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OCTOBER 26, 2018

THE INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO SINCE 1892

Surprise Appearance: Kanye West Joins Chance at Mayoral Rally

University “Aggressively” Seeking Grocer to Replace Treasure Island

By WILLIAM TRLAK maroon contributor

West, who donated $73k to Enyia on Monday, was not billed to appear at the rally. jeremy lindenfeld

By ELAINE CHEN local politics editor

Kanye West quietly slipped into a rally hosted by mayoral candi-

date Amara Enyia and Chance the Rapper at 63rd Street and Cottage Grove Avenue on Tuesday afternoon.

The rally, which drew a crowd

of over 200 people, comes a day after West donated $73,540 to Enyia’s campaign, and a week after Chance endorsed Enyia at a press continued on pg.

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At Crerar Opening, Zimmer Teases “Large Sequence of Investments in CS”

By LEE HARRIS news editor

Crystara, the John David Mooney sculpture that hangs in the atrium of John Crerar Library. lee harris

Homecoming Is Here

By CAMILLE AGUILAR

“I’m looking forward to the moment when the building is too small,” Zimmer said, stressing that development in computer science is a top priority for the University.

At the Friday opening of the newly renovated John Crerar Library, which now houses the Department of Computer Science and the Computation Institute, President Robert Zimmer and Provost Daniel Diermeier stressed that substantial further investment in computer science is on the horizon.

Zimmer described the move to Crerar as “one piece of what we intend to be a large sequence of investments in computer science,” but did not offer specific plans for expanding the department.

The comments come on the heels of the recent election of Microsoft chief executive officer Satya Nadella (M.B.A. ’97) to the University’s Board of Trustees, and may suggest that technology and computing interests will have a larger voice in shaping the University’s development.

In his remarks, Zimmer decontinued on pg.

2

The closing of Hyde Park grocery store Treasure Island on October 8, along with the chain’s five other stores in Chicago, has left Hyde Park community members wondering who the next tenant will be in the now vacant University-owned building.

Associate Vice President of Real Estate Operations Angelica Marks is leading the effort to find a tenant that fits the community’s needs. In a statement to The Chicago Maroon, University spokeswoman Marielle Sainvilus said, “Immediately after the store closing, the University worked in collaboration with the alderman and other organizations to host a community meeting and job fair, resulting in multiple job offers on the spot for some attendees.”

In a post on the 53rd Street blog, a website run by the University on news about Hyde Park, University Marketing Communications Manager Amy Srodon said, “The University’s Real Estate Operations team is working aggressively to re-lease the space. In an effort to provide the most current information possible, we will provide updates on this blog.”

“For now, there is no shortlist with specific stores to succeed Treasure Island, but the University is trying to incorporate com-

munity members into the process,” Sainvilus said.

“We are currently in the process of meeting with a wide range of grocers that operate in the Chicagoland market to understand their interest in the Hyde Park Shopping Center. This also includes following up with every single one of the suggestions from community residents,” she said.

Community members want an immediate fix for the lack of grocery stores, with consideration given to those who will fill the vacancy permanently. The Hyde Park Google Group “Good Neighbors” has hosted Hyde Parker’s discussion of the closing. One “Good Neighbors” post suggests a temporary “‘former-Treasure Island’ store” to provide short term employment for the jobless Treasure Island employees.

Others say that Hyde Park needs a moderately-priced store such as an Aldi or Jewel-Osco.

Another “Good Neighbors” post reads, “I know many people were driving out of the neighborhood to Costco, Trader Jo’s, Aldi’s, etc. So I think that a moderately priced replacement store would have a good chance of success.”

“I certainly hope the powers that be are not saying our neighborhood can’t support another store,” says another “Good Neighbors” post, “because the situation as it currently stands is completely unsustainable.

UChicago Economics Paper: “The Tyranny of the Top Five”

By YUEZHEN LI contributor

University of Chicago professor and a Nobel Prize–winning economist James Heckman and pre-doctoral fellow at the Center for the Economics of Human Development Sidharth Moktan, published a paper last month on the importance of publishing in “Top Five” (T5) journals for the careers of young economists.

Their paper, “Publishing and Promotion in Economics: The Tyranny of the Top Five,” was published by the National Bureau of

Enough With Clickbait: A Destructive Publication

By RACHEL SALISBURY

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Economic Research (NBER). It argues that economics departments across the country tend to use a job candidate’s publishing record in the so-called “Top Five” journals as a criterion in deciding whether or not to grant them tenure.

In the economic academia, the Top Five refers to the five most prestigious journals in general economics, The American Economic Review, Econometrica, The Journal of Political Economy, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, and The Review of Economic Studies.

The paper contains a formal continued on pg.

2

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THE CHICAGO MAROON - OCTOBER 26, 2018

2

Events 10/26–10/29

Friday U.S. Against the World: Trump and International Law Ida Noyes Hall, noon–1 p.m.

Harold Hongju Koh, former dean of Yale Law School and former legal adviser and assistant secretary for human rights at the U.S. Department of State, will discuss his new book, The Trump Administration and International Law. UChicago Presents: Seong-Jin Cho Mandel Hall, 7:30–9:30 p.m.

The winner of the 2015 Chopin International Piano Competition makes his Chicago debut with a program of fantasies and a virtuosic piano showpiece. There will be a 6:30 p.m. pre-concert lecture with John Lawrence.

Saturday Outsider Hermeneutics Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society 5701 South Woodlawn Avenue. 9 a.m.–5 p.m.

This conference asks the question, “What are the changing criteria which make Outsider Writing ‘literary’ and readable, not merely pathological, incoherent or endlessly boring?” Panels will feature talks from both UChicago and visiting professors, including creative writing chair John Wilkinson, English professor Edgar Garcia, and music and humanities professor Seth Brodsky.

Sunday Rockefeller Chapel at 90: The Anniversary Service Rockefeller Chapel, 11 a.m.–12:15 p.m.

On the 90th anniversary of the Chapel’s dedication on Sunday October 28, 1928, organizers will draw from the liturgy and music of that very service, including Anton Bruckner’s glorious Locus Iste.

Monday Chicago Style: Retain or Refrain? Why Judicial Elections Matter Institute of Politics, 5:30–6:30 p.m.

Rick Tulsky, co-founder and co-editor of the nonpartisan journalism organization Injustice Watch, will discuss the issue importance of Judicial Elections – including the 59 Cook County judges up for reelection this fall, for new six-year terms on the Circuit Court.

Support Our Advertisers Page Four: Get free drip coffee by mentioning The Chicago Maroon at Nella for brunch on Saturdays and Sundays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Page Four: New patients can get a 10 percent discount on dental work as well as a complimentary oral exam at Kaufman & Kaufman Smile Design Studio, LLC. Page Four: Hear Dr. William Foege, M.D., M.P.H. speak at the Maclean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics Prize Lecture Saturday November 10 at 9:30 a.m. at the University of Chicago Law School.

If you want to place an ad in The Maroon, please e-mail ads@chicagomaroon.com or visit chicagomaroon.com/pages/advertise.

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GSU Panel Addresses Inequity on the South Side

By KEATON BOYLE maroon contributor

Graduate Students United (GSU) hosted a panel discussion with student and community activists on Wednesday evening in Stuart Hall. The event, titled “You Are Here,” aimed to give students and community members an overview of the issues surrounding the University’s role on the South Side.

Panelists spoke about the problems of police brutality and gentrification, and offered ways for students to stand in solidarity with those affected. Many panelists emphasized the University of Chicago’s troubled history on the South Side.

“Historically, it’s clear that…UChicago is situated very squarely within the history of American racial capitalism,” Todd St. Hill, a member of Black Youth Project 100 and UChicago Socialists, said. “It doesn’t see a relationship with neighborhoods and communities that surround it, but only sees [those neighborhoods] as potential land to be grabbed.”

Displacement caused by new development was also an important issue for second-year undergraduate Federica Ferrari, a panelist who has worked toward striking a community benefits agreement (CBA) with the Obama Foundation and parties involved in the development of the Obama Presidential Center. The CBA requires that a portion of jobs in the Center are reserved for local residents and that housing in the area is affordable for existing residents.

“If these goals aren’t met, that’s 10,000 families displaced,” said Ferrari. “That’s actively changing the landscape of these communities in an irreparable way.”

Actions by the University of Chicago police were another important issue for panelists. Growing up in Hyde Park, one “constantly hear[s] about how University police

A GSU panel discussed issues of injustice, police violence on the South Side. keaton boyle are harassing Black and Brown children” said Taylore Norwood, a member of advocacy group Good Kids Mad City.

Jazmine Salas, a School of Social Service Administration alum and co-chair of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, also noted: “UCPD is excluded from public accountability mechanisms like FOIA requests…and that’s terrifying.”

Panelists also discussed the role of UChicago students in both perpetuating and helping address these issues of police violence and gentrification.

“It’s hard to watch people who have invited themselves into your community not care about the issues going on within that community” Norwood said.

Panelists advocated for student support in various ways, while also noting the careful balance between “stepping up” and lending your voice to a cause, and “stepping back” and letting those most affected speak.

Salas suggested ways to frame an organization like GSU’s mission as linked to the goals of another. “Something like ‘Union Power for Black Power’.... That kind of stuff is so beautiful to me,” she said.

After the panel, audience members and panelists broke out into smaller groups.

Members of GSU facilitated discussions within these groups, spurring conversation about the meaning of solidarity and ways people can turn what they had learned during the panel into concrete action.

This orientation toward action was a key goal of the event according to Arianna Gass, the GSU steward who moderated the panel.

“We all know the theory, but show us the practice,” Gass said.

In this respect, Gass said, she thought the event went well. “I think that at least one person will do something different tomorrow than they did the day before, and that’s the whole point.”

Zimmer is “looking forward to...when the building is too small” continued from front

scribed a “seminal moment for our community science department.” Some of his comments appeared to tease plans for departmental expansion.

“Something like [this building] has been desired for quite some time. It’s now here and open, and that’s a great thing. But I think it’s also important to think about this building in a larger context – namely that this building is really one piece of what we intend to be a large sequence of investments in computer science, a large expansion of our computer science department itself, a large expansion of things connected to computer science around the University, connected to data science – so, the way to think about this building is that it’s a necessary but not sufficient piece of what it is that we actually want to do,

as a whole, in computer science.”

“I’m looking forward to the moment when the building is too small, because the activities in computer science have grown so much, and so robustly, that we’ll have another problem figuring out what it is we have to do next in terms of space.”

Speaking after Zimmer, Diermeier reiterated the president’s emphasis on the department as a top area of interest for investment and growth.

“As Bob has mentioned, growing the computer science department…is one of the top priorities for us at the University at this moment,” Diermeier said.

Rob Mitchum, communication manager for the department of computer science, told The Maroon that following the move to Crerar, there are no immediate plans for a

new building designated exclusively for computer science.

“The Department of Computer Science continues to expand by adding new faculty members, and we’ll be increasing activities in the Center for Data and Applied Computing and the Media Arts, Data, and Design Center later this academic year, but there are no current plans for new facilities beyond the new space in the Crerar Library.”

When the Crerar renovation was originally announced in 2016, Edward “Rocky” Kolb, dean of the Physical Sciences Division, told The Maroon that the move to Crerar constituted “yet another step toward the division’s goal of having every department in new or renovated space by 2022.”

The full event can be viewed via a Facebook livestream.

Professor Argues for Change in Econ Journal Landscape continued from front

statistical analysis showing a young economics scholar’s Top Five publication has a powerful influence on his or her likelihood of getting tenure. It also contains a survey of the perceptions of junior economists that corroborates this situation.

Heckman and Moktan find the status quo problematic, as it can incentivize “careerism.” According to their paper, the demand for young scholars to publish in Top Five journals “shapes research agendas. For many young economists, if a paper on any topic cannot be published in a Top Five outlet, the topic is not worth pursuing.”

Therefore, young economists are implicitly encouraged to only conduct research that is likely to be published by a Top Five paper.

Not only is long-term or paradigm-defying

research discouraged, but there is also a fear that research in the discipline can be unduly influenced by the Top Five editors’ personal tastes of topics and methodologies.

Moreover, scholars who know the editors of Top Five journals personally are more likely to get their papers published. “Editors are likely to select the papers of those they know. Network effects are empirically important,” the researchers argue in the paper.

“As Professor Heckman and I write this paper, what we want to see is that Top Five journals get de-emphasized in our discipline.

But the point is not to move on to a new set of journals—say, Top 10 or Top 20—but to a different way of conducting matters, so that creativity is encouraged,” Moktan said.

Moktan finds it worrying that the Top Five have a “quality-independent” effect on

a candidate’s likelihood of getting tenure, which means that a candidate whose portfolio contains Top Five publications has an edge over another who does not, even if their quality of research is controlled to be the same. Yet the paper contains empirical evidence that this may the case for many.

“It pays more [for a junior economist] to have a mediocre publication portfolio with T5 publications than an outstanding portfolio without any T5s,” the paper reads.

Moktan thinks change is needed. He argues that senior economists should read papers themselves and form their own judgment on junior candidates. He also thinks that economists should encourage creative, long-term, and even risky (in the sense of potentially fruitless) research.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - OCTOBER 26, 2018

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National Review Editor on Suicide of the West

By JACK CAPIZZI maroon contributor

Conservative columnist and National Review editor Jonah Goldberg discussed his new book, Suicide of the West, at the Institute of Politics (IOP) on Friday. The book is an analysis on how the rise of identity politics, nationalism, and populism is destroying America’s democracy.

IOP Pritzker Fellow Mary Katharine Ham, a conservative commentator, senior writer at The Federalist, and CNN contributor, held a conversation with Goldberg.

She introduced the book as a study on how nationalism and populism have been bred in various cultures and societies. Goldberg stated that his book looks at human history dating back 250,000 years, mentioning that the book was already underway when Trump was elected.

Ham asked about Goldberg’s process of writing the book, and specifically about how he researched his material. Goldberg said he modeled his writing style on publications such as The Public Interest or Commentary, aiming to ground his arguments in scientific research.

“One of the things I tried to do is work on terms that should be appealing to people across the aisle from me who say they care about science and evolution and facts and empiricism,” Goldberg said. “My argument is entirely grounded in that stuff as opposed to appealing to divine authority, which has pissed off my friends on the religious right.”

Ham also touched on the impact of social media and online news outlets on the

culture of the United States. The Internet’s relationship with the media, Goldberg said, has threatened the economic systems that United States is based upon.

“Capitalism depends on values and norms it cannot create and cannot restore once lost. Those norms come from institutions like the family and organized religion,” Goldberg said. “Due to the erosion of civil society from things like Facebook and Instagram, people are retreating into their homes and following politics as if it is entertainment.”

Skyrocketing partisanship over the last two years has made supporting a party similar to supporting a sports team, he added.

Comparing partisanship to the rivalry between the Chicago Bears and the Green Bay Packers, Goldberg stressed that if one’s own side is incapable of winning, the objective turns to wishing for the opposition’s collapse.

“When you start watching politics as a form of entertainment,” Goldberg said, “you start internalizing this idea that politics is all about punishing the other tribe.”

Both commentators said that within their own work, they have received increased hostility from both Republicans and Democrats. Their refusal to ardently support President Donald Trump while remaining conservative, Ham said, has caused this division.

Ham brought up the controversy sparked online regarding Mark Wahlberg’s daily routine—an intense schedule of exercise, work, and prayer, which some have criticized and parodied. She suggested that social media has been responsible for a backlash against self-control.

courtesy of gage skidmore

“We live in this era where self-control is frowned on and self-expression is celebrated at every turn,” Goldberg responded. “30 years ago, if you saw someone walking towards you with a neck tattoo, you’d walk to the other side of the street. Today that person could be a poetry teacher at Bryn Mawr.”

Though he believes the hostile divide in partisanship has spilled into everyday life, Goldberg said that he believes that the more power is delegated to a local level, the greater chance there will be for a return to civil

discourse and an end to hostile partisanship.

“If you give people more control over their lives they will feel less like unseen forces are controlling their lives,” Goldberg said.

“If you push power down to the local level, you will still have culture wars, but the winners and losers will have to look each other in the eye when talking with other parents at the kids’ track meet or at the supermarket, which breeds a certain sense of empathy and humility.”

Northwestern Prof Talks Radical Environmentalism, “Tree Spiking”

By CHARLIE KOLODZIEJ maroon contributor

Northwestern University history professor Keith Woodhouse sat down with Loyola University professor Benjamin Johnson on Wednesday at the Seminary Co-Op to discuss Woodhouse’s new book, The Ecocentrists.

Johnson introduced Woodhouse’s new book with a joke: “The only annoying thing about reading this book is, it’s proof that I’m now old enough to read history books about events that I actually vaguely remember.”

At the heart of The Ecocentrists is “Earth First!”, a radical environmental movement popularized in the 1980s. The book explores the history of the group’s organizing, as well as its impact on modern policy and activism.

The book’s title refers to a main tenet of the Earth First! movement, which proposes that human beings and nature belong

on equal moral footing. The Ecocentrists revolves around a central historical debate: Does ecocentrism constitute a common-sense approach to environmentalism or a deeper critique of modern society?

Woodhouse provided a brief history of the Earth First! movement, saying, “It is defined by direct action, standing in front of bulldozers, standing in front of mining trucks, chaining yourself to construction equipment, and probably most famously, sitting in trees.”

He went on to describe the process of “tree spiking,” in which environmental activists would drive long iron nails into the trunks of trees. “The idea is that either you do not log that stand or you spend a lot of time, money, and effort, into removing the spikes from the trees, which costs the forest service and logging companies time and money,” he explained.

Actions from Earth First! movement ac-

tivists led logging companies to begin scanning trees with metal detectors, leading the movement to retaliate with undetectable ceramic spikes rather than metal. The first move in what Woodhouse described as a “kind of arms race going on in the forests.”

Johnson mused on the extreme nature of the Earth Firster’s actions. “When you’re doing things like this, you’re not trying to convince the swing voter to come out for the midterms and vote for an environmental proposition,” Johnson quipped.

“Like all radical groups that I’ve ever encountered, there’s a ton of infighting within Earth First!,” Johnson said. “What were some of the things Earth Firsters disagreed about with one another, even hanging out in a tree, or chained to a bulldozer?”

Woodhouse answered by elaborating on a central debate of the book: The degree to which environmentalists should consider issues of race, gender, and class when orga-

nizing their activism.

According to Woodhouse, while the first generation of Earth Firsters defined their exclusive concern as protecting wilderness and non-human nature, later activists argued that environmental preservation and hot-button social issues were intertwined.

“Subsequent activists went on to say, ‘Look, you cannot understand these issues without understanding social politics,’” Woodhouse said. He added that to these activists, “social politics” included everything from alternative forms of labor for loggers and miners to gender disparities within the Earth First! movement.

However, the organization did not stop at social politics. “They debated everything, they had an annual gathering called the Round River Rendezvous, there was a debate on whether people should be allowed to bring their dogs.” Woodhouse joked.

“This is a rally, this is for you, this is not even for the press, y’all” continued from front

conference at city hall.

Throughout the rally, which was billed as featuring only Chance and Enyia, Enyia repeatedly said that she wanted to hear Woodlawn residents discuss their concerns in the neighborhood. However, shouts in response to West’s sudden appearance and calls for Chance’s attention repeatedly drowned out community members’ questions and Enyia’s responses.

Enyia, 35, is the director of the Austin Chamber of Commerce in the West Side of Chicago. She ran for mayor in 2015, but dropped out before the vote. Long seen as a longshot to become mayor next year in a field of what now totals 17 candidates, Enyia received an overwhelming amount of attention after Chance’s endorsement last week.

At the highly anticipated press conference, Eniya said that Chance’s endorsement

“is not your typical flash-in-the-pan endorsement,” explaining that Chance would be supporting her throughout the campaign rather than support her in just a one-time announcement.

At the rally, Chance was the first to take the speakerphone, but quickly passed it on, saying, “I’m going to let our future mayor, Amara Enyia, speak to you guys.” He then stood behind Enyia as she explained the purpose of the pop-up rally.

“We pull up to a location in a community so that we can amplify the issues in that community,” she said. “It’s just saying: Come through and hear from each other.”

She then voiced her support for a Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) to protect Woodlawn residents from displacement due to the incoming Obama Presidential Center.

Chance has also long supported a CBA. A few minutes in, attendees began notic-

ing West, who inconspicuously appeared on the back wall behind Enyia and Chance in a neon orange jacket. West did not speak, but Enyia acknowledged him briefly.

“I also have to give kudos to Ye,” she said.

She then hugged West, and he left shortly after.

Enyia’s assocation with West, an ardent supporter of President Donald Trump, could land her in hot water among a strongly progressive constituent base. Enyia told the Chicago Sun-Times on Tuesday that she is not a Trump supporter and does not have to answer for West’s stance toward Trump.

Chance and Enyia then began taking questions from attendees, which touched on violence to policies on immigrants.

“This is a rally, this is for you, this is not even for the press, y’all,” Enyia said. “We came out here for the residents of Woodlawn.”

However, as the attendees continued to swarm closer to Enyia and Chance, their answers became harder to hear for members in the crowd, which had begun spilling into the road. Many attendees were Woodlawn, Hyde Park, and Englewood residents. UChicago and some Northwestern students made up a large part of the crowd as well.

Enyia’s answers during the rally were occasionally interrupted by attendees directing questions at Chance, such as, “Chance, can you sign my arm?”

Enyia ended the rally by saying that she would continue to make pop-up appearances throughout the city in the next few weeks.

She said her next rally will be this Saturday downtown, and that she will announce details on Twitter.

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THE CHICAGO MAROON - OCTOBER 26, 2018

The MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics Prize Lecture:

Dr. William Foege, MD, MPH

“Global Health: Ethical Challenges” Saturday, November 10 at 9:30 AM

William Foege, MD, MPH is an American epidemiologist and infectious disease physician, known for his strategy of “surveillance and containment” that led to global eradication of smallpox in the 1970’s. Since then, there has been no deaths from smallpox, a disease that had led to more than 200 million death earlier in the 21st century. Dr. Foege’s strategy soon came to be adopted across the globe. Dr. Foege has also been the Gates Foundation adviser on vaccination policy for Africa and Asia for the past 20 years, and has had a major role in the control of Guinea worm disease, polio, measles, and river blindness.

The MacLean Conference on November 9 & 10 will also include many exceptional lectures on issues such as reducing disparities in health care, reproductive ethics, surgical ethics, pediatric ethics, and end-of-life issues.

FRIDAY NOVEMBER 9 – SATURDAY NOVEMBER 10, 2018 UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO LAW SCHOOL – 1111 EAST 60TH STREET DR. FOEGE’S LECTURE – SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 10 FROM 9:30 – 10:30 AM The event is free and open to the public!

Register today at MacLeanConference2018.eventbrite.com

Contact Choiselle Marius with any questions at cmarius@medicine.bsd.uchicago.edu

THE CHICAGO MAROON - OCTOBER 26, 2018

5

VIEWPOINTS Don’t Fill Out the Committee on Graduate Education’s Survey

By YALI AMIT University faculty recently received an e-mail from the Committee on Graduate Education (CGE) prompting us to fill out a survey. I thought I’d peruse the survey before responding and subsequently decided to forgo the pleasure.

I find it hard to understand what is to be gained by University-wide statistics on various obscure categories often with murky connections between cause and effect.

For example, it is unclear what the University has to gain from knowing what proportion of faculty respond “moderately common” when asked if students having “difficulty getting through the program” struggle because of “unrealistic expectations for what they must produce.” What is the purpose of attempting to understand graduate students’ academic experiences with such poorly defined, arbitrary categories?

I find this all the more surprising since a principal argument the University administration and David Nirenberg, chair of the CGE, made against graduate student unionization was that it would introduce bureaucracy and crude metrics into the special relationship between adviser and advisee.

In an e-mail sent on September 9, 2016, Nirenberg wrote, “Hence, I am suspicious of any process that threatens to commodify our work or reduce it to crude metrics or simplifications of value, as I suspect unionization would do.”

To be clear: I, and I assume many faculty, agree that the process of academic research and the

educational relationship between adviser and advisee should not be reduced to crude metrics. I happen to be involved with three graduate programs: Statistics, Computer Science, and Computational Neuroscience. Despite being closely related intellectual disciplines, these three programs are very different on almost all levels—recruitment, expectations in terms of research, teaching, lab work, commitment to adviser’s research agenda, time to graduation, summer activities, post-graduate employment.

A serious effort to evaluate any one of them would require indepth conversation among faculty both senior and junior, lecturers, non-academic admissions staff, and of course the graduate students. These questions cannot be reduced to “crude metrics.” This survey will not reveal anything we don’t already know, on the one hand, and might well produce inaccurate results, on the other, given the significant confessional element in the survey.

In contrast, and I emphasize— in stark contrast—the specific issues graduate students encounter as workers—whether T.A.s, R.A.s or instructors are easily quantifiable in terms of metrics and evaluated on a University-wide basis.

And here the administration could learn from the survey conducted by the Graduate Students United (GSU) with the clear goal of focusing only on those quantifiable issues. GSU’s survey focused on questions regarding the distribution of student salaries, did students get cost-of-living increases,

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the timeliness of payments, health care access, and housing concerns.

These are matters that can be readily and legitimately studied through a survey. Moreover, these issues need to be periodically reassessed, which is precisely one of the roles of a union. In contrast, the CGE graduate student survey had one question on satisfaction with University financial support, and one question on satisfaction with the current housing situation.

Now, if say 30 percent of students report they are partially satisfied with their housing situation, what should we conclude?

So here we are again confronting the University’s intellectual dishonesty surrounding graduate student unionization. Much has been elaborated in letters over the past year.

The CGE was created in response to the unionization election held last October in which the graduate students overwhelmingly voted for unionization. The University administration had worked very hard to prevent the vote through legal channels, but

once that failed, they switched tactics and strongly encouraged the graduate students to vote, hoping that a majority would reject the union. Disappointed with the result, the administration decided to show its contempt for the student body by again appealing to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), hoping that new Trump appointees would rule in their favor. Graduate student unions across the country were worried that the newly constituted NLRB would use this appeal as an opportunity to revoke the original 2016 NLRB decision allowing graduate students in private universities to unionize. So, they all decided to remove their requests for recognition from the NLRB. This does not preclude universities from voluntarily recognizing their graduate student worker unions, as Harvard, Brandeis, and Georgetown have done.

Instead, our administration decided to stick to its anti-union position and play the standard anti-union game of creating benevolent committees trying to address

student dissatisfaction. Thus was born the CGE: Feign sincere concern for the workers but keep the entire process under management control, while ignoring the students’ organized response expressed through their union.

To reiterate, it makes perfect sense to survey and quantify issues of student income, expenses and health care, and the best way to do that is by listening to the elected student representatives in the GSU. Instead of creating paternalistic committees to address student dissatisfaction, the administration should show them the respect they deserve and negotiate with their union on those very issues. In no way is the GSU threatening to encroach on the academic aspects of graduate student life, or proposing uniform solutions to particular issues facing the different graduate programs. Ironically, that seems to be exactly what the CGE survey is doing. I therefore decline to participate.

Enough With Clickbait: A Destructive Publication The Maroon Shouldn’t Have Published the Quizlet Of DU Brothers’ Favorite Sex Positions

By RACHEL SALISBURY By publishing a Quizlet of Delta Upsilon (DU) brothers’ sex position preferences that was previously public but had since been taken down, The Maroon failed to consider the weight of the public’s need for this information against the potential harm to the brothers and to the women associated with them.

The Maroon published this information despite the information not being significantly relevant to its readership other than as gossip.

The behavior of fraternities often legitimately detracts from the University’s culture, and in this way is often newsworthy. This does not justify demeaning members of these fraternities for actions that do not pose significant harm.

Although it was responsible of The Maroon to censor the names of women on the list, it was otherwise irresponsible to publish the Quizlet. The attention surrounding the piece makes it likely for redacted names to be speculated upon among social circles within Greek life, and the emotional harm to these women is a predictable, relatively high cost of publishing the list. Many on campus—both in and out of Greek life—have dated members of DU, and now, details of their sex lives have been made available without their consent. One anonymous commenter claiming to have been romantically involved with a DU brother mentioned receiving harassment after the article was published, demonstrating the reality of this risk.

I am not arguing that The Maroon released strictly private information, nor am I defending the creation of the Quizlet, but The

Jessica Xia

Maroon embarrassed itself as well as others when it published this article, engaging in gossip irrelevant to most of campus and harmful to many. If The Maroon thought the creation of the Quizlet posed harm, reporting on the Quizlet without including the list of names would have been more appropriate.

For the sake of entertainment value and page views, The Maroon would benefit from continu-

ing to publish the personal, sexual dramas of campus groups, but collecting “clicks” is not the purpose of good journalism. Ultimately The Maroon should reconsider what sorts of gross behavior need to be published and handled as a community, versus what should be handled privately.

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ARTS

The Other Will Returns to Shake Up Shakespeare

By ALEX ORESKES maroon contributor

Amid the assembled f lags of modern republics in International House, Will Kemp, the fool of the Bard, trod the boards once more. The language of Elizabethan Engla nd echoed from the proscenium once again. However, what materialized on stage was not the same view of the era we’re used to seeing. The Newberry Consort’s most recent production, Will Kemp Returns: A Jigs Revival, looks instead at the farcical light comedies that formed a key part of the artistic experience of Shakespeare’s London.

Will Kemp Returns consists of a collection of jigs (short song-plays) and other musical pieces about some performers from the Globe, including Will Kemp (the actor who played most of Shakespeare’s fools), who wake up the day after a performance. We watched them practice their craft in their off time, adding comedy to tragedy, and levity to gravity. Often this mea nt drastica lly reshaping what one might consider a Shakespearean classic: The ver y first song, for example, was a condensed version of King Lear. While it was distressing to some audiences (myself including) to see Shakespeare’s opus treated in this way, it certainly provided a good contrast between the art forms of the two Wills.

Powering this production is the performance of Steven Player. While Player also does an impressive job in the jigs, he shines best as Kemp himself. His rendition of Kemp is full of energy and wit, even when he’s draining the bottle a bit too deep, a nd Player aug ments his considerable

acting talents w ith his singing, instrument-playing, and dance. His Kemp is the consummate performer and—yes—a jaded performer, one who always understands of the power and importance of art. Indeed, soon after taking the stage, he extolled the virtue of the performer’s life to the onstage band. Most wonderfully, one could see in his performance the marks and mannerisms of the great Shakespearean comic parts—Bottom, Falstaff, etc. You could see the character for whom these roles were written and whose profession was inhabiting these roles.

However, I would be remiss to imply that Player merely adds his other talents on top of his acting, for Will Kemp Returns is a show that celebrates more than words in verse. In this piece, dance and especially music were championed on their own merits. The band was onstage throughout the show; furthermore, as opposed to Elizabethan plays written in verse, the actors sang all their lines in time with each jig’s accompanying song. At one point in the show, Will Kemp, tired of strutting his stuff, bade the band to strike up whatever tune it pleased. What followed was one of the show’s most compelling moments— three purely instrumental pieces, accompanied by dancing and mute performance.

When Player and Ellen Hargis accompanied the band on their guitars, they turned to face each other as the music took on a particularly tender strain. They danced and played, looking only at each other, reminding the audience that their music is a language itself. The show went to pains to stay true to the work of Elizabethan comic masters, performing jigs from real publications and donning period costumes. Indeed,

Will Kemp was a celebration of performance–lines in verse, dance, and music. courtesy of the newberry consort

authenticity was a focus of the production throughout: The intermission was filled by Tim Macdonald and Jeremy Ward, a pair of Scottish fiddle players who focus on period-accurate music. Even the way the cast swapped pieces around from scene to scene to draw up new characters was based on Elizabethan practice. The production drew from the period in the same way a play by Shakespeare or Marlowe might, despite being constructed from several different

period sources.

All in all, Will Kemp Returns was delightful and enchanting. For fans of the Bard, it offered a unique new perspective; for those of dissenting opinion, it perhaps offered the levity and comic appeal they desired. The attention to detail and love for the material from everyone involved shone through and paid off in an homage worthy of the Will Kemp and his kith.

Art Starts Here: Symposium Celebrates South Side Scene

By ZOE WILLIAMS & ANDRE CASTRO maroon contributors

Educators, activists, and artists alike gathered to celebrate the South Side’s rich culture in “Unfinished Business! The South Side and Chicago Art.” Featuring lectures, movie screenings, and art exhibitions, the weekend-long event was a collaborative effort by the department of art history at Northwestern University, the Museum of Contemporary Photography (MOCP) at Columbia College Chicago, and the Smart Museum at University of Chicago. The symposium worked in conjunction with exhibitions The Time Is Now! Art Worlds of Chicago’s South Side and The Many Hats of Ralph Arnold: Art, Identity & Politics, respectively held at the Smart Museum and the MOCP. The sy mposium opened w ith a panel, moderated by DuSable Museum a rchivist Sk yla Hearn, that explored the various ways through which the South Side has engaged with art over time. The diverse panel included acclaimed writer and journalist Natalie Moore, community educator Maséqua Myers, artist Faheem Majeed, and photographer Bob Black. Although each panelist had a unique take on how to impact their communities through art, they all echoed a same message: the importance of retaining the South Side’s authentic culture.

With eloquent certainty, Moore highlig hted the impor ta nce of w r iting for people, rather than about them. She challenged the traditional notion of audience,

warning of the fallacy of single stories.

Aspiring artists in the crowd were invited to portray their truth or the truth of those around them. With natural stage presence, Myers spoke of the uplifting nat u re of a r t for t he Black com mu n ity. She reminded the crowd of the bleak history against which the rich culture of Bronzeville emerged, and of the beauty that had dared to blossom during segregation. While guiding the audience through a presentation of cultural landmarks in Chicago, Myers emphasized the importance of knowing one’s history and how liberating that knowledge can be. She closed with a picture of the South Side Community Arts Center, a landmark that serves as a reminder of the importance of preserving the cultural history of Chicago’s artistic revolutions.

The evening closed w ith t wo f ilms about music and the Black experience, Ed Bland’s The Cry of Jazz (1959) and Harvey Cokliss’s Chicago Blues (1970). They explored the complex relationship between jazz, blues, and the Black experience. The Cry of Jazz made several controversial claims, most infamously that jazz is dead.

It depicted jazz as a physical body, comparable to how America wanted to dehumanize Black people. The film went on to explain the metaphorical importance of jazz as a mediator of the hardships Blacks faced in the country, and how its form symbolized the ever-present paradox of freedom and restraint for Black Americans. Chicago Blues built upon an idea that suffering is a necessity in creating a genre like blues. Images of men with their guitars,

making up lines on the spot to an iconic blues chord progression filled the screen.

Diving into the institutional discrimination of the Black population in Chicago, scenes of playing children contrasted the bleak narration of their everyday reality.

Eerily, many of the issues Cokliss captured on screen 40 some years ago still ring true today.

One of the sy mposium’s most cha rismatic and spirited presenters was radio-host Ayana Contreras, who is writing a book called Energy Never Dies about the cultural contributions that Black Chicago has made within society after the civil rights era. She credited Curtis Mayfield as one of the pioneers of this movement starting in the ’70s, and passionately worked her way up to the present day. She herself has worked with Chicago musicians Chance the Rapper and Noname as young adults. Her conviction made it easy to see the natural talent that bubbles in all parts of Black Chicago, and she plans to harness this potential through spreading the values of community spirit and confidence.

Monica Trinidad provided the standout visual arts speech of the day. She is a self-proclaimed “radical artist” pushing movements for justice all across Chicago. Drawing lessons from the history of injustice in Chicago, she hearkened back to the spirit of the Memorial Day Massacre of 1937, in which unarmed protestors marched on Sam’s Place. The police subsequently opened fire, killing 10 people.

She conveyed that prisons and policing today “thrive on forgetting” events such continued on pg.

7

A photograph from The Time is Now exhibit, currently on display at the Smart Museum. courtesy of the smart museum of art

THE CHICAGO MAROON - OCTOBER 26, 2018

7

“Moore highlighted the importance of writing for people, rather than about them.” continued from pg.

6

as this one to maintain the status quo.

She stressed the importance of “visual curriculums” told by visual artists to convey powerful message, and that visual art is one of the most effective forms of communication in this way. Echoing other presenters who criticized the move, she trashed Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s plan to create a $50 million police academy while simultaneously shuttering several South Side schools.

75-yea r-old Abdul A lka limat delivered the most convincing presentation of

the symposium and had me walking away with his booming voice still echoing in my head. A natural-born speaker, Alkalimat touched on issues such as the responsibilities of Black artists to stand up against oppression and to hearken back to their roots, which can be interpreted as a pointed dig toward Kanye West and his cozying up to President Donald Trump. He passionately remarked on how the baby boomers nostalgically remember the ’60s, quipping that “when they talk about the ’60s, they’re not talking about our [Black] ’60s.”

The pop culture image of the ’60s omits

the extreme hardships of Blacks making audience to see how these issues manifest their way through the midst of the civil themselves in society today, since it is a lot rights era. He stressed social conscious- harder to analyze the effects of racism and ness, not only for Blacks, but for all citi- injustice in the present than it was in the zens. He also remarked that “we [people ’60s with the added influence of hindsight. of color] can afford the truth, while white While the day was a celebration of the people cannot,” explaining that white peo- joy and beauty created from hardship, it ple’s ancestry is tarnished and stained by was also a bleak reminder of how much talks of slavery and other injustices, while more progress still needs to be made. As people of color are free to discuss past in- Myers so beautifully stated, “ W here do justices without feeling as if it ref lects you start, and where do you begin? Well, badly upon themselves. His talk painted a you start from where you are right now.” picture of the troubled past, present, and future of racial struggle, and helped the

Florence + The Machine Takes Fans High as Hope at United Center Concert

By JAD DASHAN associate arts editor

On October 19, a mere hour before the opening act, only the most dedicated fans of Florence + The Machine walked into the wide halls of the United Center, adorned in f lower crowns galore and f lowing, f loral dresses. Inside the stadium, the seats were barely filling up when the opener, Perfume Genius, performed a decidedly humble set. The two screens sandwiching the stage remained unused while the Seattle-based musician, with only a few instrumentalists, performed in front of silky masses of fabric towering like ghosts.

After thanking those present for “coming early to listen,” he performed fan favorites such as “Slip Away,” “Wreath,” and “Fool.”

At once delicate and brash, he ended the set with the hit “Queen,” during which the audience was doused in royal purple light as the singer, whose music addresses the challenges of being gay, implored, “Don’t you know your queen?”

More people f looded the stadium as crew members diligently prepared the stage for the barefooted spectacle to come.

The setting was undeniably transformed: The glacial mountain range of Perfume Genius’s spectral stalagmites was replaced with bands of pale wood that caught fire in the orange stage lights, exuding a much warmer atmosphere. The atmosphere grew still hotter with anticipation as the band members ascended the stage, including harpist Tom Monger, who has been an integral part of Florence + The Machine

since the band first started in 2007. Fi- ty of the album. Although 2015’s How Big, During the show, Florence did not shy nally, front woman Florence Welch, in a How Blue, How Beautiful was an attempt away from addressing politics, tra nsisunf lower-yellow dress, glided onstage at approaching this candor, exorcising tioning from the introduction of the song and opened the set with “June,” the sum- herself of demons ranging from substance “South London Forever,” about messy teenmery first track on the band’s most recent abuse to a messy breakup, it is with High age times, to talking about the importance album, High as Hope. as Hope that she came to terms with such of hope in dire circumstances. “My heart A s w ith most songs on the new LP, issues through quiet and calm confession— hurts a lot at the moment,” she admitted, “June” starts off silently and is much bet- to herself and others. Yet, on the current urging the crowd to “please keep showing ter appreciated in quiet surroundings or tour cycle, the rampant rage of “ W hat up because hope is an action and I believe with high-quality headphones. It leads the Kind of Man” (2015) was not superseded in you and I believe in love.” “A revolution listener in with the cavernous lull of the with the cutting candidness of “Hunger”— in consciousness sta r ts w ith indiv idupiano and the timid twinkling of chimes rather, both songs were performed, in a als,” she continued, “and the things you before picking up with the simple yet pro- way augmenting each other. do, do make a difference and they do matfound invocation in the chorus to “hold Indeed, older mater ia l wa s v iv id ly ter.” She then encouraged viewers to hold on to each other,” ultimately escalating present during Friday’s concert, arranged hands and to sing along to “South London toward a physical and spiritual high at into a narrative of suffering, growth, and Forever,” a charming ballad inspired by the end of the song. In live, however, the hope. Just a f ter per forming “Hunger,” her hometown Camberwell. Later on, she symphonies f lared up in the vastness of the indie band performed “Between Two prefaced the song “Patricia,” dedicated to the concert hall and every note tickled Lungs,” a song from Lungs (2009), followed punk poet Patti Smith, by decrying toxic the audience’s bone marrow. Standing still by “Only If For A Night” from Ceremonials masculinity and revelling in the powerful while singing for most of the beginning of (2011), and “Queen of Peace,” from How Big, feminine energy of the concert’s attendees. the song, Florence unleashed a miasma of How Blue, How Beautiful (2015). Within Needless to say, the night was gloriouswild twirls and dervish-like spins towards the respective albums, each of these songs ly transcendental. With an encore of the the denouement of the song. falls into a particular story, but sung con- soul-shaking “Big God” and the cleansing This was followed by “Hunger,” the currently on a 2018 tour, they mark the “Shake It Out,” the concert came to a consecond single off the album. Beautifully stepping stones of a jour ney ta ken by clusion after 16 songs from throughout shot by director AG Rojas, the “Hunger” all of Florence + The Machine, and their this British band’s career were performed. music video lends many of its dance ele- fans. Much to the audience’s delight, the In the introduction to Florence’s book of ments to Florence’s performances on tour. unquestionable bop “Dog Days Are Over” lyrics, poems, and art, she describes the While she has been known for her zealous was also on the set list. Per tradition, mid- prophetic nature of her music as a kind of dancing and impressive offstage leaps, go- song, Florence paused and encouraged the “useless magic,” which is also the book’s ing as far as breaking her foot during an attendees to embrace one another and to title. However, the songstress’s charm is especially ambitious jump during a previ- “tell each other that you love each other!” far from useless, as anyone could have ous tour, her movements while performing What distinguished this performance was seen in the tear-streaked faces and smiles tracks off High as Hope seemed somehow an additional request: “Look deeply into leaving United Center on Friday, or in the less restrained and choreographed. It was a stranger’s eyes and say, ‘Please register countless pieces of art or acts of kindness as if her performance corporeally embod- to vote!’ and then tell them you love them that the flame-headed sorceress inspires ied the cathartically raw emotional hones- again!” in her listeners.

Beautiful Boy Unveils Ugly Truths

By SEBASTIAN VON STAUFFENBERG maroon contributor

Felix Van Groeningen’s Beautiful Boy covers the complex and tumultuous relationship between a father and son as meth addiction tears apart their relationship and ability to understand each other. As we explore the two perspectives, we come to learn that both their stories hold only part of the truth. The father, David (Steve Carell), can’t come to terms with his son’s addiction and is at the same time left utterly useless to help. Meanwhile, Nic (Timothée Chalamet) desperately wants to reconnect with his family but is ultimately afraid to face himself and his father’s disapproval.

The two sides of the story are adapted from the memoir Beautiful Boy by David Sheff, and his son’s own memoir, Tweak: Growing Up on Methamphetamines. Over the course of the film, we see Nic’s desperately tragic situation unfolds, along with its effects on his identity and those he loves.

The film brilliantly captures the two characters’ shared dilemma: their inability to face the truth. David struggles with accepting that his son is far from the in-

nocent boy he used to tuck in at night, and Nic neglects the fact that his absence will hurt the ones closest to him. Throughout the film, there are many flashbacks to Nic’s earlier life: times when he would jam out to death metal in his father’s car or hug him goodbye before he left for his mother. These f lashbacks are cleverly inter woven between the emotional climaxes of Nic’s addiction to depict the contrast between his two identities. David desperately clings to an ideal, a trap that he hadn’t realized he’d fallen into before hearing his son’s words: “This is me, Dad. Here, this is who I am.”

David’s efforts to get his son clean lie in the hope of revisiting a stage in his life that has long since ended. As David says, Nic is no longer the “kid that I raised, who I thought I knew inside and out,” because a drug has turned the beautiful boy into something beyond childhood memories.

Nic’s view of his situation, unlike his father’s, is something far darker than reality. He has made his addiction synonymous with his identity, ultimately seeing this turn of events as a product of choice rather than tragedy. In a heated conversation with his father, he denies his status as

a victim, saying: “I don’t feel like I have a disease. This isn’t like cancer. This is my choice, I put myself here.” The film deftly delves into the controversial debate of culpability surrounding addiction. Through Nic’s struggle, this “choice,” which he so defiantly argues for, turns into an overpowering need.

The saddest part about Nic’s view of addiction is that he feels that he deserves everything that has happened to him. For him, it is not an option to return to his family because the addiction that tore him away from his family must have, in some way, been a choice he made. This internal struggle is brought to life most vividly when Nic desperately tries to get away from his stepmother, who chases him in a car, mimicking his emotional decision to detach himself from his family and the love and support which they are more than willing to provide.

Although there are some beautiful moments of cinematography and dialogue, Beautiful Boy only scrapes the surface of many aspects of the father-son relationship rather than delving into the core of any one of them. This makes it possible for

the audience to witness the struggle but not to truly sympathize with it. The flashbacks, despite having beautiful imagery, do little to inform us of David’s thoughts, and much of Nic’s story is taken out of context with little dialogue. Ultimately, the film’s visual symbolism leaves more confusion than profound thoughts or emotions.

Carell, as the father, was given far more opportunity than Chalamet to express the details of his situation. And yet, even with these opportunities, Carell’s portrayal was rather perplexing. Oftentimes the actor’s tone would miss the mark, which made it hard to register the emotion he wished to convey. Chalamet, although seemingly more enveloped in his character, was stunted by the greater focus on cinematography over content.

Beautiful Boy is a film that will leave you deep in thought as your mind slowly pieces together its complicated structure.

The film touches on intimate topics of family and self-worth, things we all ultimately struggle with but never truly explore, and will leave you trying to piece everything together your own.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - OCTOBER 26, 2018

8

SPORTS

Homecoming Is Here FOOTBALL

By CAMILLE AGUILAR sports staff

This weekend, the University of Chicago alumni and parents are all invited to campus for a weekend of fun and spirit, while reconnecting, reminiscing, and tailgating.

This event, Homecoming, reflects the University’s strong commitment to supporting and including its students and families in the school community. This year, the University’s football team is hot and demanding an audience. This article is a call to all those who will be on campus this weekend and wish to celebrate the time spent at the University. In the midst of your nostalgia—or overwhelming relief—Stagg Field is the only place to be this Saturday at 2 p.m.

This Saturday, the Maroons will be hosting Ripon College at 2 p.m. as one of their final regular season conference games. Overall, the Maroons have gone 4–3 this season and 2–1 in the conference. While Ripon brings a slightly higher winning record to this Saturday’s match (5–4), a look at each team’s statistics reflects some key game-time differences.

This season, the defensive line has shut out teams three times so far. From last Saturday’s game against Beloit College, the 102 yards allowed by the Maroons were the least they have allowed in over six years. Offensively, the passing yardage of this season adds up to an incredible 1,516 yards. Ripon, for comparison, stands at 598. According to the athletic

department’s football preview, the Maroons’ net yards rushing in the game against Beloit proved to be the team’s most since a 2007 match against Eureka College. Major score inequalities are nothing new to these players, racking up two huge 49–0 wins earlier in the season, and most recently a record-breaking 63–0 win against Beloit.

The skill and passion of the team are what have led it to some major victories this season.

Fourth-year defensive back Jeremy Vincent made it clear that there is much more to this team’s success than simple conditioning, play memorizing, and team building. Vincent said that on the individual level, a player “can’t really be successful if he or she doesn’t have a work ethic or drive in the classroom, and it’s the same way on the football field.” When asked how the team was preparing for Ripon, Vincent mentioned “small adjustments as a defense,” and also that the program has “been making sure everyone is assignment sound during the week so [the team] can just go out and play.” The knowledge that the football team believes in a correlation between academic and athletic success is truly inspiring and wholesome.

As a fan, it is sometimes difficult to understand the meaning of the game in the perspective of an athlete. Vincent emphasized the pride he has felt in games and the significance of Homecoming. He wrote how Homecoming has been a “pretty special game because it’s a chance to play in front of family and friends.

First-year Nicholas D’Ambrose avoids a tackle as he runs down field. uchicago athletics It’s one of the few times during the year where almost the entire school, families and alumni are on campus at once, so it’s a cool experience to have everyone coming together again.”

When asked if the fans contributed to the outcome of the games, Vincent was absolutely convinced they do. He found it difficult to describe the “certain energy they create.” In an attempt to put words to feeling, he highlighted the importance of fans: “[Fans] may not realize it but the energy they give off with the yelling and screaming during the game really gets the team going and motivates us more.”

To those who will be on campus tomorrow, if the statistics or the good weather forecasted for Saturday have not already convinced you to attend this Saturday’s game, perhaps Vincent will. He wrote that the team “always appreciates when people sacrifice their own time to come watch us play, so we want to make sure we use that energy they give us and put on a show!”

The Maroons will be playing Ripon College this Saturday at 2 p.m. on Stagg Field as a part of the University’s Homecoming weekend.

Maroons Approach Season Kick Off

A Memorable Senior Day

SWIM & DIVE

VOLLEYBALL

By MIRANDA BURT sports staff

The University of Chicago swim and dive team will take part in its first action this weekend at Northwestern. The Maroons will face off against two other DI teams—the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and the University of Illinois—in addition to the Wildcats. The South Siders beat DI foe UW–Milwaukee last season.

Fourth-year diver Anna Girlich leads the team into this season, as she has been a threat in NCAAs as well as been named the UAA Women’s Diver of the Year. Girlich spoke of last year’s impact on this season, “Last year, everyone came into the season really ready to compete, and even though we didn’t finish the season as well as we wanted to, there were some very promising performances that we are looking to build upon throughout this whole season.

Additionally, we have a few people who are coming back from injuries last year, so having them fully healthy should really ignite the team!”

Girlich also spoke of the leadership dynamic this year, saying, “Our captains [fourth-years Simone Stover, Hannah Eastman, Keenan Novis, Michael Lemay] have done a great job so far.

They have been working so hard and leading by example, so we are all really excited to follow their lead. The freshmen on the team have

provided a much needed spark. There is a lot of talent in our freshman class, so they are only going to make us better than last year which is exciting!”

Last year, Northwestern’s women’s squad went 6–5 on the year and beat the Maroons 188–100 in their lone matchup. On the men’s side, the Wildcats went 4–9 overall and 0–4 in the Big 10 last season. The UChicago men had a closer match with Northwestern, losing 158.5– 110.5. UIC’s women’s squad is already 0–1 on the year but had an impressive 8–4 record last year. They barely beat the Maroons, 154–141.

The UIC men are also 0–1 and went 5–5 last year. The UIC Flames beat the men 155–140.

Finally, the University of Illinois women enter the weekend 3–1 overall but only won one match last year. Illinois does not have a men’s team.

Girlich said of the opening meet, “Our first meet is always a good time to see where the rest of our season is going to go. It being against a few DI teams is definitely a challenge, but usually makes everyone compete even harder. We are not too worried about how we stack up next to our opponents on Friday, but instead that we put down some decent times/dives, and see areas that we can grow.”

The squads will kick off competition in Evanston at 5 p.m.

By ALYSSA RUDIN sports staff

Today, the No. 11 volleyball team will celebrate its Senior Day while playing against Elmhurst College. Chicago is currently 25–3, and the Bluejays sit at 10–17.

The team is honoring its two fourth-year players, Audrey Scra f ford a nd Sa ra h Muisenga, who have led the Maroons to an 86–36 record and two NCA A qualifications in their four years.

Muisenga has a decorated career. Her first year, she started in almost every game and totaled 64 kills in the season.

In 2016, she led the team with 380 kills and 34 aces. She started in every game of the season and was rewarded by being named for the All-UA A First Team and getting an American Volleyball Coaches A ssociation (AVCA) A ll-Region honorable mention. She was also awarded UAA Athlete of the Week and nominated for the Carthage Invite and Gargoyle Classic All-Tournament Teams. Muisenga continued her success in her third season, once again starting in every game, earning 359 kills, including 16 double-doubles and 23 matches with double-digit kills. She was named for the UW–Eau Claire/Eastbay and Aurora Invite All-Tournament Teams and earned All-UA A First Team honors and AVCA honorable mention once again.

In her final season, Muisenga joined the

1,000-kills club and was named for anSPORT DAY Opponent TIME other All-Tournament team.

Scrafford has also been successful throughout her time on the team. As a Swim & Dive Friday Northwestern 5 p.m. first-year, she started in 25 games and Women’s Soccer Friday NYU 3 p.m. racked up 238 kills, ranking third on the Women’s Volleyball Friday Elmhurst 4 p.m. team and earning more than 15 kills in seven games. She was named UA A AthFriday NYU 5:30 p.m.

Men’s Soccer lete of the Week and UA A Rookie of the

Year and nominated to the All-UA A Sec-

UPCOMING GAMES

ond Team. She showed continuous improvement in her second year, playing 27 matches and coming in second in kills on the team. She was named for the Carthage Invite All-Tournament Team and the All-UA A Second Team. In her third year, Scrafford started in every game and made 389 kills with double-digit kills in 22 games. She was named for the Illinois Wesleyan Classic and Aurora Invite All-Tournament Teams and was a threetime UAA Athlete of the Week. Her hard work paid off as she got nominated for the All-UA A First Team and the AVCA All-Region honorable mention.

Muisenga ca n’t believe her senior night is already here. “My four years have truly gone by so fast. I am a little in denial that my career is ending soon, so I haven’t really allowed myself to think about it much. It has been an amazing experience, and I cannot express how grateful I am to have it in college.” Asked about her favorite memories, she picked “going to Niagara Falls my freshman year when play ing in Rochester, our yea rly team Halloween parties, going 8–0 in conference play for the first time of program history sophomore season (also my first time beating Wash U and Emory), bumping to jams with our assistant coach Thom when we traveled in vans, and going to an escape room [and] being split into two teams fiercely competing against each other after a tournament.”

T he fou r t h-yea rs, boosted by t he strong performance of the rest of the team, have led the Maroons to a very successful season, including a season-high rank of No. 8 in the country.

T h e M a r o on s w i l l b e f a c i n g o f f against Elmhurst College, a slightly less formidable opponent, at Ratner at 4 p.m. this Friday.