Monday, November 23, 2009

Daily Herald the Brown

vol. cxliv, no. 112 | Monday, November 23, 2009 | Serving the community daily since 1891

Atkins ’10 claims Rhodes, looks ahead to Oxford

By Sydney Ember Senior Staf f Writer

Alex Bell / Herald

Gov. Donald Carcieri ’65 cut the ribbon on the University’s brand-new supercomputer Friday.

Supercomputer welcomed with optimism

By Alex Bell Staf f Writer

Brown’s newest researcher has a brand-new name: “Big Rhody.”

At a ribbon-cutting ceremony Friday morning, the University and top Rhode Island of ficials

unveiled Brown’s latest research acquisition, a multimillion-dollar supercomputer that promises to boost research capacity and visibility in the Ocean State.

“We need a different dimension to the economy of this state, and research and innovation are going

to be the core of that,” said Gov. Donald Carcieri ’65, who spoke at the ceremony. “If you’re going to build an economy with more science, more innovation, more research — you’ve got to have continued on page 2

Zohar Atkins ’10 was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship on Saturday, one of 32 United States winners named by the Rhodes Trust.

Atkins, who is concentrating in classics and Judaic studies and pursuing a simultaneous master’s degree in history, said he plans to study philosophy and theology at the University of Oxford.

The selection committee announced the winners in front of other local finalists on Saturday night, culminating a months-long process that included receiving endorsement from the University and undergoing a series of interviews with selection committees, Atkins said.

“I just couldn’t believe it,” he

said. “I just want to express how indebted I am to Brown for making this possible.”

Atkins’ award represents the second straight year in which a Brown student has won the prestigious honor. Rakim Brooks ’09 was selected in 2008.

In addition to the American Rhodes Scholars, about 80 international winners from across the globe will attend Oxford for two or three years of study.

“It just seems surreal,” Atkins said. “It’s only now just beginning to sink in.”

Atkins, a New Jersey native, said he could not have won the Rhodes without the support of his professors and deans who endorsed him and helped him prepare for his continued on page 3

Brown scientists over the M. soccer out at NCAA tourney with loss moon for lunar water find

By Andrew Braca Spor ts Editor

By Miriam Furst Contributing Writer

inside

There is water on the moon, Professor of Geology Peter Schultz can now say with certainty.

Schultz and a team of fellow scientists announced the finding Nov. 13 after poring over data from a NASA mission that made international headlines. On Oct. 9, with telescopes worldwide pointed skyward, a NASA spacecraft carrying instruments developed by Schultz sent a projectile crashing into the moon, producing a plume of debris that could be analyzed for signs of water.

But until recently, researchers had not determined if the debris indicated a significant presence of water on the moon.

Though analysis is far from complete, researchers have identified 26 gallons of water among the debris, Schultz told The Herald in a phone interview late last week.

The information “is just evolving,” he said. “This isn’t instant science.”

The October collision created a hole about 60 to 100 feet wide in the permanently shadowed region of a crater near the moon’s south pole, said Brendan Hermalyn, a graduate student in planetary sciences who works with Schultz. A second, smaller spacecraft lagged behind to measure the debris created from the crash.

Brown geologists have made several breakthroughs in the search for

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lunar water recently, said Professor of Geology James Head.

Professor of Geology Carle Pieters, working with the nascent Indian space program, made headlines when her research team detected evidence of ice on the moon’s surface with a scanning device earlier this year. And Associate Professor of Geology Alberto Saal “found water in lunar volcanic gases” last year, Head said.

But Schultz’s discovery stands out because it confirms the presence of water below the surface of the moon, Head said. The discovery suggests the possibility of a previously unknown treasure trove of lunar ice.

“On the moon, ice is worth more than gold,” wrote Michio Kaku, a professor of theoretical physics at City College of New York, wrote in an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal.

According to Kaku, the discovery was well worth the cost of the mission. “Imagine Neil Armstrong made of solid gold. Now multiply that five to 10 times, and you understand how much it costs to put anything on the moon,” he wrote. Because the moon lacks vital resources, such as air, soil or plants, the discovery of water is significant for future lunar explorations, he added.

The presence of water on the moon has the potential to make future lunar missions much less costly, Hermalyn said. It provides

The men’s soccer team ended its season with a 2-0 loss to North Carolina Sunday afternoon in the second round of the 0 Brown 2 UNC NCAA tournament.

The Bears return from Chapel Hill, N.C., having finished the season with an 11-3-5 record. UNC will face Indiana in the third round of the tournament.

The Tar Heels scored the deci-

sive goal in the 20th minute. Kirk Urso booted a free kick into the box, where Billy Schuler broke free from the Bruno defense to head the ball past Brown goalkeeper Paul Grandstrand ’11.

UNC’s suf focating defense held Brown without a shot until the 58th minute. The Tar Heels tacked on an insurance goal with 1:17 left on a devastating counterattack. After a shot by Dylan Remick ’13 hit the crossbar, UNC’s Urso got the ball and found Alex Dixon near midfield, who streaked all the way down the

left side of the field. Just when he appeared to be getting too close to the back line, Dixon mastered a tricky angle to put a shot just inside the right post.

The Tar Heels held an 11-5 advantage in shots overall. Brooks Haggerty made two saves to keep the Bears of f the board, while Grandstrand made five strong saves to keep the game from getting out of hand. Taylor Gorman ’12 led Brown with two shots, and Jay Hayward ’12 and Thomas McNamara ’13 recorded Bruno’s shots on goal.

Poll: students feel good about advising

By Hannah Moser Senior Staf f Writer

Undergraduate satisfaction with advising may be on the rise, according to a recent Herald poll, in which 59.7 percent of students reported they were satisfied with advising, and 38.1 percent reported they were dissatisfied.

The numbers reveal a 10-percent increase in satisfaction since spring 2008, the last time the Herald poll asked respondents about advising. Then, students were split between satisfied and dissatisfied by an almost-even margin of 49.2 percent to 48.8 percent — though the two polls were administered at different points in the academic year.

First-years had a more

continued on page 3

Are you satisfied or dissatisfied with academic advising at Brown?

Don’t Know/Don’t Answer

2.2% Strongly Dissatsifed

9.6%

Very Satisfied

19.1%

Somewhat Dissatsified

28.5% Somewhat Satisfied

40.6%

continued on page 3

Sports, 4

Arts, 5

Opinions, 7

Almost eli-trifying M. hockey lost to Yale after an exciting but unsuccessful comeback

Wax without Waning

ACtions and words Tyler Rosenbaum ’11 asks what really makes a country great

195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island

“Night Garden,” an exhibit of waxed flora, is on display at the Sarah Doyle Women’s Center

herald@browndailyherald.com

Page 2

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

C ampus N EWS

Monday, November 23, 2009

Lit Arts’ Waldrop wins National Book Award

By Ashley Aydin Contributing Writer

Alex Bell / Herald

Gov. Donald Carcieri ’65 (middle) gets a tour of the University’s new supercomputer Friday morning.

Supercomputer to benefit city, mayor says continued from page 1

the tools.”

Brown’s Vice President for Research Clyde Briant said the site of the supercomputer, built by IBM, could not be more appropriate.

The Center for Computation and Visualization at 180 George St., Brown’s first computing center, was donated by the Watson family in 1961 in honor of IBM founder Thomas Watson, Sr. The building was dedicated during Carcieri’s freshman year, the governor said he remembered, when he used to deliver boxes of punch cards to the center to be analyzed in what was then a similarly state-of-the-art IBM machine.

“We’ve really come a long way since then,” Briant said, motioning toward the room that now houses the supercomputer.

Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts ’78 said she was impressed at the

speed with which Brown and IBM progressed with the project since May, when the two parties signed an initial memorandum of understanding, offering the University affordable equipment and consulting from IBM. IBM’s vice president of technology, Nick Bowen, said when he was growing up in Rhode Island, he never viewed “Little Rhody’s” small size as an advantage, but he now hopes the state’s sense of closeness will help bring researchers together from different organizations and disciplines around the supercomputer.

“One of the things that everybody who has a supercomputer does is they give it a nickname,” Bowen said. “I’d like to propose a name: I’d like to call it ‘Big Rhody.’”

“What we’re celebrating here is a computer that is 50 times larger than what Brown had before,” he

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added. “It really means that these scientists are going to be able to solve problems that weren’t solvable before.”

Speaking at the event, Providence Mayor David Cicilline ’83 said, “Rhode Island was the real leader of the Industrial Revolution a century ago, and I think this really is the beginning of Providence and Rhode Island becoming a leader of research, innovation, science and technology.”

“In the way the Industrial Revolution brought great prosperity to Rhode Island, this will bring great prosperity to our city,” he added.

The ribbon-cutting ceremony was followed by an official announcement of the supercomputer’s opening at Alumnae Hall, at which time the machine was already running at 95 percent efficiency, according to Briant.

At the announcement, Professor of Applied Mathematics Jan Hesthaven, who directs the computation center, emphasized the importance of having a supercomputer on campus to handle the “data explosion” facing researchers.

Processes such as gene sequencing and functional magnetic resonance imaging, which are becoming more common in research, can spit out otherwise unmanageable amounts of data. “We need to have the infrastructure to support that data,” he said.

Panelists from the University of Rhode Island and the Women and Infants Hospital shared projects for which they plan to use the supercomputer, including analyzing the genomes of deep-sea microbes and studying the genetics of preterm delivery.

“Accelerating the pace of the application of contemporary techniques to solve clinical problems more quickly and more directly — that’s translational research,” said Alpert Medical School James Padbury, who is also pediatrician-inchief at Women and Infants. “This is where medicine is going, and we couldn’t go there without this resource.”

Rober ts, in her remarks, echoed the celebrator y sentiments.

“Big Rhody is going to show what is best about Little Rhody,” she said.

Professor of Literary Arts Keith Waldrop has won the National Book Award for poetry this year for his book “Transcendental Studies: A Trilogy,” the National Book Foundation announced last week at a ceremony in New York.

The foundation cited “Transcendental Studies” for its unity of poetry and philosophy, calling Waldrop a “transcendentalist for the new millennium.” It also praised Waldrop for his language and passion for poetry — emphasizing that, in his work, “life imitates language, and when language becomes these poems, life itself gets more various, more volatile, more vital.”

Waldrop’s book, published this year by the University of California Press, includes three poem sequences: “Shipwreck in Haven,” “Falling in Love through a Description” and “The Plummet of Vitruvius.” The poem sequences are experimental collages — phrases from three books from different literary genres ­— that Waldrop selected from various works he compiled. Waldrop was chosen from a group of five finalists.

Waldrop said “Transcendental Studies” is especially different from his other works because it has more collage in it.

“I think of poetr y as more charged than other writing,” Waldrop said. “There’s more feeling and tone to it.”

To create the collages, Waldrop

wrote the phrases and stanzas freehand, typed them and arranged them alphabetically.

The National Book Award is one of the most prestigious nationwide prizes for a single book. Judges make their selections based on the author’s literary sensibilities and expertise in one of four genres: fiction, nonfiction, poetry and young people’s literature.

Though the win was surprising, Waldrop said he was pleased with the foundation’s decision, explaining that it might make people look at his book who otherwise might have not noticed it.

“It is one of the biggest awards for a writer,” said Brian Evenson, professor of Literary Arts and chair of the department. “It ratifies a writer and enforces that a writer is doing something valuable. It’s very nice to be honored.”

Waldrop has taught at Brown since 1968. His book, “A Windmill Near Calvary,” was a finalist for the 1969 National Book Award.

“What I liked about Keith’s work is that the language is rich,” Evenson said. “It’s beautifully elusive and complicated but very interesting.”

The other National Book Award winners are Colum McCann’s “Let the Great World Spin” for fiction, T.J. Stiles’ “The First Tycoon” for nonfiction, and Phillip Hoose’s “Claudette Colvin” for young people’s literature.

Waldrop is currently writing a new book of poetry, as well as a translation in French. “I am always working on something,” he said.

New software makes cell phones a safety device

By Anne Speyer Senior Staff Writer

Brown students, faculty and staff can now activate their cell phones for use as portable security devices, thanks to the Department of Public Safety’s recent launch of Rave Guardian, a software system designed to protect registered users across campus.

Rave Guardian, made by Rave Wireless, Inc., provides students with two new ways of accessing public safety officers, according to a campus-wide e-mail sent last week

by Michelle Nuey, manager of special services for DPS. With the push of a button, a cell phone user can send DPS a distress signal that includes the user’s name, picture and precise coordinates if the phone is equipped with GPS. Students can also use Rave Guardian to set precautionary timers when walking alone or at night. By calling DPS and entering four-digit PINs, students can inform DPS of their locations and the amount of time they expect to take to get to their destinations. If students do not disable the timer within the set timeframe, DPS will call to check on the students’ safety.

The launch of Rave Guardian is

partially the result of a successful trial

by Safewalkers, who took on the role of testing out the software last April.

Isabel Mattia ’11, a Safewalk supervisor, said several Safewalkers — many of them women — had used the software to help them return home safely after their late-night shifts.

While testers seemed to appreciate the timer function, they raised some questions about the utility of the panic button, Mattia said.

“People were like, ‘Why can’t I just put DPS on my speed dial?’” she said. “But (with the software) they get your name and a picture, a lot more information than if you just call.”

Some also worried that the GPS functionality would allow DPS officers to track their location at all times. But Nuey emphasized in her e-mail that Rave Guardian “is not an active GPS system that allows DPS to track your every move” and “can only be activated by you, the user.”

“I think it’s a great thing, we’re happy to have even more resources for students,” Mattia said, though some joke that Rave Guardian is “competition” for Safewalkers’ services.

To register for the ser vice, people can create a user profile at getrave.com.

Monday, November 23, 2009

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

C ampus N EWS

Page 3

“We got beat every which way.”

— Headcoach Phil Estes, on football’s loss to Columbia

Lions beats odds, Brown in last game

By Dan Alexander Senior Staff Writer

Nick Sinnott-Armstrong / Herald

Professor of Geology Peter Schultz.

Water on the moon?

You bet, prof says continued from page 1 possibilities “not only for being able to put people on the moon for much cheaper, but also for bringing material back to Earth,” he said, noting that the water can be broken down to create additional resources, such as fuel from hydrogen.

“It’s extremely exciting to be a part of this,” he said.

Hermalyn was among those responsible for helping to analyze the images from the crash. “We tend to think of pictures as static things, but in science we look at pictures

as data,” he said.

Both Schultz and Hermalyn attended the Lunar Exploration Analysis Group conference at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston last week to discuss strategies for establishing permanent settlement on the moon, Schultz said.

“These discoveries have completely changed the perception of the Moon as a very dry planet and it forces us to go back and rethink our understanding of the sources of water and the processes that are responsible for its transport and storage.”

NEW YORK — Columbia had fallen to Brown 11 of the last 12 seasons. The Lions had won only two Ivy League games this year, against Dartmouth and Cornell 14 Brown — the two Columbia 28 losingest teams in the Ivy League. And its starting quarterback, who had been the hero last week against Cornell, was injured. But in the final game of the season, the Lions beat the Bears, 28-14.

Before the game, Head Coach Phil Estes called the Lions “a dangerous football team.”

“The one thing I look at that stands out is their pass defense,” Estes said.

“They really do a good job of putting pressure on the quarterback and making him sometimes throw into some bad coverages.”

Estes saw that in person on Saturday.

Quarterback Kyle Newhall-Caballero ’11 was pressured often and threw two interceptions, one of which went back for a touchdown. He opened the game with a four-of-four passing drive for 73 yards, but couldn’t put together another scoring drive until late in the fourth quarter.

“We got beat every which way,” Estes said. “After that first drive and we went down and scored, we didn’t play on offense, and we didn’t tackle on defense.”

On Brown’s second possession, Newhall-Caballero hit Buddy Farnham ’10 in stride with a deep ball, but Farnham lost it in the sun and dropped the pass on third down, forcing Brown to punt.

“We drop a pass, and I think, boy, that’s not a great way to start things,” Estes said.

Despite Brown’s struggles, Columbia had only a 14-7 lead with two seconds left in the first half. With time for one more snap and the ball 37 yards away from the end zone, Newhall-Caballero heaved the ball up for Bobby Sewall ’10 downfield, near Columbia safety Adam Mehrer. But Sewall didn’t run his route correctly and wasn’t in the right place, as Estes tells it.

Mehrer was.

The Columbia safety picked the ball off and ran it back into Brown territory. Columbia cornerback Andy Shalbrak trailed Mehrer, yelling for

SPORTS the lateral. When Mehrer was hit by Newhall-Caballero at midfield, he pitched the ball to Shalbrak.

“There was two seconds left when the play started. So after the interception, I knew there was no time left,” Mehrer said. “I looked and saw Andy, and I was like, he’s faster than me.

So I pitched it to him, and the rest is history.”

Shalbrak broke free down the left sideline and ran 49 yards to the end zone, giving the Lions a 21-7 lead going into halftime.

“The touchdown at the end of the half was just a huge momentum swing and a killer for us,” Estes said.

When asked what he told his team at halftime, Estes demurred.

“I can’t tell you. You wouldn’t want to hear it,” he said.

The Bears came out of the locker room with the advantage of receiving to begin the second half. But they went three-and-out on their opening

Herald poll find students higher on advising continued from page 1 favorable opinion of advising than upperclassmen in this semester’s poll, with 75.1 percent reporting that they were satisfied and 22.2 percent that they were dissatisfied.

In the 2008 poll, first-years were more narrowly divided, with 58.6 percent satisfied and 40.8 percent dissatisfied.

By comparison, non-freshmen in this year’s poll were split, with 53.9 percent satisfied and 43.7 percent dissatisfied — up from 45.1 percent and 52.2 percent, respectively, in the 2008 poll.

Despite the shift, it is difficult to draw firm conclusions by comparing this semester’s poll results to last year’s, said Professor of Sociology Gregory Elliott, who studies methods and statistics.

Comparing data from the two polls is difficult in part because the polls were conducted at different times of the year and because they surveyed different sets of students, Elliott said.

“This is a very old conundrum,” he said.

Improving advising is among the “Phase II” recommendations of the Plan for Academic Enrichment and was emphasized especially by the Task Force on Undergraduate Education. The updated version of President Ruth Simmons’ master plan, published in February 2008, calls for “a more robust and integrated academic advising program for Brown undergraduates, through all four years and across all disciplines and concentrations.”

Since then, the Office of the Dean of the College has initiated new programs and changed old ones, according to Deputy Dean of the College Stephen Lassonde.

For instance, the Faculty Fellows program has expanded from five to 19 members and is no longer confined to events at fellows’ oncampus houses. Students can drop in to meet with fellows weekday afternoons in Advising Central, a new center located on the second floor of J. Walter Wilson.

“Right now, the traffic varies,” Lassonde said. “We haven’t done a good job yet of letting people on

the first floor know (the space is) on the second floor.”

Meeting in a neutral space rather than a fellow’s house may be less intimidating to students, Lassonde said. This year, the Faculty Fellows have held advising dinners in dining halls as another avenue for students to meet somewhere they are comfortable.

The Advising Central space also increases the visibility of Randall advisers, who are specially trained to work with sophomores. Lassonde acknowledged that sophomore advising has been a problem in the past. Students who did not connect with their first-year advisers or who had interests different from their advisers’ areas of expertise can often spend a year in advising limbo before finding a concentration adviser, he said.

“I’m having a lot of trouble finding a good adviser,” said Anisha Sekar ’12, an applied mathematics-economics concentrator. She said the classes she has taken in her concentration have been very large, so the professors she knows well are those who have

taught smaller classes outside her concentration.

Though she has good relationships with those professors, “they can’t really advise me as well as someone in my concentration can,” she said.

Students who were interviewed connected the quality of advising to academic departments.

“The classics department is absolutely wonderful,” said Amy Heuer ’11. “Sometimes you just have to look a little harder for it in some departments.”

The Herald poll was conducted from Nov. 2 through Nov. 4 and has a 3.6 percent margin of error with 95 percent confidence. A total of 687 Brown undergraduates completed the poll, which The Herald administered as a written questionnaire to students in the Mail Room at J. Walter Wilson during the day and in the Sciences Library at night. The margins of error were 6.9 percent for first-years and 4.2 percent for all others, and the margins for the spring 2008 poll were 6.7 percent and 4.4 percent, respectively.

possession.

Neither team scored in the third quarter. But midway through the fourth, the Lions made it a 28-7 game with a six-play drive highlighted by Columbia freshman quarterback Sean Brackett’s 32-yard run and 37-yard touchdown pass to Austin Knowlin.

Brackett, who stepped in for an injured M.A. Olawale, was 10-of-19 passing for 151 yards, one touchdown and one interception. He added 171 yards on the ground on 20 carries.

“He ran all over the place,” Estes said of Brackett. “That’s pretty impressive.”

Just after Columbia’s final score, Brown came back and ran its first successful drive since early in the opening quarter. Newhall-Caballero led his team 77 yards down the field in just 1:09 and hit Farnham on a short pass that the senior wide receiver turned into a touchdown.

In the last game of his career, Farnham had nine catches for 107 yards and two touchdowns. The performance brought his season totals to 1,003 receiving yards and 11 touchdowns.

“He was excited coming into this game to make some plays, and it didn’t quite happen that way. I mean, he made nine catches and two touchdowns, and certainly that was big,” Estes said.

But not big enough.

On the final play of the game Olawale came in for one last snap in a Columbia uniform. He downed it, and the Lions celebrated.

“You really couldn’t draw it up any better to complete the career,” Columbia’s Shalbrak said. “It’s kind of a fairy tale ending.”

Not for the Bears.

Atkins ’10 takes home Rhodes continued from page 1 interviews.

“I just feel incredibly grateful,” he said.

In addition to working on an honors thesis, Atkins also conducts twohour weekly poetry workshops for inmates at the maximum-security Rhode Island Adult Correctional Institutes. “I don’t see it as teaching so much as learning from the inmates,” Atkins said.

Last spring, Atkins won the Elie Weisel Prize in Ethics from the writer’s foundation for an essay titled, “The Duty of Cock-Eyed Angels.”

According to a press release from the Rhodes Trust, 805 students received support from 326 colleges and universities across the country this year. Winners were selected based on “high academic achievement, integrity of character, a spirit of unselfishness, respect for others, potential for leadership and physical vigor,” according to the release.

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SportsMonday The Brown Daily Herald

Monday, November 23, 2009 | Page 4

M. hockey comes up short versus No. 9 Yale despite comeback

By Dan Alexander Senior Staf f Writer

No one has ever had a “good” loss, according to men’s hockey Head Coach Brendan Whittet ’94.

Not even on 6 Yale S a t u r d a y, 5 Brown when the winless Bears came back from a four-goal deficit to tie No. 9 Yale, but fell in overtime, 6-5.

“We’re 0-6-1. I just want to win a hockey game,” Whittet said. “That game was there for the taking tonight. And we just handed it to them there at the end of the game, for no reason. It’s unacceptable.”

Two minutes and 32 seconds into overtime, Yale’s Denny Kearney charged down the right wing and sent a cross-ice feed to Broc Little. The Bulldogs’ leading goal scorer one-timed the puck past goalie Anthony Borelli ’13, and the Bulldogs (3-2-2, 2-1-2 ECAC) rushed onto the ice in celebration.

Brown (0-6-1, 0-4-1) continued its recent habit of weak starts and fell behind 4-1 in the opening period.

Four different Bulldogs, including three freshmen, netted goals in the first frame. Yale scored on two of its three power plays in the period.

In the last five games, the Bears

Jonathan Bateman / Herald

Bulldogs crash the net during Saturday’s Brown-Yale tilt. The Bears lost in overtime despite a comeback effort.

have been outscored 11-1 in the first period and outshot 75-29.

“That’s all we talk about is our good starts and being ready to go,” Whittet said. “I think it’s totally in guys’ heads. Honestly, if I could afford a sports psychologist, I would get one. Or I’d go get my degree in sports psychology, because I can’t figure it out.”

But once again, the Bears clawed their way back into contention.

“Clearly, you can see that they’ve

got a big heart and that they don’t give up,” said Yale Head Coach Keith Allen.

After the first period, goalie Anthony Roselli ’13 replaced Mike Clemente ’12, who has let in at least four goals in each of the last four games.

In his first period of regular season college hockey, Roselli made nine of 10 saves. The lone goal he let in during the second period was accidentally kicked in by a Brown

defender.

“Anthony was tremendous,” Whittet said. “He was a stabilizing force, and he came in and gave us an opportunity to win the game.”

After goals by Chris Zaires ’13, Jarred Smith ’12 and Jordan Pietrus ’10, Brown was just one goal away from evening the score.

Midway through the third period, Harrison Zolnierczyk ’11 received a pass from Zaires at far post.

Zolnierczyk one-timed the puck for

his second goal of the game, tying the game, 5-5.

“Harr y, I just told him, that it was the best I’ve seen him play this year,” Whittet said. “He’s excellent. He was determined. He moved his feet. And he was very, very good.”

The game remained tied for the rest of the third period. Roselli denied 13 shots in the frame, including one from just feet away with less than 10 seconds left in regulation.

The freshman goaltender, who finished with 29 saves, stopped two more shots in overtime but couldn’t turn away the third.

After the third period, Yale’s head coach told his team that “the ice was crappy. Shoot the puck. Don’t try to make plays,” Allen said.

The Bulldogs put the puck on net three times in overtime, and the Bears never did.

“No one feels good about the outcome, especially in our own barn,” Zolnierczyk said. “Putting a team up (three) goals is not a way you want to go. And basically, (Whittet) said we’ve got to get back to the drawing board and find a way to come out with a better start.”

The puck drops between Brown and Bentley at 7 p.m. Tuesday in Meehan Auditorium. The Bears will be searching for their first win.

M. hoopsters put down by Rhody

By Tony Bakshi Sports Staff Writer

The men’s basketball team (2-3) went 1-2 this week, getting a victory over Maine after almost pulling out a comeback win against a tough Big East opponent.

URI 78, Brown 57 The Bears and Rams battled neck-and-neck through the first half of their Wednesday night game at the Pizzitola Center.

Forward Peter Sullivan ’11 carried the offense in the opening minutes, scoring the first eight points of the game, and giving the Bears an early 8-5 lead. Andrew McCarthy ’13 also provided offense early on, as he sank two free throws after an offensive rebound, and then stuffed a thunderous dunk through the net to give Brown a 14-11 lead.

Toward the end of the first half, URI capitalized on a string of missed field goals by the Bears, and went on an 8-0 run to grab a 27-20 lead.

But Bruno fought back before the first-half buzzer, helped in part by three-point shots by Adrian Williams ’11 and Sullivan.

Brown went into the locker room down one point, 31-30, and Sullivan felt great about the teams’ first-half performance.

“The first half was the best half of basketball we played all year,” he said.

The tide turned in Rhody’s favor in the beginning of the second half.

A three-point play by guard Keith Cothran gave the Rams a 44-36 lead with about 15 minutes remaining, their biggest lead of the game up

to that point. From then on, URI would extend its lead to 63-40 with a devastating 19-4 run, capped by three consecutive dunks that came off Brown turnovers. It was a huge swing in the game, one that silenced the student section and put the game out of reach for Bruno.

“We kind of lost our cool a little bit, and we weren’t very composed bringing the ball up the court,” Sullivan said. “They got a lot of quick steals and started getting momentum.”

Cothran scored a game-high 16 points, while Sullivan led all Brown scorers with 15.

St. John’s 79, Brown 76 The Bears then traveled to New York for a Philly Hoop Group Classic match-up Friday night. Bruno almost upset its Big East opponent, but a potential game-tying three-pointer

by Williams did not fall in the final seconds.

Brown mounted a significant comeback in a hostile environment.

Down 71-58 with under seven minutes remaining, Bruno went on a 16-4 run to cut it to a one-point deficit, capped by Tucker Halpern’s ’13 three-pointer. Another jumper by Halpern would again bring the Bears within one point of the Red Storm, 77-76, with 41 seconds left in the game. That would be the closest the Bears would get, as St. John’s guard Malik Boothe sank two free throws to push the lead to 79-76.

Despite the disappointing result, Bruno forward Christopher Taylor ’11 was impressed by his team’s comeback effort.

“We executed really well and kept

pushing even though they made a couple runs,” he said. “A few guys really stepped up for us in the second half.”

Sullivan, who scored 12 of his game-high 17 points in the second half, agreed.

“We came out very strong in the second half, so it was definitely a very good game for us,” he said.

“Unfortunately, we missed a (gametying) three at the end. They’re a big and physical team, but we almost got the win.”

Brown 75, Maine 62 Sunday afternoon, back home at the Pitz, the Bears broke through and earned their second win of the season over the Maine Black Bears.

The first half of the match-up played out similarly to the Bears’ last home game. Sullivan again controlled the offense in the early stages, scoring the first five points of the game for Bruno. But Maine would fight back against Brown, and the teams would go back and forth, exchanging baskets until intermission. The Bears struggled with their long-distance shooting, hitting only two of 11 three-pointers in the first 20 minutes. A lay-up by Maine forward Murphy Burnatowski with seconds remaining gave Maine a two-point advantage, 34-32, heading into the break.

The Bears came out with a renewed determination in the second half, and connected on a barrage of threes to pull away from Maine.

Treys from Matt Mullery ’10, JeanHerbert Harris ’12 and Sullivan helped extend the Brown lead to

Jonathan Bateman / Herald

Tucker Halpern ’13 drives to the basket against URI last Wednesday night. The Bears faltered despite keeping the game close for a time.

57-48 midway through the second half.

While Maine would cut the Brown lead to 62-57 minutes later, strong free-throw shooting in the final minutes, especially from guard Steve Gruber ’10, helped Brown secure the victory with a final score of 75-62.

Mullery led all scorers with 24 points, and Sullivan chipped in 20 on four-of-eight shooting from behind the arc. McCarthy led the Bears with six rebounds, and contributed 10 points in a solid performance.

For the Black Bears, guard Junior Bernal starred with 18 points on eight-of-15 shooting.

Taylor downplayed any differences in strategy between the URI and Maine games.

“Not a whole lot changed for us.

We played a different team with a different style,” he said. “We executed well against Maine.”

Sullivan predicted an improved performance before Sunday’s matchup.

“We got to learn from our past games,” he said. “I think we’ve improved a lot over the past week, and it’ll be nice to get home looking for a win.”

The Bears did indeed go home and found a way to get that victory.

Brown will finish the Philly Hoop Group Classic this weekend at the Palestra in Philadelphia, facing the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia on Friday and Siena on Saturday.

Arts & Culture The Brown Daily Herald

Monday, November 23, 2009 | Page 5

‘Inner City’ explores modernization Waxing philosophical with wax-coated flora

By Kristina Fazzalaro Staff Writer

At first glance, nothing looks amiss in the budding metropolis below.

It’s a typical day in New York or Tokyo or London. Construction workers are busy assembling the newest skyscrapers. Steel and cement come together to create a new city ripe for progress. Initially, Arnie Zimmerman and Tiago Montepegado’s new installation at the Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art, “Inner City,” resembles that iconic photograph of New York construction workers taking a lunch break on a beam high above the sidewalks — all ease and comfortable camaraderie.

Take a closer look, though, and Zimmerman and Montepegado’s tiny world is far from ideal. It is a dangerous place intent on covering up the past. What no one in this urban microcosm seems to realize is that it is the here and now that requires attention.

“Inner City” tells the story of a metropolis on the verge of transformation from the days of florid Victorian and Baroque architecture to clean modern lines of the 20th century. It’s out with the old and in with the new in this collaborative work.

This is the first time “Inner City” has been shown in the United States, with previous installments in museums in the Netherlands and Portugal. The display at the RISD Museum is the largest to date, arranging Zimmerman’s figurines through the 4,000-square-foot space so museumgoers feel as though they are walking across town, taking in the sites as the city is built up around them. Zimmerman’s ceramics on display are beautifully executed and highly detailed.

Montepegado flew in from Portugal to design the installation. He adapted the museum’s Chace Center to fit the almost 200 figurative and architectural ceramic pieces and built a viewing platform so that, after wandering through the streets of the city, visitors can take in the metropolis as a whole.

The result is quite dramatic. The bird’s-eye view transports viewers to a playful world of skyscrapers, bridges and tenements where anything can happen. The problem is anything does happen, and the results are not pretty. Brawls erupt between workers, people fall down shafts and into waste bins spilling over with rubble.

Zimmerman has lived and worked in New York for the past 25 years, according to the RISD Museum’s press release. While in the city, he was able to see the effects of the building boom of the last two decades. He saw firsthand how older buildings were razed to be replaced by the bland, corporate buildings of today. Gone is the individuality of the architecture and the connection to the city’s history.

It’s all about modernity.

This has created plenty of problems, not just in New York but all across the globe, as cities find themselves striving to shed their

By Suzannah Weiss Senior Staf f Writer

Courtesy of the RISD Museum An installation by Arnie Zimmerman and Tiago Montepegado at the RISD Museum explores urban modernization and its effects on city life.

skins in favor of a new, more sophisticated look. The burden of actually building these megacities falls on the shoulders of workers who are left to grapple among themselves and wonder just when enough will be enough.

Looking at the figurines, one cannot help but feel for the characters Zimmerman has created. They are entwined with the buildings themselves, becoming one with their creations. Some even lack a head as they march materials from one construction site to another, leaving viewers to ask themselves what price they are willing to pay for progress.

Each figure is at once different and yet remarkably similar, lumping everyone into the same category of worker in this industrious city.

They are nameless and faceless because they are telling a story collectively — a story about the changing dynamics of a city bent on modernizing and washing away remnants of a diverse past.

Zimmerman’s aesthetic is also deliberately rough around the edges, giving the figures an even more realistic feel. Their physical imperfections make the scene somehow more relatable. These are real people hard at work in a merciless city set on pushing its limits.

This would not have been accomplished if Zimmerman had employed traditional methods of ceramic work, glossing over the details to make the figures smooth, pretty and graceful. There is nothing graceful about dangling from a 10-story building or pushing a shopping cart down the crowded city streets. Zimmerman understands this and, according to the press release, allowed firing accidents to take place when he was drying the clay, providing a more accurate depiction of city life, no matter how bleak that image might be.

Visitors to the gallery in the Sarah Doyle Women’s Center will have one last chance to catch “Night Garden” by Boston-based artist Hilary Tolan this week. The exhibit, which closes Nov. 27, uses wax flowers and delicate paper to depict life’s fragility.

Most of the works in the show employ floral themes in shades of gray, pink and green. “I’ve been working with the iconography of plants and flowers for a lot of years,” said Tolan, who proposed the exhibit after seeing the gallery’s call for work in the magazine Art New England.

The most striking works in the gallery are two series of wax-coated flowers, both natural and cloth. At first glance, the shiny material of “Beloved (Waxed Plants)” is difficult to identify, as are the figures, which look like hybrids between brains and sponges. Close up, though, traces of petals and stems are visible.

Similarly, “Beloved (Waxed Plants and Florals),” an arrangement of flowers and other plants displayed on three shelves of a china cabinet, features real, cloth and waxed flowers side by side, almost indistinguishable from one another.

“I’ve been interested in exploring the idea of time decay in my art,” Tolan said.

Death is inevitable for all living creatures no matter how hard they try to avoid or postpone it. Preserving a flower’s fragile petals in solid, unyielding wax “still doesn’t stop time,” she said.

Tolan said she also aims “to illuminate that fragility” with paper, which hangs loosely off the surface of her collages, creating a delicate third dimension.

Collages combining paper cutouts with pencil drawings of flowers, leaves and other plant parts line the walls of the gallery, whose interior architecture influenced Tolan’s positioning of each piece.

The galler y is “an interesting space because, unlike most galleries, it’s an old house,” said Gallery Coordinator Brooke Hair ’10, who helped set up “Night Garden.”

Tolan said the fireplace in the gallery inspired her when she first visited the building. She placed “English Garden,” a collage of black and white flowers and draping green leaves, above it, and arranged the rest of the artwork based on this starting point.

“What I like most about Hilary’s work is that she pays close attention to the detail in her work, and she’s very precise about how she uses her materials,” Hair said.

Tolan said she hopes gallery visitors reflect on what they see, as the collection “requires people to slow down and take something in that’s kind of subtle and doesn’t hit you on the head.”

“Inner City” will be on display at the RISD Museum through Jan. 3.

See what’s up on campus this week, and post your group’s events online! browndailyherald.com/flyerboard

Editorial & Letters The Brown Daily Herald

Page 6 | Monday, November 23, 2009

You could write next year’s editorials!

Apply to become a member of the 2010 editorial page board

E-mail editorials@browndailyherald.com for more information on how to apply chris jesu lee

e d i to r ’ s n ot e

e d i to r i a l

An article in last Monday’s Herald (“Taking dance to another level,” Nov. 16) contained a number of passages that presented as direct quotations language that differed from the wording originally used by the individuals quoted.

Due to the extent of the misquotations discovered in that article, The Herald reviewed the author’s previous work and found similarly problematic passages in three previous articles (“Seeding, not reading, at ‘Rock’ garden,” Nov. 11; “Brownbrokers return to stage with musical,” Nov. 8; “Spooky slate of events in store,” Oct. 29). The quotations have been corrected in the online versions of these articles.

The Herald is committed to accuracy in its reporting and regrets the misquotations.

t h e b r o w n d a i ly h e r a l d Managing Editors Michael Bechek Chaz Firestone

Editor-in-Chief Steve DeLucia

Deputy Managing Editors Nandini Jayakrishna Franklin Kanin Michael Skocpol

editorial Ben Hyman Arts & Culture Editor Sophia Li Features Editor George Miller Metro Editor Joanna Wohlmuth Metro Editor Seth Motel News Editor Jenna Stark News Editor Andrew Braca Sports Editor Han Cui Asst. Sports Editor Alex Mazerov Asst. Sports Editor Katie Wood Asst. Sports Editor Graphics & Photos Chris Jesu Lee Graphics Editor Stephen Lichenstein Graphics Editor Kim Perley Photo Editor Max Monn Asst. Photo Editor Jesse Morgan Sports Photo Editor production Ayelet Brinn Copy Desk Chief Rachel Isaacs Copy Desk Chief Marlee Bruning Design Editor Jessica Calihan Design Editor Asst. Design Editor Anna Migliaccio Asst. Design Editor Julien Ouellet Neal Poole Web Editor Post- magazine Arthur Matuszewski Kelly McKowen

Editor-in-Chief Editor-in-Chief

Senior Editors Rachel Arndt Isabel Gottlieb Scott Lowenstein Business

General Managers Alexander Hughes Jonathan Spector

Office Manager Shawn Reilly

Directors Sales Ellen DaSilva Sales Claire Kiely Finance Katie Koh Asst. Finance Jilyn Chao Alumni Relations Christiana Stephenson Managers Kelly Wess Local Sales Kathy Bui National Sales Alex Carrere University Sales Matt Burrows Credit and Collections Opinions Alyssa Ratledge Sarah Rosenthal

Opinions Editor Opinions Editor

Editorial Page Board James Shapiro Editorial Page Editor Matt Aks Board member Nick Bakshi Board member Zack Beauchamp Board member Debbie Lehmann Board member William Martin Board member

Marlee Bruning, Jessie Calihan, Gili Klinger, Leor Shtull-Leber, Designers Ayelet Brinn, Raj Patel, William Tomasko, Copy Editors Sydney Ember, Alexandra Ulmer, Night Editors Senior Staff Writers Dan Alexander, Mitra Anoushiravani, Ellen Cushing, Sydney Ember, Nicole Friedman, Brigitta Greene, Sarah Husk, Brian Mastroianni, Hannah Moser, Ben Schreckinger, Anne Simons, Anne Speyer, Sara Sunshine, Alex Ulmer, Suzannah Weiss, Kyla Wilkes Staff Writers Shara Azad, Emma Berry, Alicia Chen, Zunaira Choudhary, Alicia Dang, Juliana Friend, Anish Gonchigar, Sarah Julian, Matt Klebanoff, Etienne Ma, Christian Martell, Heeyoung Min, Jyotsna Mullur, Lauren Pischel, Kevin Pratt, Leslie Primack, Luisa Robledo, Dana Teppert, Gaurie Tilak, Caitlin Trujillo, Monique Vernon, Senior Business Associates Max Barrows, Jackie Goldman, Margaret Watson, Ben Xiong Business Associates Stassia Chyzhykova, Marco deLeon, Katherine Galvin, Bonnie Kim, Cathy Li, Allen McGonagill, Liana Nisimova, Thanases Plestis, Corey Schwartz, William Schweitzer, Kenneth So, Evan Sumortin, Haydar Taygun, Webber Xu, Lyndse Yess Design Staff Rebecca Ballhause, Caleigh Forbes, Gili Kliger, Jessica Kirschner, Zahra Merchant, Nicholas Sinnott-Armstrong, Leor Shtull-Leber, Kate Wilson Photo Staff Qidong Chen, Janine Cheng, Alex DePaoli, Frederic Lu, Quinn Savit Copy Editors Jenny Bloom, Brendan Burke, Sara Chimene-Weiss, Miranda Forman, Sarah Forman, Casey Gaham, Anna Jouravleva, Geoffrey Kyi, Jordan Mainzer, Joe Milner, Claire Peracchio, Lindor Qunaj, Madeleine Rosenberg, William Tomasko

Scandalous If there’s one thing we’re sure about, it’s that most Brown students don’t want their ability to party on campus shut down by the Providence Police. We came too close for comfort last week, when PPD Chief of Police Dean Esserman was quoted in the Providence Journal saying “The position this department will take is: ‘We’re against anything Brown wants to permit’ … Everything for the rest of the year is canceled, period.” Though Esserman retracted later in the week, it’s a scary possibility.

Relations between the police and the University came to a brink two Saturdays ago, when Delta Sigma Theta, an off-campus sorority with members from various Rhode Island colleges, threw a party (ironically called “Scandalous”) at Alumnae Hall where four people were arrested, a man tried to reach for a police officer’s gun and Department of Public Safety officers needed pepper spray to break up a fight that broke out on the dance floor.

The prospect of violence at on-campus parties is, of course, even scarier than the possibility of parties being shut down, as bad as that would be. A number of students and other partygoers could have been seriously injured. How can the University make sure that something like this won’t happen again?

We suggest it might start by looking at the sponsoring organization. Delta Sigma Theta is not a “Residential Greek Organization” that takes part in Brown’s Greek Council. All 10 of those fraternities and sororities are housed on campus and made up exclusively of Brown students. Delta Sigma Theta, by contrast, is open to students at all Rhode Island colleges.

While Greek organizations at Brown hold large parties frequently, no event in recent memory has

created the type of problems witnessed recently.

Part of the difficulty is the wider presence of people from off-campus: All four individuals arrested were Massachusetts residents, not Brown students.

That is not to say that non-Brown students are necessarily untrustworthy or that they ought to be banned from Brown’s campus entirely. Our point is that on-campus parties hosted by social organizations with a significant non-Brown contingent are especially risky. Because their members know people from all over the state, word about these parties can spread much more easily to individuals that the hosts do not want in attendance. Non-Brown students are also less likely to know that DPS officers are fully licensed and enabled law enforcement officials, making them less likely to listen to them when a bad situation escalates. This in turn makes PPD involvement more likely, damaging University-police relations and endangering Brown parties.

To ensure the safety of partygoers and to prevent Brown students from being punished for incidents out of their control, off-campus organizations should not be allowed to host parties on campus until a thorough review of the Scandalous incident is completed. Though some basic measures like restrictions on off-campus advertising are already in place, lax rules of entry or University regulations on conduct may have been at fault. Until such facts can be ascertained, Brown should shut these events down.

Editorials are written by The Herald’s editorial page board. Send comments to editorials@browndailyherald.com.

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Opinions The Brown Daily Herald

Monday, November 23, 2009 | Page 7

Ever vigilant TYLER ROSENBAUM Opinions Columnist Sean Hannity is fond of proclaiming America the “greatest, best country God has ever given man on the face of the Earth.” Bill Maher has an interesting response: “America must stop bragging that it’s the greatest country on Earth and start acting like it.”

Obviously Bill Maher’s job depends on his saying controversial or provocative things, so all his observations should be taken with a grain of salt. But perhaps it’s worth considering: What, exactly, makes America so great?

Of course, there are numerous possible justifications for the contention that the United States is the greatest country in the world. One plausible explanation would be our overwhelming military force.

Surely, this is how nations used to be differentiated — whichever country could both conquer and avoid being conquered was considered great. However, I like to think that our military is so powerful because our nation and citizens are great, and not vice versa.

Perhaps our economic superiority sets us apart? Given the fiscal predicament we’ve gotten ourselves into (and the fact that the European Union actually has a higher GDP), I should certainly hope not! Indeed, this argument would be akin to declaring Bill Gates the best person on Earth.

No, I think it is an uncontroversial proposition that our values — our definition of who we are as a nation — and not whom we can

defeat or what we can buy set us apart. But it must also be more than simply the values we hold, for the United States is not the only country to believe in democracy, the rule of law and equality of opportunity.

Rather, it is our centuries-long commitment to perfecting these values and our conviction that they transcend borders that distinguishes our experience from that of so many other countries and has led to the widespread admiration and emulation that the United States has historically enjoyed.

This column is not meant to be a simple

Obama was not enough. Yes, his administration has taken positive steps, but the American people must maintain constant pressure on him and on Congress to repair the damage that has been done and to ensure that it never recurs. The integrity of our values should not depend on the benevolence of any president, especially since the president has a strong incentive to maintain an expansive definition of executive power.

Most importantly, however, the ongoing national project of repairing our image and reforming our actions will require the con-

American ideals — concepts like “innocent until proven guilty” — should not be privileges for Americans only.

paean to America, however — I’m sure I hardly need to be selling it to this audience.

The point is that if we want to continue being the greatest country, we should not forget or compromise the values for which we stand.

George W. Bush’s administration illustrated the extreme dangers of indifference toward defense of our values in vivid clarity: Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, water boarding, extraordinary rendition and other national shames did more to tarnish this country’s reputation and self-image than any military defeat or economic catastrophe could.

Though the Bush administration deserves condemnation for the violence it did to our national values, electing President

stant vigilance and continued dedication of an active citizenry. Without this, politicians will almost certainly cave to fear mongering, and we will be doomed to repeat the disastrous mistakes of our past.

Last week, we found out that certain individuals who have confessed to perpetrating the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 will be tried in a civilian court in New York City. While some expressed satisfaction that these murderers will finally be brought to justice, others were outraged that terrorists would be put through the American justice system, saying they don’t deserve it.

But the American ideals — concepts like “innocent until proven guilty” — should not

be privileges for Americans only. If the government can’t prove you did the crime, you should not be put in prison for years and years. This should be equally true, whether you’re a citizen of the United States, or of Canada, France or Pakistan.

There is still tremendous resistance in Congress to the Obama administration’s plans to close the prison at Guantanamo and to try terrorists in American courts. Is the justice system that was good enough for Timothy McVeigh, the Unabomber and the Green River Killer insufficient for terrorists?

The point of bringing suspected terrorists to American courts is not to give confessed murderers an opportunity to escape.

It is to prevent the government from imprisoning anyone it labels a terrorist for as long as it wants. The Bush administration did this with the Uighurs in Guantanamo, who have been imprisoned there for eight years despite their acknowledged innocence.

A great nation does not torture, does not imprison individuals it cannot prove did anything wrong and does not shy away from justice. It may sometimes be unpalatable or difficult for America to follow through on the promise of its values, but they should never be compromised.

America’s life-long and impassioned advocacy of freedom, equality and justice has bought it the moral superiority it has long enjoyed and has made it the greatest nation on Earth. Nothing is worth bargaining that away, and Americans should guard that honor jealously.

Tyler Rosenbaum ’11 holds these truths to be self-evident.

A death in Bobst

BY ANTHONY BADAMI Opinions Columnist It was in the early hours of a Tuesday morning this month that Andrew Williamson-Noble, a 20-year-old student at New York University, leapt to his death from the 10th floor of the Bobst Library. He was found on his back, with nothing but a suicide note left in his dorm to give his grieving family and friends consolation or clarification.

When I first heard of Andrew’s death, I could not help but detect a very strange sense of contrition within myself. What hand had I in his death? How could I, just another lowly undergraduate, have prevented such a harrowing tragedy?

In the last few days, I have been plagued by Andrew’s memory. He was someone I did not know, but whom I could not wrench from my mind. Like many of the publications and Web sites reporting his death, I too sought some kind of explanation, some kind of resolution — I wanted it all to make sense.

As details from his family and friends have revealed Andrew seemed satisfied, or at least no more or less satisfied than the next stressed-out, work-encumbered college student. His Facebook page evidenced his varied social circles, and his peers attested to his wit and humor. But there still remained an underlying unease, something to which I am sure my peers can relate. In describing this sleepless disquiet in a status one night, Andrew wrote:

“There’s a considerable loneliness that comes from being awake when few others are. One feels both that one owns the world, and that despite this triumph, has no one to share it with.”

If you cannot understand this heartrending sentiment, then I, a nocturnal being as well, can assure you that he articulates pithily and profoundly something I experience many a wakeful night.

It was reading these words that I realized, after much inner (and at times melancholic) examination, that I do have a connection to Andrew’s death. I exist within, benefit from

to U.S. News rankings and to institutional pedigree. It is the atmosphere of academic elitism promulgated by administrators, admissions counselors, parents, students and, most obstreperously, one’s peers. It is the milieu of students who taught me to judge, to assess and to taunt. It is the binary of total success or complete failure — and I am complicit.

I cannot say definitively (obviously) that this was on Andrew’s mind as he climbed the stairs of the Bobst and leapt over the plexiglass that horrific morning, but it must be attended to. Suicide is the third leading cause of death among adolescents. NYU had four suicides

I do have a connection to Andrew’s death. I exist within, benefit from and contribute to the academic and social environment that killed him.

and contribute to the academic and social environment that killed him.

Let me say, immediately, that in this column I am not attempting to psychoanalyze Andrew or give some piercing personal insight in hopes of rationalizing his suicide. Rather, I am hoping to communicate to you the importance of his life in relation to our own.

Ours is a culture that attaches extreme significance to academic achievement, to high standardized test scores, to “four-oh” GPAs,

in 2004 alone. What can be done to curb this unsettling trend?

Think globally, act globally, but first do what you can locally. The first line of business I’d proffer would be Brown’s departure from the heinously overrated U.S. News and World Report rankings, with a clear statement from President Ruth Simmons that Brown is withdrawing to fight the elitism of Ivy academia. Expressing to the general public that higher education is not about exclusion would

reshape the expectations of parents and students, almost certainly alleviating academic pressure.

Another measure would be an encouragement of student-faculty relationships. Bringing undergraduates closer to professors would assist in augmenting self-confidence and inclusion. My thinking is faculty dinners and coffee dates funded by the University (I do know that Brown-RISD Hillel has begun something like this through Shabbat dinners). In these more intimate settings, we can emphasize community.

The challenges facing a serious college student can be daunting, no doubt. Giving students access to professors will go a long way in eliminating the (often self-imposed) cutthroat collegiate environment.

I did not know Andrew, nor will I ever get the opportunity. But in the undulating wake of his tragic death, I can do better to strengthen my own awareness of the individuals around me, genuinely inquiring and responding to their needs. Let us not mourn Andrew’s death, or over-romanticize it, but act to prevent unnecessary deaths like his in the future.

As Shakespeare subtly but so magnificently wrote in “Macbeth,” “Your cause of sorrow must not be measured by his worth, for then it hath no end.” It does provide for me, at least, a bit of solace.

Rest peacefully, Andrew.

Anthony Badami ’11 is a political theory concentrator from Kansas City, MO. He can be reached at anthony_badami@brown.edu.

Today The Brown Daily Herald

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M. hockey still in hunt for first win

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to day

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52/42

52/ 40

‘Night Garden’ casts nature in wax

Monday, November 23, 2009

Page 8

t h e n e w s i n i m ag e s

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4 c a l e n da r

Today, november 23

tuesday, november 24

4 pm — “What Are We Doing In Afghanistan?” Joukowsky Forum

2:30 PM — A lecture by Michael Oren, Israel’s Ambassador to the U.S., Brown-RISD Hillel

5:30 pm — “Development In The Era of Globalization,” lecture by Prof. Patrick Heller, Watson Institute Student Lounge, Suite 130

comics Cabernet Voltaire | Abe Pressman

7 pm — Men’s Ice Hockey Versus Bentley, Meehan Auditorium

menu Sharpe Refectory

Verney-Woolley Dining Hall

Lunch — Hot Sausage Patty Sandwich, Lentil Croquettes with Spicy Raita, Pepperoni Pizza

Lunch — Cavatini, Tomato Basil Pie, Sauteed Zucchini and Onions

Dinner — Roast Turkey with Gravy, Mashed Potatoes, Cornbread Stuffing

Fruitopia | Andy Kim

Dinner — Roast Turkey with Gravy, Mashed Potatoes, Cornbread Stuffing, Broccoli Quiche

crossword Hippomaniac | Mat Becker

STW | Jingtao Huang

Classic How To Get Down | Nate Saunders