ART IN THE MOONLIGHT DOWN GOES DUKE
TURF WAR FEATURES
ARTS & REVIEW
SPORTS
Reps from BC landscaping on sod and asthetics, A4
Students turned up in huge droves for the student opening of the new McMullen Museum, B8
Simon Enstrom’s strike took down the Blue Devils in the ACC opener, B4
www.bcheights.com
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The Independent Student Newspaper of Boston College Vol. XCVII, No. 30
Monday, September 12, 2016
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AMELIE TRIEU / HEIGHTS EDITOR
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inaldy Cadet, MCAS ’20, seems like any other freshman on Boston College’s campus. He wears a backpack and has headphones in his ears as he walks to class. But the story of how he got here is unlike any other student’s at the University. Cadet immigrated from Haiti when he was a toddler, and his path to citizenship has been plagued by obstacles that made a BC education seem out of reach. A few weeks before the fall semester began, Cadet was denied a green card, which he needed to receive his financial aid package. He was unsure how he would pay to attend BC, and it was too late to enroll at any other university. “My family, on August 11, at the site of the interview, started crying, and I started crying as well,” he said. But before that, before the absent green card caught the attention of a former and a current senator, an archbishop, and The Miami
Herald, his college application process started out like many other high school seniors’. “The whole college process was sort of random,” Cadet said. When he was first getting ready to apply to college, he didn’t have a top choice. He had been applying to various schools but wanted to really involve himself in one application and put his best foot forward. After spending a weekend reflecting on what he wanted in a school, he decided BC was the school for him. He learned about the university through older friends and Google searches. “Boston College really focuses more in terms of education, which I really enjoy coming from a high school that was all about sports,” he said. He applied regular decision because he missed the Nov. 1 early action deadline, and got the response he was hoping for—an acceptance letter. After being admitted, he was fairly sure he wanted to enroll at BC. Cadet said he received a potential financial aid package a few days later that would allow him to come to BC. But BC could only give it to him if he had an I-485, or a green card. Minaldy is an immigrant from Haiti—he moved to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., in 1999 when he was just
See Cadet, A3
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JULIA HOPKINS / HEIGHTS EDITOR
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JULIA HOPKINS / HEIGHTS EDITOR
NXc^i\\ej \o\Z fe k_\ A\jl`k d`jj`fe Xe[ Ô e[`e^ Zfddle`kp 9P K8PCFI JK% ><ID8@E 8jjfZ% E\nj <[`kfi When he was 12 years old, Steve Pemberton found a crumpled-up brochure for Boston College. On the front flap, Gasson Hall’s 200-ft bell tower stretched into the air. Pemberton had never really thought about the idea of attending college. He grew up in the foster care system, and a higher education didn’t seem like it was in his cards. But after seeing pictures of the Heights on the cover of the pamphlet, Pemberton began to rethink his future. From that point in the seventh grade onward, Pemberton was determined to beat the odds and become an Eagle. Pemberton carries himself with a certain presence. He must reach just over six-feet, and has a voice that booms throughout a room. He is the kind of guy who has a firm handshake, seemingly developed from years of working in the corporate world. In casual conversation, he addresses people by their first names, giving off a sense of importance and professionalism. From the looks of Pemberton today,
one would never believe what he endured as a child. Pemberton, who is now the global chief of diversity for Walgreens Pharmacy, grew up in an abusive foster family. He describes his childhood as a constant struggle of trying to find his identity. He struggled to decipher where he came from and who his parents were. Pemberton recalls constantly feeling forgotten and alone, and describes his foster parents as doing everything in their power to thwart his efforts to find his identity. They limited his access to libraries, computers, or extracurriculars, preventing him from researching where he came from and who his parents were. Despite the tribulations he faced as a child, he found solace in books that his neighbor, Mrs. Levin, would sneak him weekly. He started to picture a life outside of his own, and to this day is thankful for Mrs. Levin’s gift, he said. When he was 16, Pemberton finally escaped the foster system. He recalls the joy he felt when he finally slipped away from the grasp of his abusive foster parents. This ecstasy was short-lived, however, as he soon realized that he had nowhere else to go. To this day, Pemberton describes his high school English teacher as his greatest inspiration in life. In his final year of high school, when he had nowhere else to turn,
his teacher, Mr. Sykes, took him in and gave him a home. “All he had to give me was a home, a place to live,” Pemberton said. “And boy, that was exactly what I needed.” From people like Mrs. Levin and Mr. Sykes, Pemberton began to understand the real meaning of the Jesuit mission. He is well aware of the importance of being at the service of others, he said. After losing parents, siblings, and any semblance of a community or home in his childhood, Pemberton, more than most, understands the goodness of a servant’s heart. Now, he strives to give back to his family, friends, and community, and sees the value in doing things for a greater good, he said. Despite how far he has come in life, developing from an orphan into an executive in the corporate world, Pemberton still said that he has never been satisfied. He describes this as his Achilles’ heel. Because he was born into a struggle, Pemberton has trouble seeing the good in the world, he said. “My wife is working on me,” he said. Everytime he returns to BC, however, Pemberton once again feels at home. He fondly recalls moving into his freshman dorm room in Duchesne East, watching the Marathon from his perch in 66 Com-
See Pemberton, A3
The Undergraduate Government of Boston College (UGBC) has a really nice office on the first floor of Carney. It’s bright and air-conditioned, with a bunch of cubicles set up on all sides for the heads of UGBC’s different departments. It seems like the type of place where open and clear discussion between different groups would be easy, which is why it’s surprising to hear UGBC’s members say that it’s not. In years past, several told me, the organization has suffered from a general lack of communication between its branches and a marketing operation that hasn’t done enough to tell students about UGBC’s accomplishments. It’s also battled the perception that it’s exclusive and insulated from the student body, and general frustration at the slow pace of policy change in working with the administration. This year, many hope, that’s going to change. Last spring, I talked to Russell Simons and Meredith McCaffrey, this year’s UGBC president and executive vice president, both MCAS ’17, about their plans for their tenure. Student perception kept coming up, as, at the end of a confusing and drawn-out election season with the lowest turnout—by far—in years, UGBC seemed to be at a crossroads. It had to act, Simons said. Transparency was seen as critical to the group’s future. So over the summer, UGBC’s com-
munications department got a fresh look. Led by Emily Yu, this year’s vice president of communications and MCAS ’17, the department, formerly focused solely on internal event marketing, added an outreach arm to work on student perception and branding. It just might save the day. *** Toward the end of every school year, after the UGBC presidential election, students apply to the executive board, home to the vice presidents of the different branches. Those are—in addition to communications—diversity and inclusion, finance, student organizations, student initiatives, and the Undergraduate Leadership Academy (ULA), a group of about 40 freshmen who get an orientation to UGBC and an intern-like spot in one its departments. Usually the people who get those positions helped out on the winning team’s presidential campaign or have been in UGBC for a while. Not Emily Yu. “I’ve actually never been a part of UGBC before, so this is a completely new experience for me,” she said. “To say the least, it’s been an adventure.” Before this year, Yu worked on marketing for the Asian Caucus, which gave her a sense of how campus groups attract and direct attention. It also gave her a pretty negative view of the organization she now helps run. “Why would you go out and try to vote for someone when the change that they promise isn’t going to come within the next four years?” she said, talking about how she’s felt in years past. “A lot of people aren’t invested in long-term development of BC and UGBC because they just don’t feel represented. Which is what I thought, as an outsider.”
See UGBC, A5