposed to Boston,” ered a Celtics game and concerts at the said Mark Larik, co-director of BC House of Blues as possible events for to Boston and CSOM ’13. the spring.

A native of California, Larik “It’s likely that we’ll have one Red said that out-of-state students are Sox game this year, with more cultural often unfamiliar with Boston and outings in the spring,” Larik said. desire experiences to help them Wicked The Musical will be the next become acquainted with the city. BC to Boston showcase.

While BC to Boston is not exTickets are expected to go on sale in clusively for freshmen, Larik said mid-October. n For The Heights

The amended alcohol policy recently announced by the University that allows students to voluntarily seek medical help for themselves or an intoxicated friend without any fear of punitive sanctions has found favor among BC students.

Many students said the policy is a step in the right direction.

“I think the policy really promotes the health concerns for underage drinking, which is great,” said Mary Goetz, A&S ’13.

“I’m sure students will be much more likely to call the police or an RA if they know that their friend wouldn’t get written up.”

“In a situation where someone has excessively consumed alcohol, the most important thing is safety, then after that you can deal with the repercussions,” said Alex Fitch, A&S ’13.

“It’s a step in the right direction because it doesn’t penalize someone being responsible and calling in,” said David Schwartz, A&S ’13.

There’s no longer a debate over whether or not to make the call, he said.

“There can be borderline situations

where someone might not know whether a situation is severe enough to call the police, and in these situations the policy would really help students to make the safest choice without fear of the consequences,” Goetz said.

While the reception has been positive, questions and concerns still remain.

“It feels like the people who actually do drink responsibly will be punished more than those who excessively drink,” said Pat Collins, CSOM ’13.

“Why does it not effect more than the first offense?” Fitch said. “Because then you get into a situation where your friend is unconscious, and you have to ask if they have been called in before.”

Some students expressed concerns that the change in policy had not been clearly communicated by the University administration.

“For [the policy] to be effective, I think there needs to be a little more awareness of the change,” Goetz said.

“I had heard of it vaguely but was never really told directly about it,” she said. “As long as the people advertising it emphasize that this change is looking to help those in need of medical attention and not to

seek out people who are drinking, I think students will really respond positively to it.

I’m not sure whether a ton more people will call for help, but as long as they know that they can without probation, that’s a step in the right direction.”

The policy is currently operating under the title “Seeking Help for Alcohol-Related Medical Emergencies,” and it affects the last row of the drug and alcohol Matrix.

The movement to amend this portion of the Matrix was student-driven, brought to the attention of the administration by Harvey Simmons, A&S ’11; Justin Pike, A&S ’11; and Rob Celin, CSOM ’11. As members of the Alcohol Task Force, Simmons, Pike, and Celin worked for over a year to create a finalized version of the policy.

The three originally sought a full amnesty policy for students who voluntarily sought medical help, but eventually determined that the policy needed to include a mechanism for education.

Under the new policy, students who require medical attention due to the over consumption of alcohol, while they will not be punished, must attend alcohol education classes and / or therapy sessions. n

The Heights

A4

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Ultrinsic allows students to turn GPAs into cash Site’s critics point to perceived issues in educational ethics

By Kendall Bitonte For The Heights

For most Boston College students, academic success doesn’t immediately translate to financial awards. Unless, of course, the student has an account at Ultrinsic.com Ultrinsic Motivator Inc., the company that runs a Web site that allows students to wager money on their grades, recently released an updated list of universities that had participating students.

Included on the list of participating schools, alongside Stanford and Harvard, was BC. While the University is not affiliated with the site, an unspecified number of BC students have registered and sent in their transcripts in hopes of financial return.

Ultrinsic.com reports that the site currently has about 600 users from 36 colleges and universities.

Started by college students, Ultrinsic.com allows students to “create semester incentives” as well as “class incentives,” which

are the cash payouts stand to receive for earning their predicted GPA. Users initially contribute a specified amount and, if the goal is met, Ultrinsic Motivator will contribute the remainder to make the incentive total. If the student does not meet the goal, the student loses t=he initial contribution.

If a student thinks he or she will earn a 3.6 GPA over the course of the semester and makes his semester incentive $100, upfront, the student will pay $57. If the student does earn at least a 3.6 GPA, Ultrinsic Motivator will pay him the difference of $43. If the student does not meet a 3.6, he will lose

his $57, which Ultrinsic Motivator takes in as profit.

The Web site was started by Jeremy Gelbart and Stephen Wolf, who claim the concept was to motivate students to achieve higher grades.

Every GPA and Incentive combination has a specific contribution ratio, allowing both the student and the company to play the odds.

Rev. Richard McGowan, S.J., a professor in the economics department with a specialty in gambling, alcohol, and cigarettes, has researched the Web site.

“Just think about it,” McGowan said. “Most students

overestimate themselves. I’ll use the analogy of the Plex.

Look at how many students are there in January versus later in the year. [The company] is betting that students aren’t going to be disciplined.”

Julian Ponsetto, A&S ’12, said he was skeptical about the Web site’s premise. He said he agrees with McGowan about the company’s assumptions.

“Obviously the site is making money to stay in business, so it seems to me as if the students must be getting the short end of the stick,” Ponsetto said.

However, McGowan said the Web site is technically not a betting site, as students have

some control over the outcome of their grades.

“There is a silver lining,” McGowan said, referring to the money reward serving as a possible incentive for students to do well in their classes.

He does see ethical problems with the Web site, though. “One of the problems is that it causes temptation,” he said. “Suppose you went to a teacher and said, ‘If you give me an A, I’ll get this much money?’ Grading, in a way, is a certification contest. Betting causes all sorts of conflicts that should not be involved.” n Michael Caprio, News Editor, contributed to this report

Patrick highlights issues in U.S. higher education responsible for more of a children’s upbringing than in the with the president of the United past, Patrick said.

States.”

“I believe very profoundly that This change took place in one we are asking schools to do what generation, Patrick said. “Now whole neighborhoods used to do that story doesn’t get told as before.” Because of this, he said, often as we’d like in this country, the qualifications of the staff and but it gets told more often in this the length of both the school day country than any other place on and year should be brought into earth. That’s an American story. question.

An education is central to that One of the most important story for me and lots and lots pieces of legislation that has been and lots of other enacted during “I believe very Americans.” his time in office Massachuprofoundly that we is the achievesetts has a histoare asking schools ment gap bill he ry of educational signed in Januto do what whole innovation and ary, Patrick said. recently received neighborhoods used to The achievement a federal grant gap has lasted 17 do before.” for coming in first years. place in the Race “It’s an eduto the Top comcational and eco— Deval Patrick, petition. Despite nomic issue to t h i s s u c c e s s , Massachusetts Governor have an achievePatrick said, the ment gap at all, state government should con- but to let it go for 17 years, that’s tinue to work toward improving a moral question,” he said. education. “We can’t allow our “Those are our children, too. previous accomplishments to dull And now we have some tools to our vision for the next generation be able to reach that part of our of leaders,” he said.

Commonwealth-wide family.”

Because of this, Patrick said, In addition, the administra“We’ve continued to invest in tion has opened the first public public schools at the highest level law school in the state and inin the history of the Common- creased the ease of transferring wealth, even when the bottom credits between Massachusetts was falling out of so much of our public universities. state budget.”

“All of these innovations and A scientific component has reforms and investments have been added to the Massachusetts common thinking,” Patrick said.

Comprenhensive Assessment “They’re all part of the larger System (MCAS), the state’s high- plan to lay the foundation for stakes test, greater emphasis has future economic and social imbeen placed on math and science, provement here in Massachuand elementary school teach- setts.” ers are required to show math Before engaging in a question proficiency. and answer session with the auIn addition, he has signed dience, Patrick spoke about the anti-bullying legislation and generational responsibilities of enacted nutrition guidelines in the Baby Boomers. He spoke of schools. a New York Times column he read Today, schools are being held in which the baby boomers were

Patrick, from A1

compared with the generation that fought in World War II. “Then the writer compared them with the Baby Boom generation and described us as a grasshopper generation, because we’ve been feeding off of [their success] all our lives. And he’s right. See, it seems to me that what has been missing from our economy, and I say this as someone who’s spent most of his life in the private sector, from government, not just in the Commonwealth but in this country, is a willingness to make the hard choices today that we know will leave things better than we found them. And that there is no better way to do that than getting public education right.”

After the event, Patrick spoke briefly with The Heights about the achievement gap, the hard choices of his generation, and how college students and recent graduates should approach the job market.

Thinking about the reasons behind the achievement gap aren’t as important, he said, as making sure that it is fixed in the future. “[The legislation] is about is some new rules, and some new tools for greater flexibility to meet kids where they are,” he said. “I think what we have to do is stop just accepting the achievement gap as a fact of life and acting like we have a stake in those kids, too.”

The hard choices the baby boom generation has to make are largely based on the investments they make. “I think a lot of it has to do about the choices we make in what to invest in,” he said. “We’ve invested in this administration in education and health care and in job creation, because I believe if we get those right, it will leave a better and stronger Commonwealth, and we

Kevin Hou / Heights editor

Mass. Governor Deval Patrick, a Harvard graduate, spoke of how his early education affected his professional life. have done that by cutting in some other areas and raising revenue.

Those are difficult, those are real challenges, but those investments are making a difference.”

Other work has involved working on public infrastructure, such as improving highways and bridges, he said. “It’s not glamorous work, but it is absolutely essential, both as a job creation mechanism today, as a platform for economic development, and as improved quality of life over time.”

In regards to the recent economic downturn, college students and recent graduates should remain positive, Patrick said.

“First, don’t be discouraged,” he said. “I know it’s tough out there, believe me. I have seen what this economy has done, but it’ll turn, and it won’t turn by our just standing on the sidelines and railing about what’s wrong. It’ll turn by our doing things, by our making these kinds of investments, by preparing yourself for the opportunities that are out

there.

“The second thing I’d say is, optimism combined with effort, or as my grandmother would say, ‘Hope for the best and then work for it,’ is what we’ve been about – what I’ve been about in my own life, what your state government is about, and I think that is a focus and an attitude and a way of being in the world that you can’t emphasize enough, especially at a time when there’s so much negativity in the world,” Patrick said. n

UGBC Senate votes 7-5 in favor of proposed budget

Taylour kumpf / heights editor

Members of the UGBC Senate budget committee criticized the executive branch’s proposed budget at last night’s meeting, saying that the budget did not contain a proper oversight mechanism for the cabinet’s discretionary fund.

Budget, from A1 Stanley said.

The remaining discretionary fund represents a 5 percent increase from last year’s discretionary fund and will be used for unforeseen costs. “If costs balloon out of control, that’s what it’s used for,” Stanley said.

Derek Lo, Senate finance committee chairman and A&S ’12, said during last night’s Senate debate that the budget as proposed did not leave a sufficient

mechanism for Senate oversight of the funds. He encouraged the development of a line item discretionary fund, to closely monitor the funds.

“If we had line items for these funds, I would have an easier time explaining to my constituents, ‘This is what I voted for,’” Lo said.

Lo said that, while there would be Senate oversight to the funding process, the lack of Senate approval for budget items presents an issue.“There’s a difference between

knowing where it goes and having a say in where it goes,” he said.

Addressing his fellow senators, he said, “If we approve it now, you’re not going to have a say in where the money goes and where it doesn’t.”

Driscoll said the process by which the executive department will distribute portions of the discretionary fund has “a sufficient number of checks and balances.” “[The groups] are going to say how much they had originally requested

and how much they are requesting now. Once we see justification for that, then we get the signatures, then we get the money,” he said.

Any funds distributed from the discretionary fund will require the approval of Mabida, the two finance directors, Driscoll and Stanley, and Paulette Durrett, assistant dean of the Student Programs Office (SPO) and liaison to the UGBC. Nick Domino, UGBC Senator and A&S ’12, was one of five senators who

voted against approving the budget.

“I think it sets a precedent,” he said.

“The discretionary fund’s original intention was as a small ‘rainy day’ fund. It has already grown over the years.”

The Senate finance committee, composed of Lo, Vanessa Gomez, A&S ’13, and Guruaj Shan, A&S ’12, also voted in opposition of the budget.

There were seven votes in favor of the budget proposal, with one senator abstaining from the vote. n

THE HEIGHTS

Thursday, September 16, 2010

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Office creates specialized positions for deans SPO, from A1

for programming, and Paulette Durrett, assistant director for governance.

Miceli will work directly with organizers for Welcome Week and Senior Week activities, as well as campus election organizers, and Bell will oversee the registered student organizations as well as the Student Organization Funding Committee (SOFC), while Blumenstock will continue to manage programming efforts, including Nights on the Heights and off-campus programming.

Paulette Durrett, assistant dean of SPO, will act as liaison to the Undergraduate Government of BC (UGBC).

SPO has also developed a new initiative called Collegiate Link, a data management system similar to Facebook that allows registered clubs to advertise events, post information about their clubs, house documents and pictures pertaining to their clubs, and even invite others to join their clubs’ pages. With the implementation of Collegiate Link, SPO hopes to facilitate easier communication between deans and student organizations.

The changes made to the SPO represent an effort to streamline the office’s responsibilities. The

new model focuses on three major disciplines: leadership development, student involvement in advising, and programming.

“BC has quite a few really strong and popular leadership programs on campus, but many of them are for very specific populations of students and the number of participants are pretty small,” said Darrell Peterson, director of SPO. “We’re trying to develop programs that are more broad in scope and available to any student.”

Through these new developments, SPO hopes to allow more students to take advantage of leadership opportunities and understand their leadersh-ip potential, Peterson said.

The office also hopes to foster more peer interactions.

“We’re adopting a new advising model for our student organizations which will entail more involvement from faculty and staff advisers but will also involve a team of students to help in some of the day-today aspects, such as answering questions about programming or how to run an organization,” Peterson said.

To ensure that students are privy to what’s going on around campus, the reorganized office will be looking at the different

opportunities in which students can be involved and ensuring they are aware of them. There will also be more of an emphasis on late-night and weekend programming and off-campus events.

“Staffing responsibilities have been redirected into those areas to give us an opportunity to provide better services and resources for students and to expand the offerings that we have now,” Peterson said.

“For example, because we have two staff members who are working on the leadership piece, they can commit a lot of their time and energy to research the best practices to develop a really outstanding program,” he said.

This different approach is aimed to help the office work with students in a different capacity by providing learning opportunities and bringing them into the department.

“The previous system was flat in terms of physical structure,” Miceli said. “Before everyone did everything, but now it is more specialized and people are focused on specific areas.”

This specialization allows for new leadership developments and more student engagement, Miceli said. “We’ve gone from a reactive to a proactive office. Student groups

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE STUDENT PROGRAMS OFFICE

This year, administrators in the Student Programs Office will be specializing their jobs so as to encourage students to assume more leadership roles on campus and have a larger influence on University programming. used to come to us, but now we look for them.”

With the reorganization of SPO, Bell has become the administrative point man for clubs and organizations. But Bell is not alone.

With both a graduate and un-

dergraduate student to assist him, Bell will have to delegate to his assistants. “It’s not really just Karl.

If it were Karl in the old system, it would fail,” Miceli said.

Peterson and Miceli said they are both optimistic about the

changes to SPO. “We hope it will create more opportunities for students to get involved, and hopefully they will be able to gain more of an idea of who they are as a leader,” Peterson said. 

Hispanic Heritage Month kicks off on campus

TAYLOUR KUMPF / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Students gathered in O’Neill Plaza yesterday to celebrate the beginning of Hispanic Heritage Month. Dancers performed on a main stage while vendors sold traditional Latin American food items at a stall near Devlin Hall.

Line for Kid Cudi tickets extended to the Mods Tickets, from A1

CSOM ’12. As Hsin stood in line on Monday, he watched trash collect along the roadside of Campanella Way. As t h e a f te r n o o n a p proached, scalpers worked their way up and down the line, offering students a shorter wait, for a price.

Kitlas said that the UGBC will be looking into alternative methods of selling tickets

so as to avoid situations like Monday’s.

Other possibilities, Kitlas said, are using an online interface to sell tickets through Robsham and using the Conte Forum box office, which contains more ticket booths.

Doors to the event open at 7 p.m. The first 800 at the door will be offered floor seats.

In light of safety complications that arose during last year’s Fall Concert, featuring

Akon, Kitlas said that the UGBC will be working to ensure that artists abide by the terms of their contracts.

Last year’s Fall Concert was cut short when Akon urged students to rush the stage, creating a safety issue for event organizers.

While Kitlas could not yet disclose the exact terms of the contract, it is formatted to prevent such incidents, he said. 

Campus political groups gather for local politicians Campaigns, from A1 political science department, said she attributes the unexpected results to a lack of confidence in the political establishment.

“The Tea Party is clearly tapping into the wellsprings of deep dissatisfaction within the American public,” she said.

Ordinarily, in midterm election years, Schlozman said that voters will trend back toward the center, particularly in cases when the previous presidential election featured a major swing to the left or to the right.

Voters will typically reward the administration in times of peace and prosperity, “And right now we have neither,” Schlozman said.

But there is relatively little precedent for the way in which the Tea Party has unseated veteran politicians who were

expected to breeze through their respective primaries.

“America has had a lot of experience with third parties, but much more frequently they are challenging in presidential elections than in congressional races or governors races,” Schlozman said.

She said that, typically, third parties are either associated with a particular issue – such as the Green Party – or an individual, as was the case when Ross Perot ran for president in 1992 and 1996.

At BC, both the College Republicans of BC (CRBC) and the College Democrats of BC (CDBC) are hoping to take advantage of the anticipation that has been building as candidates ready themselves for the November general elections.

“The interest is there,” said Kris Munden, president of the CDBC and A&S ’11, adding that the group would be focusing on campaigns within the state.

“We feel that our resources are better used here in Massachusetts,” he said.

Students who participate in campaigns are likely to do a combination of canvassing, visibility work, and working the phones, Munden said.

The group will be targeting five local campaigns, including that of Deval Patrick for governor; Barney Frank (DMass.), and Niki Tsongas (D-Mass.).

They will also be working with the Bill Keating for Congress and Steve Grossman for Massachusetts State Treasurer campaigns.

Less than a year removed from Scott Brown’s electoral victory, Republican candidates in Massachusetts are still striving for a niche among the state’s voters. For the CRBC, which hosted Brown in the group’s first meeting of the year last fall, the unexpected victory gave a moral boost to members

who had previously felt as if they were fighting against the current.

“I think the Scott Brown election was really huge for our members to see that it can be done,” said Tomas Castella, president of CRBC and A&S ’11. “That really opened our members’ eyes to the possibilities.”

Later this fall, BC will play host to the fall convention for the College Republicans of Massachusetts. Until then, members will be occupied with local campaigns, including Charlie Baker’s bid for governor and Karyn Polito’s campaign for Massachusetts State Treasurer.

“It’s been really exciting for our members to get an idea of how a campaign goes on from the inside,” Castella said. “That’s our focus right now.”

Both the CDBC and CRBC will be collaborating throughout the fall in an

effort to register new voters in time for the general election. With respective strong recruiting pitches at last week’s Student Activities Day, the outlook is bright for both organizations.

“One of the biggest things we’ve been doing the past couple weeks is registering voters,” Munden said. He said that he’s expecting to see a rise in interest on campus because of the seats at stake in this year’s elections.

As was demonstrated in Delaware and New York on Tuesday, among other races, every vote counts, Castella said.

“We’re really trying to get everyone registered to vote either in their home state or register here in Massachusetts,” he said. He said that getting students involved and aware is paramount. “The political environment has changed quite a bit,” he said. 

A6

Thursday, September 16, 2010

The Heights

Editorials

Visions of the future While the University looks to the future, we hope it remembers the past when naming some major buildings on campus.

When Rev. J. Donald Monan, S.J., assumed the office of president of this University in 1972, he inherited a difficult legacy. The nation was in a state of turmoil, as popular memory informs those of us who were not there to see it, and the campus was a microcosm of all the same civil unrest.

On top of that, the University was $30 million in debt, and the endowment was a meager $6 million. Monan, however, had an immediate calming effect. He spoke to students rationally, and, taking stock of Boston College as it was, he chartered a course for the future. By the time Monan stepped down from his office 24 years later, he had established what he referred to as “the ongoing movement of the University,” the momentum that has

carried BC to the cusp of its next vision of the future.

Before launching into thehopeful blue, however, it may be good practice to tidy some of the ragged edges of the past. There are several buildings on this campus known only by numbers (66 and 90) or by location (The Gate).

In order to both impart character to one of these buildings and honor Monan, The Heights submits that the University consider christening the building referred to as St. Ignatius Gate as Monan Hall. Of all presidents this side of Father Gasson, Monan deserves to have his name placed on a building at one of the entrances to campus, and especially on one that looks towards the open spaces of BC’s future on Brighton Campus.

Matthew Laud / Heights Illustration

Changes in SPO

Letters to the Editor UGBC executives must follow constitution

Student organizations will no longer be caught in red tape to get funding and approval with the new SPO system.

Over the summer, the Student Programs Office (SPO) was restructured in order to better assist student groups.

SPO, which oversees almost all major student organizations and a number of major campus activities, ranging from the Undergraduate Government of Boston College (UGBC) to Nights on the Heights to Senior Week, was reorganized to do away with advising for clubs, replacing those advisors with a group of deans who will act as contacts for the various clubs and organizations.

In addition, the SPO will be adding programs in leadership development and will use a new Web-based program called Collegiate Link to help facilitate communication between club leaders and their deans and between club leaders and interested students.

The Heights feels that these changes, particularly the implementation of Collegiate Link as a means of connecting students, organizations, and University administrators, will effectively simplify processes such as the organizing and publicizing of club-related events to the campus community, in addition to easing the process by which clubs can submit financing requests.

However, with the changes that have been implemented, the onus now falls on SPO deans to reach out to clubs that they predict will require increased oversight. Additionally, students have expressed concerns over the ability of the system currently in place to establish new clubs. Heights columnist Ben Key chronicles his struggle to establish

The UGBC constitution is clear: our President has no authority to allocate unto her own good judgment a discretionary fund of $63,021, whether the Senate decides to pass that item or not. Such a fund wrongfully places additional power to the Executive and is destructive to the budgetary relationship between the Senate and the President. As our constitution makes clear, “the Senate is responsible for the Budget. The Senate shall allocate all the funds given to UGBC amongst all departments of UGBC throughout the year.” (III.7.1) While the President, with her Vice President, is called upon to create a proposed budget, it is ultimately the decision of the Senate to accept or reject that proposal as a whole or any particular item therein.

Now, it is the assertion of the President, and quite rightly, that this fund is born of organizational concerns (The Heights, “UGBC Senate approves 2010-2011 nudget with exception”).

Unforeseen expenditures, a program that goes over budget, or an entirely novel proposal may and do arise. If there were no recourse for this, we might reasonably accede to the allocation in question, and surely mere convenience would compel us, by

a new club in his column this week, discussing how SPO went so far as to prevent his as-of-yet unregistered club from recruiting at Student Activities Day. The Heights supports any student who is interested in bringing new and diverse interests to campus, and we believe that it is the SPO’s job to do everything in their power to bring these student interests to life.

For a University, there are certain prerequisite clubs, such as a radio station, a literary magazine, an undergraduate government, and perhaps even a newspaper, but the possibilities for student organizations do not end there. We need to start filling in the gaps and shading in the edges with more and different clubs, showcasing the truly diverse student life here on campus. We propose that for this purpose, a space in the Quad in the warmer months and the Rat in the colder months should be reserved as a space for new clubs to recruit, spread the word, and generally establish themselves among students.

The changes in SPO have built a framework that shifts the bulk of responsibility from advisors onto the students, requiring them to take the initiative to reach out for help and utilize this new system to its full potential. Dean Karl Bell has a very good grasp of student life and organizations, and we encourage established and proposed clubs to work closely with him. If students are passionate about a project, the ability to create an organization around that idea is now more accessible than ever.

SBIRT offers peer support to those in need I am one of six currently active SBIRT Collaborative screeners. When I heard The Heights was writing an article about our program I felt compelled to discuss the nature of Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment from the screener perspective.

We are the only substance use intervention program to ever employ the use of undergraduate students in the role of SBIRT screeners, a role traditionally reserved for health care professionals. From a purely economic standpoint, this configuration allows us to be orders of magnitude more cost-effective than staff-based programs. However, that fact is hardly relevant to my screener role interacting with patients. SBIRT offers the

David Willner Go back 16 years to April 1994, just before the genocide in Rwanda began.

You hear that the Interahamwe militias are stockpiling weapons, particularly machetes, while radio broadcasts are urging Hutus to kill Tutsis.

You are all the way across the globe, in the United States. What do you do?

What can you do?

Take yourself back even further, to 1944. You somehow find out that Hitler is using gas chambers to murder countless numbers of people. What do you do with this information? Do you call the White House and tell them to bomb the gas chambers? Do you simply spread awareness by telling your friends and family about what is going on?

At what point do you say, “I’ve had enough. I have to do something”?

This is the question raised in John Prendergast and Don Cheadle’s new book, The Enough Moment, and it is a question that applies to all of us today.

Less than four months from now, South Sudan is going to have a referendum on whether or not it wants to secede from the North and the government in Khartoum. The

Monday’s ticket line left many students grumbling; ‘The Heights’ offers some constructive criticism for the future. foresight into how to organize ticket sales should be employed to avoid a similar debacle in the future.

One of the best ideas would be to just move the entire process online. Another method might be to apply the system that’s used for Homecoming ticket sales, for which members of each class are assigned days staggered throughout the week on which they can purchase their tickets. This same notion could be applied to the online method, to avoid crashed servers and frozen laptops. If neither of these are feasible, the crowd could be managed by allotting ticketing blocks every hour on a first come, first serve basis. The main objective is to keep students from spending half of their day in a relative waste of time – to leave them free to attend the classes they’ve already paid for and to reflect on what promises to be an enjoyable concert uninhibited by memories of the six hours it took to get there.

The Heights The Independent Student Newspaper of Boston College Established 1919 Matthew DeLuca, Editor-in-Chief John O’Reilly, General Manager Darren Ranck, Managing Editor

chance for in-depth patient contact, specifically patient contact that has been shown to have long-term positive effects on the well-being of our patients regardless of their age or life situation. We are especially proud to provide undergraduate patients honest and faithful peer support at times they are likely to need it most.

SBIRT has been a truly unique and invaluable reallife health care learning experience for myself and my fellow screeners. I would encourage anyone interested in SBIRT to visit www.caritaschristi.org/sbirt for further information.

Daniel Paz de Araujo A&S ’13

Students can stand up for Sudan

Streamlining

Many students who spent hours in line outside of Robsham Theater on Monday to purchase tickets for the UGBC’s Fall Concert would agree that the price of admission for the event went far beyond the $25 they handed over to secure their seat.

Some students spent up to six hours in line, missing several classes, meals, and appointments. Others played into the ludicrousness of the situation by setting up shop in lawn chairs and ordering pizzas to be delivered to the “massive line in front of Robsham.”

Some came home empty-handed, with only a wristband to show for their time spent in line, and the promise they could pick up their tickets by setting aside more time for the affair the next day. Though the UGBC’s care in securing a popular act for this weekend’s concert should be commended, more

appropriate action, to divest the Senate of this particular power.

However, by-law I presents just such an avenue for addressing these types of costs and changes in the budget.

This statute, carrying the full force of any article in the constitution, mandates a bi-monthly review by the Senate Finance Committee of “any and all budget material from the previous months and budget allocations for the coming months.” The emendation of the original budget ought to be made or prepared for at such times, as the Finance Committee follows this process.

Unless it is the intention of the President not to abide by the limits placed on her office, she ought to rethink this gross sidestepping of the constitutionally mandated process. Let these monies be given to their respective departments or be placed in such a reserve fund as shall not be made accessible to the Executive without specific and explicit Senate approval. If not, complaint ought to be made to the Judiciary Council by a member of the UGBC. Jordan Dorney A&S ‘12

problem is that several components of the landmark 2005 peace agreement between North and South Sudan have not been implemented, including the demarcation of borders and questions surrounding Abyei, the volatile oil-rich region that both sides continue to argue over. Most polls currently show that South Sudan will, in fact, vote for secession. The big question on everyone’s mind is, what happens then?

One does not have to delve deep into President Omar al-Bashir’s history to discover his ruthless tactics in securing his wealth and power. His crimes in Darfur are widely known, and Bashir has already been indicted by the International Criminal Court for three counts of genocide, five counts of crimes against humanity, and two counts of war crimes. If war does break out, there is no doubt that it will be bloody and it will be brutal.

The countdown to the referendum brings us back to the original question: when is your “enough moment?” Do you have to wait for a crisis to reach Rwanda or Holocaust proportions before you stand up and act?

There is plenty that you can do to help prevent the impending crisis in the months ahead. The U.S. govern-

David Willner is a junior in the College of Arts & Sciences.

Readers Note: The Heights welcomes Letters to the Editor not exceeding 200 words and column submissions that do not exceed 700 words for its op/ed pages.

The Heights reserves the right to edit for clarity, brevity, accuracy, and to prevent libel. The Heights also reserves the right to write headlines and choose illustrations to accompany pieces

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Submissions must be signed and should include the author’s connection to Boston College, address, and phone number. Letters and columns can be submitted online at www.bcheights.com, by email to editor@bcheights.com, in person, or by mail to Editor, The Heights, 113 McElroy Commons, Chestnut Hill, Mass. 02467.

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Editorial Kaleigh Polimeno, Copy Editor Michael Caprio, News Editor Zach Wielgus, Sports Editor Jacquelyn Herder, Features Editor Kristen House, Arts & Review Editor Daniel Martinez, Marketplace Editor Hilary Chassé, Opinions Editor Ana Lopez, Special Projects Editor Alex Trautwig, Photo Editor Margaret Tseng, Layout Editor

ment has only very recently been paying any attention to Sudan (Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently called the referendum a “ticking time bomb”), largely because advocacy groups have been putting pressure on the Obama administration. This is exactly the kind of pressure we must keep up in the coming months in order to ensure that the U.S. and the world do everything they can do to prevent another civil war in Sudan.

This is where you, the student, come in. You have the chance to give some of your time and energy to stopping a war and speaking out against atrocities. There is a group on campus, the Genocide Awareness Committee, working with Americans for Informed Democracy (AID), that will be focusing on Sudan this year. They will be meeting with politicians urging them to do more in Sudan as well as holding campus events designed to raise awareness about the issue.

If you have decided that this is your “enough moment” and that now is the time for you to do something to try and stop a war from happening, then come join our movement and take a stand.

Michael Saldarriaga, Graphics Editor Christina Quinn, Online Manager Laura Campedelli, Multimedia Coodinator Brooke Schneider, Assoc. Copy Editor DJ Adams, Asst. Copy Editor Patrick Gallagher, Assoc. News Editor Taylour Kumpf, Asst. News Editor Maegan O’Rourke, Assoc. Sports Editor Paul Sulzer, Asst. Sports Editor Kristopher Robinson, Asst. Features Editor

Contributors: Diana Nearhos, Amanda Huang, Alyssa Shaffer, Alex Manta, Mollie Kolosky, Kevin DiCesare

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Joelle Formato, Business Manager David Givler, Advertising Manager Brynne Lee, Outreach Coordinator Brendan Quinn, Systems Manager Madeline Demoulas, Local Sales Manager Daniel Ottaunick, Collections Manager James Gu, Asst. Ads Manager Dara Fang, Business Assistant

The Heights

Thursday, September 16, 2010

A7

Opinions

Ace of clubs

Thumbs Up Gov. Patrick – The Bay State’s fearless leader made an appearance in Robsham on Monday to discuss Massachusetts as a leader in public education. Even though some may questions his motives (only six weeks to November), the visit of a sitting guv’nah is an event regardless.

The Rat’s plates – No longer will panini enthusiasts be greeted with an amorphous blob of what was once Styrofoam plates.

The introduction of plastic platters has averted that particular hurdle; environmental consciousness must be next.

VMAs – Well, that was cathartic! After a year of tension between country princess T. Swift and resident crazy person Kanye West, the wounds have been healed in both condescending and self-loathing ways. You may now proceed with your daily lives.

Auditions – Every oncampus group imaginable, from the debate team to the Chorale, is spending these weeks sorting out the diamonds of talent from the rough of the average.

But take heart, Eagles, The Heights is always looking for new writers (ability to carry a tune not a prerequisite).

Truthiness – The pompous pundit’s die-hard fans (commonly referred to as Colbert Nation) have been lobbying the late night host to hold his own rally on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Although he has sidestepped the issue so far, TU/TD is throwing its support into the ring and giving the idea the TU/TD bump .

Thumbs Down Baguettes – Eagle’s Nest patrons looking for a satisfying crunch to accompany their sandwiches will be sorely disappointed. The new “crusty roll” is anything but, with a doughy middle and floury sides.

BC Dining, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Ticketing – Now, TU/TD is as excited as the next person (in line) for the Kid Cudi concert, but not interested in waiting outside Robsham for longer than the actual concert will last.

Sorry we didn’t go to the Fray, UGBC, but you don’t need to keep punishing us!

Vineyard Vines – This uber-preppy company has apparently decided to cut its losses and just advertise directly to its largest consumer, the female BC population. The new online ad features over a minute of staged cheesy BC campus tomfoolery. This disproves the adage that all publicity is good publicity.

Miracle Whip – Why are these commercials so intense? Please do tone it down, you are a mayonnaise-substitute company.

Gaga – Alright, we get it, you’ve got practiced eccentricities down to an art form.

But sometimes, thinking inside the box, or near the box, or in the same galactic system as the box, might not be such a terrible thing.

Benjamin Key The new school year never really hits me until Student Activities Day. I usually buck at such things, but I find myself swept away by the whole “college!” of it all. The event is part anthropology, part comedy, and part school spirit, all whisked together in the Dustbowl. Where else can you see the odd dichotomy of club members (who don’t care) pretending to be interested in freshmen, alongside freshmen (who really do) attempting to act nonchalant as they add their e-mail addresses to yet another listserv. By 3:00 p.m. the clubs start getting aggressive: Club: “Do you like human rights?”

Freshman: (seeing through ploy) “Ummm … no … sorry …”

Club: “Enjoy hell.”

I actually heard that. We’re a tactful bunch.

But I realized something this year (I’m a senior now, I’ve become contemplative). After you take away the properly ironic comedy-groups frying bacon at their tables and the dozen or so a cappella groups with their CDs clashing against each other, Boston College really does not have many clubs. Certainly not those with wide appeal, at least. CSOM has their armada of “let’s pretend to make money” clubs, there are a handful of politically-motivated societies (the fact that the College Democrats and the College Republicans are placed adjacent to each other is brilliant). The Undergraduate Government of BC (UGBC) has several tables to itself, as do the literary journals. On top of these, BC has what is defined as “intercultural” and “religious” clubs. We have 44 in total. These are clubs designated for specific cultural and religious groups on campus. I’ll come back to that.

I’m going to tip my cards here. For the last year or so I have been attempt-

ing to officially start an Outdoor Club – not by myself, there have been many hands at work – most notably those of my cofounder, Ashley Grace. My effort is far from unprecedented. A member of the Student Program Office (SPO) gleefully told me at my first meeting that someone has tried to start some kind of outing club unsuccessfully for the last 20 years. When I showed up to that first “new clubs” meeting, my effort was greeted with amusement rather than consideration. In all fairness, that was a year ago, and much has happened since then. I also want to be clear that there are administrators in SPO that have been extremely helpful: Dr. R. Darrell Peterson, the director of SPO, and Dean Karl Bell have both gone out of their way to help make the Outdoor Club a reality.

But still, it’s been over a year and this club is still not official. The Facebook group has 544 members, with more added each day. The listserv has over 300. Those numbers have been garnered entirely by word of mouth. I was told by SPO that my table would be removed by the BC Police Department if I attempted to set one up at Student Activities Day. The sad fact is, at any other university, the Outdoor Club would have been a reality 20 years ago. The sadder fact is, at any other university, when 500 students make it clear they want a club to exist, they would take that more seriously.

I have been told that this year there will be some sort of official outings, possibly run through the Plex. I appreciate this effort, but it’s unacceptable.

That BC goes out of its way to make the founding of a club so difficult is not only an embarrassment to the University, it’s detrimental. Looking back on Student Activities Day, a large majority of the clubs are simply microcosms for the cultures from which the members already come. The cultural societies are important, but ultimately they’re a way for similar people to find each other. These are people who are alike religiously and culturally. While these clubs often throw wonderful events, that expose those who attend to a new culture, the actual members are largely homogenous.

Is this what BC is attempting to do?

Create cultural pods where people join

BC societies with only those who look like them, have the same major, or believe in the same God? The comedy, art, and dance groups offer a full spectrum of people, as does the UGBC, but these organizations are limited in number.

What BC lacks is non-academic, nonathletic, and non-cultural groups. I want us, as a community, to find diversity in interests rather than in background. I want a BBQ club, a squash club, a pogo stick enthusiast club. I don’t care what they are, but if there is an interest, we should have them. Other universities do. If an odd interest can bring people together, whether it’s 10 or 500, isn’t that worth the University’s approval?

If BC wants to break down cultural barriers, then allow us to pursue our interests and find others who share them.

I didn’t make the friends I have because they are also white, or also Catholic, or also English majors. I made the friends I have because they like to hike, or canoe, or write. Or, perhaps more often, because my friends had other interests that I found compelling. These menial interests are not really so menial. There is a fundamental element of human character that provides a zest for the unimportant. An outdoor club would accomplish very little of importance – but it would bring different sorts of people together. And that is important.

So let me be bold and speak for the students. I know I can speak for the 500 who wait eagerly for the Outdoor Club. Give us clubs, BC. Whichever ones we want. Within reason, of course.

No one is asking for a Pyrotechnic Society. Although, actually, that might be sort of fun. Everyone loves fire. So I direct this column to the administrators, on behalf of the students. Give us a chance to find each other through what we have passion for, not simply through what we would reveal on a census. Sometimes the former is more important. Allow us to connect through the insignificant eccentricities of life.

There is profundity in that.

Francesca Jung Questions of sexual health have been under much debate at Boston College in recent years, especially after almost 90 percent of students asked for increased information and availability of sexual health resources in a poll in February, 2009. BC does not allow condoms to be passed out at any place on campus and does not administer birth control to female students due to longstanding Catholic tradition. STD testing is available, but it is not affordable for many students on campus.

Free pregnancy tests are available at health services, but as far as sexual health is concerned, that is about as far as BC goes. These policies are made clear to students, but many are looking for more information on sexual health issues, as well as increased availability to resources.

Students have begun to take measures into their own hands, forming a Facebook group which currently has over 1,700 members: BC Students for Sexual Health (SSH). The aims of the group are to “improve Boston College students’ access to sexual health education and resources. [They] are working to achieve the goals laid out by the undergraduate student referendum,” including setting up “safe sites” to distribute condoms confidentially in at least one dorm on every campus at BC. The group also distributes condoms on certain days outside of McElroy Commons, just beyond the bounds of

Party Time with Mel&Randy

BY BEN VADNAL

Pooja Shah

Web site to use “the barrier method” to prevent the spreading of STDs, and suggests that both partners should be tested, while also promoting abstinence as the most effective prevention method. If BC wished to follow suit, there are possible loopholes to consider which still follow Catholic tradition, such as looking at the condom issue through the lens of STI prevention.

Condoms are the only effective way to prevent STIs from spreading, and the Catholic Church does not explicitly prohibit their use for this purpose. If BC could offer condoms to students as a means of preventing the spread of disease, rather than as birth control, they might be made available.

This is one of the few areas in which the Catholic community still has influence over the students at BC. Church policy will not change, and it is unlikely that the beliefs of BC will. That being said, it is essential that the health of students not be disregarded, while still respecting the institution we all chose to attend. Information, at least, can and should be made available to students. Even if services and various methods of birth control are not prescribed or provided by the University, students should at least be able to know where to get them on their own.

Health services could provide listings of places in the area that do provide birth control and affordable testing for STDs. Condoms, as a way of preventing the spread of disease and infections, could be given to students. Student health, regardless of personal choices that affect the student’s health, should have a priority at this University.

“We are UGBC, We areUGBC, We are UGBC!” were the most audible and familiar words chanted by a swarm of more than 100 people dressed in navy blue and white t-shirts. To kick off the 2010 academic year, the Undergraduate Government of Boston College (UGBC), along with the AHANA Leadership Council (ALC) and GLBTQ Leadership Council (GLC) made steps towards greater cooperation at their fall retreat in New Hampshire on Sept. 3. The student government embarked on a confident journey to create visible changes on our campus and to modify the way the UGBC is viewed. Fortunately, all shades of ambiguity are cleared as Micaela Mabida, UGBC President and CSOM ’11 and Patrick Raab, UGBC Vice President and A&S ’11 make obvious steps towards defining what the UGBC actually embodies.

To be honest, when I initially became part of the student government by getting involved with the Women of Color Caucus under ALC, I had no idea that all these divisions fell under the umbrella of a mighty UGBC. It seemed as if each organization was fighting in a “battle of governments” to make their individual contributions to BC stand out most. Very quickly were my notions corrected when I understood that all the branches were working together to implement policies that are most reflective of the student body. When talking to a friend of mine, UGBC Chief of Staff and A&S ’12Shefali Bhardwaj, I came to understand that despite the painful trek across a spider web rope course (I only fell three times), the retreat set a precedent for how the UGBC should work. Now all branches are invited to attend a newly structured Sunday meeting – Bhardwaj even said that, “[these meetings] send out a general message that encourages everyone to carry on school spirit, which was engendered throughout the retreat and to bring this spirit back on campus” Speaking of school spirit, this year’s calendar lists a number of new programs and events that will bring about greater student involvement, collective unity, and the entire student government working as a cohesive unit to focus on a range of interests.

An important outcome of improving communication within the UGBC is encouraging parallel departments of each branch to work together. This new teamwork will allow groups to bring different passions and interests to the table and spread them throughout BC. Though each division produces certain events that are characteristic of their entity, the interaction between the liaisons will broaden the school’s perspective and create less of an overlap. This is perhaps the best exemplification of unity on campus. Additionally, the UGBC plans on reaching out to the greater Boston community through its participation in the Boston Intercollegiate Leadership Council (BILC). The executive department plans on improving its relations with 14 schools in the Boston area by attending a conference on Nov. 14 that will potentially open up networking opportunities – an excellent way of learning from one another and further strengthening our already potent University. BC seeks to practice the Jesuit admonition “set the world aflame” – and it seems like with an integrated UGBC, this year will be a hot one.

Francesca Jung is a staff columnist for The Heights. She welcomes comments at opinions@bcheights.com.

Pooja Shah is a staff columnist for The Heights. She welcomes comments at opinions@bcheights.com.

Benjamin Key is a staff columnist for The Heights. He welcomes comments at bkey@bcheights.com.

Catholic values in a modern world BC’s campus. Students who offer their rooms as safe sites may be at risk of University punishment, and are told this when they sign a contract to become a safe site. University policy says that Boston College expects students to uphold the values of the Catholic Church on campus, including refraining from sexual activity as well as refraining from “helping other students engage in sexual activity.” Although it is not likely that the University will actively seek out these students, it is made clear that private choices, both for the “safe site” providers and those who use them as a resource, are susceptible to punishment. However, students feel strongly enough about this cause to continue to provide aid to those who wish to practice safe sex.

Although we, as BC students, are asked to uphold the ideals of a Catholic university, it is impossible to deny that sexual activity occurs on campus.

Nearly 80 percent of college students have reported being sexually active at some point by the CDC. The question is, does creating an environment for students in which sexuality is taboo quell the amount of sexual activity?

And, conversely, would providing sexual health basics and open conversation increase the amount of sexual activity?

Unfortunately, some students will continue to practice unsafe sex regardless of the health and safety concerns. It is a question of whether or not the BC community should try and prevent the spread of disease by allowing resources to be made available, or allow the students’ health to be at risk.

Every Catholic college is faced with the problem of student safety versus Catholic beliefs. Villanova University in Pennsylvania, another Jesuit institution, encourages students on their

A united UGBC

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The Heights

Thursday, September 16, 2010

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The Heights

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Academic success trumps ACC’s recent state of play

john quackenbos / bc media relations

Jerry York, head coach of the Boston College hockey team, spoke to alumni before the team met with President Obama.

President congratulates hockey team on title win

By Paul Sulzer

Asst. Sports Editor President Barack Obama congratulated the Boston College men’s hockey team on its 2010 national championship Monday afternoon.

The team also met with U.S. senators and BC Law School graduates Scott Brown and John Kerry of Massachusetts at Capitol Hill and the Russell Senate Office Building, respectively.

The Eagles were among 32 championship-winning teams the President addressed on the South Lawn of the White House.

“Now, that term, ‘student-athlete,’ is the thing that makes me so proud to stand before you here today, because when each of you won the titles that you won – whether it was in lacrosse or gymnastics or wheelchair basketball – you didn’t do it as professionals,” Obama said. “You didn’t have multimillion-dollar contracts or huge endorsement deals. You woke up early; you put in countless hours of practice for the love of the game and for the pride of your school. You rode those buses and you carried those bags because you knew what it was going to take to be the best – and because every one of you has a competitive streak that’s about a mile wide.”

The team began its trip with a visit to the Walter Army Medical Center Monday morning, where the 40 players, coaches, and support staff met wounded soldiers, listened to their stories, and handed out national championship hats.

Then, the Eagles went to Capitol Hill for an alumni reception, where Brown offered opening remarks before John Feudo, associate vice president of alumni relations and BC ’82, introduced head coach Jerry York.

“The visit to Walter Reed was the highlight of my day,” York said from the podium with the U.S. Capitol serving as the backdrop. “I was so inspired by the courage and conviction of the warriors that we met this morning. I’m sure that rubs off on a lot of the student-athletes that we brought here today.”

York then introduced Matt Price, the captain of the national champion team, and Joe Whitney, the captain of the 2010-2011 team. Both thanked the alumni for their support.

The Eagles then departed for the Russell Senate Office Building, from which they were given a tour of the U.S. Capitol by Kerry’s aides. The team met Kerry outside the Russell Senate Office Building for a group photo before going to the White House to hear the president speak. n

Ole Miss’ mascot, and A.J. Green gets suspended for selling one of his used game jerseys. Next time, A.J., just remember that the NCAA wants you to wait until you graduate before you start selling things like game jerseys and Heismans. It just seems as if the hypocrisy never ends with the NCAA and some of the people who cover it, as they continue to hold money in one hand and slap Brad Zak wrists with the other.

Trendiness is rampant in college football. From So we have these messages being sent out that week to week, things change from hot to cold to we can’t accept the struggles of the ACC, but we keep the 24-hour sports news cycle in perpetual want all our programs to be compared to groups motion. of choir boys who make the right choices and From the time Hannah Storm brings the heat uphold the “integrity of the game.” That’s why on a topic during the morning SportsCenter to all this criticism of the ACC seems to be far off. when Uncle Tony Kornheiser makes a joke that Yes, the conference hasn’t been able to generate you’re not sure is appropriate, you’ve heard a legitimate national championship contender enough and are ready to bash your television recently, but it has been the one conference that screen in with your tainted Heisman. Save your best emphasizes the importance of the classroom. cold hard facts, Coors Light, and stick to makLooking at NCAA football graduation rates ing my beer cans change colors, because I will can be as shocking and saddening as watching certainly never get enough of that.

Mark Sanchez try to throw a football, but they Right now, on a scale from Lady Gaga meat dresses reveal a lot about how programs operate and the to Silly Bandz, bashing the Atlantic Coast Conference priorities of those who run them.

The ACC boasts the highest is about as trendy as Bieber Fever. graduation rate of any conference With disasters such as Virginia Looking at these with Duke (96 percent), Boston Tech falling to James Madison, statistics amid the College (91 percent), Wake Forest Florida State getting waxed by Oklahoma, Ohio State taking landscape of college (81 percent), and North Carolina (80 percent) all leading the way. For some swagger away from the U, football right now most of you, seeing an 80 percent and Georgia Tech falling to a weak Kansas Jayhawks team that lost has never made me usually gives you low levels of anxi6-3 to an FCS opponent, it’s hard ety, but when it comes to football more proud to be to really blame anybody for getting graduation rates, it’s a slam dunk.

Here’s your top five right now down on the conference. Even Regan Eagles fan. and their corresponding graduation gie Bush had a better week than rates: Alabama (67 percent), Ohio ACC commissioner John Swofford.

Just yesterday, Mike Wilbon took a break from State (65 percent), Boise State (58 percent), TCU his awkward commercial pillow talk with Uncle (65 percent), and Oregon (49 percent). We might take those as Dave Shinskie completion percentTony to claim the ACC should lose its automatic ages for games this season, but it’s outrageous BCS bid to make way for Boise State or TCU to that we continue to berate the schools that try to get one should they qualify. I doubt he shared that same sentiment when everyone was bashdo things the right way for not keeping up with the schools that we scold for taking shortcuts. ing on his hometown Big Ten a few years back, as Looking at these statistics amid the landscape programs such as Michigan’s struggled out of the of college football right now has never made me gates. more proud to be an Eagles fan. We should apThe ACC may not be living up to the super conference billing it was given when the conferplaud our school for fostering an environment where academic success is just as important as ence expanded, but let’s not overreact. No one success on the field. would have guessed we’d see Maryland coach Many of us complain that BC isn’t a big time Ralph Friedgen squeeze into an extra large coach’s football school, but shown the stakes, would you shirt before we saw the Florida State-Miami ACC championship dream match-up, but it’s not like really want that? It takes a long time to wash off the stink of academic sanctions and forfeited the ACC has been as bad as the NFC West. victories.

During the cycle of ACC hate, all of the talking As the competition grows tougher, BC has choheads also had to deal with the Reggie Bush saga sen to stand steadfastly by its values. Our football and the issue of recruits taking gifts from agents at the very same time. All around the NCAA land- players will one day be rewarded, and that reward will take place over the table. scape, people are clamoring for students to clean up their acts and “start playing by the rules.”

Brad Zak is a staff writer for The Heights. He can be As this is taking place, the NCAA endorses an ad campaign for a Star Wars character becoming reached at sports@bcheights.com.

THE HEIGHTS

EDITORS’ PICKS

Thursday, September 16, 2010 The Week Ahead

Standings

Since football has a bye week, now’s as good a time as any to support the smaller sports. Men’s soccer plays BU Friday night at Newton Campus Field.

Women’s soccer and field hockey are on the road, while volleyball plays in the Brown Tournament.

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BCnotes

Recap from Last Week

Zach Wielgus

3-2

Maegan O’Rourke

3-2

Paul Sulzer

3-2

Heights staff

3-2

None of us saw men’s soccer’s 1-1 tie or field hockey’s first loss of the season happening. Otherwise, it was smooth sailing. Football won by 26-13 over Kent State and women’s soccer beat Fairfield 2-0. Ohio State covered against Miami in the game of the week.

Guest Editor: Matt Palazzolo Assistant Marketplace Editor “Week 2: Still undefeated.”

Football Boston College sophomore middle linebacker Luke Kuechly was named ACC Defensive Lineman of the week following his performance in Saturday afternoon’s 26-13 victory over the Kent State Golden Flashes.

Kuechly, the 2009 ACC Defensive Rookie of the Year, recorded 10 tackles (eight solos, two assists) and 3.5 tackles for a loss, as the team held Kent State to four rushing yards and 205 total yards.

For the 11th consecutive game, Kuechly notched doubledigit tackles, a streak that leads all Football Bowl Subdivision players. He currently leads the Eagles with 21 tackles and four tackles for a loss.

Women’s Track and Field Zach Wielgus Sports Editor

This Week’s Games

Maegan O’Rourke Assoc. Sports Editor

Paul Sulzer Asst. Sports Editor

Matt Palazzolo

Asst. Marketplace Editor

Men’s Soccer: Boston College vs. Boston University

Tie

BC

BC

BC

Women’s Soccer: Boston College at Rutgers

BC

BC

BC

BC

Field Hockey: Boston College at Maryland

Maryland

Maryland

BC

Maryland

Volleyball: Wins in the Brown Tournament

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1

2

1

Patriots

Patriots

Patriots

Patriots

NFL: New England Patriots (-2.5) at New York Jets

Boston College senior Caroline King was named the women’s Cross Country Performer of the Week by the ACC on Monday.

The runner from Scotia, N.Y., won the individual title at the BC Invitational Meet on Saturday at Franklin Park in Boston, Mass. King finished the 5K race with a personal-best time of 17:14, which led BC to a first-place team finish against 10 other teams.

The win was the second victory of King’s career, and this is the first time King has won the award.

Back-to-back ties leave BC looking for answers

BY GREG JOYCE For The Heights

For the second straight game, the No. 13 Boston College men’s soccer team (20-2) tied its opponent, this time in a 00 draw at FairBoston College 0 field University 0 Fairfield (1-1-3) Tuesday night. The Eagles dominated the stat line, but came up empty on offense, and had to settle for a tie after playing two overtimes.

“It was a difficult game, but we had a lot of scoring chances,” said head coach Ed Kelly. “[Fairfield] played a very defensive kind of game. It’s tough coming off the big ACC game and being away from home. All in all it was a pretty good performance. We had chances.”

Although BC outshot Fairfield, 17-11, and had more corner kicks (10-2), the Eagles were unable to connect on any of these opportunities.

Many of the Eagles’ chances came in the second half of play, when they had 10 shots to Fairfield’s three. In the second overtime, BC had three corner

kicks, but again was unable to put the ball in the back of the net.

“We had a lot of good opportunities, to be honest,” Kelly said. “We just didn’t put them away. There were several opportunities. We had enough opportunities to win the game.”

Kelly added that, although the Eagles had six shots on goal, Fairfield’s goalkeeper “wasn’t really tested much.”

This has been a growing problem for the team, which has not scored a live goal in 369 minutes and 32 seconds.

The lone goal in its win over Quinnipiac and tie against Maryland came off penalty kicks.

Kyle Bekker led the Eagles with six shots, including four in the final 20 minutes of the second half, but could not convert on his opportunities. One shot went wide, one went high, one was blocked, and the other was saved by goalkeeper Michael O’Keeffe.

Bekker came out of the game in the 107th minute for what Kelly called “a little hamstring issue.” The substitution was a precautionary one, with the

coaching staff trying to “protect” the midfielder.

Forward Charlie Rugg came close to scoring for BC in the final 20 minutes, as well, but his shot hit the crossbar. Karl Reddick and Amit Aburmad also had three shots apiece for the Eagles.

The bright spot for the Eagles was goalkeeper Justin Luthy’s second shutout of the season. Luthy registered three saves over the 110 minutes of action.

“He handled a lot,” Kelly said. “They had a big six-foot-four guy up front and a lot of stuff into the box, and [Luthy] did very well. He was in total control of his area, so it was a good game for Justin.”

BC received two yellow cards in the game; one was given to Kevin Mejia in the 19th minute, and the other to Colin Murphy in the 85th minute. The Eagles were also called for 16 fouls to Fairfield’s 14.

Tuesday night’s draw was the second straight contest of 110 minutes for the Eagles, who lost their No. 5 ranking in the latest poll after tying Maryland.

“You can never figure the rankings

ALEX TRAUTWIG / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Kyle Bekker, who led BC with six shots at Fairfield, is up in arms about the team’s offense. because they’re coaches that are doing the voting, and it’s still early days,” Kelly said of the inexplicable drop.

“So they vote based on what they see.

But they’ve never seen Boston College play, and I’m on the committee and I’ve never seen UCLA play. So people

are just looking at scores. At the end of the day, it means nothing.” Kelly said his players were tired after playing two straight double overtime games, but they seemed to be okay.

“We’re still in early days,” Kelly said.

“We just keep plugging away.” 

Knowlton leads barrage as Eagles batter Bulldogs Yale Rout, from B1

It was the sixth straight win for the Eagles, who have turned their non-conference schedule into a scorched earth campaign. Since a 1-1 draw against No. 2 Stanford to open the season, BC has outscored its opponents, 22-1.

The Eagles’ performance against Yale serves as one of their most impressive ones yet this season.

The Bulldogs knocked off No. 13 Penn State in their season opener, but they were no match for the No. 4 Eagles.

Yale couldn’t get anything going on Wednesday night, mustering only six shots to the Eagles’ 27.

Ten different players put attempts on goal for BC, coming from more players than just the na-

tionally acclaimed sophomore tandem of Mewis and DiMartino.

On the other side of the field, keepers Jill Mastroianni and Jess Mickelson combined to shut out the Bulldogs and record the Eagles’ fifth shutout of the season.

Up next on the schedule is a road trip to Piscataway, N.J., where BC will face No. 24 Rutgers, a game for which Foley says the team is very excited.

“They’re a very disciplined team, a top 25 team, and an old Big East foe of ours,” she said. “It’s going to be a tough game but I think we’re ready.”

The way they’ve played this season, it’s clear that the Eagles are ready to play anyone in the country. 

ALEX TRAUTWIG / HEIGHTS EDITOR

A group effort from the Eagles completed the seven-goal shutout against Yale, with six different players scoring.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

The Heights

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Coleman has found a new home with Eagles

alex trautwig / heights editor

The progression of Johnathan Coleman is astounding. The redshirt freshman, who started playing football duirng his senior year of high school, has caught on quickly, and now leads the Eagles with seven catches and 150 receiving yards.

A New Home, from B1

It was at Radnor that Coleman found greater stability in the form of an exhis education, his grandfather was the tended family. one who sparked Coleman’s interest in “I lived in a house with a whole bunch sports. of other kids that were in the program, Vaughn Coleman, Johnathan’s grand- and that was like my big family,” Coleman father, has a story of his own. He grew up said. “Just the fact that I knew what was with a passion for baseball. going to happen next, and He played and excelled to “I feel like I have I didn’t have to guess. Just the point that professional little things like that, and to do this, just to that I knew I could eat, and baseball teams started to recruit him. His baseball show people that it I could eat well, and that I’d career never made it past always have someone to go that point, though, which can be done, and to talk to, and I’d be around Coleman described as represent my family.” people that support me all typical in his family. the time.”

“My family is always These were all firsts for like, what could have happened,” he Coleman. That led to another first in his said. senior year of high school.

Coleman, the first to go to college in “I played football just to do something his family, is not a story of what could new,” he said. have happened, but what did happen, To his surprise, it’s what allowed him and what is happening. to pursue a college education.

Unlike his mother, he was able to “I’m just happy that I’m able to be in escape the pull of the streets. His grand- college,” he said. “At the beginning of high mother, a social worker, placed him in a school, I didn’t see myself being where I program called A Better Chance when am now, especially not with football.” he entered high school. The program Regardless, Coleman is here now, and provides children living in poor urban it is at BC that he feels most at home. areas and low-income homes an oppor“I don’t go back home really. I stay tunity to excel in more affluent suburban here, even over breaks. I just rather be schools around the country. This program here than there,” he said. “I miss my famled Coleman to Radnor High School in ily, but I have to do what I have to do.”

Pennsylvania.

As he did at Radnor, Coleman has

found a new, extended family at BC: the football team.

“We all support each other on the team,” he said. “We all know we’re family.”

This season, within the context of this football family, Coleman has finally found his place. After redshirting his freshman year, Coleman is now the leading receiver on the Eagles with seven receptions for 150 yards.

While last season Coleman said he sometimes felt detached from the team, he acknowledges the necessity of redshirting in order for him to sit and learn a sport he had played for only a year.

“I needed to learn the things that I didn’t know, that the other guys already knew,” he said. “It’s still all new to me.

I’m still learning stuff.”

But Coleman feels himself improving with each passing week.

“When I first came, I was just an athlete trying to learn how to play football,” he said. “Now I see myself as a football player.”

This newfound confidence is something Coleman is, once again, not taking for granted.

“Before I was just iffy. I was like, ‘Well I don’t know if I can do this,’” he admitted.

“My heart was beating really fast all the time. But now I’m just confident. I just know in my mind that I can beat anybody.

Now that I’ve been doing well, I’ve been evicted from their home in the Bronx. doing extra stuff because I want to do His mother, such a large part of his life, is better now. I’m always thinking about now homeless. She also has yet to see him football, even when I’m just sitting and catch a ball in an Eagles uniform. watching TV. I like being competitive.

But Coleman hopes that will change I have confidence that I’m going to do in October. well.”

“Hopefully she gets to come up in With Rich Gunnell having graduated October,” he said. and Colin Larmond out for the season, Why October?

Coleman acknowledges “Her job is laying her that this is his chance off on Oct. 1. So she’ll “I’m just happy that have to be on unemployto make a name for himself as a wide re- I’m able to be in college. ment,” he added matceiver for the Eagles. ter-of-factly. “I used to At the beginning of “This is a big opbe mad about the way portunity I have to high school, I didn’t see things always turned out take advantage of,” myself being where I am with my family. It’s not he said. “Right now really a big deal anymore.

I’m just trying to do now, especially not with I don’t want to say it’s the best I can. [The normal, because I know football.” coaches] have taken it’s not, but I’ve come to baby steps with me. I accept it.” didn’t even know the names of some posiNot only has Coleman accepted his tions. So they took it easy on me, which I past, but he has also learned to use it to think helped me a lot.” his advantage.

Just because he now sees himself as “My life in general motivates me,” he an up-and-coming receiver does not said. “Especially when I know my mom mean that Coleman has forgotten his past is at home struggling, it really helps me – because it won’t let him forget about it. to push through things. I’m just playing Even now, when he is the leading receiver football, and she’s been struggling all on a Division I football team, reality is her life. constantly pushing back.

“I can do it if she can do that. FootRecently, reality has pushed back ball is little compared to what she’s been hard. Coleman and his mother were just through.” n

Don’t lose sight of what really matters What Matters, from B1

them not to say it.

Instead, I’d rather turn the attention back to what actually matters: the Boston College football team. Let’s not forget that’s why we’re at the game in the first place.

When I was reading some of the preseason predictions and commentary this summer, I noticed two different and somewhat contradicting trends.

My first observation was how underrated BC always is at the start of every season. The case can be made that BC is one of the least recognized teams by the AP Top 25 poll.

Take this season, for instance. Even though the Eagles returned 14 starters to a team that went 8-5 and made a bowl game, the Eagles once again started the year unranked, receiving only one vote in the preseason poll (thanks, Kirk Herbstreit). Five teams from the ACC – Virginia Tech, Miami, Georgia Tech, North Carolina, and Florida State – made the cut ahead of BC. In the last 10 years, BC has finished ranked in the AP poll five times, yet only received a preseason nod once. In that same 10-year span, BC’s differential in the times it started the season unranked and the times it finished ranked was the third-highest of all FBS teams.

Even though they didn’t get much love in the polls, I also noticed that the Eagles were getting some respect from

other media outlets. The combination of a relatively favorable schedule, a 1,500-yard rusher, and a strong offensive line and linebacker corps made the Eagles a relatively safe pick to once again make a bowl game this year.

One ESPN article even went so far as to name BC one of the 20 teams in the country that has a chance at winning the national championship.

So is this the year that BC gets rid of the underrated and overachieving label? Maybe, but it’s somewhat too early to tell.

While I’m not going so far as to predict that Dave Shinskie and Co. will end up in Arizona for the BCS title game in January, I am saying Superfans should be excited for this season – with the Eagles hopefully making it through Notre Dame the first weekend of October unscathed. Ask any player on the team, and he’ll tell you the team’s goal all along has been to end up in the Orange Bowl playing for the ACC championship.

Superfans should be more concerned about and interested in what’s actually happening on the field, not just the chants in Alumni. Forget about the first down chant. Get to Alumni in time for kickoff and stay until the band finishes “Alma Mater.”

It’s a much better use of your time.

Maegan O’Rourke is the Associate Sports Editor for The Heights. She can be reached at sports@bcheights.com.

alex trautwig / heights editor

With an early bye week, the football team has an opportunity to reevaluate starters and get set for the tougher stretch of its schedule.

Notes: Shinskie’s spot not safe

By Diana C. Nearhos Heights Senior Staff

One year ago, Boston College opened its season with wins over Northeastern and Kent State and was preparing for its first match-up against a tough conference rival. There were issues and uncertainty at the quarterback position.

Today, BC enters its third week of the season after having defeated Weber State and Kent State, and is preparing to face Virginia Tech. There is once again uncertainty at quarterback. The differences are that, this year, the Eagles have a defined starter and an early bye week during which to work out the kinks.

Dave Shinskie started the season by completing 10 of 20 passes for 185 yards, two touchdowns, and two interceptions against Weber State. He followed that by adding 214 yards by connecting on 18 of his 27 throws with another two touchdowns and no interceptions against the Golden Flashes.

Though not atrocious, Shinskie’s statistics were lackluster, and many started clamoring for backup Mike Marscovetra to get a fair shot.

Marscovetra played in both games, but he had little chance to find a rhythm in either contest. He came into the contest for the second quarter against the Wildcats, but received limited reps.

The sophomore completed two-of-three passes for 38 yards and a touchdown.

Against Kent State, Marscovetra saw less playing time. He entered the game for a three-play drive, which ended due to his interception.

“We had planned to play Mike [against Kent State],” said head coach Frank Spaziani. “Mike deserves to play.

Dave is not quite where Dave needs to be. We need to get Mike work, and the

only way to get better is to play.”

Marscovetra played most of the game against Virginia Tech last year with some success. He completed 10 of his 16 attempts for 114 yards and two touchdowns, though all of that came after the Hokies had created a 34-point lead. Shinskie left the game after only completing one-of-12 pass attempts and throwing two interceptions in the first quarter.

Last year’s results, however, have no bearing on Spaziani’s plans for his quarterbacks.

“The opposition has nothing to do with whether Mike plays or not,” Spaziani said. “It’s not like pitching in baseball.”

Great timing Many teams prefer a bye week later in the season, when the team might be more worn down. This year, however, a young Eagles team can use the week to prepare for Virginia Tech and Notre Dame, much stronger opponents than it saw to open the season.

“With this team, this is really an opportune time to have one, because you can reorganize a little bit, as much as you can in four or five practices,” Spaziani said. “And get the guys better positioned. We know more about the younger guys now.”

BC did not score a touchdown until the second half against Kent State, despite having the ball on the 6-yard line in the final minutes of the first half.

The entire offense struggled, including the usually formidable Eagles running backs, who only gained 102 rushing yards. Some of that could be attributed to the offensive line, composed mostly of upperclassmen, which did not open as many holes as usual.

It’s two weeks into the year, but the coaching staff is back to basics.

“We’re improving fundamentals,” Spaziani said. “What we’re trying to do is get them in a position where they can do the right thing at the right time.”

Meeting expectations Between Luke Kuechly’s ACC Defensive Rookie of the Year performance in 2009, Mark Herzlich’s return to the team, and Kevin Pierre-Louis’ heralded incoming, high expectations were set for the linebacker corps.

“We feel good about the future of the linebackers,” Spaziani said. “It’s a new position for Luke, and he’s adapted well there. He hasn’t missed a beat, and he’s only going to get better.

“Certainly Mark coming back is tremendous for Mark. Mark is not quite where he was 18 months ago, or whenever the last time he played was, but we’re hoping that will come around.”

So far, the position has looked pretty good for the Eagles. Kuechly recorded 10 tackles (eight solo and two assists) and 3.5 tackles for a loss Saturday. His strong play earned him the ACC Defensive Lineman of the Week honors, and he now leads the team with 21 tackles.

Herzlich and Pierre-Louis each have 11 tackles on the season and played a large role in BC holding Kent State to four rushing yards and 205 total offensive yards.

Taking up a cause Some students have begun an effort, which includes a Facebook event, to convince their fellow students to cease the cheer “Eagles, first down, b—h” after BC completes a first down.

The event stops on Sept. 25, the date of the Virginia Tech game. n

SPORTS THE HEIGHTS

Thursday, September 16, 2010

B1

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2010

Knowlton’s hat trick chases Yale

BY TIM JABLONSKI For The Heights

Brooke Knowlton notched the first hat trick of her collegiate career, and four other EaBoston College 7 gles contributed 0 Yale a goal as the No. 4 Boston College women’s soccer team (6-0-1), dominated the Yale Bulldogs (1-4-0), 7-0, Wednesday night at the Newton Soccer Complex.

“We try to develop a style and have everyone buy into it, and I thought that the whole team did a great job of that tonight,” said head coach Allison Foley.

Knowlton got the scoring started early, slotting a great pass from mid-

fielder Amy Caldwell past opposing keeper Ayana Sumiyasu just six minutes into the contest.

Preseason All-American Victoria DiMartino added to her impressive start to the season 16 minutes later, rocketing a left-footed bullet just under the crossbar for her eighth goal in seven games.

After taking the 2-0 lead into halftime, the floodgates opened up for BC in the beginning of the second half.

The Eagles notched four goals in less than nine minutes, starting with Kristie Mewis’ fourth goal of the season off a slick pass from DiMartino in the 54th.

Four minutes later, freshman Patrice Vittori netted the first goal of her college career off another DiMartino pass.

Knowlton then took over, putting two

in the back of the net in four minutes to complete the hat trick.

The senior forward called her performance “a total team effort,” noting great passes from Julia Bouchelle and Caldwell.

Foley took her foot off the gas after that, inserting many of her reserves into the game. Freshman Kate McCarthy finished off the scoring for the Eagles, tallying her first career goal off a corner kick in the 87th minute.

“Our reserves did a great job tonight keeping the ball moving and controlling the flow of the game,” Foley said. “They really impressed me and showed how complete our team is.”

ALEX TRAUTWIG / HEIGHTS EDITOR

See Yale Rout, B3

Midfielder Brooke Knowlton caught fire against Yale, recording her first career hat trick.

Finding His Way Home

BC’s leading receiver has been forced to travel a difficult path to Chestnut Hill

BY JAKE BURG

ALEX TRAUTWIG / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Heights Staff

Let’s start focusing on what really matters MAEGAN O’ROURKE I had a very difficult time starting this column.

To be honest, I really had no idea what to write about. I’ll blame it on the 200 pages of reading I’ve had since Monday and the fact that the football team doesn’t have a game this weekend.

Maybe it’s because of the team’s bye week that a debate of no real consequence to the actual players on the field has developed: the now infamous “First down … b—h” chant.

I originally wanted to comment on the “B—h controversy” this week after becoming annoyed with the Superfans in my section at the Kent State game chanting the profanity. They were even more annoying than the fact that we

Everyone has a past. Everyone has a story to tell. This is Johnathan Coleman’s.

He was born March 8, 1991, in Manhattan. But Manhattan represents only the beginning of a long journey characterized by instability. His life is replete with moves down to South Carolina, back to New York, out to Pennsylvania, and finally, to Boston College.

Fatherless from the start of his journey, Coleman has always held a deep love and appreciation for the only parent he has ever known: his mother, Vanci Coleman.

“Me and my mom are really close,” Coleman said. “I’m always the first person she tells when something is wrong.”

That is not to say he has always relied upon her. Coleman, due to economic hardships, was forced to rely upon himself first and foremost. It is this inner drive, coupled with his love for his family, that pushes Coleman to succeed at a sport he started playing only two years ago.

“I feel like I have to do this, just to show people that it can be done, and to represent my family,” Coleman said.

After his mother became unemployed in Manhattan, the two moved down to South Carolina, to live with relatives.

They stayed there only a brief time before moving back to New York, this time to the Bronx.

“My mom just doesn’t have good luck with finding work,” Coleman said. “So she had to do illegal things just to get money, like selling drugs.”

Vanci Coleman continued to sell drugs, mainly marijuana, in order to make ends meet. This propelled young Johnathan into a world in which he had

I NSIDE SPORTS THIS ISSUE

See A New Home, B4

HOCKEY GIVEN PRESIDENTIAL TREATMENT

only scored six points in the first half against the Golden Flashes.

But that was before everyone and their eight-man started chiming in. It seems like everyone from freshmen to alumni have an opinion on the matter, with the debate breaking out on Facebook and getting acknowledgement from Barstool Sports. After hearing and reading all of it, I’ve decided that the entire thing is exhausting. It’s trivial to argue about whether the word itself is offensive or about how immature and uneducated we sound (though I will say it’s going to be embarrassing when we play Virginia Tech and Notre Dame on national television if the chant continues).

So I’d rather not add my voice to the debate, only to have my thoughts fall on deaf ears. The people who started the chant (the most amusing part of all this is that I’ve heard at least 10 different people claim they started it) and the people who continue it are not going to be persuaded by me asking

See What Matters, B4

to grow up fast and take responsibility of himself and his younger siblings.

“She was selling and she was using, but then she got really desperate, and she tried to help import drugs,” Coleman said. It was at this moment in his life that Coleman was forced to mature well beyond his young years.

When Vanci Coleman traveled up to Connecticut to stay at a friend and fellow dealer’s house before attempting to import drugs, Johnathan and his younger brother refused to stay behind in the Bronx.

“Me and my brother went out there with her, just because we wanted to be with our mom for the weekend,” Coleman said.

But then Vanci Coleman was arrested in the airport, leaving Johnathan and his brother to fend for themselves in the Connecticut home.

“My brother and I didn’t know what was going on,” Coleman said. “So I ended up calling my cousin on the pay phone, and that’s how we were able to get back to New York. The people in the house [in Connecticut] took us on a train to our cousin.”

At only 11 years old, with his mother sentenced to time in prison, Coleman went to live with his grandparents in the Bronx. It was under his grandparents’ care that Coleman began to find some stability and guidance, and it was there that he first began to realize his athletic potential.

“I don’t know where I’d be without [my grandparents],” Coleman admitted.

Each played a vital role in propelling him to where he is today. While his grandmother made sure he kept up with

LAWRENCE JACKSON / OFFICIAL WHITE HOUSE PHOTO

The Boston College men’s hockey team was congratulated by President Barack Obama at the South Lawn of the White House. See B2.

Bye week notebook

Football is focusing on tying up its loose ends before the Hokies come to town...................B4

Men’s soccer plays to another draw

The Eagles offense couldn’t figure out Fairfield, failing to score against the Stags.......................B3

Editors’ Picks..............................B3 BC Notes.....................................B3

mike saldarriaga / heights photo illustration

Thursday, September 16, 2010

The Heights

C2

+Editor’s Corner

Disgust drenched in neon A starryeyed, 3year-old boy stares at the outlines of the coloring book before him. The page is full of promise and Kristen House unbounded by pressures to fill in the “correct” colors in these so-called “lines.” He grabs for the most outlandish colors, turning Simba into a neon-green and fuchsia-maned jungle cat. The air around the lion is electric orange.

The mother is utterly proud of her son’s artistic mastery in the most simplistic sense – he has managed to understand that these conical crayons should be rubbed against paper. He is rewarded with the appropriate gummy snack.

This child’s art does not bother me. It is lovely to watch the unfolding of creativity. But I have just one qualm. A beef, if you will. Tell me, why has the world continued to reward Andy Warhol for having done the exact same thing with a never-ending supply of adoration and gummy snacks?

An abundant number of people will flip up their laptops, only to display a background of neon Warhols taunting me from behind white block quotes that opine, “Everybody must have a fantasy,” and “I always say one’s company, two’s a crowd, and three’s a party.” An astronomical number of residence hall rooms display Warhol on the walls.

I’m sure my beef with this fluffy “pop art” will be summarily canned into that horrible Campbell’s soup picture for which Warhol has become so famous. But honestly, the print of that soup can doesn’t evoke a single emotion in me other than, “Gee, that’s not what I want for dinner tonight.” On a good day.

Then there’s the picture with Marilyn Monroe. The most ubiquitous version of this print, a staple of the posters on sale at Target, chooses a banana yellow for her hair, a block of fuchsia eye shadow, and a matching background. There’s an endless supply of color combinations in the entire series. Red-faced Marilyn! Pea green-haired Marilyn!

Just look at all the possible color combinations! Again, the ability necessary for this type of artistic endeavor often kicks in long before the establishment of fine motor skills.

Somewhere, a 17th century Dutch artist, capable of making a porcelain figurine with handpainted, delicate patterns in every crevice, is weeping porcelain tears in his grave.

For me, Warhol epitomizes absolutely nothing. I don’t see edge, I don’t see any other intention behind an outlined banana on a black background. I get that Warhol embraced the superficiality, but I don’t believe that he embraced it in an intelligent way. You know who else paints pop-culture in tacky-neon lights? Perez Hilton. E! True Hollywood Stories. Not exactly honorable company.

Warhol allegedly is the man who coined the phrase “15 minutes of fame.” It seems like producing this simple phrase was a watershed moment for culture as we know it.

In a bizarre way I blame Warhol for a world where people procreate 19 times in hopes of getting a get-richquick TLC reality series. So why did we bestow a legacy on this guy?

“Oh,” some will argue, “Warhol was a product of his time,” drenched in a ’60s wave of consumerism and out-there pop-culture. But Warhol didn’t do anything special with his own era. Unless dipping everything in pink, orange, green, and yellow counts as special.

In preparation for this column, I thoroughly researched Warhol, hoping that the key to his “genius” would be revealed. Surely, I thought, I’m missing an essential ingredient. The key to his pop art artistry. Then, I happened upon “Andy Warhol Eats a Hamburger” on YouTube, watched Warhol silently munch on burger, bun, and ketchup for four minutes until I couldn’t take it anymore. In the end, I was only mystified, really pissed off, and hungry.

Kristen House is the Arts & Review editor for The Heights. She can be reached at houseka@bc.edu.

An independent frame of mind

arts events calendar, september 16–19 thursday

friday

saturday

sunday

Ancient inspires new Burns Library

Ancient inspires new Burns Library

Ancient inspires new Burns Library

Cecilia Farrel, Piano Bapst Library, 4 p.m.

Literary Lives McMullen Museum

Literary Lives Burns Library

Literary Lives Burns Library

Literary Lives Burns Library

Of Montreal House of Blues, 7 p.m.

Broken Social Scene House of Blues, 8 p.m.

Pavement Agganis Arena, 8 p.m.

Caribou Paradise Rock Club, 7 p.m.

Pray for polanski Great Scott, 9 p.m.

township The Middle East, 9 p.m.

disco biscuits BofA Pavilion, 6 p.m.

Vampire Weekend BofA Pavilion, 7 p.m.

videos on the verge

Fact: These vids will make you cool

It’s the beginning of a new semester, and I know exactly what all of you (not just the freshmen) are spending the bulk of your time worrying about – “What will make me the coolest kid in the Mods Friday night?” Sure, some of you might already be biting your nails in anticipation of midterms, but in the end you just want to receive more sweet Facebook invites to off-campus parties than your friends do. So here are some tips fresh from the World Wide Web to ensure that you are well prepared for any stressful social situations that may come your way. Impress your friends! Be a trendsetter! And when all else fails, remember that relaxation is the best medication.

—Krysia Wazny

Photos Courtesy of YouTube.com

Scientists Identify Sexy Dance Moves on cnn.com

Daniel Tosh Puts an End to Bros Icing Bros

The title really says it all: Solid evidence that you will attract women, or at least the 35 British ladies consulted in the study, if you rock these moves. CNN offers several versions of this video, from full report to silent simulation. I found the latter to be most helpful because of its tutorial nature and the complete lack of audio distractions. The awkward and rhythmically challenged will rejoice.

This summer, you probably heard of the term “iced.” Handing someone (perhaps even a friend) a Smirnoff Ice suddenly pervaded American culture.

If this video teaches us anything, it is preparedness. Getting iced can have embarrassing consequences – think puking and uncomfortable church services – but Tosh gets points for innovation, using a Coors Zima instead.

Do the same, and you’ll be the envy of bros everywhere.

Tickling Slow Loris Simply put, relax, be adorable, and people will come to you. This little creature, fondly referred to as Sonya Ferguson, knows how to have a good time, and she doesn’t have to go any farther than the comfort of her own bedroom. Her smile is infectious and will put you in a great mood immediately.

Copy her moves and you’ll have the same effect on BC’s sexiest Eagles. If you can be cute while doing it, all the better.

bc tube

Is Big O too oooooover the toooooopp?

As a child, my parents always reminded me to never look a gift-horse in the mouth. Recently, I realized that sometimes you don’t even have Darren Ranck the chance to stare down the gullet of the proverbial mare.

Sometimes it stampedes in excessive joy, flanked by a cavalcade of show horses and ecstatic townspeople, whinnying in a low roar, “We’re going to Australia…”

Such is the tale of a gift-horse named Oprah Winfrey.

As the vomit (or tear, depending on your degree of Oprah fandom) inducing previews have announced, this is the final season of daytime staple The Oprah Winfrey Show. Since the show premiered in 1986, The Oprah Winfrey Show has brought radio personality and Oscarnominated actress Oprah Winfrey into the homes of millions of housewives.

Through her infinite wisdom, Oprah diagnosed America with a bad case of “misunderstanding,” and decided to educate suburbia on the AIDS epidemic, life in racially segregated towns, and Tom Cruise’s new outlook on love, glorious love. To many, she is a hero. To others, she’s merely another TV personality with a self-righteous streak.

Honestly, I can’t say I “hate” Oprah.

It’s undeniable that her empire is incredibly effective, and her endorsement has launched the success of many small businesses and entertainment projects.

For that, she deserves respect. Besides, who am I to diss good ol’ Harpo? The issues I have with Oprah stem, strangely enough, from her wildly extravagant giveaways. On Monday’s season premiere, Oprah gave an eight-day, sevennight trip to Australia to every member of the 300-person audience. For Ms. Winfrey, though, it can’t just be, “Guess what? You’re all going to Australia!” It has to be, “I thought to myself, ‘What will I do with my time off? Where do I want to go? Hmmm …. What … if … all of you … came with me … to the other side of the world?”

That’s all it took to cause the studio audience to lose its collective mind.

Tears flow. Women clutch one another to keep from passing out. They scream as if someone’s been shot when they don’t even know where they’re going yet. That’s when she finally frees them from misery. “We’re going to Australiaaaaaa...” Her voice reverberates as if she’s falling off Ayers Rock. Confetti showers the audience, and strangers join

Photo Courtesy flickr user alan light

As Oprah begins the last season of her beloved talk show, she has amped up the prizes, the glitz, and the A-list guests, but at what cost? together in group hugs. Men dressed as the Crocodile Hunter storm the stage (and somewhere poor Steve Irwin rolls over in his grave). Oprah launches into her favorite cadence, “You’re going, and you’re going, and you’re going.” To cap it off, a mock 747 jet enters the stage from behind a scrim, and pilot John Travolta welcomes them aboard.

To the average human, it’s a dream.

To Oprah, it’s generosity at its best.

Call me a cynic, but in situations like the one described, I can’t help but doubt Oprah’s sincerity. The audience for this particular giveaway was 300 of Oprah’s greatest fans, as decided by her Web site and viewer mail. Oprah’s savvy, but to give away a trip of such magnitude in such an over the top fashion reeks of overwrought publicity stunt. Obviously, it’s TV. There needs to be that sense of the melodrama to keep it interesting, but in a room of 300 of her biggest fans, why couldn’t Oprah put aside the spectacle and deliver the announcement with the warmth and personal affection for which they watch?

Everyone remembers the “You get a car!” giveaway, during which Oprah rewarded her studio audience with Pontiac G6’s. It seemed so incredibly generous at first, but then the press caught wind of the nefarious legal terms that bumped the price of the car up to an unexpected $7,000. Oprah escaped unscathed.

People still couldn’t believe she gave a car away to every member of her studio audience. That’s my problem with Oprah – too much glitz and pageantry and a gluttonous need for kudos, but what of the audience? At what point in her two decades of broadcast, did Oprah put her own image before the grace of her fanbase? Behind all the confetti and the guise of millions of dollars, does Oprah really care about the recipients of her extravagant gifts, or are they just a vital cog in the Hollywood machine?

Methinks it’s time to hit the dusty trail, gift-horsey.

Darren Ranck is a Heights editor. He welcomes comments at ranckd@bc.edu.

A radiant explosion Langston Hughes once wrote, “nobody loves a genius child / Kill him – and let his soul run wild.”

These fitting words serve Brennan Carley as a haunting elegy in the documentary Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child. The film moves beyond the image of Basquiat as a “rock star” of the art world and instead chooses to get right at the heart of the tortured painter. In late July, the art-house documentary snuck into just one theater in New York City. Had it not been for rave reviews from The New Yorker and The New York Times, it would have flown entirely under my radar. Knowing next to nothing about the subject of the documentary, I decided to trust my mom’s taste and accompany her to a musty little theater in Greenwich Village. Splicing together previously unseen footage of a 1986 interview with the painter with testimonials by friends, family, and artists alike, director Tamara Davis (the same woman who, eight years ago, directed Britney Spears in the flop Crossroads) pays elegiac homage to her friend.

Basquiat was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, the son of two immigrants, one Puerto Rican and one Haitian. His mother encouraged him to learn several languages; he was fluent in three by the time he was 11.

She also taught her son how to draw and paint, something that obviously resonated with him. Yet, the film reveals a rocky homelife. Basquiat’s parents divorced when he was 7, and his mother began to struggle with bipolar disorder, causing her to viciously lash out at her children. After moving in with his father, Basquiat found himself subjected to abuse from the alcoholic man he once idolized. At 15, Basquiat began to sleep on benches in Washington Square Park while selling postcards for a living. A journey that the film frames as a formative odyssey, his time as a homeless youth greatly affected his aesthetic. He dropped out of high school and started spray-painting graffiti all over New York City under the guise “SAMO” (a truncated version of the phrase “same old sh—t”).

He began to make a name for himself as SAMO, and soon formed a band that played the famous and now defunct CBGB club in New York City.

The documentary then dives into Basquiat’s big break as a featured artist in the famed Times Square Show in 1980. With his newfound popularity, the avant-garde artist abandoned the SAMO moniker and began to show his neoexpressionist work in a world where minimalist, conceptual art was all the rage.

Exploring the gritty, fascinating art world of the decade, Radiant Child follows Basquiat on his journey to Los Angeles. After his first show, at which his dense, bebop-influenced paintings sold out in minutes, he soon became heavily dependent on drugs. According to friends, the overnight fame that came with his Hollywood “premiere” got to the artist. His insecurities and discomforts itched at him, and a euphoric-paranoia that came along with a lethal diet of cocaine and heroin was Basquiat’s way of scratching. His addiction was so noticeable that one of his closest friends and idols, Andy Warhol (with whom the film spends a sizable amount of time, focusing on the pair’s critically-panned collaborative art show) abandoned him. The art icon passed away shortly afterward, which only sent Basquiat further into a drug-fueled depression.

The film follows him on a cleansing getaway to Hawaii, and for a brief moment, the audience can forget that this is a documentary and believe that Basquiat had the will to kick the habit for good. However, as Madonna said about her friend, “He was one of the people I was truly envious of … but he was too fragile for this world.”

His untimely death came in 1988 of a drug overdose.

As the lights went up, I found myself wanting more. For a movie about someone I knew essentially nothing about to have such a profound effect on me speaks for the intentions of the director; doing what Basquiat did when he painted. Even if you’ve never heard of Jean-Michel Basquiat, give The Radiant Child a chance when it arrives at the Kendall Square Theatre this Friday for a limited run.

Brennan Carley is a staff columnist for The Heights. He can be reached at review@bcheights.com.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

THE HEIGHTS

C3

+Music

NEW RELEASES

Flowers attacks unfinished business

A

BY DAN SIERING For The Heights

fter a year of swirling rumors and anticipation, fans of The Killers finally get the chance to fill their ears with Brandon Flowers’ ambitious solo album, Flamingo. Despite an announced hiatus by the band early this year and the death of his mother in February, The Killers frontman quickly began recording without the aide of his fellow bandmates. What came out of the studio was a myriad of songs that seem to be Flowers’ own collection of remnants from previous endeavors with The Killers. The album gets its name from the notorious Flamingo Casino and Flamingo Road in Flowers’ hometown of Las Vegas. The fact that Sam’s Town Casino, the inspiration for the name of The Killers’ second album, is located on Flamingo Road serves as a rather ironic symbol for the connection between the two albums.

Flowers’ Flamingo ultimately never finds its own flight pattern, as it stays too close to the foundation of The Killers’ Sam’s Town. Flowers shows that much was left unsaid after the completion of his band’s ode to Sin City. Sticking to what he knows best, The Killers frontman infuses poppy synthesized harmonies with lyrics about lost romance amidst the backdrop of the western frontier. In the opening song, “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas,” Flowers uses heroic piano chords and rolling drum beats to set the stage for the heartbreak that will ensue. Flowers serves as an ambassador to Vegas in the chorus when

SHONTELLE NO GRAVITY

FLAMINGO BRANDON FLOWERS PRODUCED BY ISLAND RELEASED SEPT. 14, 2010 OUR RATING 6.5/10

MAROON 5 HANDS ALL OVER

CHART TOPPERS SINGLES PHOTOS COURTESY OF AMAZON.COM AND FLICKR USER DJDROGA

Brandon Flowers’ solo effort ‘Flamingo’ picks up where the Killers’ last studio album ‘Sam’s Town’ left off, tying up loose ends, sometimes to the detriment of his solo career. he somberly exclaims, “Give us your dreamers, your harlots, and your sins.”

The epic introduction flows well into the next song, “Only the Young,” in which Flowers calls on Jenny Lewis, lead singer of Rilo Kiley, to add an eerie set of background vocals. At this point in the album, however, the correlation to Sam’s Town becomes undeniable. “Only the Young” seems to be the solemn brother of The Killers’ poppy hit “Read My Mind,” as Flowers uses nearly identical synthesized effects in the background and during the interlude.

Nevertheless, there are tracks on Flamingo that show that some ideas left in Flowers’ head are certainly worth expressing. “Magdalena” is a catchy track that holds with it an ambition that most current alternative

music lacks. “Playing with Fire” is also another notable track. This deliberate country ballad is loaded with imaginative lyrics that will remind you of Flowers’ merit as a songwriter. Amid the steel guitar, Flowers humbly asks, “Oh well, River of Truth can you spare me a sip? / The holy fountain of youth has been reduced to a drip.” The somber tone of the track will easily help any helpless romantic find emotional shelter. The deluxe edition of Flamingo on iTunes contains four extra songs and the music video for “Crossfire,” which might be better than the song itself. It stars Charlize Theron alongside Flowers and is definitely worth a visit to YouTube. Yet with the deluxe priced at $14.99, most should be content with the standard edition.

For the most part, Killers fans will

be satisfied with Brandon Flowers’ Flamingo, as the album revisits many lyrical themes and music styles that originally made Flowers and The Killers popular. However, those hoping for an original collection of songs from Flowers will be disappointed. Flamingo does not artistically, or even physically, venture far from The Killers’ Sam’s Town. Flower’s solo endeavor keeps true to the path that his band paved, which begs the question of whether his messages would have been more strongly conveyed with his fellow Killers behind him. Nonetheless, despite the fact that some critics and fans might ultimately dub Flamingo “Sam’s Town B-sides,” Flowers consistently channels enough artistic ability throughout the album to create an overall impressive solo performance.

1 Teenage Dream Katy Perry 2 Love the Way You Lie Eminem feat. Rihanna 3 Dynamite Taio Cruz 4 Just the Way You Are Bruno Mars 5 I Like It Enrique Iglesias COLLEGE ALBUMS 1 Plastic Beach Gorillaz 2 Broken Bells Broken Bells 3 Have One on Me Joanna Newsom 4 One Life Stand Hot Chip 5 Gorilla Manor Local Natives SOURCE: Billboard.com & CMJ.com

‘Hurley’ slowly works toward signature sound

BY DARREN RANCK Heights Editor

When looking at the cover of the newest Weezer album, it should be fairly obvious that the long-maned, rotund spirit gracing the cover is not frontman Rivers Cuomo. An avid television fan would recognize Jorge Garcia from his stint as Hurley on LOST, the character for which the album is named. Cuomo claims he chose the photo of Garcia for its “vibe,” but there’s a certain HURLEY WEEZER PRODUCED BY EPITAPH RELEASED SEPT. 14, 2010 OUR RATING 5/10 meta-meaning behind the choice. The viewing audience considers Hurley a bit of relief, a somewhat forgettable but likable character in the vast cast of dramatic and charismatic heavyweights.

Hurley the album falls into a similar category in the Weezer catalogue.

It cannot be denied that the album is a step in the right direction for Weezer. Its last album, Raditude, was All-American Rejects style pop, lacking the grit and edginess of initial albums.

Since Raditude, however, Weezer left its major record label and began working with an independent record producer. The result is a decid-

edly darker and rougher sound for the California natives, and fans and casual listeners are all the better for it.

It almost seems as though the band openly admits its hope for a return to form in opener “Memories.” The strong verse is a string of ’90s nostalgia, from the glory days of drinking to the strange catharsis of vomiting. While the chorus is not the most melodically intriguing, the lyrics speak volumes as Cuomo drones, “Memories, make me wish I was back there / back there.”

Scott Shriner’s bass is stronger and more prevalent than on recent albums, properly highlighting his talent.

“Memories” offers a taste of the minor selfreferential aspect of the album. A select number of songs offers humorous social commentary and gives insight to Weezer’s cause. The witty alternative dirge, “Trainwrecks,” satirizes the rock star lifestyle with a darkly glamorous chorus. The band members claim they “sleep all day / and rock the night,” but everyone labels them “trainwrecks” because the public is “jealous of me and you.” It’s one of the album’s highlights. Another strong showing is the acoustic “Unspoken.” With light flute and medieval horns peppering the backing track, Cuomo has never sounded more sensitive in his vocals, and the theme of broken friendship is universal. The track takes an unfortunate turn near the end, however, as the over the top production kicks in. Therein lies the greater problem with the album.

On the whole, the album is pleasing, but Weezer cannot perfect a majority of the songs, leaving a nagging awkwardness to the piece. Too many of the songs have corny lyrics and little

PHOTO COURTESY OF FLICKR USER THATCRAZYSTEEN

Though ‘Hurley’ trumps ‘Raditude,’ Weezer still wildly veers from its roots in search of popier sensibilities. personal output. For instance, an unbearably silly song, “Where’s My Sex?,” replaces the word “sock” with “sex.” The result is eye roll-inducing lyrics such as “I can’t go out without my sex” and “Mom made my sex / she knit it with her hands.” For a brief moment, Weezer transforms into Blink-182.

The production varies between excitingly vintage (think a throwback to The Turtles) and annoyingly new age. The more stripped down, the

better Weezer projects its signature image.

They obviously are working toward restoring their original image, but it may take some time. This album is not a Pinkerton or even a Red Album, but with any luck, the next few Weezer albums could be a steady rise back to the top.

As they say in their song “Brave New World,” “I don’t know where we’re going / but I know we’ll figure it out.” After all, didn’t Hurley eventually become the leader of the island?

houseka@bc.edu

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Thursday, September 16, 2010

The Heights

+Fashion and Food Chronicles of Campus Fashion

The final elements of summer

By Taylor Cavallo | For The Heights

lthough the end of summer is never an easy thing to face, the transition is always a little bit easier with the promise of fall fashion on the horizon.

For those of us who want to hold on to summer for as long as possible, there are ways to incorporate the carefree season into our September garb. My advice? Girls, whip out your dresses and skirts for one last hoorah. Wear them with tights to give your summer clothes a new look and obviously, some much needed warmth. The coming weeks will be your last chance to sport them for a long while and trust me, I know that the hardest thing about adjusting to fall is parting with the femininity

On Leigh: Flannel fierceness.

of summer wear. Jeans, however, as pictured on all three ladies, are always a great way to start this transition.

Walking around campus and seeing countless students wearing their fall clothes mixed with summer staples is a revitalizing wake-up call to the new season of fashion. What first struck me about Laura Lennon’s, A&S ’11, outfit in the Campanella elevator was her necklace: a brass key and a single coin hanging from a long black string. The key, intricately designed with a linear yet old world feel, was the key to her apartment while studying abroad in Argentina, and the coin is an Argentinean peso.

Being a huge jewelry enthusiast, I was thrilled and intrigued to hear the story behind this beautiful homemade accessory, the clear focal point of her outfit. Accenting the brass key beautifully is an eye-popping teal t-shirt worn underneath a muted, yet freshly colored blazer (sleeves rolled up, of course).

Slate-colored suede Oxford shoes evoke a collegiate feel to her playful outfit, yet paired with basic jeans her outfit remains casual and comfortable. Laura’s bag, a crucial component of any finely tailored outfit, is hinting at one last memory of summer; although now carrying books and pens, her brightly colored, striped

On Laura: The key to fashion.

dorm-cooked party on with pesto pasta

Kevin hou / heights editor

By Diana C. Nearhos

shrimp is not available in this area, the fish counter will simply sell already thawed frozen shrimp.

The easiest method is to buy a bag of frozen Pasta is a great food, especially for college shrimp. You can take out how much you want on students. After all, it’s easy to cook, tasty, and a given day, put it in the fridge or in a plastic bag inexpensive. One of my friends recently said he in cold water, and it will defrost in under an hour. eats pasta most nights.

Do not use a source of heat to defrost the shrimp.

But he also said he typically rotates between One of the best things about this recipe is canned tomato sauce and soy sauce. its flexibility. If you do not like shrimp, you can There are many more interesting options for use a variety of other ingredients. Depending on eating pasta. You don’t have to rely on a jar of what I have on hand at the time, I sometimes use Prego to dress your favorite pasta. I like a bit of chicken. When I can go to the store that day, I something else in my pasta, maybe some form of use salmon – a little more expensive, but worth it protein, even. for the nutritional value and, of course, the taste.

For an easy but classy pasta dish, try pesto Sometimes, I throw steak in with the pesto pasta. pasta with sauteed shrimp and tomatoes.

If you have leftovers (I know, who really ever has Cook the pasta the same as you normally leftover steak, but it could happen) or you can would. Then, when you add the pasta to your also use steak tips. boiling water, throw a handful of shrimp into a If you do not like tomatoes (as many of my frying pan with just a little bit of olive oil. friends don’t), you can simply leave them out of Flip the shrimp after about three to four minthe recipe. I like the little burst of juice, and as a utes, until the bottom side is pinkish. big fan of tomatoes in general, I would put them Let the other side cook until the entire shrimp in anything. Walnuts would make a good addition is opaque and pink, about another three minutes. to this dish as well. The taste is very complimenA minute or two after you flip the shrimp, add a tary to the pesto pasta, the nuts are good for you, handful of sliced grape or cherry tomatoes. The and the crunch provides a different texture. shrimp, tomatoes, and pasta should all be done You could also mix some mozzarella into this at the same time. dish if you’re a cheese person. Mozzarella goes When everything is done cooking, throw it very well with pasta and with pesto. The cheese all in a bowl and coat it with your favorite pesto. might overpower the shrimp, so only use a little Depending on the level of ambition in your cookbit. If you make the dish with chicken, use more ing, you could even make your own pesto from mozzarella, as the chicken can stand up to it basil, olive oil, Parmesan, and a bit of garlic. better.

Store-bought pesto will work just as well. Add as Most other adaptations you could come up much pesto as you choose – I am a big fan so I with would also work, but these are my favorites. use a lot, but some just like a hint This dish can be served in a variety of the flavor. of ways depending on your tastes, The shrimp can also be more or or those of your friends, if you’re Want to make less complicated depending on your really nice and are willing to share.

Diana’s pesto pasta ambition and time. If you don’t want Plain pasta with tomato sauce yourself? Check out to spend the energy shelling and will always be a staple, but there www.bcheights.com/ deveining the shrimp, you can buy are many other ways to serve your arts for the specific it that way. However, you can save pasta. Pesto is an easy alternative recipes featured yourself a lot of time simply buying with an entirely different taste. in this week’s shelled, deveined shrimp. Since fresh Enjoy!

Recipe of the Week.

Heights Senior Staff

bag could absolutely double as a beach bag, giving this fall outfit a recognizable taste of summer sunshine.

While there is no trio of color more identifiable than that of red, white, and blue, and while we have probably all seen our fair share of this color trio at Fourth of July barbecues, Christine Callahan, A&S ’13, manages to sport the set of American colors so subtly that it’s elegant. Christine’s Hunter rain boots are of course foreshadowing the winter weather to come, but because of their shockingly vibrant, fire engine red color, it’s almost okay, and her basic J. Brand blue jeans are exactly what this outfit demands.

However, the real key to this seemingly difficult endeavor – that of making the overseen color scheme understated – is her delicate Bergdorf sweater; oversized and detailed gold buttons act as the visually striking emphasis on the grey cashmere sweater, the color of which acts as a serene backdrop for the crisp primary colored ribbon, making it a subtle, but undeniably chic use of everyone’s favorite color-threesome.

After all, red, white, and blue are also the colors of the French flag.

Probably wearing the most fall-conscious outfit of the three, Leigh Hamilton, A&S ’11, utilizes the beloved flannel shirt in a very refreshing way. Flannel, a risky fashion choice for those with a fear of looking like a ’90s grunge rock enthusiast, is an irrefutable fashion (and theme party) staple. Yes, it could potentially bring to mind some well-known icons, namely lumberjacks, Kurt Cobain, or Eddie Vedder, but flannel also epitomizes comfort, versatility, and style. Bought from the children’s section of L.L. Bean, Leigh’s tomboyish flannel is neutralized by its feminine cut and fit. The white t-shirt peeking out from below the button down also adds a flash of classic crispness to its

taylor cavallo / for the heights

On Christine: Fresh patriotism. deeper shades of blue and green. Formfitting straight leg jeans paired with her Minnetonka moccasins also add to the laidback vibe. Her Longchamp bag, in a clean, mint color, is an energizing contrast to the forest green and navy blue of her shirt. One side note: White nail polish, as seen on Leigh, is always a plus in my book.

Taylor Cavallo is a Heights contributor.

She can be reached for comment at arts@ bcheights.com.

on The Session

Lift your standard of living We have all sinned in the grime of Mary Ann’s. A few high priests in Kendall Square, however, can absolve us, drink by drink. If you’re willing to repent those binges in the bowels of MA’s, trek to the Eastern Standard, home to some of the most astute bartenders, ebullient and ingenious cocktails, and vivacious surroundings of Zak Jason any bar in Boston.

In other words, the Eastern Standard grants one of the classiest and most exciting venues to go on the session.

With regal red awnings and spiky foliage lining the entrance, ES’s exterior immediately snatches the eyes of any Kendall Square passerby. But that’s just foreplay for the expansive, lush interior. Glowing marble countertops, red bankers lamps lining the mammoth bar, elegant elephantine pop art posters of ’40s pinups and jazz artists, and a stately staff in pressed oxfords – when you walk into ES, you walk into a time much simpler, much more straightforward, much more purposeful. When you sit at the polished wood stools of the bar and the bartender in a stiff tie and rolled up sleeves approaches you, or when you sit in the leather lounge chair and the waitress presents the cocktail menu, you realize you aren’t there to drink, you’re there to have a drink.

The ES boasts one of the most eclectic and refined drink menus in the city. Just the worldly names of the drinks themselves, regardless of their ingredients, lure you into ordering one. With the 19th century, the Periodista, the Tally-Ho!, the Dutch Courage, selecting a cocktail feels a lot like assuming an entire personality for the night. The menu even contains a section devoted to fizzes – gin drinks invigorated with a whipped raw egg, which bear a warning on the menu that, “consuming raw eggs may increase your risk of being held in high regard by the bar.” (For the salmonella concerned: The alcohol emulsifies the egg, and the result is surprisingly refreshing.)

To assure a pleasant experience, just select a spirit you like. The mixologists will take care of the rest. If you choose a drink that sounds intriguing but contains a spirit you don’t care for, you will regret it. But if you like whiskey, you can’t go wrong with a Whiskey Smash or a Frisco or a

Casablanca, the fresh ingredients in each drink will regale your soul.

Once you order the drink, it’s best to sit at or near the bar, because the creation of the concoction satisfies you almost as much as drinking it.

Though ES opened just five years ago, its bartenders could fill a room with the mixology awards they’ve already won. This becomes abundantly obvious as you watch the bartenders squirt eye droppers of bitters, shake tumblers with the violence of a Shake Weight, and hand carve the garnish.

Once the cocktail begins to flow through your person, you will begin to embody the spirit of Eastern Standard. You will speak with conviction, with weight, with gait. In the warm glow of the bar you will see your friends and loved ones in a new light, and you will hear them clearer and deeper. If Mary Ann’s channels the Civil War’s hotbed of secession, The Eastern Standard evokes the West Wing, the opulent, dignified corridors where men and women swig the finest spirits and make decisions. At MA’s you overhear repeating chats about how Jimbo’s trip to Venezuela really changed the way he sees the world and its relentless injustice, about how big OJ is still hooking up with Suzy Tight Tush, or about how “This beer sucks, man!” At ES you overhear conversations of Venezuela’s flawed diplomatic policy, of men professing their love, of how these drinks are extraordinary.

The resources of this environment attract a species vastly divergent from any creature lurking in Cleveland Circle. Retired professionals, yuppies, and cougars fill ES. All this grandiosity and good times, however, drain the wallet. Most cocktails at ES cost $10, enough for four Busch Lights at Mary Ann’s or half of a Roggie’s happy hour Budzilla. But it pays to cleanse your soul and bask in top notch mixology on occasion.

Plus, my advisor tells me that college is the one socially acceptable time in our lives to blow our money. So order a Ponce de Leon, raise your Collins glass to the dimly light chandeliers, and drink to that, to lascivious aging women in fur coats, to a well-crafted cocktail, and to seizing your youth in the heart of the city.

Zak Jason is a Heights editor. He can be reached at arts@bcheights.com. eastern standard 528 commonwealth ave.

Boston, MA 02215 (617) 532-9100 open sunday 5 p.m.–1:30 a.m., monday–saturday, 7 a.m.–1:30 a.m.

courtesy of Eastern Standard

best drinks Whiskey Smash, $10 Old cuban, $12 frisco, $10 Mount orohena, $10 19th Century, $10 Le Grande Flip, $10

CLASSIFIEDS

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THE HEIGHTS

Thursday, September 16, 2010

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MISCELLANEOUS Friend The Heights on Facebook for breaking news, UGBC updates, and the first look at on-campus announcements on bcheights.com.

Interested in blogging for The Heights? Contact Dara Fang at fangda@bc.edu for more information or to submit a tip.

Brooke – so very rude. Hey, Maddie D!

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The Heights

Monday, September 13, 2010

The Heights

Thursday, September 16, 2010

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+Television What we’re watching

tv close-up

The darker side of ‘Entourage’

By Will Watkins Heights Staff

fter several seasons of being nothing more than a plot device on Entourage, movie star Vincent Chase (Adrian Grenier) has finally had a chance to be interesting in the darkest season of the HBO series to date. In all prior seasons, Vince was the carefree movie star who only thought about having a good time with his buddies and getting laid.

This season has seen him date Sasha Grey, a pornstar who plays herself on the show, and start doing hard drugs. In the season finale, Vince thwarted his friends’ attempt at an intervention, got into a brawl with Eminem’s posse, and is caught by the police with cocaine at the hospital. It’s a relief to see the show’s writers give Vince an interesting storyline, as the darkness of his character removes the fantasy element of the series.

courtesy of amc

Infuse your TV with drama Rubicon

Following the recent premiere of AMC’s new conceptual drama, Rubicon, everyone was intrigued by the unanimous critical acclaim it was receiving. The show follows Will Travers, an analyst at a federal intelligence agency, who is becoming increasingly aware that nothing is as it seems. James Badge Dale, known by most for his role in The Departed, wins you over with his quiet sense of mystery, but several episodes into the series we are still waiting for our jaws to drop. At times, episodes move so slowly that the show loses its sense of thrill and becomes cold, hollow, and even dull. Still, AMC has established itself as a thoughtful, intelligent creator of dramas, and so it seems unlikely that the show will disappoint in the end.

Sundays at 9 p.m. on AMC.

Project Runway

Weeds

What many people fail to realize about reality competition shows is just how significant the cast actually is. Bravo’s Top Chef, though an Emmy winner this year, is losing popular attention because of its lack of stand-out cast members this season. Just the opposite is occurring on Project Runway. Cast favorites include Gretchen, who was recently dubbed a bully by Tim Gunn himself, Casanova, who spends most of every episode attempting to translate the challenge directions, and the justeliminated Peach, who won us over with her middle-aged spunk, despite her stuffy designs.

Thursdays at 10:00 p.m. on Lifetime.

Season six of everyone’s favorite dramacomedy Weeds is upon us, and its more than apparent that the show is taking a sharp turn from the usual. One of the show’s winning qualities is its ability to build on its own absurdities with each progressive season, but this season, which has the Botwins fleeing from the scene of a murder committed by 14-year-old Shane, might be taking it a bit too far. With new identities and hotel jobs, and without the brilliance of Elizabeth Perkins as Celia Hodes, season six has a lot to prove to its hardcore fans, who are used to a very different Weeds and a very different hairdo on its leading lady.

Sundays at 10:00 p.m. on Showtime. courtesy of hbo

—Allison Therrien

courtesy of allmoviephoto.com

bump it, louder

Babies get braces & babies

O

By A na Lopez | H eights E dito r

ver the years, MTV and ABC Family have illustrated to America’s youth exactly what it is to function (or dysfunction) in their nuclear families or with their Waspy friends, and how to handle that infamous teenage forbidden fruit, sex.

Most recently, they’ve taken those Degrassi-esque themes even further, exploring life after new life is created; the hardships and hilarity of the teenage mother. MTV’s Teen Mom is back for its second season, following the rollercoaster that is coming of age, getting married, moving out, getting scammed, fixing your overbite with unsightly rubber bands – oh, and the small beans task of raising a child – for four teenage ladies. Each endowed with their own particular philosophy of parenting, the now-famous “teen moms” have been gracious enough to offer America an inside look at what it means to raise a child before you finish puberty … or high school.

This week’s episode opened with saucy shots of the on-again, off-again couple Amber and Gary, who, after breaking up, getting back together, and breaking up again, decided to get married and deemed dancing lessons a must. Amber, packed snuggly in a turquoise satin number with a slit ending on her upper thigh – a garment meant to acclimate her to the feeling of dancing in a wedding dress – clutched tightly to her shuffling fiance, stating, “Get dirty for me, Gary!” Perfect first dance material.

Farrah, fresh from dropping a court order against her allegedly abusive mother, decided that her best course of action would be to move into her mother’s rental house, thus adding the low-stress positions of “renter” and “neighbor” to her list of relations to her estranged mother. Debra, the landlord granny, was captured brokering the housing deal with her daughter while playing with the ever-sassy baby Sophia, casting doubts on her legitimacy as a serious businesswoman. Matters reached a fever pitch when Debra attempted to treat Farrah and Sophia to a day at Omaha’s world renowned Henry Doorly Zoo and their car blew a gasket. “Why even bother going to the zoo when you have a family like mine?” Farrah posed.

Maci, ever the level-headed one in the bunch, also grappled with housing issues, as a custody battle with her baby daddy has stalled her decision to head South to live in Nashville with her new demi-god of a boyfriend, Kyle.

Caitlyn and Tyler, the only couple who made the decision to offer their daughter, Carly, up for adoption, struggled this week when it came time to contact Carly for her first birthday. Though it would be a cold day in hell before Caitlyn and Tyler spent a span of 10 minutes together not rehashing their lives’ most tumultuous dramas, this week’s conversations were particularly tragic as Carly’s birthday marked a solid moment of loss in their childless lives. That, paired with the fact that Caitlyn’s mother, a recovering alcoholic, decided to head to Vegas to distract herself from the absence of her rehab-bound husband (who doubles as Tyler’s father), ensured that Caitlyn and Tyler will have far more to rehash next week.

In the end, all found some level of solace. Amber came to the epiphany that she doesn’t love Gary and, much to baby Leah’s tortured dismay, she kicked him, his television, and his sheets out of her home. Maci found a $99 deposit to be reason enough to move two hours from her family and the father of her child; Farrah asserted herself with the perceptive statement, “I shouldn’t have to be aggravated … especially on my birthday;” and Caitlyn proved that laughing, eating sticky foods, and making out are all possible, even if your jaws are bound by three rows of rubber bands.

The fictionalized version of these events, which has been captured nicely in the PSAmasquerading-as-a-primetime-show The Secret Life of the American Teenager, proved a bit juicier. With an emphasis on financial woes this week, the amount of times the phrase, “Did you have sex?” was uttered dropped significantly. Still, when the beloved blonde, Grace, is feared to be planning to do the big dirty at med camp, parent intervention makes a comeback in the form of her mother, Kathleen. After all, Grace, we don’t need any more teen moms.

Ana Lopez is the Special Projects Editor for The Heights. She can be reached at editor@ bcheights.com.

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Thursday, September 16, 2010

THE HEIGHTS

Oct. 1 1969

Zacharius Knight Galifianakis exits his mother’s womb.

Sept. 1988

Zach attends North Carolina State University.

1992

After a mental breakdown, Zach moves to New York.

1996

Zach lands his first television role: a stoner on Boston Common.

2001

Zach steps onto the national comedy stage with his first special on Comedy Central Presents. He also stars in the snowboarder cult classic Out Cold.

2007

Zach begins guest appearing on the influential comedy series Tim and Eric Awesome Show: Great Job.

Jan. 2008

Zach joins the Funny Or Die Comedy Tour with Will Ferell and Demetri Martin.

June 2008

Zach crafts his first feature length film, Visioneers.

His humor is equally absurd and probing. He has a body and face built for comedy.

And now, by the grace of God, Zach Galifianakis is the first moral king of comedy since Eddie Murphy.

Zach Galifianakis Shuffles to the Throne

Z

BY Z A K JAS O N | ASS O C. A RTS E D I TO R

Sept. 2008

Zach launches Between Two Ferns, which soon lures in the likes of Natalie Portman, Sean Penn, John Hamm, and Ben Stiller.

June 2009

The moment: Zach shines in The Hangover.

March 2010

Zach hosts Saturday Night Live and delivers the first unscripted monologue in over a decade.

Aug. 2010

Zach makes the cover of Gentlemen’s Quarterly.

Oct. 2010

Zach stars in It’s Kind of a Funny Story, critics begin to consider him as a serious actor.

Nov. 2010

Zach stars in Due Date, and the world begins to dub him the king of comedy.

ach Galifianakis’ brother used to strip him, drag him across the lawn, and hold him by his ankles so passing cars would see his naked, pubescent body. But Zach didn’t mind.

That kind of nonchalance toward trauma sculpted the new king of comedy.

Galifianakis finally broke into the mainstream last summer as the affably slow brother-in-law in The Hangover (now the highest grossing comedy of all time). With a few Holocaust jokes and a now infamous speech about a pack of wolves, he landed in the foreground. Since then, America can’t get enough of this bearded cherub. In the past year, he’s hosted Saturday Night Live, posed for the cover of GQ, starred in the HBO comedy series Bored to Death, hosted Between Two Ferns (one of the most popular comedy shows on the Internet), cameod in a half dozen other TV shows, and played uproarious side roles in several movies. Not bad for a farm boy who was bussing a strip joint 15 years ago.

Reminiscent of the tales of many comedians, Galifianakis’ rise to fame is both troubling and charming. A native of the Blue Ridge Mountains in North Carolina, he grew up with loving parents, an abusive older brother, and narrow-minded schoolmates. Out of his bizarre reality Galifianakis began creating strange characters that have become staples in his standup bits. In high school he would waltz the halls as “the effeminate redneck,” much to the chagrin of his classmates. Such characters were the predecessors to his bits as the “pretentious illiterate,” “the timid pimp,” “the forgetful vegan,” and “the effeminate gay basher.”

Reaching the national ranks of standup, however, took some trial and error. After his best friend died and he suffered a nervous breakdown, Galifianakis moved to New York in 1992, where he worked a handful of odd jobs – a bus boy, a house cleaner, a nanny.

Along the way, he persevered with standup.

After a few years, people began to take note of his offbeat comedy – the borderline offensive characters, the relentless nonsequiturs, the intentionally awful jokes for the sake of satirizing comedy, the somber piano ballads, and the berating of innocent patrons.

Perhaps it’s no coincidence that Galifiankis’ fame rose with the Internet. The A.D.D. clicking from site to site, the ruthless popup messaging, all of it channels the randomness and inanity of his humor. Regardless of the cause, if he’s not already, Zach Galifianakis will soon be dubbed the king of comedy. This fall, he will star in It’s Kind of a Funny Story, one of his first serious roles.

He really plays the same agressively aloof, outburst-prone wacko he’s nailed in most of his roles, but because he plays a mental patient, we see him in a new light. A few weeks later he’ll star in Due Date, one of the year’s most anticipated comedies, opposite Robert Downey Jr. Next year he’s already set to star in The Hangover 2 and play Humpty Dumpty in the Shrek spin-off Puss in Boots.

But he hasn’t let his head ride along with his fame off into the stratosphere. In an interview with Paste Magazine Galifianakis asserted: “I take things that come my way. When I go do acting jobs, I really miss standup, and when I’m on the road for a while, I need to act. If I’m in an Ashton Kutcher movie here and there, I know it’s really against my style, but I’m not so elitist.”

He still resides on a farm in North Carolina that he hopes to one day share by converting it into a retreat for writers. A philanthropic A-list comedian who doesn’t take himself seriously? It sounds like a joke, but it’s Galifianakis’ non-acting character.

This is good news for America. For a few years, the likes of Dane Cook held the comedic throne, brash jokers who spat bro humor and not much else. But Galifianakis’ humor mixes the probing with the absurd, the highminded with the unabashedly low-brow, the topical with the trivia of yesteryear. Watching his humor forces you to philosophize and guffaw simultaneously. We need a man like Galifianakis at the helm.

MARKETPLACE THE HEIGHTS

Thursday, September 16, 2010

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THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2010

Fence is not the solution

Iran releases hiker

POLITICALLY SPEAKING

Two Americans still imprisoned indefinitely

BY DANIEL MARTINEZ Marketplace Editor

DAN OTTAUNICK Societies tend to define themselves by examining different cultures.

By claiming that their own society is more advanced than others, people have convinced themselves that their nation’s aggression can be justified.

This dangerous logic has been applied throughout history, particularly during the European colonization of Africa. In Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad portrayed Africa as uncivilized and primitive compared with his native Europe, juxtaposing the two continents in an attempt to legitimize colonization and racism. Europeans of this time defended their atrocious actions by claiming that they were trying to help Africans live better lives, when the reason for many of Africa’s problems were the colonizing policies themselves.

The problem with such cultural comparison is that it causes people of one nation to ignore their own issues.

Many in Conrad’s Europe thought that Africans were less civilized than Europeans, and that European culture was therefore good. Such flawed logic is used by many Americans when considering Mexico. A less developed nation than the United States, Mexico has problems with guns, drugs, and illegal immigration that are very much visible to Americans due to a shared border. To claim Mexico’s cartel violence is benign would be outlandish, as cartel armies have numbers rivaling those of the Mexican Army, and gang wars and drug-related violence have

MIGUEL TOVAR / AP PHOTO

Mexican drug lord and former police officer Sergio Villarreal Barragan was arrested on Sunday. killed an estimated 27,000 since 2006.

In addition, Mexicans immigrating into the United States, often with the help of cartels, have created problems for both Mexico and the United States.

Although some Americans would like to erect a giant fence and install armed troops across the border to prevent Mexico’s problems from spilling into the United States, it would be unfair to consider Mexico’s state of affairs independent from the influence of the United States. Indeed, Mexico’s values are far more similar to America’s than we may be inclined to believe, and the supposedly normative American culture is perhaps more responsible for the shared Mexico-U.S. problems than one might at first think.

The most dangerous issue shared

by Mexico and the United States is gun violence. Mexican cartels, which are at war with the Mexican army, have procured massive caches of guns and weapons. If we were to denounce Mexico as the proverbial other, we could simply compare this with typical insurgence in developing nations.

However, the overwhelming majority of these weapons do not originate in Mexico. According to data from the

U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, about 87 percent of seized weapons were smuggled into Mexico from the United States. Indeed, American guns are responsible for the chaos in Mexico that has prompted American citizens to denounce the country.

Mexican cartels require weapons because of their war with the Mexican army, which persists largely due to cartels smuggling drugs into the United States. During the rise in cocaine usage in America during the 1980s, drug smuggling became lucrative. Since this time, Mexican cartels have established a drug market, including corrupted officials, violence, and illegal border crossing. An enormous rise in demand resulted in an increased supply – without more Americans demanding cocaine, marijuana, and methamphetamines, the supply of these drugs from Mexico would plummet. To consider the drug trade Mexico’s problem is foolish, as America is the single largest con sumer of illicit drugs in the world.

The problems with drugs are

Sarah Shourd, one of the American hikers detained in Iran, was released on $500,000 bail Tuesday. Shourd and two other Americans, Shane Bauer and Joshua Fattal, had been in Iranian custody since July 31, 2009. While Shourd was freed and left Iran immediately Tuesday, the other two Americans, Bauer and Fattal, were not as lucky. Both of their detentions were extended by a period of two months.

The events surrounding the release of Shroud were as murky as the situation that resulted in their detention in the first place. After forcefully stating that the Americans would stand trial for espionage, Tehran was noncommittal on how it would proceed with the Americans. In May, the controversial Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stated that although it was unlikely that the Americans would be convicted of espionage, he believed they should stand trial for their alleged illegal entry.

According to Iranian officials, the three Americans illegally entered Iran

SARAH SHOURD

when hiking in the autonomous Kurdish region of Iraq. The U.S. citizens were living in the Middle East and went to Kurdistan on holiday. They visited a local waterfall, a popular destination for native and foreign tourists alike. After walking near the waterfall in what they believed was Iraq, they were approached

by Iranian border guards who immediately detained them. While the Iranians vehemently claim the Americans were trespassing into their country, Shourd, Bauer, and Fattal deny this, saying they were kidnapped in Iraqi territory.

Iraq, especially its autonomous Kurdish region, does not have any sort of legal precedent for the case of a foreigner who is charged with illegal entry to a neighboring state, and the United States has not had any diplomatic relations with Iran since 1980. When Americans are detained or arrested abroad, in most cases, a member of the U.S. Embassy liaises with the local government to resolve the dispute.

However, the nonexistent diplomacy between Iran and the United States has made this impossible. In matters

See Iran, D2

JOSHUA FATTAL 27

SHANE BAUER

Onamia, Minnesota

Elkins Park, PA

Educational coordinator for Iraqi refugees

Photojournalist, writer for The Nation

Teaching fellow for a study abroad program

NOTES

Allegedly released due to health issues

Fluent in Arabic

Became engaged to Shourd while in Iran

STATUS

Released, Sep. 14 2010

Detained, Since Aug. 2009

Detained, Since Aug. 2009

AGE

31

HOMETOWN Los Angeles, CA PROFESSION

27

POLITICAL BELIEF

See Drugs, D2

Imitating radical Superbug now in United States tactics not the answer Victims from multiple states, antibiotic regimen originated in India

OLENA SAVYTSKA

Bacteria resistant to antibiotics, referred to as “superbugs,” have long been a concern to scientists and health professionals around the world. The issue has again reared its ugly head, as health officials reported on Monday that new drugresistant bacteria had been found in three U.S. states, including Massachusetts.

Only a month after a Belgian became the first cas+ualty of an antibiotic-resistant superbug from South Asia, three cases were confirmed in Massachusetts, California, and Illinois by the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). All three cases involved patients who were unrelated and had recently received medical care in India, where the problem of drug resistance is widespread and thought to have originated. A British medical journal brought this issue to the public’s attention when it cited a sudden outbreak a month ago, in which British hospitals were confronted with dozens of cases in people who had recently visited India.

The bacterium is believed to have mutated into its drug-resistant form by a frightening new gene named NDM-1. This

Nine years after Sept. 11, remembering the tragedy of the terrorist attacks has become, well, a prickly issue. Prickly like Ronald Dworkin’s proverbial hedgehog, covering its soft and sensitive underbelly with a protective shield of individual rights. In the days leading up to Sept. 11, some Americans, led by the example of Florida pastor Terry Jones, were fired up about burning copies of the Qu’ran, while others were equally supportive of plans to build a mosque and an Islamic community center not far from Ground Zero. President Obama, meanwhile, advocated unity, emphasizing that America is not at war with Islam.

Freedom of speech was pitted against its twin brother, freedom of religion, in an epic First Amendment shouting match. The American mind attempted to weigh prayer books against flags, business centers against centers of worship, and lost lives against tolerance, finding little closure or comfort on this unhappy

Japanese doctors discuss the proliferation of the NDM-1 bacterium to their country from India. gene allows for the bacteria to develop a resistance to some of the strongest antibiotics that are commonly prescribed.

Scientists have long feared the possibility of adaptable genes that hitch onto bacteria and confer drug-resistance.

The more resistances that a bacterial strain acquires, the more difficult it becomes to treat. So far, the gene has been most commonly found in bacteria that cause urinary or gut infections.

India is often criticized by medical

professionals for its overuse of antibiotics, a factor that can increase the rate of generating drug-resistant strains of bacteria. India’s current problems with overpopulation, widespread diarrheal disease, and lack of clean water have been noted as factors that may have led to the propagation of the infection within Southeast Asia. The ease of

See Superbug, D3

POLITICS

ECONOMICS

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

The French government passed a law banning any face-covering veils, including burkas, by a vote of 246-1.

Broadly supported by the pubilc, the law will go into effect next spring.

House Minority leader John Boehner hinted that he will vote for a bill that excludes the wealthiest 5 percent of Americans from extended Bush tax cuts. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell pledged to extend the tax cuts to all Americans.

Nokia unveiled three new smartphones at its world conference in London. Nokia’s CEO was recently ousted amid criticism that the company is losing ground to its competitors Apple and Google.

On Tuesday, Tea Party candidates won primaries against mainstream Republican candidates in Delaware and New York, signaling difficulties for GOP moderates in November.

Incoming BP CEO Robert Dudley estimated that total costs for the Gulf Oil Spill will approach $32 billion. He also predicted that the $20 billion escrow fund will cover all claims by Gulf residents.

Halo Reach sold millions of copies on its launch on Tuesday. The new blockbuster fell short of the single day $310 million set by Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 last year.

I NSIDE MARKE TP L A C E

THIS ISSUE

On the flip side

See Belief, D3

12

Millions of dollars Jennifer Lopez will be paid to be a judge on American Idol this season.

500

Number of workers recently laid off by the Cuban government, in thousands. Over 90 percent of the Cuban workforce is still employed by the government.

This week On the Flip Side will explore both sides of the issue of Facebook privacy and employer rights....................................... D4

“

IN QUOTES

KYODO NEWS / AP PHOTO

IN NUMBERS

IN THE NEWS

BY S. EVAN COOPER For The Heights

anniversary.

The case for burning the Qu’ran rests largely upon the precedent set

by Texas v. Johnson, which asserted Johnson’s right to burn the American flag as a means of self-expression protected by the First Amendment. If our Constitution allows us to deface our country’s flag, then it is definitely acceptable to destroy the holy book read by the terrorists who engineered Sept.

11, sending the Twin Towers into flames and rupturing the calm of American life for years to come – right? Besides, the American flag had been burned abroad before, shortly after Sept. 11.

While such an act of violence may be an effective catharsis for militarist fundamentalists, it is hardly an effective solution to America’s relationship with the Muslim world. Imitating the tactics of Muslim radicals is not likely to preempt acts of terrorism – such imitation amounts to, in every sense, simply adding fuel to the fire.

On the conciliatory side of the political spectrum, those who support the construction of a mosque in lower Manhattan lay out a parallel argument: We could build anything here, so why not a mosque? New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg emphasized the importance of tolerance– and freedom of expression. Yet Park51, a heartbeat away from

The drug organizations are like a starfish, you cut off a leg and it regenerates.

”

– Stephen Dowing former deputy police chief of Los Angeles supporter of marijuana legalization, explaining why the U.S. drug policy has failed

Column: A Green Piece................................D4 Column: International Insights...................D3

D2

Thursday, September 16, 2010

THE HEIGHTS

Drugs overshadow any other issue Drugs, from D1

DANNY MARTINEZ

MATT PALAZZOLO

HILARY CHASSE

PAUL SULZER

Are the Tea Party primary wins from Tuesday an omen for November?

Yes. It is bad for the Democrats in the short run but far worse for the Republican party long-term.

Tarring and feathering will be the new punishment for voting against the party line.

Like Damien himself, it is an omen of evil to come.

Democrats better start sweating.

What do you make of Iran releasing American hiker Sarah Shourd?

I think it is funny that Iran might think that Berkeley residents would spy for the United States.

Iran’s luring the United States into a false sense of security before it unleashes the ambassador of death.

Both the United States and Iran need to become more cooperative. Enough with the macho head games.

It’s a big step for good relations between the two countries.

Should the United States aid the Somalian government to fight al-Shabaab?

It should aid USAID in the region more vigorously.

Only if it’s willing to film a sequel to Black Hawk Down.

Here’s an idea: America should avoid costly foreign entanglements for a bit.

The United States shouldn’t support corrupt governments.

Is it wise for Democratic congressional candidates to stump with President Obama?

I don’t think it is wise for President Obama to stump for President Obama in many congressional districts.

Yes, but only if they can remember that Curt Schilling is not a Yankee fan.

Do I think it’s fixing their wagon to a star? Maybe not anymore.

Not if they want to get reelected.

Marketplace Editor

Asst. Marketplace Editor

Opinions Editor

Asst. Sports Editor

not going to vanish if America makes it more difficult for drugs to cross the border. Such a policy would merely result in increased prices for drugs, which would result in more profits for drug cartels. Prevention, a major component of America’s failed “War on Drugs,” has proven to be counterproductive.

It is in the best interest of the United States to implement a policy that does not provide incentives to drug cartels. However, such a goal cannot be accomplished if the citizens of the United States continue to blame our nations’ shared problems on Mexico. The demands of the United States provide incentive to the Mexican cartels – if Americans stopped demanding drugs, or if U.S. drug laws were liberalized as Mexican President Felipe Calderon has suggested, the cartels would lose millions of dollars. Losing their profits would take away their demand for guns, which would prevent

arms smuggling, and mitigate violence.

It is clear that the best way to better relations with Mexico is for Americans to stop characterizing Mexico as less advanced than the United States. It is unfair to claim the problems of Mexico the result of differing values, as both Mexicans and Americans are responsible for the drug wars. In colonial Africa, during Conrad’s time, many of the problems plaguing society could not be blamed merely on cultural differences, but on the interactions between the Europeans and Africans. The same principle applies today. President Calderon feels that working with the U.S. government can accomplish much toward the goal of ending drug violence, but only so much can be done until Americans are willing to accept a shared responsibility for the cartel wars.

Dan Ottaunick is an editor for The Heights. He welcomes comments at marketplace@bcheights.com.

American held by Iran released after 13 months Iran, from D1

concerning Iran, Switzerland represents the United States, yet even the Swiss counsel attempting to speak with the Americans found difficulties dealing with the Iranians.

One of the main reasons for Shourd’s early release was potential health problems; Shourd apparently found a lump that might be cancerous. “The health issue has given them a chance to act properly,” said Iranian journalist Omid Memarian, who now lives in Berkeley, Calif., the Oakland Tribune reports. He added that “there is nothing in the case except illegal entry,” and it would be a “huge embarrassment” if the case went to trial. Furthermore, Memarian said, the international reaction to a detained hiker would be tepid compared to an American woman dying in Iranian prison for an alleged charge of illegal entry.

The political circus was not reserved

to foreign countries – there was significant disagreement in the rings of different Iranian agencies on how to deal with Shourd. On Thursday, Sept. 9, Iran’s Culture Ministry announced the intended release and pardon of Shourd, with many suspecting a reason for this being the American’s medical condition.

However, the next day, Iran’s judiciary vetoed this, arguing that a pardon could not be granted for a crime that Shourd had not been found guilty for. In the end, they agreed on a $500,000 bail, which the U.S. government denies paying (the source is unknown).

After his initial harsh statements, Shourd found an unlikely ally in Ahmadinejad, who advocated for an expedient trial process and merciful treatment.

However, this appeal to Iran’s judiciary fell on deaf ears – a sure sign that the political future for the Iranian president is not bright. After a hotly contested

election with political rival Mousavi in 2009, Ahmadinejad’s power has waned, in both popular support and among the movers and shakers of Iran’s government.

While Shourd’s release might have been an improvement in Iranian-American relations, the fact that Ahmadinejad’s moderate stance on the issue was not condoned by the powerful judiciary in the government surely makes marked progress a fallacy. Political rivals have taken shots at Ahmadinejad, signaling to the establishment in Iran, the people, and the international community that his unrivaled status in Iranian politics has come to an end.

For now, Sarah Shourd is happy and grateful to be alive. Upon meeting her mother in Oman on her way back to the United States, Shourd said, “I want to thank [the Iranians] for this humanitarian gesture, I am grateful and very humbled by this moment.” 

SULTAN AL-HASANI / AP PHOTO

Sarah Shourd (right) was reunited with her mother in Oman shorlty after being released by Iran.

The Heights

Thursday, September 16, 2010

D3

Balance, not radicalism, will win in fight against extremism Belief, from D1

be only a cosmetic solution to the festering resentment that some Americans have come to bear toward Islam. In fact, the juxtaposition of a Muslim center of worship and the site of Muslim extremist terrorist attacks frames the attacks of Sept. 11 in a black-and-white snapshot of Islam versus America. Perhaps that is how the perpetrators of the attacks would like us to interpret them, but this is a distorted view, and one that does little justice to Muslims who have been victims of discrimination in the wake of Sept. 11.

Park51 is, for many people, too soon, too close. There is room for freedom of religion in the United States, as well as room for freedom from it; certainly, mosques can be built in the United States – but it is both insensitive and unwise to build one so close to a place where Islam acquired a bad name with many Americans. If the hopes of its commissioners are that the proposed mosque will promote

greater understanding and acceptance of Islam, the result may well be the reverse.

Undoubtedly, the political lines that have divided the country in the past few weeks bring to light a lack of understanding of Islam in America, as well as a persistent identification of this faith with extremism and acts of terror. This is a gap in the cultural awareness of the American public, which will take time to fill in – positive strides are being made by Islamic studies programs within the political science departments of many universities. Undoubtedly, many Muslims have faced discrimination in the wake of Sept. 11, an injustice which should be addressed in due time.

Today, the outlook is somewhat different. A nation whose 9-year-old wounds are still fresh, a nation that still maintains a sizeable military presence in the Middle East, is not yet in a position to understand and acknowledge Islam in an appropriate manner. It is perfectly sensible in principle

for Americans to defend their rights – to build and to burn, to criticize and to worship, and always to speak their minds freely.

Yet every collective undertaking necessarily circumscribes individual rights in the interests of a common purpose.

America today needs to pause, casting its qualms aside, to find its balance in an ever more open and ever more volatile world. Now is not the moment for arguing over symbols, because these symbols belie a more complex reality that surrounds us. America needs to be assertive in the face of terrorism, yet understanding of the Islamic faith and customs in order to maintain a meaningful presence on the global stage. Given today’s realities, the protests in favor of and against Park51, as well as the planned Qu’ran burnings amount largely to a fight against windmills.

Olena Savytska is a staff columnist for The Heights. She welcomes comments at marketplace@ bcheights.com.

john raoux / ap photo

Terry Jones, a Florida pastor, had planned to burn Qu’rans to protest the Islamic terrorists who carried out Sept. 11.

Superbug Experts convene in Basel to debate bank regulations originates International Insights

Binh Nguyen On Sept. 12, a panel of elite central bankers and bank regulators in Basel, Switzerland agreed on new rules for the global banking industry. The main goal of the new regulations is to help banks handle market shocks better and to make the global economy less vulnerable to future financial crisis.

The panel consists of financial authorities from 27 countries, including Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve, and Jean-Claude Trichet, president of the European Central Bank. The Group of Central Bank Governors and Heads of Supervision, under the direction of Trichet, worked for most of Sunday in the headquarters of the Bank of International Settlements, which is a clearinghouse for the world’s central banks. The panel also includes central bankers and regulators from China, Japan, and other major economies to discuss rules formerly developed by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision. The Basel Committee was created in 1974 as a response to a German bank failure that upset the world market. Since then, the Committee has grown significantly as a forum for bank supervision.

The rules, known as Basel III, must be authorized by the G-20 nations later this year before the Committee can require banks to boost the amount of low-risk assets in reserve as a cushion against market shocks. Under current rules, banks can hold the most bulletproof category of reserves, known as core Tier 1 capital, equal to as little as 2 percent of their assets. Core Tier 1 is computed as a percentage of riskweighted assets, or assets adjusted according to the riskiness of a bank’s portfolio. For instance, U.S. government bonds are low-risk assets, while car loans carry a higher risk. Analysts at Morgan Stanley anticipate that Basel III will raise the required amount of reserves to about 8 percent.

In addition, during times of a booming economy, regulators can oblige banks to raise their reserves

even more to protect against a sudden market collapse. Banks would have to add another 3 percent of assets to their reserves, amounting to a total of 11 percent. Some analysts forecasted that banks might even need to set aside as much as 16 percent in boom times.

Basel III is also expected to impose a leverage ratio in an attempt to force banks to hold reserves against all their money at risk, which ensures against the possibility that banks try to game the rules for calculating risk-weighted assets. The leverage ratio would also provide a cushion against the chance that markets suddenly lose faith in low-risk assets, as occurred with Greek government bonds.

The financial stability requirements will not be fully reinforced until 2019, thereby giving banks plenty of time to adjust. Critics worried that Basel III would put additional pressure on weaker banks to raise more capital.

However, as many banks have already increased their reserves in anticipation of the new rules or are planning to do so, the impact is not as severe. For instance, the Germany-based Deutsche Bank said Sunday that it would sell 9.8

billion euros ($12.5 billion) worth of shares, mainly to back its acquisition of Postbank, a German retail bank, and, at the same time, to boost its reserves.

Many analysts and bankers say the rules could make the banking system stronger and help restore confidence, which plummeted after the financial meltdown that followed the bankruptcy of investment bank Lehman Brothers in late 2008. New regulations are also engineered to make the financial world more transparent. An additional goal is to provide banks with incentives to trade exotic derivatives on open markets rather than hide them between institutions.

Despite their good intentions, the new regulations were not welcomed by everyone in the financial industry. The American Bankers Association (ABA) opposes the proposal of a conservation buffer as part of the capital it must hold. “A one-size-fits-all buffer is inappropriate in many cases and could have serious, negative unintended consequences,” wrote Mary Frances Monroe, a vice president of the ABA, to the Basel Committee. If the banks’ capital levels were below the buffer,

banks could face restrictions on the compensation they pay their executives or the dividends they pay their shareholders.

I also have an additional objection against the new regulations. Basel III does not address the calculation of riskweights, which were the principle contribution of Basel II to the last financial crisis. One of the key elements of Basel II was to increase the amount of capital that banks had to hold against riskier assets. Basel II discouraged banks from lending to risky enterprises, and encouraged the accumulation of riskfree assets. Such consequences were a main contributor to the structured finance frenzy. There is not a set of rules that guarantee the banking system’s resiliency in a crisis. In a competitive market, banks have to seize opportunities to increase their return on capital.

This means that regulators need to be flexible in their response to change in the marketplace, instead of counting on a one-size-fits-all buffer.

Binh Nguyen is a staff columnist for The Heights. He welcomes comments at marketplace@bcheights.com.

Georgios Kefalas / ap photo

The Bank for International Settlement in Basel, Switzerland was the site where financial experts gathered to establish international banking rules.

Modern Day Philospher

By Gregory Kita

in India

Superbug, from D1 global travel has allowed for the infection to easily spread, and cases have already been reported in Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, the Netherlands, Sweden and now the United States.

“It’s a great concern, because drug resistance has been rising and few new antibiotics are in development,” M. Lindsay Grayson, director of infectious diseases at the University of Melbourne, told the AP on Tuesday.

“It’s just a matter of time before the gene spreads more widely.”

The case in Massachusetts involved a woman from India who had surgery and chemotherapy there for cancer before traveling to Boston. The woman was treated at Massachusetts General Hospital and was isolated in an effort to prevent the germ from spreading. The Californian patient is believed to have contracted the infection while receiving hospital care after a car accident in India. These two patients who were treated in Indian hospitals are not believed to have traveled to India for medical tourism or less expensive surgeries. However, the frequent outbreak of cases in India has placed a large roadblock for the country’s expanding health tourism industry. This has led India’s health industry to insist that strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria are present everywhere and to actively protest against the superbug being named NDM-1.

The patient from Illinois had preexisting medical problems and a urinary catheter, and was thought to have caught the superbug while traveling in India. Thankfully, all of the patients in the United States have survived, and the superbug appears to be contained for the time being in the country. The only two antibiotics that had some measure of effectiveness on the patients were older drugs called colistin and tigecycline, reflecting both the strength of the superbug and the lack of new antibiotics currently being developed.

The biggest threat for fatality from the superbug is within hospitals. Like the recent outbreaks of MRSA and the multitude of other drug-resistant bacterial strains, infection and mortality are less likely to occur in an everyday, healthy individual and more likely to infect those who are already ill, are in the midst of major surgery, or in the intensive care unit with multiple wounds.

Experts have been advising that nations try to avoid adding to the drug-resistance problem. Patients should not pressure doctors for antibiotics that are not needed and are not appropriate for the situation. Antibiotics should only be taken properly and as prescribed, and infections should be avoided by washing hands and trying to maintain a sterile environment within hospitals. Since the gene contained within the bacteria can easily be transferred from hand to mouth, it is important to try to keep a hygienic environment.

With the threat of the evolution of new and stronger drug-resistant superbugs, and with the nearly 150,000 Americans who travelled overseas last year to save on the cost of medical care, the United States may not have seen the last of the NMD-1 superbug. n

D4

Thursday, September 16, 2010

THE HEIGHTS

Profile is extension of oneself

ON THE flip side

MATT PALAZZOLO

THE ISSUE:

CareerBuilder.com estimates that roughly 53 percent of employers check job applicants’ Facebook profiles as part of the screening process, and, of that group, 40 percent are rejected solely because of the applicant’s profile. German lawmakers are considering a bill that would ban employers from checking social networking sites while still allowing them to view publicly available job sites and information. How much freedom should employers have in vetting their applicants?

An incomplete projection

given profile. This includes an individual’s pictures, groups, and posts. It is utterly unfair 30 years ago if one were to ask for companies to make employment decisions based upon the the typical college male what the information present in these three main tenants of any college parts of a profile. Despite being experience were, they would out in the open on the Internet, most likely say academics, envithese aspects of a profile are ronment, and networking. Now, given the vast cultural, academic, more accurate reflections of any given person’s personal life. This and technological advances, the fact is precisely why companies average male college experishould not be allowed to look at ence can be summed up in the a profile. It is wholly unjust to “three F’s:” finals, females, and assume that someone’s personal Facebook.

It is impossible not to note life will have an effect on how they will do their how much the A Facebook profile job. Even if it social networkas though ing site has incannot tell viewers how seems an individual fected computer a user will act in any may be a wild screens in lecture halls, librar- given situation, or how partier in their pictures, there ies, and study lounges every- they will truly interact is no way to prove that that where. However, with other people. particular aspect Facebook has begun to stretch beyond its in- of their life may come to work tended use for college students. with them.

The same thing can be said Facebook profiles have gone about their groups and posts. from simple ways to stay in conWhile opinions may be reflected tact with friends, to a full-blown in those aspects of a profile, persona through which a person free speech clearly protects any can be viewed.

With Facebook exposing more opinion that an individual may have. And, again, that someone and more of a user’s personal expresses their opinions on a life with each passing day, it Facebook profile, does not mean becomes interesting to note who that a particular worker will is looking at this information. A allow that opinion to become an profile originally intended to just issue in the workplace. be seen by the closest of friends Ultimately, the most pressing can now be seen by parents, issue with employers viewing a professors, and, most dangerprofile is human nature. Whenously, potential employers. The ever people view a Facebook recent statistics released by profile, they tend to make rapid CareerBuilder.com only serve to prove the hazard that a Facebook suppositions about another person’s character and personality. profile can pose. The question It happens in everyday Facebook has accelerated far past whether interaction. For example, if a girl employers look at Facebook profiles; now the question is whether spots a guy in class that she is interested in, she will, undoubtFacebook is a viable excuse for edly, start Facebook-stalking not accepting an employee. the individual. She then spots a An individual’s Facebook picture of him holding a red Solo profile is, inherently, a private cup, wearing his high school lax display of their personality.

When seen in such a fashion, it is pinnie, surrounded by four other girls. She immediately assumes utterly preposterous for employ“Lax Bro,” and moves onto the ers to use an individual’s profile next cute guy. What she does against them in the application not end up noticing, however, are process. America has over nine his numerous photos taken with pieces of legislature designed President Obama, or his “About specifically to prevent discrimiMe” detailing his never-ending nation in the workplace. Why search for true love, as opposed should a Facebook profile be any to artificial one night stands. different? A profile, at its most basic level, displays several of the The girl made an assumption based upon the limited informathings that the discrimination tion she saw, and chose never to law specifically protects against, try and find his true character. including religion, sexual orienThis example, while obviously tation, age, race, etc. extreme, details a scenario in The next issue that arises which employers are putting is the content other than the themselves. They could easily “basics” that are present in any

CHRISTOPHER OSNATO

judge one photo or post an individual has on his or her profile, and ultimately judge against that person.

They may not know they are doing it, and they may not admit to having a reaction, but, as humans, it is impossible to see a photo of an individual and not have a reaction, it is impossible to not set up some sort of presumption.

Facebook is fast becoming one of the most f re q u e n t ly used sources people have in getting to know one another.While it is impossible to reverse this trend, it is important to remember what a Facebook profile truly is.

It is an individual’s personal projection of themselves. It is a combination of quotes that they think look cool, pictures that do not show their “bad side,” and status updates that make them sound hip and edgy. A Facebook profile cannot tell viewers how a user will act in any given situation, or how they will truly interact with other people. The only things that employers can obtain from a given profile are inaccurate assumptions that often fail to truly project all that an individual has to give.

Christopher Osnato is a guest columnist for The Heights. He welcomes comments at marketplace@ bcheights.com

Social networking sites are one of the fastest growing-phenomena of the 21st century. Sites such as MySpace and Facebook began as small series used almost exclusively by teenagers and college students. Now, over 1 billion people have Facebook accounts, nearly one fifth of the world population. These sites have allowed people to reconnect with longlost friends and interact with current ones all from their home computer or laptop. Private corporations, eager to embrace the latest technology, have also jumped on the Facebook bandwagon. Many companies screen job applicants’ social networking profiles before deciding whether or not to hire them. I believe that this is completely legal and acceptable.

It is important to consider the context of this debate from the employer’s point of view. History is rife with examples of employee discrimination and courageous unionization initiatives. However, employers have rights of their own, passed by the U.S. government. Among these is the right to reject an applicant if the employer does not feel he or she is fit for the job. They also have the right to fire an employee for any reason, as long as it is not based on discrimination or does not violate a contract. If the boss feels that his worker is being lazy, or isn’t competent, he can fire the employee. A company is a private entity, free to hire whomever it believes is a qualified candidate, no matter how dubious their standards.

The opposite scenario of employer rights is tenure. Teachers and professors are common

recipients of tenure. Once a themselves doing a keg stand the teacher has worked at the same night before. If an employee is school for a certain length of willing to broadcast his personal time, he or she is practiaclly imlife to the world, why should the mune from termination. Barring federal government step in and a serious crime, the teacher has bar companies from viewing it? a lifetime position until he or she Companies could save millions chooses to retire. of dollars, avoid lawsuits, and While most teachers are dedi- even prevent tragic accidents cated and will if they learn work just as hard an employee People must with or without t for the understand that their isjobunfi t e n u re , s o m e or potenprofile is a virtual will abuse their tially dangerous invincibility by before hiring representation of putting less efthem. Employfort into their themselves, available ers have nothing w o r k , t a k i n g to all their friends as a to gain and long vacations, plenty to lose first impression. or even bullying from restrictheir students. tions on viewing Employer rights eliminate employee’s Facebook profiles. this threat by ensuring that any A Facebook profile is without worker, no matter how long he has doubt a personal matter. People been employed a company, must post intimate photos and reveal work hard or face termination. relationship statuses on their Even if employers are prohibprofile. Nobody would want ited from viewing their workers’ complete strangers to be able to social profiles, they will not view such a personal part of their remain completely in the dark. lives. Unfortunately, a complete Suppose a supervisor hears a stranger is a friend request away, rumor that one of his subordior less, depending on privacy setnates is a cocaine addict. Instead tings, from having access to their of breaking the law and examinprofile. On the other hand, reing the person’s profile, he asks moving the personal aspects of a a close friend of the employee in Facebook profile destroys its very question, who is friends with the purpose. People must understand person on Facebook. The friend that their profile is a virtual repconfirms the story, and the suresentation of themselves, availpervisor is thrust into a severely able to all their friends as a first uncomfortable situation. He impression. Furthermore, even if knows his subordinate is a drug employers are barred from viewaddict, but by law he cannot fire ing profiles and workers are alhim. Allowing employers to view lowed to air their messy personal social networking sites elimilives on Facebook with impunity, nates this problem. it doesn’t change who they are. If Facebook accounts are not someone has skeletons in his or hidden vaults that people use to her closet, they will eventually be store their personal life. They revealed. Instead of hiding your are hosted on a free Web site to wild behavior on Facebook, don’t which everyone has access. Com- behave badly at all. Censorship, pare an employer hiring a private even disguised as protection of investigator to gather informaprivacy, must never be condoned tion about an employee versus in a democracy. friending the same person on Facebook and browsing his or her Matt Palazzolo is the Asst. profile. Which sounds more sinMarketplace Editor for Th e ister? The employee is not forced Heights. He welcomes comments at to accept their boss’s friend marketplace@bcheights.com request, nor to post pictures of

PHOTO COURTESY OF DAWN.COM

Mark Zuckerburg, the founder of Facebook, has been criticized for his handling of online privacy. He has only issued an online apology with no concrete solutions.

A GREEN PIECE

Make your BC experience eco-friendly, one CFL at a time ELIZABETH BARTHELMES It’s that time of year again, when we load up our bags with all those back-tocollege “necessities” and make the great migration to Boston College for another dose of learning. This year, though, why not make that bag reusable, and throw in a few recycled notebooks and organic snacks? Oh, and that octopus lamp you’re still trying to hide from the RAs, at least make sure the bulbs are CFLs (compact fluorescent lights), and hit the switch when you leave the room. While you might not save the planet with these simple changes, it is possible to start a new, more sustainable lifestyle while living on campus this year. BC offers a number of ways you can reduce your impact, and these options are constantly growing as we, the students, show our support. Choosing to act sustainably not only improves our environment, but our quality of life, health, and economy. So even if you’re still muttering about the reality of climate change, these tips can make a difference in more ways than you might have imagined.

Is this hard, you ask? Some of the easiest and cheapest methods of being green on campus just take a bit of think-

ing. When doing your back-to-school shopping, take a look at what you’ve already acquired over the past few years.

Most likely, folders from past semesters are in good condition, you have a stash of pens and pencils, and your pencil sharpeners are still in working order. I still use my mom’s wooden fish stapler from 1970.

It is always best to consume less, as college students produce a national average of 640 pounds of solid waste each year, according to dumpandrun.org. Shopping vintage is your next best bet, and luckily it’s in style. Used books can be purchased in the Bookstore, furniture and electronics from online sites like Craigslist, and clothing from a variety of boutiques in the Boston area.

If you can’t quite find what you’re looking for there, the Bookstore is your source for new eco-friendly products.

Most of these items are clearly labeled, and include everything from notebooks and cleaning supplies to cosmetics. Also, be sure to purchase a reusable water bottle (avoid chemical-leaching plastics #3, #6, and #7), as Boston water is great for drinking and there are filtered water taps around campus. For an added incentive, the dining hall offers a rebate for students who use these bottles in place of the paper cups. What BC does make you pay for, however, is energy. We might not receive a monthly bill, but our tuition files sure do. Energy is currently one of the largest expenditures on campus, and each year contributes to raising our residential costs. If you must have an extra

lamp, buy a CFL and add a power strip to easily shut off all electronic devices.

Choose a warm or soft white bulb, as they are most compatible for home lighting.

When purchasing an item outside of BC that appears to be “green,” always do your research to determine if the company’s claims are true. Sites online, such as The Green Guide or Cosmetic Database, can help to decipher most of these labels. Look into your bedding, rugs, and cleaning products, as these are often the most harmful to your health in

the small space of a dorm room.

Products, however, are only the start to making a difference. The true changes come with practicing the right behaviors.

We each come to campus with our own backgrounds and habits, but part of the experience on any campus is learning to live with an open mind and adapt to our new surroundings. You may have never used a recycling bin before if you live, say, in the desert, but here at BC there is an abundance of bins you can use to try this new system out. Recycling here

AMANDA HUANG / HEIGHTS PHOTO ILLUSTRATION

is single-stream, meaning that all clean and non-greased items of glass, plastic, aluminum, paper, and cardboard can be tossed right in. In both McElroy and Corcoran Commons, you even have a place for food waste in the bins labeled for compost. Laundry rooms have sites to drop off all used ink cartridges and batteries, making sure these heavy metal products do not pollute the environment. Unfortunately, the rest is trash, but each year BC has reduced its trash waste significantly by adhering to these practices. Another way to reduce waste is by making sure your water is used only when needed and all leaks are reported to facilities by the “work order” link on their Web site.

Last, but not least, make sure you check out the amazing organic and local food options that BC offers in the dining halls, Addie’s Loft, and at the fall Farmers’ Market outside of Corcoran Commons every Thursday. Some perks include the offering of fair trade and organic coffee, all cage-free eggs, and meat that has no added growth hormones, antibiotics, and is from animals fed a vegetarian diet. With all these reasons and more, there’s no excuse not to make a change now. If you want to get involved, connect with environmental groups EcoPledge, SustainBC, or Real Food on campus.

Elizabeth Barthelmes is a staff columnist for The Heights. She welcomes comments at marketplace@bcheights.com.