NEWS Around Town Two new Asian eateries opening in Evanston » PAGE 2
SPORTS Softball Senior powers Northwestern into record books with offense » PAGE 8
OPINION Debating 2016 Columnists debate foreign policy issues ahead of the 2016 election » PAGE 4
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The Daily Northwestern Tuesday, February 16, 2016
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‘A PLAYGROUND FOR INNOVATION’
Study abroad to aid flight purchases New program allows financial aid money to go toward airline tickets By MATTHEW CHOI
the daily northwestern @matthewchoi2018
bin, that will no longer be an issue,” she said. The Office of Sustainability has been considering a switch to mixed recycling for several years, Cahillane said. She said she decided Winter Quarter would be the best time to implement the program because it would allow students to become accustomed to the system before spring break. “There’s so much happening at the beginning of the school year that it seems like a good time, but it’s not always a good time to roll out something new,” she said. “We’ll have hopefully a big hit and a lot of visibility and a lot of attention to it before spring break, and then there’ll still be a bit of time afterwards before students leave for the year.” The mixed recyclables will now be taken by the University’s contracted recycling hauler to a transfer station,
Low-income students studying abroad this quarter and next have been able to purchase plane tickets through the Northwestern Study Abroad Office as part of the new Bridge Builder Program. Headed by the Office of Undergraduate Financial Aid and the Study Abroad Office, the new program is an effort to make study abroad more accessible to students of all income levels, said Krista Bethel, assistant director of study abroad financial services. “The intention was to avoid students having to pay out-of-pocket for something their financial aid will eventually cover,” Bethel said. “If you don’t have one or two thousand dollars out-ofpocket … to book a flight that will be paid for later, then that can be a real hurdle.” Bridge Builder allows eligible students to purchase plane tickets for study abroad through the Study Abroad Office and have the airfare added to their study abroad bill, said Jessica Fetridge, assistant director at the Study Abroad Office. This then allows students to use their financial aid for airfare, along with all other bills for study abroad, she said. The program began with this year’s application process during Fall Quarter, Fetridge said, with three students successfully purchasing plane tickets for study abroad programs Winter and Spring Quarter. Bridge Builder is available to undergraduate students with expected family contributions of less than $10,000 for the academic year — a threshold which would expand beyond Pell Grant recipients, the common definition of a low-income student, Bethel said. She said she contacted eligible students accepted into study abroad programs and has met with them to determine their eligibility and to have an opportunity to discuss other financial matters concerning study abroad. The program is only applicable for NU-run and affiliated programs, and is not available for summer study abroad programs, Bethel said. She said she feels strongly about making study abroad financially accessible, as she relied on financial aid to be able to spend a year in Germany as a college student. “It would be a coin toss in my life whether study abroad or financial aid was more defining for me in college,” Bethel said. “So the study abroad offices and I have been working hard to really remove as many barriers to study abroad as possible.” Previously, study abroad students
» See RECYCLING, page 5
» See FLIGHTS, page 5
Lauren Duquette/Daily Senior Staffer
VEHICLE FOR INNOVATION People convene at the cafe of The Garage, Northwestern’s startup innovation hub. The Garage was launched June 2015 as a workspace for student entrepreneurs.
The Garage becomes hub for student entrepreneurship By KELLI NGUYEN
the daily northwestern @kellipnguyen
Nestled in the second floor of the Henry Crown Sports Pavilion complex, The Garage has begun sheltering late-night brainstorming sessions for what Northwestern students are hoping will be the next big innovation. Prospective groups must apply to gain resident status, which grants them 24-hour access and designated workspace, said Melissa Crounse, executive director of The Garage. The Garage houses 52 student resident teams this quarter, all of which are geared toward projects in entrepreneurship and innovation. Of these groups, 48 are development team “companies” and four are student organizations. Roughly 60 percent are developing software while the other 40 percent are creating hardware. The Garage tags itself a place “where ideas
get built,” whether it be a nonprofit, a personal project, an invention or a new kind of service program, Crounse said. “It’s really the full gamut,” said Crounse, who formerly worked at Google and IBM. “If you have an idea for something new that you think should exist in the world and you want to be in a community of people who are also trying to make those things happen, then this is the place where you should come hang out.” Timing and Racing Around the Clock, one of The Garage’s graduated companies, worked in the space during Fall Quarter to develop a software to monitor foot races. TRAC is now in San Francisco participating in Y Combinator, the top accelerator program in the US, Crounse said. Accelerator programs are startup incubators, similar to The Garage, geared toward helping new companies gain traction and take off. “We’re really more of a pre-accelerator which means we’re trying to help you figure out who your customer is, what is your business model,
what’s your product, all of that to get you to your next milestone,” Crounse said. For Akshat Thirani, The Garage connected the McCormick senior and his team to people who helped them mold a company model for their product. The group is working to develop Ampér, an energy monitoring and control system for homes. With the help of The Garage, the creators of Ampér have also filed for a provisional patent and have consulted with lawyers. “We are all engineers from Northwestern, but it’s a very different thing in creating a prototype versus creating a company,” Thirani said. “All the missing holes were filled out at The Garage.” After The Garage, Ampér is slated to participate in HAX, the world’s first and largest hardware accelerator program, in Shenzhen, China. There, the company hopes to set up a manufacturing and supply chain for the product. Another one of The Garage’s residents, Eighty » See GARAGE, page 5
NU rolls out new mixed-recycling program By MADELINE FOX
daily senior staffer @maddycfox
Daniel Tian/Daily Senior Staffer
REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE Recycling bins in Technological Institute display the new mixed recycling label.
Serving the University and Evanston since 1881
Northwestern has switched from separated recycling to mixed recycling as part of its goal to reduce the University’s landfill waste by 20 percent by 2020, the Office of Sustainability announced Monday. Although it will take several months to change labels on recycling bins in all common areas throughout campus, bins previously designated specifically for disposal of glass, paper or cans can now be used for all of those recyclable materials, said Julie Cahillane, a manager in the Office of Sustainability. Cahillane said the new system should streamline recycling for students as well as for the office’s recycling collection and bin distribution. “If you’re walking around campus with a can and can only find a paper
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