1-31-23 entire issue hi res

Ph.D. Candidate Seeks to Secure Mayoral Race Win

By SOFIA RUBINSON Sun News Editor

Following an announcement that Mayor Laura Lewis would not be running for reelection, Alderperson Robert Cantelmo grad announced his bid for the position on Jan. 8.

“I’ve had a lot of opportunities to work closely with colleagues to build coalitions around legislation already,” Cantelmo said in an interview with The Sun. “And I have every confidence that I will continue to be able to do that in Council and continue to be able to do that in the community.”

Cantelmo is the first and only person thus far to announce his candidacy for the 2023 mayoral election, which will be held in November. He is the associate director of the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies, represents the Fifth Ward on the Common Council since winning the 2021 election — which includes parts of the Cornell community — and is finishing his Ph.D. in government at the University.

At the Einaudi Center, Cantelmo works on the Democratic Threats and Resilience initiative, which examines the causes of democratic backsliding and institutional resilience mechanisms that can help insulate democratic societies

from autocratic tendencies. He said his research at the Center has relevant implications for his service on the Common Council.

“Even these hyper-local issues that we deal with about streets being paved, sidewalks being in good condition, fire departments being fully staffed, this is all service delivery stuff that matters at the local level, no matter where you are in the world,” Cantelmo said. “It’s when governments are unable to provide those basic services to their populace, that some of these risks are generated about threats to democracy. I love having the ability to engage in good evidence-based policymaking at the local level.”

ChatGPT Disrupts Academics

Professors and students discuss impact of artifcial intelligence

By JULIA SENZON Sun Staff Writer

Long gone are antiquated excuses of dogs eating homework and students selling essays after class. The new enemy of plagiarism and cheating is an artificial intelligence chatbot known as ChatGPT.

ChatGPT was built by OpenAI, a San Francisco technology company also credited for GPT-3 and DALL-E2. The platform, launched on Nov. 30, attracted a million users in its first five days.

ChatGPT uses a type of machine learning called natural language processing to generate realistic language at any level.

Previous AI chatbots were capable of specific, explicitly defined jobs like writing marketing copies, but they failed when tasked outside their areas of expertise. ChatGPT is more flexible and intelligent — able to both write jokes and explain scientific concepts at high levels.

Ph.D. student in information science Jose Guridi

TCAT Receives Funding Increase

By PATRICK KUEHL Sun Contributor

The Tompkins Consolidated Area Transit reached an agreement on Jan. 20 with its three local donors — the City of Ithaca, Tompkins County and Cornell University — to increase their contributions by five percent for the coming fiscal year.

The three underwriters are obligated to give the same amount of finances each year, as agreed upon in a contract organized in 1991. An eight percent increase was proposed this year to address inflation, supply chain issues and staffing shortages which led to reduced TCAT services. While the

city of Ithaca and Tompkins County agreed, Cornell raised concerns based on the TCAT’s budgeting.

Cornell’s Vice President of University Relations Joel M. Malina stated to the Ithaca Times that Cornell would keep up their commitment as an underwriter to the TCAT but was unwilling to drastically increase their financial contribution to eight percent in a Dec. 29 article.

“TCAT has not offered any specific justification for such a large increase in the underwriter contribution,” Malina said.

Furthermore, Malina argues that TCAT already holds adequate fund-

ing. “[TCAT administration] holds approximately $16 million in reserve and fund balance with an additional $15 million in grant funding,” Malina said.

The grant funding came from an $8.7 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Low or No Emission program and a $7 million grant from the New York State Energy and Research Development Authority. The DOT grant is intended to fund 10 electric buses, while the NY State grant was unspecified.

grad believes that users are unnerved by the humanlike capacities of ChatGPT communication.

“I believe that [what is] most revolutionary about ChatGPT and other AI advancements of the last years is not necessarily the technology itself, but how it openly challenges the boundaries between humans and machines,” Guridi said. “What scares people is how we [accept that] technologies can [now] do things we [previously] believed were exclusively human, which forces us to rethink what is to be human, how we generate value and how we will live with these systems.”

Universities are struggling to maintain academic integrity amidst this technological development. An informal and anonymous poll conducted by The Stanford Daily reported that 17 percent of Stanford student respondents admitted to utilizing ChatGPT on their fall quarter assignments and exams.

Books to bid | Robert Cantelmo smiles brightly in front of the State Theatre of Ithaca.

COURTESY OF THE CANTELMO CAMPAIGN

Students work in Gates Hall on an snowy afternoon of Jan. 30. Gates Hall houses the College of Computer and Information Science, well-known for its expertise in technology fields such as artificial intelligence.

A LISTING OF FREE CAMPUS EVENTS

Medieval Studies Lecture Series | “Seeing All the Anguilles: Eels and Identity in Premodern England,”

John Wyatt Grene

4:45 p.m. - 6 p.m., A.D. White House Guerlac Room

Ensemble X: CU Music

8 p.m., Barnes Hall

Midday Music for Organ 2/1: CU Music

12:30 p.m. - 1:10 p.m., Virtual Event

LEPP Seminary Francesco Di Filippo (YITP, Kyoto University)

2 p.m., Physical Sciences Building 401

Biophysics Colloquium by Joey Davis (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)

4 p.m. - 5 p.m., Clark Hall 701

Sophie Pinkham, Turning to the Public: Reimagining Your Academic Research for a Popular Audience

4:45 p.m., A.D. White House Guerlac Room

MAE Colloquium: Xiang Yang Pennsylvania State University

4 p.m. - 5 p.m., Kimball Hall B11

Seminar 4 p.m. - 5 p.m., Baker Lab 119

Disciplinary Support: Why is Reproducibility not Uniformly Required Across Disciplines?

4:15 p.m., Virtual Event

Matthiew Felt, Haga Yaichi and the Meaning of ‘Ancient’ Japanese Literature

4:30 p.m., Rockefeller Hall 374

Documentary Film Screening | Builders, Housewives and the Construction of Modern Athens

5 p.m., Abby and Howard Milstein Auditorium

Scripture Vitality in Ancient Judaism

5 p.m. - 6:30 p.m., White Hall 110

Business Manager Serena Huang ’24

EIRINI VOURLOUMIS / THE NEW YORK TIMES

Athens’s architecture | Architecture Visiting Lecturer Ioanna Theocharopoulou will host a screening of the documentary “Builders, Housewives and the Construction of Modern Athens,” along with a Q&A session for atttendees.

ChatGPT Generates Buzz

CHATGPT

Prof. Haym Hirsh, computer science and information science, said that while students could always cheat, the introduction of ChatGPT has made plagiarism more accessible.

“Now it becomes possible to just run a program to [complete assignments] — cheaply and as often as you want,” Hirsh said. “And even when it’s not about cheating wholesale, you can use ChatGPT to do elements of assignments — like framing the response to a homework question, letting the software do it rather than the student doing it and learning from that part of the exercise.”

Nick Weising ’24 is Cornell Intellectual Property and Ethics Club’s lead researcher and shared concerns that excess ChatGPT use may make it harder for students in primary and secondary education to acquire foundational skills.

“ChatGPT can blow through multiplication table worksheets, summarize chapters of books and answer historical [and] science questions,” Weising said. “A lot of this work is repetitive to drill core concepts [and] skills into students’ brains so that they can be drawn upon in more advanced courses. This work is also designed to get students acclimated with the process of working through [hard problems which] helps students in the future regardless of their academic or professional career.”

Some professors are also concerned with

ChatGPT’s spread of misinformation. Prof. Kim Weeden, sociology, expressed that the common person may struggle to discern whether some AI-generated information is reliable.

“AI technologies are in some sense laundering misinformation and biased information. They grab bits of existing content, feed it through an opaque probability model and then spit out ‘new’ content that’s been stripped of information about its sources,” Weeden said.

At universities across the nation, administrations have formed task forces and held university discussions to address ChatGPT. The University of Buffalo and Furman University plan to establish AI discussions into required classes for freshmen. Washington University and the University of Vermont are adapting academic integrity policies to address generative artificial intelligence.

In other cases, professors are adapting classes to a post-ChatGPT learning environment. Prof. Aumann, philosophy, of Northern Michigan University decided to tweak his teaching methods after a student confessed to utilizing ChatGPT on an assignment. These changes include mandating students to construct first drafts in class.

To continue reading this article, please visit www. cornellsun.com.

Cantelmo Casts His Mayoral Bid

Continued from page 1 MAYOR

Continued from page 1

As alderperson, Cantelmo said his most notable accomplishments include his efforts to codify Ithaca as an abortion sanctuary city and establish a pay transparency law.

Working with Planned Parenthood and local activist group End Abortion Stigma, Cantelmo said he was able to secure a new amendment and article in the city code that declares Ithaca a sanctuary city for reproductive rights.

“Even though our federal government has failed us, there was an opportunity at the local level for us to stand up for our residents in the face of what I have called really one of the most significant human rights rollbacks in this country, certainly in my lifetime,” Cantelmo said.

Cantelmo said his effort at crafting and passing a salary transparency law in Ithaca, which took effect Sept. 1 — over a year before the statewide transparency law is set to take effect — is a step toward reducing discrimination in the hiring process.

“There’s a lot of evidence that shows this helps reduce the gender pay gap and helps reduce racial pay gaps. It also improves employee morale and retention because people are not ending up in a situation where they join a company, and then six months later, they learn that they are the least paid of their colleagues by $15,000,” Cantelmo said, referring to research also cited in the statewide legislation. “So it’s really a plus side for everyone at the table. And it creates, I think, a much more equitable environment.”

As mayor, Cantelmo said he would prioritize completing the goals of the Ithaca Green New Deal and reimagining public

Student Assembly Holds First Meeting Of Spring Semester

By CHRISTINA MACCORKLE Sun Staff Writer

The Student Assembly held its first meeting of the spring semester on Thursday in Willard Straight Hall, where they discussed prior resolutions and held an election for the Vice President of External Affairs position.

safety efforts. He also believes Ithaca has a housing crisis that requires continuous efforts to adequately address.

“We need to have a serious conversation about expanding tenant protections in the community,” Cantelmo said.

“Whether that’s the right to renew, whether that’s opting into the Emergency Tenant Protection Act, I think we really need to make sure that our community of renters, which is three-fourths renters, that they both have the appropriate protections and a knowledge of their rights to be able to successfully advocate for themselves and secure housing.”

Cantelmo would also aim to support public sector employees, who have expressed con-

for Ithaca is that the mayor will be freed up to be the political leader and the policy driver for the city,” Cantelmo said. “That requires the mayor adopting the persona of coalition building, of listener, of policy and subject matter expert, and really digging into the issues that are facing the community.”

Though Cantelmo said it is too early in the campaign for him to receive endorsements, he has met his fundraising goal for January and hopes to continue to engage with the local community, especially at Cornell.

“As a member of the Cornell community, I really have to emphasize the personal value I’ve felt in being more involved in the community that I live in,” Cantelmo said. “It’s really important to see, in your elected leaders, is this someone who’s actively trying to build bridges between the community that I live in academically, and the community in which I’m located? And hopefully [a leader can] reconcile those identities and make people feel really integrated.”

S.A. President Valeria Valencia ’23 started the meeting with University President Martha Pollack’s responses to the resolutions the assembly passed last semester.

Valencia started with President Pollack’s response to Resolution 16: Condemning Greek Life.

“A number of educational harm-reduction strategies for Greek Life are already being considered,” Pollack wrote. “Strategic work to improve the fraternity community is also underway.”

Valencia then said that she has not received a response to Resolution 15, which requested that the University funds an on-staff M.D. Gynecologist at Cornell Health.

Survivors and Facilitating Harm-Reduction Strategies in Greek Life in response to the reports of drugging incidents and a sexual assault allegation last semester.

cerns about their salaries and staffing in recent months.

“If the people and our personnel are not adequately resourced and adequately supported, nothing we vote on will be fully realized in implementation,” Cantelmo said. “I want to really emphasize and center the importance of our city staff who make this community, really to a large extent, the great community that this is.”

The role of city mayor is also set to change in 2024 with the addition of the city manager position. Cantelmo said he would be excited to head the reform process and work with a professional administrator who can handle the day-to-day implementation of regulations in the city.

“What’s really important now

Even though Cantelmo had a decade-long career in the nonprofit sector in Washington D.C. prior to moving to Ithaca and is finishing his Ph.D. in government, he said his aspirations remain on engaging in local politics.

“I love the idea of raising my kids in this community. I love the idea of being settled, having seen them grow up with their friends, of giving them that stability,” Cantelmo said. “I really love the [research], but my passion is absolutely public service in my community. And I look forward to being able to provide that stability in my family for staying in a community that’s given a lot to us already.”

The resolution recognized an editorial published in The Sun in which 136 students urged the University to provide funding for Cornell Health to hire a M.D. gynecologist capable of diagnosing and treating prevalent gynecological problems including chronic vulvovaginal and pelvic pain conditions.

Valencia said she received an email explaining that President Pollack would take longer than usual to respond.

Resolutions 14 and 13 were also discussed.

Resolution 14 approved a thousand dollars to fund the Willard Straight Hall union board tradition of serving freshly popped popcorn in the Willard Straight Hall lobby.

Resolution 13 amended and ratified specifics of the S.A. bylaws regarding the Student Assembly Office of Ethics.

For the last resolution discussed, Valencia shared President Pollack’s response to Resolution 12: Supporting

“I am horrified and repulsed by the reported events at our fraternities [throughout the Fall 2022 semester] and appreciate the Student Assembly’s concern,” Pollack wrote. “I fully support this resolution and in particular support the three specific harm-reduction strategies that they recommend.”

The first harm reduction strategy in the resolution is to redevelop and strengthen the sexual violence prevention programs by the Office of Sorority and Fraternity Life and Skorton Center for Health Initiatives.

The second strategy explains that the SFL office and the Tompkins County Advocacy are exploring an expanded partnership. The Office of Institutional Equity and Title IX has also established many new resources in the last two years to increase capacity for both hearings and investigations and to coordinate support for victims, according to Pollack.

Isaac Chasen ’23, director of elections, then announced the special elections for three vacant seats in the S.A.

The three seats were previously held by LGBTQIA+ Liaison At-Large Kelly Chan ’24, At-Large Representative Benjamin Luckow ’24 and College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Student Representative JiHo Lee ’23.

Students who want to run must gather 75 petition signatures by next Friday. If there is more than one candidate, there will be an election.

Students speak | Student Assembly hosts its first meeting of the spring semester, discussing Greek life concerns and position elections.

Julia Senzon can be reached at jsenzon@cornellsun. com.

“I love having the ability to engage in good evidence-based policymaking at the local level.”

Robert Cantelmo grad

“I am horrified and repulsed by the reported events at our fraternities”

President Martha Pollack

By MARIAN CABALLO Sun Staff Writer

Students hailing from any Cornell undergraduate college can now minor in data science, a unique opportunity to learn how to examine and analyze data in an increasingly data-driven world.

“The world is drowning in data that’s waiting to be analyzed,” Prof. Joe Guinness, statistics and data science, wrote in an email to The Sun. “The data science minor will equip you with the skills to search for interesting patterns in data and, most importantly, make sense of them.”

The minor is a new addition to the Department of Statistics and Data Science — where Guinness serves as the director of undergraduate studies — within Cornell’s Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science, which currently offers the statistical science major in the College of Arts and Sciences and the biometry and statistics major and minor offered through the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

A data science minor allows a greater subset of students to gain important quantitative and analytical skills. Data science previously only existed as a concentration for information science and information science, systems and technology students within CAS, CALS and the College of Engineering. CAS also offers a data science in astronomy minor.

Natasha Aysseh ’23, who is pursuing the data science concentration in the information science major, said she enjoys how data science enables her to process information on her own.

“There’s a lot of information that goes into any sort of job or project, but typically we wait for data scientists or analysts to process it so that we can look into it,” Aysseh said. “It gives

someone quite a bit of autonomy to be able to understand what a series of data can do for you and what you can do to a series of data in any situation.”

According to Aysseh, her studies in data science has helped her throughout her tech internships at Rent the Runway and Rocketbook, and is a valuable asset in any field.

“The [information science with a data science concentration] major gives you the tools to understand the information yourself and then present it to others in ways that are comprehensible and natural to someone unfamiliar with the field,” Aysseh said.

The new minor teaches key data science concepts, while also equipping students with the computational and methodological skills to apply it to their own diverse endeavors.

“The minor is designed for students who want to learn some skills in data analysis and statistical modeling to supplement their major field of study, without fully majoring in a data-intensive discipline like statistics,” Guinness told The Sun. “For example, if you want to eventually get a graduate degree in the social sciences, or if you want to be a journalist, the data science minor might be a great fit for you.”

Six courses are required in total for the minor, including one core course in statistics and one in computer programming. Students must take four courses from four categories: data analysis, domain expertise, big data ethics, policy and society and data communication. Students must take courses in at least three categories.

A data science minor may help open doors to different career possibilities.

“It’s a bit early to say, since this is a new minor, but the [career] list will probably include ‘researcher,’ ‘data journalist’

TCAT Agreement Reached

Decreased ridership due to the pandemic was TCAT’s main driver for more reserve funds. If the yearly revenue is below what is needed to keep the non-profit afloat, additional funds will need to be pulled from the reserve.

According to a TCAT tax report, the Ithaca Times explained that by 2024, TCAT could burn through its reserve funds and consequently face a $3.7 million budget deficit.

Scot Vanderpool, TCAT’s general manager, explained that TCAT respects the decisions of its underwriters.

“[TCAT understands that each contributor makes its financial decision] based on what they determine is reasonable for them to contribute,” Vanderpool said.

However, according to the Ithaca Times, Tompkins

County Legislator and TCAT Board Member Dan Klein believes that Cornell’s financial reasoning is unjust.

“Cornell took in approximately $1 billion in donations last year alone,” Klein said. “Cornell receives the biggest benefit by far from TCAT, and they have shown disregard for the financial well-being of TCAT over and over again. Spending one-time money on ongoing operational costs is unsustainable.”

Similarly, many student-led organizations and community organizations have raised concerns about the University’s conservative behavior in negotiations with TCAT. The Ithaca Democratic Socialists of America’s FreeCAT campaign pushes for free TCAT passes for all users.

To continue reading this article, please visit www. cornellsun.com.

or simply ‘the person in the office that knows what to do with this massive dataset we’ve been sitting on,’ which will make your boss happy,” Guinness said.

Sonia Mar ’26, an Industrial Labor Relations student who is exploring Cornell’s minor options, grew interested in the new data science minor after taking Industrial Labor Relations Statistics 2100: Introductory Statistics.

Mar said she recognizes that data analysis is increasingly valuable as information science expands to different professional sectors.

To continue reading this article, please visit www.cornellsun. com.

New Data Science Minor Encodes Key Skills S.A. Elects New Vice President of External Afairs

S.A. seeks special election candidates

ASSEMBLY

Continued from page 3

“If you know anyone who’s interested, reach out to them,” said Chasen. “This could be freshmen who ran for freshman representative seats and didn’t

win, transfer students who ran for transfer representatives and didn’t win, bigs, littles, people in your clubs.”

To conclude the meeting, the S.A. moved into an executive session for the election of a new VP of External Affairs. During the executive session, community members left the room as the assembly voted on the two candidates, Bahram Mehretu ’26 and Veronica Lewis ’25.

The meeting ended with Lewis winning the election.

“As vice president of external affairs, I’d like to communicate more to the student body on our initiatives. We’ve had some really important ones in the semester that have been a little overlooked,” Lewis said. “We recently got an OBGYN for Cornell Health and we funded a bikeshare for Cornell and the Ithaca community. I think this will be a great position for me to communicate with everyone.”

Data analytics | Students work in Bill and Melinda Gates Hall on Jan. 28.

JULIA NAGEL / SUN PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Marian Caballo can be reached at mcaballo@cornellsun.com.

Patrick Kuehl can be reached at pok3@cornell.edu.

Christina MacCorkle can be reached at cmaccorkle@cornellsun. com.

“We’ve had some really important [initatives] in this semester that have been a little overlooked.”

Veronica Lewis ’25

‘Elvis’ is a Boomerish Nightmare

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, a body seemingly obsessed with the idea and recognition of so-called great men, loves a good biopic. Making a movie about a real famous person is a surefire way to get a few Oscar nominations whether it be one of the countless films recognizing Churchill or Thatcher (sans war crimes and unsavory policies) or the crowd-pleasing, if slightly-sanitized, music biopics of Bohemian Rhapsody or Walk the Line . This year’s subject of fawning praise is Elvis , a member of that latter category, featuring Austin Butler in a star-making role as the King himself.

On the surface, one might be fooled into thinking that this would just be one of those aforementioned films, largely boring, but featuring self-evidently excellent music and moderately “transformational” performances. Elvis , however, isn’t just a music biopic: It’s a Baz Luhrmann movie. Baz, whose previous efforts include the endlessly maximalist Moulin Rouge and The Great Gatsby, seems on the surface to be a fitting choice for a movie about a man who led such an extravagantly sized life, and, on some level, he is. The Elvis biopic is as big as can be expected and filled with all the colors and extremity to match Luhrmann’s style and Presley’s brand. Unfortunately, however, Baz Luhrmann’s brand

of maximalism is neither legitimately entertaining nor intellectually compelling, giving Elvis all the style, but none of the substance. Where Elvis manages to ever so slightly break free of genre conventions, it supplements dullness with disgust. Ultimately, Luhrmann has produced an exercise in grotesquery, as unpleasant to watch as it’s entirely regressive to think about.

It may be unfair to start by talking about the racial politics of Elvis . After all, the film certainly doesn’t want to think

about them, considering how cavalierly and quickly they’re cast off in a film that is nearly three hours long. Our introduction to how Luhrmann plans to handle the issue comes in an absurdly edited sequence featuring some five or so ambulatory reaction shots to the notion that Elvis, the man they’re all hearing on the radio, is in fact white. Later, the film chocks up legitimate criticisms of Elvis as an appropriator or an exploiter of Black culture to the notion that the man “wished he was Black.” Though one could hardly expect such a rosy-eyed film to honestly reckon with the dubious racial politics of its protagonist, it isn’t inappropriate to hope that it may do better than a poorly executed punchline and a series of absurd dismissals.

Defenders of this film, of which there are many, may not care about the racial politics. After all, what film today doesn’t have a bit of a thorny political underbelly. In fact, they’ll point to everything as a bit of a genre mockery, purporting that Elvis has some grand satirical project of imitating the glamorous, but dangerous, “snow job” to the point of exhaustion. Its cleverness is in how it matches the allure of celebrity then gives way to an eventual disillusionment. If that’s so, it fails. Besides an uninteresting depiction of the business, complete with ugly digitally rendered stages, Luhrmann still con-

stantly approaches everything with an earnestness towards Elvis. With such rosy glasses pointed towards the protagonist, Elvis becomes an uninteresting morality tale, sapping any bite that the visual extremity might hold. Opposite Presley is our guiding deceiver to this Circus: Tom Hanks’s cartoonish Colonel Tom Parker. The performance, bizarre and unpleasant in many ways, produces neither an interesting character, nor a legitimate tactician. Instead, his villainy falls so far into vague xenophobic ridicule that it feels more inspired by black-and-white WWII Propaganda films than the real-life Colonel.

Parker represents the most awful part of an otherwise dull and unremarkable film. Luhrmann’s interest in Parker as a villain is understandable. There’s a legitimate argument to be made against the real-life figure (by all accounts he’s a heinous representative of greater rot in the entertainment industry). Elvis , however, doesn’t care about what Parker represents, or, alternatively, whether Parker stands alone. Luhrmann is so obsessed with the singular portrayal of Colonel Tom Parker as a villain that he is willing to present every single other figure as heroic. All the other potential managers are more legitimately interested in Elvis’s art and success; drug addiction is characterized entirely through the eyes of Parker’s response to it. In the end, Parker isn’t even a greedy capitalist: He’s a gambling addict who needs his fix.

His final curse on Elvis’s legacy emerges out of necessity, from

the same system that seemingly sucked up and spit out his client. This, however, is a comparison upon which Luhrmann doesn’t care to indulge, instead uplifting his simplistic story with little legitimate reflection.

One has to suspect that Elvis was recognized by the Academy for its quality as a Baby Boomer showcase of their King and a simultaneous attack on the transgressor who ended his reign. Butler’s passable performance (made legendary by his current refusal to abandon the trademark accent) and Luhrmann’s flashy direction serve to exhilarate the most uncritical elder statesmen of the industry, all while those same qualities arm defenders with a ridiculous language of intentionality. Whether it’s an unambiguous endorsement of extremity or an ineffective commentary on it, Elvis remains grotesque. It’s a regressive relic of older films, modernized in the worst ways through excessive visuals, editing, music and cinematography. Preserved from film history are only poor racial politics, idiotic black-and-white characterization and rote storytelling, just enough to produce a “they don’t make films like this anymore” response. In reality, they never did, and, frankly, they shouldn’t ever again.

MAX FATTAL SUN CONTRIBUTOR

This is the frst article in a series coveing each of the Best Picture Oscar Nominees.

Max Fattal is a sophomore in the School of Industrial and Labor Relations. They can be reached at mbf68@cornell.edu.

COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

CHANTAL ANDERSON / THE NEW YORK TIMES

Obioha Chijioke and Tofunmi Olabode Amplify!

Obioha Chijioke ’24 and Tofunmi Olabode ’24, Co-presidents of Black Students United, are students in the College of Arts & Sciences. Comments can be sent to opinion-editor@cornellsun.com. BSU can be reached at bsu.cornell@gmail.com. Tis is the first installment of Amplify!

Our names are Obioha Chijioke ’24 and Tofunmi Olabode ’24, and we are Co-Presidents of Cornell’s Black Students United. Before we all head out (or stay!) for the winter break, we have some amazing news.

This semester, we met with Emma Leynse ’23 and Katherine Yao ’23, the associate and opinion editors respectively of The Cornell Daily Sun, to discuss expanding the range of campus perspectives in opinion guest content submissions. The Sun wanted to diversify the voices that were published in the opinion section to reflect the true range of experiences on Cornell’s campus. BSU was happy to comply.

Black Students United was founded in 1979 out of what used to be the AfroAmerican society (founded in 1967). We provide a network/venue for the members of the African Diaspora to express their needs and have those needs met. We intend to be a strong and influential campus-wide voice of action for the PanAfrican community as we promote and cultivate Black culture on Campus.

We serve as an umbrella organization for 30+ other political, professional, cultural, performance, fraternal and sororal organizations. Coming into this school year, one of our major goals was to establish a column in The Cornell Daily Sun. We initially wanted a platform to amplify our efforts and showcase the activity happening among our sub-organizations. We couldn’t have been more excited when the opinion editors reached out.

Working with the editors throughout the semester, we crafted the vision for a rotating column. It was a truly collaborative initiative — BSU is grateful to The Sun for making what a few months ago felt like a dream, come to life. We and the editors recognized, however, that there were many other organizations on campus that would benefit from access to the platform.

For that reason, we are creating a bi-weekly rotating column to provide a platform for all clubs and other student groups on Cornell’s campus that advocate and provide safe spaces for underserved

but rather highlight club activities and responses to campus news with respect to the organization’s values.

Essentially, if you haven’t heard about our organization, we are hoping that this column can change that, and do the same for many more student organizations on campus.

Okay, so who are the current members of BSU, and what have they been up to this semester? We are prominent members of the Student Assembly, Kappa Alpha Phi Pre-law Fraternity, the Milstein Program, the Nigerian Student Association, BlackGen Capital, Underrepresented Minorities in Computing, Black Greek Life Organizations and more. During the summer, we run our virtual “Inside Scoop” series where we prime incoming Black and Latinx students on what they can expect coming onto campus. We opened the school year with a week of events for orientation week. Shortly after, we held a club fair for organizations under our umbrella called “Black Life on The Hill” and threw an annual freshman mixer in Ujamaa.

We ran a voter registration booth on Ho Plaza ahead of the midterm elections. Last week, we held our annual Town Hall, where we had an open-floor discussion about the issues our community faces with the Vice President for Student and Campus Life, Dr. Ryan Lombardi, and the Dean of Students, Dr. Marla Love. We hope to have an equally productive spring semester, and hope that you might be able to interact with us as well!

and underrepresented voices. This includes affinity, advocacy and activist groups on campus who tend not to be represented in The Sun’s guest content. The contents of this column will not be promotional,

We hope that this column is a useful tool for organizations around campus to publicize their amazing work. We look forward to contributing and reading it, and can’t wait to see what it does for underrepresented and underserved communities across all identifiers on Cornell’s Campus.

We are creating a bi-weekly

column to provide a platform for all clubs and other student groups on Cornell’s campus that advocate and provide safe spaces

underserved and underrepresented voices.

The Sun wanted to diversify

voices that were published in the opinion section to reflect the true range of experiences

Cornell’s campus.

Random Buttons

Sundoku

Puzzle 655323

A CLOCKWORK

Fill in the empty cells, one number in each, so that each column, row, and region contains the numbers 1-9 exactly once. Each number in the solution therefore occurs only once in each of the three “directions,” hence the “single numbers” implied by the puzzle’s name. (Rules from wikipedia.org/wiki/ Sudoku)

Paddles

We have availability for the 2023-2024 school year beginning June 1st at Hudson Heights apartments. These studios include electric, heat, water, garbage and parking. Coin-operated laundry facilities available on site. Prices start at $850/month for a 12 month lease, with options for 10 month and semester leases with different rates. If you have any questions or would like to schedule a tour contact us by email: renting@ithacaLS.com. Please visit our website www.ithacalivingsolutions.com for photos and more information.

Fleet Week

Hil & Mallory Pity-proofed

Men’s Basketball

Cornell Defeats Brown

Chris Manon helps lead the Red over the Bears

By DAVID SUGARMANN Sun Staff Writer

Cornell squared off against Brown in a high-stakes in-conference game on Saturday. Heading into the matchup, the Red had a 4-2 record against Ivy league opponents, good for second in the conference. The Bears were close behind with a record of 3-3. This game had 2,216 fans in attendance, the largest turnout at Newman Arena this season.

At the tipoff, sophomore guard Nazir Williams was not in the starting lineup due to an undisclosed injury. Williams is Cornell’s second leading scorer and ranks ninth in the Ivy League in points per game.

With Williams out, this was junior guard Chris Manon’s first opportunity to be in the starting lineup. The Red wasted no time getting on the board, with Manon hitting two jumpers in the opening minute of the game. This lead did not last long, though. Brown’s ability to drive into the paint and dominate the offensive glass allowed it to go on a 9-0.

With gritty performances on both sides, the rest of the half saw seven lead changes and a tie, with no team leading by more than five points at any point in the first half. Going into halftime, the team trailed the Bears by a score of 35-33. This was the Red’s second lowest first half point total of the season. This low scoring

performance was in large part due to Cornell’s inability to connect on its 3-point shots. The team converted on just two of 14 from behind the arc, well below its season average of 37.5 percent.

Senior forward Marcus Filien was the team’s star the opening half, scoring seven points to go along with a rebound, two blocks and a steal.

In the opening minutes of the second half, Cornell strayed from its usual long-ball strategy. Its first four buckets of the second half were scored inside the paint, each by a different player. During this stretch, the Bears hung tough and shot the ball well, stretching its lead to six with 14:44 to play.

After tying the game at 55 apiece with 11:51 remaining, freshman guard Josh Baldwin scored a fast break layup to give the Red a two point lead. The team would not trail for the remainder of the game, winning by a score of 80-73.

Cornell needed a player to step up to win the game, and Manon did just that. Throughout the back half of this game, Manon was by far the best performing player on the court. He finished the game with 23 points, 11 rebounds and one assist.

On the defensive end, Manon had three steals and two blocks. Both blocks came in the final minute of play to put a stop to any potential comeback from the Bears. Manon currently

averages 2.2 steals per game, which leads the Ivy League and is 29th in all of Division 1 men’s baskeball.

Cornell is now tied with Princeton for first in the Ivy League. The Red will fight for sole possession of the top

when it hits the road to face the Tigers on Friday at 7 p.m. in New Jersey at Jadwin Gymnasium.

Celebration | Chris Manon celebrates with teammates before a free throw in men’s basketball game vs. Brown at Newman Arena on Feb. 12, 2022. Manon leads the Ivy League in steals.

David Sugarmann can be reached at dsugarmann@cornellsun.com.

The Red beats Brown | Men’s basketball defeated Brown on Saturday, Jan. 28.

JASON WU / SUN ASSISTANT PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

COURTESY OF PATRICK SHANAHAN / CORNELL ATHLETICS