The Heights April 10, 2017 by The Heights

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The Independent Student Newspaper of Boston College

EST. 1919

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MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017

OUR YOUTH

TRUTH OR DAIR

ARTS

SPORTS

The period piece explores the timeless youth present in the 1980s.

Tennis brought Asiya Dair, the champion of Kazakhstan, around the world and back.

Behind Seven Runners’ Inspirations to Finish the Marathon Carson Truesdell isn’t just aiming to ﬁnish— he wants to ﬁnish fast.

Maddie Perlewitz had to overcome chronic stomach pain to race.

Day After Day

BY ARCHER PARQUETTE

BY BERNADETTE DARCY

Features Editor

Heights Staff

After the first attempt to film him running, Carson Truesdell, CSOM ’17, jogged toward the camera, smiling. “Was I too fast?” He had been. Truesdell’s first run through the slush in front of the Doug Flutie statue outside Alumni Stadium had been faster than the pace we needed for the accompanying video. Despite the gusts of snow pelting him and the slippery cement under his shoes, he laughed and ran back to the start point. He repeated the run again, this time slowing

Maddie Perlewitz, MCAS ’17, has always been an athlete. The Wisconsin native was an avid soccer player, competing at the varsity level in high school while taking on a club team in the offseason. She planned to play the sport she loved so dearly in college, but chose instead to focus on the grueling pre-med track. Still, Perlewitz wanted to remain active. She took up weightlifting during her freshman year at Boston College. When she saw the Boston Marathon on her first Patriots’ Day, she hoped to tackle JULIA HOPKINS / HEIGHTS EDITOR

See Carson Truesdell, A8

Truesdell (above) is one of seven runners The Heights proﬁled leading up to this year’s Boston Marathon, which is a week from today.

See Maddie Perlewitz, A4

Psych Professor Seeks to Gauge Interest in Neuroscience Major Christianson has yet to reveal the results of the email survey. BY COLE DADY For The Heights

AND JOSHUA HOLTZ Heights Staff John Christianson, a neuroscientist and the Gianinno Family Sesquicentennial Assistant Professor of Psychology at Boston College, emailed a brief survey

to psychology students on Monday, March 27, and received roughly 250 responses out of the nearly 1,000 students emailed. The survey asked students to rate their agreement or disagreement with various statements, such as, “A minor in neuroscience would satisfy my academic goals,” and, “Assuming I would still graduate on time, if BC offered a neuroscience B.S., I would change to that major today.” For now, Christianson won’t share results of his survey, which was sent to

psychology majors and any student who has taken a psychology class. “The goal of the survey was to quantify the opinions of our current students so that we can use that as part of a comprehensive self-study,” Christianson said in an interview. After a satisfactory response rate, the survey was closed on Tuesday, April 4. That “self-study,” which is an attempt to examine how a neuroscience program at BC might best be created, if at all, is still ongoing. At some point, survey results will be made public, and may be

featured, sometime in the near future, in a white paper or an executive summary of the self-study linked to the psychology department’s website. “We’re also evaluating our department from the faculty level—what areas we want to strengthen, how these align with trends in the field, and how what we could do as a neuroscience program compares to what other excellent neuroscience programs are doing [at other universities],” Christianson said. Among the 40 highest-ranked national universities in the United States,

Boston College is ranked 31st. Of those 40 institutions, 18 offer a major in neuroscience, according to U.S. News and World Report. “What we can’t assess is how many people didn’t come to BC because we don’t have a major in neuroscience,” Christianson cautioned. Neuroscience, an interdisciplinary field which consists of the study of the nervous system, is a field in which BC’s department of psychology, which stud-

See Neuroscience, A3

In Flipped Classroom, CJBC to Share Info With Professors Thus far, 10 of the 25 professors invited have said they would go. BY MARY KATE DINORCIA Heights Staff This Tuesday, Climate Justice at Boston College (CJBC) will flip the classroom by putting professors into the seats of students at their new event titled “Climate Justice Teachback: Trumping Climate Denial.” At

the event, which will be held in McGuinn 521, members of CJBC will teach their professors about the importance of the divestment movement and what actions they can take to help. CJBC invited 25 professors, according to numbers provided by the group, and, so far, 10 professors have confirmed they are attending the event. These professors include Tony Laramie, an adjunct professor of economics, and Elizabeth Wallace, a professor of English. At press time, no professors have responded to request for comment.

CJBC’s goal is to explain the importance of divestment to faculty so that more professors can work towards educating the student body on the issue through the courses they teach or clubs they advise. “We hope to move people more from being passive allies in this fight to becoming more active and more involved,” said Aaron Salzman, a member of CJBC and MCAS ’20. This action could range from faculty incorporating this discussion in their classrooms, signing petitions, or getting more

involved at on-campus rallies. “We would like to have professors feel like they’re on the same page with us in terms of what the issue is and how to go about working towards a solution,” Salzman said. Salzman said that while there will likely be professors present who are already aware of the divestment movement, the event may serve as a catalyst for faculty to take more action in spreading awareness on campus. Although he explained that this event will increase overall awareness on current

issues regarding climate change, Salzman also pointed out that faculty support will add legitimacy to CJBC’s fight and spread the word in a much more impactful way than the club itself can. “It definitely shapes the overall culture a lot better than action from individual students.” Salzman said. “Rather than having students just talk to friends about divestment, you have faculty who have a lot more access to students and a lot more influence telling them that divestment is important.” 

GSA, Mogan Discuss BC’s Free Speech Policy The Graduate Senate met with Mogan, the Dean of Students. BY CONNOR MURPHY News Editor

SHAAN BIJWADIA / HEIGHTS STAFF

Over 300 students attended this year’s Holi celebration, A3.

INSIDE THIS ISSUE

NEWS: University Ethics

Panel discusses money and transparency in higher education...................................A2

Members of the Graduate Senate met with Dean of Students Thomas Mogan on Thursday to discuss requested revisions to Boston College’s free expression policies. Mogan and two students who were present commented after the fact on what took place. Craig Ford, executive director of the Graduate Student Association and GMCAS ’21, and Gloria McGillen, a member of Eradicate BC Racism and LGSOE ’17, presented a report and recommendations on

FEATURES: Hometown, Downtown

Emma Howes’ poor luck hasn’t stopped her from keeping her Marathon promise........A5

INDEX

BC’s free expression policies that included some ideas for changes and additions. Ford said a similar report had been prepared by the Faculty for Justice, although it could not be obtained at press time. At the meeting, the GSA also officially endorsed BC’s Graduate Employees Union, which filed papers with the National Labor Relations Board in March and hopes to hold an election before the end of the semester to gain bargaining rights with the University. Ford said the group has received some pushback over publicizing the endorsement. The Office of Graduate Student Life has advised the GSA that it is not appropriate to use University channels like its Facebook group or newsletter, to

See GSA, A3

NEWS.......................... A2 SPORTS......................B1

The Heights

TOP

things to do on campus this week

Former United States Ambassador to Greece Nicholas Burns will speak about the importance of U.S. relations with Greece and Europe with the new Donald Trump presidency tonight at 6 p.m. in McGuinn 121. Burns was also undersecretary of State for political affairs during the George W. Bush administration.

Monday, Arpil 10, 2017

The Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life will host an event titled “The Ethics of Citizenship in the Trump Era” featuring Eric Owens, interim director of the Boisi Center. Owens will discuss what it means to be an American citizen in the Trump era. The event will take place on Tuesday at 12 p.m. at 24 Quincy Rd.

Pascal Brice, director general of the French Office for the Protection of Refugees, will talk about refugee acceptance in France and the European Union on Tuesday from 3:30 to 5:00 p.m. in the Woods School Conference Room in St. Mary’s Hall. The event is sponsored by the Woods College Graduate Programs.

NEWS Local University Presidents Discuss Board Diversity BRIEFS By Chris Russo

Leahy Signs Letter

University President Rev. William P. Leahy, S.J. signed a letter on behalf of Boston College late last month calling for members of Congress to oppose recent proposals cutting funding to various federal student aid services. The open letter was released on Friday, and was written by the Student Alliance Organization. There were 576 organizations that signed the letter, including Boston College, Georgetown University, Boston University, and Harvard University. “Federal student aid serves a critical role in preserving access to higher education, and enabling student success at a time when postsecondary education has never been more necessary to support the American economy,” the letter writes. The proposals suggest cutting, or eliminating, funding for Pell Grants, Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants (SEOG), Federal Work Study (FWS), TRIO, GEAR UP, among other programs. “As you consider the best ways to meet the needs of our country, we ask that you continue this support for our nation’s economy by opposing any attempts to cut or reallocate funds away from federal student aid programs,” the letter writes. The letter underlines the importance of a bachelor’s or graduate degree, citing the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ finding that as of Jan. 2017, the unemployment rate for workers with a high school diploma was 5.9 percent, as opposed to just 2.5 percent for those with bachelor’s or graduate/professional degrees.

Prof. Wins Book Prize Ling Zhang, an associate professor of history, has been selected for the American Society for Environmental History’s 2017 George Perkins Marsh Prize for best book on environmental history for her book The River, the Plain, and the State: An Environmental Drama in Northern Song China, 1048-1128. She is the second Boston College faculty member in the department to earn the prize. The book is about when the Yellow River flooded several communities in northeast China in 1048. The river changed its course and turned the Hebei Plain into a delta, affecting the lives of millions of people in Hebei. “I feel as if I’m accepted by my peers, and that’s something I truly appreciate,” Zhang said to The Chronicle. “When I started out, I was an economic historian. I never knew there was a field for environmental history, never trained to become part of it, and didn’t have a sense of the fundamental questions or the methodology that characterize the discipline.” Zhang first learned about the Hebei disaster while researching the area’s economic history. She used elements of geography, hydraulic engineering, and political science to write the book. The book, however, is not solely a historical account of the event. It is also a drama featuring three major actors—the river, the land and its residents, and the imperial government of China. “The state couldn’t see beyond its own perceptions and desires and wouldn’t accept the fundamental constraints of the environmental world,” she said. “As China, the U.S., and other nations confront environmental problems on an even greater scale, how willing and able are we to learn the painful lessons from history?”

Assoc. News Editor

Universities often use the word “we” when referring to their students, but not everyone is represented in this “we,” according to Jackie Jenkins Scott, a former president of Wheelock College. Margaret McKenna, former president of Suffolk University, specifically discussed Boston College’s board of trustees. Out of the 50 members, 11 are women. Two of the members are college presidents, which she said is good because they understand the business of education. Scott, McKenna, and Brian Linnane, president of Loyola University Maryland and BC ’77, spoke at a panel on Friday afternoon about stakeholders at universities. The discussion was a part of a three day conference, “Toward a Culture of University Ethics,” sponsored by the Jesuit Institute, the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life, the Institute for the Liberal Arts, and the Lowell Humanities Series. “The majority of people on university boards know nothing about the business,” McKenna said. “For the most part, even after they’re there, they know nothing about this business.” McKenna described the demographics of boards of trustees at universities across the country as mostly older white men who are often lawyers or businessmen, whereas student bodies are mostly women and, increasingly, minority students. “The governing boards do not reflect the population of our students in any way, shape, or form,” she said. Doctors make up the board of a hos-

pital, she said. Yet faculty are not often included on the boards of universities. Some university boards have no educators on them at all, she said. On a corporate board, there are shareholders. Board members can be voted off by the shareholders if they are not doing a good job. At a university, shareholders are students, faculty, and alumni. But if a university board does a bad job, these shareholders of the university cannot vote them off. She said many university presidents make it one of their primary goals to move up in the U.S. News and World Report rankings. This often involves taking money out of need-based scholarships to “buy” more students who have no need but will help the university rise in the rankings. “No one says to you ‘Is that in line with our values—to become more selective?’” McKenna said. Scott served as the president of Wheelock College from 2004 to 2016. She was the first African-American president at the University and the third woman president, despite the fact the college served only women for 79 years and is currently made up of 86 percent women. Scott described the challenges she faced as president of the university. Administrators, faculty, and staff were not on the same page and often had different beliefs of what was fair and just. Scott often had to reflect on whether equality or equity would take precedence in fulfilling the school’s mission. After earning her position at Wheelock College, Scott quickly learned that she was not a part of the traditional

“we.” She commended the members of Wheelock’s board for being courageous enough to open themselves to new ideas about what a president should look like, be like, and what experiences a president should bring to the table. “They were strong enough … to want to redefine the ‘we’ of the institution, to decide for inclusion and the future over hierarchy and history,” she said. Scott said women and minorities are important stakeholders at universities across the country, but they are not represented equally on the board of trustees. There has been a large shift in student population, as students are coming from more diverse backgrounds. While the student demographic is changing, the administration has remained largely the same. She said that there are steps administrators at universities should take to promote equity for women and see the value of nontraditional leadership. Men should join women to push for change, Scott said. She also called for the compensation of women who have been excluded by creating opportunities for them to grow and take on leadership roles. Linnae spoke about his experience as president of Loyola University Maryland and how he has interacted with the surrounding neighborhood in his position. Loyola is surrounded by affluent neighborhoods on three sides of its campus. The fourth side of the campus, bordered by York Road, is a low-income neighborhood. West of the road, the neighborhood is 75 percent white, has a population with a median income is $110,000, and has a high number of bachelor’s degrees. East of the road, the neighborhood is 89 percent

African American, with a median income of $39,000, and only 21 percent of inhabitants have a bachelor’s degree. “It’s really almost a tale of two cities,” he said. Loyola has helped to develop after school programs for the neighborhood’s youth and a clinical center to deal with educational issues students in the area may face. It also has successfully advocated for streetscaping along York Road. It created a summertime farmer’s market that allows residents to buy fruits and vegetables at a low rate, helping to solve the neighborhood’s food desert. Linnae has also spoken with Baltimore’s mayor to push for methadone clinics to be hospital-based. He has noticed that when these clinics are placed in communities, although the clinics do good work, they also attract people who sell drugs. The location of these clinics allows for recovering addicts to more easily fall back into their harmful habits. During a brief question and answer period at the end of the event, the panelists explained how universities can become more inclusive and properly use “we.” “One of the most interesting things I’ve found is that the campuses that have the highest voting rates are the campuses where people feel most like ‘we,’” McKenna said. McKenna also reflected on her time at Suffolk and the unnecessary extravagance of her office while she was president. “When I walked into the president’s office at Suffolk, I almost fell over,” she said. “It was unbelievable how huge it was. That kind of symbolism—there is no ‘we’ there.” n

Bible Supports Theory of Evolution, Newsom Says By Katie Murphy For The Heights Most people think of science and theology as standing on opposite ends of the spectrum when it comes to things such as climate change and evolution. But in a lecture on Thursday titled “Climate Change as a Consequence of Human Presence: A Dialogue between Anthropology and Biblical Studies,” Carol Newsom explained how the two are not as opposed as people believe. Newsom is the Candler Professor of the Old Testament and the Hebrew Bible in the Candler School of Theology at Emory University. She is known for her work translating the Dead Sea Scrolls and challenging long-held assumptions about women in the Bible. This lecture was part of the annual lecture series given in honor of Rev. Richard J. Clifford, S.J, sponsored by the by School of Theology and Ministry and supported by the Kitz family. Newsom then discussed climate change’s relationship with theology. In her interpretation, the creation story of Genesis 2-3 is not against the theory of

evolution but instead supports it. Newsom elaborated, saying that when God first created human beings, they did not have rational thought and were on the same level as other animals. When Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge, they gained rational thought that was meant only for divine beings. Newsom likened this transformation to evolution. Newsom also cited Adam and Eve eating from the tree and gaining rational thought as the driving force behind why humans speed up climate change. Newsom spoke about the impact that climate change has on people’s lives. In the past few years, the World Bank, the Pentagon, and other organizations have published reports that predict a bleak future for Earth’s climate, showing that the global temperature has gone up 1.5 degrees celsius, approaching the 2 degree Celsius point which has been regarded as the critical temperature. She also talked about how scientists have said that the earth is currently in the beginning stages of the next mass extinction. This man-made extinction is

different from the first five mass extinction events in the earth’s history, which were caused by natural events. Over the past 250 years, the Industrial Revolution and growth of technology has sped up climate change exponentially, but humans have altered the world around them long before then. Since the time of hunting and gathering, humans have contributed to the extinction of prey species, and because the prey species would die, so would the predators that would hunt them. “This is a time of immense change for the earth, but this is also a time for change for us as the human species and I hope that we’ll be more self aware, more humble, more wise than we have been,” she explained Human beings have rational thought but do not wield it correctly, according to Newsom. She explained how the knowledge from the tree that Adam and Eve ate from was only meant for divine beings and, in human beings, it leads them to make decisions that harm the environment. The rational thought that makes human distinct from other species is that

same thing that makes us incompatible with the earth and its biodiversity. Newsom talked about reasons to be hopeful. She explained that along with research into the degree of damage done to the earth so far, there are also a positive things that are being discovered, like cheaper and more efficient ways to harvest wind and solar power. “While there are reasons to be optimistic, we have to realize that not everything will be saved,” she said. “The world that comes after this century will be very different than the one that existed before … but I don’t see it in dystopian terms.” The realities of climate change are very serious, but Newsom holds hope in human being’s ability to reverse or lessen its effects. “The resources of both science and our religious traditions offer us ways of living with an understanding of who we are, with seriousness of purpose and yet with humility, that our actions, successful or not, are involved in a process that will incorporate them into a larger story of this marvelous world and God’s intentions for it,” she said. n

POLICE BLOTTER: 4/5/17 – 4/7/17 Wednesday, April 5

Williams of Boston, Mass. at University Health Services.

9:30 a.m. - A report was filed regarding a well-being check on a BC student at an off-campus location. 10:02 a.m. - A report was filed regarding a warrant arrest of non-BC affiliate John

5:24 p.m. - A report was filed regarding medical assistance provided to a BC student who was transported to a medical facility at 2000 Commonwealth Ave.

Thursday, April 6 3:38 a.m. - A report was filed regarding a breaking and entering by non-BC affiliate Adam Auditore of Medford, Mass. at the Mods. Auditore was arrested for B&E nighttime for felony, attempt to commit a crime, and trespassing.

7:49 p.m. - A report was filed regarding a medical incident at the Middle Campus Lots.

—Source: The Boston College Police Department

Admitted Eagle Day Edition of CORRECTIONS What has impressed you the most about BC so far? “Visually the whole scenery.” —Joe Iaske, Easton, Conn.

“I think the campus and the people here are really different.”—CJ Araujo, New York City, N.Y.

“Everything.”—Julia Fahy, Aspen, Col.

“I came here a while ago, and my tour guide was absolutely fantastic.” —Madison Gabouer, Lemont, Ill.

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

The Heights

Monday, April 10, 2017

At Annual Holi Celebration, Colorful First Signs of Spring By Chris Russo Assoc. News Editor Colored powder remains on Stokes Lawn as the only remnant of Saturday’s Holi celebration, which was hosted by the South Asian Student Association (SASA). Over 300 students attended the event, which has been celebrated at Boston College for more than a decade. Holi is a festival of colors celebrated in India, Nepal, and Pakistan, and marks the arrival of spring. It is not only a holiday, but also a game played by friends and families across the world in their backyards. Participants throw colored powder at each other, which is made up of flour and chalk material. The result is a rainbow of colors on people’s white clothing. The event was previously held on Brighton Campus, but was brought to Stokes Lawn last year to make it more accessible to students. Students of all backgrounds were invited to the event so they could learn about this South Asian tradition. “Hopefully we set the example for other students to share their cultures as well,” Aditya Luthra, co-president of SASA and CSOM ’17, said. “I want Holi to be a symbol of that.” n

Shaan Bijwadia / Heights Staff

Interest in Major Gauged as Psych Hires More Neuroscientists Neuroscience, from A1 ies the human mind and its intersection with human behavior, has considerable academic strength. Approximately seven years ago, a group of faculty from various disciplines gave a presentation to the BC administration concerning the possibility of launching a new, interdisciplinary neuroscience major. Despite the presentation’s positive reception, the major was not created. Instead, a B.S. in psychology was created and first awarded in 2012. It features largely the same curriculum that was contained in the 2010 presentation, though it lacks some courses from other disciplines, such as biology, chemistry, and physics, which are often part of neuroscience programs. At the time, some felt that BC had insufficient resources to offer a competitive neuroscience program—only seven professors in the psychology department were neuroscientists. Since then, efforts toward creating a neuroscience major have languished due to a lack of momentum. Since then, BC has hired 25 new professors, across several departments, with interests in neuroscience—as a result of this recent growth, a larger variety of neuroscience courses and research opportunities are now available, and the B.S. track has become even stronger in neuroscience. Some of those hires were replacements to professors who departed, but most are ad-

ditional positions. “We have what feels [to students] like a disconnect between what we offer in the psychology department, in terms of courses, and what we call it,” Christianson said. The psychology department offers two degrees—a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Science—in psychology. The B.A. track gives students extensive choice in what they can study, and a breadth of exposure to a wide range of topics, while the B.S. track emphasizes upper-level courses on behavioral and cognitive neuroscience—it was intended to enable students to go on to work successfully in the neuroscience field. Today, 11 of the 24 psychology faculty members at BC are neuroscientists, who publish their research in neuroscience journals and teach a number of classes in the field. The course load required for a psychology B.S. is roughly comparable to that of a neuroscience major at many universities with prestigious programs in that field. “We could do something right now, which would be just to change the name [of the B.S. track to a major in neuroscience], and really do nothing else—and that would really be in line with a lot of what’s out there—but that might not be the best thin for BC,” Christianson said. Christianson’s self-study aims to answer difficult questions about a possible neuroscience program and its place at BC—how to provide recognition to students earning the B.S. degree for their neuroscience-heavy

coursework, how to shape a program that fits within the University’s mission to approach curricula holistically, how it might interlock with the Core Curriculum, and how such a program might compare to those of other universities. The breadth of the field of neuroscience is such that having a psychology degree is not unusual among those working in the field. “We may put too much stock in the name of our undergraduate degrees,” Christianson said. “For example, English or economics majors can go to graduate school in neuroscience if they’ve taken the right set of background courses.” Since neuroscience is an interdisciplinary field—drawing upon psychology, biology, and computer science, among other disciplines—extensive collaboration among BC departments would be needed to create such a program, and BC’s lack of a medical school or an engineering program poses a challenge. Provost and Dean of Faculties David Quigley said in an email that new interdisciplinary majors require a high level of support from existing departments. “The primary costs [of a new major] are faculty to teach in the program and administrative support for students and faculty,” Quigley said. “Additional costs include research expenses as well as funds directed toward lectures and seminars by visiting scholars.”

Asst. News Editor Boston College students ran laps around the Chestnut Hill Reservoir on Sunday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Teams of up to nine students ran nine laps around the Res to raise awareness and fundraise for BC’s Campus School in the second annual Campus School Relay Res Run. The event raised $1,865 this year, with 109 runners. The Campus School educates students ages 3 to 21 with disabilities through personalized special education. Currently, 42 students from 31 towns are enrolled in the school. Its main source of revenue is from the towns that enroll students in the school, so raising awareness and fundraising events contribute greatly.

in employment or acceptance to graduate schools were harmed by not having a neuroscience major on their resumes, Christianson was skeptical. “I think [students] think it does, [but] I’m not sure—having a degree from Boston College means a ton, and the name of the university carries, probably, more clout than the name of the department,” Christianson said. “I think if [students] are really interested in neuroscience, they have to explain themselves [to potential employers].” Grace Elliott, MCAS ’18 , who is currently pursuing a B.S. in psychology, agrees. “I have found that I have to qualify my psych degree by explaining that I have a focus in neuroscience and take a lot of bioheavy classes,” Elliott said. “It would be helpful to specify what exactly I try to study.” While Christianson is still currently in what he called an early “plan-generation” phase of self-study, when asked what he’d like to see in five years, he expressed a personal hope that BC will offer a major in neuroscience, and that there would be a commitment for the University to become a leader in the field. “If students who are are reading this [article], or faculty, or anyone want to weigh in on this [question], now is the time to have their voice heard,” Christianson said. “We want to be as inclusive as possible to students, faculty, or any other interested parties.” n

GSA Meets With Mogan GSA, from A1

Julia Hopkins / Heights Editor

Relay Res Run Supports Campus School By Heidi Dong

Neuroscience research, in particular, requires expensive instruments, extensive work space, and intensive collaboration among faculty working in close proximity to one another, and, ideally, a “wet lab” allowing students to engage in hands-on study and faculty to conduct research. Currently, the psychology department does not have such a laboratory. By consistently hiring neuroscientists over the past decade, the psychology department—and ultimately the University, which approves new hires—has demonstrated a commitment to growing the psychology department’s strength in neuroscience, but commitments by other departments are also critical. Those other departments, such as biology, chemistry, physics, and computer science, do not have a significant neuroscience presence—BC’s relatively smaller size, compared to universities of comparable prestige, has led these departments to specialize in subject areas in which they have considerable expertise. Those areas, generally, have not included neuroscience. In addition, the sub-fields of molecular, developmental, and computational neuroscience, which are critical components of a strong neuroscience program, require strength in biology and computer science. Many of the relevant computer science classes at BC are currently operating at close to full capacity. When asked if students’ prospects

According to Kristen Morin, marketing and outreach coordinator for the Campus School and BC ’86, before the Boston Marathon bombing, about 300 Campus School Volunteers would run the Boston Marathon as “bandits,” or unregistered runners, and would raise about $75,000 per year for the Campus School. Since the Boston Bombings in 2013, however, bandits are no longer allowed to run in the Boston Marathon due to heightened security measures, and the Campus School could no longer receive the donations that were made through bandit runners. “[The Reservoir Relay] only ever came to be because we were no longer raising a significant amount of money from running as bandits in the Boston Marathon,” said

Gina Iozzo, co-president of the Campus School Volunteers and MCAS ’17. According to Iozzo, the Campus School Volunteers have also been working to expand their golf tournament, which brought in over $60,000 last year. They have also added a spikeball tournament in October which brings in about $1,000, and have sponsored a team to run in the Newton Chilly Half Marathon, which raised $26,000 last year. The relay event is mainly an event to spread awareness for the Campus School. Last year, the first year of the Res Run, 115 BC students came out to run around the Reservoir, raising about $1,500. Six families with students enrolled in the Campus School were present to cheer runners on as they completed the relay. n

promote the Union, according to Ford. “I see it partially as a freedom of information issue, that if there is an act of the Senate, that should be able to be made public,” Ford said. “Because I don’t see it as promoting the Union as much as promoting the activities of the Senate.” BC’s official policy is that only registered student organizations (RSOs) may register demonstrations, distribute literature, or table. The free expression report argues that BC’s exclusion of non-Registered Student Organizations from the demonstration process “offers no demonstrable benefit or protection to the campus community and risks functioning as a discriminatory barrier against students who belong to unregistered student groups.” The recommendations include for BC to hold a campus-wide forum on free expression; for BC to create a free expression handbook as a resource for students; to allow groups to petition for the right to register events and demonstrations and distribute literature; and to create a Committee on Free Expression at BC that would have appeal power over decisions on groups’ petitions. These recommendations are the result of concerns raised by Eradicate, which recently had seven members sanctioned for their involvement in two unregistered demonstrations last fall, that BC’s current policies are unclear. In statements this semester, Mogan has disputed that Eradicate members were confused, saying it was obvious that members of Eradicate were clear on the policies. Ford said Mogan did not comment at the

meeting on the presentation of the report. He said Mogan has indicated that he plans to go before BC’s Board of Department Chairs and the Provost’s Advisory Council to hear more student perspectives, and then potentially seek an administrative resolution. Mogan said in an email that they would review next steps after those meetings. One argument in Ford and McGillen’s report is that it is needlessly restrictive to prevent non-RSOs from registering, especially given that demonstrations’ content must already be vetted. An abortion rights group would not be eligible for RSO status because of its conflicts with Catholicism, for example. The report’s recommendation that any group be able to petition for a demonstration or advertising rights comes out of that finding. One concern is trans activism, in theory not eligible for RSO status. “The discussion was a little muddled between demonstrating and outright advocacy on campus, versus academic discussions,” Ford said, referencing a lecture given last year by Shane Ortega, a transgender activist. McGillen said she is optimistic their recommendations will continue to earn support from more faculty and students, although she said it is concerning that an Undergraduate Government of BC proposal made two years ago failed. “I think it makes Eradicate concerned as a group that there’s just going to continue to be a lot of administrative resistance to reforming these policies in all of the ways that we would like to see,” she said. “Policy reform at BC is often slow to respond to student concerns, even those that have been long expressed.” n

THE HEIGHTS

MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017

Recovering From Injury: Kathryn Lieder BY COLE DADY For The Heights She had been training to run the Boston Marathon for months, and it seemed as if nothing could go wrong. She had already trained so hard and pushed herself past her limits in preparation for the race on Marathon Monday. But Kathryn Lieder, MCAS ’18, incurred a knee injury about a month ago that forced her to temporarily halt her training. This unexpected occurrence presented a major hurdle to Lieder as the date of the Marathon approached. But if she has learned anything through her training, it is that she must not let obstacles prevent her from achieving her goals. She has adapted well to her injury by working with a physical therapist and cross training on the side. She

also believes that the energy of the day will push her through the race. “Sometimes things get in your way, but I’m still so excited to run,” she said. For Lieder, the glass is always half-full, for her unwavering positivity allows her to overcome whatever challenges come her way. As the Marathon is only a week away, Lieder cannot help but feel grateful for the opportunity to run and proud of how far she has come. She began her running career in high school, performing on her school’s track team in short distance events, like the 4x400 meters relay. Nonetheless, she did not begin running long distance until the midst of her college years. Freshman year, she was in awe of the marathoners whom she witnessed running down Commonwealth Ave.

in the rain. Prior to this experience, she believed that only a certain type of individual could run a marathon. She now realized that many of the people running Boston hardly fit the image of a marathoner that she held. They were people of all ages—young and old—who were alike in their tenacity and determination. “I realized how much more mental running is than physical,” she said. “If these people could run a marathon, I figured I could too.” At the beginning of her sophomore year, she signed up for the Newton Chilly Half Marathon, inspired by the long-distance runners she saw, and decided to fundraise for the Boston College Campus School. She incrementally built up mileage, eventually running 11 to 12 miles. She then ran the half-marathon with flying colors, achieving her goal time

FRANCISCO RUELA / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Kathryn Lieder is running the Boston Marathon for The Adventure Project, a charity that helps young cancer survivors recover.

and successfully fundraising for the Campus School. Because of her success, she developed an insatiable passion for longdistance running that motivated her to be on the other side of the fence on Marathon Monday. She began thinking about running the Boston Marathon last spring and later applied in the fall through the Mission, a charity out of Fairfield, Conn., equipping young cancer survivors with the knowledge of how to lead healthy, vibrant lives. The Mission initially began as a yearly bike-riding fundraiser to build the organization’s current cancer survivorship center. Lieder has established a personal connection to the charity, having ridden in the annual fundraising event since fourth grade. More specifically, she is working with a program within the charity called the Adventure Project, which aims to provide young cancer survivors with individual and group physical training to help them restrengthen and gain confidence in their physical abilities. The charity was started by Jeffrey Keith, BC ’84, who has never let obstacles slow him down, be it having cancer as a child or enduring a leg amputation at the mere age of 12. He played Division I lacrosse at BC and became the first man to run across America with a prosthetic limb after graduation. Lieder finds that his story puts everything into perspective for her. His perseverance shows her that she

can push herself much further than she thinks, and her limits are just a roadblock she has to pass on her path to success. She is running in honor of Ryan, a 14-year-old cancer survivor who continually inspires her through his endurance and motivation. Ryan, who wishes he could fit in with kids his age, wants to play sports but is not strong enough to do so. Nonetheless, the Adventure Project gives Lieder the chance to participate in Ryan’s physical training. As such, she has seen firsthand his admirable work ethic and tenacity, which have helped him come such a long way in regaining his strength. Lieder started training for the Marathon over Winter Break, following a loose training plan and performing incrementally longer runs overtime. Along with her training, she also has to meet a fundraising goal for the Mission. Although balancing fundraising with her other commitments is a challenge, she stays on top of it by gathering financial support from friends and family and even selling Marathon Monday t-shirts. Running for a cause has changed her idea of what it means to run. On the one hand, she uses running as a stress reliever and a way to energize herself and feel present. On the other, Ryan has kept her motivated throughout the entire process. A marathon is the ultimate test in perseverance and drive, but more importantly, it is a chance for her to serve others. 

Community in a solo sport: Maddie Perlewitz Maddie Perlewitz, from A1 every athlete’s ultimate goal: the grueling, 26.2-mile course through the heart of New England. “My dad ran a marathon a couple of years ago, but I never considered running a marathon myself,” Perlewitz said. “Then I came to Boston, watched the Boston Marathon, and was completely inspired.” After 400 miles, 20 weeks of training, and $10,000 worth of fundraising, Perlewitz will finally reach that unreachable goal. But her journey to race day has been an arduous one. It wasn’t so long ago when the Marathon was an impossible feat. As a freshman at BC, Perlewitz was hospitalized for severe stomach pain on four separate occasions. Doctors struggled to find the underlying cause of her pain. During her sophomore year, Perlewitz underwent exploratory surgery on her abdomen. A month later, she underwent another surgery, and slowly, her chronic stomach pain began to subside. “I found answers and feel a ton better,” Perlewitz said. “It’s one of the reasons I’m running—I’m really thankful for my health and I’ll never take it for granted.” As Perlewitz coped with the fear and uncertainty surrounding her health struggles, her parents were in Wisconsin, working and taking care of her younger sister. As a result, Perlewitz faced her health issues primarily on her own, undergoing surgery

without her parents nearby. Once fully healthy after her sophomore year, Perlewitz began on her new path as a personal trainer at the Flynn Recreation Complex. “I went up to one of the trainers in the Plex and said, ‘This is awesome, how do you do it?’” Perlewitz said. Perlewitz works to help other BC women feel empowered through exercise. She is running the Boston Marathon to raise money for 261 Fearless, an organization committed to empowering women around the world through exercise and community. During the 1967 Boston Marathon, Kathrine Switzer was running her second mile when an infuriated race director attacked her, attempting to rip off her runner’s bib, numbered 261. He declared the race was for men only, and was furious Switzer entered the event. In her application for the race, she signed her name K.V. Switzer, and her gender went undetected until race day. With the help of her fellow runners, Switzer got away from the official and went on to finish the race. Throughout her running career, she completed 39 marathons and won the New York City Marathon in 1974. In 2015, Switzer founded 261 Fearless as a means to empower women to overcome life’s obstacles and embrace healthy living. Perlewitz chose to run for 261 Fearless, in part, because the organization’s message resonated with her personal journey of conquer-

ing unforeseen challenges. “Just being able to go through that and emerge as kind of a fearless woman, if you will, definitely made me identify with 261’s cause,” she said. Even when she felt her best, however, Perlewitz never thought she would be running a marathon someday, let alone the Boston Marathon. At the beginning of her training, she felt intimidated. The first time Perlewitz went on a group run in Boston with members of CharityTeams—an organization that assists nonprofits like 261 Fearless fundraise through athletic events—she felt apprehensive. “I didn’t know what to expect,” Perlewitz said. “I didn’t know what people’s running levels were going to be, I didn’t know the course, didn’t know anything—fueling, shoes, you name it.” Yet once she met up with the runners, Perlewitz felt at ease. “I was completely in the dark, but everyone was so welcoming and supportive,” she said. “Whether you’re a runner or not, they back you.” Weeks one, two, and three of Perelwitz’ training consisted of base training exercises. The goal of base training is to develop runners’ endurance, or increase their aerobic capacity, before delving into more taxing, race-specific workouts. After base training, runners engage in strength and speed exercises, slowly building mileage capacity up to 26.2.

Typically, Perlewitz runs middledistance routes three times a week. On the weekends, she completes one long-distance run along the Marathon course. During her base training period, Perlewitz’ long runs were about six miles each. Now, they range from 12 to 21 miles, depending on the week of training. “You go up in intensity for two weeks, then scale back for one, just to make sure you don’t get injured,” Perlewitz said. Sundays are cross-training days for Perlewitz. She cycles, uses the ergometer, and teaches fitness classes at the Plex. On cross-training days, she exercises to maintain cardiovascular fitness without running. Beyond establishing the physical fitness to run a marathon, another essential component to marathon training is learning how to fuel and hydrate during a race. Fueling refers to the intake of calories and electrolytes during a long-distance race that help runners gain energy and maintain appropriate blood sugar levels. Some runners consume energy chews or gels designed for ingestion during exercise, while others have sports drinks like Gatorade. “A big part of training, and a big part of what I’ve been working on over the last 18 weeks, is trying to figure out what works for me in terms of hydration and fueling,” Perlewitz said. “Learning how your stomach reacts and figuring out when you need to fuel is crucial for keeping

your energy levels up.” Perlewitz’ least favorite thing about distance running is the first six miles of any course. She finds it challenging to establish a rhythm during these initial miles, but by mile six, she finds her stride. “After that, I really enjoy it, and it kind of frees your mind,” she said. On days when she feels her motivation slipping, Perlewitz looks at her online fundraising page for 261 Fearless and reads the comments. She looks at the charity’s website and reads about for whom she is running. “That’s a big motivator for me because I remember that this race isn’t just about me, it’s about women across the globe,” she said. On race day, Perlewitz’ parents will be waiting for her at the finish line. Her two sisters, who are also at BC, will be cheering her on too. “Running the Marathon not only speaks to [Maddie’s] physical strength, but also her mental strength,” said Gabby Perlewitz , Maddie’s twin sister and MCAS ’17. “Raising $10,000 and completing every training run is no easy feat, and she successfully achieved both of these goals.” After pushing past the obstacles in her path, she is now entering her last week of training. Her journey to this ultimate goal has been long and strenuous, but she is ready to finally conquer what she once thought couldn’t be done. 

FRANCISCO RUELA / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Maddie Perlewitz came to campus after playing varsity soccer in high school and took up weightliﬁting and running. Now she is about to reach one of her ultimate goals, running the Boston Marathon.

THE HEIGHTS

MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017

Searching for ‘La Descente’: Hannah Bowlin BY CONNOR MURPHY News Editor Hannah Bowlin’s 21st birthday present to herself was a solo marathon. Last year, while Bowlin, MCAS ’17, was training for the Minneapolis Marathon, originally scheduled for June 5, it was cancelled because the organizers had overlooked construction work taking place on a key bridge along the route. Bowlin’s parents encouraged her to run anyway. “It wasn’t really about the race, it was about me,” she said. “I was proving to myself that I could do something and overcome something—literally the first person who ran a marathon died in Greece.”

So she ran it alone, her parents accompanying her on bikes, going a bit faster and then circling back with water and food as Bowlin looped lakes and made her way through the Twin Cities to the finish. It was really hard, she said, probably one of the most challenging things she’s done. “A marathon is more than one event to me, but everything that leads up to it,” she said. Boston will be different, extremely different in terms of just the atmosphere. Bowlin knows she can finish, but she wants to make sure she takes it slow. She ran a half-marathon last January, where she had some gastrointestinal issues and her IT band—a muscle along the outside of the leg,

from the hip to the ankle, that runners often injure—flared up. And she’s a little nervous about performing well if people are tracking her along the way. “There’s not a lot of actual pressure from my friends, but because BC is such a visible place on the route, I feel pressure to keep my act together until Mile 21,” she said with a grin. Bowlin’s freshman Marathon Monday experience was pretty typical, with the tank top and early wake-up. She spent the last two years, though, working for BC EMS, providing treatment to runners along the course, which shifted her perception of the Marathon from a fun morning to a storied tradition, an honor to partake.

FRANCISCO RUELA / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Hannah Bowlin worked for Boston College EMS for two years assisting Marathon runners before deciding to run it herself.

“When I saw [the Marathon] my freshman year, I thought it was really cool, but more of an excuse to dress up and drink,” she said. “But working it, and seeing the magnitude, the vast amount of runners, really kind of brought a whole new level of appreciation.” And she hadn’t really thought about running it until last year, when she watched one of her friends run by, somebody who hadn’t been a serious runner before, and thought “If he can do it, I can.” At that point, she was already training for Minneapolis, although the logistics of getting a charity bib for Boston are a bit more complicated. She applied in September to be on the team for the Children’s Museum, and started training and fundraising the week she heard back, in December. The museum, located in the South End, has a team of four runners. Their goal is to raise money to help build and sustain after-school and summer programs for inner-city kids in Boston Public Schools. They’re nervous this year about museum funding from the federal government, so the Marathon money is crucial. Since then, she has run between five and 15 hours a week, taking Fridays off and cross-training on Sundays. Bowlin has also had to look for some creative ways of getting her friends and family to donate, because of the number of organizations on campus that ask for students’ money. Bowlin said she has enjoyed the charity piece of the Marathon because it moves running to a team effort instead of an indi-

vidual battle of the will. Bowlin already has a lot of experience with that, from both her solo marathon and her days running up the foothills of the Alps when she was abroad last fall in Grenoble, France. She and her host brother would go out and run up and then downhill on winding footpaths, constantly looking forward, as she described it, for the three miles up. At the top was a lookout, with an old fort. On the way up, she’d repeat to herself “La descente,” which became her mantra, to push through the hard stuff for the moments that feel more like the downhill. As she started to connect more with running, finding ways to distract herself—meditating, almost—Bowlin said she got in really good shape, and when she got back to BC she set some fitness goals. That’s what led her to train for Minneapolis. “I wanted to continue that at BC because it’s a place that doesn’t always foster good body image, usually with girls but with guys as well,” she said. Bowlin won’t be in Boston for the next three years after graduation, so her next Marathon might be a while off, if at all. But she’s not ruling it out. And for now, she’s focused on what happens once she gets over Heartbreak Hill. “I think in my mind, I’ll be thinking of Mile 21 up until Mile 21,” she said. “Even if they don’t have any affiliation with BC, people say it’s their favorite place on the Marathon route, and to have that be a place where it’s also all of your best friends and people that you know is pretty special.” 

From Black Box to Blacktop: Emma Howe BY ARCHER PARQUETTE Features Editor When Emma Howe, MCAS ’18 was a senior in high school, she promised her dad that she would run the Boston Marathon. Earlier that year, Scott Howe had been diagnosed with Stage four oropharyngeal cancer. The advanced cancer of the throat and tongue required immediate and intense treatment. He underwent eight weeks of radiation and chemotherapy at the DanaFarber Cancer Institute. This meant daily radiation, major surgeries, and constant care. Howe experienced firsthand the work Dana-Farber did with her father. The doctors and nurses at the Institute helped her and her family get through the pain and fear that comes with cancer treatment. Howe was profoundly inspired by what she experienced. She learned that Dana-Farber fields a 100-person Boston Marathon team every year, which accepts applications from runners who plan to fundraise for the institute. While Dana-Farber was treating her father, she made the promise to join the team and one day run the Marathon for him. “This year was finally my year,” she said. Her father didn’t want her to run the Marathon in high school, fearing that she would burn out, but she kept working and

never forgot her promise. She had started running before the diagnosis, five years ago, when her mother, Cathy Howe, introduced her to it. Since her mother was Howe’s age, she has been running and has even run eight Boston Marathons herself. While Howe hadn’t ran competitively before that, she learned from her mother’s extensive experience and worked at long distance running up to the point where she can now run the Marathon. In the three years since her father’s diagnosis, she went to Oberlin College, transferred to Boston College, and applied to the Dana-Farber Marathon team. She was accepted and has now spent the last four months training and raising money. Most importantly, her father made a full recovery. At 5:30 a.m. most days this past semester, Howe could be found running across campus. Every weekday of training consisted of an early-morning run, after which she immediately went off to class or work at one of her two internships, depending on the day. After a day of studying international relations and economics or working as an undergraduate research fellow for BC and an intern at a Ceres, a sustainability nonprofit, she was off to rehearsal for the theatre department’s production of Kingdom City. The production, written by Sheri Wilner, this year’s Monan Professor

for Theatre Arts, ran during the end of the March after a long series of rehearsals. Her average day would end at 11 p.m., when rehearsal was over, with her next run only a few short hours away. “This has probably been the most crazy semester of my entire life,” she said. Her weekends were spent on her long run, which can be 18-to-23 miles long. The frantic “pretty unsustainable” schedule, physical difficulty, and mental roadblocks of the past few months have been straining, but she has pushed herself through it. When the running gets toughest, as she pushes to the end of her hardest 20-mile long runs, her thoughts turn to why she’s running in the first place. “My cause is so special, I just kind of think about my dad every time I get to mile 18,” she said. “It’s like, ‘keep pushing, keep pushing. You have two more to go.’” While thoughts of her father keep her going on difficult runs, her mother has remained a crucial part of Howe’s training. Unfortunately, they won’t be running the Marathon together this year. After sustaining an Achilles’ tendon injury, Howe’s mother continued running, exhibiting the same driving energy that Howe exhibits in abundance. But the injury grew worse and is now keeping Howe’s mother out of the race. “It’s kind of like I’m taking up the baton,”

FRANCISCO RUELA / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Emma Howe’s jam-packed schedule includes a morning run, classes, and rehearsal. Howe said. Her mother will be waiting at the starting line on Marathon Monday. Many marathon runners most look forward to reaching downtown Boston or passing Mile 21, but Howe’s special connection is with the starting line. Hopkinton, Mass., where the Marathon begins, is her hometown. Just the other weekend, she took her long run all the way from her apartment to her family home, 23 miles away. “That was crazy, but it was really cool to be able to run home,” she said. “Who gets to say that?”

After these long runs and months of training, as the Marathon gets closer, Howe believes the best part of working so hard has been feeling the improvement. This means not only the physical strength to run five miles without a second thought and push herself far beyond that, but the emotional strength that comes from breaking through what she is capable of and pushing herself further. A week from now, 21 miles away from home where her parents stood watching, Howe will push toward the finish line, her thoughts on the promise she made. 

A Brother’s Bond: Bennet Johnson BY DJ RECNY Executive Assistant Just shy of four years after arriving from his Minnesota hometown, Bennet Johnson, MCAS ’17, is a mere seven days from running the Boston Marathon. Johnson, an English major and former three-year editorial board member of The Heights, has wanted to make the journey from Hopkinton, Mass. to downtown Boston ever since he first arrived on campus. Now, he will be doing so while supporting a cause close to him and his family.

Unlike the speed demons that qualify for the Marathon by running fast times at other marathons, Johnson will be running in a charity bib for the Special Olympics of Massachusetts, which helps people with mental and physical disabilities compete in sports. Johnson’s brother Sam is severely autistic, and although he personally does not participate in the Special Olympics, Johnson said that raising money for the organization would allow people like his brother to compete in the games. “I wanted to do it for a charity that meant a lot to my family and that reso-

FRANCISCO RUELA / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Bennet Johnson raised $8,500 for the Special Olympics in honor of his brother Sam.

nated with me,” Johnson said. Tasked with raising at least $8,500 in donations as a minimum requirement from the Special Olympics, Johnson put his nose to the grindstone and has reached that goal. “That’s my minimum, which is good,” he said. “Special Olympics wanted me to raise 10 [thousand], and I think that helps 26 athletes compete in the games each year, which is one for each mile I’ll be running. So that’s pretty cool.” Such successes have not come without their challenges, however. Often seen tearing around the indoor track at the Plex, Johnson admitted that his lack of running knowledge prior to December caused him to sustain an overuse injury to his sartorius muscle (which runs diagonally down the front of the thigh), a muscle he didn’t even know existed. He required physical therapy to help overcome the injury, but the local community stepped in to help. He saw a physical therapist, who now serves as his trainer, and is back on track to run the full marathon. Not only did the medical community step in to facilitate this 26.2-mile journey, but the running and business communities as well. “The cool thing about doing this that I really didn’t know about is that there is such a community surrounding running in Boston,” he said.

Johnson is from Minnesota, where he says no one would ever form these large communities around running for charity. This sense of community and service inspires Johnson as he nears the Marathon. Agoro’s, a local Chestnut Hill bar and restaurant, also stepped in to help Johnson on the financial side of his venture. Allowing him to guest bartend for a studentbased event, Johnson made money from his tips, and a portion of the proceeds for the night went toward his charity as well. As the gap between now and the Marathon narrows, however, the prerace nerves are present in the back of the Minnesotan’s mind. There are concerns about pacing and injuries, but the main emotion now is excitement. In a similar way to every other student on campus, Johnson is eagerly awaiting the ridiculousness surrounding Marathon Monday’s lore, albeit for a different reason than the average BC student. Johnson said he has had his fair share of on-campus absurdity on Patriot’s Day, but that that is what he is most excited to experience while running the race this year. Mile 21 is both feared and adored by the runners. It is the top of “Heartbreak Hill,” named for its infamous difficulty. It’s also one of the rowdiest and best-lined sections of the race, giving the runners their due praise on the gentle downhill slope of Commonwealth Ave.

“I’m definitely trying to see all my friends and everything,” Johnson said. “There’s a cool thing where you can track where people will be, so it’ll be great to see everybody while I’m doing that.” Johnson’s father, Restor Johnson, will also be flying in to cheer on his son, although most likely not among the rowdy at Boston College. Meeting his son downtown at the finish line on Boylston, Johnson’s dad will get to experience the conclusion of his son’s first marathon as he steps over the iconic blue and yellow banner. Despite the excitement surrounding his approach to BC’s campus and seeing his dad, Johnson has not lost sight of the reason he is able to participate in the famed Marathon. Although Sam will be unable to attend the marathon himself, Johnson said that his family connection between the Boston Marathon, the Special Olympics, and his brother is what makes this experience special. “I was really inspired growing up by the people taking care of Sam,” Johnson said. “All the doctors, my parents especially, social workers, and others who care for these people. And that’s what the Special Olympics does. So that’s really who I wanted to do this for. And being able to have all this money go to a great cause, that means a lot to my family and my brother especially.” 

The Heights

Monday, April 10, 2017

Editorials

With Forthcoming IISS, BC Should Establish Neuroscience Major A survey was recently released to psychology majors on the subject of adding a neuroscience major and minor at Boston College. Currently, the University has two different kinds of psychology majors: Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Science. The B.A. track in psychology is diverse in terms of its academic program, while the B.S. track is geared more toward the study of behavioral and cognitive neuroscience. While the B.S. in psychology is currently the most similar offering, the establishment of a neuroscience major at BC would provide students with a more practical and marketable degree, and would be a timely addition with the upcoming construction of the Institute for Integrated Sciences and Society (IISS). BC is one of the 22 institutions within the top-40 highest-ranked universities that does not offer a major in neuroscience, according to U.S. News and World Report. Other Boston area schools, such as Northeastern University, Boston University, and Brandeis University, all offer undergraduate neuroscience programs. Since 2010, the University has hired 25 new professors that have interests in neuroscience, creat-

ing new research opportunities and courses in the field. With this growing foundation in place, the University should seek to transition to the implementation of a designated neuroscience major and minor. Giving students interested in the field of neuroscience the option to major specifically in that field is imperative to the quality of their academic study and their future professional development.

A specific major would benefit students applying for jobs and to graduate school. The creation of a neuroscience major would require the addition of new and specific courses on the subject. This would allow interested students to better tailor their classes to their academic pursuits, and open up opportunities for other students outside the major to explore the field as well. Furthermore, a specific major in neuroscience would benefit students applying for jobs and to

graduate school, as they would no longer have to explain to employers and admissions committees that they focused on neuroscience throughout their college careers. One of the major obstacles to establishing a neuroscience major at BC is the current lack of “wet” labs required for the research coursework associated with the potential program. With the construction of the IISS, the University plans to build new lab spaces and to encourage areas of interdisciplinary study focused on solving the world’s most pressing problems. The University should devote some of the new planned space to construct the labs necessary for the future creation of a neuroscience program. The field of neuroscience is certainly interdisciplinary, as it encompasses areas of psychology, biology, and computer science, and therefore would fit well within the University’s vision for the IISS. Based on the University ’s hiring of new faculty interested in the field of neuroscience and plans to construct the IISS, BC should recognize that the time to establish a neuroscience major is quickly approaching.

QUOTE OF THE DAY “The future belongs to those who prepare for it today.” - Malcolm X

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Letter to the Editor A Response to the Sanctions of Eradicate BC Racism Members (April 3, 2017) Two weeks ago, Eradicate Racism saw several of its core members threatened and sanctioned by the Boston College administration for the so-called crime of holding rallies against hate. While The Heights ran a first page article on the sanctions, and the social justice groups on campus are very aware of what occurred, I am disturbed by the lack of outrage over this authoritarian crackdown. Our administration is punishing students for rallying against racism. I say again: our administration is punishing students for rallying against racism. That is not an exaggeration. That is not a biased account. That is the reality of living under an administration whose primary goal is maintaining the status quo. For a Jesuit institution to put the desires of its shareholders over its own stated values of social justice and equality is not only immensely hypocritical—it is morally egregious. At orientation this summer, Rev. Michael Himes painted the picture of an ideal university being defined by conversation. He captivated myself and my peers with this image—a place where we could all feel free to explore

our beliefs and share them with the world. What an unplea sant shock it has been to realize that a permit is required to converse, and that some speakers are intentionally silenced. In some small way, it is a fortunate that Eradicate Racism was targeted. It is so obviously unacceptable and immoral to silence a group advocating against bigotry that it might just awaken the BC community, and provoke renewed cries for justice. No matter how you view Eradicate, this incident should make one thing abundantly clear: this administration will stop at nothing to silence disquieting voices. It is essential that all those who believe in liberty and justice for all demand liberty and justice for Eradicate. We have no choice but to demand that our administration revoke these sanctions and reform its grossly antiquated free speech policies. And if the current administration lacks the moral rectitude to undertake such reforms, then we must demand their replacement. If we fail to do so, and we allow injustice to fester, there’s no way of knowing who might be next.

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Matthew Barad, MCAS ’20

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The Heights

Monday, April 10, 2017

Breaking the Course Comfort Zone The Fear Kelsey Connors Where Has This Been All My Life - I was recently made aware of the existence of perhaps the most useful kind of punctuation mark the world has ever known. The interrobang, denoted ‽, is the combination of a question mark and an exclamation point, and it is amazing. In fact, it is an absolute tragedy that it is not more widely used. Just think, the next time you want to say, “What the [insert profanity of choice]!?!?,” you could simply use the interrobang, and make your angry texts far less cluttered. Throw it in one of your future essays and make your know-it-all professor have to actually Google something for once. Text it to your parents when you ask them why they cancelled your credit card hooked up to their bank account, and they’ll be sure to reactivate it in a jiffy. It’s Almost Over - Freshman year is an experience. To come out of your hometown high school on top the world, only to arrive on Boston College’s campus and be subjugated to dirt by seniors at the doors of Mods, is a humbling yet strengthening journey. Only little time remains in this inaugural year, and while it feels as though the weeks flew by, it also seems as though someone should be handing me a diploma. Such is the nature of so much happening in a relatively short period of time. While the time feels short as all the events of this year blur together, their impact remains profound and felt in full effect to the equivalency of seemingly a lifetime. The future only promises more to come.

It can be so easy to see the world in black and white terms: good and bad, wrong and right, us and them. Once we make up our minds about how to understand something, it can be hard to change our way of thinking. I, like most current Boston College students, grew up in post-Sept. 11 America. From a young age, we were bombarded with media messages that surrounded Islam with uncertainty and anxiety. The religion became heavily associated with the Sept. 11 attacks and with terrorism itself. Briefly, I learned about another Islam in middle school. It had five pillars of faith, which meant Muslims had to pray at certain times every day to Allah, fast during Ramadan, give to the poor, and take a trip to a city in Saudi Arabia called Mecca. The religion that my public school showed me was strange and different from my own. Even during the beginning of my college career, this was the extent of my understanding. All I knew of Islam came from a quick world religions unit in school and the mentions of terrorist attacks in the mainstream media. Given the current state of our world, where terrorist attacks pop up weekly on the news, I felt unsure of what to make of the violence. What link does this violence actually have to Islam? Is the religion an oppressive one at its core? I wanted to believe that the answer was no on both accounts, but the truth is that I knew so little, and I could not form an opinion with any kind of knowledgeable basis. When I saw the course “Women and Gender in Islam” as I planned my spring schedule last semester, I decided that now was the time to take it. Now was the time to educate myself. My decision to take advantage of this course

was one of the best decisions I have made yet during my time at BC. Natana Delong-Bas, an assistant professor of the practice in the theology department, I found out, is truly an expert in her field, not just in the U.S., but all over the world. The past few months in her class have not only deepened my understanding of this religion, but have shown me just how much of the world I know so little about. Nearly 25 percent of the world practices Islam, and its major adherents range from Malaysian to Moroccan. The course has provided me with scriptural back ground to enhance my understanding of Islam, and has clarified touchy subjects like Sharia Law and a woman’s choice in wearing the veil. The media often uses Qur’anic verses out of context and images of burkaclad women to shock viewers, creating a culture of fear and misunderstanding. Yet, I’ve learned that, once looked at in full—a whole picture rather than the fragments that we get of Islam in our everyday lives—it becomes clear that what most Americans think they know about Islam is far from reality. We are often manipulated into believing ideas that are exaggerated and negatively simplified, when the truth itself is too complex and multifaceted to squeeze into any five-minute news segment. It is so easy to take what we see and hear as the truth, allow it to take root, and grow in our minds until it becomes a fully formed opinion or belief. These are the seeds of prejudice, the beginnings of immigration bans. As BC students, we are so fortunate to have access to professors in every area of study. These men and women have made it their life’s work to research, learn, and to share their valuable knowledge with students like us. It is so important to deepen our understandings of the things we don’t have a clear, whole picture of, so that we can form our own opinions, media biases aside. Watching the news is often not enough. In fact, the news can grow into the source of our ill-formed opinions. To research and seek out the

truth is often the only way to find it. We are fortunate to have access to a diversity of courses that are interesting and important. Within the Islamic Civilization and Societies or Near Eastern Languages and Cultures programs, we have the opportunity to learn about societies and cultures that students are rarely exposed to in high school or in most tracks of college education. For interesting and enlightening courses, other interdisciplinary departments like African and African Diaspora Studies or Slavic and Eastern Languages and Literatures give important insight into cultures and societies we could not likely learn about otherwise. The world is much bigger than our Western and largely Christian view of it makes it seem. The Jesuit philosophy of educating the whole person challenges us to expand our horizons and minds to make us more empathetic global citizens. Everybody has areas of uncertainty, where they are unsure what to call fact and fiction. For me, it was Islam, but for others it may be racial inequality in urban areas, styles of government other than democracy, or practices of other religions and cultures, to name a few. No one has all the answers to the questions we face, but the worst place to look is probably the mainstream American media. We owe it to ourselves and to the world to take advantage of our educational opportunities to the fullest. As you select courses for next fall, look for a class that focuses on something you don’t understand and want to know more about. It doesn’t have to be in your major, it doesn’t even have to fulfill a core requirement. Learning about what both confuses and interests you is enough. Better yet, take a class that challenges your values and beliefs. We are still so young. Now, more than ever, is the time to push ourselves to think differently.

Kelsey Connors is an op-ed columnist for The Heights. She can be reached at opinions@bcheights.com.

Trump’s Dangerous Diplomacy Ditch Selling Out - Sometimes, the cliché narrative of popular musicians selling the soul of their artistry to rise to the top of the charts becomes far too evident to ignore. The Chainsmokers have enjoyed considerable fame lately, selling out shows around the world and sitting comfortably atop multiple Billboard lists for months on end. Just when it seems like one of their hit songs is about to die out, they put out something new with impeccable timing, and the public latches onto it with astounding quickness and attention. The duo has figured out the magical formula, with each song differing from the last just enough to keep their listeners on their toes. With predictable yet relatable lyrics and catchy synths, the Chainsmokers crank out track after track that people everywhere keep on repeat on Spotify for an uncanny amount of time. By now, your grandmother probably knows the words to “Closer.” Just the other day, The Chainsmokers released their debut album, and I have to say, as someone who has been following their music for a long time, I was entirely disappointed. Not only did the music lack variety, but it conformed painfully to the simplistic and expected trends of the mainstream, leaving little room for the uniqueness that used to set The Chainsmokers apart from everyone else. They’ve come a long way from their SoundCloud days, that is certain. But ever since their ascent to prominence, they’ve time and time again sacrificed making good music for ensuring their songs will get endless plays on the radio, and this is saddening.

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Ryan Duffy President Theodore Roosevelt loved to say, “Speak softly, and carry a big stick.” This West African proverb concisely and effectively espouses a dominant school of thought in United States foreign policy, one that prescribes a blunt Machiavellian style of realpolitik. Force is an effective form of deterrence, coercion, and persuasion, and America’s Commanders in Chief, both before and after Roosevelt, have adeptly used their big stick as leverage and bargaining power at the negotiation table. From the Civil War-era to gunboat diplomacy to the World Wars and Cold War to present, the U.S. has utilized a big stick—hard military power—to aid with negotiating and diplomacy. Obviously, the degree to which the country leans on these two proverbial strategies—using a stick and/or speaking softly—has fluctuated, with the country opting in some periods of its history to entirely forgo one in favor of the other. Striking a balance between these two elements is key. If the U.S. leans too far toward reliance on hard power, then it will find itself wading into tricky waters, such as the aggressive territorial expansion and low-key neocolonialism that has characterized much of the nation’s history. These campaigns are contrary to the moral beacon of human rights, democracy, and freedom that America tries to represent. On the other end of the spectrum, spineless states, with their hands bound by lacking means of force, have fared poorly in the arc of history. The U.S. military out-muscles any other in sight, on this planet at least: it has nearly $600 billion to spend annually, which ensures that we are armed to the teeth. Sure, nuclear weapons are a great equalizer, but to date they’ve been more of a deterrent. America also projects a considerable degree of soft power, which Harvard’s Joseph Nye coined as “the ability of a country to

persuade others to do what it wants without force or coercion.” Think about the range of influence that some American companies—such as Coca Cola, Facebook, Apple, and Exxon Mobil—can project, as well as their market access. In many cases and places, these companies’ power eclipses that of states, to the point that Time, The Guardian, and Foreign Policy have poised the question: “Are Companies More Powerful Than Countries?” And this is to make nothing of the reach of Beyoncé or Bieber, the near-monopoly on mainstream filmmaking that Hollywood enjoys, and the internationally sought-after prestige of American universities. In short, this matters because it allows the U.S. to dangle carrots rather than solely rely on its high-budgeted, state-of-the-art stick. All of this is presumably a good thing, since actors on the global stage are more and more able to avoid force and conflict while still seeking to further their interests at the bargaining table. The further we get from a Hobbesian world, where life is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short,” the better. Locke’s social contract was a great start. The Treaty of Westphalia was also important because it normalized statehood. Yet it did not stop war, territorial expansion, or colonialism, and we are nowhere near what Kant and liberal internationalists might hope for, a cosmopolitan community where common humanity prevails over national, religious, or ethnic differences. Parts of the world are balkanized as ever, with much of the MENA region embroiled in internecine fratricidal conflict. Unfortunately, billions of Muslim voices are being drowned out by extremist offshoot cells and jihadis that, despite being Muslims in name only, are the loudest voice in the proverbial room. In Syria, horrific crimes against humanity have been committed with offputting regularity for years, so much so that it’s basically become institutionalized. In the 1990s, Samuel Huntington put forth a “Clash of Civilizations” worldview, a particularly insidious prediction “in which the great divisions among humankind and the dominating source of international conflict will be cultural,” and the Islamic world

is assigned its own distinct cluster that is directly at odds with the western world. With Clash of Civilization adherents stepping into power, such as Trump Svengali Stephen Bannon and popular far-right European leaders Geert Wilders and Marine Le Pen, 2017 is breathing new life into this idea. In this age of political upheaval, the people ascending to positions of power are the type to have no qualms with using their huge stick to poke around, with talk coming later, if at all. It feels like we’re resetting to the times of autarky and monarchs ruling with a heavy hand and large stick, without regard for others. Increasingly, the U.S. and the European Union seem to have no hope of leading the global community or using multilateralism and international institutions, and leaders are explicit about their disdain for global cooperation. This stick-speak dynamic is important in the Trump administration’s budgeting plans, which give short shrift to the State Department and other key arms of U.S. diplomacy, and big bucks to a military that really doesn’t need that much of a boost. Over 120 retired general and admirals wrote to Trump that “the State Department, USAID, Millennium Challenge Corporation, Peace Corps and other development agencies are critical to preventing conflict and reducing the need to put our men and women in uniform in harm’s way.” They also quoted Trump’s Defense Secretary, James “Mad Dog” Mattis, who remarked in 2013 that “If you don’t fully fund the State Department, then I need to buy more ammunition.” Still, somehow Trump seems to think he can just funnel money into the military, at the expense of basically everything else. The jury is out on what his next steps in Syria are, after raining nearly 60 Tomahawk cruise missiles down on Syrian government targets, but one thing is certain. You can’t just overfund the military and use it to make bad things go away. It isn’t zero-sum, and we can’t solve our problems with a stick alone.

Ryan Duffy is an op-ed columnist for The Heights. He can be reached at opinions@bcheights.com.

The opinions and commentaries of the op-ed columnists and cartoonists appearing on this page represent the views of the author or artist of that particular piece, and not necessarily the views of The Heights. Any of the columnists and artists for the Opinions section of The Heights can be reached at opinions@bcheights.com.

of Writing

Karen Choi

I think that 7-year-old me had the whole “writing as a full-time thing” nailed down to a science. A few times a week, I’d plop myself in front of a keyboard, cuddle up to a box of apple juice, and begin typing as fast as I could with two fingers whatever stories had emerged in my head. I fervently believed that I could do it all. When I wasn’t allowed to use the computer, I took to writing these stories out by hand. I even made illustrations for most of them. I was a writer and illustrator all at once, and believed myself to be a true tour-deforce. It didn’t matter that my plot lines closely resembled those of my beloved Magic Tree House series or that my stick figures looked more like marshmallows haphazardly skewered onto sticks. What mattered was that I was writing, and fully believed that this was what I was meant to do. But in my middle and high school years, the idea of writing and what it meant to be a writer entered into more nebulous territory. I was afraid of even claiming to be a writer. Sure, I thought I could write reasonably well, but I was daunted by the habits of professional writers. They write every day and take careful notes everywhere they go, and I was just slaving away writing essays for English class and never writing what I truly wanted to. When I came to college, I noticed that this sentiment was reflected in my peers as well. Many students at Boston College are afraid to write, and the word “essay” strikes fear in their hearts, let alone “creative essay.” Despite being an English major, I too was afraid to write, but taking creative writing classes at BC has changed my perspective on writing. My reintroduction to creative writing in college was not so much a quick and easy whirlwind, but more of a slow reconciliation. It did teach me quite a bit about myself, however, and about the importance of creative writing. On a whim, I decided to take a creative nonfiction writing workshop this year. Initially, the workshop format itself—having others critique your work while you sit there patiently—was a hard thing to swallow for a workshop newbie. This course, however, taught me focus. I learned how take feedback and edit my work. Much to the chagrin of my professor, who advised us against using clichés, I could say that I learned that to be a better writer, one must write often. What I will say, instead, is this: in becoming a better writer, I learned how to write often, but I also learned to be humble, take breaks from writing and listen to others, and to never view my work as quite finished. It was through my fiction workshop that I understood the greatest benefit of creative writing. I began to see the act of writing fiction as a close imitation of life itself. There’s conflict, rising action, falling action, climax, tension, and all that good stuff that can be found within the texture of our own lives. The greatest source of encouragement I found, however, were the words of Charles Baxter, whose essay, Burning Down the House, we read a few weeks ago: “When all the details fit in perfectly, something is probably wrong with the story. It is too meaningful too fast … the writer has decided what her story is about too early and has concentrated too fixedly on that one truth.” The best aspect of life that manifests itself in fiction writing is the notion of nothing being preordained, that a story is written down as it is being conjured in the imagination. In truth, writing should not be a source of fear. Though it might seem daunting, taking a creative writing class at BC can help alleviate this fear. Because you are writing constantly, you not only get the opportunity to improve, but also to engage in dialogue with other writers and receive feedback from them. Being in a creative writing class can eradicate the fear that one is ineloquent or under qualified. These workshops serve as opportunities to learn, express oneself, and reimagine life itself.

Karen Choi is an op-ed columnist for The Heights. She can be reached at opinions@bcheights.com.

THE HEIGHTS

MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017

Buddied Up Sean Kane had plenty to do leading up to the Marathon, but the No. 1 thing on his mind lately is his Campus School “Best Buddy,” Thiago. BY ARCHER PARQUETTE Features Editor On any given weekend these past few months, Sean Kane, MCAS ’19, ran 15 miles. This was after a week filled with early morning runs, biology classes, work, volunteering, and club meetings. He always saved his longest runs for his days off, so he wouldn’t have to squeeze them in between his other commitments. A reasonable person might ask Kane why he would add long runs and constant training to an already jam-packed routine. But he’d rather talk about Thiago. Thiago is a child with special needs who meets with Kane, his buddy, every week at the Boston College Campus School. On Fridays, Kane interacts with Thiago and helps him as he learns to walk. They can’t speak to each other conventionally, as Thiago uses signs and symbols to communicate, such as touching his chest to indicate that he would like to see something. Despite this, Thiago’s teachers at the Campus School have worked at this sign language and have turned it into an advanced way to communicate. His ability to learn has significantly developed, and Kane continues to witness his progress with every visit. “His time at the Campus School has done so many great things for him, and I’m learning more and more of them

every time that we get together,” Kane said. Gina Iozzo, the co-president of the Campus School Volunteers and MCAS ’17, first met Kane when he started volunteering for the Campus School. “His connection with his buddy Thiago … is just so beautiful to watch,” she said. “The two of them are just like little best friends, like bros hanging out.” The educational services and specialized care Thiago receives at the Campus School are made possible through fundraising. For years, the Campus School raised a large portion of its money by sponsoring unregistered bandit runners, who jump into the race and run alongside its official participants. The program received great interest from people who wanted to run but didn’t want to go through the difficulty of qualifying for the Marathon. While runners might only raise a few hundred dollars each, there were so many of them that the money ended up being a substantial part of the Campus School’s fundraising efforts. But after the 2013 Marathon bombings, bandit runners were no longer allowed in the race due to security concerns. “It was a huge hit to us financially,” Iozzo said. The next year, the Campus School and its volunteers had to search for a way to make up the lost bandit runner donations. For the first two years

after the bombing, the school hosted its own fundraising race a week before the Marathon. Runners would run the same route and take on donations like before, but since they weren’t running during the actual Marathon, the interest was not substantial enough to make up for the money that the bandit runners used to raise. Instead, they put their efforts into getting registrations for the official Marathon and finding qualified runners to fundraise and run the race. While he had never run a Marathon before, Kane had experience running in high school. More importantly, he wanted to help. Working with BC Best Buddies, which pairs a BC student and a person with special needs, he had developed an interest in service and mentorship. This led him to contact the Campus School and see different ways he could get involved. He had heard about the Campus School’s marathon fundraising efforts and asked if there was a way he could participate in that. When they offered him the chance to run for them, he leapt at the opportunity and got to work. “This training has been definitely so much different than I expected,” he said. “A lot of times there were like unexpected snowstorms when I had to do my long runs.” The rigorous training is unlike anything Kane’s done before and comes on top of his other commitments. While

training for the Marathon, he is still on the eboard of Best Buddies, works for the Office of University Advancement and as a student health coach, and participates in WeRunBC. “It’s like my maximum commitment right now,” Kane said. Every Friday, he still meets with Thiago in between his other meetings and runs. It reminds him of the good the Campus School does as he works toward his fundraising goal. N o w th e m o ment of truth is only a week away. Kane’s family is coming out to see him run the race alongside the hordes of BC kids lining Commonwealth Ave. Much of the excitement from his friends and families comes not only from seeing him run, but from knowing the good that he is doing. He expects to see many familiar faces cheering him on. “It would be a pretty surreal moment

NEWTON NATICK

LIZZY BARRETT / HEIGHTS EDITOR

when I pass a lot of them,” he said. The reactions of those onlookers has been one of the most rewarding parts of training for Kane. “When I tell them why I’m running the Marathon, it is the best feeling,” he said. “And it lets me know that this has been worth all of the hard work and all of the sweat and all of the runs.” 

HEARTBREAK HILL

BOSTON COLLEGE

BOSTON

HOPKINTON MEG DOLAN / HEIGHTS EDITOR

This is the 26.2-mile route of the Boston Marathon, which begins in Hopkinton, Mass. and concludes at Copley Square. Runners will pass the main campus of Boston College at Mile 21, just after Heartbreak Hill.

Truesdell Is Gunning to Break His Own Records Carson Truesdell, from A1 his pace so we could keep up. This speediness sets Truesdell apart from most Boston College students who run the Boston Marathon. While many students who run for charity are running their first Marathon and just hope to finish, he has already run two. Far from just hoping to finish, he’s trying to break his own record. Last year, Truesdell finished 148th in the Boston Marathon with a flat 2:41:00 time, which qualified him to run again this year. That result would more than satisfy many runners, but Truesdell is aiming for better this year—he wants to run under 2:30:00. For perspective, the average male marathoner in the United States ran 4:20:13 in 2015, according to Running USA. “It’s a goal I’ve had for a while,” he said. “Can’t wait to accomplish it.” Truesdell has been working up to that goal for 10 years now. Since the seventh grade, running has been an important part of his life. Through the decade since, he has evolved—he began running short distances, before graduating to cross country and marathons—but what remains constant is his commitment, discipline, and desire to improve. “Running is just a big part of my life,”

he said. “It’s one thing that I know I’m going to do every day when I wake up.” When he started, running was a way to get exercise. He quickly started to pursue it more diligently as he approached high school. In eighth grade, he began training with a private coach, Mike Scannell, who worked with him throughout high school. “I put him on a regime that required training not only daily but also pretty much 24 hours a day,” Scannell said. When Truesdell joined his high school track team, he began running with some of the best runners in his home state of Michigan. An upperclassman had already won state several times and broken the state record. Then a student in the class under Truesdell broke that same record and became one of only six high school students to ever break the four-minute mile at that time. Running with some of the fastest young runners around, he learned more about the sport than ever before. “The most impactful thing about him being really fast was not the fact that he did that, but the way that he did that,” Truesdell said. “He was so humble and gracious.” Truesdell learned to handle himself among stiff competition, developing a perseverance struck Scannell.

LIZZY BARRETT / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Truesdell qualifed by time for this year’s Marathon after ﬁnishing 148th in 2016.

Scannell particularly remembers coaching Truesdell through a 2-mile race. As an underclassman, he was not a favorite in the race—he was barely expected to finish. But his goal was to make the state meet, and to do that Scannell had to push him to do more than he’d ever done. Truesdell needed to run the first mile at a faster pace than he had ever run a mile before, if he wanted to do well in the race. “We set him up to come in faster than he had ever run and run another mile on top of it,” Scannell said. “And he did it.” This accomplishment was a crucial moment for Truesdell. Scannell views it as a breakthrough. It showed Truesdell that he had the mental fortitude to push himself beyond where he had been before. This striving spirit has followed Truesdell through to his marathon running, as he works to better last year’s time. It also led to one of Scannell’s strongest memories of Truesdell—the time they ran across the Grand Canyon together. In a one-day trek, Scannell, Truesdell, and a group of other young runners decided to run across the Grand Canyon. They undertook the “adventure run” for no reason other than the challenge of the experience. Starting at roughly 9000 feet, they descended the rocky walls to the canyon floor 2000 feet below. In 90-100 degree heat, the sun beating down on their backs, the traversed the jagged canyon floor. It was one of the most challenging runs Truesdell ever completed. “When you’re at the bottom right where the Colorado River is, you’re about halfway across the distance and about 10 percent done in effort,” he said. After the river, he had to run uphill and through zigzagging trails to the top of the canyon. For most of the time, he couldn’t even see the top. They stopped to drink water from their packs, but otherwise kept up a steady pace.

After running the Canyon, Truesdell gained a passion for difficult treks. Last year, he climbed two mountains in Ecuador including Chimborazo, the highest mountain in the country. He found that on these adventurous hikes, he could experience breath-taking sights, while also accomplishing great feats. Getting to the top of mountain proved even harder than crossing the Canyon had been. He started hiking at midnight to get to the top between six and seven in the morning. After three hours, he found himself looking down and seeing nothing but mountain. At the peak, 20,549 feet up, he was at the closest point to the sun on the planet, the farthest from the earth’s core. These experiences geared Truesdell toward the idea of completion and pacing in difficult conditions, something that would stick with him as he trained for the Boston Marathon. Since then, Truesdell came to BC and ran track. While on the time, he found himself running too hard too frequently in order to prove himself, and ended up pulling a muscle. He found that he didn’t quite fit into the system and his love for running started to wane. This brought down other aspects of his life, and he made the decision to leave the team after a year and explore other areas of life at BC. Leaving the team renewed his interest in running. Instead of shorter track team runs, he switched his focus to long distance and the new challenge of marathon running. “After that, I’ve just been running on my own,” he said. “And so the natural progression is kind of to do marathons.” Truesdell’s casual attitude is striking, considering how much he has accomplished so far as a marathon runner. He has spent the past six months training for the Marathon through the harsh Boston winter, sometimes even running twice a day. “Running is really like a lifestyle thing where you need to make sure you’re get-

ting enough sleep and eating the right stuff,” he said. “Sometimes it’s hard if a lot of your friends aren’t runners.” Balancing school work and a social life with 80 miles of running a week can be difficult, but Truesdell loves it. While he sees running as a solitary activity, he’s found a community of runners at BC and in Boston. Just last Sunday, he went for his long run of the week and saw thousands of people jogging down Commonwealth Ave. during his run, all preparing for the upcoming marathon. These moments of community are an amazing part of running for Truesdell, and they find their culmination at Mile 21 on Marathon Monday. “It is super cool as a runner to like be able to see the community really just like cheering on runners,” Truesdell said. “We often don’t get that. We’re not like basketball or football. People don’t come and watch running a lot. So I just love like the atmosphere of that.” But for now, Truesdell continues his training. From pushing himself to run the fastest mile he has ever done back in high school, to now striving for the best marathon time he’s ever run, he continues to work for more. As a maturing runner, he’s learned not to push himself too hard and to allow his body to rest. If he wakes up feeling overly sore and tired, he’ll relax his workout to match that. He plans to use this discipline and experience to better pace himself while running the marathon this year and achieve a better overall time. As the weeks and months passed, he has felt improvements and is now only a short week away from going for his goal on Marathon Monday. Instead of being cocky, anxious, or any emotion you might expect, he appeared quietly assured and humble about the upcoming race and about running: “It has taught me, over the 10 years I’ve done it, that if I’m patient and put in the work, things that you never thought would be possible can be accomplished.” 

SPORTS

MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017

@HEIGHTSSPORTS

BASEBALL

UNC Crosses the Plate 48 Times in Convincing Sweep of Birdball BY ANDY BACKSTROM Asst. Sports Editor A Brian Rapp pitch struck Cody Roberts, and the North Carolina catcher trotted to first. Minutes later, Rapp walked Michael Busch. Before the junior pitcher knew it, two men were on base with only one out. It may have looked like a small second-inning jam, but it was the beginning of the end for Boston College baseball. Logan Warmoth singled through the hole on the left side, scoring Cody Roberts. Immediately after that, Ashton McGee drew a walk, loading the bases. Then, Kyle Datres chopped one to third, which got underneath Brian Dempsey’s glove. The ball rolled into left field, giving the Tar Heels enough time to clear the bases. To make matters worse for BC,

Brandon Riley followed up with a single into the left-center gap, scoring Datres and extending the UNC lead to seven. Like the first game of the doubleheader, the Tar Heels distanced themselves from the Eagles in just a few innings of work. And BC’s deficit would only increase as the game went on. UNC tacked on eight more runs to cap off a 15-3 victory and a series sweep. Having already used four pitchers in the first of Sunday’s two games, BC (920, 1-14 Atlantic Coast) turned to Brian Rapp to start the latter. But, right from the get-go, the No. 4 Tar Heels (26-6, 123) jumped out to a two-run lead. Brian Miller started things off with a line drive directed Mitch Bigras’ way. The 6-foot-6 first baseman stretched to make the catch, but despite getting a glove on it, couldn’t come down with it. Instead

the ball ricocheted off of his mit, allowing Miller to scamper to second. Warmoth and McGee played a little small ball to knock in Miller. With two outs, Kevin Datres singled to center. Next, Brandon Riley hit a line drive over the head of Bigras. Now, with runners on the corners, Riley stole second. Eagles catcher Aaron Soucy took the bait and threw to second, but Jake Alu cut it off and, as Datres was on his way home, zipped it back to Soucy. Yet, the tag was late, and Datres scored. Meanwhile, Austin Bergner retired the side in his half of the frame. As a result, only minutes separated UNC’s first two plate appearances. To no one’s surprise, the Tar Heel’s continued to build momentum. Thanks to a few walks

CELINE LIM / HEIGHTS STAFF

See Birdball vs. UNC, B4

No Hiding From Stats

Senior Michael Strem fights off a pitch during Saturday’s loss to the Tar Heels.

WOMEN’S TENNIS

RILEY OVEREND The analytics revolution is upon us, and whether Charles Barkley & Co. like it or not, one thing is for certain: Big Data is making all of us better at our jobs. Advanced analytics allow coaches and GMs to better measure and tinker with their lineups to ensure their product is performing at maximum efficiency. Players no longer have the luxury of hiding their weaknesses—especially on the defensive end—thanks to new tracking data, which calculates the previously incalculable and holds athletes under a more powerful microscope than ever before. The media has adopted this numbers-driven approach, as well, increasingly judging based off of advanced analytics instead of relying on the eye test. With enough luck, sportswriters who embrace sabermetrics might even find themselves working in front offices. Take the NBA MVP debate, for one. At first glance, Russell Westbrook looks like a no-brainer selection for the award as the first player to average a triple double since Oscar Robertson in 196162. But gone are the days of evaluating a player on merely points, rebounds, and assists—now, Westbrook is accused of padding his stats because of his unusually high uncontested rebounding rate. What’s more, only Rudy Gobert and Hassan Whiteside have contested less 3-pointers than Westbrook this season, suggesting that he may be sacrificing his defense to cheat on the boards. Meanwhile, the advanced stats love James Harden. The Beard became the first player to score and assist on 2,000 points in a single season. He maintains efficiency, too, with a true shooting percentage (61.2) that puts Westbrook’s to shame (55.3). But, then again, Harden has a much better supporting cast. Plus, Westbrook leads the league by a landslide in clutch shots with less than five minutes left in the fourth quarter or overtime. (Advanced stats also make these kinds of arguments never-ending.) These types of statistics are nothing new in sports. In fact, it has been over three decades since Bill James, the father of sabermetrics, published Historical Baseball Abstract in 1985. A generation of sports fans have grown up on this baseball Bible, and some of them climbed the ranks of sports management. Daryl Morey was 16 years old when he first read Bill James’ revolutionary encyclopedia. He wanted to be like James, to remove some of the human error inherent in scouting, to make better predictions than the experts. In 2006, he finally got his shot with the Houston Rockets as the assistant general manager. It didn’t take long for Morey to identify the most important question: Which information is valuable in this employ-

See Advanced Analytics, B3

INSIDE SPORTS

PHOTO COURTESY OF BC ATHLETICS | ABBY PAULSON / CREATIVE DIRECTOR

Before beginning her career at BC, junior Asiya Dair traveled the globe as Kazakhstan’s national tennis champion. BY ANNABEL STEELE Assoc. Sports Editor

siya Dair has been all over the world. Her tennis career has taken her to Austria, England, Serbia, Tunisia, Zimbabwe, Dubai, Australia, and Japan—and that’s not even close to a comprehensive list. But if you ask her about her favorite trip, she doesn’t even hesitate before telling you an unlikely answer: New Delhi, India. On its own, New Delhi isn’t a surprising choice. What makes her answer interesting is what actually happened in New Delhi back in 2013, when Dair represented her home country, Kazakhstan, in the Asian Closed Junior Tennis Championships. They couldn’t make the trip from Kazakhstan to New Delhi in one flight, so Dair and her teammates had a layover in Dubai. That’s when the trouble started. Problem No. 1: Their bags were lost somewhere along the way. Losing bags on a flight for most of us is just inconvenient, but for Dair and her teammates, it was catastrophic. They had arrived in New Delhi ready for the tournament, but suddenly lost all of their luggage. The only solution was to go to the only mall open and buy new clothes to play in. Problem No. 2: The mall had no women’s tennis apparel.

Instead, Dair and her teammates had to purchase and wear men’s apparel. In the heat—around 100 degrees Fahrenheit—donning men’s shirts and shorts rather than the typical tennis skirt or dress was killer. But still, Team Kazakhstan persevered, ready to take on the tournament. Problem No. 3: Dair’s bag fell out of the tuk-tuk on the way to the courts. Dair and her teammates took a tuk-tuk, a sort of taxi slightly resembling a golf cart, to get from the hotel to the courts where they needed to play. With all of them crammed together, it was tough to fit their big tennis bags in the tuk-tuk, too—Dair had hers precariously balanced on her lap as they made their way to the courts. But the traffic in New Delhi is crazy and unpredictable. At one point, as the tuk-tuk moved to the side of the road, her bag fell out onto the road. Immediately, a group of children fell upon it and started to run away. Arriving at her match without rackets wasn’t an option. Dair asked the driver to stop and jumped out, determined to get her bag back. She chased the kids down, got her rackets back, and jokingly promised that next time, they could keep them. The pregame chaos did little to slow Dair come tournament time. Ranked as a fifth seed, she knocked off the three-seed and made it all the way to the championship match before losing to Snehadevi Reddy of India. “I have warm memories of New Delhi, India,” Dair said with a smile on her face.

he sky was still dark when Dair’s father, Dairov Zharat, unexpectedly woke her up one morning. Just 6 years old, Dair wanted to go back to sleep. But her father, a former professional basketball player, had other plans. It was time for Dair and one of her brothers to start their athletic careers. It was the day of her first tennis lesson. Dair wasn’t happy about waking up early to start her tennis career, but even the sight of her tears didn’t shake her father’s resolve. Soon enough, however, even as her brother decided to stop playing, she fell in love with the sport—and her life took off from there. Dair quickly became serious about tennis. She had a team of four coaches help her develop as a player: two fitness coaches, one tennis coach, and a sparring partner to challenge her at practice. Her relentless work ethic propelled her into the international rankings—Dair was a top-50 player in the world until the U-18 age bracket. Of course, this meant she traveled to play in tournaments across the world from a very young age. “The best part of tennis is traveling,” Dair said. “My childhood—it was all airports.” When Dair was 15, however, she contemplated quitting tennis. It was a huge time commitment and she wanted to focus on her grades. She elected to take a short break from the sport, but couldn’t

See Asiya Dair, B3

FOOTBALL

Marcell Lazard to Transfer From West Virginia BY RILEY OVEREND Sports Editor Head coach Steve Addazio and his staff received good news on Saturday afternoon, when offensive lineman Marcell Lazard confirmed his transfer from West Virginia. The move couldn’t have come at a better time for Boston College football, which likely just lost left guard Elijah Robinson for the year with a torn ACL. Lazard, a fifth-year graduate transfer, will arrive in Chestnut Hill this

summer from a Mountaineer program known for its up-tempo offense. The Bloomfield, N.J. native has seen action in 25 games, including 12 starts, over the last two years for head coach Dana Holgorsen. Lazard began as a right tackle before switching over to left tackle, where he is expected to stay at BC. The move wouldn’t disrupt the offensive line too much—6-foot-7 junior Aaron Monteiro would transition to left guard from his current spot at left tackle.

Jon Baker is set at the center position, while junior Chris Lindstrom appears to be comfortable in his new right tackle spot. That leaves one opening at right guard, where John Phillips looks to compete for playing time. The announcement comes a couple days after injuries during spring practices raised questions about the Jay McGillis Memorial Spring Game. “We’ll see,” Addazio said. “I’d say today, we probably still could but I don’t know what next week brings.

LACROSSE: BC Collapses Against Duke SOFTBALL: Eagles Fall to Louisville The Blue Devils won their first ACC game of the season against the Eagles on Saturday...............................B2

The Cardinals scored five runs off Jessica Dreswick, all unearned, in a win on Friday............................................B2

The minute you drop below nine, 10 offensive linemen, it’s almost impossible. So if we were to take too many more issues there, that’d make it tough.” Addazio cancelled the Spring Game back in 2013 in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing, and nixed it again in 2015 because of injuries. While Lazard will be of little help to BC’s depth problem in the short term, his transfer is a huge victory for that will pay dividends for this young offense when it really matters. 

TU/TD............................................. B2 SPORTS IN SHORT................................ B2 BASEBALL.............................................. B4

THE HEIGHTS

MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017 LACROSSE

Eagles Blow Second-Half Lead in Loss to Blue Devils

THUMBS UP

BY KATE PEAQUIN Heights Staff

A LONG TIME COMING AT AUGUSTA - After 74 major starts, Sergio Garcia has finally won one. In an epic Sunday pairing, Garcia and 2013 US Open Champion Justin Rose battled for positioning throughout the back nine. Tied after 18 holes, the two were forced to play a sudden-death playoff. But Garcia birdied on the first hole, claiming the green jacket. GOLD STANDARD - For the third-straight year, the Golden State Warriors will finish the season with the best record in the NBA. The last time a team accomplished that feat (Boston Celtics, 1983-86), Steph Curry wasn’t even born. To top it off, the Warriors are the first team in league history to reach the 65-win mark three seasons in a row. ROMO’S “RETIREMENT” - With Houston and Denver calling, former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo had the chance to make one more run at the Lombardi Trophy. Instead, the longtime signal caller hopped on another once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Starting this summer, Romo will take over as the top NFL color commentator for CBS. Most have to wait years to make their way up to that position.

THUMBS DOWN WHY SO BLUE? - Coming into Saturday’s game, Duke women’s lacrosse was averaging just 7.8 goals in ACC competition, and consequently had not won a game in conference play. That was, until it faced off against BC. The Blue Devils put up 15 goals on head coach Acacia Walker’s team en route to a stunning victory. SCOTT STERLING IRL - On Tuesday night, St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Stephen Piscotty was hit three times on one trip around the bases. Just like the fictional YouTube star, Scott Sterling, Piscotty was the ultimate ball magnet. Luckily, he was rewarded by scoring a run, albeit after taking a heater to the head.

While games are defined by how you play, they are determined by how you finish. Boston College lacrosse learned this lesson the Duke 15 Boston College 12 hard way this Saturday in a 15-12 loss to Duke. Despite coming out very strong to start the annual Red Bandanna Game in memoriam of Welles Remy Crowther, the Eagles couldn’t hold on against a strong showing from the Blue Devils. The Eagles (10-5, 2-5 Atlantic Coast) came into the game against Duke (7-6, 1-5) feeling confident—and they had every right to be. Before this Saturday, the Eagles had not lost at home this season and the average win margin for those six games has been 4.8 goals. Of the four losses that the Eagles have suffered so far this season, three have been against opponents ranked within the top five nationwide. Needless to say, the Eagles were confident going up against the unranked Duke at home. This confidence showed promi-

nently in the first half with Mary Kate O’Neill and Laura Frankenfield scoring 21 seconds apart before the game was even five minutes in. Frankenfield were able to score one more goal before the Blue Devils were able to finally put themselves on the board—after more than 15 minutes of play time. The first half finished with the Eagles still confidently in control, despite brief moments where the Blue Devils were able to wrestle momentum from the Eagles. At halftime, BC was up by two with eight points to Duke’s six. What can’t be shown in the score however, was the elegant way that the Eagles worked together. As BC weaved across the field it seemed that the players were acutely aware of their surroundings. The chemistry built throughout the season was on full display, resulting in a productive first half for the Eagles with three players—O’Neill, Frankenfield, and Hart—each scoring two goals and Kenzie Kent racking up three assists. The Eagles’ momentum did not carry over to the second half. Coming out of halftime, the Eagles looked

somewhat slower and the chemistry that had been so apparent in the first half was lackluster at best. Duke took advantage of this shift in the BC demeanor and within the eight minutes of the first half, the game was tied at eight. BC was able to manage a response with Frankenfield scoring her 12th goal of the season in a swift unassisted shot on the goal. Duke responded two minutes later with two consecutive goals to put Duke ahead for the first time in the game. The Eagles mustered a response to tie the game at 10. In a case of déjà vu, the Blue Devils scored back to back goals less than two minutes after BC brought the game to within one. This cycle repeated itself twice more with any effort on the part of the Eagles to close the points gap being immediately squashed by the cohesive momentum of the Blue Devils. BC ended the game opposite the way they started. All of the confidence and teamwork that had shined so brightly in the first half were lost in the second half of play with the two teams seeming to switch countenances.

During the first half, only one of Duke’s six goals was assisted while BC had five of its eight goals scored with assistance. This switched during the second half with the Eagles only recording two assists to Duke’s seven. This further highlights the way in which BC’s chemistry seemed to fade throughout the game while Duke’s was built through time. Another important factor is scoring bursts. In the first half, BC had two scoring bursts where two or more goals were scored consecutively without a goal being recorded by Duke. In the second half, the Eagles were only able to score one-off goals whereas eight of Duke’s nine goals were scored in bursts. This shows how the momentum totally shifted toward Duke in the second half. The next game against Dartmouth should prove a good test for the Eagles to see if all of the work that they have put in this season has built something that can last, or if their season will slowly begin to unravel much as the team did in the final minutes against Duke. 

SOFTBALL

Field Errors Cost BC Series Opener Against Louisville BY ANDY BACKSTROM Asst. Sports Editor It looked like more of the same. For the fifth-straight game, Boston College softball’s Jessica Dreswick was orchestrating Louisville 5 yet another Boston College 3 dominant performance on the mound. Three innings into Friday evening’s game against Louisville, and the reigning ACC Pitcher of the Week was on pace for her thirdconsecutive scoreless outing. But in the fourth frame, Dreswick found herself in uncharted territory. The Eagles’ infield committed two throwing errors—just as many as the team had tallied in the past three games combined—moving the Cardinals into scoring position. And before long, Louisville made BC pay. Thanks to timely hitting and two more throwing errors, the Cardinals tacked on five runs. The scoring spree proved too much for the Eagles to overcome, as Louisville took the first game of the series, 5-3. The first few innings of the game consisted of a pitching duel and some small ball. Dreswick got things going by punching out Caitlin Ferguson in just four pitches. Jordan McNary reached first

with a single, but Dreswick forced the next two Cardinal (22-10, 6-2 Atlantic Coast) batters to pop out and ground out, respectively. Then, the Eagles (21-13, 5-3) got lucky on the offensive end. Taylor Coroneos hit a grounder to third base, but a throwing error enabled her to make it to first. Tactically, Annie Murphy grounded out to third, advancing Coroneos into scoring position. Just like Murphy, Chloe Sharabba sacrificed herself to move Coroneos around the bases. Down in the count, Tatiana Cortez hit a ball toward third, but for the second time in the inning, the Cardinals’ throw missed the mark, Cortez reached first, and Coroneos scored. Dreswick and Maryssa Becker traded goose eggs for the next two innings. Both struck out a pair of batters in the second, and Becker executed a onetwo-three to round out the third. But, the complexion of the game changed in the fourth. Nicole Pufahl grounded to third, but Cortez failed to make the throw to first. Next, Becker reached base on a fielder’s choice, as Pufahl was forced out at second. Once again, Louisville targeted Cortez. This time, Tiarra Sanabria hit it to the hot spot. Cortez ignored Sanabria and went for the lead

runner at second, but her throw was off the mark. Both Becker and Sanbria were safe. Michala Riggle came in to pinch run for Becker, but she wouldn’t be on the base path for too long. Alison Szydlowski hit a grounder to shortstop, and Sharabba turned to third to get the force out. Shortly after that, Jenna Jordan scampered to first, following a Jordan Chimento throwing error from behind the plate. Chimento’s miscue was costly, as Sanabria scored and Szydlowski sped all the way to third. Already having tied the game, Louisville began to string together some hits. Morgan Meyer singled up the middle, bringing home Szydlowski. The ensuing batter, Ferguson, singled to right field, advancing Jordan to third and Meyer to second. Soon after that, Chimento failed to handle a Dreswick pitch, and the passed ball gave Jordan enough time to cross home plate. The unconventional, but highly potent scoring stretch ended with one more Eagles error. McNary hit one toward Sharabba, but the shortstop’s throw didn’t go as planned. As a result, Meyer and Ferguson scored, extending the Louisville lead to 5-1. After the inning, Dreswick was replaced by Jordan Weed. Meanwhile,

Becker just kept on rolling. Louisville’s ace held BC hitless until the fifth inning. She wouldn’t give up another one until the seventh—that’s when the Eagles attempted their comeback. Down by four runs, Cortez ignited a rally with a single to center field. After Chimento was robbed of a line drive, Allyson Moore singled. Megan Overton would take her place on the base path. Then Lexi DiEmmaneule lined out, giving Cortez the opportunity to tag up and advance to third. With runners on first and third, Weed doubled to right field, scoring Cortez and Overton. The deficit was cut to two, and that’s as close as the Eagles would get. Carly Severini grounded out to shortstop to end the game. This one was as ugly as it gets. For a long time, BC had more errors than it did hits. If the Eagles want to win this series, they’ll have to polish up their defensive play. With Dreswick shouldering so much of the workload on the mound, the infield must cut down on its mistakes. Saturday and Sunday’s games will be crucial, as BC and Louisville are neck and neck in the ACC standings, behind the two powerhouses—North Carolina and Florida State. 

DA BEARS - Earlier this year, Chicago Bears head coach John Fox said that his team is in “striking distance”. Then on Friday, the team’s Twitter account took a jab at Aaron Rodgers, alluding to his breakup with Olivia Munn. They deleted the tweet on Saturday, but still, it raises the all-important question: where is this confidence coming from? This team went 3-13 last year.

Like Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down? Follow us @HeightsSports

CELINE LIM / HEIGHTS EDITOR

BC committed four inﬁeld errors, which led to ﬁve unearned runs and a loss to Louisville on Friday. Despite winning the next two games, the Eagles recorded four more errors.

SPORTS in SHORT ACC ATLANTIC BASEBALL

NUMBERS TO KNOW

CONFERENCE

OVERALL

Clemson

13-2

28-5

Louisville

12-3

27-4

Wake Forest

9-6

23-10

Florida State

7-8

21-13

NC State

7-8

18-15

Notre Dame

7-8

13-17

1-14

9-20

Boston College

Number of runs that Birdball gave up to No. 4 North Carolina on Saturday, the most the team has conceded all season.

Number of goals that women’s lacrosse allowed in the second half against Duke on Saturday.

Numbers of errors committed by softball throughout its weekend series against Louisville.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“[Keep your] head down, play the game, not the scoreboard.” — Mike Gambino

on consistently facing large deﬁcits in the weekend series versus North Carolina

The Heights

Monday, April 10, 2017

WOMEN’S TENNIS

From New Delhi to Chestnut Hill, Dair Dominates the Court Asiya Dair, from B1 stay away very long. Before long, she had earned the title National Champion of Kazakhstan and was back to the traveling tennis life. Along with traveling for tennis came the opportunity to experience the unique cultures of well over a dozen countries across the globe—and, notably, the opportunity to test out the unique foods of well over a dozen countries. Dair estimates that she gained four pounds of weight in one week in Europe just from trying out various pastries and bread. Some of the tournaments Dair played in are well-known to even the most casual tennis fan. She competed in the juniors tournaments at Wimbledon, the French Open, and the U.S. Open. Typically, colleges will scout major junior tournaments to identify talent and start the recruiting process. With Dair, the process went a little differently. Initially, according to Boston College assistant coach John Sherwood, she toyed between attending college and going pro. Sherwood says that’s just the type of player BC loves. “We’re looking for players like Asiya who can make that transition [into professional tennis] if they choose to,” Sherwood said. Head coach Nigel Bentley wanted her to come to BC, too. Throughout the winter and spring of her senior year Bentley and Dair remained in contact as BC attempted to convince her to come. At first, it might have seemed like a tall order, considering the other schools (and weather opportunities) Dair had to consider. She received attention and offers from UCLA, USC, Miami, Florida, Wisconsin, and Virginia, among others. The thought of beautiful weather in the California and Florida schools tempted Dair, but in April of her senior year she flew from Kazakhstan to Boston to take a look at BC. When she arrived, she fell in love with the campus—especially the Harry Potteresque architecture of the buildings—and the rest is history. (It certainly didn’t hurt that Dair visited BC during the most

magical weekend of the year: Marathon Monday weekend.) And with that, it was official: Dair would spend the next four years in maroon and gold, representing BC in the competitive Atlantic Coast Conference. Flash forward three years and Dair, now a junior, is making her mark at BC. ark Cooper is a celebrated artist and sculptor based in Boston. He is a faculty member at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, but also teaches ceramics at BC, and came to know Dair when she took his Beginning Ceramics class. Students in Cooper’s Beginning Ceramics class conduct a research project in which they identify an artist who will influence their work over the course of the semester. Dair chose sculptor Ralph Helmick. Cooper has known Helmick for years. The two went to graduate school together and have been friends ever since. But Dair’s thorough research turned up information about Helmick and his art that Cooper didn’t even know, despite their close friendship. She put just as much energy and focus into her final project, creating a ceramic stage complete with ceramic curtains— and then projecting video through them, a project Cooper labeled as “sophisticated” for someone new to the art world. For Dair’s teammates, this laser focus on the task at hand and dedication to giving 110 percent to every challenge is apparent on the court as well as in the classroom. Dasha Possokhova, a freshman on the team, connected with Dair right away, partly because both of them speak Russian fluently. The first time she saw Dair play, Possokhova was astonished at her grit and focus. It was the first outdoor practice of the year, and the heat was nearly unbearable. Even as Possokhova grew exhausted and overheated, she watched Dair not let up even one iota. Dair’s commitment to improving goes beyond practicing her strokes. Dair and Possokhova worked out together some mornings, and Possokhova marveled

Big Data is the Future Advanced Analytics, from B1 ment decision? Perhaps the problem was best illustrated with former Boston College center Sean Williams, one of my all-time favorite players. A little context: Williams was a 6-foot-10 giant who played with Jared Dudley and Craig Smith under head coach Al Skinner. To picture his athleticism, just imagine his step brother, Myles Garrett, except taller and the best shot blocker in the country. During the 2006-07 season, Williams blocked 75 shots in only 15 games. Fans referred to his games in Conte Forum as the “Sean Williams Block Party.” But there was one thing about Williams that worried potential NBA suitors: the man loved marijuana. He was arrested for possession in 2005 and earned suspensions for both his freshman and sophomore years. Naturally, his affinity for weed was going to be a topic of discussion before the 2007 NBA Draft. In an attempt to hone Williams’ interviewing skills, his agent arranged for him to sit down with the Rockets. Williams wouldn’t talk to any other teams in exchange for feedback on how to be a better candidate. “So you got caught smoking weed your freshman and sophomore years,” said the Rockets interviewer, according to Michael Lewis’ new book, The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds. “What happened your junior year?” “They stopped testing me,” Williams answered. “And if you’re not going to test me, I’m gonna smoke!” That was the last interview that Williams’ agent ever granted him. Nonetheless, the former Eagle was still drafted 17th overall. His career, however, failed to take off and his relationship with BC became more tumultuous. In 2009, Williams was invited back to the Heights for a game against Duke, only to be arrested upon arrival for violating an old trespassing order. But for every troubled big man that struggled breaking into the Association, there was a charming one that went down the same path. There had to be a better way by which to judge these players than interviews, than feelings.

So Morey began mining as much data as he could find, searching for any patterns that could help him estimate NBA success. He sent out workers to the NCAA offices in Indianapolis to photocopy box scores from every game over the last 20 years. Morey also collected unconventional data, like personal info on players’ backgrounds and families. Not only did he want to see if there were connections between college scoring and NBA success, but he was also interested in examining whether growing up with two parents had any effect on future hoop performance. In most cases, there was no correlation. But when it came to stats like rebounds per minute and steals per minute, Morey’s model proved to be quite predictive. And it showed in the win column, too, as the Rockets haven’t had a losing season with Morey at the helm. The data-driven analytics championed by Billy Beane, Theo Epstein, and Morey have not been celebrated by everyone, though. During a TNT broadcast last year, Charles Barkley ripped the Rockets’ GM and his business of sabermetrics: “I’ve always believed analytics was crap,” Barkley said. “All these guys who run these organizations who talk about analytics, they have one thing in common—they’re a bunch of guys who have never played the game, and they never got the girls in high school, and they just want to get in the game.” Barkley and other former professional athletes see advanced statistics as a war on their traditional ways. Data analytics and even sportswriting are, by nature, intrusive. I understand the game better than you. But that doesn’t mean they’re wrong—just ask the Cubs, Indians, or Rockets, which are enjoying one of the best offensive seasons of all time under Morey. Following analytical models as a blueprint for running a sports franchise is keeping both players, coaches, and the media honest. Yes, numbers do lie—just a lot less often than people do.

Riley Overend is the sports editor for The Heights. He can be reached on Twitter @RileyHeights.

Photo Courtesy of BC Athletics

Asiya Dair draws some of the best competition in the country as the Eagles’ top singles player, and she has more than held her own. at her teammate’s drive to push herself constantly. “She just keeps going,” Possokhova said. “She’s like a machine, she never stops.” Bentley has seen this “extraordinary” work ethic for the past three years. In practice, he says, Dair maintains her focus and pushes herself beyond the challenges assigned by her coaches. One practice, she hit almost 200 strokes perfectly, then clipped the net on one shot. Frustrated, she asked Bentley what she’d done wrong. When he pointed out that she’d just hit hundreds of perfect shots, she didn’t care—she’d made a mistake on just one, and that wasn’t good enough. Another time, after a tough loss in a match, Dair texted Bentley, promising that she’d work harder than she’d ever worked before at the next practice. If she makes a mistake with her forehand in a match, she’ll challenge herself to hit 100 extra forehands at the next practice, placing them perfectly each time. air sums up her practice mentality pretty succinctly: “You try to kill yourself in practice. That’s how you build your confidence.”

Before arriving at BC, Dair was primarily a singles player, but now she plays both singles and doubles. Dair plays on Court One, matching up against the toughest competition in the ACC. So far this season, she is 10-9 in singles play, with many of her losses coming against the top players in the country. Meanwhile, she plays doubles with Elene Tsokilauri. Playing doubles has been the biggest challenge of her college career—but given her work ethic and the support of her teammates, Dair has quickly adjusted to her new role. In singles, she prefers to stay back on the court, hovering around the baseline and sending deep groundstrokes across the net to challenge her opponents. Playing at the net and using volleys to win points wasn’t in her singles arsenal. But net play is crucial in doubles, so she set about mastering volleys. Besides volleys, Dair counts her backhand and serve as her two most dangerous weapons on the court. Dair has a naturally strong backhand, and she has relied on it to help her out in tough moments in numerous matches across her career. As for her serve? Well, as Dair says, when it

works, it works really well. Whether it is her serve, backhand, forehand, or volley, all facets of Dair’s game are enhanced by her mental toughness. “Tennis may be different from other sports in some ways,” Bentley said. “It’s a very big sport mentally when you get to a certain level and Asiya is very tough in that department.” Although Dair has earned plenty of big wins during her first three years as an Eagle, Bentley is proudest of her for the way she acts after a tough loss. Rather than allowing herself to sulk at her loss, Dair responds with renewed determination, energy, and drive. Of course, for Dair, this is only natural. She loves tennis now just as much as she did after her first tennis lesson at the age of six. Every step of her career—every backhand winner, every tournament won, every country visited—has carried her to BC, where she is able to discover new things about herself in every single match. “Every match is like a challenge to myself,” she said. “I always associate a tennis match with my life.” n

The Heights

Monday, April 10, 2017

BASEBALL

Tar Heels Outscore BC by 24 Runs in Sunday Doubleheader Birdball vs. UNC, from B1 and clutch hits from both Datres and Riley, UNC widened its lead to seven. Already in desperation mode, BC fired back. Well, sort of. Gian Martellini drew a walk, and Bigras shot one through the gap on the left side, moving a man into scoring position. Tactically, Alu grounded out to first, shifting the runners over. Jacob Yish also grounded out, but recorded the RBI on the play, as Martellini crossed the plate. Unlike the first game of the day, BC was on the board prior to the sixth inning, albeit one run. But it would take hours for head coach Mike Gambino’s crew to add anything else. UNC wasn’t waiting. The Tar Heels rattled off three more runs in the next inning, forcing Gambino’s hand in the fourth. Jack Nelson—the first of three relievers—had to take the hill to slow the bleeding. But even he, who has had the hot hand of late, couldn’t get it done. Due to a combination of walks, an error, and a monster double by Roberts, the Tar Heels put together another three-run inning in the fifth, extending their lead to 12. For the ensuing two innings , both sides traded scoreless frames. Donovan Casey offered Gambino some stability at the rubber, fanning two and holding the Tar Heels hitless. But as soon as Michael Strem came in for Casey, scoring resumed. Roberts’ field day continued as he singled through the left side. He

would then advance to second on a wild pitch. Busch and Miller scored Roberts on a pair of sacrifice flies. As soon as it looked like Strem was going to escape, Warmoth roped on over the left-field fence. The Eagles retaliated with two runs of their own. After two quick outs, Dante Baldelli drew a walk. Anthony Maselli proceed to double down the right-field line. To complete the two-out “rally,” Strem singled up the middle, scoring both Baldelli and Maselli. Neither team scored in the eighth, and due to the complexion of the game and the timing of the first game of the doubleheader, both sides agreed to end this one without a ninth inning of play. There was a reason why the first game took so long. BC simply could not stop the UNC lineup. At first it appeared that Dan Metzdorf would have an advantage against the left-handed heavy Tar He els . But that wa sn’t the ca se whatsoever. UNC tormented Metzdorf early and often, scoring five runs in the first four innings. On the other hand, Tar Heels freshman Luca Dalatri was burning the Eagles. Literally. Rather than toying with breaking balls, Dalatri stuck to his fastball, and it payed off. He struck out five batters and didn’t allow a hit until the fourth and a run until the sixth. UNC really broke loose offensively in the fourth inning. Warmoth laid down the perfect bunt right along

the third-base line, which came to screeching halt as soon as it reached the end of the grass. With one man on, McGee rocketed a shot toward second. Jake Palomaki tried to backhand it, but the ball got by him. Datres brought them all home with a three-run shot to left field. And the Tar Heels weren’t done. Zack Gahagan and Riley reached ba se, singling to shor t stop and drawing a walk, respectively. Once again, Roberts came through: the first baseman singled through the left side, scoring Gahagan. Adam Pate would walk, loading the bases. And even though Brandon Martorano grounded into a double-play, Riley still scored on the play. UNC picked up another run—its 11th—before BC scored its first. In the sixth, Aaron Soucy doubled to left, notching the first hit of his collegiate career. Dempsey then grounded out to first, advancing Soucy to third. Yish, another freshman, singled through the right side, scoring his fellow classmate. One inning later, Yish tallied another RBI, scoring Alu with a sacrifice fly. Still down 11-2, BC ’s bullpen wasn’t doing itself any favors. After two relatively flawless innings, Jack Cunningham gave up three runs in the eighth, virtually erasing everything the Eagles accomplished in the previous two innings. B C got two more back in the bottom half of the inning, but it didn’t matter—partially because of the deficit at hand, and also due to the

Celine Lim / heights Staff

UNC shortstop Logan Warmoth totaled six hits in Sunday’s doubleheader sweep.

fact that UNC would go to score two of its own in the ninth, rounding out its total at 16 on the day. The 16-4 loss foreshadowed what was to come for the Eagles. And it probably could have been foreseen, as BC gave up a season-high 17 runs to the Tar Heels on Saturday. Before this weekend, the Eagles hadn’t given up more than 13 runs all season. But against UNC, the they conceded at least 15 in each game of the series. When the team is down as much as it was against UNC, there’s only one

thing it can do. “[Keep your] head down, play the game, not the scoreboard,” Gambino said. “And if you do that, assuming you get some good at bats, then all of sudden you can kind of keep doing that, and then you can get back in the ball game.” Only, the Eagles could not get back in the ball game. Every time they got some sort of offensive spark, it was quelled by a Tar Heel outburst— extinguishing any chance BC had to grab a game this weekend. n

Celine Lim / heights Staff

The BC pitching staff allowed 17 runs to North Carolina on Saturday, 16 in the first game on Sunday, and 15 in the second game of the doubleheader, as the Eagles were handily swept this weekend.

UNC Hits Four Home Runs in 17-Run Victory Over Eagles By DJ Recny Executive Assistant

For th e Un i v e r s i t y o f N or th Carolina, it was a story of the longball on Saturday. Powered by four home runs from North Carolina 17 Brian Miller, Boston College 7 L o g a n Warmoth, Kyle Datres, and Zack Gahagan, the Tar Heels (24-6, 10-3 Atlantic Coast) defeated host BC (918, 1-12) 17-7 to kick off the weekend series. The first inning saw good pitching from both Jacob Stevens and Tar Heel righty J.B. Bukauskas. UNC went down in order, while Donovan Casey threatened with a single before being picked off to end the first inning. The Tar Heels struck back in the second, putting two men on on an error by shortstop Johnny Adams. Stevens forced a pop fly to get the second out, but Michael Busch delivered in the clutch with a single up the middle to bring in two runs for the Tar Heels. The Eagles, however, were not to be outdone. Catcher Gian Martinelli

led off with a laser to the right field fence, causing UNC outfielder Tyler Lynn to crash through the temporary wall in right field. Following a hasty repair to the Lynn-sized hole in the outfield wall, Jake Alu flied out to left, allowing Martinelli to score on the sacrifice. Mitch Bigras, who walked prior to Alu’s sacrifice, advanced to third following the fly ball and a throwing error, and then scored on a wild pitch to tie the game at two. The third inning proved to be uneventful, but the fourth would be an explosion of offensive power. The Tar Heels racked up two easy runs on doubles from Miller and Cody Roberts, but then Warmoth launched the Heels’ second homer of the night. A towering shot over the left-center wall, the bomb brought the tally to six runs for UNC before Stevens struck out freshman Ashton McGee. As they did in the second, the Eagles would strike back. On the first pitch of the inning, Martinelli was drilled with a fastball to the face. He would leave the field bleeding, but

under his own power. With Martinelli unable to continue, Freshman catcher Aaron Soucy took first base. Bigras would follow with a single, and on the following bunt attempt by Alu, Bukauskas threw it away to allow Soucy to score. Brian Dempsey also bunted for a hit, and then Anthony Maselli walked in the fourth run for the Eagles. With the bases loaded, they weren’t done. Chris Balogh recorded an RBI on a groundout to first, and then a single from the red-hot Donovan Casey would bring home two more. The Eagles took their first lead of the game, 7-6. It would not last. Stevens returned to the mound, and Detras to ok advantage. He launched the Tar Heels’ third home run of the night, tying the game at seven. Unlike the previous two innings in which UNC had scored, BC would not answer in the bottom of the fifth. The sixth inning is when the Tar Heels began to run away with the victory. Stevens was left on the mound, subsequently giving up a lead

off single to Roberts. It’s commonly said that there is no excuse not to score if you get the lead-off man on base, and the Tar Heels certainly took that to heart. Miller stepped to the plate, and with a swing whose violent power would be envied by power-hitters everywhere, launched a two-run bomb which easily cleared the right field fence. The hard-hitting junior’s homer would prove to be enough to beat BC, but the Tar Heels had other ideas. Zach Stromberg came in to relieve the tired Stevens, but would not make it out of the inning before giving up a run off three walks and a wild pitch. He was quickly replaced by sophomore-righty Jack Nelson. It wouldn’t take long for the Tar Heels to find Nelson’s number either. In fact, it only took one batter and six pitches before Gahagan would hit the Tar Heels’ fourth homer of the night, a grand slam that would bring UNC’s total to 14. Now the only thing that UNC had to do was shut down the potentially explosive BC offense. It did just

that, seeing the towering Rodney Hutchison Jr. fool the Eagles with his crafty breaking ball and sidearm delivery. The Tar He els would end up notching three more runs in the seventh inning as a form of extrad i l i g e n t i n s u r a n c e , b u t U N C ’s fundamentally sound defense and deep (not to mention talented) bullpen insured the win from the fourth inning onward. North Carolina is the No. 4 team in the nation for a reason, and it showed it on Saturday with its ability to score runs and prevent them when necessary. The Tar Heels eventually sealed the win with a backwards K on Bigras, ending the first game of the series in a dominating fashion. If the Eagles want to steal a win or two in the double header tomorrow, they will need to limit the Heel’s explosive offense. In a double-header, an underdog team can easily snag two wins, it’ll just be a question of whether or not the Eagles can put together a complete enough game to take down the North Carolinian powerhouse. n

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THE HEIGHTS

MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017

In ‘2017,’ Louis C.K. Dismantles Humanity With a Razor’s Edge BY GUS LEWIS

For The Heights

In his new Netflix standup special 2017, comedian Louis C.K. delivers what might be his most cohesive and intriguing set to date, offering unique perspectives on the topics of abortion, suicide, religion, parenthood, and love. These perspectives are at times dark and nihilistic, but are delivered in a way that is difficult not to accept and softened by C.K.’s expert use of humor. In this special, C.K. demonstrates that he is a master of observational comedy. He upholds the image as someone who studies humans and spends great amounts of time pondering the minutia and subtleties of everyday life. Often underappreciated, show openings are critical to setting the scene for a comedy special. C.K. is a master at opening shows, never wasting any time with awkward introductions and pleasantries, instead always jumping headfirst into his material and delivering laughs within the first few seconds, immediately setting the

tone for the rest of the show. This special is no different with C.K. opening by going straight into his thoughts on abortion. He then proceeds to offer up a refreshing take on the controversial subject. He points out the extreme dichotomy between abortion stances where one side sees it as merely “taking a shit” and the other sees it as killing a baby. While C.K. admits he is “pro-choice,” unlike most, he doesn’t deny that abortion is killing a baby, but believes women should be able to kill babies. From here he segues into the topic of life and death, drawing our attention to the harsh realities of life. He calls on the audience to think of every awful thing ever and then reminds us that they are all a part of life. He claims to only like life just enough that he has not killed himself but with a “razor-thin margin.” He portrays suicide as something intriguing that we all contemplate at times. In an absurdist fashion, he claims there are no real obligations in life because you can just kill yourself—it will solve all your problems

and even the world’s problems. After making the case for suicide, C.K. points out that there must be something about life, because people often pick even the worst versions of it over death. By dishing out his brutally honest perspective on life and death, C.K. is giving us an against the grain take on the insignificance, rather than significance, of human life. But C.K. does not stop at dismantling the value of life itself. He then goes after the conventional views of love with an equally brutal approach. His message is wise and one we do not hear often enough in a world where half of all marriages fail. He admits that love is the best part of life, but warns that it is greedy to expect such a good thing to last. He calls out the naïvety and arrogance of young couples who think they have figured it out when so many before them have failed. In a culture that glorifies love, C.K.’s harsh observations are refreshing and comforting in a way, making us realize that the idea of everlasting love that everyone

COMEDY

LOUIS C.K. 2017 LOUIS C.K. DISTRIBUTED BY NETFLIX RELEASE APR. 4, 2017 OUR RATING

NETFLIX

celebrates is not realistic and that we should just enjoy love in the moment and not be surprised when it inevitably dies. C.K. is one of the most prolific comedians out there, releasing a new special nearly every year. He is also one of the most consistent, with all of them delivering in terms of humor. While this one is on par humor-wise, it stands out a little above the rest in terms

of wisdom and thought provocation. In this set, C.K. dug a little deeper, getting at some profound truths about human nature. He bombards us with the harsh realities of life, love, and death but with enough humor that we still walk away feeling good, but definitely wiser from having confronted the bleak and terrifying nature of our existence we usually try to ignore. 

Cold War Kids Depart From Norm to Honor SoCal Roots With ‘L.A. Divine’ BY ISABELLA DOW

Asst. Arts & Review Editor

Cold War Kids released their sixth studio album last Friday with L.A. Divine, which featured their trademark blend of perceptive and authentic lyrics to carry off their alternative, blues-rock sound. Ten years after the release of their debut album Robbers and Cowards, the band continues to stay true to their roots by writing songs about relationships, spiritual inquiries, and the difficulties of living up to the expectations people have for themselves and each other. L.A. Divine is also a tribute to the band’s Southern California roots, which incorporates a stronger pop sound to the album than listeners have ever heard from the band. Lead singer Nathan Willett’s soulful and expansive vocals powerfully convey the emotional and artistic depth of the songs, even while the musical style presents a less emphatic presence than previous albums. Opening the album, “Love is Mystical” feels familiar upon first listen with its upbeat, marching piano and the warmth of the lyrical sentiment. The song presents the lighter, more pleasant side of love, stat-

ing it will give one direction and temper feelings of emptiness, which will “give you the power to believe again.” This lofty declaration seems more accessible with lyrics such as “something happens when I lean on my mistakes,” as listeners can sympathize with making mistakes, and the statement considers the potential of blunders to help one attain fulfillment. The album immediately throws this heartwarming idea into conflict with “Can We Hang On?” and “So Tied Up,” both of which remind the listener that a powerful force such as love can be a double-edged sword. “Can We Hang On?” is a wistful, bittersweet track that uses a dreamy riff and nostalgic lyrics to convey the wear and tear a relationship undergoes with time. The song is full of ambivalence, which continues with “So Tied Up” and its frustration about love’s ability to trap people in maddening dynamics. The buoyant and impassioned track describes someone that serves as “lover, best friend, my worst enemy,” which makes good and bad inseparable and develops a tension within human connection that is carried throughout the rest of the album. The album also contains some oddities,

MUSIC

L.A. DIVINE COLD WAR KIDS PRODUCED BY CAPITOL RECORDS RELEASE APR. 7, 2017 OUR RATING

CAPITOL RECORDS

such as in the hazy, distant track “L.A. River” or the brief venture into the spoken-word genre with “Wilshire Protest.” Both songs remind the listener of the artist’s efforts to revere the mythical quality of Los Angeles as a place of inspiration and authenticity, contrary to the popular view of the city. While some might consider it a leap to tie the broad range of topics used throughout the album back to L.A. with a couple unexpected tracks, others would consider the themes of these tracks pertaining to fame and living authentically to be more condensed versions of ideas that other tracks elaborate on and amplify. L.A. Divine also contains some tracks towards which fans of the group would gravitate towards immediately. “Luck Down” is a tough and confrontational song that is reminiscent of the band’s more profound rock sound, and is a sort of intervention against lifestyles that burn people out, and the difficulties of dragging someone out of those habits. “Ordinary Idol” is one of those energetic and thrilling tracks that Cold War Kids does so well, with its infectious, overwhelming presence and its ability to flip a familiar idea around on the listener. Discussing the notion that idolizing people is often an irrational, the lyrics ask, “Why would you idolize me? / There’s nothing I got that you don’t / I’m the one that you ignore.” Painting this tendency to obsess over certain figures as hollow, the song intuitively makes sense to the listener even as they may be guilty of this tendency themselves. A more mellow track, “Restless” speaks to the elusive nature of contentment over soaring vocals and musical simplicity. Most of its strength lies in the ability to immerse the listener in a sentiment that sounds and feels relatable. The closing track, “Free to Breathe,” is also mellow and speculative, haunting the listener with an open-ended, “Why should I believe that everything will be alright? / If you’re not angry, then you must not be listening.” Instead of ending the album with some sappy, blanket declaration that everything is fine and swell all the time, the song beautifully wraps everything up with a reflection on the contradictions contained within our lives, and the fitting lack of closure that brings to the listener. 

1 20TH CENTURY FOX

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE REPORT TITLE

WEEKEND GROSS

WEEKS IN RELEASE

1. THE BOSS BABY

26.3

2. BEAUTY AND THE BEAST

25.0

3. SMURFS: THE LOST VILLAGE

14.0

4. GOING IN STYLE

12.5

5. GHOST IN THE SHELL

7.4

TRENDS IN MOVIE MONEY

The week of April 7-9 made $122 million. Holy catchphrase, Batman! That’s a lot of money right there. Quite a sum, if we do say so ourselves. And! It’s only $80 million less than this same weekend last year, again due to the “Donald Trump” of movies that came out last year, Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. To explain this needlessly political analogy, Batman v. Superman is the “Donald Trump” of movies for the following reasons. Everyone knew way in advance how bad it would be as a movie (read: President). When it hit theaters (read: the Oval Office) it was torn to pieces by critics. Everyone is constantly astounded that it made over $1 billion (read: was elected President of an actual country oh my god). Even now, after being torn apart to reveal the garbage fire that it actually is, there are still adoring fans that cling to the last shred of hope that it was a good movie (read: not a monster in “human” form). What’s also pretty interesting is that this weekend and the same weekend last year saw the premiere of two very similar movies. Last year it was God’s Not Dead 2, a movie in which a teacher is brought before an actual court for making overtly religious relations in history class, and if that’s not the biggest Evangelical bible-thumping straw man we have seen for the secular side, then maybe this year’s fiery sermon “based on a true story” turned movie The Case for Christ is. Anyway, go see Get Out. Please. That movie is so good. See it again.

2 DISNEY

3 PARAMOUNT PICTURES

‘Going In Style’ Sees Aged Cinema Giants Steal the Show BY SHANNON KELLY Asst. Features Editor

There are some people on this earth that just seem like they have kind of always been an old person. Despite their successes as a young adult or the normality of their middle age, these people have looked old for a very long time—long enough that you have to Google what they looked like when they were young. Probably the best examples of this phenomena are Alan Arkin, 83 years old, Sir Michael Caine, 84, and Morgan Freeman, who is surprisingly only 79 but also has played God, quite possibly the oldest thing ever, since 2003. Acknowledging their talents as Academy Award-winning actors even in their old age, director Zach Braff has built Going in Style around them, creating a funny and smart remake of the 1979 original, despite a few bumps along the way. Joe (Caine) finds himself at Williamsburg Savings Bank after getting a yellowcoded envelope indicating his house may be foreclosed on soon. While there, a group

of men in Purge-like masks take over the place, stuffing cash into bags as they shout rhetoric against Big Banks and corporate greed. After witnessing one of the robbers up close, Joe gets taken in and interviewed by Hamer (Matt Dillon), an FBI agent who doesn’t seem smart enough to ever find the perpetrators. Joe and his fellow Brooklynite friends Albert (Arkin) and Willie (Freeman) lose their jobs due to company outsourcing and their pension plans are dissolved to get rid of the company’s debt. Determined to get “a piece of the pie,” Joe decides he wants to rob his bank, which is holding the pension funds, and after some encouraging of the others, the plan is set in motion. The plot picks up from there, leading to a practice go-around on the local grocery store, tapping Joe’s weed-selling ex-son-inlaw for fellow “lowlifes” to help them with the job, and meticulous training for the actual robbery to take place on the day Joe’s house will be lost and their local hangout holds a carnival. As expected, the robbery does not go as smoothly as hoped.

Going in Style is a departure from the original, which shone a spotlight on the boredom and loneliness of old age and featured bleaker plot points. Braff ’s work, instead, comments on the social issues surrounding his characters, from the general distrust of corporations and the continuing gentrification of areas for hipsters. Joe acknowledges to his granddaughter, Brooklyn, while walking her home from school that the neighborhood has changed over the years, with her remarking it has gotten safer. In the carnival scene, solar panels peek out from the old-style rides and concessions stands. The three main characters are funny on their own and build off on each other, though some of the initial comedy—a lot of “they’re just so old!” jokes—leaves much to be desired. The situations Braff puts them in, however, from an engrossed viewing of The Bachelorette to a frantic electric scooter chase with pork loin stuffed down Freeman’s pants, give the film a freshness that shows that the characters have kept up with pop culture just fine and can compete with the

FILM

GOING IN STYLE ZACH BRAFF DISTRIBUTED BY WARNER BROS. RELEASE APR. 7, 2017 OUR RATING

WARNER BROS. PICTURES

youngest of criminals. Efforts from the supporting cast do not go unnoticed, as Braff has compiled heavy-hitters that all fit into this world. Dillon, who often plays guy-whothe-audience-is-supposed-to-hate, brings his usual sliminess and condescension to his role as the FBI agent. Going in Style may not be the best movie at the box office this week—Boss Baby and

Beauty and the Beast will reign supreme after multiple go-arounds—but the film does the job, bringing an interesting story to the screen without feeling gimmicky in its premise. The last 20 minutes of the movie provide a satisfaction that few films in comedy do, and make Going in Style a great vehicle to watch the most famous of old people wreak havoc on New York City. 

THE HEIGHTS

MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017

Body Swapping Fuels Attraction in Mature Themes of ‘Your Name’ BY PETER GAVARIS Heights Staff Even while attempting to connect us, modern technology seems to further emphasize our own deeply felt isolation. Stroll through any city and find that nearly every man, woman, and child has their face down and headphones in, seemingly unaware of what’s happening. These ideas, admittedly, are not novel, as recent films like Her (2013) explore the difficulty of finding love in the modern age. Your Name, the Japanese animated mega-hit, seems to recognize this isolation felt by younger generations and consoles them. Disheveled and unkempt, Mitsuha (Ryûnosuke Kamiki) wakes for school and mindlessly prepares for the day, longing for a chance to leave provincial Japan for Tokyo. She braids her hair, eats a quick breakfast with her elderly grandmother, and walks to the high school with some friends. Soon, however, she recognizes a few oddities, such as her friends continually commenting that she was acting “weird” the previous day, and suspicious writing in her notebook asking, “Who are you?” These abnormalities seem to comment just as much on the nature of

being an adolescent as they work to move the plot forward. The following morning, Mitsuha wakes for school again, before quickly realizing that she was not living in her own body. Rather, she looks around this mysterious bedroom and, after gazing at herself in the mirror, concludes that she is occupying the body of a boy from Tokyo, Taki (Mone Kamishiraishi). This impossibility allows Mitsuha to live the life she yearned for, as she spends the day riding the train and frequenting cafes with Taki’s friends. As Mitsuha occupies his body, Taki occupies hers as they begin switching places in their sleep a few times each week. Played on for wacky hijinks initially, this Freaky Friday-esque body swap concept is quickly relished by both Taki and Mitsuha—as they are both given the chance to live a life unbeknownst to them. They start leaving notes to one another while occupying each other’s body, reminding the body’s rightful owner what happened throughout the day, as both get more and more entangled in each others lives. Both characters are adolescents searching for something greater than what they have. This unfocused longing is

For The Heights In the time since Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky completed his first piano concerto, the work has become cemented as a quintessential piece in many pianists repertoire. Like the quadruple axel in figure skating, or the skateboarder’s coveted 900, performing Tchaikovsky’s first piano concerto in public is a daunting task, reserved only for true experts. Saturday night, Alexander Aylward, MCAS ’17, took it on for the first time in public. Those who congregated in Gasson 100 bore witness to an exhibition of greatness, and the coronation of a Boston College piano-playing legend. Before Aylward took the stage, the concert began with Mozart’s “Symphony No. 40,” perhaps the most famous of his 41 symphonies—interestingly, one of only two that are in minor keys. Nonetheless, the piece is still Mozartian—listeners were treated to an elegant experience, starting with one of the prodigy’s most famous melodies. Conductor John Finney, director of the BC Symphony Orchestra, brought the piece to life by taking appropriate tempos and accurately conveying the feeling of the piece. In response, the ensemble played beautifully, pleasing listeners with sophisticated phrase-endings and wellemphasized moments of harmonic tension. The orchestra chugged through sonata form like a finely tuned motor, leaving the audience satisfied. Aylward and the orchestra then lept forward some 100 years into the romantic period for the Tchaikovsky concerto. The first movement, a monster in itself, takes listeners on a journey through many different musical palettes. The unforgettable introductory horn motive introduces a strand of the theme of the first movement, initially in Bb until an eventual arrival in the less agitated relative major. This opening was delivered energetically and set the tone for a thrilling first movement. Aylward’s first test was the piano cadenza, a slight variation on the initial theme. Stuttering block chords and fast lines were no match for his virtuosic playing, and

FILM

YOUR NAME MAKOTO SHINKAI DISTRIBUTED BY TOHO RELEASE APR. 7, 2017 OUR RATING

TOHO

Of course, the unexpected splitting of the comet coincides with the abrupt splitting of Taki and Mitsuha’s communication. Many of the images presented throughout visually depict the two teenagers’ crossing of paths. A pair of telephone wires are shown entangled, early on, to express the entwining lives between both characters. Furthermore, after the body swapping ceased happening, an image of two birds flying past one another followed,to further emphasize the

missed connection experienced by both characters. Your Name is overwhelmingly successful by utilizing animation to tell a teenage love story with mature sensibilities. Shinkai’s film is perplexing to begin with—the confusion from the body swapping could have been distracting. Your Name, rather, operates more in a dream state, switching between characters with the ease and enjoyment that Taki and Mitsuha embody. 

Full Swing Impresses With Flair, Tact BY CALEB GRIEGO Arts & Review Editor

JAKE CATANIA / HEIGHTS STAFF

Aylward, BC Symphony Channel Tchaikovsky BY JAMIE DEANTONIS

why Taki and Mitsuha grow to love body swapping. In his own body, Taki often sits alone in his bedroom, sketching pictures he recalls from provincial Japan. Makoto Shinkai’s stellar direction emphasizes the beauty of nature—holding on images of the rural town, with the twilight sun breaking over the looming mountains. Shinkai’s knack for creating sumptuous pastoral imagery helps viewers understand why Taki is attracted to rural Japan, and, as a result, Mitsuha. While switching bodies, it should come as no surprise that the two fall in love with one another. This powerful association formed between the land and people. All good things must come to an end, and the body swapping stops occurring following the presence of a mysterious comet in the night sky. This prompts both Taki and Mitsuha to begin calling one another—each time, the line is unavailable. If the universe was responsible for bringing these two lost souls together, the universe seemed to be keeping them apart. The filmmakers further accentuate the thematic truths of their film through the use of imagery. The comet, for instance, breaks apart into two when it reaches its perigee—symbolizing the diverting paths of Mitsuha and Taki.

listeners immediately understood the treat that was in store. The remainder of the epic 20-minute movement was full of elegant piano playing, interwoven with a manicured orchestra who together went on a signature Tchaikovskian journey through various atmospheres. Finney expertly guided the orchestra to the end of the movement, building suspense until the famous I-IV-I closing chords were so grand that they absolutely begged for applause. The second movement is more lyrical than its thrilling predecessor, but still equally captivating. Flautist Isabelle Pazar delivered the sweet opening melody, eventually picked up by the awaiting pianist. The movement depicts a scene reminiscent of a lonely lover sighing as he gazes out the window into a rainy day, recalling a love from days gone by. Aylward expertly delivered the theme, precisely capturing the appropriate espressivo marking. Despite the sugary nature of the majority of the movement, this movement contains some of the most technically difficult piano passages of the entire piece. Tucked away in the middle of the movement are jolts away from the peaceful dreamscape, an anxious drift from contentment. Those who knew the piece excitedly awaited these passages, and Aylward exceeded expectations with supremely nimble fingers. The shortest of the three, the final movement is forceful and to the point. Aylward played the theme memorably, skillfully accentuating the nuance of time without belaboring listeners with an overly dragged moment. Throughout the movement, great speed and fury called for many technically difficult passages from all players, and the ensemble executed well and in time. As the movement approached its conclusive finish, clarinetist Derek Cho, CSOM ’19, recalls his experience in the orchestra. “I was overwhelmed by huge walls of sound, layer upon layer of dramatic tension,” Cho said. “Our conductor, John Finney, led us with great ferocity, inspiring us to play with a burning sense of energy and passion to convey a celebration of life.” 

JP Neisewander, CSOM ’18, hoisted Izzy Mueller, MCAS ’18, into the air. As he held her upright, she made her body almost vertical, supporting herself on his shoulders. In an image of two people bracing one another reminiscent of the show as a whole, Full Swing impresses with the dynamism of two people as part of a larger organization. Brimming with smiles and evincing a fun-loving demeanor, Boston College Full Swing transferred its infectious attitudes to the hearts and minds of spectateurs. Its jovial spirit, embodied in its members, was felt with every lift and flick of the head. Much like its use of momentum on stage, Full Swing used the momentum from its AHANA Leadership Council Showdown People’s Choice Award win to put on an incredible display of all things swing in Lindy Hop ‘til You Drop. “Chelsea Dagger,” choreographed by Mueller, and Dante Keeler, MCAS ’17, saw a tale of love and affection blossom on stage. The all-black dress and caps donned by those in the background contrasted the white garments of the centerpiece dancers. This allowed for the focus to be shifted to the movements of the two lovers, supported by those clad in black. During the dance, the idea of support was solidified when the troupe executed a cascade of lifts and spins amongst couples as they remained stationary across the stage. The next dance “L ight It Up,” choreographed by Ilektra Andoni, MCAS ’17, and Wild Bill Stone, MCAS ’19, saw its members fit with bright colored dresses and shirts, with a few sporting bow ties and suspenders. As

they danced merrily about the stage, the dance oozed a party scene vibe as dancers smirked and spun. At one point, two of the men threw their legs into the air in a handstand, pulsing them around as the lights fluctuated in color. Synergy took the stage as the first guest performer, giving a second viewing of its “Game of Life” performance. The smaller setting did not dampen the effects of its movement as the choreographery remained strong and succinct in this smaller setting. Described by the Asinine announcers Matt Blue and Luke Smith, b oth MCAS ’19, as a “salad of moves” and a “delicious pudding,” “Black and Gold,” choreographed by Han, was a tender dance that had all the flashiness of lifts, but executed in a slow and delicate fashion. Championing the Full Swing attitude of having fun, this dance saw a slew of moves acted out on stage, loosened by their choreographed muses. Gingerly dipping partners and holding them. After a rousing guest performance by BC Irish Dance (BCID), both groups set up on stage in a genial collaboration. Fusing styles and sharing moves to Ed Sheeran’s “Galway Girl,” Full Swing members spun the girls of BCID while throwing in a few tamer lifts. Embracing the Irish tradition, Full Swing members agilely stepped to the intricate footwork. This piece was a sweet melding of styles that did justice to both disciplines. Keeping with the light-hearted themes of the evening, even Blue and Smith decided to show off their skills in the interim. Clasping hands and comedically giving themselves to dance with Tom Jones’ “It’s Not Unusual” the duo even executed a backward flip. Though they admitted to taking only

one lesson, it seems to prove that indeed anyone can dance. An all-ladies swing routine, “Ex’s and Oh’s,” choreographed by Anna Ritoch, MCAS ’17, and Morgan Hamill, MCAS ’17, challenged the gendered norms of the dance while keeping with stylistic tradition—it was the first of its kind in the group’s history. Though the ladies could not execute the more physically demanding lifts, the overall spunky attitude of the piece as well as the chemistry between the girls made the piece enticing and elocutionary. “Z ip Gun B op,” choreographed by Paige Hanauer, CSOM ’18, and Jason Rothstein, MCAS ’19, was an exuberant display of flashing lights and flashy moves. Stylized to the story of Bonnie and Clyde, saw the cops and robbers game played out on stage as the famed fugitives evaded police through vaults and the opposing forces became entangled in dance. The incorporation of this theme into the performance was truly impressive as the narrative was wholly played out comprehensively with tact. To end the night, Full Swing, along with alumni members, threw down their best moves to showcase the dramatic and intense dance skills they have acquired from the organization. To end on such a showcase strikes at the heart of the organization as it looks to the future to expands its successes and keep on swinging at BC and beyond. After being held for several impressive seconds, Mueller was brought down as gracefully as she went up. Though the strong vertical image came down, Full Swing’s ascension in the BC dance community appears to still be climbing and stretching ever higher. 

SHAAN BIJWADIA / HEIGHTS STAFF

Sarah Steiger and Eddy Nicaise, both MCAS ’17, throw down their best in a melange of dances with current and former members.

B8 MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017

ARTS&REVIEW

@BCHEIGHTSARTS

Distractions in the Past CALEB GRIEGO Time is the biggest distraction of all. Transfixed by the finite majesty of the past, I find myself neglectful of the future. Just as sound can be a distraction from our present state in the world, so too can an idea of another time dampen the candles of thought we hold to the future. I recently watched Midnight in Paris (2011) for the first time. Given my apparent Francophilia, I was surprised myself that I had not yet seen it. Even so, the impact the film and its simple message had on me was, as it was for so many others, profoundly inspiring. Treading on symbolic ground that modern man is all too familiar with, the film still comes away claiming that there is no time like the present. Thematically, there is not a sense of profundity within the film. The story sees its characters discontent as they deal with the ails of their own slice of time. Wistfully looking back to the past, they feel their kindred spirits would be better suited for another time altogether. One yearns to mingle with the Lost Generation in the swinging streets of Paris during the Roaring ’20s. Another looks even further back, into the Belle Epoque at the turn of the 20th century, where antiquity made way for modernity. In all cases, it is made painfully clear that such yearning for another time is a ceaseless notion, as peoples everywhere look to the past as the solution for their contemporary misfortune and heartache. I found that I was guilty of much the same kind of flawed mentality, where I misplaced my hopes in the past. For me, the past was comforting because it was contained and finite. All I had to do was wish to be a part of it, as I placed myself in the concert halls, at old movie premieres, and contemplating the history du jour. The past exists as an unmoving monolithic entity (hopefully, it won’t be the victim of redaction). As such, people find comfort in its certainty and wholeness. Period piece films, when elegantly executed, create that feel of a different time and place. Viewers, can be intoxicated by the allure of difference and stark tangible change. But I may fall victim to charming aesthetics, without having any actual connection to the world I wish to inhabit. But, at least before my birth, I do not belong to the past. I can place myself into the pristine image I have in my head, but this is simply a fabrication of my mind. I do not belong to any place but the present. That being said, there is a certain amount of due reverence to be put in the image a society that calls out to those beyond its years from the pages of history. But there are greater reasons still to quell the longing to abandon the current age. We are the forbearers of our age, our generation, and our day. Living for today and in today is critical for our own personal sanity and for our future. As each day passes, it is stamped in the permanent ink of time. There was only one Oct. 3, 1973. There was only one Jan. 7, 2004. There will be only one April 10, 2017. Once catalogued, processed, and filed away, our fingers can no longer reach to leave a mark on it or our voices a word. I love being enchanted by different times. Everything seems different. I sometimes think even the air must have smelled different and wonder what scents the world would have carried. But our job lies not in the past, but in the present. We will live in the 2020s and carry on stories, lives, and memories through them. One day people may very well refer to these years as the ’20s, hopefully with a cheeky prefix. We are the standard bearers for the years we have on this planet. For those living today, we might hope that people of the future may look back on our time and wish to have been a part of our small sliver of shared years, days, minutes, or seconds.

Caleb Griego is the arts & review editor for The Heights. He can be reached at arts@bcheights.com.

INSIDE ARTS& REVIEW

Our Days Our Youth

TAYLOR PERISON / HEIGHTS STAFF

The Dramatics Society’s rendition of Kenneth Lonergan’s ‘This is Our Youth’ powerfully explores the timeless struggles of youth in the turbulent context of the 1980s. BY TOMAS GUARNA For The Heights Kenneth Lonergan wrote This is Our Youth as a poignant reflection on youth during the Reagan era. But the Boston College Dramatics Society production proved that its relevance escapes its specific setting. Directed by Michael Quinn, MCAS ’19, assisted by Lauren Strauss, MCAS ’18, it is a stellar homage to Lonergan’s seemingly always contemporary play. Set in the ‘80s, the play narrates the story of three young adults in New York City. Kicked out from home by his abusive tycoon father, Warren (Michael Mazzone, MCAS ’19) arrives at Dennis’ (James Stevenson, MCAS ’20) place with a stolen $15,000 and a suitcase full of collectibles. Despite his initial reluctance to host his friend, Dennis suggests buying cocaine to share with his girlfriend, who he’s trying to get back after a fight, and another girl, Jessica (Haley Holmes, MCAS ’19), who Warren likes. Warren’s encounter with Jessica and the boys’ attempt to recover the money leads to a series of conflicts and realizations between the characters. This Is Our Youth is an exploration of delicate themes such as sexuality, maturity, privilege, as well as a poignant reflection about American society. Stevenson delivers an uncanny

performance of a chronically unlikeable Dennis. His interpretation stresses the character’s extreme aggressiveness and emotional violence, and does not fall short of showing his deep complexity. Stevenson’s brilliant performance of Dennis is perhaps the show’s starkest departure from the 2014 Steppenwolf ’s production, Quinn’s inspiration, which presented a more tame interpretation. The decision to present Dennis in this light is arguably a good call. Lonergan’s script does not really aim at poetic justice- in the end of the play, no character is really rewarded or punished for their actions. What it manages to do is to show a journey of stagnation: the characters’ evolutions are just developments of their personalities, results of the conflicts between them—yet nothing in their lives really changes, except perhaps for the accentuation of their confusion, and a hint of a realization on Warren’s side. For this reason, Quinn’s call to ask for no sympathy for Dennis suits the play’s original spirit. Despite its aggressive portrayal, Stevenson’s performance is far from simplistic. It leads the audience to admit that, in the end, they understand Dennis’ deeply troubled ways. Stevenson does not present a caricature of a violent and abusive person but a complicated and troubled character,

best developed in the flawlessly performed monologues, which shed light on Dennis’ darkest side. Holmes plays an authentic Jessica, who starts as an uncomfortable and slightly automated character but soon feels at ease in the play. Holmes’ matter-of-fact approach to her character is fresh and extremely credible. She manages to embody Jessica’s oscillating shyness and boldness, and stays true to the character that Lonergan intended her to be: a representation of the imposed vulnerability and confusion that young women in America face. Moreover, Holmes does an excellent job at portraying her character’s insecurities and contradictions regarding her sexuality. The outcome of her encounter with Warren is delivered in an extremely believable manner, and its relatability makes it especially relevant in the context of a student production. Holmes’ on-stage dynamic with Mazzone is also praiseworthy, giving scenes their right amount of awkwardness and sexual tension. The couple manages to give a solid account of two young people experimenting with their sexualities, and going through the strange consequences of doing so. Mazzone excels onstage both with Holmes and with Stevenson, always conveying the idea of a character in constant submission. Warren has ran away from home because of his abusive

father, and now is staying with Dennis, who puts him down constantly. With Jessica, he constantly needs to prove he genuinely cares about her. In a nutshell, Warren is at odds with a society that always seems to find a way to oppress him. The play leads to his arguable collapse, and Mazzone excellently delivers the realization and escalation of these troubles. He also transmits Warren’s confusion regarding his privilege, a place also explored by Dennis. The two characters, sustained in the limbo between adolescence and adulthood, enjoy a comfortable immaturity afforded by their parents’ wealth. The play follows the realization by the two characters that this does not come at a small cost. In the director’s note, Quinn says he read Lonergan’s play not as a “stereotype of an age group,” but as “the struggle of feeling these complicated emotions but not being to express them to someone else. The way young life can take on a rhythm of hitting us until we find out what it takes to make the skin break. And how we keep going.” His production stays true to his view. Far from a display of caricatures of the American youth, the Dramatics Society production of This is Our Youth transports to the present the story of three individuals facing a reality they can’t quite understand. 

Fleabag Gets Laughs Through Comic Relatability BY ISABELLA DOW Asst. Arts & Review Editor Firing up an enthusiastic crowd by showing everyone a Facebook Live video to introduce its much-anticipated presence, improv comedy group My Mother’s Fleabag entertained this past weekend with its knack for engaging the audience and its imaginative sketches. Relying mostly on audience suggestions to inspire the content of its comedy games, no two shows were the same, which made each experience a unique one. With random and varied topics ranging from pigs to lethal ailments inspiring the sketches, the audience laughed throughout the memorable night. One of the highlights of the show was the scripted sketch the group presented about a terrifying and toxic phenomenon that everyone dreads—contracting “the feels.” The video mocked the tendency of some college students to avoid anything close to genuine romantic connection in a satirical, infomercial-type video. In a deliberately awkward and facetiously serious set-up, a series of testimonials from a divorcée and a student that came to the distressing conclusion that she too had the “feels,” painted the epidemic as a clinical illness that science can help curb, much to the relief of the testimonial actors. The video demonstrated a few protective tactics, to defend against such a debilitating problem. These included relegating someone to the friend zone via the “you’re just like a brother to me,” line, or simply by “ghosting”

‘L.A. Divine’

them by blocking their phone number and sprinting inconspicuously out of the dining hall at any sign of follow-up contact. Additionally, the video suggested making a list of everything you hate about someone in order to focus on their unappealing qualities to the point where you can talk yourself out of your feelings, which was a novel, if not dubious approach to resolving the situation. Perhaps the most amusing quality of the whole sketch was the fact that it was based around the epitome of emotional and linguistic immaturity in the mere fact that people refer to feelings as “feels.” In a generation that uses words like “adulting” in regular, everyday discussion, the true crisis of the times was so carefully revealed in Fleabag’s show. And, of course, the normalized impulse of youths everywhere to disconnect from each other and live in fear of binding relations also hit a few viewers in the face as well. Another sketch asked the uncle of one of the performers onto the stage to outline his day, which the group would go on to reinterpret in an amusing way. The end result was an absurd retelling of the man’s day, starting with his rising before daybreak, and continuing through his frustrating bout in Boston traffic, ending with a tasty but atmospherically-lacking trip to a restaurant with killer caesar salads. Another improvised portion of the show involved 185 objects walking into a bar, where the audience named the object, and the performers provided the punchlines. The ease with

Incorporating a pop sound to a blues rock genre, Cold War Kids explore spirituality and human connection....B6

‘BC Symphony’

LIZZY BARRETT / HEIGHTS EDITOR

Fleabag put on a compelling critique of emotional immaturity through comedy. which the improv group developed witty and entertaining jokes about board games and beauty products wreaking havoc on the bar scene was exceptional, and left the audience in an uproar. Keeping with Fleabag’s tradition, the show closed with a BC-themed medley of song parodies, this year bringing together the outrageous combination of Taylor Swift and Kanye West songs. The number drew on common concerns or situations of BC students to create a relatable, amusing, and gloriously out-of-tune spectacle. Some of the topics were timely, as a reimagined “You Belong With Me” became “You Should Room With Me,” a tale in the dog-eat-dog world of housing pick season. Everyone clamors to form the most advantageous groups for the optimal chance at their

Channeling Tchaikovsky, BC Symphony and Alexander Alyward graced listeners with nuanced movements......B7

desired housing choice, or else risk ending up in some unsavory dorm, which seemed easier to laugh at now that housing for the upcoming year has already been decided. The performers did remind the audience of the flip side of that mock criticism, being that CSOM students will have a more clear path to stable employment than perhaps other students will, which solidified the segment as an all-in-good-fun musing on life after college. Continuing on that topic, the group sang of the nostalgia of looking back on freshman year as a senior, and what a simpler and more appealing that time was when graduation starts staring one in the face. The song was a fitting end to a hilarious show, and sustained the audience’s immense interest in the comedy group. 

WEEKEND BOX OFFICE REPORT.................. B6 ‘Louis C.K. 2017’.............................................. B6 ‘Going in Style’............................................. B6