The Daily Northwestern – March 6, 2019 by The Daily Northwestern

The Daily Northwestern Wednesday, March 6, 2019

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ASG pushes for sustainability fund Money would support student group initiatives

By CATHERINE KIM

daily senior staffer @ck_525

The Associated Student Government is pushing to establish a Student Group Sustainability Fund that will encourage student initiatives to help turn the campus green. The Student Group Sustainability Fund was introduced in ASG Senate last Wednesday as a grant to support student groups pursuing “sustainabilityminded projects.” The legislation’s authors, Weinberg first-year Carl Morison and Weinberg sophomore Juan Zuniga, said internal ASG money will be used to fund the projects in the hopes of pushing students to be more environmentally-conscious. “If we do our job right, then it’s going to make that change seem like second nature, and it’s just going to become a normal habit that student groups do when they organize events,” Zuniga said.

The introduction of the legislation follows the termination of the Universitysponsored Northwestern Sustainability Fund, which was cut for the 2018-2019 year as the University struggles with its budget deficit. Because the NSF’s budget of $50,000 was not approved, student-led sustainability initiatives have lost financial support, NU’s sustainability director Kathia Benitez said. Unlike NSF, the Student Group Sustainability Fund is only open to ASGrecognized student groups, Zuniga said, although the goal is to expand its reach in the future. For now, student groups will apply for small amounts of money –– $100 to $500 –– to headstart projects, such as purchasing recyclable and compostable cups for events, he said. Any action taken by students to promote sustainability is important, Morison said. The goal of the fund is to have students take the lead, especially because the University has been slow in implementing green policies, he said. “Northwestern is pretty sluggish when it comes to » See FUND, page 6

Zoe Malin/The Daily Northwestern

Weinberg first-year Irem Özturan makes a smoothie at a National Nutrition Month event with the help of Gerald Daye Jr., a Northwestern Dining marketing intern. NU Dining and Compass will continue to provide similar programming throughout March.

NU highlights healthy food habits

University provides resources, programs for National Nutrition Month By ZOE MALIN

the daily northwestern @zoermalin

For National Nutr i t i on M on t h , C om p a s s Group North America and

Northwestern Dining are offering resources and special programming to support students in making nutritious food a priority. National Nutrition Month, celebrated in March, is an annual campaign created by

the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, said the organization’s spokesperson, Jen Bruning. Its purpose is to educate people about the importance of making informed food choices and developing sound eating habits. Bruning said

this is especially important for college students. “National Nutrition Month can provide students with tips about how to stay healthy on campus and even cook for » See NUTRITION, page 6

ETHS features world languages Local writers share Week-long celebration fosters learning about diverse cultures By CLARE PROCTOR

daily senior staffer @ceproctor23

Students at Evanston Township High School have the opportunity to engage with world languages beyond the classroom this week as the school celebrates World Languages Week. The ETHS World Languages department is hosting a weeklong celebration of diverse world languages spoken at the school. In addition to the seven languages formally taught at ETHS, there are over 40 languages spoken by students and staff, said Rachel Kern, a German teacher at the school. During students’ lunch periods Tuesday through Friday, world language teachers are holding a film festival showcasing a variety of foreign films in different languages with English subtitles. Since students typically only take one language at school, Kern said the film festival provides a “sampling” of other cultures and languages at ETHS. In previous years, the film festival took place after school, but because of extracurricular activities and jobs, Kern said it was hard for students to attend the

works in progress Residents gather to hear ‘literary appetizers’ By ASHLEY CAPOOT

the daily northwestern @ashleycapoot

Daily file photo by Lauren Duquette

Evanston Township High School, 1600 Dodge Ave. The school is celebrating World Languages Week with a film festival and cultural breakfast.

film screenings. “Offering films during the lunch periods allows them to still bring their food and have something to eat and appreciate foreign films at the same time,” Kern said. Students can attend screenings

Serving the University and Evanston since 1881

of films in Japanese, Chinese, German or Spanish, ETHS German teacher Edward Gray said. On Tuesday, the first day of the film festival, Gray said he had a group of Spanish-speaking students attend his screening of a

German film. “We’re trying to get people to even know about (the film festival) and know that there’s an opportunity to immerse » See WORLD, page 6

Evanston residents gathered in the back room of Bookends & Beginnings on Tuesday to enjoy wine and cheese and listen to a group of writers share their “literary appetizers,” or works in progress. Pam Ferdinand, a writer who lives in Evanston, organized the event, “Literary Appetizers: A Taste of Works in Progress,” with Nina Barrett, who owns the bookstore. The event gave local writers, poets and podcasters an opportunity to share snippets of their pieces they have not yet finished. Ten writers spoke at the event, and they each had seven minutes to share whatever work they wanted. Ferdinand kicked off the evening by sharing her own piece she’s in the process of writing: a novel about a plane crash. She said the evening was inspiring, and she hopes to host similar events in the future. “There are so many writers in

Evanston,” Ferdinand said. “Writing itself is so lonely, and it’s fine to do a book tour or reading once you have a published work, but actually to be able share your work in progress and to know there’s other people out there doing the same thing as you is really inspiring and motivating.” Emily Skwish, an Evanston children’s book author, read a segment of her work at the event. Though she usually writes stories for young audiences, she is currently working on a choose-yourown-adventure romance novel. Skwish said she comes to Bookends & Beginnings almost every weekend, so she enjoyed sharing her work at the store. Her piece had the audience roaring with laughter. “I thought it would be a great opportunity to put this work out in front of people,” Skwish said. “It’s something that is completely unfinished.” Skwish said this was the first time she had read any of her works aloud at an event. She said she decided to share her novel at Bookends & Beginnings to push herself to share her work with an adult audience. Skwish said that the event was » See WRITERS, page 6

INSIDE: Around Town 2 | On Campus 3 | Opinion 4 | Classifieds & Puzzles 6 | Sports 8

2 NEWS | THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 6, 2019

AROUND TOWN

Local store to start used book buyback By SNEHA DEY

the daily northwestern @snehadey_

Nina Barrett (Medill ‘87) wants Northwestern students to find a literary haven in her bookstore, Bookends & Beginnings, but she knows how expensive books can be. Barrett hopes the store’s new used book buyback program will alleviate this cost burden and engage student readers. Bookends & Beginnings will begin a new initiative March 9, through which people can trade in their gently used books for store credit. Buyback hours are every Saturday and Sunday, from 1 to 5 p.m. and 3 to 5 p.m. respectively. Barrett said used books offer Bookends & Beginnings customers a wider range of titles and can enhance the browsing experience. “What we’re really encouraging here is for people to come in and spend some time and look at what’s on the shelf and maybe find things that they didn’t know that they wanted,” Barrett said. “The used books expands the enjoyment of that experience.” Bookends & Beginnings will join three other local bookstores — Market Fresh Books, Amaranth Books and Beck’s Bookstore — in selling used books. Bookends & Beginnings has accepted book donations in the past but has never formally accepted used books before. Before Bookends & Beginnings opened in 2014, the rare and antique bookstore Bookman’s Alley occupied the space for 50 years. Barrett said she has always been aware “that’s how people knew the space” and recognized the value of bringing in used books. The local bookstore plans to be selective about the kinds of books they will take. Barrett said the store will not accept textbooks, old encyclopedias and out-of-date texts. The store is primarily interested in literary fiction, children’s books and scholarly press. Bookends & Beginnings will also take audiobooks and CDs — something the store has not

Sneha Dey/The Daily Northwestern

Used books at Bookends & Beginnings. All used books will sport the navy blue “U” sticker.

sold in the past. Barrett said both audiobooks and CDs do not sell fast, and the resale market allowed Bookends & Beginnings to sell an otherwise expensive type of product. Bookseller Brooke Williams, who has run used book buyback programs at other stores, said this type of program allows titles to move in and out of stores faster. Williams said she loves working with used books. “When you work with these books, you find a lot of really cool stuff,” Williams said. “Every day is different because you never know what you’re going to see with used books.” Growing up, Williams said she spent a lot of time in her local used bookstore. Once the program at Bookends & Beginnings starts, she said she will be heading the book buyback program. Northwestern political science Prof. Jeff Rice, who also worked in the Evanston book business

for 27 years, said he almost exclusively purchases books from Bookends & Beginnings — he currently purchases at least one book a week from the local store. Rice said Bookends & Beginnings creates “a salon-like atmosphere.” “They may trade in books, but they also trade in ideas and culture,” Rice said. Rice said he likes to recirculate his fiction books. He plans to take advantage of the buyback program and will bring shopping bags filled with his own used books to contribute to the store. “It’s another way independent booksellers can stake out a piece of the community,” Rice said. “The trick is to get people in your store. If offering used books will get more people or different people in your store, that’s a good thing.”

POLICE BLOTTER Over $100,000 in cash taken from Evanston resident’s safe An Evanston woman reported Monday that valuable items and over $100,000 in cash were stolen from her residence in the 100 block of Ashland Avenue. The woman said she got a call about a burglar alarm in her home as she was leaving work for home. Evanston Police Department officers arrived at the residence before the woman returned, and they observed that the rear door of her residence was forced open. They searched the interior, but no one was inside, EPD Cmdr. Ryan Glew said. Officers noticed that the master bedroom had been targeted, but no other areas of the residence were disturbed. The woman told EPD officers that the contents of a safe with her “whole life inside” were missing. Taken was $100,000 in cash, 20,000 euros, $10,000 of jewelry and her family’s passports, Glew said. The safe was bolted to the floor of her closet, and the woman said that only she and her husband knew about the contents of the safe. Her daughter knew that the safe existed but was unsure what was inside, Glew said. He said the family had not hosted any guests over recently. Detectives are investigating the incident, but there are currently no suspects, and no one is in custody. — Ashley Capoot

Setting the record straight

An article published in Tuesday’s paper titled “NU wins one of three in Atlanta” misidentified the player in the photo. The photo was of Charlie Maxwell.The Daily regrets the error.

snehadey2022@u.northwestern.edu

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THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN | NEWS 3

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 6, 2019

ON CAMPUS

GeoGame’s rise as an NU sensation

By ALEX SCHWARTZ

daily senior staffer @alexpshorts

It was a day that would go down in Northwestern history: On Jan. 13, the Wildcat GeoGame mixed up Belize and Belgium. The game’s question for that day asked Northwestern students to identify Belize on a map, but players across campus were shocked to find that upon clicking the correct Central American country, they were met with a red thumbs-down icon and the devastating words, “You Missed it!” Instead, Belgium was mistakenly highlighted as the correct answer. Emails were sent. Memes were posted. Hearts were broken. The Wildcat GeoGame has come a long way since it was first floated as a concept in the fall of 2016, Medill Prof. Candy Lee said. In the game’s first quarter of operation, 142 people answered at least 30 daily geography questions correctly, winning free Blaze Pizzas. At the end of Fall Quarter 2018, the game had 1,221 winners and over 86,000 pageviews. So far this winter, it has amassed over 79,000 pageviews. After noticing a lack of geography knowledge among students, Lee said she wanted to create a game that could both engage students and help them learn about the world. Lee, who is also a member of The Daily’s governing board, Students Publishing Company, applied for a grant from Academic and Research Technologies, a department of Northwestern Information Technology, to jumpstart the project. Soon, she said, several departments and offices — from the Buffett Institute for Global Studies to the Office of the Provost — became involved, assisting her in building the game, testing prototypes and securing funding. “This truly is a village,” Lee said. “I would never be able to do this without the group.” In addition to providing an initial grant for the GeoGame, NUIT also helped create the digital framework for the project. Rodolfo Vieira, developer lead in the Media and

Design group at NUIT, said he provided guidance to student developers from the NUX Studio, who built most of the GeoGame’s design and technology components. “This was a perfect application and game for them to work on,” he said. “We were lucky enough that we have very high talent in our student team, and they were able to turn this around in a very short amount of time.” The team also brought on Kelsey Rydland, a geographic information systems and data analyst for Northwestern Libraries, to produce the game’s content. Rydland said he creates a bank of questions, which have gotten more challenging over the past three years. “At the beginning, the game was really pretty basic, just like ‘Where is Denmark?’ or ‘Where is Brazil?’ and then we got feedback that people wanted the questions to be a little harder,” Rydland said. “So we started adding capitals, larger cities, things like that. And then we started adding some two-part questions as well.” Rydland said he keeps his question bank in a Google Sheet, from which the game software pulls to create a daily question. Lee said she and Rydland play the game early each day to catch any mistakes. Rydland said January’s Belize-Belgium mixup happened when he accidentally typed the wrong ISO country code into the spreadsheet — Belize’s is BZ, and Belgium’s is BE. “I do remember one of the students, when we realized that there was a mistake with the Belize question, wrote back, ‘I can’t Belize this,’” he said, adding that because of the error, everyone who played the game that day got the question right. Rydland said he didn’t realize how ingrained the game had become in the Northwestern community until he and Vieira looked at the answer data for that day and noticed that at a certain point, people began to answer Belgium because they had heard about the error. People weren’t just playing the game individually; they had created an “informal communication network” around it, Ryland said. Lee said the success of the GeoGame is due to the collaboration across departments and schools.

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A Blaze Pizza gift card students can win by answering 35 Wildcat GeoGame questions correctly. The GeoGame has become a campus-wide phenomenon.

Sports desk

“This was really a community-wide endeavor,” she said. But Lee said issues with funding for the Blaze Pizza cards could mean an uncertain future for the GeoGame. This quarter, the number of questions players have to answer correctly to receive the first Blaze Pizza card increased from 30 to 35, and the number of cards a player can receive was capped at two instead of three. University-wide budget cuts made to alleviate the $94 million deficit have put financial strain on the offices and departments that originally contributed money to buy the cards. However, Lee attributes the change more to the steep increase in players than to any budget issues. Lee said she thinks the game will be able to run next quarter but is unsure if it can continue into next year — and that the thousands of people who play the game not being able to learn about geography would be a “considerable loss to the community.” “The fact is, we had a unique experiment that brought all of those things together,” Lee said. “And it’s very hard to bring it back, and it’s pretty inexpensive to keep it together.”

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OPINION

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Wednesday, March 6, 2019

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Extracurriculars should be more than just bullet points on a resume While I agree with many points within Alexandra Huang’s column regarding the organic nature of opportunities in life at Northwestern and beyond, I am struck by how indicative this column is of the level at which activities on campus have been co-opted by pre-professionalism. Extracurriculars at Northwestern have ultimately become, in our minds, means for us to get ahead. We think to ourselves: “If I join this club, take this class, make this team...I’ll get a job.” This ideology is held by so many students at Northwestern, and creates a competitive environment where we are all striving to do more, achieve more, and be more. And, we’re all overburdening ourselves in the process. Huang’s piece, at first glance, seems to refute this mindset. But a closer read denotes the struggles of yet another Northwestern student attempting to place herself and her personal achievements within Northwestern’s achievement-based framework, with the piece’s references to prestigious opportunities and leadership positions as indicators of success. There’s nothing wrong with that, and there is also nothing weird about it: Northwestern is composed of some of the best students in the United States and across the world, and it’s only natural that we all strive toward greatness. And, for many students at Northwestern, striving for things like club memberships and internships is just an extension of a lifelong commitment to personal excellence. It all makes loads of sense. I just wonder if we’ve all lost ourselves along the way. I agree with Huang’s point on going at one’s own pace, but find it invalid that the metrics by which she measures “going at one’s own pace” are related to accomplishments and achievements without any reflection of their meaning or personal impact. Using empty, corporate terms to describe takeaways from our many endeavors at Northwestern does not replace the many aspects of personal growth missing from the extracurricular commitments of many students on campus. Being the editor of this or the director of that does not denote valuable personal growth. I’ve learned this through a relentless chasing of those types of aforementioned titles, ultimately leading me to question myself about what I actually learned through the process. The only way for us to grow as individuals through these commitments is to find enjoyment and growth of personal values through what we do on campus. The way to change the culture of involvement at Northwestern is not through rejecting clubs that seem broken or pre-professional or anything else. And, it is certainly not through rejecting all activities at Northwestern entirely. Rather, I feel that campus involvement should be meaningful and personally impactful. Extracurricular involvement isn’t just something to write about on a résumé or Daily column for credibility; the things you do on campus should be things that you genuinely enjoy and do for the sake of personal growth and enjoyment and not for personal profit. There are so many opportunities to do just that on campus that are often overlooked. We complain often about the competitiveness of clubs on campus, but would that be a problem if we all stopped to think and started joining just the clubs that we are passionate about rather than the ones that we think will best suit our professional experiences? Imagine how much happier we’d all be if we just focused on our personal passions rather than the bullets on our résumés. Let’s stop trying to get ahead, and let’s start trying to make ourselves a little happier. — Patricia Tang, Weinberg College Class of 2020

Traveling while queer isn’t always easy A. PALLAS GUTIERREZ

DAILY COLUMNIST

As spring break approaches, many students are excitedly discussing their travel plans, whether they’re going home or abroad. But for queer students, that excitement can sometimes be undercut by fear. Traveling while queer often isn’t easy, both inside and outside the United States. Newer travel books often contain sections on LGBTQ nightlife in various destinations, telling readers to check out Le Marais in Paris, Porta Venezia in Milan, or Soho in London, but rarely do they warn about the dangers queer travelers will face. In eight countries, homosexuality is still punishable by death, and in 73 countries, homosexual activity is illegal in some capacity. While the easy solution may be to just avoid those countries, queer people can still be threatened even in countries without laws banning homosexuality. While being

gay is legal in Armenia, for example, there are no provisions protecting queer people from discrimination, and anti-queer hate crimes have been on the rise in recent years. Even in supposedly safe travel destinations like Rome, queer people can face homophobic comments and actions, which can be incredibly violating.

Within the U.S., the experience is slightly different. People generally know which areas are queer-friendly, and, in general, big cities and the surrounding areas tend to be, if not openly proud, at least tolerant of queer people. Areas that are not as welcoming can be difficult to avoid, whether on a road trip which necessitates gas stops or traveling home to a homophobic place.

In June 2017, California’s attorney general blocked state-funded travel to Alabama, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Texas due to laws discriminating against queer people. While this action drew attention to these state’s queerphobic policies, it did not protect queer people in any way, especially those who have to be in those states either for travel or daily life. Traveling within the U.S. as a queer person is still wrought with danger. As a country and a globe, we still have a long way to go as far as queer acceptance. So if your queer friends seem cautiously excited about their spring break plans, whether they’re going to Japan or Wisconsin, understand that they are just as excited to travel as you are, but have more dangers in their path. A. Pallas Gutierrez is a Communication freshman. They can be contacted at pallas2022@u.northwestern.edu. If you would like to respond publicly to this op-ed, send a Letter to the Editor to opinion@ dailynorthwestern.com. The views expressed in this piece do not necessarily reflect the views of all staff members of The Daily Northwestern.

‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine’ addresses assault RACHEL MENDELSON

OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR

This article discusses sexual assault and contains spoilers for the Feb. 28, 2019 “Brooklyn NineNine” episode “He Said, She Said.” The NBC show “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” is no stranger to addressing social issues: It has already tackled racial profiling, LGBTQ experiences and police corruption. With the shifting cultural emphasis on sexual assault and the #MeToo movement, it only seemed time for the show to delve into the complexity of sexual assault cases. “He Said, She Said” is the first sexual assault case in all six seasons of the show. But as it balances the serious topic with humor, “Brooklyn Nine-Nine’s” #MeToo episode does more than just appropriately address sexual assault; it teaches viewers about how society normalizes and dismisses sexual violence against women, representing the power of media and entertainment to educate and spark difficult conversations on sensitive issues. “He Said, She Said” opens with a new case where an investment banker, Seth ( Jonathan Chase), has been admitted to the ER with a broken penis. After main characters make comical guesses about how the incident occurred, Capt. Raymond Holt (Andre Braugher) informs the team that Seth was struck by a female coworker, Keri (Briga Heelan), who claims he sexually assaulted her. The show’s star couple, detectives Jake (Andy Samberg) and Amy (Melissa Fumero), are assigned to the case. They immediately believe Keri (which isn’t typical for sexual assault cases, but works for the sake of a 22-minute episode) and suggest that she turns down the $2.5 million non-disclosure agreement that the firm offered her and file charges

for sexual assault instead. However, Rosa (Stephanie Beatriz) challenges Amy’s plan to press charges and explains that pressing charges introduces even more problems, like that Kira will be forced to go through a public trial, where her credibility will be questioned. As Rosa powerfully asserts, “Even if she wins, she still loses,” the conversation addresses the larger issue of institutionalized sexism and whether coming forward in the hopes of protecting other women is worth the trouble of fighting against a system that predominantly benefits men. This powerful moment highlights the difficult decision many women must face when confronting those that harmed them.

While the majority of the episode balances the serious topic with its typical “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” humor, the most powerful scene in “He Said, She Said” is when Amy tearfully shares her own experience of sexual harassment to Jake. She reveals that the reason she transferred to the precinct was because her previous captain tried to kiss her when he took her out for an ostensibly professional, celebratory dinner after she made detective. When Jake realizes that the challenges women face are worse than he previously imagined, Amy replies, “This kind of stuff has happened to literally every woman I know. I just wanted to help make it better for this one woman.”

In this raw and emotional scene, Amy reveals the detrimental impact that sexual assault and harassment has on all women, not just herself or Keri. In what I believe may be the most powerful line in all five-and-a-half seasons of the show, Amy exposes the historically patriarchal society that has silenced women for far too long. And in that silence, there are hundreds of women with stories just like Keri and Amy’s – women who are forced to carry the guilt and blame for their assault while their perpetrator continues on unharmed. Amy’s vulnerability seeks to end this silence, showing viewers that sexual assault and harassment can be seen in many different ways, and that each of those creates an equally difficult and long-term emotional impact. “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” doesn’t try to apply a happy moral ending about sexual assault; instead, it sends a positive message about the importance of supporting survivors and how doing so can potentially inspire others to feel less alone and come forward about their own experiences. Media and entertainment have the role of setting precedents for reality; by tackling difficult social issues, they set the frame and conversation for society as a whole. Mixing vulnerability with comedy, “He Said, She Said” allows survivors to see their experience represented on TV and use humor to cope with pain. While the episode certainly isn’t perfect, “He Said, She Said” is an excellent example of using entertainment as a means of educating viewers and sparking the difficult conversations necessary to challenge the prevailing societal norms that perpetuate sexual violence against women.

Rachel Mendelson is a Weinberg sophomore. He can be contacted at mortymort2021@u.northwestern.edu. If you would like to respond publicly to this column, send a Letter to the Editor to opinion@dailynorthwestern.com. The views expressed in this piece do not necessarily reflect the views of all staff members of The Daily Northwestern.

The Daily Northwestern Volume 139, Issue 82 Editor in Chief Alan Perez

Managing Editors Maddie Burakoff Alex Schwartz Syd Stone

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THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN | NEWS 5

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 6, 2019

Kaplan competition encourages student storytelling By MEGAN MUNCE

the daily northwestern @meganmuncie

A new storytelling competition created by the Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities aims to bring students together through the sharing of meaningful stories. This Northwestern Life, inspired by NPR’s This American Life, is a collaboration between the Kaplan Institute and the Office of Residential Academic Initiatives. The project was spearheaded by Emily Lane, a graduate assistant and Ph.D candidate in musicology. To participate in the competition, students must submit any piece of nonfiction prose related to the Kaplan Institute’s 2018-2019 Humanities Dialogue theme of security. Ten winners will be chosen by a panel of faculty, staff and students to perform their pieces live at a showcase in May. The top three winners will also receive a cash prize. “Security might be a much more elastic theme than they realize. It doesn’t mean, ‘Is this door

locked?’” said Brad Zakarin, the director of residential academic initiatives. “It could be, ‘Do you feel safe here?’ ‘When did you start to feel safe here?’” Lane said she brainstormed the idea with Zakarin and Tom Burke, the assistant director of the Kaplan Institute. “Personally I would like to… connect students with each other,” Lane said. “I feel like Northwestern is such a big place and there’s so much going on it’s easy to become insular and only know what’s going on in your own little world.” Zakarin said the three hoped to take advantage of the space within Willard Residential College to integrate the academic experience with residential living. He said he hopes the experience will be a combination of academic, social and entertaining elements. Kaplan plans to host several workshops to introduce students to storytelling and prepare them for the competition. Burke said he’s been impressed by student turnout so far. Last week, he led a workshop where students attended a reading, then brainstormed

ideas for their own writing. “(At) the first event — the storytelling workshop — we had really strong numbers and the people that were there were really engaged with it,” he said. Burke added that the program is an “intellectual springboard” for students to get involved with nonfiction storytelling. Zakarin said these workshops are designed to have a “low bar” for engagement so that anyone, regardless of experience, can participate in the competition. Burke said he wants to see some humorous stories, but overall just hopes that students will be able to hone in on and explore their personal narratives. While this is a pilot year for the initiative, Lane said, she and Burke hope Kaplan will continue to hold the competition in following years. “I’m hoping that people submit stories that mean something to them,” Lane said. “One of the goals is also to show that everybody has a story to tell and that everybody needs to be able to tell that story.” meganmunce2022@u.northwestern.edu

Megan Munce/The Daily Northwestern

Emily Lane, a graduate student leading a new competition organized by the Kaplan Institute for the Humanities. The competition aims to bring students together through sharing meaningful stories.

MEN’S BASKETBALL

Ohio State’s NCAA hopes on the line versus NU By CHARLIE GOLDSMITH

daily senior staffer @2021_charlie

If the Big Ten hadn’t expanded its conference schedule from 18 to 20 games this season, Northwestern’s regular season would already be over. Instead, the Wildcats will be facing a team with everything to lose Wednesday in Welsh-Ryan Arena. NU (12-17, 3-15 Big Ten) hosts Ohio State (1811, 8-10) for the Cats’ second- to- last game of the 2018-19 regular season, already having secured a lastplace finish in the conference standings. The Cats are enduring a 10-game losing streak, and the Buckeyes are right on the NCAA Tournament bubble. According to Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany, the conference expanded its schedule to give its best teams more opportunities to compete against

tournament- quality opponents. The extra conference games mostly replaced non-conference matchups against low-major opponents. “We thought playing against each other more was good, and good for the Big Ten and good for college basketball in general,” Delany said at Big Ten Media Day in October. Wednesday’s matchup is an unintended consequence of that change. Ohio State has to play an additional game against a team with a losing record instead of one against a team that could bolster the team’s tournament resume. The Buckeyes badly need another win over a highly- ranked opponent, but all they can do in Wednesday’s game is avoid calamity by beating NU. The expansion from an 18-game conference schedule to a 20-game one comes a year after only four Big Ten teams were selected for the NCAA Tournament. In 2017-18, Penn State and Nebraska were left out of

the field after the Cornhuskers won 22 games over the season and the Nittany Lions won 21. The selection committee passed on those two teams because they both lacked a significant number of highprofile victories. “Last year (the Big Ten) had the fewest amount of Tier 1 wins in the top six conferences,” Purdue coach Matt Painter said in October. “We had the most Tier 3 wins. We had the most scheduled Tier 3 wins. This forces us to play more people because ultimately getting four teams in the NCAA Tournament is not good enough.” In some ways, the expanded schedule has worked. In ESPN’s latest bracketology, eight Big Ten teams are listed in the field of 68, double the number of teams from last season. But if Ohio State falls in Evanston and earns an additional bad loss, that number could drop down to seven. For the Cats, the expanded schedule gives them

the opportunity to compete against teams with a lot to play for as they round out their seasons. In addition to the Buckeyes, NU plays Purdue on Saturday, and the Boilermakers are currently tied for the top of the conference. The Big Ten regular season championship will likely be decided at Welsh-Ryan Arena this weekend, even though NU won’t be playing for anything. Over his tenure at Rutgers, coach Steve Pikiell has had similar experiences, sitting at the bottom of the conference and having to play teams heading down an important home stretch. At Big Ten Media Day, he said he recognized the potential side effects for teams struggling in conference play. “Every game’s important when you’re (low in the standings),” Pikiell said in October. “When you’re adding two more hard games to a schedule when you’re picked last in the league, it’s a tough place to be.”

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6 NEWS | THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN

NUTRITION From page 1

themselves,” Bruning said. “For a lot of students, college is the first time they’re living away from home, so they have to learn new skills like portioning their meals and grocery shopping.” College is a good place to develop healthy eating habits, said Lisa Carlson, NU’s campus dietitian. Nutrition Month is an opportunity to highlight some of the resources the University already offers to students who want to learn more about nutrition, she said. During March, all National Nutrition Month programming at NU will be centered around the theme “find your flavor,” messaging that strives to

FUND

From page 1 sustainability and being green,” Morison said. “Once we show our commitment to the ideal of sustainability, then hopefully it’ll get the University moving a little quicker on matters like that.” Zuniga added that he hopes the fund will encourage people to explore different sustainable

WORLD

From page 1 themselves in a different culture, even if it’s for one period of the day,” Gray said. Some of the films being shown include the Chinese film “The Blue Kite” and the German film “The Lives of Others.” The school is also holding a world languages breakfast, during Thursday’s morning support period before

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 6, 2019 emphasize how healthful food choices can still be “delicious,” Carlson said. “Our goal is to have students slow down and focus on the flavor of food,” Carlson said. “One way to do this is to set aside your phone during meals and engage in mindful or intuitive eating instead of distracted dining.” During National Nutrition Month, students can attend themed events like a nutrition Jeopardy game, smoothie bikes and “guess that herb” food samplings. Carlson said “find your flavor” themed dishes will be served in the dining halls as well. Carlson said National Nutrition Month is also an opportunity to increase students’ awareness about the year-round nutrition resources available

on campus. As the University’s dietitian, she holds personalized appointments to discuss topics like weight management and allergy concerns. “Most students come to me because they want to have a healthier relationship with food,” Carlson said. “Whatever their concerns are, my role is to assist students with their lifelong wellness journey.” One of the first steps students can take to prioritize their nutrition is to get to know their campus resources, Danielle Mach, a performance dietitian for Northwestern Athletics, said in an email to The Daily. It is helpful for students to do research and know where to find foods that fit their goals, she said. While NU’s performance nutrition program is specialized for student

athletes, Mach said its lessons can be applied to everyone. “It’s always beneficial to schedule a visit with a dietitian and talk about goals or identify barriers to eating healthy for you,” Mach said. “Start slow, and make realistic goals you can work towards.” After National Nutrition Month comes to an end, Carlson said she hopes students apply the lessons they learn throughout March to their everyday lives. “The overall goal is to have students try new foods and learn about campus resources,” Carlson said. “National Nutrition Month shows that delicious and nutritious can be at the same table.”

practices and incentivize those who were reluctant to go green. The fund is also partially an outreach effort of ASG’s Sustainability Committee, as the group will assist students while they establish a plan for their project, Zuniga said. He acknowledged that the process of gathering information can be daunting, which is why the committee will provide feedback on different sustainable resources and market prices.

“Sometimes it’s changing behaviors, particularly towards sustainability, which is sometimes a daunting task, just because there’s a lot of information out there,” he said. While student engagement is never easy, Zuniga said he has seen an increase in students calling for more environment-friendly practices on campus. He hopes this fund will encourage more conversations about the environment beyond sustainability

groups on campus. Morison said any action taken against climate change through the Student Group Sustainability Fund will ultimately be meaningful. “Every action you take that helps mitigate (climate change) is important and is something that I think everyone has a duty to do,” he said.

school, as a part of the celebration. ETHS Spanish teacher Curt Ogborn said the event was successful last year, with more than 70 students bringing dishes representing their own culture or a culture they were interested in. Dishes at the breakfast must be “culturally significant” and show that the student put time and thought into the food, Ogborn said. “The thing is, most cultures, in some way or another, celebrate food,” Ogborn said. “It’s one of the areas

that we find that breaks down cultural barriers and brings us together.” He said the breakfast allows students to connect with other languages in a non-academic setting. The celebration will conclude on Friday, when students are encouraged to wear clothes that feature another language, Kern said. World Languages Week allows students at ETHS to interact with people they otherwise may not have crossed paths with, Ogborn said, a barrier especially prominent

because of the size of the student body. It also combats polarization in society and within the school, he said. “Our society is highly polarized for many reasons, whether or not they’re legitimate,”Ogborn said.“World Languages Week kind of allows us to break down these barriers, even that are within the building. Kids just want to find a way to connect over a language that feels good to them. This is a way we can foster that relationship.”

zoemalin2022@u.northwestern.edu

catkim@u.northwestern.edu

clareproctor2021@u.northwestern.edu

WRITERS From page 1

impactful for her because she was able to meet new writers and hear a diverse body of works. “It’s been great to hear all these other people,” Skwish said. “I’m acquainted with a few of them but not everybody, so it’s really fun to hear what everyone does. I think the variety is what makes it so fun for everybody.” Another Evanston writer, Patricia Skalka, said she came to the event to support her colleagues and the bookstore itself. She said events like this are special because they can’t be replicated online. Skalka said she tries to go to as many readings as she can because learns from listening to other people’s work. “It’s a literary community,” Skalka said. “We’re all in it together. It’s inspiring to hear other people read. If you’re just there for entertainment, it’s enjoyable. If you’re there as another writer, it really benefits you because it’s inspiring.” ashleycapoot2022@u.northwestern.edu

Ashley Capoot/The Daily Northwestern

Nina Barrett, the owner of Bookends & Beginnings, introduces a Tuesday event titled “Literary Appetizers: A Taste of Works in Progress.” The event featured 10 writers, poets and podcasters who shared their pieces they have not yet finished.

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DAILY CROSSWORD Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle

Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis Edited by RichEdited Norrisby and Joyce Lewis

ACROSS 1 Nurse Barton 6 Work with a libretto 11 Capture 14 Spring for a drink? 15 Piece of info 16 “What __ the odds?” 17 It may require a permission slip 19 “Narcos” org. 20 First encounter in a romcom 21 Open, as a gate latch 23 Pigs out (on), briefly 24 Believer’s suffix 25 General sense 27 Nearly one-third of Africa 31 Roadside business 34 Decorating job on “Cake Boss” 35 Coin-op gas station machine output 36 Grand-scale production 37 Extra feature 39 “And your point is?” 40 Drumstick 41 Guys-only party 42 Let up 43 Gathering with much networking 47 Neutral shade 48 __Clean: stain remover 49 Tarzan raiser 52 Razor sharpener 54 Time-out 56 Seek the affections of 57 Table with columns, and what literally can be found in 17-, 27- and 43-Across 60 Rock concert need 61 Angel who directs Satan to Earth in “Paradise Lost” 62 Speak formally 63 “__-haw!” 64 Diver’s gem 65 Renoir subjects

3/6/19

By Roland Huget

DOWN 1 Pink drink, for short 2 Tied, as sneakers 3 Volcanic particles 4 Real hoot 5 Hardly gregarious 6 One-named folk singer 7 Make car-friendly 8 Saison that starts in juin 9 Diamond score 10 Radio component 11 Instances of rotten luck 12 Carpet calculation 13 PRNDL selection 18 Like rainforests 22 Turndowns 25 Tex-Mex snack 26 Genesis place 27 Jiffy 28 Blue __ Mountains 29 Prepare to sing an anthem 30 Stepped (on) 31 “Alice” diner 32 Oil org. 33 Metaphor for a precarious course 37 Surmounting 38 Bewildered state

Tuesday’s Puzzle Solved

39 Granola bar morsel 41 Makes more powerful 42 Co-host of the sports radio show “Boomer and Gio” 44 Chinese chairman 45 Last words of the Pledge of Allegiance

3/6/19

46 Deleted, with “out” 49 In the future 50 Golfer Calvin 51 Some Deco collectibles 52 Persuade 53 Big volume 54 Stein filler 55 By way of, briefly 58 Register opening? 59 River inlet

THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN | SPORTS 7

WEDNESDAY MARCH 6, 2019

PALLAS From page 8

McKeown on an official campus visit. Her decision was announced at Rabun Gap’s signing day in November 2014. Kallina said she couldn’t wait to see what was ahead for her former player. “She could defend anybody in the post, she was the best rebounder on the floor all the time,” Kallina said. “And, you know, she got better and better with us, but I knew her best basketball would be in college.”

Under Nia’s wing

When Kunaiyi-Akpanah arrived on campus as a freshman, junior forward Nia Coffey was already a rising superstar. Coffey, the fifth overall pick in the 2017 WNBA Draft, said Kunaiyi-Akpanah challenged her in practice with her tenacious effort. The effort from the sparingly-used freshman forward rubbed off onto the team’s best player. While on the team with Coffey, Kunaiyi-Akpanah played a limited role in the NU offense, averaging under four points per game. But she grew as she trained alongside the team’s star. Earlier this season, she credited Coffey’s influence after she recorded her 1,000th career rebound and became the second player to do so in program history. Coffey still holds the all-time NU mark with 1,183 rebounds in her career. “I (had) a chance to come here and play alongside (Coffey) for two years and just watch how she plays with such poise and skill and talent,” Kunaiyi-Akpanah said. “She’s very hard working, so to be able to follow her footsteps and also being able to sit alongside her in the history books is really huge for me.” Coffey said that Kunaiyi-Akpanah helped her with her off-the-court knowledge as well. When the team got together to hang out, Coffey said Kunaiyi-Akpanah would always find a way to dance, and as a result, made a similar impact on Coffey’s dancing game as she did in her rebounding game. “My best dance move?,” Kunaiyi-Akpanah pondered. “I do a lot of popular dances, like a lot of the mainstream stuff. So I don’t know what was popping back then. But right now I’m doing like the woah and the hit the folks a lot.”

Leaving behind a legacy

McKeown, now in his 11th season at NU, coached both Coffey and Kunaiyi-Akpanah, and he said both players have the innate ability to “go get the ball” no matter where it was. In McKeown’s eyes, Kunaiyi-Akpanah has improved exponentially since coming to Northwestern, improving her understanding of the “ebb and

flow” of the game. He praised her improved ability to finish around the basket, her footwork and her intelligence and awareness on the defensive end of the floor. “She’s a really smart defensive player, where when she got here she was so aggressive, she tried to block every shot,” McKeown said. “Now she’s much more disciplined, so I think you see tremendous growth in her game.” After Coffey graduated in 2017, Kunaiyi-Akpanah noticed there was a leadership void to fill. When sophomore guard Lindsey Pulliam arrived on campus at the start of Kunaiyi-Akpanah’s junior season, she was immediately impressed with KunaiyiAkpanah’s work ethic and the level of care she puts into her game. “This girl is a dog,” Pulliam said, joking about her first impression of the upperclassman. The pair have shared the team’s scoring reigns for the past two years, combining for an average of over 25 points per game in the time period. Kunaiyi-Akpanah handles the interior, posting up and creating looks for herself near the basket, while Pulliam is an aggressive sharpshooter with a trademark mid-range pull-up jumper. In recognition of their playmaking efforts, this season both players were named to the All-Big Ten First Team by the conference media. Off the court, Pulliam said the pair have a “goofy” relationship where they are often joking around with one another. When Kunaiyi-Akpanah graduates, Pulliam will miss having someone like her to look up to as well as the senior’s sense of humor. The general public witnessed what Pulliam sees on a daily basis at the 2018 Afropollo talent show, where Kunaiyi-Akpanah performed a stand-up routine. She said she was the only comedian at the event, as most people chose to sing or dance or rap, and that she cracked jokes about the juxtaposition of her experiences in Nigerian and American cultures. Her act placed third in the talent show. “As soon as they placed her in third, we all went crazy because we thought she should have won, but she had the whole crowd laughing, the entire team was dying,” Pulliam said. “When she’s done with basketball, she might have a chance to be a comedian.” But even with potentially only one game left in her collegiate career, Kunaiyi-Akpanah doesn’t plan on being done with basketball just yet. She is hoping to continue to play the game professionally for at least a few more years while she has her body, youth and athleticism intact. To make it at the next level, Kunaiyi-Akpanah will likely need to transition from her preferred position at center to a forward role because, at only 6-foot-2, she lacks the height to guard taller centers. As a part of that adjustment, she will need to improve her dribbling

and her mid-range game to increase her ability to space the floor. Coffey, who has had to undergo a similar positional transition in the WNBA, said she believed in KunaiyiAkpanah’s ability to make a similar jump. “Just seeing what Pallas has done in the last four years, as long as she continues to develop her (skillset), especially around the basket shooting and just keep up her rebounding, her defense, I definitely do think she could play on a professional level,” Coffey said. Before Kunaiyi-Akpanah moves onto life after NU, she has one lofty final goal for her senior season: to win the Big Ten Championship. She believes the team’s close results — all but two of NU’s conference losses have come by a single-digit margin — are indicative of their ability to compete with any team in the Big Ten. But no matter where the team finishes, Kunaiyi-Akpanah’s legacy is intact. “I just want to be remembered as somebody that believed in the program and, you know, like, made an impact on (its) growth and success,” Kunaiyi-Akpanah said. “And also (as) somebody who inspired the younger players.” Her ability to leave an impact on all those she crosses paths with is already etched into the history books. ryanw@u.northwestern.edu

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SPORTS

ON DECK MAR.

Men’s Basketball Ohio State at NU, 7 p.m. Wednesday

ON THE RECORD

She was the best rebounder on the floor all the time. She got better with us, but I knew her best basketball would — Kenneth Kalina, coach be in college.

@DailyNU_Sports

Wednesday, March 6, 2019

The senior captain has made Evanston her home, nearly 6,000 miles away from her native Nigeria By RYAN WANGMAN

daily senior staffer @ryanwangman

After a team practice in the summer of 2018, Pallas Kunaiyi-Akpanah was ready to do the improbable. Sporting purple Northwestern shorts and a purple shirt with No. 14 on the back, the 6-foot-2 center gathered herself behind the 3-point line before exploding to the basket. Two dribbles. Smooth ball transition from left to right hand. Liftoff from the painted area. With her teammates and coaches watching and a painted purple Chicago skyline as her backdrop, Kunaiyi-Akpanah elevated above the cylinder with her outstretched right arm and threw down a rim-rattling jam with authority. Boomshakalaka. “I had never done it before and I went up and I was able to do it,” Kunaiyi-Akpanah said. “(I) like (doing) something that excites everyone like that. Everyone was like really happy for me.” What about in game action? “I tried once in a game this year and… epic fail,” she admitted. “So I don’t think I’ll be doing that again. Until I can do it again in practice, then I don’t think I’ll do it again in a game.” While no statistics exist for the number of women who have thrown down epic practice slams, dunking in women’s basketball remains an exceedingly rare accomplishment. In the WNBA, only seven women have ever dunked in a game in the league’s 20-plus year history. That makes Kunaiyi-Akpanah’s dunk all the more impressive, even if it took place in Blomquist Recreation Center and the clip of the one-hander only went semi-viral on Twitter with 16,000 views. In her final season at Northwestern, Kunaiyi-Akpanah has played

magnificently, averaging a double-double with 11 points and 11 rebounds and earning a First Team All-Big Ten selection by the conference media. The senior from Abuja, Nigeria, is an impressive center, recently becoming just the second player in Northwestern history to notch 1,000 rebounds over the course of a career. She has become a locker room leader by example, inspiring with her work ethic and high motor, diving on the floor for loose balls as she does the team’s dirty work. But she’s come a long way from where her basketball career began in Nigeria —

”

This is a girl who will be successful no matter what she does in life.

Mobolaji Akiode, Founder and Executive Director, Hope 4 Girls Africa

over 6,000 miles to be exact — to make it to Welsh-Ryan Arena and bitterly cold Evanston winters.

Hope for a girl

Even when she was younger, KunaiyiAkpanah was tall. So tall, she said, that people would regularly encourage her to play basketball. Eventually, she acquiesced and her parents signed her up for a basketball training program. “I remember playing a bit of basketball at my boarding school in Nigeria and I was terrible at the time,” Kunaiyi-Akpanah said. “But people would still pass me the ball because I’m like the tallest person there, and they’re like, ‘Here you go!’ and I’m like, ‘I don’t know what to do with this!’” She didn’t take her basketball training program all that seriously at first, not

attending as consistently as some of the other kids and usually just showing up when she was bored. But not long after she started going to the training academy in Abuja, she found out Mobolaji Akiode, the founder and executive director of the organization Hope 4 Girls Africa, was coming for a day. Kunaiyi-Akpanah made sure she attended that visit. Familiar with Akiode’s work with Hope 4 Girls Africa, which was founded on the premise that sports and education can be used to empower girls in Nigeria and around the continent, a coach introduced Akiode to Kunaiyi-Akpanah. The coach told Akiode about Kunaiyi-Akpanah’s raw talent. But he was more interested in how Akiode could improve the young player’s self-confidence. “The thing that blew me away about her was just how smart she was,” Akiode said. “She was super shy, you know, it took a while to get her to open up, but once she did… I was like, this is a girl who will be successful no matter what she does in life.” Akiode then met with Kunaiyi-Akpanah’s parents, who learned about the work Akiode did and entrusted their daughter to her mentorship. About a year later, when Kunaiyi-Akpanah was about 15, Akiode set up the next step: an opportunity to move to the United States to attend the Rabun Gap-Nacoochee School, a private boarding school in Georgia. When it came time to leave home and travel across the ocean to her new school, Kunaiyi-Akpanah felt prepared, as she’d attended boarding school in Nigeria for roughly five years at that point. She knew how the sad separation from her parents felt, how she would cry when looking at her mom as she was getting dropped off. However, there was one key difference. While in Abuja, her parents would come on visiting days and picnic with her on the school’s campus. Once Kunaiyi-Akpanah moved to Georgia, she saw her parents

PALLAS’ PALACE about once in three years. “That was definitely different and was definitely tough,” she said. “But, you know, people at Rabun Gap treated me just like family, and it wasn’t too bad after that.”

Building the foundation

When Kunaiyi-Akpanah arrived at Rabun Gap in the fall of her sophomore year, coach Dale Earnhardt was immediately impressed with her athleticism. But he saw the work that needed to be done with her ball-handling, layups and footwork. “I joke with a lot of people that I went home and just started crying to my wife after I saw our (first) workout,” Earnhardt said. “I’m like oh my gosh, she is so raw, she has no clue what she’s doing.” Early on, Earnhardt said Kunaiyi-Akpanah struggled to adapt to small intricacies of the game like the three-second rule. After she grabbed an offensive rebound, Earnhardt said she would often immediately kick the ball out to a guard on the perimeter instead of putting it back up because she was afraid of getting called for a three-second violation. But she worked on improving her aggressiveness inside and as KunaiyiAkpanah gained experience with a more structured form of basketball, she began to figure out her role on the court and averaged a double-double. “We spent a lot of time working on post moves to try to get her to look more like a college player as a junior and senior,” Earnhardt said. “I think when she was recruited…most schools’ coaches saw her potential as an athlete, a rebounder. Even during her time here, I would say she spread the floor, rebound, put back, block shots, defend and she was good around the paint.” Kunaiyi-Akpanah didn’t go home for her summer breaks during high school, opting instead to stay with her aunt in Florida and play AAU basketball. Akiode connected her with the club coach

at Florida Girls Basketball, Kenneth Kallina, and advised the high schooler to play travel ball to gain greater exposure in the basketball world. Kunayi-Akpanah said Kallina took one look at her and told her she was on the team. It didn’t take much longer for the coach to realize what kind of person she was. During one of the two seasons they spent together, while driving through Atlanta on the way to a tournament, Kunaiyi-Akpanah asked Kallina if he could pull over the van so she could “practice philanthropy” by giving money to a homeless person on the side of the road. He was floored by her altruism. Earnhardt echoed that character assessment, remembering multiple times throughout Kunaiyi-Akpanah’s high school career where she stopped playing in a game to check on an injured player. “People have helped me so much in my life and nothing I have like, accomplished ‘till this day, I would never have done without the help of others,” Kunaiyi-Akpanah said.

Committing to NU

Before playing travel basketball, Kunaiyi-Akpanah saw the sport just as something she did for fun. After she spent multiple years competing against Division I-level players, it became more serious, with the game operating as an avenue for her to get to college. At one point in her junior year, Kallina estimated that about 50 or 60 schools were interested in recruiting Kunaiyi-Akpanah, but NU already had a sizable lead on the pack. Kunaiyi-Akpanah said its combination of top-tier academics and an up-andcoming athletic department made NU the best fit. Not to mention that her dad had the chance to hit the links with coach Joe » See PALLAS, page 7