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Friday february 5, 2016 vol. cxxxix no. 5
{ www.dailyprincetonian.com } ACADEMICS
ADMISSIONS
Amjad ‘16 , Kimmey ‘16 awarded ReachOut fellowships
U. receives record number of applicants
By Andrea Ayala
The Office of Admission has received and processed a record applicant pool of 29,313 applicants for the Class of 2020, the highest in the University’s history, Dean of Admissions Janet Rapelye said. The applicant pool for the class of 2020 marks an increase of 7.4 percent from last year’s pool of applicants, according to Rapelye. A total of 27,290 applications were received for the Class of 2019, of which 1,908 students, or 6.99 percent, were admitted. The application numbers are yet to be analyzed for outstanding trends and specific metrics, Rapelye said. Rapelye added that the staff of the Office of Undergraduate Admissions is currently reading and evaluating applications for the Class of 2020. The number of applications has remained relatively constant since 2010, ranging between 26,000 and 27,000. The Class of 2020’s significant increase in number of applications marks a departure from this pattern. The University has already admitted 785 students, or 18.6
staff writer
Farah Amjad ’16 and Clarissa Kimmey ’16 were awarded the 2016 fellowships from 56-81-06 ReachOut Domestic and International Fellowships. Amjad received the 195 ReachOut International Fellowship and Kimmey received the ReachOut 56-81-06 Domestic Fellowship. They will each receive a $30,000 stipend funded by alumni in the graduating classes of 1956, 1981 and 2006 for yearlong public service projects following graduation. The fellowship aims to support individuals who will fulfill the goal of serving others, fellowship founder Jim Freund ’56 said. He added that there were eight contenders for the fellowship this year. Amjad, a history concentrator from Woodland, Calif., said that she will use the stipend to partner with Sarah Sayeed ’90, who is a senior adviser in the New York City Mayor’s Office.
One of the projects she will be implementing is a “Muslim Civil Society Expansion Project” that will provide Muslim immigrants, women, and other disenfranchised members of the community access to “needed resources and networks for integration into the city,” through local faith community leaders and organizations, she explained While Amjad’s project is based in New York, it was considered to be international because of its focus on Muslim immigrants, the ReachOut board explained in a press release. Amjad explained her interest in working with Muslim immigrants and women stems from her fascination with the intersectionality of American and international law. Following her internship, she plans to attend law school and focus on human rights and international law, she added. Kimmey, a Woodrow Wilson School concentrator from WhisSee REACHOUT page 2
By Christina Vosbikian news editor
percent, from a pool of 4,229 candidates for the Class of 2020 through the single-choice early action program, representing the largest number of early-admits in the University’s recent history, according to Rapelye. The admitted students come from 33 countries and 46 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. 11 percent of the admitted students are international students and 42 percent of the admitted students are U.S. students from diverse backgrounds. Rapelye also noted that this was the first year that more women than men were accepted during early action. She also expects financial need to be consistent with that of previous years. The Class of 2019 saw 767 of 3,850 students admitted through early action, for a 19.9 percent acceptance rate. The previous year, 714 of 3,854 students were admitted through early action for the Class of 2018, for a 18.5 percent acceptance rate, compared with 18.3 percent for the Class of 2017 and 21.1 percent for the Class of 2016. Of the students offered admission for the class of 2019, 52 percent were men and 48 percent
were women, and 49 percent identified as people of color. Of those, 10 percent were AfricanAmerican, 12 percent were Hispanic, less than one percent was Native American or Alaskan Native and 23 percent were Asian. The percentages of males and females admitted were about the same as last year. Harvard College accepted 14.8 percent of the 6,173 early action applicants for the Class of 2020, marking the lowest early acceptance rate since Harvard reinstated its early action program in 2011. Yale College has accepted 795 early action applicants for the Class of 2020. Fifty-three percent of the applicants were deferred for reconsideration in the spring, and 29 percent were denied admission; 1 percent of the applications received were withdrawn or incomplete. Both Harvard and Yale have not released regular applicant pool numbers. Rapelye said she expects to release admissions decisions at 5 p.m. on March 31. Admitted students to the University’s Class of 2020 have until May 1 to respond to their offer.
Q&A
Farah Amjad ‘16
Clarissa Kimmey ‘16
LECTURE
Newport discusses public opinion polls, voter priorities Despite the controversy behind Gallup’s decision to move away from polling leading up to the 2016 presidential elections, Editor-in-Chief of Gallup Frank Newport argued that polling is more than just election polling in a lecture Wednesday afternoon. In light of the 2016 state presidential primaries, Newport asserted that Gallup decided to move away from focusing on polling during this election cycle in order to focus on overall public opinion. Although Gallup is known for its role in developing horserace polling, and has been one of the primary voices on election polling, in recent years it has decided to focus on issues and voter priorities instead of forecasting election results. Newport is the editor-inchief of Gallup and author of “Polling Matters—Why Leaders Must Listen to the Wisdom of the People.” His analyses on the American public’s views on elected officials and on public mood and behavior make regular appearances in his blog “Polling Matters.” “What is the role of public opinion — beyond voting —
as a measurement?” he asked. Public opinion is manifested in the vote and is essentially channeled through elections, he said. Like elections, polls help measure public opinion, and by paying attention to what people are saying in between the elections, polls allow us to better understand what the public believes in. Despite Gallup’s attempts to use fair polling methods, public reactions to their polls are frequently negative. According to Newport, individuals naturally tend to criticize poll results that do not overlap with their personal beliefs, which leads them to dismiss the poll as a whole. “Naturally, they shoot the messenger,” Newport said. Another area of contention is in methodology; some people argue that a sample cannot possible measure the entire population, or that a sample focuses too much on one specific group of people rather than the country as a whole. Many also fear that polling is imprecise and can distort certain facts. “It’s a controversial job,” Newport said. Gallup has also garnered See GALLUP page 3
AHMED AKHTAR :: ASSOCIATE PHOTO EDITOR
In a lecture Thursday, Frank Newport commented on the controversy Gallup’s opinion polls garnered.
Q&A : Frank Newport, Editor-in-Chief of poll-based consulting company Gallup By Christopher Umanzor staff writer
Frank Newport is the Editorin-Chief of Gallup, a management consulting company known for its influential public opinion polls, and author of “Polling Matters: Why Leaders Must Listen to the Wisdom of the People.” He sat down with The Daily Princetonian before a lecture Thursday to talk about the importance of polling in politics, the role of Gallup in the 2016 election and where his love of polling comes from. Daily Princetonian: What are some of the important changes in political polling since you’ve become Editor-in-Chief of the Gallup? Frank Newport: The biggest change probably methodologically is the increasing use of cell phones in each sample which we did not have when I started in 1990, we were using the all land-line interviews so we continually changed our methodology. We made a lot of
other changes in how we do it. DP: This past month alone, polling has become sensationalized by the media, particularly in the political realm. What exactly do you see as the role of polling in politics? FN: I believe that politicians should carefully read polling and take that into account. I think the people collectively are smarter than any one politician, although a politician would most likely disagree. To be sure, we have collective wisdom, since we have 100 senators and 435 representatives, so there is some collective decision. But, I think those collective decision makers should try to take into account and understand public opinion because it will help guide them to make wiser decisions to move our democracy forward in a positive way. That’s my personal opinion. And, you know, the public is very wise. When you see people are resistant about doing something, it tells you something.
In Opinion
Today on Campus
Columnist Paul Kigawa suggestions relaxing the guidelines for summer study abroad, and the Editorial Board calls for more courses in American Sign Language. PAGE 6
10 a.m.: The Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory will hold a public tour of the laboratory. Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory.
DP: How would you describe Gallup’s role in the 2016 election? FN: We will spend a lot of time in this election environment and have already tried to understand the issues that people are concerned about, how they are reacting to the candidates, what they like and don’t like about them, and how Americans respond if somebody like Cruz, like I’ve mentioned [in the lecture], says he wants to abolish the IRS, it’s important to know how the public will respond to that, and if Bernie Sanders says he will go to a single-payer system, how will the public react? We feel that’s our major function in the field. DP: So, what has been the impact of Gallup’s decision to walk out of the horse-race polling during the 2016 election? FN: That’s one of the reasons that I gave my presentation to talk about our rationale. We’re hoping people pay more attention to what we are doing, like I talked about See Q&A page 3
WEATHER
By Annie Yang news editor
HIGH
39˚
LOW
24˚
Rain and snow in the morning. chance of rain: 100 percent
Sports
Friday february 5, 2016
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{ www.dailyprincetonian.com } MEN’S BASKETBALL
Men’s basketball to face Ivy League rivals By Miles Hinson sports editor emeritus
After a promising start to Ivy League play, the men’s basketball team finally gets the opportunity to bring the fight to their home court. After playing the first three intra-league games on the road, the Tigers will host the Harvard Crimson and Dartmouth Big Green in a FridaySaturday double-header. Princeton (12-5 overall, 2-1 Ivy) enters Jadwin coming off a 4-point loss to the top dogs of the league, the Yale Bulldogs, this past Saturday. The Tigers’ grit was on full display throughout the game — they faced doubledigit deficits multiple times throughout the game, but struggled back to close the gap in the late minutes of the game.
Having shown their mettle against one of the top teams, the Tigers now have an opportunity to push themselves up the league rankings against teams that have so far struggled to find their footing. Both the Crimson (9-11, 1-3) and the Big Green (7-11, 1-3) will head into Princeton coming off of losing streaks within league play. In recent years, the battle between Princeton and Harvard has gone predominantly in the Crimson’s favor — the Tigers have fallen in five of their six most recent matchups against their foes from Cambridge. Both teams will be fielding vastly different squads than in previous years. On Harvard’s side, the loss of stars such as Wesley Saunders and Siyani Chambers, and
other key players such as Jonah Travis, has led to a drop in their record. The Tigers, on the other hand, come in with a team revamped by strong rookie and veteran play. Junior forward Henry Caruso and freshman forward Devin Cannady have been important scorers, putting up 16.6 and 10.8 points per game respectively. Junior guard Spencer Weisz continues to be a solid ball-handler for the Tigers and has been shooting well from downtown at a 39.2 percent mark. Indeed, the Tigers’ prowess on the offensive side is the stark difference between them and their upcoming opponents. Princeton leads the Ivies in points per game and is second best in field goal shooting. See M. BASKETBALL page 5
MIKKEY CLARKE :: CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
The men’s basketball squad will continue their season by taking on Harvard and Dartmouth at home this weekend.
WOMEN’S BASKETBALL
Women’s hoops takes on Harvard, Dartmouth By David Liu sports editor
TIFFANY RICHARDSON :: SENIOR STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
The Princeton women’s basketball team will take to the road Friday and Sunday to face Harvard and Dartmouth.
Entering the third week of Ivy League play, the women’s basketball team (13-4 overall, 2-1 Ivy) will embark on a road trip this weekend to tackle Dartmouth (713, 2-2) on Friday and then Harvard (8-9, 3-1) on Sunday. The Tigers began the Ivy League stretch of their season with a disappointing 48-50 loss to rival Penn, which currently sits atop conference standings. After such an offensively slow game, the Tigers regrouped over January under the leadership of head coach Courtney Banghart and returned with refreshing, dominating offensive performance over Yale and Brown. This weekend will test the Tigers’ ability to sustain and build upon their improvement. Fortunately, recent history favors Princeton in both games. In fact, the Orange and Black hold a 12-game win streak over the Big Green, a record that dates back to 2009. With the Crimson, the Tigers hold a sizable threegame sweep over Harvard. Both opponents will surely seek to end their unfortunate history against Princeton. Those watching this week-
end’s games should expect impressive performances from senior guard Michelle Miller, senior forward Annie Tarakhian and senior forward Alex Wheatley. Of late, Miller has averaged 13.8 points per game over Ivy League opponents, scoring a game-high 21 points over Brown. Tarakhian has complemented Miller’s sharp shooting by dominating the glass, grabbing a career-high 17 rebounds against Brown. Perhaps Princeton’s greatest strength thus far in Ivy League competition has been its impeccable defense. On average, the Tigers have held its three conference rivals to under 30 percent shooting. Areas of improvement for the Tigers include turnovers and three-point shooting. Three games into conference play, Princeton ranks second-to-last in three-pointers and dead last in turnover margin in the Ivy League conference. Princeton’s opponents will enter this weekend determined to prove their strength early in Ivy League play. Both Harvard and Dartmouth will face both Princeton, the defending Ivy League champions, and Penn, the current No. 1 Ivy League
team. Harvard will ride the confidence and momentum of sweeping both Columbia and Cornell last week. The win over Columbia came with little surprise as the Lions have yet to win a conference game this season. However, the win over Cornell dealt the Bears, the league’s offensive leader, their first conference loss, confirming the Crimson’s potency. In terms of players, the Crimson will showcase a threepointer shooting duo in Shilpa Tummala and Kit Metoyer. The two rank first and second in Ivy League three-pointer shooting. Dartmouth, on the other hand, will seek redemption after falling to Cornell in overtime last week. Overall the Big Green have not shown consistent Ivy League performance, as they have flip-flopped between wins and losses. Though it is impossible to predict the exact outcome of this weekend’s clash of Ivy League opponents, one can be certain that the results will set the tone for the remainder of the season. A Princeton win would confirm the Orange and Black potency and allow the Tigers, currently No. 4, to rise in standings.
SWIMMING
Men’s and women’s swim teams take on Columbia to end season By Nolan Liu associate sports editor
Both the men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams will seek to conclude their seasons against Columbia this Friday at Denunzio Pool. The Princeton men’s team enters this final competition with a 6-0 in-conference record, with its latest successes coming in a sweep of Harvard and Yale last weekend. The Tigers won 15 of 19 events, beating Harvard by a score of 224.5-126.5 and Yale by a score of 235-98. Battling against Columbia, Princeton will face an opponent solidly in the middle of the Ivy League standings. The Lions have lost meets to Penn (114-167), Yale (110-190), and Harvard (79220), while edging out Cornell
and Brown. However, the Tigers’ latest opponent is not to be overlooked: Columbia defeated Princeton in their last meeting, 168-132. The Lions’ current squad boasts such weapons as the foursome of Omar Arafa, Forrest Davis, Kevin Frifeldt and Codi Sanders, who earned victories over Bucknell and Brown in the 200-medley relay and starred individually in a wide selection of events. Also menacing is Brian Tsau, who has won 3 events this year in the 1000 free. Also dangerous is diver Jayden Pantel, who has controlled the boards in Columbia’s past two matchups and boasts 20 career wins in the 3-meter event. Against this opponent, Princeton offers a squad with perhaps See SWIMMING page 5
Tweet of the Day “It’s amazing how every time I watch the Warriors I’m more impressed than I was before. Just beautiful basketball for 48 minutes” TJ Bray (@ tjbray5), princeton men’s basketball ’14
JACQUELINE LI :: CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
The Princeton Men’s and Women’s Swimming and Diving teams will look to finish their regular seasons on a high note as they prepare to take on Columbia on Friday.
Stat of the Day
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50.7 rebounds
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The Daily Princetonian
Friday february 5, 2016
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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.
Seniors Ajmad ’16 and Kimmey ’16 to receive $30,000 stipends for public service projects REACHOUT Continued from page 1
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kerville, Pa., explained that her project proposal was to partner with Equal Justice Under Law, a non-profit organization that she had interned with over the summer. She noted that her goal is to promote pre-trial reform for incarcerated peoples. In her proposal she wrote that she would “work with city officials in states where Equal Justice Under Law has successfully abolished money bail in order to further reform without litigation” and “conduct investigative work on the new practices implemented by cities in Alabama, Missouri, Louisiana and Mississippi,” she explained “It really goes back to the clients I met in my internships, who were incarcerated for months at a time because they were unable to pay the bail in a process that really significantly impacted his life,” Kimmey said. She said that prison reform has been a huge focus throughout her University career, adding she has been the co-president of Students for Prison Education and Reform since 2013. According to Kimmey, during her time at the University, she tutored through the Hispanic Community Center and the Petey Greene program, interned with the New Jersey Office of the Public Defender and worked as an Oscar S. Straus II Fellow in Criminal Justice for the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice. She added that she plans on attending law school, with the goal of addressing racial and economic
injustices in the American legal system. Fellowship adviser Sarah Lederman ’81 noted the quality of the proposals for this years was very high. She added that while she wished all of the projects could be funded, the board wanted to support projects that could be achieved and seemed feasible within the donated amount of money. The candidates were evaluated on whether their proposed project identified an urgent need and laid out a very practical plan for addressing this need. Freund said he found both Amjad and Kimmey’s projects to be very timely, which helped distinguish them from the other applicants. Freund also added that the ReachOut fellowship differs from other fellowships of its kind, because it emphasizes the impact projects have on the communities, rather than the individual. “There are benefits to the individual who wins; each previous awardee has told us that. But that’s not the purpose of it. The purpose of it is to serve others and do something of a public service nature. The benefit to the individual is secondary,” said Freund. This is the 16th year of the fellowship’s existence, according to Freund. Lederman added that she would like to see the fellowship expand in the future, to give other students an opportunity to contribute to their communities, although the fellowship is still dependent on donations.
Friday february 5, 2016
Gallup to move away from election forecasting polls, Newport says GALLUP
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controversy in its decision to move away from focusing on polling during this election cycle in order to focus on overall public opinion. Although Gallup is known for its role in developing horserace polling, and has been one of the primary voices on election polling, in recent years it has decided to focus on issues and voter priorities instead of forecasting election results. Newport explained that the intention behind this was to measure public opinion and determine the role of public opinion in polling. Newport asked what the role of public opinion in changing the field of polling should be. Three of the primary goals of polling are to forecast, understand and guide. Forecasting begins by analyzing polls in order to produce specific results that will allow the data to be integrated as a whole. In understanding the polls, Newport noted that it is important to explore the reasons behind polls’ deviating from actual results. Such explorations are important to improving polling systems in that they help to locate areas which need improvement and adaptation.
Over the years, Gallup polling has had to evolve in response to social changes that have arisen, including rapidly improving technology. Polling initially involved person-to-person interaction, which later gave way to polling through telephone and cellphone as communication technology became more advanced. Newport noted that the majority of polls are now conducted on cell phones, due to their ubiquity and convenience. Despite changes in technology and form, Newport does not believe that poll results differ significantly based on the methodologies used to achieve them. He added that even if a poll to determine President Barack Obama’s approval rating were carried out through house-to-house methods, the result would be the same as if the poll were performed using technology alone. “There’s no secret sauce to it,” he said. The lecture, titled “Controversy Over the Role of Public Opinion in Presidential Elections,” took place in Dodds Auditorium in Robertson Hall at 4:30 p.m. The event was co-sponsored by the University’s Survey Research Center and the Center for the Study of Democratic Politics.
Newport: The future lies in the power of public opinion Q&A
Continued from page 1
tonight, understanding and guidance and less attention to whether we happen to be doing the horserace polling. DP: Did you see the discussions that emerged about Gallup polling after the 2012 election as valuable? FN: It’s always important - you know - we reviewed everything we did in methodology. Like every business, any industry, any medical practice, you continually want to improve, so it’s part of our continuing process of always evaluating what we’re doing. This field moves quickly. DP: How has Gallup’s methodology changed since the 2012 election? FN: It’s always evolving. It has since Gallup started. It’s constantly changing and had been. After the 2012 election we did a very large scale evaluation of methods and the way we do samples and some things about the way we weigh data. These are some of the more technical details that we tweaked. But, more recently as an example, we now do 60 percent of our interviews through cell phones and 40 percent through landlines. And that’s up from fifty-fifty just a year ago. That’s one of the ways that we’ve been moving forward in our standard telephone interviewing. Independently, we’re doing a lot of other testing – we do mail surveys, we do internet surveys when appropriate, we’re testing smartphone surveys, so we’re doing a variety of different kinds of work. DP: What kinds of methodological obstacles as Gallup faced in the past, in general? FN: All pollsters constantly face challenges. When you’re calling out to people, the response variable has gone down. So, if you come to or conferences, that will be one issue everyone discusses, where of all the people we set out to contact, we end up making contact with about 10 percent. That’s a challenge that we look at that’s very important. There are legal challenges that we face about calling cell phones. So, that’s another challenge that we must all face. DP: In your personal opinion, what do you see as the best re-
The Daily Princetonian
sponse to those who don’t see polling as useful? FN: Nobody likes everything. Some people don’t even think journalism has a place. We think it’s by doing the best job we can and respond to anyone who criticizes and tries to explain what it is that we do. For reasons that I explained in my talk, there are always going to be some objections. DP: Obviously, polling has its roots in times much earlier that the 21st century. However, what, in your opinion, do you see as the future of polling? FN: For me the future lies in the power of public opinion. So, how we measure that, however, is going to constantly change. The value of public opinion, per se, will be continually valuable in the future. DP: Dr. Newport, there are a lot of students on campus who struggle with finding your own passion. You seem to love your field, but where does that personal drive and ambition for polling come from? FN: Personally, I have always had a fascination with human behavior; that’s why I have a Ph.D in Sociology. Some people like to study ants, asteroids, big trees - I like to study humans. Polling is a great method of understanding humans. In my professional career, I have come to recognize that I think there’s a lot of wisdom there. We need direction for society - the world needs direction. What do we do? If you have to move a society forward and make decisions, the collective wisdom of the people is better than having a dictator or any single person think they’re so smart. DP: Can you share with us some of your personal projects outside Gallup? FN: I work a lot in the area of religion. I published a book on it and I’m still looking to what we can learn about Americans and religion. With the Muslim issues today that’s extremely important. Religion’s a powerful force still in the world and I’m trying to understand that. I also do a lot of work in inequality and the issue that Sanders has raised is a very important issue. American perception is a very muddy area. It’s very easy to say that there’s too much inequality but to try to remedy or look at what can be done is what I’m trying to do.
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Opinion
Friday february 5, 2016
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{ www.dailyprincetonian.com }
EDITORIAL: EXPAND ASL LEARNING
P
rinceton’s office of Disability Services provides resources and opportunities to help students with disabilities overcome significant obstacles and works to ensure that all qualified students can attend Princeton regardless of physical or psychological disability. As reported this week, Princeton has seen an 80 percent increase in the number of students registered with ODS between 2011 and 2015. As more students with disabilities enter Princeton, there remain several steps that the broader University community can take to further its commitment to students with disabilities. Specifically, this Board has two key recommendations in support of Deaf students on campus: allowing American Sign Language to satisfy the foreign language requirement and pursuing further options for the study of ASL or ASL-related topics.
Currently, American Sign Language does not count towards Princeton’s foreign language requirement. Peer institutions such as Yale and Brown, as well as numerous other universities, accept ASL proficiency as satisfying the foreign language requirement. According to the Office of the Dean of the College, “When you become proficient in a foreign language, you acquire more than a communication skill; you become literate in another culture and gain another perspective on the world.” All the goals of the foreign language requirement are achieved by someone who is proficient in ASL. Cognitively, it provides all the benefits of learning a new language and training the brain to think in a different way. Culturally, it allows access to the rich cultures of Deaf communities in America. This policy change should apply both to learners of ASL as a second lan-
guage (including many students with Deaf family members or friends) and Deaf learners of ASL as a first language, who have had to learn English as a second language. The Board also recommends that the Wilson School take this into account in the additional foreign language requirements of the public affairs concentration, as ASL fulfills the concentration’s goals of communicating effectively and thinking about issues in a broader ethical framework. Last semester, the University offered LIN 321, Linguistics of American Sign Language, as a for-credit class. Depending on interest, the Board suggests that the University offer more for-credit courses on ASL. These could either take the form of higher-level linguistics classes similar to the one offered in the fall or the form of introductory language classes such as ASL 101. In the past, the Princeton Univer-
Lighten up: A look at summer credit transfers
sity American Sign Language Club has offered non-credit ASL classes in Dillon Gym which were popular with students. Hiring staff to teach for-credit ASL courses would help meet the demand caused by the discontinuation of these informal classes, while also promoting a deeper understanding of the Deaf community. Therefore, by enacting these changes, the University would better serve the needs of all its students and foster a greater understanding of the challenges facing people with disabilities.
Do-Hyeong Myeong ’17 editor-in-chief
Daniel Kim ’17 EDITORIAL BOARD chair Cydney Kim ’17 Allison Berger ’18 Elly Brown ’18 Thomas Clark ’18 Paul Draper ’18 Daniel Elkind ’17 Theodore Furchgott ’18 Wynne Kerridge ’16 Jeffrey Leibenhaut ’16 Sergio Leos ’17 Carolyn Liziewski ’18 Sam Mathews ’17 Connor Pfeiffer ’18 Ashley Reed ’18 Aditya Trivedi ’16
The Editorial Board is an independent body and decides its opinions separately from the regular staff and editors of The Daily Princetonian. The Board answers only to its Chair, the Opinion Editor and the Editor-in-Chief. Connor Pfeiffer ’18 and Carolyn Liziewski ’18 abstained from the writing of this editorial. Allison Berger ’18 recused herself from the writing of this editorial.
TIGERHUB
David Shin ’18
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Paul Kigawa columnist
I
f you are like I am, you may have lately been heeding your parents’ daily reminders and scrolling through applications for summer classes. Studying during the summer is a valid and popular choice; many students plan to take the opportunity to do this study abroad. For many students, like athletes or B.S.E. students, studying abroad during the summer is far easier than leaving campus during the school year. Moreover, for those wishing to complete tricky distribution requirements or avoid fivecourse semesters, this is an ideal path to take. Now, much to your (and your parents’) relief, you’ve found a great place for study and a topic that you love — say, economics in New York or art history in Florence. But between you and that “enroll” button stands an intimidating and discouraging path to receiving credit. After meeting with a study abroad adviser, you must complete the “Approval Form of a Course Taken at Another Institution” and have your course pre-approved by the Office of International Programs and the appropriate departmental representative. But that pre-approval process entails requirements that are remarkably difficult to meet. Among other necessary criteria, your course must entail at least 30 contact hours spread over four weeks, can only satisfy LA, SA or ST distri-
Reva Abrol
— courses taught by Princeton professors which are, in consequence, a far easier route towards course approval. Yet the spots for these Global Seminars are few and highly sought after, with generally only 12-15 spots available in each of the six seminars. An unsuccessful application will find you back at the drawing board. This is not at all to fault the staff at Princeton’s Office of International Programs; in fact, they are friendly and helpful in the pursuit of credits abroad, and I highly recommend reaching out to them. Rather, I would posit that these arbitrary guidelines are one of many rigid stipulations set by the University when it comes to transfer credits. Some such rules, such as the University’s disallowance of AP scores for credit, are not unusual. But others are quite strange. For instance, Princeton has historically been the only Ivy League institution to bar transfer students and, as a result, transfer credits from previous institutions. While this policy may change in 2018, it would not be surprising if the University were to remain tight-fisted with regards to transfer credits. The University also does not accept credits that are taken before a student is enrolled (i.e. during high school), even if the course runs the gamut of course guidelines. One motivation for these University guidelines may be to fight against brand illusion and any di-
luting or cheapening of the Princeton diploma. In theory, these are not bad motives, and the Princeton name and diploma are indeed points of pride for alumni, faculty and staff. Yet we must acknowledge the drawbacks to such policies. Just as grade deflation increases anxiety about job prospects, stringent credit transferals can restrict students by allowing them to study in only the most familiar locations — those which have received Princeton’s accreditation. This might discourage students from traveling to unfamiliar locations and defying the norm, or it may even discourage summer study abroad altogether. This creates an unattractive image for Princeton, suggesting that the institution makes study abroad
a secondary concern in order to protect its prestige and reputation. Moreover, by equating two credits from another institution to one Princeton credit, this policy might appear to represent an elitist perspective on Princeton’s behalf. Studying abroad is a fantastic opportunity for cultivating a more global and open-minded education, and Princeton and OIP go to great lengths to endorse study abroad. However, the University would benefit from relaxing and simplifying its credit transfer process, for the convenience — and sanity — of its students. Paul Kigawa is a freshman from New York, N.Y. He can be reached at pkigawa@princeton.edu.
Reimagining our extracurricular culture
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bution requirements (for A.B. students), cannot be an online course, must be similar in content to another course at Princeton and can only count as one of three or four credits (for A.B. and B.S.E. students respectively) taken outside the University. The list of requirements, mind-boggling and exhaustive in its entirety, goes on. In a vacuum, these policies might not seem stringent. In practice, however, they create bizarre and often counter-intuitive situations that do more harm than good. Take, for instance, the very popular summer sessions at the London School of Economics. Each course has 36 contact hours spread over three weeks, with the high level of independent, outside-the-classroom work that characterizes a typical United Kingdom university. Yet, even though the course runs six contact hours over the threshold for obtaining credit at Princeton, it squeezes its material into three weeks. The consequence is that it is rendered ineligible for credit. Instead, interested Princetonians must take two LSE sessions, adding up to a total of six weeks and 72 hours, for a single transferable credit. Such a problem is widespread, since a vast number of summer sessions, in the United States and abroad, are three or six weeks — not four. If this array of guidelines and paperwork proves too much, the University points towards its esteemed Global Seminars program
t a holiday party over winter break, I asked a high school friend, who had entered Yale as a freshman in the fall, about her college experiences. Between boozy tales and suitemate anecdotes, she mentioned that she had joined a publication and dropped it within two weeks. Explaining why, she claimed that the publication’s expectations for new members proved too much for her to handle and, in her mind, produced little pay-off. She informed me that Yale’s student organizations rarely require selective applications or auditions — just an obscene level of commitment for their new members. First, I doubt this to be ubiquitously true of Yale’s student organizations. I imagine the worlds of elite a capella, the Yale Daily News and secret societies would scoff at such a trusting assumption. The conversation did make me wonder, though: is Princeton’s extracurricular culture of requiring applications for any and nearly every club
membership the best method for funneling students into causes to which they will truly be committed? My problem with applications for membership in student organizations does not stem from an issue with selectivity. The unfortunate truth is that certain students have skills best suited or most adaptable to particular activities, and the resources of each student organization can only support so many members. Anyway, it’s best not to be coddled here when in fact, the institutions we encounter beyond our graduation will use similar principles of selectivity to determine whether or not we are a match for them. Applications, however, are unfavorable determinants of success and commitment in three ways: 1) they favor the good writers, the greatest spin-doctors of accomplishment, 2) they permit laziness and 3) they tend to favor past experience over future potential. Applications to Undergraduate Student Government committees, Pace Center programs and many special interest organizations on campus require you to answer generic questions re-
garding your motivations for applying, potential contributions to the organization and maybe an anecdote about a time you did something special. Students with a capacity for writing, or at least those not averse to writing, may churn out answers to such applications without much thought. While written applications can be important indicators of communication skills and excellent vehicles for conveying passion, they may be ineffective in cases of students for whom writing is not a particularly comfortable language of communication. Even in the case of undergraduate college admissions, personal essays are supplemented by academic record, recommendation letters, scores and extracurricular achievements. This is neither to suggest that the SAT score is a valid indicator of potential success in college nor to propose that Princeton extracurricular activity applications start asking for standardized testing results — that would be terrifying. Still, the multiplicity in the types of indicators allows students the opportunity to represent their potential in different ways. Written applications, thus, prove re-
strictive and favor the writers of the lot. Applications permit laziness. If you’ve written an application and been lucky enough to get accepted into an organization, you’re good to go. The terms of membership for many student organizations are often scantily outlined and little enforced. You can afford to contribute nothing to a group for two semesters and your membership will still be waiting for you in the third. Applications are one-time efforts; while they may sometimes be suitable determinants of relevant experience, they don’t effectively gauge likelihood of commitment because applicants are not required to undergo any real grueling process in order to obtain membership. The exceptions to this rule may be organization like the Princeton University Press Club and any other clubs with similar recruitment processes. The Press Club isn’t perfect either, but it does make prospective members work long and hard to obtain membership, and the process itself seems a worthwhile growing experience. Applications essentially make membership contingent upon
relevant past experience. This is valuable in many respects because relevant past experience may mean you’ll be quickly adaptable to the contexts and requirements of the organization. But a relevant background says little about your willingness to commit to a similar cause on campus. The type of person you are and your ability to cultivate passion for a cause, rather than your immediate familiarity with it, may be stronger indicators of what you will actually contribute to the organization. Such indicators may be best accessed through more extensive recruitment processes that immerse students in the realities and expectations of membership. Although it can be trying and a little risky for both students and the organizations recruiting them to opt for more inclusive recruitment procedures, doing so may prove best for the future and development of such organizations. Where talents can be cultivated and are not immediately necessary, we should consider this alternative. . Reva Abrol is a sophomore from Syosset, NY. She can be reached at rabrol@princeton.edu.
Friday february 5, 2016
Men’s hoops prepares for Harvard, Dartmouth M. BASKETBALL Continued from page 6
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Against the Big Green, the Tigers have had a strong run of success as of late — they have come out victorious in five of the last six meetings between these two. Indeed, as they try to break the trend of the past three years, Dartmouth faces another challenge — ending Princeton’s perfect record at home this season. The Tigers have won all six of their games when defending Jadwin Gym.
The Tigers’ frontline of Caruso and junior forward Pete Miller will certainly be put to the test, as they face one of the top big men in the league in Evan Boudreaux. He’s been one of the league’s leaders in both points and boards on the season, putting up 16 and nine per game. Gametime is set for 7 p.m. on Friday and 6 p.m. on Saturday. The Harvard game may be viewed on ESPNU, and the Dartmouth game on the Ivy League Digital Network.
Swim teams to face Columbia in final meet SWIMMING Continued from page 6
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the best selection of depth and versatility in the Ivy League. Against the tough squads of Harvard and Yale, the Tigers not only won an astonishing spread of 15 out of 19 events but also took multiple top spots in these events. Most notably, Princeton swimmers took the top three spots in the 100 breast and 200 butterfly, and swept the top five positions in the 200 IM. A win against Columbia would give the Princeton men’s team its first undefeated Ivy League season since 2012. Meanwhile, the women’s team also looks to end its regular season on a high note by vanquishing the Lions. The Tigers enter this final competition with their lone loss going to top-ranked Yale. This past weekend, however, Princeton split the Harvard-Yale meet, beating the Crimson 165-135 to solidify its hold on second place in the league standings. The Columbia women have struggled thus far this season, with their lone win coming
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against Cornell. Strong performers for the Lions include Mary Ashby, who has scored a string of victories in events such as the 200 medley relay, 100 backstroke and the 200 free, and Jessica Antiles, who has shown strong performances in the 200 free and the 200 IM over the course of the season. The Tigers will present a young but talented squad; standouts include sophomore Mary Kate Davis, who has demonstrated prowess in events such as the 200 back and the 1000 free, and freshman Janet Zhao, who has recorded a large number of encouraging top finishes in the breaststroke. A win for the women over Columbia would move Princeton to 6-1 inleague; the Lions last defeated Princeton in 2014. For both squads, this final meet takes special meaning as it marks the last regular-season contest for the teams’ seniors. However, competition for both groups is far from over; both the men and women currently stand in first and second in conference standings and are poised to go far in the upcoming Ivy League championships in late February.
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