Monday, April 11, 2011

Daily

Herald

THE BROWN

vol. cxlvi, no. 46

Monday, April 11, 2011

Since 1891

Slavery’s past Two female students struck in hit-­and-­run confronted sidewalk, and a car accelerated onto the sidewalk and hit both of them. at Brown, The driver was a woman, and once Amanda Chew ’14 and Juliana Un- she hit both Amanda and Juliana, anue Banuchi ’14 were hit on the she reversed and left, leaving them Harvard corner of Hope and Charlesfield injured on the sidewalk,” wrote Sofia

By KYLE MCNAMARA CONTRIBUTING WRITER

By LEAH BROMBERG CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Ignoring the convention of separating personal stories from academic discourse, President Ruth Simmons shared her connection to slavery as the great-granddaughter of slaves in an emotional keynote address that kicked off this weekend’s “Slavery’s Capitalism: A New History of American Economic Development” conference Thursday in Salomon 101.

The conference — which highlighted the North’s connections with slavery and was hosted by Brown and Harvard — drew students, community members and scholars from around the country.

“Ideas that have been flowing back and forth are radical in their potential to re-define history,” said Seth Rockman, associate professor of history.

Ronald Bailey, professor emeritus at Northeastern University, addressed Simmons directly when he said at the conference, “I’ve been waiting for a college president to do this for 30 years, and you stepped forward.” Four years ago, the Steering Committee on Slavery and Justice, convened by Simmons, published findings that linked the University to its own slavery-ridden history. This weekend, she opened up about her own history. continued on page 2

streets by an unidentified driver who immediately left the scene at approximately 10:45 p.m. Saturday.

The students “sustained moderate to serious but non-life-threatening injuries,” wrote Marisa Quinn, vice president for public affairs and University relations, in an email to The Herald.

A suspect has been detained, and the Providence Police Department is currently investigating the case, said Department of Public Safety Sergeant John Heston shortly after the accident.

Heston declined to comment further but said the suspect was “probably” the driver of the vehicle.

The female students “were on the

Unanue ’11.5, the sister of one of the victims, in an email to The Herald.

The car that struck the students was a black Audi, wrote Juliana Unanue in an email to The Herald.

Witnesses who arrived later at the scene said they saw at least one of the students being put onto a stretcher and loaded into an ambulance. The students were taken to Rhode Island Hospital for treatment, Quinn wrote.

Sofia Unanue wrote that her sister suffered a fractured right leg and will undergo surgery in the next few days.

Chew suffered a mild concussion and other injuries to her head and is under observation, Sofia Unanue

Herald staff

continued on page 3

Ambulances and police cruisers arrived at the intersection of Hope and Charlesfield streets after a car struck two students Saturday night.

Transfer apps rise by 20 percent Student

By MIRIAM FURST STAFF WRITER

For the first time, Brown’s acceptance rate for transfer applications may drop below its acceptance rate for first-year applications, according to Dean of Admission Jim Miller ’73. The University received around 1,950 transfer applications this year — a 20 percent increase from last year’s 1,621 applications.

The Admission Office has not yet decided the exact number of transfers it will accept, but it plans to offer spots to around 200 students and enroll between 125 and

130. The Corporation approved an increase of up to 50 for next year’s transfer class to stabilize the student body at around 6,000, but the University determined a smaller increase in transfer enrollment would be sufficient.

About $400,000 in financial aid will be offered to transfer students, Miller said, the same amount that was earmarked last year.

Transfer students are admitted on a need-aware basis — by contrast, first-year student admission is need-blind. By increasing the number of admitted transfers, the University can also increase the

amount of money received from tuition without a significant increase in enrollment or additional strain to first-year resources.

“As a transfer, I would really like if more came, just because the transfer community is really strong and having more people would make us an even bigger presence on campus,” said Zoe Hoffman ’13, who transferred this year from the University of Virginia. Brown enrolled 110 transfer students last fall.

The application process for transfer students is similar to

celebrating the semiotics program anniversary one year late.

“You might think that it is funny math or extreme math,” said Mary Ann Doane, chair of the MCM department. “This event was very MCM.” The conference was characterized by alums’ passion for the department and its professors, as well as self-aware humor from presenters and faculty.

Anna Fisher GS, a fourth-year doctoral student in MCM and one of the main organizers for the conference, said MCM@50 was developed to honor the program’s continued on page 5

continued on page 3

continued on page 2

FEATURE

Courtesy of Julieta Cardenas

INSIDE

Ira Glass ’82, host of NPR’s “This American Life,” was a crowd pleaser.

NEWS...................2-3 HOUSING.............6-8 EDITORIAL.............10 OPINIONS.............11 ARTS....................12

the Department of Modern Culture and Media. The two-day symposium comes during the 15th anniversary of the MCM department, but its predecessor, the semiotics program, was founded 36 years ago — the number 50 comes from a combination of the two dates and

Feeling the crunch

The Herald explores Brown’s long history of overcrowding, its causes and its impact.

HOUSING, 6–8

Endorsement

The Herald endorses David Chanin ’12 for UFB chair

EDITORIAL, 10

WEATHER

Alums, professors and students flocked to “MCM@50: Theory, Practice, Passion” this weekend — though the event did not in fact celebrate the 50th anniversary of

By AMY RASMUSSEN SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Matthew Strickland, who was enrolled as an undergraduate from 2005 to 2009, was found dead in his Alabama apartment Tuesday.

Strickland was on leave from Brown and was studying full-time at the University of Montevallo during the 2010-11 academic year.

The cause of death is unknown, but no foul play is suspected, according to a University of Montevallo press release.

Strickland, originally from Owens Cross Roads, Ala., was a dual concentrator in urban studies and history of art and architecture, wrote Marisa Quinn, vice president for public affairs and University relations, in an email to The Herald.

In an email to the community Friday morning, President Ruth Simmons noted that though Strickland pursued courses ranging from African dance to Spanish during his time at Brown, he had ultimately hoped to become a physician.

“He was known to many as a courageous, tenacious and unfailingly generous student,” she wrote.

“We have extended our deepest condolences to Matthew’s family and join with them in mourning the loss of a valued member of our community.”

In meta-­conference, MCM explores MCM

By MORGAN JOHNSON STAFF WRITER

found dead in Alabama

T O D AY

TOMORROW

68/55

62 /44

2 Campus News C ALENDAR TODAY

APRIL 11

6 P.M.

TOMORROW

APRIL 12

2:30 P.M. The Politics of Haiti Today,

Service and Community: Finding

Watson Institute, Joukowsky Forum

Both at Brown, Granoff Center

7 P.M.

8 P.M.

ROTC: Should Brown bring it back?,

Directorz in the Downspace

Brown-RISD Hillel, Winnick Chapel

Festival, T. F. Green Hall

MENU SHARPE REFECTORY

VERNEY-WOOLLEY DINING HALL LUNCH

Gnocchi alla Sorrentina, Chicken Fajitas, Vegan Moroccan Beans, White Chocolate Chip Cookies

French Bread Pizza, Green Beans with Tomatoes, White Chocolate Chip Cookies

DINNER Vegetable Strudel with Cream Sauce, Chicken Fajitas, Vegan Rice Pilaf, Cream Cheese Brownies

Green Pepper Steak, Stir Fried Vegetables with Tofu, Garlic Bread, Cream Cheese Brownies

SUDOKU

CR OSSWORD

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

Conference addresses U. upholds slavery’s history, legacy marijuana prohibition continued from page 1

“Slavery is not just about the history of one region but really the history of the nation as a whole,” added Sven Beckert, a professor of history at Harvard, who said Simmons inspired him to teach a course titled “Harvard and Slavery.”

The conference examined ways in which northern textile industries profited from the reduced cost of cotton due to slave labor and also emphasized that early donors who contributed to Brown and Harvard profited from slavery. Industries in the North also provided the timber and supplies used to fund slave trading and plantation practices.

“These buildings we have around us and the wealth that built New England partly derived from slave labor,” Peter Wirzbicki, a New York University graduate student said as he stood and looked around Alumnae Hall.

The history is as tangible in Harvard’s neighborhood as on Brown’s campus.

“If you look down at Boston Symphony Hall on Huntington Avenue and universities, a lot of funds they used to do that came out of processes in which the labor of African-American people were exploited around the process of cotton picking,” Bailey said.

Some professors also spoke of slavery as a contemporary phenomenon, tying it to modern-day human trafficking, industrial labor and health care reform.

“In school, we were taught a lie

— that it was the evil Southerners versus the virtuous Northerners,” said Bob Burke, creator of the Independence Trail in Boston. But “the wealth of Providence came about from lower labor costs owing to slavery.”

Harvard graduate student Jeremy Zallen said the conference was important because “universities like Brown and Harvard that are geographically in New England and have disassociated themselves from slavery are taking that on and investigating their own connections to slavery.”

“My parents toiled in the cotton fields at the behest of plantation owners,” Burke said. “I’m willing to take the gloves off, I’m willing to fight for this issue.”

“It’s interesting to hear about slavery and its history and its contemporary implications,” said Barbara Andrews, director of education at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tenn. “But I wonder what they do with it.”

She said she will help spread the conference’s message beyond New England.

Rockman, who will teach HIST 1840: “Capitalism, Slavery and the Economy of Early America” this fall, said “the basic work of discussion remains to be done. We’re at the starting point of this. We need more people to go to more archives and find out more things. It is as simple as digging to find out all the ways slavery insinuated itself in every aspect of the American experience.”

By LOUISA CHAFEE CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Though medical marijuana is now legal in Rhode Island, administrators maintain that under both state and federal law, the University cannot allow smoking of marijuana on school grounds.

Medical marijuana was legalized in Rhode Island June 16, 2009 after state legislators voted to override a veto by then-Gov. Donald Carcieri ’65. Three new dispensaries for medical marijuana will open in Rhode Island this summer.

Despite the state’s legalization of medical marijuana and imminent opening of dispensaries, the University released a statement saying it would not permit smoking on campus because Rhode Island and federal law “prohibit smoking marijuana on any school grounds, including college campuses.”

According to the statement, “Any breach of the federal law would put Brown’s eligibility for federal funding at risk. A student with an illness serious enough to warrant a doctor’s prescription for continued on page 3

200 transfer students to be admitted in May continued from page 1 the first-year application process, Miller said. “We do pay more attention to college performance than high school, but we do factor in, to some degree, high school grades,” he said. The Admission Office does not track how many students apply to transfer from four-year colleges compared to two-year colleges.

The University plans to notify transfer applicants in the middle of May, though there is no fixed date.

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The Brown Daily Herald (USPS 067.740) is an independent newspaper serving the Brown University community daily since 1891. It is published Monday through Friday during the academic year, excluding vacations, once during Commencement, once during Orientation and once in July by The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Single copy free for each member of the community.

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Campus News 3

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

Medical marijuana Hit-­and-­run injures two students prohibited on campus continued from page 1

continued from page 2 medical marijuana would need to consult with Brown’s Health Services to identify options to meet their needs in compliance with the law.”

Mark Porter, chief of police and director of public safety, did not respond to requests for comment.

The University’s policy is in compliance with the Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act Amendments of 1989, which does not allow students to “manufacture, distribute, dispense or possess with the intent to manufac-

ture, distribute or dispense” any illicit drug, according to the Office of Student Life website.

If an officer catches a student violating the rules regarding drug use — even if the student is in possession of medical marijuana with a valid license — the student may be suspended, dismissed or expelled from the University in accordance with the non-academic disciplinary code.

Students caught with marijuana by off-campus law enforcement officers may be subject to more stringent legal sanctions like imprisonment and hefty fines.

wrote.

Carmen Bonilla, a SafeRide driver who was on duty at the time, said when she drove up to the corner where the accident occurred, she “saw two students on the ground.”

She said she approached the stu-

dents, and one asked her in Spanish to “please get me help.”

While Bonilla said she did not see the accident take place, she said she spoke to a coworker who witnessed the accident. According to the coworker, the driver of the vehicle appeared to be drunk and immediately left the scene after the impact,

Bonilla said.

“University officials have been in touch with the students and family members to offer support,” Quinn wrote. “As we learn more about the details of the accident, we will seek to determine if there are additional steps to be taken to strengthen pedestrian safety on and around campus.”

Strickland remembered as being ‘full of love’ continued from page 1 According to an obituary in the Huntsville Times, funeral services for Strickland were held Saturday.

“Any plans for a campus service will come later,” Quinn wrote.

In an email to The Herald, Gem

Chema ’11, a friend of Strickland, remembered his “lively and warm personality.”

“Matt was full of love, and I’m certain this love will live on in everyone who knew him,” she wrote.

“I feel very grateful to have had him as a friend.”

Got something to say? Leave a comment online!

Visit www.browndailyherald.com to comment on opinion and editorial content.

4 Sports Monday

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

M. LACROSSE

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By ETHAN MCCOY ASSISTANT SPORTS EDITOR

The men’s lacrosse team snapped a three-game losing streak and posted its first Ivy League win in a back-and-forth thriller against No. 12 Penn Saturday on the Bears’ home turf. Bruno (4-6, 1-2 Ivy) outscored the Quakers (5-4, 2-2) 10-3 in the middle two quarters and survived a four-goal Penn run in the final 10 minutes to hang on to a 13-12 victory. “I’m really proud of this team,â€? said Head Coach Lars Tiffany ’90. “Having lost some really close games — four overtimes to Princeton, having lost to Bryant by one — it would have been really easy by human nature to start secondguessing ourselves. ‌ But I’m really proud of this team for sticking together and fighting through the adversity we’ve faced and continuing to believe in each other. And we saw that today — we played some of our best lacrosse today.â€? “I feel like it was finally the first time we’ve put together a good, complete game,â€? said attacker Parker Brown ’12, who scored four goals on the day. “It was a little scary at the end — I think we got a little complacent with the score — but overall, it feels great to finally get an Ivy League win, especially on our home field.â€?

Rob Schlesinger ’12 helped spearhead the Bear’s attack with four goals of his own, as well as two assists, in a breakout six-point performance. The two attackers, along with David Hawley ’11, who scored his 12th goal in five games, stepped up in the absence of tricaptain and scoring leader Andrew Feinberg ’11, who has missed the last three games with a concussion. “It’s the first time our offense has really clicked all year,�

Jonathan Bateman / Herald

Rob Schlesinger ’12 scores one of his four goals against No. 12 Penn. Schlesinger also dished out two assists as men’s lacrosse won a thrilling contest 13-12 to secure its first Ivy League victory.

Schlesinger said. “Defense has been carrying us all season, and it’s about time the offense finally got it together and scored a few goals, so that was huge for us.� “I was really impressed with Rob Schlesinger, who’s struggled scoring, but had some huge goals for us today,� Tiffany said. “And Parker Brown. He’s getting the best defensemen from the opposing team. He’s getting beat on, yet he continues to run through checks and make plays and prove that he’s one of the better attackmen in the league.�

Schlesinger kicked off the scoring with an early, unassisted goal.

After a Penn score tied the game, the Bears regained the lead on Parker Brown’s first goal. He was left all alone on the doorstep for the easy finish thanks to a Quaker defensive miscommunication. But Penn responded in a big way, scoring four times to close out the first

quarter with a 5-2 lead. The last goal came in the final seconds of Penn’s man advantage following a slashing call on tri-captain defenseman Peter Fallon ’11.

It looked like it might be a long day for Bruno supporters at Stevenson Field, but a huge second quarter in which the Bears outscored Penn 6-1 proved to be a turning point. Parker Brown scored twice in the quarter’s first five minutes to bring the Bears within a goal. On the second finish, Parker Brown had an easy flick-in from point blank thanks to a heads-up pass from Schlesinger.

The Bears tied the game less than four minutes later on a great individual effort by Sam Ford ’13.

The defenseman broke up a pass in his own half and scooped up the ground ball before racing coast to coast for the unassisted goal. “We’ve been joking in practice that our D’s finally going to get a

goal,� Schlesinger said. “Sam’s been saying he’s going to get a goal, and he finally stuck that, and that really got our team going.�

But the Bears were not done yet. In an isolation play, Schlesinger was alone alongside the net but kicked it out to midfielder Jeffrey Foote ’11, who buried the longrange shot to give Bruno a 6-5 lead. Penn quickly tied the game, but the Bears closed the quarter with scores from Hawley and Schlesinger to give the home side an 8-6 advantage heading into intermission.

At the start of the second half though, Penn caught the Bears asleep and tied the game a mere 31 seconds after the faceoff. Penn’s Alek Ferro scored from long range when he saw goalie Matt Chriss ’11 out of position. Twenty-three seconds later, Nick Richards took advantage of a miscommunication on the Bear’s end to put home an

easy goal.

But again, the Bears regrouped and answered. Teddy Daiber ’11 and Parker Brown scored in quick succession, and the Bears regained a two-goal lead. On a man advantage after Penn was penalized for too many players on the field, Foote scored his second goal with a clever finish as he slipped in front of the net and bounced his shot past Penn goalie Brian Feeney. Schlesinger’s third of the day stretched the Bear’s lead to 12-8 before the quarter’s close.

Schlesinger scored again early in the fourth to give the Bears a 13-8 cushion, but a late Quaker surge in the final 10 minutes almost pushed the game into overtime.

Goals from Al Kohart, Morgan Griff and Ryan Parietti cut the lead to 13-11 with just over three minutes left in regulation. Griff again scored in transition off a Bruno turnover with 32 seconds left to make it a one-goal game. The Quakers won the ensuing faceoff, but Chriss made a huge stop with 13 seconds left. But his clearing pass was intercepted, and Penn had another chance. Maxx Meyer’s final shot attempt for the Quakers flew wide, icing the 13-12 win and prompting a collective exhale at Stevenson Field. “Little bit of a nail biter there at the end, but we got it done,�

Schlesinger said.

Tiffany said he was proud of the way his team performed but was quick to point out the game’s conclusion as evidence that the team needs improvement in certain areas. “We didn’t make plays at the very end of the game,� Tiffany said. “We had turnover after turnover.

We held on, and Matt Chriss made a bunch of big saves, but there were a lot of decisions at the end of the game that were not smart plays — that were not plays that you’d like to have in the future in big games.�

The win moves the Bears to 1-2 in conference play and sends the rest of the Ivy League a message that despite the team’s disappointing start, it has no plans of packing it in this season. “Teams have been looking over us — I think Penn looked over us a little bit at the beginning of the game,â€? Schlesinger said. At “0-2 in the Ivy League, this game is a turning point for our season. ‌ If we lost this game, it’s pretty much over — 0-3 in the Ivy League, it’s tough to make the tournament like that.â€?

Tiffany pointed to the importance of the game to the team’s mindset rather than the standings. He said he wanted the team to focus its energy on next week’s opponent — No. 17 Yale — instead of thinking about any postseason play. “This is just one win,� he said. “I don’t want to worry about the Ivy League playoffs or anything like that. It gives us a big win, and we’re going to appreciate it for what it is. It’s a win over a very good Penn team who’s No. 12 in the country.

And that’s it.�

Feature 5

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

MCM celebrates anniversary with weekend symposium continued from page 1 founders, as well as expose undergraduate and graduate students to “all of the amazing things” alums of the program have accomplished.

In addition to three panels of distinguished alums, conference attendees participated in informal “unconferences,” hour-and-a-halflong group discussion sessions with up to 20 participants. “‘Unconferences’ are the opposite of what you would think of as a stodgy event,” Fisher said. The “unconferences” were not designed to be academic functions but rather a dialogue between attendees, she said.

Yasmeen Hoosenally ’92 attended an “unconference” on the role of MCM in nonprofits and education.

“There was a lively discussion that erupted around a set of people with completely different backgrounds,” she said.

Big in media

The weekend’s main attraction was the “Big Media” panel in the Martinos Auditorium in the Perry and Marty Granoff Center for the Creative Arts. The panel, moderated by MCM Professor Emeritus Michael Silverman, featured director Todd Haynes ’85, “This American Life” radio host Ira Glass ’82, NBC Universal Entertainment and Digital Network and Integrated Media chairwoman Lauren Zalaznick ’84 and Michelle Higa ’04, a member of the digital animation group Mixtape Club.

Higa, whose group works primarily on music videos and commercials, showed off her group’s 2008 music video for Yeasayer’s “Wait for the Summer,” as well as a recent Batman-themed commercial for Google, which narrated

Batman’s story through search terms such as “flexible Kevlar” and “Gotham City Crime Statistics.”

Zalaznick, who said she was not aware that each panelist was supposed to prepare a presentation, joked that she jotted down her talking points on the spot with pen and paper, despite spending much of her professional career giving PowerPoint presentations. “I work for the Man,” Zalaznick said of her duties at NBC Universal, to which her friend and former work partner Haynes retorted, “I thought you were the Man.” Zalaznick, who produced several of Haynes’ films, including 1991’s “Poison,” said she did not anticipate ending up in television.

In her talk, she traced her professional career from her early work on movie sets to her current life as a television executive.

“I literally work at 30 Rock,” she said of her office. “And it’s literally just like (the sitcom) ‘30 Rock.’”

Zalaznick joked that when speaking about her days at work, her kids ask her if she is talking about her real life or the episode from the night before.

“I’m obsessed with ‘Top Chef,’” Haynes said as he began his presentation, a reference to a reality show on the television network Bravo, which Zalaznick oversees. Haynes said he came to Brown wanting to create art and film and credited the semiotics department for grounding his ambitions in “a theoretical framework.”

Haynes also spoke about his struggles coming out of graduation. His short film “Superstar: the Karen Carpenter Story,” which depicts Carpenter’s career and struggle with anorexia, used mixed media including animated Barbie dolls for the roles of Carpenter

and her family. “No one wanted to show ‘Superstar’ when I finished it,” Haynes said.

Though Haynes enjoyed success with later feature films, he said he found it difficult to keep his fans happy when branching out into unfamiliar genres. His first film, “Poison,” was embraced by gay audiences for its confrontation of the issues surrounding HIV . When Haynes switched gears in 1995 with “Safe,” he said fans of his earlier work were perplexed by the film, which did not contain any explicitly gay themes. “When I showed it at gay film festivals, everyone said, ‘what the (expletive) is this?’”

Haynes also expressed concern about today’s filmmaking. “The way we view media has changed, the alternative venues that existed and the things that propelled me have disappeared or vanished,” he said. Haynes added he was surprised that, given the accessibility of filmmaking equipment today, even on devices like cell phones, more innovative work has not flourished.

Glass proved the most crowdpleasing speaker at the panel, and the audience erupted in laughter multiple times during his presentation. Glass, who started his relationship with National Public Radio as a 19-year-old intern, said he had never heard of the program before he began working there.

“I still use what I learned at Brown every day at my job,” Glass said. He said his study of Roland Barthes’ proairetic code, which emphasizes sequences of actions and suspense to draw in audiences, influenced the structure of “This American Life” — “Exactly the opposite of what my professors intended for me to do with that information.”

“It’s hard making anything good,” Glass said, recalling struggles early in his career. “Most things that you’re making are trying to be crap. It wants to be bad.”

“We all probably need a drink at this point,” said Silverman, the moderator, after Glass’ eccentric presentation.

The other(ed) alums reminisce

In addition to the Big Media panel, other alums had the opportunity to present their work and share humorous tributes to their concentration in panels titled “Artists and Producers” and “Academia After Academia.”

At one panel, columnist and writer Ed Ball ’82 joked that the original semiotics building “resembled a tenement of the East Village in New York.” This was appropriate he said, because it “prepared graduates for the type of housing they would occupy” after school.

“I felt like I was being adopted into a cult,” artist and scholar

Coco Fusco ’82 said. “We had a language, a protected space. We all wore black and smoked Export A cigarettes. Everyone said something controversial in their other classes to identify themselves as semiotics students.”

“A lot of people worry about turning into their parents,” said Alex Galloway ’96, a computer programmer and associate professor at New York University. “I worry about turning into my old MCM professors.” Galloway also joked about the department’s tendency to produce “hyper-emo subjects” though it prides itself on “destroying the idea of interiority.”

Despite the humorous tone, the speakers all shared an intense pride in the department. “There’s something important about this lack of a signifier that people could identify us with,” psychoanalyst Ona Nierenberg ’80 said of the concentration. “It’s not a ‘pre’ to any already known profession. There’s a call to invention.”

Hoosenally mentioned MCM’s difficulty as a seductive factor for many alums, who recalled nearly failing their first papers as the moment they “knew they wanted to do MCM.” “I would like if this happens again,” conference attendee Madeleine Fix-Hansen ’94 said. “It’s nice to gather everyone together and think through things.”

6 Housing

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

Students feel the squeeze of chronic housing woes

Dorm overcrowding a persistent problem

By ALEX BELL NEWS EDITOR

Since the University became a residential college in 1951 with the completion of Wriston Quadrangle, overcrowding has been a persistent problem.

A four-part series run by The Herald in the fall of 1968 proclaimed that all normal and emergency on-campus rooms had been filled, prompting the director of housing to call the construction of new dormitories “the greatest need in the University.”

At a time when the University had plans to significantly raise enrollment from 5,200, the series raised particular concerns about how the rise in off-campus living could turn Brown into more of a commuter than a residential college.

By contrast, a front-page article at the start of the 1980 spring se-

mester announced a vacancy of 75 beds for that semester, the result of a new residence hall opening.

The new dorm provided necessary relief — the previous semester, 42 sophomores had to live in lounges due to an unexpectedly high firstyear matriculation rate.

According to a housing official at the time, the 75 excess rooms did not significantly affect the budget and allowed for greater flexibility in room changes.

“Dormitory overcrowding is over at Brown — at least for this semester,” the article proclaimed.

But just five years later, Mike Trotter ’58, then a member of the Corporation Committee on Student Life, told The Herald a very different story.

“All over campus, we don’t have enough rooms — they have been cannibalizing other space such as dance practice rooms and lounges and turning them into dorm

Day 1 overcrowding: the norm

Julien Ouellet / Herald

On the first day of classes, dormitories are generally overfilled.

rooms,” he said.

The following semester, residents of Andrews Hall, Keeney Quadrangle and South Wayland House again saw lounges disappear to accommodate an excess number of students living on campus, The Herald reported that fall.

In the fall of 1991, The Herald reported that the Office of Residential Life overbooks on-campus housing by about 30 or 40 students each year to account for unplanned vacancies during the semester and thereby reduce the number of empty beds on campus. That semester, the strategy resulted in 28 transfer and visiting students being housed in common spaces.

“It is a reality that there are going to be transfers,” a transfer student told The Herald at the time. “They should plan ahead for us.”

Two decades later, the practice of purposefully overbooking oncampus housing to account for unplanned vacancies is still in place, according to Richard Bova, senior associate dean of residential life and dining services. Stories of the impact of overcrowding have been increasingly prevalent in recent years.

A Wooley Hall residential peer leader told The Herald in fall 2005 that his unit was missing out on birthday parties and get-togethers because they lacked a common space to hold such celebrations.

At the time, Bova said this overcrowding was the result of a higher number of current students seeking on-campus rooms than expected — one cause of this year’s overcrowding as well.

A spring 2008 Herald article lamented the loss of Keeney lounges and its effects on living units’ communities, recounting low attendance at unit events in unconventional locations, a pizza party in

By ALEX BELL NEWS EDITOR

Nick Sinnott-Armstrong / Herald

Despite overcrowding challenges, “We don’t leave anybody on the doorstep,” Bova told The Herald.

the hallway and study sessions in a laundry room.

During the first week of September 2008, The Herald reported that “almost all hallway lounges and common spaces have been turned into bedrooms” due to an unexpectedly high yield in matriculation for that year’s first-year class.

“People want to use the kitchen,” a sophomore living in a converted common space told The Herald in fall 2009. “So people come and knock on our door to use the kitchen, but since we are here, they cannot use it.”

In spring 2010, the Herald reported that an inspection of 200 common spaces around campus by the Undergraduate Council of Students found that approximately two-thirds of the rooms were no longer used as lounges, and most had become dorm rooms.

But despite recent signs from administrators that an expansion of housing is on its way, there has been little indication that any institutional change will be made to prevent history from repeating itself.

— With additional reporting by Greg Jordan-Detamore

Academic priorities trumped housing concerns

By ALEX BELL NEWS EDITOR

Recognizing a gradual and unplanned rise in enrollment over past years, administrators are now turning serious attention to housing expansion in an effort to improve on-campus living standards affected by the growth of the student of body, according to Richard Spies, executive vice president for planning and senior adviser to the president.

“The experience ought to be better than it is,” he said. “I think that’s the acknowledgement now.”

Spies said the Plan for Academic Enrichment, the University’s longrange growth plan, did not account for this increase in the size of the student body.

When the University set its priorities, improving housing was a goal, but the consensus was that academic needs like growing the faculty and improving academic facilities took precedence.

“There was never a goal set in (the plan) that said to increase enrollment,” Spies said. “It’s one of those things that you deal with

rather than try to get out in front of.”

At the time the plan was approved, total undergraduate enrollment was 5,946, according to statistics from the Office of Institutional Research. Enrollment fluctuated until peaking last academic year at 6,243.

Dean of the College Katherine Bergeron attributed some of the increase to the over-enrollment of the class of 2012 in fall 2008, when admission officials overestimated the decrease in Brown’s yield after Harvard and Princeton did away with their early admission options.

Spies said there was a feeling that the student-faculty ratio was too high at the time the plan was drafted. Administrators made a conscious decision to increase the size of the faculty and grow Brown’s professional schools while keeping the size of the undergraduate student body constant, he said.

Despite this decision, there is a tendency each year to overshoot enrollment targets primarily because of the increasing quality of the applicant pool, Spies said, particularly for international applicants. At the

margin, financial reasons also play a role in increasing the number of students on campus because costs for faculty and other services are already determined, and a larger class leads to more tuition.

“You’d rather be a little over-enrolled than under-enrolled,” he said.

In an ideal world, undergraduate enrollment would stay roughly the same, “but for a variety of reasons that were not part of the plan, it grew slightly,” he added.

When enrollment does increase, growing housing at ahead of enrollment is preferable. “But at smaller numbers, there’s the illusion that you can get away with it,” he said.

Because formal plans did not call for the increase, administrators are only now beginning to recognize the need to grow housing, he added. But Spies said he believes the decision to prioritize academic projects was the right one.

“The fact that we’re eight years into the plan and really starting to think about housing in a significant way is unfortunate, but I wouldn’t say it’s surprising,” Spies said. “It’s risen in the priority list by virtue of

Model for housing both complex and imprecise

us getting some other things done.”

Discussions about the University’s next capital projects include improvements in areas such as engineering and the physical sciences, though the need for academic investment does not exist across the board as it once did, Spies said.

“It was a tough competition to get into the capital backlog seven or eight years ago,” he said.

Aside from renovations to 315 Thayer St., Spies said housing projects under consideration include adding new dormitories and a “program of renovations” for existing dorms, though plans are largely contingent on the generosity of donors.

An objective of the plan’s second phase, released in 2008, is to increase the percentage of undergraduates living on campus from roughly 80 percent to 90 percent “as soon as financing allows.”

A short term goal, Spies said, is increasing this number to about 85 percent, which would require an increase of about 300 students.

“Can we do that?” Spies said.

“Yes. That’s the kind of number we’re trying to talk about now.”

Each year, about 20 percent of undergraduates — roughly 1,000 seniors and 250 juniors — live off campus as part of a system that enables the Office of Residential Life to relieve pressure on the limited supply of on-campus housing, like a safety valve that can be opened as needed.

But the variables that feed into the model that determines how much the valve needs to be opened can be hard to predict from current data, and historical trends at times prove unreliable.

“The truth of the matter is that it’s an imperfect science that is carried out with as much data as we have,” Dean of the College Katherine Bergeron said.

Further complicating the equation, misaligned incentives hamper ResLife’s ability to accurately hit the target number of students living offcampus. The system encourages students to “have their feet in multiple doors,” as Richard Bova, senior associate dean of residential and dining services, put it.

Calculating the target

At its most basic level, the model predicts the difference between the projected number of students enrolled at Brown and the projected number of students separating from the University. This difference represents the number of students needing a place to live — on or off campus. The target number of students living off campus is this number minus the number of beds on campus.

The number of total separations is made up of the number of students graduating, going off campus for study abroad or taking leaves of any type — such as medical or personal leaves.

The first category of separation — the number of students graduating — is never an exact figure, and can fluctuate from projections by about 10 students, Bova said.

The number of students studying abroad may fluctuate by as many as 20 students and can be more volatile due to world events such as the tsunami in Japan and conflicts in the Middle East. Finalized numbers from the Office of International Programs do not arrive until late spring, well after the first round of off-campus approvals are sent out in the fall.

As for the number of students taking leaves, Bova said the best predictor he has is an average of the past three years’ data. Each year, the model factors in a projected fall “melt” of about 30 students to account for students who drop out for various reasons during that semester.

Bova noted that though trends show overcrowding on the first day continued on page 8

Housing 7

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

Overcrowding swells Wriston tensions

By JOSEPH ROSALES SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Though Wriston Quadrangle was built with the idea of a residential community in mind, overcrowding in recent years has heightened tension between Greek living and independents.

The construction of Wriston Quad around 1950 was the University’s first major step toward creating a residential campus. Administrators had been talking as early as President Francis Wayland’s P’46 term in the mid-19th Century about transitioning into a residential style of education. But it was not until President Henry Wriston that the University began seriously considering developing a true housing system on campus, according to a May 10, 1952, extended piece in The Herald about the history of Brown’s housing written by Thomas Appleget ’17, then the vice president of the University.

Wriston proposed his initial plans to the Corporation in 1943, basing his ideas and goals on Wayland’s desire for a residential campus expressed nearly 100 years prior, Appleget wrote. Wriston hoped to construct a large housing area that would be home to the University’s fraternities as well as independents — students that are not affiliated with Greek organizations — that needed housing. In September of 1951, Wriston Quad was completed, and fraternity members began liv-

Jabberwocks’ lounge has storied history Most on-campus residential spaces are primarily used by the students that live in the building, but Room 004 in North Wayland House serves as home to the Jabberwocks, the University’s oldest a cappella group. The Jabberwocks is the only student group on campus to have space in a dormitory allotted solely for its use.

When a few of the Jabberwocks found an abandoned bicycle room in North Wayland in 1988, the group decided to invest in making it a unique space for themselves, according to Joe Lerman ’11, a senior member of the singing group.

“At the time we got the room, it was just having a place where we could put all of that stuff — the keyboard, the music,” Lerman said.

The room is used for rehearsals, and occasionally members’ own projects and a few parties each semester.

Reed McNab ’12, Wayland’s women peer counselor, said she feels it is unfair that the Jabberwocks are the only group on campus with their own room, as if the University considered them “the elite a cappella group on campus.”

— Joseph Rosales

ing on campus. At that point, the University was affiliated with 17 fraternities, with members making up almost half the student body.

Wriston pushed for this construction, Appleget wrote, because of what he felt was a need for a greater sense of community at the University.

“Intimate friendship and college spirit and good breeding all demand that men should sit at table together, in unhurried intercourse,” Wriston wrote in an accompanying piece in that same issue.

He also wished for a university where fraternity brothers would have places not only to live on campus, but also to grow as intellectuals and to interact with their nonGreek schoolmates. In exchange for on-campus housing, the University assumed the deeds to their off-campus houses.

“Freed from the burden of debt and occupying attractive quarters, they again may become an educational force, as well as an effective bond between successive generations of alumni,” Wriston wrote.

‘No sense of community’

Despite the fact that there are no Greek common areas converted this semester — though Buxton International House’s library was converted into dorm space last semester — independents’ common areas have not been as readily available for use.

The independent lounge and kitchen in Goddard House has housed students all year, according to Michelle Ngo ’12, a community assistant in the building.

Independents in Diman House have also had their common areas converted, Angell Shi ’13, a community assistant, wrote in an email to The Herald. Diman’s basement lounge and library are currently living spaces for students, while the main independent lounge was set to be converted but then reverted back to a lounge, Shi wrote. continued on page 8

To what extent has overcrowding — the accommodation of students in common spaces such as lounges or kitchens — affected your residential experience?

Julien Ouellet / Herald

Lack of common spaces irks students

By GREG JORDAN-DETAMORE SENIOR STAFF WRITER

A majority of students indicated that overcrowding in on-campus housing — specifically the accommodation of students in kitchens and lounges — has affected their residential experience, according to last month’s Herald poll. Eleven percent of respondents said overcrowding has affected them very much, while 43 percent said it has affected them somewhat. Forty-six percent said they have not been affected by the loss of common spaces.

THE HERALD POLL Fifty-five percent of first-years, 59 percent of sophomores, 60 percent of juniors and 42 percent of seniors — many of whom live off-campus — said they have been affected by the overcrowding.

Seventeen percent of sophomores said they have been affected “very much” by overcrowding, compared to 7 percent of seniors, 11 percent of juniors and 8 percent of first-years.

This mirrors another trend: When asked in the poll what the University’s highest priority should be, 14 percent of sophomores favored building new on-campus dorms, compared to 11 percent of juniors and 8 percent of both first-years and seniors.

Though students living in temporary housing often have varying

opinions of their living situations — as The Herald has reported in the past — students living near converted kitchens and lounges also feel the effects of lost common spaces.

‘No options’

“Last semester, our second-floor kitchen was converted into a triple,” said Ellen Shadburn ’12, a secondfloor resident of Vartan Gregorian Quad A, which houses about 170 students. Some students chose to live on the second floor because of its kitchen, Shadburn said, but were given no warning it would be taken away.

“A lot of us wanted to reduce our meal plans, but decided not to because the only kitchen was so far away.” She said the situation was “extremely inconvenient” for a suitemate who enjoys cooking.

This semester, the kitchen has been reopened.

Some students living in Wriston Quadrangle dormitories as independents — residents not affiliated with program or Greek houses — have no access to kitchens or lounges in their buildings.

“We are independents, and we have no kitchen or lounge,” said Jordan Place ’13, a Marcy House resident who is not on a meal plan.

The Office of Residential Life gave him card access to Sears House to use its independent kitchen, he said.

“We rarely do anything with a stove, because we just don’t want to walk,”

Place said. “We microwave a lot of things in our room.”

Hope College has two lounges — one in the basement and Appleget Lounge on the first floor. But Appleget Lounge is currently being used to house students, leaving Hope residents with only the basement lounge.

“I have never seen Appleget Lounge,” Hope resident Margaret Tennis ’14 said. The basement lounge is cold and uncomfortable, she said.

“I know that everyone in Hope is pretty peeved about the situation.”

She said that if she wants to talk on the phone, but her roommate is in the room, she has nowhere to go.

There are “no options if you want to respect your roommate’s rights and still have your privacy,” she said. Tennis also said there is nowhere to go for students who want to study in the dorm. “We have people doing work in the kitchens every night, which I don’t think is ideal.”

Looking for a lounge

ResLife’s website currently contains inaccurate information about common spaces. For example, it says North Wayland House 101 is a lounge, but in reality, it is being used to house students.

Excluding Arnold Lounge, ResLife’s website lists five lounges in Keeney Quadrangle, but a visit to one of the locations — Bronson House continued on page 8

Students avoid lottery through program housing

By ABBY KERSON STAFF WRITER

For many, applying to program houses is not just about seeking out a community of other students who share interests — program house leaders and applicants alike consider avoiding the housing lottery an added bonus. And with more students placed in temporary housing due to overcrowding, the promise of superior rooms in program houses can provide an enticing alternative to facing the housing.

French House saw a slight increase in the number of applicants this year and a slight decrease in the number of outgoing residents, said Carolyn Crisp ’12, one of the house’s co-presidents.

“I know there were some people who either thought about applying or did apply because they wanted to avoid the housing lottery,” Crisp

said, noting that it was likely one of many reasons. “They don’t want to be stuck in a triple in Keeney or something.”

As incoming Spanish House member Ana Colon ’14 said, “The lottery is kind of a black day at Brown because nobody is happy and everyone is stressed out.”

If students begin to live in the French and Spanish components of Machado House purely to avoid the lottery, “over time, we would lose the French and Spanish houses all together,” Crisp said. Still, Crisp said she has “every confidence” that the new recruits are “all there for the right reason.”

Molly Chambers ’11.5, vice president of Buxton International House, said that while the house did not see a similar increase in interest this year, the recruitment committee “could recognize that a few people were there because the lottery was

overwhelming.” Chambers said the lottery was not a significant factor in her decision to join the house.

Buxton gets anywhere from 100 to 120 applicants each year, while only about 25 to 35 new spots open up. Luka Ursic ’14, who was accepted for this fall, said the lottery definitely contributed to his decision to apply.

“I guess I am afraid that your group can get split up or you can get a bad number and get a really bad location,” Ursic said. “I’m really happy that I don’t have to go through the lottery,” he said.

Technology House Manager Dana Mirsalis ’11 said the house looks for people who will be involved in the community, but someone who was “only interested in the room” would not be welcomed. The house has only had to turn away two members in their history for this reason, she said.

King House, primarily occupied

by the literary fraternity St. Anthony Hall, has also seen increased interest and currently has a waitlist for living in the house, according to Courtney Hall ’11, the fraternity’s president.

The house “is a selling point, but I don’t think it makes or breaks anyone’s decision,” Hall said. Like many of the other program house officials, Hall pointed to a sense of community provided by the organization as the primary motivation to join.

Nick Morley ’13, a new member of St. Anthony Hall who will be living in King house next fall, described the advantage of avoiding the lottery as a “push factor,” as opposed to the initial draw. Morley said this year’s use of temporary housing increased his distrust of the lottery.

The thought of avoiding unfavorable housing conditions “definitely came into my head” when deciding to apply to King House, said William Barnet ’12, who currently lives there.

8 Housing

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

Matching heads with beds an inexact process Common continued from page 6

to find rooms for them on campus.

of each school year, the melt mitigates overcrowding as the semester progresses and students living in temporary housing are moved into normal rooms. And in years that begin with vacancies, the melt intensifies the problem of being under capacity for ResLife.

The total number of new and continuing students is made up of the number of students continuing at Brown, returning from abroad or returning from leaves, plus incoming first-years and fall transfers.

Of this piece of the equation, Bova said he faces similar uncertainty. The number of incoming first-years, Bova said, is generally close to its target. Other variables, like students returning from abroad, are based on what students report, and are more likely to change. Administrators calculate the projections based on students’ indications of their intentions combined with historical trends, refreshing estimates periodically.

But even trends change, Bergeron noted.

“Another problem has to do with the fact that one side of the house deals in beds, and the other side deals in FTE’s,” Bergeron said. An FTE, or full-time equivalent, is an undergraduate student who is taking at least three courses at Brown, Bergeron said. Though many numbers at the University, such as the enrollment target, are specified in FTE’s, this number does not always translate perfectly into the number of students who will be living at Brown, though it is usually quite close.

A large chunk of off-campus approvals are sent out in the fall, followed by another round shortly before the housing lottery. Later into the school year and over the summer, Bova said he sends out new approvals weekly. The model is updated at several points as its variables — such as deadlines for declaring study abroad choices — firm up.

Toward the end of the process, Bova also needs to track down about 30 “ghosts,” or students who have not done anything to arrange housing for the next year. Later on, ResLife may also need to accommodate a number of students who are off campus and do not like their living situations. In such cases, Bova said he does his best

Even if the model perfectly predicted the number of students who ought to live off campus, achieving that target number of off-campus students is also messy work.

“There are many students who sign up, get off-campus approval, and they have no intention of even going off campus,” Bova said.

Currently there is no penalty for applying for off-campus permission and then declining to live off campus prior to Super Deadline Day, which was March 8 this year.

Students declining permission after the deadline are ineligible to participate in the lottery and are forced onto the summer waitlist.

“That creates such a ripple and a flurry of phone calls from parents,” Bova said, which at times involves a large amount of “screaming, yelling, insulting behavior.”

But assignments on the summer waitlist are made by semester level, so upperclassmen who decline permission usually end up living in normal housing and not in converted lounges. In fact, 90 percent of students in temporary housing this fall were sophomores, according to Bova.

“Why do you apply for off-campus permission if you don’t really want it? Many students want their feet in both places of the yard. They want to straddle the fence,” Bova said.

“Is there an incentive for Brown students to want to have their feet in multiple doors? Yes,” he continued, saying that the University’s housing system has been based on seniority for decades, which is inherently vulnerable to misaligned incentives.

“But I really cannot foresee a time when I just shut students out completely and say, ‘You made a bad choice,’” he said. “We don’t leave anybody on the doorstep.”

Last semester, Richard Hilton, ResLife’s assistant director for operations, sent emails to all sophomores and juniors, directed at any students “thinking of applying for off-campus permission.” For many sophomores, this was their first introduction to the off-campus system.

“There are a limited number of students approved to live off campus each year. Therefore, if you have any

A leaky safety valve

The Housing Model Total Students Students continuing

+

Students returning from abroad

+

Students returning from leaves

+

Incoming first-years

+

Incoming fall transfers

-

Those not needing housing Students going off-campus for study abroad

+

Students taking leaves of all types (medical, personal, etc.)

Beds available on campus =

Number of beds short = Target number to live off campus = Initial number approved for off-campus permission Julien Ouellet / Herald

interest in living off campus for the 2011-12 academic year, please complete an application,” Hilton wrote.

Still, Bova said ResLife has put stern warnings on its website to students who would apply for offcampus permission on a whim.

“I think we’re very clear,” Bova said. “Enter in the process if this is what you want. Why enter the process if you don’t have the intention?”

Bova said 78 juniors declined their permission late last spring.

Though ResLife maintains waitlists for students initially denied off-

campus permission, some students say they have been notified too late to find housing in Providence.

Bova dismissed the prospect of approving more students for offcampus permission than the current model’s off-campus target, saying he does not believe it is ResLife’s responsibility to plan around students who irresponsibly back out of off-campus commitments.

“There is no housing program in the country that will overshoot the model because they think people are going to decline,” he said.

areas out of reach for students continued from page 7 109 — reveals otherwise, leaving only four lounges for Keeney Quad’s roughly 600 residents. Three of these lounges are on the top floor. Keeney Quad also has only three kitchens, though one listed on ResLife’s website, again Bronson 109, does not exist, while another kitchen — Bronson 421 — is not listed on the site.

The Residential Council’s website information on dormitories — last updated in 2008 — lists eight kitchens in Keeney Quad.

ResLife does not update information on its website each year to reflect temporary changes, and the guarantee that all dorms will have kitchens should not be taken literally, Richard Bova, senior associate dean of residential and dining services, said in an Oct. 28, 2010 Herald article. “Everybody does have access to kitchens, but it’s all up for interpretation,” he said.

“I think there’s always an impact on students when there’s not as much communal space,” Bova said in the article.

Leigh Carroll ’12, a Women’s Peer Counselor and Herald contributing writer, lives next to a converted lounge and kitchen in Keeney Quad.

“There’s definitely a lack of common space,” she said.

Keeney Quad’s top-floor lounges are “definitely too far for people to go just to hang out,” Carroll said.

Her residents tend to hang out in hallways and individual rooms, and with no kitchen in her unit, cooking can be difficult.

The Herald poll was conducted March 14-16 and has a 2.9 percent margin of error with 95 percent confidence. The margin of error was 5.6 percent for the subset of first-years, 5.6 percent for sophomores, 5.9 percent for juniors and 6.1 percent for seniors.

A total of 972 students completed the poll, which The Herald distributed as a written questionnaire in J. Walter Wilson and the Stephen Robert ’62 Campus Center during the day and in the Sciences Library at night.

Independents lose out in search for Wriston common space continued from page 7 “I think it’s very unfortunate for the residents because some people are off meal plan and need at least a kitchen,” Ngo wrote in an email to The Herald about the situation in Goddard. “I’ve had some people email me about their dissatisfaction, but there’s nothing I can do about it, and neither can they.”

According to Emma Patterson Ware ’13, both her roommate Laken Hottle ’13 and she are on meal plans “because there’s no way to be off.”

“There’s no other space for you to go in that building,” Patterson Ware said.

“It makes you feel really undervalued,” Hottle said. “There’s no

sense of community.”

Molly Chambers ’11.5 said the two students who were placed in Buxton’s library last semester felt uncomfortable — they were the only ones in the building who were not a part of the program house.

“It’s not the ideal community to have two people living who are not involved at all,” she said.

‘It’s just not fair’

For fraternity and sorority members, the independents’ lack of common areas may be a problem, though not one they were all aware of. James Ardell ’13, a member of the Delta Phi fraternity, thought all lounge areas in Goddard were reserved for members of DPhi and

Alpha Delta Phi, the fraternity and literary society that share the building with independents.

“I guess it sucks to be an independent and not get your own lounge, but I think most people understand that when they’re living in the frat,” Ardell wrote in an email to The Herald.

Hottle noted the stark contrast between the situation of independents and that of Greek residents.

“It’s just not fair, and it’s not comfortable to live in a place like this,” she said. “If I just had access to a kitchen and a common room, that would make everything so much better.”

Andrew Alvarez ’11, president of the Greek Council, wrote in an

email to The Herald that in situations where independents do not have social spaces available to them, they have other options to turn to. “(The Office of Residential Life), upon request, will give independents card access to all houses on Wriston for the use of available social spaces, a privilege the Greeks are not entitled to,” he wrote.

Hottle said ResLife gave her access to Harkness House, but she is hesitant to start cooking. “It’s awkward and weird to be using their kitchen,” she said.

Though the Greek system may seem to have a set of privileges, there are also responsibilities Greeks must adhere to, Alvarez wrote.

“Any fraternity or sorority is subject to losing their social spaces when membership declines in order to use those social spaces for more independents,” he wrote. “Greek houses are still under the guidelines of (Residential Council) and ResLife. Not too many non-Greeks are aware of that part because they don’t have to interact with Res Council.”

Until overcrowding on campus is eased, independents will continue to deal with what Ngo feels is an unfortunate lack of common areas.

“We’re all helpless in this overcrowding situation,” Ngo wrote.

— With additional reporting by Greg Jordan-Detamore

9

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

Jazz band 7UDFN VTXDGV OHG E\ ¿UVW \HDU VSULQWHUV jives and tours in Dublin

By JAMES BLUM SPORTS STAFF WRITER

continued from page 12 the center and attended the senior recital, which quickly became a jam session for all, McGarrell said.

The band also gave a concert at a church in South Dublin to support the Dublin Housing Mental Health Association.

“This concert had a very large audience, and we were able to raise almost 3,000 euro,” McGarrell said.

They played a wide selection of repertory pieces, including works

by Duke Ellington. The band also performed in the bar at the Conrad Dublin Hotel preceding the Dublin City Jazz Orchestra’s concert at the National Concert Hall across the street.

“Performing together night after night was a really neat experience,” said Brett Anders ’14, a trumpet player in the band. “As an ensemble, we started to sound better, our sound got a lot tighter over a couple nights.” Schonwald said the trip was “a huge success” and believed this to be “largely because Irish people are very welcoming.”

Students also had time to wander around Dublin and take in the city and its surrounding areas, including sightseeing and a hiking trip just outside the city, Anders said.

McGarrel said the trip’s funding, which totaled about $22,000, came from a number of sources, including the students themselves, money sent in from Brown Jazz Band alums, the wind symphony and jazz band instructional account, the Sarah and Robert A. Reichley endorsed fund and the Office of the President.

At a rehearsal early on the evening of April 7, the Brown Jazz Band were already hard at work on their next major event, rehearsing with celebrated jazz clarinetist and trumpeter Anat Cohen for a concert which took place in Salomon 101 on Saturday night.

Musician jams in many languages continued from page 12 in Pakistan. The musician’s wife told the audience that the floods were more disastrous than Hurricane Katrina and the Haiti earthquake combined. But the floods did not receive as much attention as those disasters, and international aid was delayed. She also described the organization’s work in sponsoring a girls’ school and building a village in Pakistan.

She concluded by urging the audience members to take action.“Start from where you are and do what you can,” she urged.

“You are the hope of the world.”

The men’s and women’s track teams garnered three first-place finishes at the unscored University of Connecticut Alumni Invite Saturday.

The men’s 4x100-meter relay team, which was composed of John Spooney ’14, Matt Bevil ’14, Ajani Brown ’14 and Nathan Elder ’13, came in first place with a time of 3 minutes, 17.94 seconds.

Craker ’13 added to the successes of the throwing squad by coming in third place in the hammer throw with a heave of 143-11. Gabriela Baiter ’11 came in a close second place behind Biblo in the triple jump with a combined leap of 40-

11 1/2.

The women’s distance squad also had some strong performances, as Samantha Adelberg ’11 recorded a second-place finish in the 1500-meter run in 4:27.05. Ari Garber ’12 and Kesley Ramsey ’11 finished

COMICS Dr. Bear | Mat Becker

SPORTS “My best race was the 400 in the four by four,” Spooney said. “I was really relaxed, and there wasn’t much pressure.”

Spooney also had impressive performances in the 100-meter and 200-meter sprints. He finished third in the 100 in 10.82 seconds and second in the 200 with a time of 21.42.

“I think I ran well. There were some improvements that need to be made,” Spooney said. “Improving my starts in the 200 and just relaxing, both mentally and in my form.”

Daniel Smith ’13 had a strong showing in the shot put with a heave of 52 feet, four inches that earned him third place. Jonathan Dieujuste ’14 triple jumped 45–2 1/2, which propelled him to a second-place finish. Erik Berg ’13 finished the 800-meter run in third place, with a time of 1:52.90.

There were a lot of injuries that prevented many of the male athletes from competing, Spooney said.

The two first-place finishes on the women’s side belonged to Victoria Buhr ’13, who threw the discus 153-7, and Rachel Biblo ’11, who triple jumped 41-8 1/2 . Buhr also recorded a third-place throw of 43-5 3/4 in the shot put. Lacey

Dot Comic | Eshan Mitra and Brendan Hainline

Gelotology | Guillaume Riesen

second and third in the 3000-meter run with times of 9:41.85 and 9:46.00, respectively.

Bruno returns home Saturday for the Brown Invitational, the first of two home meets during the teams’ outdoor seasons.

10 Editorial EDITORIAL

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

EDITORIAL COMIC

B Y A L E X Y U LY

Chanin ’12 for UFB chair Beginning tomorrow at noon, students will have 48 hours to vote for chair of the Undergraduate Finance Board. We strongly encourage students to read up on the campaign and cast a ballot. As the organization in charge of apportioning funds to student groups, UFB plays a major role in our lives on campus. After speaking with the candidates, we believe David Chanin ’12 is the right pick for UFB chair.

Chanin’s opponent, Jason Lee ’12, currently serves as UFB vice chair, giving him valuable experience making policy decisions. Lee’s priorities include increasing transparency and strengthening collaborative bonds with the Undergraduate Council of Students and individual student groups — both worthy goals. But his emphasis on improving professionalism, while certainly important, was also at the heart of his campaign for vice chair last year.

Chanin is campaigning on a forward-thinking agenda that is ambitious but realistic. He has spent the last two years on UFB working with student groups and serving as liaison between UFB and the Brown University Activities Committee. Chanin’s background makes him well-qualified for UFB chair.

Central to Chanin’s campaign is his goal of implementing an online budgeting process for student groups next year. Such a system is long overdue — online budgeting will allow student groups to easily access data from past years and submit their current proposals in a more convenient form. Chanin has already done preliminary work on this project and offered us a clear plan of action for implementing the system in full.

We were also impressed with Chanin’s idea of directing a small share of UFB funding to UCS for allocation to students with innovative solutions to campus problems such as event publicity. Chanin told us UFB must follow strict guidelines when doling out money, making UCS a better appropriator of such a fund. The idea is a sound one and underscores Chanin’s commitment to improving student groups’ effectiveness, even when that means ceding some power.

Finally, we believe Chanin is the right person to push the stalled Capital Closet project to fruition. This initiative would see UFB purchase equipment student groups frequently use at events, saving money currently used for renting such equipment. It is disconcerting that such a great idea, which has been on the table for over a year, has gained little traction with the administration. Chanin is committed to persuading President Ruth Simmons and other administrators to give the project the go-ahead.

Both candidates would look to strengthen alumni relations as a means of finding alternative funding sources and push to enlarge the student activities endowment, which would render the student activities fee unnecessary if it grew large enough. We are glad both candidates are committed to these important goals.

If you are not in a student group yourself, then surely you have been to an event put on by one. UFB plays a very important role in the operations of student groups, which in turn help to keep our campus vibrant, engaging and entertaining. Chanin is the right person to chair this vital institution and ensure that student groups continue to flourish.

Students can vote for UFB chair through MyCourses. We will offer our endorsement in the race for Undergraduate Council of Students president tomorrow.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Many students want their feet in both places

”

of the yard. They want to straddle the fence.

— Richard Bova, senior assoc. dean of residential and dining services

See HOUSING MODEL on page 6.

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

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Opinions 11

The Brown Daily Herald Monday, April 11, 2011

Hello, soft-­bellied targets

BY DAVID SHEFFIELD OPINIONS COLUMNIST The public’s conception of domestic terrorism has changed drastically over the past decade. As apparent from Rep. Peter King’s (RN.Y.) Congressional hearings, domestic terrorism is now almost exclusively associated with Muslim extremists. While Muslim extremism is certainly one of the main types of threats from domestic terrorism, it is not the only one. All too often non-Muslim terrorists are forgotten or ignored. Do not forget that until Sept. 11, the biggest terrorist act inside the United States was carried out by Timothy McVeigh, an anti-government extremist acting out a white supremacist fantasy.

While attacks by Al Qaeda and related groups have resulted in significant casualties, none of them has posed an existential threat to the country. Meanwhile, groups that have posed real threats continue to mill around in obscurity. The most successful group was the Ku Klux Klan, which denied many Americans basic rights, like the right to vote.

Luckily, the Klan’s influence has faded, but there are other extremist groups in the country that just as fervently want to deny others their rights. Currently, the anti-abortion terrorists seem the most successful in undermining the law. In 2009, an extremist assassinated George Tiller, a Wichita, Kan. doctor who performed abortions, after years of harassment, bombings of his clinics and even

assassination attempts. Anti-abortion extremists have begun to harass another doctor, who is training to provide the first abortions in Wichita since Tiller’s murder.

While Islamist, anti-abortion, whitesupremacist, anti-government and other groups present serious threats, they are usually not the ones most relevant at universities. On campuses, animal rights terrorists pose the biggest threat. Just like Muslims, people who oppose abortion and those who favor smaller government, not everyone who

entists — a tactic that the anti-abortion extremists use to intimidate doctors. They even firebomb scientists’ homes and cars with the scientists and their families inside. They have at least a little humanity and so far avoid outright murder, but the message to the target is clear: Next time, it could be you on fire.

These tactics have not stopped scientists so far. The tactics of animal rights terrorists have even caused protests to demonstrate support of animal research in the face of these attacks. One terrorist, writing

At universities, animal rights terrorists pose the biggest threat.

supports various amounts of rights is willing to terrorize scientists. Most are quite happy with scientists doing their research so long as it is done humanely. In fact, the researchers themselves care about the wellbeing of the animals and are not, as the extremists claim, sadists.

The one good thing I can say about animal rights terrorists is that they do not seem to have graduated to outright murder. Sure, they vandalize research facilities. They release animals into the wild to be cruelly ripped apart by teeth and beaks — predators are notoriously anti-animal rights. They distribute the names and home addresses of sci-

on the website Negotiation is Over, put forward a new proposal to stop animal models being used in research. The title sums it up well: “Bringing the War to the Student Body — The Soft-Bellied Target of the Vivisection Complex.” The goal of the proposal is to intimidate students to avoid studying anything that involves lab animals.

The author of the plan presents three steps to achieve the movement’s goal of stopping animal research. The second step captures her malevolent desires well: “Students also need to understand that making the wrong choice will result in a lifetime of grief. Aspiring scientists envision curing cancer at the

Mayo Clinic. We need to impart a new vision: car bombs, 24/7 security cameras, embarrassing home demonstrations, threats, injuries and fear. And, of course, these students need to realize that any personal risk they are willing to assume will also be visited upon their parents, children and nearest and dearest loved ones. The time to reconsider is now.”

Is anyone reconsidering? No? Good.

I am not particularly relieved by her vision of the future of animal rights terrorism either: “Every time a vivisector’s car or home — and, eventually, the abuser him/herself — blows up, flames of liberation light up the sky.” While animal rights activists have been less willing to kill people than other domestic terrorist groups — humans are animals, too — there is always the possibility that they will become more desperate as society goes on with medical and scientific advances while they are ignored.

We should by no means live in fear of animal rights terrorists, anti-abortion terrorists or any of the others. But neither should they be ignored. The country not only needs good laws to stop terrorists from completing their attacks, but also effort by law enforcement to investigate these groups. Law enforcement has done well in many cases, but focus should not be fixed on one type of terrorism alone.

David Sheffield ’11 is a mathematical physics concentrator whose research makes him an accomplice to the genocide of trillions of protons. Hadron rights extremists can intimidate him at david_sheffield@brown.edu.

Ceding the moral high ground

BY OLIVER ROSENBLOOM OPINIONS COLUMNIST The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property staged a protest against gay marriage March 23.

Students responded with a spontaneous rally for gay rights. On the whole, the Brown community deserves praise for mobilizing to support gay rights. But certain aspects of this counter-protest were disgraceful, demeaning and counterproductive.

Unfortunately, Brown’s counter-rally was not only defined by support and love for the gay community. It was also defined by hateful and uncivil behavior.

Some protestors resorted to vandalism, profanity, spitting and physical obstruction. These immature actions reflected poorly on our student body and did not further the cause of gay rights.

The community has been too self-congratulatory in regards to this protest. We have overlooked the uncivil behavior of some protestors to elevate our sense of accomplishment and moral superiority.

The behavior of some students at the rally demands intense self-examination, not mindless self-righteousness.

Certainly, not every protestor acted in a disrespectful manner. But it only takes a few uncivil protestors to frame a narrative of violent protest. Brown students often judge the Tea Party by the actions of a

minority of its members. When a few attendants of a Tea Party event wield racist signs or make physical threats, we condemn all of middle America. When a few members of our own community resort to spitting, vandalism and obscenity, we conveniently overlook their behavior — or even glorify it.

Regardless of the actual number of people who engaged in such behavior, the community has failed to effectively distance itself from those who did act in such a hateful and counterproductive

The society produced a provocative video that captured Brown students flipping off its members, trying to destroy their property and spitting on their materials. By acting in such an immature fashion, these protesters allowed the society to change the narrative of the rally.

While students view the counter-protest as a triumph for gay rights, those who see the video may see it as a testament to our campus’s climate of hate and inability to civilly engage with those who hold different beliefs.

Unfortunately, Brown’s counter-rally was not only defined by support and love for the gay community. It was also defined by hateful and uncivil behavior.

way. Instead, we have either dismissed their behavior or taken pride in it.

Having a noble goal does not excuse impure actions. While it is admirable to advocate for gay rights, it is not admirable to spit at opponents, flip them off or attempt to vandalize their property. This immature behavior becomes even less worthy when it is counterproductive, as it was in this case.

A more civil protest would have been a more effective protest. Students could have made an equally strong case by gathering in large numbers and vocally supporting gay rights rather than resorting to vandalism, obscenities and spitting. A civil protest would have denied the society the opportunity to alter the focus of their rally. Although they stand for little more than homophobia and hate, our be-

havior allowed them to play the victim card and portray us as the hate group.

John Miller, a volunteer with the society, said of Brown’s response, “The intellectual level is below the Ivy League status.” It is tempting to dismiss this comment as the ranting of a bitter man. Unfortunately, his observation carries a sad amount of truth. No college students should resort to physical obstruction, obscenities or spitting, no matter how homophobic or intolerant the opposition.

It is unlikely that the society would have been open to an honest intellectual debate, but their closed-mindedness does not excuse our uncivil behavior. Protestors should have either ignored the society or focused on staging their own counter-protest, instead of sabotaging the society’s.

Students are fond of citing Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. But we fail to apply their teachings to our own lives. At this rally, we had the chance to counter hate with civil disagreement and pure love for the gay community.

Instead, we stooped to the level of this hate group by resorting to uncivil tactics.

If we had protested in a respectful way, we would have been engaged in a noble, morally certain battle. But by resorting to such disrespectful tactics, we ceded the moral high ground.

Oliver Rosenbloom ’13 is a history concentrator from Mill Valley, Calif.

He can be contacted at oliver_rosenbloom@brown.edu.

Daily Herald Arts & Culture THE BROWN

Monday, April 11, 2011

Pakistani artist rocks Faunce

Jazz band charmed in Ireland

By KATHERINE SOLA SENIOR STAFF WRITER

By HANNAH ABELOW CONTRIBUTING WRITER

When one thinks of Ireland, one might imagine green fields, pots of gold and a pub or two. But for the Brown Jazz Band, the country is more a miniature mecca of improvisational beats and bluesy rhythms.

Over spring break, the 20 members of the ensemble and Matthew McGarrell, senior lecturer in music and director of the jazz band, traveled to Dublin for six days to soak up the local jazz flavor and perform with Irish musicians.

The band takes similar trips every other year, recently visiting Portugal, Iceland and Italy. “We like to go to one city and stay there,” McGarrell said. “We pick places with active jazz scenes of some kind because we like to interact with local musicians.”

“The jazz scene in Dublin is small but it was good because we could easily navigate it in a short period of time,” said Rosalind Schonwald ’12, the group’s singer and a former Herald arts and culture editor.

The group was especially excited about the opportunity to play with Jim Doherty, a world-renowned jazz pianist who has long been integral to Dublin’s jazz scene, McGarrell said.

Dublin not only offered a local professional jazz scene, but also the Newpark Music Center — a music school affiliated with the Berklee College of Music.

“Interacting with the students at the music school was a highlight,” Schonwald said. The group practiced together with students from continued on page 9

Avery Houser / Herald

David Jacobs ’14 and his fellow storytellers recounted experiences such as long-distance relationships, drunken debauchery and slaughtering farm animals.

Storytelling event a ‘slam’ dunk

By ALEXANDRA SAN JORGE ARTS & CULTURE STAFF WRITER

Inspired by the public radio program “This American Life” and a non-profit storytelling organization “The Moth,” the Brown Storytellers brought the art of storytelling to campus for the first time this past weekend with their “story slam.”

The slam took place in Kassar House Fox Auditorium for a full house of enthusiastic audience members. The set up was simple but elegant — a chalkboard decorated with a smattering of key words and an illustration of a beef -cut diagram adorned the front of the room.

At 8:10 p.m. on Friday, Eli Bosworth ’12.5 kicked off the twoday event with a story describing a high school community service trip to Costa Rica. Bosworth kept the audience in stitches describing his attempt to become the “alpha

dog” of the trip despite competition from Rashad, “a guy with tattoos on his arms that wouldn’t even fit on my torso,” Bosworth said.

“We want to blend the conversational tone and the everydayness of our stories and formalize them into a performative, literary art,” said Jonathan Topaz ’12, creator of the Brown Storytellers.

Bosworth’s humorous tale proved an excellent opener to the following night of laughter. The storytellers — including David Jacobs ’14, Lily Goodspeed ’13, Aaron Jacobs ’12 and Sophie Friedman ’12 — infused seemingly simple stories with a graceful complexity and good natured humor. What made the stories worth listening to — and remembering — was the way each storyteller introduced moments of meaningful reflection to balance out the night’s humorous tone.

Topaz, a member of The Her-

ald’s editorial page board, said he started the club with the goal of helping students bring polish to their casual storytelling — calling it perhaps “the oldest art form in the world.” Topaz himself most deftly balanced humor and depth in a story about the last weekend he spent taking a cycling class with his now-ex girlfriend Steve Carmody ’12 entertained with his lyrical style. In a story about his experience as a butcher, Cormody posed the question of the exact moment an animal becomes meat.

“I’m glad that this exists,” said Marguerite Preston ’11. “This way of telling stories is a form of socializing that isn’t as common.”

“I wasn’t expecting how great that was,” Russell Huang ’12 said after the performance. “I can’t wait to hear more from them.”

A second story slam is planned for Senior Week in May.

Twin laptop thefts shake English department

By LUCY FELDMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Two Apple laptops have been stolen from the graduate student cluster on the fourth floor of the English department building since the start of spring break, according to Mark Porter, chief of police and director of public safety.

CAMPUS NEWS The first theft occurred between March 27, when a female graduate student locked her office and secured her computer with a laptop lock cable, and March 30, when she returned to the building. Upon her return, she found the office door had been forced open and the laptop cable cut, Porter said. DPS detectives found pry marks on the metal of the door and wood chips on the ground, indicating someone had forced the door open with a metal object, likely a screwdriver, he said.

The second theft occurred April 5 in the graduate student office

across the hall from the site of the first crime. Around 1:30 p.m., a student left her laptop unsecured and unattended for about five minutes while she stepped into a neighboring office, Porter said. When she realized she had left her laptop out in the open, she returned to find it missing.

Devon Anderson, a second-year English graduate student, said at the time of the second theft there was another unsecured laptop and a purse out in the open in the office.

Both went untouched.

“Typically in cases with such a short time frame, there are very specific and limited motives and types of suspects,” Porter said in regard to the twin thefts. “We look into special identifying circumstances such as things on the computer itself and the location of the theft. This being the fourth floor, it’s probably somebody who knows the area.”

Porter said the information the detectives are gathering indicates “some relation between the thefts.”

DPS has not identified any indi-

vidual as responsible, but “detectives are focusing on a number of possible leads,” he said.

Kevin McLaughlin, professor of English and chair of the department, said he thinks one person is responsible for both crimes. “I think what’s significant is that both occurred in the same part of the building — a quiet area that houses graduate students,” he said.

In addition to the main staircase in the building that leads to an exit on Brown Street, there is a back stairway near the graduate student cluster that leads to a more isolated exit on Angell Street. Porter said the criminal may have slipped out the back door.

The two thefts were the first in the English department since 2008, Porter said.

“It’s just no longer a safe space,” Anderson said about the building.

“One can sort of hypothesize that a good way to blend in if one were a laptop thief would be to look like a student and have a backpack,” McLaughlin said. “That means, I

think, we’re all just extra aware of how people are moving in the building, and that’s just really unfortunate.”

In addition to those taken from the English department, two other laptops have been stolen on campus recently. Two professors had their computers taken from locked offices in the Taubman Center for Public Policy and American Institutions between March 23 and April 3, Porter said. But he said there is no evidence the thefts were related.

In response to the number of laptop thefts on campus in the past few years, DPS’s crime prevention unit has been working on lowering laptop theft rates.

“We’re getting more information and awareness out, and people are taking more precautions, but we have to take a bigger step toward protecting our personal property,” Porter said. “Laptops and other portable electronics are pretty easy targets for theft, and theft continues to be one of the most common problems on college campuses.”

“That whisper in your heart has strength,” Salman Ahmad told the audience in the Underground Friday evening. The Pakistani star of Sufi rock combined songs in Urdu and Punjabi with conversation about his experiences growing up in America and Pakistan in a presentation entitled “Rock and Roll Jihad.”

Ahmad played 17th century Punjabi music, Pakistani nationalist songs, qawwali music and the shahada, the Islamic declaration of faith. He proved to be an engaging performer, coaxing the audience of Brown students and community members to clap and sing along to lyrics many did not understand.

He said when people sing together, their “mystical energy” creates a “circle of light,” breaking down the walls between members of the audience.

He told them the story of his childhood and his struggles to become a musician in the face of opposition from his Pakistani family, who wanted him to become a doctor. But after seeing a Led Zeppelin concert at age 13, he decided, “That’s what I want to do with my life.” Ahmad attended medical school in Pakistan but became frustrated by the strict Islamic dictatorship’s prohibitions against music and poetry. He organized a covert talent show, which was broken up by militants who smashed his guitar. “If you’re a rock musician, you’d better destroy your own instrument,” he said ruefully. That moment “changed everything,” and he resolved to follow the whisper in his heart.

Ahmad works toward fostering peace between India and Pakistan and emphasized the role of music in cross-cultural communication.

He and his band, Junoon, were the first Pakistani band to tour India.

He described how his friends and relatives told him, “You’ll be tortured, and then you’ll be deported.”

But he was surprised by the warm welcome his band received, telling the audience about a time when three major Bollywood stars came into his dressing room before a performance to ask for his autograph for their nieces. This experience, he said, exemplified the “strange cultural relationship between India and Pakistan,” in spite of political conflict. He asserted that personal contact like this will be the “way forward” for the two countries.

Ahmad played a popular Pakistani song to great enthusiasm from the audience.

The evening took a more serious turn when Ahmad’s wife, Samina Ahmad, took the stage. Two years ago, the couple started a non-profit organization, the Salman and Samina Global Wellness Initiative in response to the catastrophic floods continued on page 9