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The Daily Northwestern DAILYNORTHWESTERN.COM
Thursday, April 16, 2015
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Activists rally for affordable city housing By Marissa page
the daily northwestern @marissahpage
Activists in Evanston looking to raise the minimum wage say the lack of affordable housing in the city presents an equally important problem. Residents joined in rallies across Chicago on Wednesday in protesting the Illinois minimum wage as part of a nationwide campaign called Fight for
$15. Illinois’ minimum wage is currently $8.25 an hour, just over half of what Fight for $15 says is a fair base salary. Activists from Connections for the Homeless, an Evanston nonprofit that seeks to improve life for homeless individuals, attended Wednesday’s protests. “We’re trying to inspire more advocacy related to Fight for $15 in Evanston,” said Sue Loellbach, Connections’ director of development. Loellbach said the organization has
also been supporting other socioeconomic inequality issues in the city. It has focused on engaging community members that are affected by such problems, Loellbach said, as well as backing proposed city ordinances related to affordable housing. While minimum wage is important, Loellbach said, she emphasized affordable housing as the more pressing issue. “There’s a lot of people (in Evanston) wanting the minimum wage to raise,” Loellbach said. “For us, affordable housing is also a big issue.”
City Council raised the possibility in late March of implementing a citywide ordinance that would require a certain amount of units for affordable housing in residential buildings. The debate came following criticism from aldermen over the lack of housing downtown available to low- and middle-income residents. Nonetheless, the minimum wage resonated with Evanston residents as an issue to rally around. The Fight for $15 campaign — which began in November 2012 when fast food
workers in New York walked away from their jobs to protest low salaries — has since garnered widespread support. Some Evanston residents who protested Wednesday are involved in the Illinois Indiana Regional Organizing Network, which works to organize groups in the two states around public policy issues. Rose Simon-Smith, the organizer of Evanston’s IIRON campaign, said the » See FIGHT, page 7
Author talks beauty at Veritas Forum By Mariana alfaro
the daily northwestern @marianaa_alfaro
Sean Su/Daily Senior Staffer
Swearing in Noah Star is sworn as the new Associated Student Government president by outgoing President Julia Watson at Senate on Wednesday. Star’s running mate, Christina Kim, was also sworn in as ASG’s executive vice president.
Star, Kim sworn in at Senate
By shane mckeon
the daily northwestern @shane_mckeon
Northwestern students officially have a new student body president. Weinberg junior Noah Star was sworn in as Associated Student Government president at its Senate meeting Wednesday, succeeding Weinberg senior Julia Watson. Star and his running mate, Christina Kim, were elected with 60 percent of the vote Friday, defeating Medill junior Haley Hinkle and SESP junior Chris Harlow. Kim, a McCormick junior, was sworn in as executive vice president, replacing Weinberg senior Erik Zorn. Watson and Zorn both gave short farewell addresses, reflecting on their time in ASG. Watson said she stuck with ASG to fight for “justice and equality” and that
Feinberg, SESP receive $10.5 million donation
Two Northwestern alumni have donated millions to the Feinberg School of Medicine to bolster meritbased scholarships. The majority of the $10.5 million gift from Muneer Satter (Weinberg ‘83) and Kristen Hertel (SESP ‘86) will go toward the Satter Foundation
it’s sometimes difficult to satisfy everyone in those pursuits. “I can name only a few projects — therapy dogs being one of them — where everyone is happy at the end of the day,” she said. “As a member of ASG, you’ll never succeed if your ultimate goal is to please everyone.” Zorn said he largely measures his success in ASG in terms of the connections he’s built. “The purpose of ASG, and of life in general, should not just be about accomplishing stuff,” Zorn said. “You shouldn’t find value in experiences just from what you’ve accomplished, but instead in the people you work with and the relationships that you form.” Later, ASG’s Mental Health Working Group presented some preliminary findings. The group said students reported a general disapproval of Counseling and Psychological Services. Harlow, ASG’s vice president for student life, led the working group
and spoke about its findings. He said the group interviewed students from specific cross-sections of the student body, including international students, students of color and students who took a leave of absence. He said students reported a stigma against accessing mental health resources and a lack of diversity among CAPS employees. The working group will release a more substantial report near the end of Spring Quarter, which will include recommendations to improve the mental health climate on campus. Senate debated for a half hour which students should comprise the B-Status Finances Committee. The committee, which oversees the allocation of ASG funds to student groups that receive only a few hundred dollars per quarter, previously required six of its 14 members to be senators.
Scholarship program. The program gives $40,000 per year to three firstyear students, an amount that they continue to receive through their third year at Feinberg. Since the scholarship was started in 2008, 18 graduate students have been provided with tuition support. “Kristen and I are committed to the goal of assuring a Northwestern education to promising future physicians and medical scientists,” Satter said in a news release. “These scholarships are investments that will
ultimately benefit medical science and humanity.” The rest of the gift will support initiatives in the School of Education and Social Policy, including Project EXCITE, which provides gifted minority students in Evanston schools with supplementary education in math and science. The gift is part of NU’s $3.75 billion “We Will” campaign that launched in March 2014.
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Pulitzer Prize-winning author Marilynne Robinson explored the ways humans respond to the universe’s beauty through theology and science Wednesday before a packed audience in Ryan Auditorium at this year’s The Veritas Forum. The Veritas Forum, a group of several Christian campus ministries, hosts a speaker event each year followed by a Q&A session and discussion groups. The speaker focuses on a topic of relevance for the Christian community. During her speech, Robinson discussed the multiple ways societies interpret beauty, not only in humans but universally. She described how sometimes humans struggle to find an exact definition of what they think is beautiful because there are many standards of beauty, both within and outside the realm of spirituality. “The idea of beauty varies from one receiver to the next, one decade to the next, one culture to the next,” she said. However, she said humans have the capability to acknowledge beauty, even if it doesn’t fit their own definitions. “Sometimes, with a little instruction, we recognize varieties of beauty we could never otherwise approximate or even imagine,” she said. “If existence were designed to immerse us into the
world, to charm and engage us, what could be better suited to accomplishing this than beauty, with its inexhaustible openness to variation?” Robinson said science and theology agree that reality captures a series of moments that cannot be repeated and that this causes beauty in our world. She cited the scientific theory that believes any number of universes are possible. “God’s freedom is expressed in what is usually called miracles, but I think the world and human experience itself should be valued as miraculous as well,” she said. Following her speech, Robinson sat down with University of Pennsylvania law professor David Skeel, who interviewed her about her novels, writing process and ideology. Robinson’s novel “Gilead,” which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2005, chronicles the story of a dying congregationalist pastor and sparked a debate on Christian multiculturalism and the representation of Calvinism and Puritans in literature and society. During the interview, Robinson said her life has not changed much since she gained international fame through her novels and that she remains “a solitary creature surrounded by many books.” Robinson said Christianity has been a large part of her life for as long as she can remember. “I’ve always been fascinated by the » See BEAUTY, page 7
» See senate, page 7
— Tyler Pager
Sylvana Caruso/The Daily Northwestern
Beautiful Universe Author Marilynne Robinson and University of Pennsylvania professor David Skeel discuss beauty, science, religion and the writing process Wednesday. Robinson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author, spoke at this year’s The Veritas Forum.
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