Founded 1876 daily since 1892 online since 1998
Friday October 20, 2017 vol. CXLI no. 91
{ www.dailyprincetonian.com } ON CAMPUS
Simberloff talks invasive species efforts By Samvida Venkatesh senior writer
Managing invasive species is incredibly important to biodiversity conservation efforts, said Daniel Simberloff, professor of environmental science at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, in his lecture “Managing Biological Invasions: What’s Worked, What Hasn’t, and Some Controversial New Prospects.” Invasive species are living organisms that are not native to an ecosystem, and can thus cause harm to global biodiversity, explained Simberloff. He added that there are two methods by which invasive species have traditionally been managed: eradication, or the complete elimination of the population from a region, and maintenance management, which aims to maintain invasive populations at low levels. Simberloff explained that novel genetic techniques for managing exotic invasive species are quickly garnering interest in the field. One such genetic technique uses Trojan sex chromosomes, in which genetically male organisms exposed to female hormones appear physically female, and vice versa. Simberloff noted that this interrupts reproduction in the popula-
tion, eventually driving it to extinction. He explained that although this method is not very quick on its own, it can be the death knell for an invasive species when combined with more traditional chemical and biological methods of population management. Simberloff added that this was not just a hypothetical model, but has been tested with designer mosquitoes to battle dengue in Brazil. Even though invasive plants can often have more extensive impacts than invasive animal species, traditional management methods have targeted animals far more than they have plants and their pathogens because of the difficulty in controlling entire plant species, Simberloff explained. Some genetic techniques hope to address this problem. RNA interference, for example, binds to the singlestranded RNA molecules in cells and prevents them from making protein. Simberloff said that RNAi is being used against plant pathogens such as insects, and has been labeled “dsRNA [double-stranded RNA] insecticide” because of its effectiveness in removing insects. In addition to new genetic technologies, traditional See INVASION page 2
BEYOND THE BUBBLE
U . A F FA I R S
COURTESY OF CAMPUS DINING
Students select food in the servery of Wu/Wilcox dining hall. Recently, Campus Dining changed the labels in the disposal areas: Napkins are no longer composted with food waste.
Stop throwing napkins into the compost bins By Talitha Wisner contributor
This year, Campus Dining no longer wants napkins to be thrown in compost bins. Napkins interfere with its efforts to accurately measure food waste in the residential dining halls. Apart from separating the disposal of napkins from organic food matter, nothing else about waste disposal has changed, said Smitha Haneef, assistant vice president of Campus Dining. “The goal is to divert every ounce of organic food
waste from going into the landfill,” Haneef said. According to Haneef, all nine of Princeton’s dining halls still send their waste to AgriArk, an industrial food waste processing operation in Hopewell, N.J., only nine miles away, where the food scraps are converted into a highgrade, nutrient-dense fertilizer. Greening Dining, a student group that collaborates with Campus Dining to encourage sustainable eating practices, welcomes the accurate collection of food waste data, but wants the opportunity
U . A F FA I R S
to compost the napkins, the group’s co-president said. “They can’t compost napkins right now, which is fair, and data is really important, but to us it seemed like a shame and a loss that the napkins are not being composted even though they are compostable,” she said. Another of the co-president’s concerns is that the new disposal system needs to be more intuitively designed since students are already accustomed to throwing napkins in the landfill bin. See NAPKINS page 3
BEYOND THE BUBBLE
U. launches Title IX Trump investigation into offers birth German professor control head news editor
COURTESY OF MICHELE TUCK-PONDER
Tuck-Ponder has served as the mayor of Princeton and is one of five candidates for the Princeton Board of Education.
Tuck-Ponder reflects on lifetime of public service By Scott Newman contributor
Michele Tuck-Ponder’s passion for civil service has been a lifelong affair. Originally from the Bronx, Tuck-Ponder grew up in Teaneck, a small town in northern New Jersey. She received an education in one of the first school districts in the United States that bused students to different el-
In Opinion
ementary schools for the sake of racial integration. Through this initiative, Tuck-Ponder said, “I got to know a bunch of kids I would never get to know. That made a really big difference in my life.” It was during her high school years, however, that Tuck-Ponder began her lifelong career of civil service. As a teenager, she was a Girl Scout, a student See TUCK-PONDER page 2
Columnist Hayley Siegel advocates for greater transparency in Princeton’s portrayal of its academic rigour to prospective students, and columnist Daehee Lee implores ‘trolls’ to raise the intellectual quality of their responses to The Daily Princetonian. PAGE 4
After two female graduate students in the tiny German department left abruptly last year — leaving men to outnumber women two to one — student pressure forced administrators to organize a town hall. A third female graduate student was gone by the end of the year. In the lead-up to the May town hall meeting, all but two of the 21 active graduate students in the department signed a letter in which they expressed concern about inclusivity and the recent departures. Students also circulated an anonymous survey. Students read some of the responses and summarized the results at the town hall, which lasted around two hours, according to a recording provided to The Daily Princetonian. One response to an open-ended question about departmental climate was particularly stark.
“Female students are subjected to uncomfortable touching from certain faculty and emeritus faculty,” wrote one student in one of the responses read aloud at the town hall. “Female students’ appearances are often commented on to them and to other graduate students. Students from other departments approach students in the German department to voice these concerns.” The three female students who left the department told the ‘Prince’ that the department’s treatment of women had affected their work and research and was a key factor in their departure. The town hall and the student complaints raised the alarm in Nassau Hall, leading the University’s Title IX office — which investigates claims of sexual harassment — to open an investigation into a professor in the department this summer, according to documents seen by the ‘Prince.’ Assistant Vice PresiSee GERMAN page 3
Today on Campus 12 p.m.: A Conversation with Shaikh Nawaf S. Al-Sabah ’94 CEO, Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Company on recent Developments in the Geopolitics of Oil and the MiddleEast. Julis Romo Rabinowitz 1A17
insurance exemption By Mallory Williamson staff writer
In a controversial move, the Trump administration fulfilled yet another campaign promise by offering a religious exemption to the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive care mandate on Friday, Oct. 6. Effective immediately, the rollback allows all insurers, including employers, to exempt themselves from the Obama-era contraceptive care mandate — where insurers were required to carry at least one form of birth control without co-payments to clients — on grounds of “religious beliefs and moral convictions.” However, Princeton students on the University’s Student Health Plan will be unaffected by the newly relaxed mandate. According to a memo published by University Health Services about its SHP on March 15, the “University does not plan to make See SHP page 3
WEATHER
By Marcia Brown
HIGH
72˚
LOW
46˚
Sunny chance of rain:
10 percent
The Daily Princetonian
page 2
Friday October 20, 2017
Simberloff: Novel genetic techniques, Tuck-Ponder: My whole Trojan sex chromosomes show promise life has been service INVASION Continued from page 1
.............
mechanical, chemical, and biological methods of management have been successful in many organisms, Simberloff explained. Some of these techniques include prescribed fires that reduce Australian paperbark, lipid-coated biological toxins called BioBullets that manage zebrafish, and dams built against lampreys. Simberloff noted that these methods could have severe off-target effects on species native to the ecosystem. He noted that in such cases, field observations have led scientists to ingenious solutions. For example, researchers saw that lampreys preferred some streams over others, so they were able to isolate a compound in these streams that attracted the lampreys. Eradication as important
as maintenance management, and is often used to eliminate invasive species in discrete geographical regions such as islands, Simberloff explained. He noted that of the 1,100 attempts to eradicate invasive island species, 900 have been successful. However, the challenges of eradication include eliminating multiple invasive species while doing no harm to local populations and conducting eradication efforts on human-inhabited islands. Simberloff provided some historical background for the research on invasive species management by introducing the United Nations Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment project. Since SCOPE’s establishment in 1969, several avenues of research into invasive species have taken off, including ecosystemwide and evolutionary research. He said that ecosystem-
wide studies, for example, explored the impact of rats on islands, which demonstrated the impact of a single invasive species on both above-ground and belowground food webs. Additionally, Simberloff said that research on the evolutionary impact of invasive species showed that invasion was not a one-time event but hybridization over multiple invasions. He explained that this has answered the genetic paradox of invasions: How does a small invasive population remain unthreatened by elimination through genetic drift? Simberloff’s lecture was part of the William L. and Jane H. Fortune Distinguished Lecture Series in Conservation Biology and included in the EEB 522 Seminar Series: Colloquium on the Biology of Populations. The lecture took place in Guyot 10 at 12:30 p.m. on Thursday and was attended by about 60 people.
Trick or Treat tashi treadway ’19 ..................................................
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: The Daily Princetonian is published daily except Saturday and Sunday from September through May and three times a week during January and May by The Daily Princetonian Publishing Company, Inc., 48 University Place, Princeton, N.J. 08540. Mailing address: P.O. Box 469, Princeton, N.J. 08542. Subscription rates: Mailed in the United States $175.00 per year, $90.00 per semester. Office hours: Sunday through Friday, 1:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. Telephones: Business: 609-375-8553; News and Editorial: 609-258-3632. For tips, email news@dailyprincetonian.com. Reproduction of any material in this newspaper without expressed permission of The Daily Princetonian Publishing Company, Inc., is strictly prohibited. Copyright 2014, The Daily Princetonian Publishing Company, Inc. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to The Daily Princetonian, P.O. Box 469, Princeton, N.J. 08542.
TUCK-PONDER Continued from page 1
.............
representative to the town council, and the president of her student council. “My whole life has been service,” she told me. “That is what I do. I am a public servant.” Tuck-Ponder received a B.S. in journalism from Northwestern University and a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School. After working brief ly for The Wall Street Journal and Architectural Record, Tuck-Ponder decided not to pursue a career in journalism. Nor did she use her law degree to pursue traditional civil or criminal legal work. Rather, she applied her legal skills to legislative work in local and federal government. Tuck-Ponder began working in the U.S. House of Representatives for Ohio Representative Louis Stokes. Shortly thereafter, she moved to the Senate, where she served as special projects assistant to New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg. Shifting from federal to state politics, Tuck-Ponder served as assistant counsel to the governor of New Jersey from 1992 to 1993. After that, she worked as New Jersey deputy director for the Division on Women, as mayor of Princeton, and as a representative on the town council. Ponder also worked as executive director of the Women’s Fund of New Jersey and as manager as the Department of African American Studies and as a pre-law adviser. In addition, for the past decade Tuck-Ponder has maintained her own consulting firm, Ponder Solutions, for nonprofit and nongovernmental organizations. As mayor of Princeton, Tuck-Ponder worked selflessly for the good of the community. Among other accomplishments, her administration laid the groundwork for the construction of a library, a municipal building, and a park. Her success, she believes, lay within her ability to collaborate effectively. “I can get along with anybody,” she remarked, “and I can collaborate and share power with anyone.” During her tenure as
mayor, Tuck-Ponder attempted to work across party lines for the good of the community. “All the former mayors, Democrat and Republican, I invited them to a former mayor’s council, and every month, they would come in,” Tuck-Ponder said. “They were all very helpful and supportive to me, and continue to be, actually, to this day…. When you’re in a small town, a town like Princeton, partisanship means a lot less than it does on the national level.” This year, Tuck-Ponder is returning to civil service in a bid for a seat on the Princeton school board, a career move that she described as inevitable. “When I left office,” Tuck-Ponder said, “I knew I would be coming back.” As a governing body of Princeton’s public school system, the school board oversees a budget that nears $100 million. If elected, Tuck-Ponder hopes to confront systemic racism within the school district, issues related to the tax burden of Princeton residents, and challenges involving facilities. “[I’m] really concerned about the systemic racism in our school district that hinders the advancement of our … students of color and students of lower socioeconomic status,” Tuck-Ponder said. Part of the issue, she explained, is that Princeton’s public schools do a reasonably good job of hiring minority teachers and educators but are not as successful at retaining them. Regarding the tax burden, Tuck-Ponder expressed concerns about the height of property taxes in a town of Princeton’s size. Tuck-Ponder also observed that new developments within the town will likely lead to an increase in the number of students within the Princeton public school system. She hopes to manage the increasing student population and maintain high qualities of education without raising property taxes. Tuck-Ponder, who is running against five other candidates, hopes to win one of three vacant seats on the Princeton Board of Education. She will appear on the ballot on Nov. 11.
T HE DA ILY
Enjoy drawing pretty pictures? Like to work with Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or InDesign? Join the ‘Prince’ design team! join@dailyprincetonian.com
The Daily Princetonian
Friday October 20, 2017
page 3
Forbes Sunday brunch Professor to graduate student: wasted 115 pounds of food Speaking out will only do you harm NAPKINS Continued from page 1
.............
“There is no finish line to this,” said Haneef. “I see this as continuous improvement.” According to Haneef, Campus Dining has become increasingly focused on engaging with students and faculty where there is a direct interest in working with food, food systems, and the environment. “At a global level, the food and agriculture sector accounts for 40 percent of all natural resource consumption,” said Haneef. According to her, this sector’s large contribution to climate change is yet another reason why the University is encouraging academic research on sustainable food systems. To that end, the University’s Food and Agriculture Initiative brings leadership to the sustainability movement by providing education in its most basic form and facilitating the global transaction of knowledge across disciplines on a common issue. Students take a really active role in this process, Haneef added, describing Campus Dining’s relationship to student groups like Greening Dining as “mutual” and “synergistic.” The University’s pilot food recovery program,
for instance, was supported by student dialogue over many semesters, said Haneef. Food waste weigh-ins, conducted by Greening Dining several times throughout the academic year, is yet another example of activism on the part of sustainability-conscious student groups. At a Forbes Sunday brunch weigh-in on April 26, 2016, the co-president of Greening Dining said that a total of 115 pounds of waste was documented — about the same weight as a small person. “It’s crazy,” said the co-president of Greening Dining. “There ends up being a whole pizza that’s not touched or a burger that’s not touched.” The changes to the disposal system implemented this year are aimed at reducing these numbers. The combined efforts of Campus Dining and student groups like Greening Dining increase awareness and engagement for sustainability through the University’s food systems. Haneef agreed that student participation is important. “We want to encourage more experiential and community based engagement, internally within the department, across departments within the university, and with students, graduate and undergraduate,” Haneef said.
Student Health Plan coverage will not change SHP
Continued from page 1
.............
changes to the Plan fees or coverage” for the 2017–2018 plan year. The SHP was updated in 2014 to include “elimination of out of pocket expenses for certain contraceptives and related devices” as per the ACA. Concerns about the new rules, however, still reach within the Orange Bubble. On behalf of Princeton Students for Reproductive Justice, Vice President of Internal Affairs Alice Longenbach ’18 issued the following statement: “Princeton Students for Reproductive Justice is dedicated to sex positivity, sexual and reproductive health education, and pro-choice politics. We strongly condemn the Trump administration’s attack on birth control coverage, a basic health care upon which almost all American women will rely at some point in their lives.” Longenbach also expressed concerns about life after Princeton for women in the working world. “Any woman … employed by an employer who now can use this rule to choose not to have their health insurance cover birth control [will have] a very big problem if they can’t afford to just pay out of pocket for their birth control,” she said. Princeton Pro-Life, a campus group dedicated to prolife politics, does not take an official stance on contraception. “Our main focus is on
abortion,” Princeton Pro-Life co-president Ally Cavazos ’19 said. Cavazos further noted she thinks contraception is something that’s particularly divisive because she has seen studies that have pointed to increasing contraception availability for women leading to lower abortion rate in some instances. “I’ve [also] seen studies that said the opposite, where providing free condoms … has actually been linked to more unintended pregnancies among women and more abortions,” she said. “Many of the institutions that are in support of this rollback do hold a pro-life position, but I wouldn’t necessarily say that it works the opposite way around, where people that hold the pro-life position are in support of the rollback.” Moreover, the birth control pill has a variety of uses outside of pregnancy prevention. According to a study by the National Center for Biotechnology Information, oral contraceptives provide protection against “ovarian and endometrial cancers, benign breast disease, pelvic inflammatory disease requiring hospitalization, ectopic pregnancy, and iron-deficiency anemia,” among other benefits. “So many women in this country rely on birth control for any of a variety of reasons, so this is a really big change … especially for low-income women who wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford birth control,” Longenbach said.
DONATE: Interfaith-RISE is seeking household goods for an Afghani family of six with three sons (11, 5, and 2 years old) and one daughter (9 years old) arriving in New Jersey. All donations can be dropped off in the Social Hall of the Reformed Church of Highland Park at 19 S. Second Ave. Please donate by Sunday, Oct. 22.
IMAGE BY ISABEL HSU :: CHIEF COPY EDITOR
The German department has a two-to-one ratio of male to female graduate students.
GERMAN Continued from page 1
.............
dent for Communications Daniel Day declined to comment about whether there are any Title IX investigations, citing that such investigations are confidential. Professor Michael Jennings, acting chair of the German department, acknowledged the student concerns. “We have been actively listening to and working with our graduate students to address their concerns,” Jennings wrote in a statement. “The department has a variety of responses in the works, such as offering inclusivity workshops. We are committed to providing our students a supportive environment in which to pursue their research and scholarship.” During the town hall, which was attended by all faculty and nearly every graduate student in the department, two male professors said that a competitive environment was essential. “Making [classes] artificially protective … will not serve you well professionally,” said one of the professors during the town hall. This account is based on interviews with five current and former graduate students in the German department, as well as a set of internal documents, emails, and recordings they shared with the ‘Prince.’ These graduate students were granted anonymity due to the sensitivity of the situations they discussed and their fear of retaliation. One graduate student told the University’s Title IX office in writing about a conversation with a department faculty member in which that faculty member had been dismissive of a former student’s complaints about sexual harassment. “It was great when women got the right to speak up about these things, but they immediately turned around and started taking advantage of it,” said the emeritus faculty member, according to the written account presented to the Title IX office and shared with the ‘Prince.’ Still, complaints within
the department are not limited to sexual harassment. At the town hall, students summarized the concerns that had been raised in their survey, pointing out an uncomfortable departmental climate, discrimination, and a hostile work environment — especially toward women, people of color, and LGBTQ+ individuals. In response to a question asking if women are treated differently in the classroom, only one person out of 21 respondents said no. Regarding people of color, nine of 17 respondents said that people of color are treated “very differently” or “differently,” compared to eight who said they were treated the same as their white peers. Five students expressed severe concern for their personal well-being in open-ended responses on the survey. Survey respondents also said that professors cut short presentations from female graduate students while allowing presentations of male graduate students to go as long as an hour. Toward the end of the meeting, after a faculty member said they’d open up the floor to comments, there was a long silence until a female graduate student finally spoke. “One concern that might explain the silence now is people’s discomfort in voicing things when they’re not anonymous because of pushback they [might] experience or retaliation,” she said. One graduate student told the ‘Prince’ that before the town hall a professor told her, “Speaking out will only do you harm.” Faculty members expressed surprise during the town hall, but also said some of the concerns raised were vague. One female professor thanked the students for speaking up. “I am struck by and impressed by the way that you have structured the presentations today and the ways in which a certain number of you are speaking for the group and I think that, for me, is meaningful,” she said during the town hall, adding that she thinks the town hall marked a
shift in graduate student culture, which she takes to “be a very good thing.” Professor Devin Fore, director of graduate studies, declined to discuss the town hall with the ‘Prince.’ “Discussing any details of the town hall would betray the trust of the people who spoke there,” said Fore in an email. Three other professors in the department did not reply to requests for comment. In addition to the town hall concerns, graduate students had also drafted a letter back in March where they noted their concerns about inclusivity, the departure of female graduate students, and the hiring of two additional male faculty members. “This makes both the number of male graduate students and male faculty members twice that of female graduate students and female faculty members,” the letter stated. The letter called for faculty to release an inclusivity statement that would indicate that inclusive practices are a priority for the department. Discussions within the department continued over the summer and into this fall. In late September, Fore emailed graduate students updating them about changes resulting from the spring town hall. The town hall will now become an annual tradition and the department will also host three workshops about inclusivity — two over lunch and one day-long event. Just last week, Jennings introduced new procedures to submit confidential complaints. “You can be sure that your conversation will be treated as absolutely confidential, and that you will be told immediately whether the information with which you have provided me will be dealt with internally or whether I need to refer you to an office or individual outside the department,” Jennings wrote in an email to departmental graduate students. If you have more information regarding the issues raised in this article, please email marciagbrown19@ gmail.com. We will not use your name in a story without your permission.
T HE DA ILY
Someone take your ‘Prince’? Get your fix online.
www.dailyprincetonian.com
Opinion
Friday October 20, 2017
page 4
{ www.dailyprincetonian.com }
A kindly letter to the trolls Daehee Lee columnist
D
ear commenters on The Daily Princetonian
website, The great majority of you have spurred debate and the exchange of ideas for all those at The Daily Princetonian for years. Through your responses to our ideas, numerous writers and columnists have refined and bolstered their thoughts, improving their opinions and writing skills. You are the final critics of our writing, and for your generous contributions, I thank you. But, as many columnists and reporters have experienced, some commenters have not been responsible with their opinions. I do not mean those who have challenged our opinions with well-reasoned and evidenced objections, nor those who have written full response articles in the ‘Prince.’ Rather, I speak to the trolls who presume that the articles they read and comment on are inherently biased and that their ideas can-
Hayley Siegel columnist
A
s a host for the Princeton Humanities Symposium, I found myself over-glamorizing the University to two high-strung, visiting high schoolers who thought the admissions committee was basically the CIA tracking their every breath. Outwardly, I know it’s my duty to project a positive representation of the University. I wanted to make the high schoolers’ next three days live up to their expectations of the No. 1 university in the United States, replete with all the trappings that the guidebooks and the internet boast about. But internally, I knew that there was an unavoidable disingenuousness to my words. I’m selectively excising and editing the bulk of what was an objectively terrifying freshman year. There’s nothing inherently wrong with harmless embellishment to indulge your Ivy League dreams; however, I value honesty, and I think it’s to their detriment that I fail to give an accurate portrait of my Princeton experience. Given what I know now, I think prospective students should be warned that this school won’t offer the unconditional, cushion-like feeling of a home, and — at least for the average student — it certainly does not readily provide academic outlets for positive selfvalidation or reinforcement of your capabilities. Anyone up for the challenge of Princeton needs to be willing to accept that for most of the time, it’s very easy to get lost somewhere as a meaningless cog within the business-like system and even harder to avoid feeling like a small fish failing to swim in an extremely wide, deep pond. Ultimately, if you’re not careful, the University
not be challenged nor altered. I speak to those who do not critique articles, but degrade their writers. And to these trolls, I ask this: Please stop your unorganized, purely emotional, illogical, and cocksure spiel. I know full well that as soon as this article goes up it will be torn apart by trolls like a feast for crows. I do not presume to think that the vast majority of the trolls will stop simply because I have asked nicely. Instead, you will in all probability attack me harder. Perhaps you will say that I cannot see your point of view due to my privilege, being a Princeton student. Perhaps you will demonize me as a “racist like Dora” [my fellow columnist] because I do not support whatever cause you prioritize. Some of you may even cry out, “I forced myself to read every line of this shamefully [insert adjective] screed,” and claim I have mentally hurt you by presenting this article. I could explore a comprehensive list of the useless comments we have received,
but energy is better spent detailing how you can improve the quality of your comments. I ask, quite simply, that you put some thought before writing your comments on all articles. These articles represent not the works of snobbish elites, but of ordinary students attempting to make sense of their world and exploring their ideas through the written word. They, unlike you, know that they are not always perfectly correct, and are presenting their thoughts in an effort to learn more and experience new schools of thought. So, if you have questions regarding articles or want to encourage debate, please do so. Please write us comments or compositions of your own that are well-supported and well-reasoned, so that we can respond in an equally civilized manner. But please do not assume that your ideas are inherently better than anyone else’s simply because of your personal emotions and beliefs (they are called personal for a reason). A view without any attempt at substantiation, based
Too Princeton to fail
will force you to assume the worst about yourself, and to entertain the notion that out of 10 people, you may very well be the 10th best. Having been a former symposium attendee myself, I can say that my host never mentioned these drawbacks. Instead, she rattled off the same practiced propaganda to me back when I was a nervous high school senior willing to soak up every word she said. Even if she was stressed, unhappy, or emotionally struggling, she never let on that her 19 years of life might have been equally as perfect without Princeton. Looking back, I see now that we were both echoes of Tina Fey’s character in the film “Admission,” mindlessly rambling, inf lating the University’s wonderful small-town atmosphere, the world-class lectures, the endlessly stimulating social scene, and all the life-changing opportunities that it provided. As I led both girls around, like many a tour guide before me, I heard myself conf lating the idea of friends with random acquaintances and animatedly describing parties that I had watched from my dorm room window rather than attended. I know that subconsciously there was a part of me that earnestly wanted to relive the few positive aspects of my freshman year, but I also couldn’t quiet the nagging guilt that in making up these anecdotes, I was stalling for time to avoid telling them the truth that I wish I had been told as a prospective freshman. For starters, the insularity of the Orange Bubble has always been severely understated, and there’s a definite reluctance to acknowledge the so-called “effortless perfection” among the student body that’s ingrained in the University’s culture. In looking back, I wish someone
would have spared my ego and had the guts to say that despite the aura of calm that many students try to project, Princeton is never easy, even for the hardest-working and most competent of students. Similarly, I wish I hadn’t listened to the oft-given spiel about taking academic risks that falsely led me to believe that the school provided a safety net where you were free to take chances and could still expect to stay af loat and even succeed. As a naïve freshman, I was completely unprepared for Princeton, especially given the ego boost of getting in that had temporarily warped my view of my own intelligence. On my receiving my acceptance letter, I took it as a signifier that I must somehow be brilliant, and thus I came to campus wanting to show my peers just how academically qualified I was. Suddenly, I became a risk-taker, deciding on a whim that I could masterfully juggle 300-level courses and compete with seniors while magically maintaining a 4.0. I became self-deluded to the point where I overestimated my own capabilities and ended up being forced to drop a lab course in a subject that I had no experience or interest in when I found out that it was non-PDF. Sadly, no one — not my academic advisor or my residential college dean or any of my older friends — informed me that I was making a mistake or setting myself up for inevitable failure; in fact, many people whom I sought guidance from applauded my ambitiousness and assured me that I would me more than capable of managing while still enjoying my freshman fall. In this moment of crisis, I felt abandoned without academic guidance or an emotional support network to fall back on. By mid-spring, I was suf-
vol. cxli
only on emotion or prejudice — or worse, an ad hominem attack — contributes nothing to the cultivation of ideas. For those who will protest that I am stifling your right to free speech by writing such an article, do not misunderstand: Having written for the ‘Prince’ for over a year now, I believe that freedom of speech and freedom of the press are among our most important rights as Americans. Instead, I ask you to honor the purpose of free speech: the advancement and unification of different schools of thought. Protect your right to free speech by being responsible with it. Put your money where your mouth is, challenge yourself, and comment or write a proper, well-argued response to the ‘Prince.’ Sincerely, DaeHee Lee Daehee Lee is a sophomore from Palisades Park, N.J. He can be reached at daeheel@ princeton.edu.
Sarah Sakha ’18
editor-in-chief
Matthew McKinlay ’18 business manager
BOARD OF TRUSTEES president Thomas E. Weber ’89 vice president Craig Bloom ’88 secretary Betsy L. Minkin ’77 treasurer Douglas J. Widmann ’90 Kathleen Crown William R. Elfers ’71 Stephen Fuzesi ’00 Zachary A. Goldfarb ’05 John Horan ’74 Joshua Katz Kathleen Kiely ’77 Rick Klein ’98 James T. MacGregor ’66 Alexia Quadrani Marcelo Rochabrun ’15 Richard W. Thaler, Jr. ’73 Lisa Belkin ‘82 Francesca Barber trustees emeriti Gregory L. Diskant ’70 Jerry Raymond ’73 Michael E. Seger ’71
141ST MANAGING BOARD managing editors Samuel Garfinkle ’19 Grace Rehaut ’18 Christina Vosbikian ’18
fering from an acute case of chronic ego def lation to the point where even dragging myself to precepts became a mortifying experience. I spent the latter half of the year living at home to avoid facing the world and having to be physically on campus too often. Even worse was the knowledge that I would not be accepted if I were to be open about the negativity of my experience or to try and seek empathy in shared struggles with my seemingly perfect peers. My roommates called me a Debbie Downer, my former classmates gave me patronizing glares when I passed them in the hallways, and even University Health Services felt inadequate at a time when I was desperate to reconnect to the campus community without being branded as an idiot. I’ll admit that it’s been a monumental struggle ever since returning to campus sophomore year to try to avoid an existential meltdown while rebuilding my sense of self-confidence and trust in my own ability. However, many of the hurdles that I faced could have been resolved had there been more transparency on the part of the University about the true rigors and intensity that I was about to face. It doesn’t matter how up to date the facilities are or how many famous professors are teaching each semester, or even what the school’s U.S. News ranking is. If a student truly wants to come to Princeton, none of these arbitrary distinctions necessarily needs to be restated. Thus, rather than trying to “sell” Princeton and build up freshman year as the best time of our lives, the University needs to give equal weight to demystifying the unspoken struggles of the freshman experience so that anyone interested in attending Princeton knows exactly what they’re getting into when
head news editor Marcia Brown ’19 associate news editors Kristin Qian ’18 head opinion editor Nicholas Wu ’18 associate opinion editors Samuel Parsons ’19 Emily Erdos ’19 head sports editor David Xin ’19 associate sports editors Christopher Murphy ’20 Claire Coughlin ’19 head street editor Jianing Zhao ’20 associate street editors Lyric Perot ’20 Danielle Hoffman ’20 web editor Sarah Bowen ’20 head copy editors Isabel Hsu ’19 Omkar Shende ’18 associate copy editors Caroline Lippman ’19 Megan Laubach ’18 chief design editor Quinn Donohue ’20 cartoons editor Tashi Treadway ’19
NIGHT STAFF copy Armani Aguiar ’21 Minh Hoang ’19
they apply. At least now, as a representative of the University, I can take that first step. I’m waiting for when I’ll inevitably be asked by the seniors I’m hosting, “Why did you pick Princeton? ” I will have revised the canned answer that I had planned in my head, in knowing that whatever I say from now on needs to have two parts, balancing the obvious pros against the cons that are too often obscured. Hayley Siegel is a sophomore from Princeton, N.J. She can be reached at hsiegel@princeton.edu.
?
? The Daily Princetonian
Friday October 20, 2017
page 5
What could I be at T HE DA ILY
Arts Photographer
Programmer Cartoonist
Layout Designer
Copy Editor
Reporter
Graphic Artist
Sports writer
Columnist
Ad Sales Manager
Videographer
If you see yourself
writingthinkingreporting doodlingdrawingexpressing communicatingdescribing photographingprogramming in college, check us out
join@dailyprincetonian.com
Friday October 20, 2017
Sports
page 6
{ www.dailyprincetonian.com } FOOTBALL
Football to face Harvard in nationally televised matchup
COURTESY OF GOPRINCETONTIGERS.COM
Senior Kurt Holuba hopes to wreak havoc on the Harvard offense on the national stage Friday night.
By Molly Milligan staff writer
This Friday night the Princeton football team will take on Harvard under the lights in Cambridge, Mass. Both Princeton and Harvard have a conference record featuring one loss, making this week’s game a must-win in the race for the Ivy League title. The Harvard Crimson has won all 14 previous night games played at Harvard Stadium, but it’s safe to say this nighttime matchup will be different from those previous ones. For starters, Friday’s game will be broadcast nationally on NBC Sports Network. Tiger fans can also
tune in online and on the NBC Sports App. Even if it weren’t going to be on TV across the country, this game would still be a critical showdown in the battle for the Ivy League championship. Harvard is just 3–2 overall and 1–1 in Ivy play so far this season. After falling to Cornell, the Crimson bounced back, posting a 38–10 win over Lafayette last weekend that featured two scores by the special team’s unit. The rushing attack was led by Charlie Booker, who posted a career-high 159 yards. Even after defeating Brown 53–0, the team is no doubt looking for another big road win against an Ivy League foe. Junior running
back Charlie Volker is coming off a career weekend in which he had four rushing touchdowns and set a new Princeton record for longest rushing score, a 96-yard run in the second quarter against the Bears. Senior defensive lineman Kurt Holuba will be looking to add to an already impressive season. Holuba had a remarkable game against Harvard last year, a 20–23 overtime loss for the Tigers in which Holuba posted 10 tackles and three sacks. Holuba currently anchors a Tiger defense that ranks No. 3 in the Football Championship Subdivision in rushing defense, allowing only 54 rushing yards per game this season.
Maintaining this consistency on the defensive will be a key to success for the Tigers against a Harvard team that rushed for 296 yards in its last game. Playing solid, mistake-free football will also be vital as Princeton faces the Ivy League’s top return man in Harvard, junior Justice Shelton-Mosley. Princeton’s defense is sure to be supported by the offense, led by senior quarterback Chad Kanoff, who now leads the FCS with a 73.9 completion percentage through the first five games and has thrown for 15 touchdowns. Coupled with Volker and junior wide receiver Jesper Horsted, who has 42 catches on the season, the Tigers have
a varied offensive attack in place that should be firing on all cylinders as the team takes on the Crimson. Princeton’s offensive depth has already produced a 52.9 percent third down conversion rate, good enough for No. 3 in the FCS. In this week’s “Original Eleven” podcast, senior offensive lineman Mitchell Sweigart plainly noted, “Our backs are against the wall now; we really need to win out.” The first step towards winning the rest of the way will come at Harvard; another “W” on the record would solidify the Tigers’ position as contenders in their bid to repeat as Ivy League Champions.
MEN’S SOCCER
Tigers look to get offense going against Crimson By Alissa Selover staff writer
The Princeton men’s soccer team (3–6–3 overall) will be traveling to Cambridge this Saturday, Oct. 21, to face the Harvard Crimson (2–7–3). When these teams faced one another last year, there were five goals, three lead changes, and two ties in just the first half of play, but the Tigers still came up short 3–2 in the end. This game is a constant battle between both teams — neither team has held a winning streak longer than two games since Princeton held a fivegame win streak from 2009 to 2013. In last year’s defeat, defender Patrick Barba ’17 scored a goal and had an assist for the Tigers. Senior James Reiner experienced his first start of the season where he tallied two assists for the Tigers. Greg Seifert ’17 also scored a goal, but the Crimson came out on top in the last three minutes of the first half. During the sec-
ond half, both defenses held strong; neither team scored. The Tigers started Ivy League Conference play with two losses against Dartmouth and Brown, one tie against Columbia, and no wins. They have a .407 shots on goal percentage (66–162), with only 11 goals throughout the season. Princeton’s men’s soccer team is led offensively by junior Jeremy Colvin, who has four goals and one assist this season. Freshman Kevin O’Toole and senior Daniel Carbonatto-Bowkett each have one goal and two assists. Senior James Reiner has also scored twice. Sophomore goalie Jacob Schachner has a 0.99 goals against average and a .778 save percentage. He has made 42 saves on 54 shots and has three shutouts. Harvard is currently in a four way tie for third place in the Ivy League at 1–1–1. The Crimson defeated Yale (2–1), lost to Cornell (0–1), and tied with Brown (1–1). Throughout the season, though, they have
Tweet of the Day “Proud to announce that I am committed to furthering my academic & athletic career at Princeton University! #aHigherStandard @tigerwrestling” Jake Marsh @snAkejAke_4, Wrestling
not won a home game, losing four and tying three. Crimson sophomore Philip Hausen has two goals and three assists this season. Paolo Belloni-Urso, Cornelius Bencsik, and Christian Sady have also scored twice each. Kyle Parks has started as goalie in 11-12 games and has a .740 save percentage (57–77). Since the first match of the season, the men’s soccer team has been optimistic. Their performance continually shows growth. When asked about how he, and the team, feel about the game against Harvard, Schachner said “As a team, we feel confident after a good result versus Columbia and we feel we can end the season on a positive note.” The Tigers are going into this game, and the quickly approaching end of their season, with much excitement. If you cannot attend the game at Harvard this weekend, it will be available for streaming on the Ivy League Network.
Stat of the Day
6 games
JAMES CURRAH :: STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Freshman forward Gaby Paniagua and the rest of the Tiger offense will look to increase production against Harvard.
This season, Princeton football plays on national TV (ESPN 3 or NBC Sports) six times, including Friday’s showdown against Harvard.
Follow us Check us out on Twitter @princesports for live news and reports, and on Instagram @princetoniansports for photos!