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The Daily Northwestern DAILYNORTHWESTERN.COM
Thursday, May 28, 2015
Find us online @thedailynu
Deru: a tradition in distress By lydia ramsey
daily senior staffer @lydiaramsey125
When Heather Menefee joined a secret honors organization, she went in with no intention of keeping her membership private. So on March 6, the Weinberg senior posted a public Facebook status detailing her experience in Deru, a secret honors society composed of 22 members of Northwestern’s senior class. The post listed three changes Menefee said the group agreed to make in meetings: making the collection of Deru documents in the University Archives public, forgoing honors for seniors and connecting with students rather than administrators. So far, none of the agreements have come to complete fruition. Deru aims to provide a space for student leaders across campus to talk about different issues affecting their student organizations and to communicate with administrators. During Winter Quarter, members raised concerns about that purpose, as well as the group’s lack of transparency and representation of the NU community. These meetings in the winter prompted Menefee to publicly voice her complaints about the group, including suggesting Deru be dissolved. None of the students who spoke with The Daily for this article said they had any knowledge of plans to recruit the next class, even as Spring Quarter winds down. Several members of the group denied requests for comment. There has been no discussion among all 22 members about recruitment. Members say if recruitment is happening, it is in a much different way than in year’s past. An 120-year-old tradition Founded in 1896, Deru is on its 119th class. Because the group has entirely new membership each year, each class is open to interpret its own mission. “You’re basically just put into the organization, told you can do with it as you wish, whether it’s end it or change the way you go about whatever,” said Liliana Bonilla, a current Deru member and Weinberg senior. “Everything was in our hands.” It began as a men’s honors society and since then has admitted women and cycled through phases of being
public and private, most recently returning to secrecy around 2000. The group functions without much of a hierarchy: There’s generally a facilitator or two who run the meetings and a president and treasurer who are given those titles mainly for the purpose of accessing a Student Organization Finance Office account. In conversations with The Daily, alumni pointed to successful campuswide events hosted in part by Deru as signs of its benefits — anything from major donations to new campus buildings, to a forum on race organized after a blackface incident in 2009. Sofia Sami (Weinberg ‘14), a member of Deru’s 118th class, said the group is indicative of larger campus issues. She said Deru’s foundation on white male privilege is problematic, and the group serves as a window into the issues caused by the University’s white, male origins. “At any point when Deru is looked at, Deru shouldn’t be considered in any way shape or form an isolated example,” Sami said. “Because it’s so old, 120 years now, and because it literally lives on tradition, it’s like a preserved relic of Northwestern’s past that doesn’t have marketing schemes built on top of it.” A year in review After a year of negative experiences leading the group as a facilitator, Sami and the rest of her class began recruiting the next Deru class. Instead of using her energy to find a way to change the group that year, Sami instead advocated for rising seniors who could work to drastically transform the group into a more accessible space. But during recruitment, Sami said she found herself frustrated with conversations that were going on with other Deru members. She recounted one late night conversation in which a Latino member of the group was asked to pick the best candidate out of three Latino students. “I was like, that was A-B-C racism right there,” she said. “That happened over and over again: ‘Well this person who protests and this person who protests seems like the same person.’ I’m like, ‘Oh that’s fascinating, all of these 18 white students in the group, they all seem like the same person too. Should we kick » See deru, page 6
Sydney Lindsey/The Daily Northwestern
let’s talk Communication senior Sean Earley, a member of the A-status finances committee, speaks to Senate at its meeting Wednesday.
ASG calls for more student say By shane mckeon
the daily northwestern @Shane_McKeon
ASG’s president and executive vice president launched a campaign at Wednesday’s Senate meeting to pressure Provost Daniel Linzer to include more students in a faculty task force examining the undergraduate academic experience. The three-hour meeting began with Associated Student Government President Noah Star and Executive Vice President Christina Kim asking senators to email Linzer and publicize a petition calling on the provost to increase the number of undergraduate students on the task force from one to five. As of Wednesday night, about 500 people have signed the petition. “If we pay,” Star said, “we should have a say.” The last time a similar task force convened was in 1988, Star said, and five students sat on the committee. Star, a Weinberg junior, said the task force could push for reforms student government has advocated for, such as credit requirement reform and a Social Inequalities and Diversities requirement. “All of these things are on the table,”
Dillo Day main stage moved to Lakeside Field
Dillo Day’s main stage will be moved to Lakeside Field because the usual stage location is unusable due to inclement weather and construction. Mayfest and University officials surveyed the area Wednesday morning and determined the stage needed to be
he said. “We don’t really see how it’s legitimate to discuss the undergraduate experience with such a limited set of perspectives.” Kim said a task force like this doesn’t come around often, so it should include student voices. “Whatever comes out of this report will affect students for the next 20, 25 years,” the McCormick junior said. “It’s imperative we get more undergraduates on (the committee).” Weinberg junior Riko Ohashi, ASG vice president for academics, is currently the only undergraduate student on the task force. The task force launched in March and is tasked with spending this quarter and Fall Quarter collecting data and drafting recommendations before presenting to Linzer in Winter Quarter 2016, neurobiology Prof. Indira Raman, the task force’s chair, told The Daily earlier this month. Raman told The Daily on Wednesday that students do have a say in the task force’s actions, and noted that both an undergraduate and a graduate student are participating. She also said the task force was “convened by the administration out of concern for students.” “The Task Force’s first responsibility has been to absorb a great deal of
data from many surveys of students (present and past), including those conducted by ASG,” she told The Daily in an email. “Additional student input (or faculty or staff input) can be shared with the Task Force through the ASG member, or through any other member of the Task Force.” Later in the meeting, Senate approved nearly $1.1 million in A-status funding for the 2015-2016 school year after allocating almost $6,000 in amendment pool funding. Senators spent more than two and a half hours debating how to spend the $58,925 amendment pool, the supplemental funding Senate can allocate at its discretion. Members of the A-status finances committee spoke against every motion to dip into the amendment pool and give a group extra funding. Communication senior Sean Earley, a member of the committee, told senators the committee spends more than 80 hours deliberating and forming a funding proposal. “You should let that influence your discretion,” he said. “Because if you’re going to use discretion to overturn (our) reasons, then you should have a really strong, logical reason.”
relocated due to recent rainstorms, severe weather forecasts and the nearby construction of the new athletic facility. “Thanks to quick support from the administration, the Dillo Day stage has been moved and will be built on the Lacrosse field just north of its previous location,” said McCormick senior Allison Schloss, co-director of production for Mayfest, in a news release. “Aside from the new shift in location, we don’t anticipate any other major changes to the layout.”
The set times and capacity for the festival will not change. Burgwell Howard, assistant vice president for student engagement, told The Daily that University officials wanted to make sure all students and guests were safe and comfortable. “We just wanted to make sure people didn’t have to stand out there listening to their favorite bands wearing a pair of Wellies,” he said.
shanem@u.northwestern.edu
— Tyler Pager
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