The Daily Northwestern Monday, September 21, 2020
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Individuals, corporations share climate burden
Students, residents clash over return
Sigma Nu exec, members resign en masse
COVID-19 causes concern for community safety
By EMMA YARGER
daily senior staffer @emmayarger
Cusick (SESP ‘18), the memorial began after Ramzan’s name was painted on the tree following his death in 2017. The next time The Rock was painted, Cusick said, the tree was left unpainted to preserve Ramzan’s name. Over time, more names were added, including Chuyuan “Chu” Qiu, who died in a biking accident in 2016. Cusick, Qiu’s Peer Adviser, remembers the tree as a way to stay connected with Qiu.
After their numbers began dwindling following a “mass wave” of disaffiliation, newly appointed executive board president J.R. Hecimovich said he doesn’t know what the future holds for the Sigma Nu chapter at Northwestern. About 75 percent of the fraternity’s pledges, including the chapter’s former president, Weinberg junior Philip Clement, said they were inspired to drop out after seeing the momentum of the Black Lives Matter movement and testimonials on the Abolish NU IFC/PHA Greek Life Instagram account. “I felt like a lot of people have had this large shift in perspective (over the summer),” Clement said. “With this new perspective, I personally didn’t feel comfortable being in an organization that operated the way Greek life currently operates.” Clement said conversations took place virtually during the summer months and
» See TREE, page 9
» See SIGNU, page 9
By SAM HELLER the daily northwestern @samheller5 As students return to Evanston and adjust to pandemic measures, city residents are also adjusting to having students back in town. Many residents are worried about students being back — especially when it comes to their compliance with Illinois COVID-19 guidelines. “We are very happy for the students to be our neighbors, but we have to ensure that not only are the students safe and healthy, but so is the broader community,” Ald. Robin Rue Simmons (5th) said. Rue Simmons said some residents have complained directly to her about students living in off-campus housing, which prompted a 5th Ward town hall meeting this Thursday. Residents’ largest concerns have been large gatherings off campus and encounters with dozens of students not wearing masks in downtown Evanston, Rue Simmons said. Some residents have also mentioned being worried about the underclassmen who are returning as well and moving to off-campus housing, thus increasing the number of students who are not under Northwestern’s direct watch. Evanston businesses are projecting a loss in revenue without all the students coming back to campus. The financial impact of COVID-19 has already hurt many of them. However some believe the risk of having the students back on campus outweighs the increased revenue students would bring. Dave’s New Kitchen relies heavily on student business. But » See RETURN, page 9
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Isabelle Sarraf/The Daily Northwestern
The memorial tree lies on the grass outside Harris Hall. After students and alumni reacted negatively to the tree’s removal, the University is planning
Student memorial to be replaced
Commemorative tree taken down without warning for safety reasons By MEGAN MUNCE
daily senior staffer @meganmuncie
Students and alumni quickly organized to save a memorial to students who died while at Northwestern after it was removed by the University without notice. On Friday afternoon, a group of students contacted administrators after noticing the tree next to The Rock had been removed and was lying
on the ground nearby alongside several other chopped trees. According to Julie PayneKirchmeier, vice president for student affairs, the tree was removed over the weekend for “safety reasons,” and the trunk is now held in storage. “We acknowledge the special place the tree held for many members of our student body, but in recent months the condition of the tree had been rapidly deteriorating, to the point that it was considered by University arborists to be a
potential risk,” she said in an email to The Daily. Before 2017, student groups would paint the tree in the same fashion as The Rock. However, in recent years, the tree served as a memorial to students who had died during their time at NU. The names of some of these students — Chuyuan Qiu, Ananya Agrawal, Kenzie Krogh, Mohammed Ramzan and Jordan Hankins — were painted vertically up the trunk of the tree. According to Katharine
Businesses adapt to help customers during COVID
Mass closures endanger downtown Evanston storefronts after shutdowns, student departures By JACOB FULTON
daily senior staffer @jacobnfulton
Downtown Evanston seems emptier than it was at the start of the year. Walk down any street, and passers-by will notice signs advertising retail spaces for lease, covering the once-filled windows of shops long gone. In 2020 alone, around 70 businesses have closed so far, and nearly 40 of these closures were prompted by a shared problem: COVID-19.
The pandemic has hit retail stores incredibly hard, causing mass closures and stalling the growth of recently-opened locations. Annie Coakley, the executive director of Downtown Evanston, said many restaurants had an infrastructure in place that allowed them to transition to pandemic service — but many retailers didn’t. “Restaurants were working or at least operating throughout the actual quarantine and shelter in place because of their ability to do delivery and pickup,” Coakley said. “That’s a different world
than regular retail where you couldn’t go into a store and shop. But the root of this problem doesn’t begin with COVID-19. Even before the pandemic, local businesses, especially retailers, were crippled by the rise of online shopping and the wave of big businesses moving into Evanston. Amid this overcrowding, Nina Barrett, the owner of Bookends & Beginnings, has remained an advocate for local businesses and the “shop local” mentality. Barrett’s store, an Evanston favorite since it opened in 2014, had to change its business model
when the pandemic hit. From the day Barrett closed her doors in March until Bookends & Beginnings’ reopening in July, the store was only taking online orders. “We had to completely reinvent the business that we were in,” Barrett said. “What was good for us and gave us an advantage that a lot of other small businesses don’t have is that all along, we had a website that allowed people to order online not only anything that we had in the store, but anything that our very large distributor that we work with has in their warehouses.”
Barrett said one of her store’s biggest competitors, Amazon, was actually the store’s saving grace for a short time. Early on in the pandemic, the retail giant announced that it would prioritize essential deliveries over nonessential ones, like books. As a result, Barrett said her store saw an influx of online orders during that period. However, it wasn’t enough in the long-term. The store was still bringing in less revenue than it would have with in-person » See RETAIL, page 9
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2 NEWS | THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2020
AROUND TOWN Mass University COVID testing causes concern By ISABELLE SARRAF
daily senior staffer @isabellesarraf
When Payton Shearn arrived at the Donald P. Jacobs Center for her mandatory COVID19 test, she said she had no idea what she was walking into. The Communication junior was among the first undergraduate students living off-campus to get tested at the center. As part of Northwestern’s three-step COVID-19 testing process for undergraduate students returning to campus, the University required asymptomatic students to get tested upon arrival at Evanston. The Jacobs Center was formerly the home to the Kellogg School of Management, which meant most undergraduate students were venturing into unfamiliar territory to take their tests. The day before her test, Shearn said she glossed over emails from administrators to see if there were any details on how the tests would be conducted but found none. She said the lack of communication made her more anxious than she already was about the testing process. “The main part that was causing me anxiety was the fact that we didn’t have any of this information beforehand,” Shearn said. “There were lots of unknowns when I walked into the building.” The University set up one big room in the Jacobs Center with several testing centers, each with four socially-distanced desks and chairs, Shearn described. She said each student was given a testing kit, and a staff member walked four people through the testing process at a time. Prior to her test, Shearn did not realize she would be administering the COVID-19 test herself. On a mandatory consent form, the University informed participants that selfadministered tests were less reliable. “I assumed that there would be either
Binah Schatsky/The Daily Northwestern
A sign outside the Donald P. Jacobs Center. Northwestern students permitted to be on campus are now expected to get tested for COVID-19 weekly.
nurses or some other health care professionals that would be administering the tests for us,” Shearn said. Medill senior Eugenia Cardinale, who was also tested on the first available day for undergraduates, said she was surprised at the number of people there at the same time. She said the last time she was around that many people at once was in March, before stay-at-home orders
were issued. “(The test) was done in groups of people, which I thought was strange,” Cardinale said. “The person sitting next to me, yeah they’re six feet away from me, but that person could’ve been partying all summer for all I know. I was really confused afterward and frustrated.” While at the center, Cardinale said she saw a note taped to a wall warning those getting
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tested that they would be asked their sex at birth during registration. She took to Twitter afterward to inform her transgender and nonbinary friends at NU about the policy. Cardinale said she knew this could be very triggering to her transgender friends and texted them about it right away. The policy was never communicated to students prior to arriving at the center and there wasn’t an option to opt out of it, so she said she at least wanted her friends to be prepared. “Northwestern apologizes in advance as that this is not aligned with our culture and practice of inclusivity,” the note at the center read. “Unfortunately, these fields and classifications are required for reporting results to the public health department.” A couple blocks away, Searle Hall is testing NU students who exhibit COVID-19 symptoms. After waking up with congestion and a sore throat, Weinberg senior Aishwarya Jois made an appointment at Searle. There weren’t any other students there when she arrived, she said, and she was escorted to a private room by a nurse in full personal protective equipment to do her screening. While the Jacobs Center testing was selfadministered, Jois said her test from the Northwestern University Health Service was professionally administered. The test went “so far up” her nose that she started crying, she said, but was glad that it was performed by a doctor. Jois said she was concerned about the possibility of infection given that four people would be taking off their masks indoors at the same time to self-administer the tests at the Jacobs Center. After hearing about the Jacobs Center testing experience, she said she was glad that her test at Searle was done in a room alone with a doctor wearing full PPE. “It seems like they’re giving everyone a cheap test unless you have symptoms, and then they’ll give you a good test,” Jois said. isabellesarraf2022@u.northwestern.edu
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4 NEWS | THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2020
ON CAMPUS
D202 adjusts to remote fall learning By DELANEY NELSON
daily senior staffer @delaneygnelson
When Gov. J.B. Pritzker ordered all Illinois schools closed back in March, teachers and students across the state transferred to online learning in the middle of the semester — and had to adapt quickly. This fall, students and staff at Evanston Township High School/District 202 have had more time to prepare and adapt their curricula and methods for an e-learning environment, but challenges remain. After announcing the school would remain online until further notice in July, ETHS returned to school in August. For Evanston families with younger children, Evanston/Skokie School District 65 announced Friday that the district’s first trimester would be remote — a change from initial plans to allow students to voluntarily return to in-person instruction at the end of September. Four weeks in, the start has shown online learning poses unique challenges for teachers at ETHS. Several teachers said it’s harder to build a sense of community online, and they’ve seen a decrease in student engagement. In some classes, students aren’t required to leave their camera on — but this can complicate teachers’ attempts to gauge students’ understanding by reading body language and facial expressions. Anita Thawani Bucio, an ETHS English teacher, has been teaching for 16 years and said adapting to this new type of learning has been hard. “I became a teacher because I love kids, and it’s a really big honor and privilege to be a part of their life and help them come to some understanding of who they are,” Thawani Bucio said. “When you just see them through a box on a screen, it’s very detached and it’s hard to connect. They feel it. I feel it. There’s so much anxiety.” Students might keep their screens off and not engage in class for a variety of reasons, including home circumstances, shyness and Zoom fatigue,
a term used to describe the exhaustion video calls can cause, according to the Harvard Business Review. As a result, teachers have had to adapt their definitions of typical engagement. Thawani Bucio said she’s using an online shared posting tool called Padlet, shared slideshows, breakout rooms and more as alternative ways to keep students invested. While the physical space cannot be replicated online, lead school social worker Martha ZarateOrtega said a lot of her focus has been on building trust and solid relationships with the students she works with. Zarate-Ortega said she wants to make sure students feel supported and able to reach out if they need help. “They’re still engaging and they’re checking in but the feel is different,” Zarate-Ortega said. “Physically in the building, students can actually sit and process. Nothing really replaces that piece, where you can see someone face-to-face.” Students and teachers are also up against technological difficulties like unreliable Internet connection. For this reason, some teachers are opting to do some pre-recorded lectures rather than relying on synchronous class time. ETHS Latino Liaison and Minority Language Coordinator Mercedes Fernández said some of the families she works with don’t have access to enough computers for each kid to use at once, and some parents don’t know enough about technology to help their children access online learning. Fernández said while families are trying to learn how to work with technology, there’s still a gap between “privileged groups that know” and have access to technology and families like some of the households she serves, who don’t. To provide students and staff with a consistent schedule for online learning, the school implemented a block schedule, where each class has two 70-minute periods a week. Classes are broken into two groups — one that meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and another that meets Wednesdays and Fridays. There are no synchronous classes on “Wildkit Day Mondays,” days
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Since school started in August, ETHS teachers have had to adapt as online learning throws challenges their way.
meant for students to catch up on work and connect with teachers for help. The new block schedule has decreased the amount of time allotted for each class, meaning teachers had to make difficult calls when deciding what content to cover. In paring down his curriculum, Greg Ruber, an ETHS biology teacher, said he’s pursuing an “inquiry-driven process called storylining,” where he introduces students to a topic and lets their questions guide the instruction. Ruber said he isn’t lecturing often and is finding new ways to complete labs, like finding at-home experiments accessible to students and creating time-lapse videos of other labs. He said online learning isn’t an ideal situation and poses challenges to students and teachers alike. “People should realize that this isn’t the ideal situation for teachers either,” Ruber said. “I am energized by knowing that when I walk into the building I get to see my students… But I also care about their health, and I care about my health and I care about my parents’ health.” delaneynelson2023@u.northwestern.edu
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THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN | NEWS 5
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2020
Students find community during virtual orientation
By HANNAH FEUER
daily senior staffer @hannah_feuer
Every September, first-year Northwestern students are typically found marching through the Weber Arch, saying “Kiss ‘n’ Bye” to their families and hanging out with new friends on the Lakefill. Instead, these Northwestern traditions were reimagined for an online format. For this year’s March Through the Arch, students’ names were virtually displayed one-by-one on The Arch. Entertainment included a caricature artist and “mind reader,” both online. In-person socializing was replaced by an activity called “speed friending” where students rotated through breakout rooms to get to know each other. “We’ve had to pivot quite a few times,” SESP senior Jacob Jordan, who serves on the board of directors for New Student and Family Programs, said. “But it’s been an interesting experience, and I think we’re pulling it off.” Other changes from previous years include breaking up the president’s convocation into sections and showing some asynchronous videos before getting into discussion groups for True Northwestern Dialogues. There were also Zoom panels geared toward a variety of affinity groups that students could attend.
Courtesy of Brandon Tang
Brandon Tang at virtual March Through the Arch. Students’ names were displayed one-by-one over a picture of the Weber Arch, a twist on the usual tradition for the virtual format.
Weinberg freshman Urja Patel said she felt Wildcat Welcome was well-organized, but the social aspect was challenging to create online. “I didn’t get to connect with my (peer adviser) group as much as I probably would have if it was in-person,”
Patel said. Weinberg freshman Savir Maskara said he was disappointed by the lack of opportunity for spontaneity, and he found it difficult to meet people outside of his PA group. Instead of bumping into a familiar
face and asking them to meet up on campus, now he said coordinating meetings requires more planning. Weinberg senior Brandon Tang, who was a PA for the third time this year, said time zone differences also posed a challenge this year. While students could get an excused absence to avoid staying up, one of his students from Turkey once woke up in the middle of the night to join a call. “She was such a trooper,” Tang said. “She stayed awake until like 3 or 4 a.m. to attend a lot of these things because she just really loved interacting with our PA group.” When his PA group’s names showed up on the virtual March through the Arch, Tang went to the physical Arch on campus to “walk them through” while he was on the call. Some see silver linings to the online format. Tang said the less frequent programming helped freshmen avoid feeling overwhelmed. Jordan added that it’s easier to learn people’s names when they’re “right in that little box on the screen.” “We’ve been very pleasantly surprised by how eager and engaged the new students (are),” Jordan said. “And I think that’s a testament to how resilient the PAs have been in being there for them and giving them space to meet other new students, never wavering or giving up on this process.” hannahfeuer2023@u.northwestern.edu
NU named 9th best university second year in a row By ISABELLE SARRAF
daily senior staffer @isabellesarraf
Northwestern was named the 9th best university in the nation according to the U.S. News & World Report’s annual rankings, breaking its three-year upward streak. NU is tied for the No. 9 spot with Johns Hopkins University and the California Institute of Technology. This puts NU one spot above Duke University and one below the University of Pennsylvania. This is the second year in a row NU has ranked in 9th place, and the third year the University landed in the top 10 since 2002.
According to a news release, NU is also one of only four top 10 universities in the U.S. also ranked in the top 20 of each of its five graduate schools. NU has moved up steadily in the ranks in recent years, “thanks to its dedication to promoting student excellence” and its status as a top-tier research university, the release said. “Universities play a pivotal role in society, especially in times of crisis such as we are experiencing now,” Provost Kathleen Hagerty said in the release. “We are proud of the role each member of our community plays in addressing today’s biggest challenges.” NU researchers were awarded 12 Rapid Response Research grants by the National Science Foundation — more than any other top 10 university, according to the release. These grants
are used for a wide range of research related to the pandemic, including funding the development of a wearable device that detects early signs of COVID-19. The pandemic did not impact the data that schools submitted, according to U.S. News, which is from fall 2019 and earlier. To account for the disruption to higher education, U.S. News wrote it reintroduced test-blind schools into the rankings and placed “reduced emphasis” in the rankings on admissions and alumni giving data. This year, U.S. News introduced a category of undergraduate computer science programs, where NU ranked 25th — tied with Duke, the University of Chicago, Brown University, the University of Southern California and the University of
California, Irvine. U.S. News also ranked NU in the top 15th for Best Value Schools and Best Undergraduate Engineering Program. The undergraduate engineering ranking was based on peer assessment surveys, University spokesperson Jon Yates told The Daily, meaning they’re based solely on the judgment of deans and senior faculty at peer institutions. “While the University experience looks a bit different this year, we are confident that our community will be able to continue the excellent work and learning that makes Northwestern one of the leading research universities in the world,” Hagerty said in the release. isabellesarraf2022@u.northwestern.edu
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6 NEWS | THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2020
August's Top Stories: Campus Edition By Isabelle Sarraf, Campus Editor
Abolish Greek Life movement prompts changes Northwestern’s Panhellenic Association, which governs 11 chapters, released a statement acknowledging its harmful history and current movement to abolish Greek life on campus. The statement was written in July and approved for release after a majority vote of PHA chapter delegates last week. “PHA has failed its purpose of serving as an inclusive space meant to empower all women and nonbinary people, and has continuously reaffirmed the patriarchy, binary gender roles, and heteronormativity,” the statement read. The organization, PHA’s executive board wrote, has functioned as an oppressive institution that furthers exclusivity, classism, racism and homophobia in the community. The executive board added that all chapter houses sit on stolen land, and members reap the benefits of white supremacy and the prisonindustrial complex.
“It is our firm belief that the harm done by PHA, regardless of intent, is irreparable and no amount of apologies or reform can lead to restorative justice,” the executive board wrote. “We acknowledge that this has come at a time where societal pressure for abolition has spread across campuses. Our movement towards disbanding is long overdue.” Throughout the summer, the Abolish NU IFC/ PHA Greek Life Instagram account has facilitated communitywide discussion on the harm that the institution inflicts on members of the NU community. On Aug. 27, the NU chapter of Gamma Phi Beta was approved by its International Council to indefinitely suspend its charter following incident reports spurred by the Abolish Greek Life movement. Last week, the NU chapter of Chi Omega published an open letter to its national Supreme Governing Council calling for accountability after being prevented from
voting on the chapter’s dissolution. “Our obligation to our members’ wellbeings remains our utmost priority, particularly our BIPOC and non-binary members,” PHA wrote. “We are actively looking into disbanding in a way that won’t negatively impact our members, including students who have signed contracts and rely on Greek housing for its affordability relative to on-campus housing.” The executive board added that the action to abolish chapters is ultimately determined by members of each individual chapter, and the degree of autonomy that their national organizations provide them in these decisions. The executive board also wrote that it’s considering how decisions to disband amid the pandemic will affect kitchen and housing staff, as well as the Evans Scholars program who are employed by PHA organizations. PHA will also stop charging chapters for dues that
go toward recruitment, as those are the only dues that the organization has direct discretion over. “When we say abolish Greek life, we have no intention of leaving a space that allows it to return,” the executive board wrote. “Therefore, we are looking into ways that would prevent national Greek chapters from coming to campus to ‘recolonize.’” In order to avoid these organizations going “underground,” PHA urged NU in the statement to take action to protect its students by preventing such groups from forming and abolish current organizations that “systematically perpetuate harm.” The executive board highlighted the need for the University to prioritize black students’ demands, because of the administration’s “consistent enablement of systems of oppressions on campus.” PHA’s statement pointed to the 52 years since the Bursar’s Office takeover, three months since NU Community Not Cops’ petition and how the University has yet to
Dining workers denied protections amid mass layoffs Compass Group, Northwestern’s food service provider, had the opportunity to extend health and safety protections to its dining workers before the start of the academic year but chose not to. This month, NU dining workers are left to face mass layoffs and “unfair” attendance policies amid a pandemic. Since March, hundreds of NU dining and hospitality workers have been laid off. While administrators announced plans to provide regular compensation and benefits to dining workers during Spring Quarter in partnership with Compass, these workers had not received any payment by June. Compass had agreed to a proposal in March to provide certain health and safety protections to workers, but those expired Aug. 31. On Friday, the University announced that Compass plans to lay off about another 100 staff members who had been recalled from layoffs to return this fall. The layoffs, which will be permanent on Sept. 20, come after the University announced some dining hall closures this fall due to fewer students being brought on campus than originally anticipated. “We regret that Compass must let go of workers who have been an important part of our campus community, and we look forward to a day when we can more fully staff our dining halls and retail outlets,” University spokesperson Jon Yates said. Over the summer, UNITE HERE Local 1, the union representing subcontracted Compass dining and hospitality workers, had circulated a petition asking Compass to commit to an agreement about COVID-19 worker safety before the start of the academic year. Noah Carson-Nelson, lead research analyst for the union, said as of Sept. 1, Compass is no longer paying for laid-off workers’ health insurance. Just as some NU dining workers are returning to their jobs for the start of the academic year, CarsonNelson said the loss of these protections mean workers may now be docked attendance points or face verbal disciplines for COVID-19 related absences. “People are putting themselves and their families at risk to serve (the) campus and should be compensated for doing so,” Carson-Nelson said. “A hazard pay, or a COVID pay, is the bare minimum.” If a worker were to come into contact with someone who tested positive for COVID-19 or is required to quarantine for two weeks by a medical professional or government authority, Carson-Nelson said quarantine pay would guarantee normal wages for those two weeks. Hazard pay is an increased wage for those
Illustration by Carly Schulman
NU dining workers were recently denied an extension of COVID-19 health and safety protections.
working during this time, they said, because there are increased costs and risks associated with working during the pandemic. Another protection that expired on Sept. 1 is a voluntary layoff, or the ability to not come back to work if a worker doesn’t feel safe and still maintains seniority. Veronica Reyes, an employee in the Foster-Walker Complex C-store, has worked at NU for 10 years. On Friday morning, she said she still hadn’t heard from the Office of Human Resources whether the rumored — and later confirmed — dining staff layoffs would cost her job. As of Friday afternoon, she and many of her coworkers’ employment statuses were still unclear. Since then, the University announced that FosterWalker Complex’s dining halls will be closed for all of Fall Quarter. “It’s very scary,” Reyes said. “My coworkers are very worried, especially (because) we don’t know if they’re going to take away our insurance.” Ever since the government’s $600 unemployment checks ended and $1200 stimulus checks ran out, Reyes said it’s been very hard for her and her coworkers to keep up with rent, bills, groceries and mortgages. She said the confusing — and sometimes conflicting — messaging from Compass and NU about reopening this fall has left many uncertain about the future.
A lot of her coworkers, Reyes said, have relied on Compass to contribute to their health insurance payments in recent months, especially the elderly and those with conditions — like cancer or diabetes — that put them at higher risk of getting COVID-19. “How can they do this during the pandemic to all of us?” Reyes said. “We have people working (since) the 70s, they’ve been loyal to Northwestern. And they’re doing this to them? All I want Northwestern to know is please tell Compass to support us with the insurance. That’s all we’re asking.” Since March, Students Organizing for Labor Rights have raised emergency funds through mutual aid to furloughed and laid-off workers, as well as staff affected by the lack of health precautions in the workplace amid the pandemic. As of last week, SOLR has raised over $80,000 distributed to over 200 workers in need who have either not received support from NU or can’t return to the “dangerous working environments” on campus. Medill sophomore Alex Harrison, a SOLR member, said the lack of communication from NU and Compass on which workers can return to their jobs and which will be let go has been a major problem. “We are going through something that has not been experienced in 100 years — there is no better
time to be dipping into (endowment) money than right now,” Harrison said. With Northwestern’s near-$10 billion endowment, Harrison said the University’s explanations to not tap into it — including that some funds are illiquid and hard to access for short-term use — only run for so long. At some point, he said, people start to look at the endowment and ask what is the point of having that much money if not to spend it on a “basic emergency response” during a pandemic and recession. Harrison said the University seems to frame the narrative around their finances as a zero-sum game, meaning if the administration is pushing for one thing, such as cutting tuition, then they have to take away from another — like laying off more staffers. There is no reason, Harrison said, that these interests need to be competing against each other when the University is as wealthy as it is. “If the purpose of your endowment is not to fund the University and its operations through a crisis like this, but the purpose is instead to just grow it indefinitely at all costs, you are not running a university, you are running a hedge fund — and that’s unacceptable,” Harrison said. Weinberg junior Abbey Zhu, also a SOLR member, said the University is “fully capable” of tapping further into the endowment than the current 6 percent rate. However, she said the administration’s priorities lie in maintaining and hoarding their wealth rather than caring for workers and low-income students. In May, University President Morton Schapiro said the idea that the University can take money from the endowment and use it for “whatever you want”is untrue. “The endowment was not established to fix budget shortfalls or manage crises, but rather to provide key resources needed to preserve our mission of academic excellence and research eminence far into the future,” Schapiro wrote. One of SOLR’s demands from a Letter to the Editor published in July, Zhu said, was for administrators to cut their salaries to that of a full-time service worker, which is about $30,000 a year. They can do that and still live comfortably, she said, because of how much wealth they’ve accumulated in their roles over the years. “There’s no reason that (administrators) should be making that much money; there’s no reason that they should not be using the resources and the money that they have to care for workers,” Zhu said. “For them to refuse to do so means that they don’t think their workers’ lives matter.”
Administrators close campus days before undergrad arrival In a Tuesday morning email, Northwestern administrators announced additional changes to Fall Quarter plans in response to student frustrations over Friday’s announcement to move first- and second-year undergraduate students online. Given student feedback, the University is now offering incoming new and transfer students the option to defer each quarter this year, effectively allowing them to defer up to the entire academic year. This would still guarantee students a spot in the 2021-22 academic year, the email said. The email also responded to student concern about housing insecurity, and announced that first- and second-year undergraduates who wish to cancel their housing contracts for the entire academic year can now do so without penalty. The deadline for upperclassmen to cancel their Fall Quarter on-campus housing contracts has also been extended. “We know some were upset with the timing of our
announcement – the fact that it was made just days before many of you had planned to move, and the fact that it came late in the day on a Friday,” the email read. “We agree the timing was far from ideal, but the pandemic has continually disrupted our best-laid plans.” Friday’s email had announced a 10 percent reduction in tuition for Fall Quarter, but students who receive financial aid would not see a change in their expected family contribution. In Tuesday’s email, the University clarified that if a family’s circumstances change and its needs increase, the student receiving financial aid can re-file an application and lower the expected family contribution. “If tuition goes up, the amount a family is asked to pay does not rise. If tuition goes down, the amount the family pays does not go down,” the email read. Financial aid recipients are also eligible for emergency funds from the University for any new expenses related to travel or technology. Funds will be
available beginning Sept. 9, according to a University spokesperson. There were no announced changes to NU’s plan to test students for COVID-19. The University reiterated that any student, regardless of their class year or housing status, could access testing through the Northwestern University Health Service after experiencing symptoms or being identified through contact tracing. However, surveillance testing will focus only on those planning to be on campus in the fall. Students living off-campus who are not approved to come to campus — first- and second-year students who did not receive an exemption — will not be tested recurringly. On-campus students will be tested weekly by Northwestern, and given the change in volume of students in residence halls, upperclassmen living offcampus are likely to be tested more frequently as well, said a University spokesperson. In the email, the University wrote that its goal has
been to return to campus “as fully, as quickly and as safely as possible.” However, by the end of last week, administrators wrote they were no longer hopeful that would still be the case in the fall for the entire community. On Friday morning, the Cook County Department of Health issued a warning for COVID-19 transmission. The rise in COVID-19 cases in suburban Cook County along with input from Northwestern Medicine and public health experts were the main reasons the University decided to switch course, the email read. As positive cases rose both in the area and at other universities who already started their academic years, the University wrote it realized the need to “radically change our plans.” “Our modeling indicated that if we allowed everyone to return to campus as planned, there would be a high probability that we would be forced to shut down the University within 7 to 10 days of move-in,” the email read.
THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN | NEWS 7
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2020
August's Top Stories: City Edition By Jacob Fulton, City Editor
D65 cancels in-person learning plans, goes remote Students in Evanston/Skokie School District 65, who were originally scheduled to return to the classroom beginning Sept. 29, will now remain remote for all of the first trimester, superintendent Devon Horton announced in a news release. All D65 students began the school year with remote classes on Aug. 27, with a planned month of entirely online instruction before students could return to the classroom. Parents were asked to select whether their child would participate in in-person classes over the summer, with the decision applying to the entire school year. However, after evaluating multiple factors, including Cook County’s risk level and Metrics for School Determination of Community Spread, the district decided the risk associated with bringing students back to school buildings was too high, according to the news release.
As of now, students who have opted into in-person learning will return to classrooms beginning on Nov. 16. Any changes for the remainder of the school year will be made on a trimester basis, and parents will be notified at least two weeks prior to the change. For parents who may have needed the childcare and support in-person instruction provided, the district will implement a limited amount of in-person events and enrichment activities. In the release, Horton said he is aware of the added burden this may place on families, and is committed to finding the best routes of support for families possible. “I am simply not willing to risk the health of any child or staff member — or a member of their families,” Horton said in the news release. “Our community has remained extremely vigilant in prioritizing health and safety. We ask that you continue to do so.”
Illustration by Carly Schulman
D65 students were scheduled to resume in-person instruction on Sept. 29 but will now do so on Nov. 16 at the earliest.
Local businesses close doors during ongoing recession Amid the pandemic, businesses in Evanston have struggled. Multiple notable retailers have contemplated closing their doors forever, with some of Evanston’s most recognizable names facing financial hardships. Whether you’re back on campus or not, here’s a status update on a few Evanston favorites and how they’ve fared since the beginning of COVID-19.
Unicorn Cafe closes after 29 years in Evanston
After nearly 30 years in Evanston, Unicorn Cafe has closed its doors permanently. Paul Zalmezak, Evanston’s economic development manager, told The Daily that Unicorn Cafe’s owner, Jessica Donnelly, confirmed the coffee shop’s closure on Monday. Zalmezak said Unicorn Cafe’s position as an Evanston mainstay was impacted by COVID-19 and the resulting recession, causing a decrease in customers. Previously, Donnelly told The Daily the cafe
was seeing significantly lower visitors amid the pandemic — in May, she estimated the store would see eight to 10 customers a day. Donnelly had to close Unicorn Cafe’s in-person seating at the beginning of the pandemic, giving employees multiple weeks off as a result. Unicorn Cafe, which was founded in 1991, joins a multitude of Evanston businesses facing closures in recent months, including large chain retailers and restaurants such as Barnes & Noble, Panera Bread and Andy’s Frozen Custard.
La Macchina Café closes doors permanently
La Macchina Café, located at 1620 Orrington Ave., has permanently closed its doors, Evanston’s economic development manager Paul Zalmezak confirmed to The Daily on Wednesday. The restaurant, which was sold to new owners at the end of last October, was initially founded in 2013. Original founder Marco Ferrarini told The
Daily in November his decision to sell was based on his hopes to return to his field of employment before he opened the restaurant — engineering. Co-owners Andrea Sappia and Emanuele Bianchi purchased the restaurant from Ferrarini and told The Daily in November that they planned to continue to build a community around the restaurant. Aside from serving food, La Macchina also hosted late night parties and events. The restaurant also showcased musicians in weekly music series like Romantic Music Thursdays. The closure means La Macchina joins the ranks of the nearly 70 Evanston businesses to close this year, 40 of which were related to the pandemic. Most recently, Unicorn Cafe, a downtown Evanston staple, also announced its closure.
Einstein Bros. reopens on Sept. 9
The franchise location was initially evaluating its reopening capabilities amid a
COVID-19-driven recession. In July, The Daily reported a decision had not yet been made on the bagel shop’s status, but in recent days, a sign appeared on the store’s exterior announcing its grand reopening. After previous uncertainty surrounding its reopening, Einstein Bros. Bagels in downtown Evanston announced it would reopen on Sept. 9. Recently, multiple downtown Evanston storefronts have closed, including Panera Bread, one of Einstein Bros. Bagels’ local competitors. Other notable retailers that closed their doors permanently after students left campus include Barnes & Noble and Andy’s Frozen Custard. Independent businesses have continued to struggle because of the pandemic, though they faced significant obstacles even before COVID19. Many have taken out Paycheck Protection Program loans to help bridge the financial gap and stay open.
Daily file photos by Brian Lee (right), Colin Boyle (bottom center), James Pollard (bottom right), Joshua Hoffman (left)
Stickers supporting Hilton Orrington hotel Rittenhouse spotted in city plans to take in students Stickers in support of Kyle Rittenhouse,an Illinois teenager charged with the homicide of two men at a protest, have been found in multiple locations across Evanston. Posts on social media began circulating Sunday after a photo of a sticker was shared on Facebook and Twitter. The sticker in the photograph was found in front of Ace Hardware, 1008 Davis St., and some commenters mentioned sightings of similar stickers elsewhere across the city, including multiple stickers on Maple Avenue. The stickers read, “White people no longer have the right to self defense. Pardon Kyle Rittenhouse.” Rittenhouse is a 17-year-old from Antioch,Ill.,which lies an hour north of Evanston,and has been accused of shooting three people during Tuesday night protests in Kenosha, Wisc. caused by the police shooting of Jacob Blake,an Evanston
native, in late August. Rittenhouse’s attorneys told media outlets Rittenhouse shot the protesters in self-defense.Investigators said he was part of a group that attended the Kenosha protest, reportedly to protect local businesses from damage. In recent days,Rittenhouse has received verbal and financial support from a variety of conservative individuals and groups,including President Donald Trump,who defended Rittenhouse during a Monday night press conference. The sticker was found the day after a Saturday event for the Blake family, held by multiple members of Evanston’s religious community. Yesterday, members of Evanston Fight for Black Lives gave Blake’s father,Jacob Blake Sr.,a check for $14,894.40 to help with medical costs and other expenses the family is facing.
The Hilton Orrington/Evanston has announced it will independently take reservations for long-term student housing for Northwestern University students. After University President Morton Schapiro announced on Aug. 28 the University would go partially remote, with first- and second-years not allowed back on campus, many students were left to find other housing solutions — including the Hilton Orrington/ Evanston. The hotel would charge a nightly fee instead of a flat fee for the quarter. Rooms are priced at $50 per person per night, with the minimum booking from Sept. 15 to Nov. 24.
As a result, the cost for the quarter would be at least $3,500, plus a $500 security deposit. Additionally, the hotel will provide plans for a laundry service and meal service for breakfast and lunch Monday through Friday. Previously, the Hilton Orrington/Evanston was in negotiations with an anonymous third party, but the deal was called off on Thursday due to “the evolving situation, as well as fear and pressure that students were feeling.” However, the third party said the hotel might have still been able to assist students with housing. The hotel has only announced plans to provide housing for Fall Quarter.
OPINION
Join the online conversation at www.dailynorthwestern.com Page 8
Monday, September 21, 2020
Individuals, corporations share burden of climate change DANI ZHANG
DAILY COLUMNIST
This fall, I am taking online courses from my hometown of Vancouver, and I cannot help but notice the level of environmental consciousness here. Environmental protests are held every year, Greta Thunberg rallied with us during a climate strike once, and a neighborhood of Zero Emissions Buildings is within walking distance from downtown. One of Vancouver’s most impressive environmental feats is its Zero Emissions Building Plan. All new buildings constructed after 2016 are required to be carbon neutral, and older buildings are retrofitted under more energy-efficient requirements and switched to renewable energy supplies. With 59% of Vancouver’s total emissions coming from buildings, this plan can drastically push Vancouver towards its goal of having 100% of its energy come from renewable sources by 2050. In Vancouver, the culture of environmental consciousness sticks out like a green thumb, and living in this city has caused me to think about an individual’s responsibility in this world. I believe there is a basic principle most people would agree
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
NU administration prioritized finances over student wellbeing
Just before 6 p.m. on Friday evening, President Morton Schapiro sent an email to the school community announcing significant changes for the upcoming Fall Quarter. Most notably, first- and second-year undergraduate students will no longer be allowed on campus or in residence halls, and they will take all of their fall courses remotely. Meanwhile, third- and fourth-year students will still be able to stay in dorms or off-campus residences with the exception of Greek housing. Those who had planned to live in fraternities or sororities will be forced to find some on- or off-campus solution. While I fully support Northwestern’s decision to reduce the on-campus population in order to mitigate the risks of the COVID-19 pandemic, this email just offers more evidence that the Northwestern administration makes decisions according to the University’s financial interests rather than the mental and physical wellbeing of the students. In an attempt to quell rising calls for reduced fees due to online learning and a lack of in-person activity offerings, the email announced a 10 percent decrease in undergraduate tuition. However, needbased financial aid will not change. “Those who receive need-based aid will not be impacted, as their aid will be reduced commensurate to tuition, and their expected family contribution will remain the same,” Schapiro wrote in the Friday email. The University recently told the Chicago Tribune that each student’s expected family contribution cannot change due to federal aid rules and regulations. However, while all higher learning institutions have faced this barrier to providing additional financial support during the pandemic, other universities have found various loopholes in the system to lower the costs associated with the upcoming academic
with when posed the question, “What is a good person like?” The judgement of whether a person has a positive influence depends on the moral standards of the beholder. But at the very least, I hope we can all agree our existence should not leave the world in a worse condition — a simple requirement all good, upstanding people can meet. Yet, that demand may be more difficult than we think. The average American has a carbon footprint of 16 tons and produces an average of 1,704 pounds of garbage per year. This is not to mention the invisible industrial practices behind the storefronts of brands, shops, and markets.
For many people, the idea of quitting Cheetos, bottled soda, and Costco prewrapped produce is absolutely preposterous. Pollution, deforestation, soil degradation — these are some of the repercussions of the capitalistic society in which we live with ease. Within this context, the simple principle of having no negative year. For example, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has offered a universal $5,000 grant to all undergraduates. As a result, NU had a clear opportunity to offer a universal reduction in fees to all students, regardless of socioeconomic status. But inexplicably, this tuition reduction essentially acts as a discount for wealthy students who pay the full cost of attendance, while anyone on financial aid will continue to pay the same tuition that they would under normal circumstances. Such clear preferential treatment for the upper class members of the NU community begs the question: What was University leadership thinking? Is the administration so out of touch with most students’ realities that they assumed we would not notice such blatant institutional inequality? The timing of Schapiro’s email has also created chaos and confusion for students and their families. The announcement came just nine days before new students were scheduled to begin moving into oncampus residences in Evanston. Other Chicago-area universities announced the closure of dorms several weeks earlier. Depaul moved to limit on-campus residences to only students with “exceptional circumstances” on August 12, and Loyola Chicago announced that it would not reopen dorms on August 6. The University had more than enough time to change its reopening plans, so what was Schapiro waiting for? Students and their families are hard pressed to find any other reason for the delay other than the University holding out hope to save a few bucks on room and board charges. On Tuesday morning, in response to widespread complaints about these issues, Schapiro released another statement to the student body regarding “additional changes and clarifications for fall quarter.” However, he failed to remedy the University’s decision-making throughout the pandemic. The only adjustment announced in the email provides more flexibility for new students to defer this entire academic year on a quarterly basis. Most disappointing, yet unsurprising, was that Schapiro doubled down on the 10 percent discount
impact on the world now seems monumental, nearly impossible for everyone. I must admit, the responsibility of environmental conservation is not simply a personal burden. A majority of it can only be attributed to societal structures. A research paper published in the Journal of Poverty found that poverty is one of the primary instigators of environmental degradation. Poverty restricts people’s options, knowledge acquisition, and resources, leaving impoverished communities with little choice but to make economically conservative decisions that degrade the environment. Other societal structures also prevail. Convenience is a major driver of personal habit, and society is structured so that it is convenient for an individual to generate waste, to be a meat eater, and to have a carbon footprint. It is commonplace for people to consume manufactured foods and beverages in single-use containers, drive cars that emit carbon dioxide, and shop for imported goods. In the 21st century, an emphasis on consumer convenience has allowed numerous businesses to thrive; companies such as Amazon, DoorDash, and Instacart provide in-home delivery to save more time and effort for the customer. It is clear to me that if we continue to take the path of least resistance, then good, upstanding people will keep harming the environment, and we will find it more and more difficult to abide by our
simple ideal. To incur no damage onto this world, we have to actively divert from the norm. For many people, the idea of quitting Cheetos, bottled soda, and Costco pre-wrapped produce is absolutely preposterous. I admit, I also enjoy products in plastic containers: milk, cosmetic products, and soap are just a few off the top of my head. I’m also guilty of ordering takeout and making online orders that deliver to my doorstep — especially given the epidemic. During COVID-19, even Lauren Singer, a noted environmentalist, decided that her health and safety are more important than remaining zero-waste and purchased numerous canned products and food in disposable plastics. The C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group calls Vancouver’s Zero Emissions Building Plan “the most stringent building codes in North America for a cold climate city” when it should have been called “normal”. We all have limitations, and while we’re all trying our best, I believe we can be even better, one Cheeto bag at a time. Dani Zhang is a Communications Junior. She can be contacted at danneszhang2022@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.
Photo courtesy of North by Northwestern
not applying universally to the expected family contribution for all students. “If tuition goes up, the amount a family is asked to pay does not rise. If tuition goes down, the amount the family pays does not go down,” Schapiro wrote in the email. But this pandemic has disproportionately impacted low-income families across the country, and this decision on tuition costs from the Northwestern administration reveals a fundamental failure to recognize the current financial hardships of students receiving aid. Ultimately, Northwestern’s poor handling of the pandemic and reopening efforts have only added to an already long list of institutional failures. In my time as a writer and editor for the student magazine, North by Northwestern, we published several features exposing the University’s underfunded and under-resourced mental health services. In “Referral to nowhere”, Rachel Hawley reported on NU’s underfunded and understaffed Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) program. At the time the article was printed, Northwestern boasted just one counseling staff member for every 1,390 students on its Evanston campus, a worse ratio compared to every peer
institution identified aside from Washington University in St. Louis. Over the past two years, the print magazine has also published features highlighting Northwestern’s confusing and often harmful medical leave policies, as well as the experiences of students facing severe mental health crises. But despite our efforts as a magazine staff to uncover these unfortunate truths, the University has done nothing in the last few years to show greater care for the mental health and safety of its students. Time and time again, senior administrators have failed to offer sufficient investment in resources that could truly make the school a more supportive and hopeful place for hardworking young people. Given this history of systemic issues and inequities at NU, it should come as no surprise to anyone that Schapiro and other university leaders have once again failed to live up to the high standards that the University demands of its own students. With an endowment of over $11 billion, NU has the resources to provide all the financial aid and mental health support that students deserve, but Northwestern continues to choose money instead. — Duncan Agnew
The Daily Northwestern Volume 142, Issue 1 Editor in Chief Marissa Martinez
Managing Editors Austin Benavides Sneha Dey Molly Lubbers Jacob Ohara
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR may be sent to 1999 Campus Drive, Evanston, IL 60208, via fax at 847-491-9905, via e-mail to opinion@dailynorthwestern.com or by dropping a letter in the box outside The Daily office. Letters have the following requirements: • Should be typed • Should be double-spaced • Should include the author’s name, signature, school, class and phone number. • Should be fewer than 400 words They will be checked for authenticity and may be edited for length, clarity, style and grammar.
Opinion Editor Ben Borrok
Assistant Opinion Editor Simona Fine
Letters, columns and cartoons contain the opinion of the authors, not Students Publishing Co. Inc. Submissions signed by more than three people must include at least one and no more than three names designated to represent the group. Editorials reflect the majority opinion of The Daily’s student editorial board and not the opinions of either Northwestern University or Students Publishing Co. Inc.
THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN | NEWS 9
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2020
TREE
SIGNU
“At the beginning of the year, when she passed away, it felt like people were moving on much more quickly than I was ready to,” Cusick said. “(It was) just a nice way to be like, ‘We haven’t forgotten about you. You’re an important part of this community still.’” After the tree was removed without notice, several students and alumni voiced their disappointment over Twitter. One was Allie Goulding (Medill ‘20), who earlier this year had hung origami cranes from the branches of the tree as part of a project for Art 390-0: Memory and the Monument. The former Daily staffer printed out all the emails she had ever received about a student or administrator’s death — including many whose names could not fit on the tree — and folded them into paper cranes as a tribute. “(The tree) was the only space we were granted to mourn our classmates. Northwestern only sends out those template emails, and that’s it,” Goulding said. “No memorial space, no monument, nothing. We deserve more than a template email and a hand-painted tree. Our classmates that died deserve more.” “I was a tour guide, so I would walk my tours past it and say, ‘These are the students who passed away and this is our way to remember them,’” Cusick said. “It made me feel like people were remembering them, and not letting their deaths get swept up in institutional nonsense.” According to Payne-Kirchmeier, staff from Facilities Management and the Division of Student Affairs will be collaborating with students to create a new memorial that can become “a permanent fixture on the Evanston campus.” Even though her time at NU has ended, Cusick still believes in the importance of having a permanent memorial to Qiu and other students who have died while at NU. “It would benefit the community and community healing to have that,” she said. “It makes me smile that even now… students are like, ‘Who is that? I might look them up,’ and keep that memory alive. I think it’s certainly important in recognizing the contributions these students made and didn’t get to make to Northwestern.”
culminated in a larger meeting where he presented a three-pillar plan for reform. This included anti-racist recruitment practices, removing financial obstacles and dismantling misogynistic practices. However even with a relatively progressive approach, Clement said many of Sigma Nu’s most active members still planned to deactivate. Without these members, he said he had no hope to accomplish meaningful reform and decided to deactivate as well. “A big part of why I chose to disaffiliate or depledge was because of the Black Lives Matter movement and my views on defunding and abolishing the police,” Communication sophomore McGuire Price, a former member of the chapter, said. “I realized it was hypocritical for me to think the frat can reform if I don’t believe that the police can reform.” Hecimovich, a McCormick and Communication junior, was vice president under Clement and has since taken over the presidency. But with the loss of their original leader, more members disaffiliated, leaving the chapter with about 25 members compared to about
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meganmunce2022@u.northwestern.edu
RETAIL
From page 1 shopping. To stay afloat, Barrett had to launch a GoFundMe to save her store — raising nearly $50,000. Since reopening in July, Barrett has also opened a second storefront for Bookends & Beginnings. But she said she’s unsure of what the holiday season will look like, and that’s when her store brings in a significant portion of its yearly revenue. Some other retailers have seen success because of their markets. The Spice House, a retailer with four locations in the Chicago and Milwaukee areas, was able to use its network to fulfill significant quantities of online orders, and has continued to do so after reopening its doors, Chasity Marini, the general manager of the retailer’s Evanston location, said. Marini said the stay at home order meant many families were cooking from home, so they needed to purchase spices — a trend she wasn’t expecting, as she furloughed a significant portion of the store’s employees before bringing them back. “There was a lot of fluctuation in the beginning,” Marini said. “And then when we did find this surge of internet orders, because we had the staff from all the stores, and because the stores weren’t having customers coming in, we acted like little fulfillment centers.” Since then, Marini said the store’s revenue has
100 last year. Ben Buettell (Weinberg ‘84, Kellogg ‘88) serves as chairman of the board of directors for Sigma Nu as well as vice president and treasurer of the house corporation. He also acts as the president of the Gamma Beta Foundation, which provides financial aid funds for Sigma Nu pledges. “I’m disappointed that some members have decided to end their membership, but each member must make his own personal decision, and I respect that,” Buettell said. “I believe fraternities and sororities have been, and can continue to be, important forums for dialogue on all relevant issues at Northwestern and elsewhere.” Some members, like Communication junior Alejandro Malavet, said they have benefited greatly from the fraternity’s financial support. Malavet said his decision to participate in the chapter was partly a financial one, as he was given more aid than he owed in fraternity dues. But after a turbulent summer, he also decided to disaffiliate. “I don’t really think any sort of amount of money would have kept me in the (organization),” Malavet said. “I just don’t really feel comfortable being associated with it anymore.” evened out, and remains at a sustainable level. As a result, she said she foresees The Spice House weathering the pandemic and coming out the other side relatively unscathed. However, fluctuating levels of COVID-19 cases in Evanston and across Illinois could mean a second stay at home order, which could force more stores out of business. Additionally, while federal aid helped some Evanston businesses in the early months of the pandemic, the city’s economic development manager, Paul Zalmezak, said the lack of a second stimulus package has left local stores to fend for themselves, with varying rates of success. He said he expects a second wave would be the breaking point for many businesses unless people change their spending habits. Despite his concerns, Zalmezak said it’s only natural for people to want to be together — and shop together. As a result, he said he believes the businesses who weather the pandemic will be able to bounce back somewhat quickly. “This digital thing we’re doing right now is only temporary,” Zalmezak said. “And when that happens, we’ll get back to business. The fundamentals were very strong going into the COVID pandemic, except for the retail world. And that was something that was happening, and we’ll adjust.” jacobfulton2023@u.northwestern.edu
That discomfort is also felt by those who remain in the frat, Hecimovich said. With the Abolish Greek Life movement happening at the same time as the pandemic, he said the situation is confusing and doesn’t know what comes next for the chapter. The Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life told The Daily that it is aware of students making decisions around their affiliations with Greek organizations due to the contexts of COVID-19 and Abolish Greek Life. FSL wrote that it is committed and open to engaging with the campus community to “provide clarity” and ensure people are “equipped to make informed decisions” about their chapter affiliations. Although Hecimovich said he is unsure if he will disaffiliate or not, he said it would be irresponsible to conduct recruitment at this time. He says while he and the continuing members remain, he wants to have as positive of an impact as possible. “It might be better if some of us can be here with the knowledge and the good intentions that we have to try to maintain some level of control over how we are impacting campus,” Hecimovich said. emmayarger2023@u.northwestern.edu
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the restaurant’s manager, Peter Jones, said safety has to be the first priority in decision making. At the time, they had spent a lot of time weighing their options and waited until early July until they felt that it would be safe, he said. “While it might bring less business to us for there to be fewer students around in the immediate present, we also need to be thinking about the long term,” Jones said. As an Evanston resident as well, Jones is particularly worriewd about the upcoming football season and the large tailgates that may result. Ken Proskie, a resident who lives in the immediate vicinity of Ryan Field, said he has not heard as many concerns about students returning from his neighbors, but he is still worried when looking at viral videos of parties at other schools that have remained open. “I do think that everybody, including students have to be responsible in a different way,” Proskie said. “If everybody does that, I don’t anticipate there to be a bigger outboard in the community about this.” samuelheller2022@u.northwestern.edu
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10 NEWS | THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2020
New dining options appear during Wildcat Wellness By HALEY FULLER
daily senior staffer @haley_fuller_
Despite initial student speculation, Northwestern will not be going viral on TikTok for serving moldy food during Wildcat Wellness. However, dining during and after the first week of school will look very different from last year. As part of Wildcat Wellness, students on campus order lunch and dinner for each day prior to their arrival, choosing from a menu with four options for each meal. The options are aligned with various stations of the dining halls, including Pure Eats, Rooted, Comfort and Kosher, and each contains a vegetable, side and main dish, according to the Northwestern Dining website. Meal pick-up is between 12 to 2 p.m. and 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. in dorm lobbies. Students also receive breakfast bags, snacks and water with fruit, Nutri-Grain bars and Pop-Tarts, and they could grab new bags from their lobby when they need to replenish. Students in quarantine and isolation housing will receive both a hot and a cold meal midday and have access to microwaves and fridges to preserve and heat their food. McCormick junior Zachary Vexler said the food quality is no different than the “typical fare” at the dining halls. His one complaint is the lack of flexibility, but he said he understands that making each meal completely customizable would make it too complicated. “I would prefer to have a better choice of the options, because sometimes I prefer the entree for one but the vegetable side on the other would be better,” Vexler said. “There’s no mixing and matching, and I totally understand why they can’t do that just because it would be like a logistical nightmare.”
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Tables and chairs are spaced six feet apart in preparation for in-person dining at Northwestern.
After videos of moldy and insufficient meals at New York University and other universities went viral on TikTok, students, including Communication sophomore transfer Aerin Gelblum, expressed concerns about what meals would be like when they came to NU. “I was honestly a little nervous because I had seen how the food was being handled at NYU, and people were just getting like an apple and some chips,” Gelblum said. “But it’s much better than that. It’s warm, which is nice. And everyone I’ve interacted with who brought the food has been super friendly.”
Starting on Sept. 21, the Allison and Sargent dining halls, Lisa’s Cafe, Viet Nom Nom (formerly home to Asiana Foodville) and MOD Pizza will open for normal operating hours and indoor seating, in addition to The Market at Norris University Center and Starbucks, which opened on Monday. The open access meal plan has remained the same with the exception of three additional meal exchanges per week rather than two. Students are asked to make reservations through the Dine on Campus app for Allison and Sargent during peak meal times, but
The Weekly. What is the status of Greek life at Northwestern? How have dining workers been affected by the reduction of on-campus housing? Why did the Big Ten reverse their decision to postpone the football season until spring? And how has Evanston’s economy fared in the pandemic?
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seating is ultimately first-come, first-serve and reservations won’t guarantee seating. The Boost mobile ordering app is also available and will allow students to order a meal for a specific time. People who feel uncomfortable entering the serving area will be able to avoid the lines. According to an email from Georgene Sardis, the director of marketing for Compass at Northwestern, Boost will be available at most dining halls and retail locations. Students can use meal swipes at the dining halls and meal exchanges or dining dollars at retail locations. Everyone with a meal plan will be provided with a reusable OZZI container and can exchange it for a clean one for each meal, while other to-go packaging will be utilized for mobile orders and those without a reusable container. Depending on how the transition to in-person dining goes, there may be a transition from to-go containers to standard plates and silverware. According to an email from Sardis, NU Dining “has instilled social distancing measures, including fewer guests per table, (and) ensuring six foot spacing signs in all food lines, limiting capacity in dining venues… students are expected to follow University guidelines as outlined on the University’s COVID-19 site.” Staff will be provided with personal protective equipment such as masks and gloves while “increased handwashing and enhanced sanitation practices” will be implemented and plexiguards installed to protect cashiers. Despite the precautions, however, eating inside at a dining hall during the pandemic still feels risky for some. “I would absolutely not be comfortable eating there,” Vexler said. “I would not feel comfortable eating like in a room with hundreds of other people not wearing masks.” haleyfuller2022@u.northwestern.edu
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THE DAILY NORTHWESTERN | NEWS 11
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2020
Wildside members miss NU gameday excitement By SOPHIA SCANLAN
daily senior staffer @sophia_scanlan
Fall is usually a busy time for Northwestern Wildside. At this point, the organization would be ramping up for the fall sports season — figuring out giveaways, publicizing games around campus and recruiting members at the New Student Tailgate during Wildcat Welcome. During the season, members could be found cheering on the Wildcats across campus, whether that’s hyping up the student section at Ryan Field or starting a chant at Lanny and Sharon Martin Stadium. Other members handed out free NU merchandise outside the gates of sporting venues. But given the uncertain status of all fall sports and the absence of large in-person gatherings, Wildside
will look different this year. “It’s just completely not what anyone expected, but we’re trying to come up with creative ways to keep everybody engaged,” Wildside president and Weinberg senior Garrett Pollack said. “(We’re) just keeping everyone excited for if — when — sports do return this quarter, it’s still on everyone’s mind.” Last spring, after the pandemic canceled the spring sports season, Wildside tried to keep fans involved by increasing its social media presence and hosting contests with prizes from the athletics department. The organization will try to host similar contests this quarter and offer a few other activities, like watch parties of old Cats games and virtual interactions with players or coaches. Wildside will also spend some of the fall trying to introduce itself to new students, something that normally happens with the hot dog eating contest the club has organized in recent years at the New
Student Tailgate. “Without having that presence to be able to act and get our name out there,” Pollack said, “We’re not entirely sure what we’re going to do to replace that.” SESP sophomore Nala Bishop, who joined Wildside last year, said she enjoys the sense of community in the organization and how all the members want to build school spirit and increase student attendance at games. A moment that illustrated that community feel to Bishop took place last year at a men’s basketball game while she passed out wrapped Christmas gift giveaways. She had fun chatting with fellow Wildside members while NU fans stopped by, she said. “I just like to talk to people like that and have a fun time,” Bishop said. “It really just reminded me why I really like Wildside.” Bishop added that she hopes the sense of
community and the high student participation continues, even while the organization cannot be together physically. Weinberg senior Deirdre Pethokoukis, the cochair of the operations committee — a committee tasked with handing out giveaways and dealing with game day happenings — said she, too, has enjoyed the sense of community on Wildside the past four years. Though she’s sad she won’t be watching NU games from the student section for her final fall season, Pethokoukis said everyone’s health is the priority. “We’re all a little disappointed that football... and all the other sports aren’t going to be what we thought,” she said. “If we somehow do make our way back in person, (we’ll) just try our best to do what we usually do, but in a safe way.” sophiascanlan2022@u.northwestern.edu
CAPTURED Last September, Northwestern athletes were already in the midst of their fall seasons, playing in front of crowds donning the Wildcat purple and white. Men and women’s soccer and field hockey battled opponents on the shores of Lake Michigan, volleyball spiked shots onto the court at Welsh-Ryan Arena, and football dueled Big Ten foes on the gridiron at Ryan Field. And then COVID-19 happened. For the last six months, these venues have all
sat empty with no fans, no athletes and no Willie the Wildcat. But on Wednesday morning, the Big Ten announced a return to football in late October, with decisions on other fall sports coming later in the week. So before any team takes its home field, Daily senior staffer Joshua Hoffman captured what no sports at NU and in Evanston looks like. — Joshua Hoffman
Lakeside Field, Martin Stadium, and Ryan Field all have sat lifeless since the pandemic began. Besides football, it is unclear as to when those other venues might see more action soon.
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SPORTS
ON THE RECORD
(Daily testing) was a decision that was made and not with a lot of dialogue and not with an awful lot of reflection on what that would mean. In the end, this is something that the Big Ten is — Jim Phillips, athletic director administering.
@DailyNU_Sports
Monday, September 21, 2020
FOOTBALL
BIG CHANGE
How the Big Ten’s decision to return impacts Northwestern’s athletes By DREW SCHOTT, GREG SVIRNOVSKIY, PETER WARREN daily senior staffers @dschott328, @GSvirnovskiy, @thepeterwarren
After 36 days of postponement, the Big Ten Council of Presidents and Chancellors (COP/C) announced Wednesday its decision for football to return next month. Immediately after the move was announced, Northwestern president and COP/C chair Morton Schapiro and Northwestern athletic director Jim Phillips participated in a press conference with other key personnel, including Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren. Later in the day, Phillips joined coach Pat Fitzgerald and Dr. Jeff Mjaanes, Northwestern’s director of sports medicine and head team physician, for a second press conference. Here’s a list of some important details regarding how today’s decisions affect the Wildcats. Teams will receive daily testing for COVID-19 All student-athletes, coaches and trainers will receive daily antigen testing before each practice and game, with a University-appointed Chief Infection Officer sharing each program’s data with the conference.
“The feeling was that if we could play football safely and there was a way the Big Ten was going to provide,” Schapiro said, “I don’t see any reason why you don’t want to go forward.”
Daily antigen testing will begin as soon as possible, but no later than Sept. 30. If a student-athlete tests positive for COVID-19 through a point-of-contact test, they will receive a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) examination to confirm the positive result. Ohio State head team physician James Borchers said he is confident that daily antigen testing will prevent the spread of COVID-19 because the tests’ turnaround times, as well as confirmatory PCR testing, will allow programs to rapidly confirm infected individuals. “We have been very comfortable with the idea that we’ll be able to provide daily rapid testing,” Borchers said. “That will give us great surveillance of our student-athletes and those individuals involved in those competitions (such as) coaches and staff and be able to respond to that with confirmatory molecular testing and PCR testing so we can quickly remove individuals that may be at risk of infecting someone else.” Mjaanes said the antigen testing technology can detect outbreaks before they happen. It detects proteins of the virus at levels thought to be below the level of infectivity. “So basically you’re catching somebody with a positive before they are even contagious,” Mjaanes said. “That’s a huge breakthrough in this. If we can do that on a daily basis, we can identify people before they’re even infectious. We can remove people and really maintain the sanctity and the health of the team.” Mjaanes said that high levels of
Illustration by Carly Schulman
antigen testing “almost eliminate” the need for contact tracing — though Big Ten institutions are still focusing on improving their tracking capabilities. What the decision means for the general campus community Schapiro was asked whether he thought it was appropriate to restart the Big Ten football season while Northwestern’s campus remains closed to freshmen and sophomores. He responded that there was no reason to prevent the fall football season from happening if experts believed it could be done safely. “The feeling was that if we could play football safely and there was a way the Big Ten was going to provide, to meet the costs of daily testing and we were able to do it,” Schapiro said, “I don’t see any reason why you don’t want to go forward.” In a press conference later Wednesday, Maryland athletic director Damon Evans told the media that each Big Ten school was to cover the cost of its own COVID-19 testing programs. Evans estimated that it would cost each school between $700,000 and $1 million. When asked what he would say to non-athletes in the Northwestern community who do have the possibility to be tested at such a frequent rate, Phillips said he did not have an answer. “That was a decision that was made and not with a lot of dialogue and not with an awful lot of reflection on what that would mean,” Phillips said. “In the end, this is something that the Big Ten is administering.” Students who test positive will undergo cardiac examination All student-athletes who test positive will take part in cardiac testing that includes an echocardiogram and MRI scan. These student-athletes have to be cleared by a Universitydesignated cardiologist to return to the field and can resume competition a minimum of 21 days after testing
positive for COVID-19. Concerns about the cardiac effects of COVID-19 arose earlier this summer when a number of Big Ten athletes were found to have developed symptoms of myocarditis — a rare condition that causes inflammation of the heart muscle — after testing positive for the virus. Mjaanes said every school in the conference now has access to cardiac MRI technology to help test athletes for myocarditis.
“At the very beginning, the reason to postpone was based on health and safety,” Mjaanes said. “And in the end, the reason to resume is again based on health and safety.”
“At the very beginning, the reason to postpone was based on health and safety,” Mjaanes said. “And in the end, the reason to resume is again based on health and safety.” If a team’s positivity rate is above five percent and a population’s rate — the number of positive individuals divided by the total population at risk — is above 7.5 percent, the program must stop practice and competition for a minimum of seven days. Schapiro said there was “almost virtually no chance” the conference could safely start competition five weeks ago, adding medical advances in understanding the pandemic and myocarditis gave him confidence to vote yes. “When the facts change, our minds change,” Schapiro said. The Big Ten will play nine-game
schedule Each team in the Big Ten will play eight conference regular-season games starting the weekend of Oct. 23. The schedule is expected to be announced in the coming days. After each program plays eight games, the teams with the best records in the East and West Divisions will meet in the Big Ten Championship Game the weekend of Dec. 18. That same weekend, teams in the same slot in each division’s standings will face off. Phillips, who chaired the Big Ten’s subcommittee on television, said his group has been in communication over the last month with various broadcast partners to get on the same page for television scheduling. Additionally, he said the conference’s schedule will allow teams to participate in the College Football Playoff (CFP) and traditional bowl games. “To play a regular season in a meaningful way, to weave it in with our partners at Fox and ESPN, to do it under the lights that our student-athletes so enjoy doing and to have it culminate at the end of the year with a chance to play in the CFP and a chance to play in traditional bowl games is incredibly exciting,” Phillips said. Teams can begin practice immediately Fitzgerald said he told the team of the news during its morning lift. With practices allowed to start right away, Fitzgerald said he and his staff had to make some tweaks to their schedule. “We had a schedule through Friday,” Fitzgerald said. “We’re going to adjust that now for tomorrow and Friday, do a little bit more installation and a little bit more on the field. Take a couple days off to kind of recover and then get really back into it next week with a six-days-a-week preparation.” The conference is still discussing how many hours teams should practice. Fitzgerald added that he feels
confident that the team will be able to be ready for the season to start in October. “We really took maybe about a week off between the postponement and starting workouts back,” Fitzgerald said. “We gave our guys a chance to go home and some guys came back this week. But they were all working out either here or working out at home with getting plans from our strength staff.” No fans allowed at Big Ten contests There will be no public sale of tickets for Big Ten games. Penn State athletic director Sandy Barbour told the media the Big Ten will look at each campus’ situation to try and find seating for the families of athletes and program staff members at both home and away games. Updates on other sports coming soon All fall sports, in addition to football, will have access to the Big Ten’s comprehensive testing efforts, Warren said. The Big Ten’s statement this morning said that information about the start of other fall sports, as well as winter sports that start in the fall such as men’s and women’s basketball, “will be announced shortly.” Also on Wednesday, the NCAA’s Division I Council approved a Nov. 25 start date for the men’s and women’s college basketball seasons. Full practices for those two sports are permitted to begin on Oct. 14. Phillips said that he hopes the decision on the remaining fall sports will be made sooner rather than later. “Within a period of, I would hope a few days, if not into next week,” Phillips said. “We have to get our arms around what we’re going to do with the fall sports. But that decision from the Big Ten is forthcoming.” drewschott2023@u.northwestern.edu gregorysvirnovskiy2022@u.northwestern.edu peterwarren2021@u.northwestern.edu