Tuesday, April 22 2014

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Tuesday april 22, 2014 vol. cxxxviii no. 52

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In Opinion Chelsea Jones defends the selfie, and the Editorial Board argues in favor of blind grading policies.

PAGE 5

Today on Campus 4:30 p.m.: Trevor Potter, Stephen Colbert’s lawyer and the former chairman of the U.S. Federal Election Commission, will deliver a talk titled “Can Our Democracy Survive the Supreme Court?” Dodds Auditorium.

The Archives

April 22, 1915 In a senior survey, one eighth of the Class of 1915 admit they have never kissed a girl, though “nearly all of the men correspond with girls.”

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ACADEMICS

U N I V E R S I T Y A F FA I R S

Citizens have little influence on policy, study finds

By Jeron Fenton contributor

New research produced by politics professor Martin Gilens and political science professor at Northwestern University Benjamin Page shows that average citizens have little to no inf luence on the outcome of government policy.

The data used in Page and Gilens’ research consisted of 1,779 pieces of U.S. policy from the early 1980s until the early 2000s. The researchers tried to predict policy outcomes based on the preferences of four different groups: average citizens, aff luent citizens (the top 10 percent), business interest groups and massbased interest groups. They then compared their predictions with policy outcomes to determine whether they ref lect the preferences of these groups.

While much political work has individually studied each of these four groups of citizens, including Gilens’ book Aff luence and Inf luence: Economic Inequality and Political Power in America, this study is unique because it uses regression analysis to take into account See RESEARCH page 4

JEFFREY WU :: STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Two students have been arrested for alleged theft at the Princeton University Store, contributing to an overall increase in arrests at the store.

Under new management, arrests at U-Store on the rise

By Chitra Marti staff writer

A copy of the summons issued against a University student for allegedly stealing grapes from the U-Store Edit Image The U-Store appears to be cracking down on thefts at the store, leading to several arrests of both students and town residents in the last few months.

James Sykes, President of the U-Store, said the increase in arrests is the result of new

management, which took over in July. Sykes said that at the beginning of his term, the new manager focused on other aspects of the store, and has only recently shifted his focus to loss prevention.

The U-Store is a nonprofit organization that functions as a co-op, meaning it is owned fully by its members, who receive a 10 percent discount on all merchandise.

Because of this, Sykes said, theft becomes more serious.

“At the end of the day, if someone steals

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U N I V E R S I T Y A F FA I R S

Nassau Hall tours canceled amid accessibility push

News & Notes Lupe Fiasco to perform at Dartmouth’s Green Key Weekend

Lupe Fiasco will perform at Dartmouth’s Green Key weekend, the Dartmouth Programming Board announced in a tweet on April 18.

Lupe Fiasco is a rapper and producer most famous for his hits “Battle Scars” and “The Show Goes On.” He also performed at Columbia’s Bacchanal, along with the Chainsmokers and Flaxo, on April 12.

Lupe Fiasco was last on Princeton’s campus in 2012 for the retirement celebration of Cornel West GS ’80.

He performed in McCarter Theatre with singer and activist Harry Belafonte, as well as funk musician George Clinton.

In May 2008, Lupe Fiasco headlined Lawnparties.

Singer-songwriter Matt Nathanson opened for him at Quadrangle Club, and USG and the Alcohol Initiative Fund cosponsored event.

The University of Pennsylvania’s Spring Fling featured Magic Man, Ra Ra Riot and David Guetta on April 11. Chance the Rapper, Diplo, Lauryn Hill and others played at Brown’s Spring Weekend April 1112; Chance the Rapper and Diplo will also be featured at Yale’s Spring Fling on April 26. Janelle Monáe headlined Harvard’s Yardfest on April 13. Cornell’s Slope Day will feature Ludacris and Matt and Kim on May 8.

GRiZ and Mayer Hawthorne will perform at Lawnparties on May 4.

from the U-Store, they’re really stealing from everybody else that’s an owner. So theoretically, they’re stealing from other students or alums or someone that’s become a U-Store member over the years.”

About $100,000 worth of merchandise is lost at the U-Store every year in internal and external thefts, Sykes said. The U-Store makes about $8 million worth of sales annually.

These extra security measures also come See U-STORE page 2

By Ruby Shao staff writer

SHANNON MCGUE :: ASSOCIATE PHOTO EDITOR

As part of efforts to improve accessibility around campus, the University plans to make at least one residential room of each type (e.g. single, double, triple) in each building accessible by elevator.

Nassau Hall is no longer a part of Orange Key tours.

The University’s oldest building was removed from the route on March 25 because handicapped visitors are not easily able to enter. The change comes at a time when the University is actively engaging in a campaign to improve accessibility on campus.

“It’s a wonderful, historic, fascinating building to visit,” said Vice Provost for Institutional Equity and Diversity and Americans with Disabilities Act Coordinator Michele Minter. “But we can’t have a situation where someone signs up for an Orange Key tour, where the whole point is to be able to see the campus, and then leave them standing on the steps of the building while everyone else goes inside.”

She cited the uneven flooring and stairs at every entrance as obstacles to the disabled and explained that administrators wanted to ensure equal access.

Office of Disability Services Director Eve Woodman expressed approval of the change, which reflects the University’s active efforts to improve accessibility on campus.

“To me, it’s giving the right face for Princeton,” she said.

“It’s not saying some people can come in here and some people can’t.”

Minter said administrators will likely renovate Nassau Hall to make it accessible as part of the next capital campaign. They expect to build a ramp that will drop down to the basement in the back of the building, probably on Cannon Green, and to install an elevator in the building. She added that this renovation would cost tens of millions of dollars.

The University’s efforts to improve accessibility on campus encompass both new construction and renovation, Minter said.

“We have a really good plan for new construction, making sure that all new construction will be compliant with the See CAMPUS page 3

STUDENT LIFE

Equal Writes blog returns, hopes to represent more diverse perspectives

By Konadu Amoakuh staff writer

Rebecca Basaldua ’15 and Nadia Diamond ’17 are spearheading an effort to revitalize “Equal Writes,” a campus feminist blog founded in the spring of 2008 by Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux ’11 and

Chloe Angyal ’09. Basaldua, now president of Equal Writes, explained that the site has had no new posts since February 2013.

Stories will begin coming out in early May, and “writer manager” Erica Turret ’16 said she thinks the resurgence of Equal Writes will be very im-

portant for campus discourse.

According to its new statement of purpose, Equal Writes is a publication dedicated to advancing gender equality by discussing gender and sexuality and how they intersect with race, socioeconomic class, religion, ability and other issues.

Basaldua explained that while previous editors of Equal Writes focused on commenting on previously published content, the new board of Equal Writes also wants to publish original, journalistic pieces. Both Basaldua and board member Lily Gellman ’17 noted that they

want writers to tackle issues one aspect at a time, rather than to make broad sweeping statements.

Another new development for Equal Writes is the creation of an editorial board separate from the core writers, Basaldua said. She noted See WRITE page 4

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The Daily Princetonian

Tuesday april 22, 2014

$100K lost in thefts at U-Store yearly U-STORE Continued from page 1

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COURTESY OF PRINCETON MUNICIPAL COURT

A copy of two summons issued against two University students by officers of the Department of Public Safety for allegedly stealing grapes and sushi from the U-Store.

at a time when police jurisdiction over the U-Store has shifted.

The U-Store is now under the jurisdiction of the University’s Department of Public Safety, rather than the local Princeton Police Department, following an agreement of operating procedures signed in May 2013. Most details of the agreement have not been released to the public.

DPS, which has a stronger presence on campus, has been actively investigating accidents in the U-Store, including charging students for alleged thefts of grapes and sushi.

Sykes said that many thefts are of food, particularly in cases involving University students.

Nonstudents, Sykes said, tend to steal high-value items such as headphones. The U-Store has previously dealt with rings of thieves, who would steal things like computers, DVDs and CDs, Sykes said, and then resell them at Saturday swap meets. Sykes also said employee theft can be a problem, primarily with temporary employees.

DPS has, in the past, not charged students for shoplifting, instead sending the students through the internal University disciplinary system, where records are not public.

The U-Store primarily uses associates’ observations and an installed camera system to identify thefts, Sykes said. If managers suspect that a theft may have occurred, they will often go back and review the tapes, and, if an issue is identified, will work with the Department of Public Safety.

Sykes said the change in jurisdiction has not had any negative impact on the way DPS identifies crimes at the U-Store.

“It’s really transparent; they respond very quickly,” Sykes said, referring to DPS. “They’re on campus anyway a lot of times.

Our people are interacting with them; they’re coming in for a variety of reasons, so it really hasn’t been a negative at all. It just really is a different process.”

Earlier last month, Ernst Delma, 30, of Princeton, was arrested and charged with defiant trespass in front of the U-Store.

He was also issued a persona non grata, in addition to a previous persona non grata that was still in effect. The arrest was made solely by Department of Public Safety officers, although one Princeton Police car was also at the scene.

A Package of Sushi and Four or Five Grapes In separate cases, two students were charged with shoplifting

by DPS last month following alleged incidents at the U-Store.

The students, whose cases were included in the University’s daily crime log, were granted anonymity as their charges are pending dismissal following community service.

Both students were arrested several days after their alleged thefts, rather than at the scene.

Both also received the following email from DPS: “I’m conducting an investigation and would like to speak with you. Please contact me at your earliest convenience to schedule a time to meet.”

The first student, who allegedly stole a pack of sushi from the U-Store on March 6, said she was with a friend who had done the same thing, but only the second student’s U-Store membership card was used. The student said she believes this is how they were able to identify her. She was charged with shoplifting, or “purposefully taking possession of any merchandise … specifically by opening packages of prepared food and consuming the food while in the store and not making payment,” according to a court summons issued against the student.

“At the end of the day, if someone steals from the U-Store, they’re really stealing from everybody else.”

James Sykes,

U-Store president

She got the email from DPS about a week later, noting that her friend, the second student, had already been called, so she was not shocked.

“It was pretty clear that they were going to send me to the municipal court no matter what,” the student said in an interview.

During her meeting with a detective from DPS, she was told that the U-Store was tracking theft more carefully, due to heavy losses of revenue.

“She said … they were cracking down and sending everyone to court and letting them deal with it,” the student said. She had her mugshot taken and was placed in a “holding cell” — an unlocked room. Once she obtained a lawyer, she said, his first priority was reaching a deal with the prosecutor.

“It was a really, really traumatizing experience. It just ruined a lot of time for me,” the student said.

The official complaint for the second student who allegedly stole from the U-Store on March

28 reads, “eating from a container of packaged grapes that were not paid for.” She was charged with a different charge of shoplifting: “causing to be carried away or transferred merchandise … by converting the merchandise to her/his own use without paying the Princeton University Store the full retail value thereof.”

“As I was walking around, I guess I — what I would do with my parents when I was a little kid — I started eating the grapes … and I ate, probably, four or five grapes,” the student said in an interview. “Then, five or 10 minutes later, [we] were ready to check out, and I thought about it, I was like, ‘I don’t think I want both these packages of grapes,’ so I took one out at random — I don’t know if it was, honestly, the package of grapes that I had been eating from or not … I put it back, and I bought the rest of the stuff.”

She also believes her name was obtained using her membership card, which she used to purchase the rest of the items.

A few days later, she received the same email from DPS as the other student got, but was not sure what it was about.

“This was the last thing that I thought they would [be asking about]. It didn’t even cross my mind until they literally told me,” she said. She said the detectives agreed with her that the charges were “ridiculous,” but that they were under direction from the UStore, which had decided to crack down on thefts.

“It was very traumatizing,” the student said. “It’s horrible to go through that and be treated like that.”

Both students and their lawyers have reached agreements with the prosecutor under which they will perform community service until their next court date, at which point their charges will be dismissed.

Neither student has bought anything from the U-Store since.

“It’s a little weird to me that they’re using the University to nab people,” the student who allegedly stole sushi said.

“What was the most upsetting for me was being treated like [a criminal] for literally eating a couple of grapes that they couldn’t put a monetary value on,” the other student said. “It’s people like us that are getting caught, because we’re not thinking about it; we’re not trying to hide.”

“It sounds like this is very innocent. It’s a few people, they eat a little food, why does it matter?” Sykes said. “Well, we can’t really create a lot of distinction between one kind of theft and another. Someone steals and it’s a big enough problem for us overall. We have to have a policy that fits everyone; we can’t discriminate.”

The Daily Princetonian

Tuesday april 22, 2014

page 3

Campus gothic architecture difficult to renovate for improved accessibility CAMPUS Continued from page 1

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Americans with Disabilities Act, and then we have a process of going back and looking at older buildings to try and figure out how they can be gradually upgraded,” she explained.

Office of Design and Construction Program Manager for Standards and Special Projects David Howell noted that although most accessibility projects start out as part of another capital or major maintenance project, the University has also independently upgraded close to 71 campus facilities since 2007.

Associate Dean of the Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Students Maria Flores-Mills said she often retrofits rooms to accommodate the special housing needs of particular students.

“Usually I probably would start with an in-depth conversation with the student themselves to help me understand what it is they really need, and to try to think about it really holistically, in very detailed form.

Then I’d go to the shops,” FloresMills said. She described an ideal room as one on the ground

floor with a wide doorway and a few additional square feet for space to move in.

On a larger scale, Howell noted that the Gothic architecture of many inaccessible residential buildings makes them difficult to renovate.

“In our dorms, most of them, you just have a set of steps, and that only gets you to some rooms, so the difficulty we had in choosing to renovate those was, ‘Which rooms do you make accessible, and which ones do you not?’ ” he said. The University worked out an agreement with the state so that at least one of each room type, such as a double or quad, would be elevator-accessible in each dormitory.

But some of the greatest challenges lie in increasing the accessibility of academic buildings, Howell said.

Wheelchair-bound Mike Zhang ’17 noted that although he can enter most buildings, he once had to delegate a friend to hand in a paper for him at Dickinson Hall, the history department building whose stairs barred him from entering. He added that buttons to open doors to campus buildings are sometimes placed in inconvenient locations that he cannot

reach.

Beyond building modifications, accessibility improvements will extend to transportation.

Woodman said that she is now spearheading a point-to-point van service that will run in addition to wheelchair-accessible Tiger Tram buses, golf carts for temporarily handicapped students through University Health Services and scooter rentals through the Office of Disability Services already offered through the University.

She explained that the van service is necessary because the bus service does not get faculty members close to where they need to teach and that conveniently located parking spaces are hard to find.

Aside from physical construction, Minter said administrators have just updated all of their policies for employee accommodations and are launching a big project to upgrade technology.

“All of our websites would be accessible to people with visual or hearing, or other sensory impairments. It’ll affect classroom technology, so making sure that classrooms will be accessible to people with sensory impairments, that library ma-

News & Notes Email declaring Yale’s divestment was a prank Select members of the Yale community received an email on Monday afternoon declaring the university’s decision to divest its assets from fossil fuel companies.

The Yale Daily News reported that Yale University Secretary

Kimberly Goff-Crews confirmed the email was “not an official Yale communication.”

The email appeared to be sent by “Kenneth Wilkinson, Yale Corporation Committee on Investor Responsibility.”

The Yale Daily News could not find any link to the university.

The text of the email described a divestment plan which would last 10 years. In the email, the author cited the student referendum through Yale’s College Council. 83 percent of students who voted did so in favor of divestment.

The email was sent the day before Earth Day.

AMBASSADOR JACK MATLOCK

SHANNON MCGUE :: ASSOCIATE PHOTO EDITOR

Jack Matlock, who served as U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union from 1987 to 1991, spoke to students about the current situation in Crimea. He was hosted by the American Whig-Cliosophic Society.

terials are accessible, that bank machines are accessible — anything that’s technology-based,” she explained.

The Office of Design and Construction plans to improve communication regarding accessible pathways around campus. “We met as recently as last week about updating the accessibility map, making it more accurate and leading towards … an interactive accessibility map that would help students or anyone who needs to find a route to this place or that place,” Howell said.

The Office of Disability Services also posted a new job offering last Tuesday for an access coordinator, whose job will include addressing physical accessibility, according to Woodman.

Woodman said the University has grown more proactive about including handicapped people in the last couple of years.

“In the past, people would say, ‘Oh? Disability? Well, send them to Eve [Woodman].’ But now people are realizing that they’re not all my students, they’re not all my visitors. Everyone takes ownership and realizes that we just need to make sure that they have equal

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access to whatever program or services there are on campus,” she said.

Minter noted that increasing accessibility requires daily attention.

“Responding well to the changing needs of our campus community and to the chang-

ing requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act is a constant process,” she said. “We will never get to a place where we can say, ‘We’re victorious.

We have done it all, and now we’re perfect.’ It’s something that we’re always going to be working on.”

The Daily Princetonian

page 4

Tuesday april 22, 2014

Study shows affluent yield most influence on policy Blog to also discuss race, RESEARCH religion, social class Continued from page 1

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how all four groups’ preferences work together to inf luence government policy.

“For example, if you hold constant what aff luent and interest groups want, how much effect do average citizens have? And the answer to that question turns out to be almost none. Quite amazing. I mean most people assume that there is a lot of democracy in the United States,” Page said.

However, the study found that there is a strong association between the wants of aff luent Americans and business interest groups

and government policy outcomes. Although the preferences of average voters are ref lected when they agree with their more aff luent counterparts, the study finds that when the average citizen disagrees with their aff luent counterparts, they almost always lose.

Gilens and Page both said that in order to increase the voice of average citizens, the voice of money within the political sphere must be reduced.

“The results of our work suggest that the answer has to come from reducing and changing the role of money in the political system, of campaign donations and lobbying,” Gilens said. “Ef-

fective campaign finance reforms are probably the absolute requirement to reform the system and make it more responsive to a broader set of the public.”

Page said this is the most important political science research in many years because it addresses many old arguments and controversies.

“There are those interest group theories like democratic pluralism that say, ‘Don’t worry, even if ordinary citizens have no direct inf luence, interest groups represent them pretty well,’ and it turns out that this study just completely refutes that also,” Page said.

Politics professor Nolan

McCarty said that the study is a high-quality study that gives the correlation between opinions and outcomes and added that he does not think there are any obvious weaknesses.

“The one thing that is puzzling with this study is the absence of any type of trends over time,” McCarty said. “One would think given the massive increase in economic inequality over the last 30 years that the problem should have gotten worse.

They have not found that it has gotten any worse.”

The full study can be found on Gilens’ website and will officially be released in Perspectives on Politics in September.

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WRITE

Continued from page 1

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that though the board originally consisted of five people, all the members later agreed to expand it to 10.

“We thought if it were just five people, that each person would be a token for a certain identity, which I didn’t agree with and many people on the board raised problems with,” she said.

Diamond said many of the changes made to Equal Writes have to do with making sure the board covers a range of perspectives of all races, genders and sexualities.

“I think the original publication was a little more homogeneous in how the writers though about these various issues,” Diamond said. “We’re making an effort to provide a spectrum of different beliefs.”

Basaldua said that while Equal Writes is still looking to fill the last couple of seats on the Board, there are over 30 committed writers already.

She also said they are looking for diversity in their pool of writers, noting that they are reaching out to groups such as the Anscombe Society and Princeton University College Republicans.

Equal Writes will welcome outside submissions, which may or may not be published, Basaldua said. She added that it may be useful to publish rebuttals alongside articles to get people thinking about an issue.

“The one thing we don’t find acceptable is just completely offensive views on something,” Diamond said regarding submissions.

Equal Writes will be collaborating with the class GSS 397: Feminist Media Studies/ Media Representations of Feminism, taught by gender and sexuality studies professor Melissa Deem. Students in the class will submit their final papers to Equal Writes to be published. Deem said that she thought it would be a good opportunity for her students.

She also said she would like to eventually become a faculty adviser for the publication.

Basaldua said writers will commit to writing an article every four weeks, and the blog will use four cycles or groups of writers staggered so that a different group of writers publish their articles every week, under the leadership of Turret.

Basaldua said she first heard about the shelved blog this past February from a post she saw on “The Stripes” Facebook page.

“I had read the Stripes, and I was a big fan of that, and I was wondering why there wasn’t a similar publication dedicated to gender,” Basaldua said.

“And then I found out that there was, but it wasn’t currently active.”

“We’ve talked about how The Stripes blog has done an amazing job of stirring discussion about racial issues on campus, and there definitely needs to be a dialogue about gender issues as well,” Turret said.

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Jiyoon Kim

Opinion

Tuesday april 22, 2014

{ www.dailyprincetonian.com }

contributing columnist

Missing the Point

“S

outh Korea is a culture that prizes obeying your superiors,” CNN correspondent Kyung Lah stated in her coverage of the now capsized South Korean ferry.

More than 450 passengers, many of them teenage students on a high school field trip, were aboard a ferry when it tipped over and began to sink off the South Korean coast on Wednesday, April 16, 2014. According to reports, the ferry’s captain Lee Joon-seok ordered passengers to remain seated for their own safety. Many of the passengers who complied are now trapped underwater.

Amid the media frenzy surrounding the disaster and the controversy of the captain’s actions, Lah points out a supposed cultural idiosyncrasy to explain why students heeded orders to stay put instead of attempting to escape the sinking vessel. In doing so, she inadvertently makes it seem as though victims are at fault for obeying misguided instructions and that a hierarchical culture vis-à-vis Confucianism is to blame for their erroneous judgment.

However, a tragedy such as this one cannot be boiled down to explanations of cultural behavior. Looking to authority figures for guidance in times of danger is not a stereotypically “South Korean” act — it is what most people would do. Regardless of upbringing or background, it is natural for people to trust that those in positions of authority or expertise have a better grasp of an uncertain situation, such as when students here at Princeton remained indoors and looked to Princeton Alert updates for the all-clear after reports of gunshots at Nassau Hall surfaced. Passengers justly believed that the captain and his crew understood proper emergency protocol and knew what was best.

The tragedy lies in the miscalculated order itself, not in the act of heeding it.

The multifaceted tragedy of the Sewol ferry’s sinking is not yet completely understood, nor will it ever be. New developments in investigations continue to surface even as the rescue operation continues on in the face of disastrous weather and horrible water conditions. To reach for something as indeterminate and elusive as culture to explain what is a very real and hurtful — and ongoing — tragedy is poor reporting on Lah’s part.

Though some would choose to target Lah’s personal background as a South Korean when evaluating her coverage of the accident, I would rather focus on her identity as a representative of American press covering a foreign event. When addressing a tragedy that has occurred in another country, it is all too easy for U.S. national media to strip the story down to more palatable elements for the sake of their viewers. It is easier to say, “This is how things are over there,” than to spend precious on-air time explaining the details of a particular event. The story becomes more sensational when one can make a sweeping statement about a country’s culture that gives an alltoo-easy explanation for how such a disaster could have come to be.

This is not to say that there is no merit in studying culture or that cultural differences do not exist. But there are ways to study culture that account for its vast complexities. For example, the East Asian Studies Department at the University strives to move away from the Orientalist tendency to essentialize and arbitrarily categorize what Edward Said calls the “other” in his book Orientalism, instead encouraging students to explore holistically “the culture, history, societies, politics and languages of East Asia (China, Japan and Korea).” However, it is disrespectful and unfair to the victims of this tragedy to use an over-generalized point-blank statement to explain the decision made by people in extreme and devastating circumstances.

In the end, however, what matters most — in fact, the only thing that truly matters — is that there may still be potential survivors trapped in air pockets underwater, that families are waiting desperately to be reunited with their loved ones and that as world citizens, we must support them and those working tirelessly in search-and-rescue operations. The rest — understanding what happened and why — can, and should, wait.

Jiyoon Kim is a freshman from Tokyo, Japan.

She can be reached at ljkim@princeton.edu.

page 5

EDITORIAL

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Implement Blind Grading Recently, in response to criticism about unfair grading, some courses have implemented a system of blind grading for problem sets and papers. In these courses, students are either required to submit a copy of their paper without a name in addition to a copy with a name or are assigned a number to write in place of a name. In both systems, the professor or preceptor grades the nameless papers and then matches grades to students.

While this policy may be unrealistic for some courses such as seminars and independent work, the Editorial Board supports this trend and encourages more University departments and classes to adopt this policy.

Proponents of blind grading note that a variety of factors can influence professors and preceptors to give grades that might not reflect the quality of the paper. In the rush to grade papers quickly, the reputation of the student, the quality of past work or biases about minority groups can act subconsciously to impact grades. When this effect is combined with Princeton’s grade deflation policy, it can be unfairly difficult for some students to do well in their classes. For example, the philosophy department has recently considered adopting this policy in response to research that showed that female students were getting consistently lower grades

in philosophy courses. The Board thinks that this is a positive step towards ending these problems.

We also believe that this step reflects our evolving understanding of how discrimination works.

Whether it is discrimination in favor of established students who have reputations for doing well or discrimination against certain minority groups, a growing body of work shows that many forms of discrimination often act subconsciously. While much progress has been made at ending deliberate and overt discrimination, there is still a lot of work to do to end the unfairness that subconscious bias can create. Professors and preceptors cannot end behaviors of which they might not be aware. By encouraging more blind grading, the Board thinks one of the main ways unfairness can manifest itself on campus can be eliminated.

We do realize that there would be limitations to this policy, which will still not eliminate biases against particular ideas (especially controversial ones in politics or philosophy) or certain approaches to a topic. This policy would also not be effective in smaller classes in which students frequently talk about their papers with the professor or in seminars that require students to produce original research papers. The Board realizes that interaction with professors is

an essential part of the process of producing original work and that it would be difficult to implement a blind policy without compromising a critical part of the learning process. Given this, we think that this policy would only apply to larger classes in which every student writes on a fixed set of topics.

In these classes, the similarity of the topics would allow students to discuss their ideas with a professor or preceptor without compromising the system. Furthermore, even though we recognize a perfectly anonymous system is difficult, we still think that a system that makes some progress in disassociating the quality of students’ work from other parts of their identities would be a step in the right direction.

There is not one policy that will end unfairness at Princeton. Many aspects of University life serve to reinforce existing advantages and make it difficult for certain students to advance. Whether it is discrimination based on identity or simply favoring more familiar students, unfairness exists both in the classroom and outside of it. However, the Board thinks that implementing this policy would help narrow advantages in course grades. Every student deserves to have their work evaluated fairly, and this policy would aid in reaching that goal.

mobilization for late meal

vol. cxxxviii

Caresse Yan ’15 ..................................................

Marcelo Rochabrun ’15 editor-in-chief

Nicholas Hu ’15

business manager

EDITORIAL BOARD chair Jillian Wilkowski ’15

Daniel Elkind ’17 Gabriel Fisher ’15 Brandon Holt ’15 Zach Horton ’15 Mitchell Johnston ’15 Cydney Kim ’17 Jeffrey Leibenhaut ’16 Daphna LeGall ’15 Sergio Leos ’17 Lily Offit ’15 Aditya Trivedi ’16 Andrew Tsukamoto ’15 John Wilson ’17 Kevin Wong ’17

NIGHT STAFF 4.21.14 news Carla Javier ’15 senior copy editor Julie Aromi ’15 Natalie Gasparowicz ’16 staff copy editor Do-Hyeong Myeong ’17 Rebekah Shoemake ’17 contributing copy editor Jacob Donnelly ’17 Do-Hyeong Myeong ’17 design Carrie Chen ’16 Julia Johnstone ’16 Hannah Miller ’16 Sean Pan ’16

#Selfie Chelsea Jones

associate opinion editor emerita

M

illennials have been called the “me generation,” and if you were to search “selfie” on any form of social media, the claim seems wellfounded. We’re a generation obsessed with looking good and letting people know that we look good. Got a new haircut? Selfie.

Wearing a new shade of lipstick?

Selfie. Dressed up for a formal?

Selfie.

It is often overlooked, however, that millennials fall into two camps when it comes to solo selfies. The first camp takes selfies and posts them online. The other is annoyed by the first. Until recently, I happened to fall into the second.

In doing so, I was a hypocrite.

I am embarrassed to admit that despite my professed opposition to what I found a vain practice, I myself have taken my fair share of secret selfies (the mirror selfie, the Photo Booth selfie, the iPhone selfie and so on) simply because I felt attractive on a

given day. But there is a stigma against finding yourself beautiful that prevents me from ever sharing, verbally or implicitly via selfie, the sentiment. If I post anything of myself, I will justify it as an “ironic” selfie or a “shameless” selfie as if to ward off those who will be inevitably inclined to judge as so many are.

However, I am beginning to think that the love-hate relationship our generation has with the selfie is ref lective of a far more toxic issue than simply whether or not it should be socially acceptable to take pictures of yourself.

And my concern is not the one that is predominantly raised by older generations that see the selfie as the worst of this “me” revolution. While the serial selfie-ist may raise concerns about vanity and egotism (fair issues in their own right), the selfie doesn’t have to be the mark of superficiality at all, but rather a mode of positive self-expression. We should recognize the inherent issue in judging a selfie, more or less condemning a person for finding him or herself attractive.

The solo selfie inherently proclaims, “I think I look good,” and, without crossing a line of course, that shouldn’t be an un-

acceptable declaration. Countless campaigns and movements have been focused on getting young people to love themselves, to consider themselves beautiful as they are. Yet, when someone makes that declaration, we are quick to cry vanity.

Something is very wrong when it becomes more socially acceptable to complain about being fat or ugly (unfounded concerns more often than not) than to call yourself beautiful. There should be nothing embarrassing about taking a picture for no other reason than that feeling good about yourself. That should be something to celebrate and encourage.

I am not oblivious to the fact that this is not always the case when it comes to a selfie.

I understand that the very act of posting a selfie seems to beg for likes or comments as a form of validation of beauty, rather than a means of expressing self-love. Young people become reliant on others to tell them they’re beautiful rather than believing so ourselves. And it is all too easy with Facebook and Instagram to collect these validations and do so quickly.

In this light, the selfie seems more self-conscious than it would appear. Nonetheless, I

do believe that not all selfies have to fall to this standard.

The selfie for one’s own sake, a declaration of self-confidence, could be a powerful tool for celebrating positive body image. I am not advocating for the “thin” selfie or the highly edited selfie, but rather for the selfie that celebrates one as he or she is, for no reason at all.

If I and other “selfie haters” set aside judgment and see the selfie as a consequence of positive self-identity, then it becomes more a mentality to envy than to mock. It should be all right to say, proudly and loudly, “I am beautiful,” and, in turn, it should be all right to post the occasional selfie that professes just that. Though I once upheld the stigma myself, I do believe selfies have the potential to do good by encouraging the truth that we are afraid to say aloud — the fact that there are moments when we should, and hopefully do, look in a mirror and see something beautiful. And this mentality should exist far more often than in selfie-ed moments, but at least the selfie could be a start.

Chelsea Jones is an English major from Ridgefield, Conn. She can be reached at chelseaj@princeton.edu.

The Daily Princetonian

Tuesday april 22, 2014

page 6

TRACK AND FIELD

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Weaver Stadium was the venue for the Larry Ellis Invitational, which featured a number of top athletes.

Lightweight women rout Georgetown SHORTS

Continued from page 8

.............

performed well at the Larry Ellis Invitational as well, with a pair of freshmen highlighting Friday night. Rookie Megan Curham was second in the 5K, barely missing a sub-16 mark with a time of 16:00.71. Her blistering time is the second-fastest in school history. Freshman Lizzie Bird had a strong performance in the 1500, as she placed seventh in the elite race with a time of 4:27.42.

Day 2 provided a number of great performances for the women, as senior Imani Oliver won the triple jump, placed second in the long jump and anchored the fifth place 4×100 relay. Freshman Allison Harris was the runner-up and top collegiate in the pole vault, as she cleared a personal best of 3.95 meters (12-11.50). Freshman Zoe Sims clocked a 2:11.96 in the 800 to take first, and sophomore Megan McMullin won the 400 hurdles in 1:00.08.

But sophomore Julia Ratcliffe stole the show once again, as she once again put up a New Zealand national record, Ivy League record, Princeton record and personal record of 70.28 m (230-07) in the hammer throw. The NCAA leader in the hammer throw, Ratcliffe has gained 7.31 m on her season mark since the beginning of the season.

The women will also compete at Penn and The College of New Jersey this week.

Eisenberg Cup goes to women’s openweight crew For the fifth straight time, the Princeton openweight women held onto the Eisenberg Cup against a visiting Yale crew.

Lake Carnegie was the venue for the showdown.

2.6 seconds separated the victorious Tiger varsity eight – their time was 7:03.8 – from their opponents. Other Princeton wins came in the second and third varsity eights, both by wide margins. The Bulldogs posted a 1.1-second win over the hosts in a tight varsity four race.

This marks the secondstraight victory for the openweights after a pair of secondplace finishes at home.

Brown remains the topranked unit in the Ivies. Brown posted a close win over the Tigers earlier this season. A number of Ancient Eight sides could still make a run at the title.

The postseason is still some ways away for this crew. Over the next two weeks, it will face Dartmouth, Penn and Clemson in consecutive home regattas.

After convincing win by women’s lightweight, the stage is set for a matchup with Harvard A whopping 15.5 seconds separated the Princeton lightweight women from their Georgetown opponents in the varsity eight final.

While this home contest did not result in a particularly stressful finish, it sets the stage for one of the regular season’s critical matchups. Next week at Lake Carnegie, Princeton and Harvard will compete for the Class of 1999 Cup. The Tigers are currently ranked No. 3 in the country while the Crimson is ranked No. 2. However, the Cambridge crew managed an upset win this past weekend over reigning champion and top-ranked Stanford.

Heavyweight men edged out

by No. 3 Harvard For eight years, the Compton Cup has gone to the Crimsonclad rowers of Harvard. This regular-season bout holds a great deal of significance between the two historic heavyweight crews.

Held on the one and only Charles River, the 2014 iteration of this regatta came down to a 1.1-second difference. Harvard’s time of 6:09.0 just edged out the 6:10.1 race posted by Princeton’s top boat.

The Tigers would only win one race on the day with a 16-second victory in the third varsity eight boat.

MIT also featured in the first two eight-man races but came in far behind the field.

The loss will sting, as ever, but the Tigers will have two more opportunities to refine their form on their home course before returning to Massachusetts for the Eastern Association of Rowing Colleges Championships.

Tiger lightweights rebound with dominant showing All three of the Senior Day races ended with Princeton boats victorious. Lake Carnegie saw the Tigers post a 9.8-second win over the visiting Quakers and a 17.5-second advantage over the Hoyas of Georgetown.

This final home regatta meant a successful defense of the Wood-Hammond Cup. A second Tiger varsity eight boat topped the field in their race, while the 3V and 4V units took first and second in the remaining race.

Currently ranked fifth nationally, the Princeton lightweights will travel to Boston and then New York in the next two weeks to close out their regular season.

The Daily Princetonian

Tuesday april 22, 2014

page 7

Princeton men, eliminated from title contention, look forward to next year M. TENNIS Continued from page 8

.............

Colautti and Yablon could not find the answer to Columbia’s Winston Lin and Mike Vermeer and fell 8-4 to kick off the match. The senior pairing of Bloom and Davies, playing doubles together one last time, kept their match deadlocked against Richard Pham and Bert Vancura. Day and McCourt faced formidable foes in seventh-ranked Ashok Narayana and Max Schnur. They fought valiantly, trading games for a while, before a single break gave the Columbia duo all it needed.

They hung on for an 8-5 win and the doubles point.

The Tigers refused to go down without a fight and actually jumped out to early leads in several singles matches. Colautti, Day and Davies all took early breaks. McCourt joined in soon thereafter to go up 3-1 in his match against No. 11 Lin. Playing some of his best tennis ever, McCourt actually wrangled the first set from Lin 6-4. His teammates, however, could not capitalize on their early successes and all dropped their first sets. The Lions ultimately proved the far better team on this occasion, taking straight set victories over Colautti, Yablon and Bloom. McCourt appeared to be in a good position to

hand Lin his first loss of the spring, but his match was discontinued in the second set with the score 3-2 in his favor.

“I’ve played him twice this season, and I’ve been a few points from beating him before. I felt like I had opportunities but wasn’t converting on the big points. This time, I used a different strategy and had more belief in myself. I played really well in the big points against him.

Unfortunately I didn’t get to finish. It would have been a fun match to win.”

This season certainly had its ups and downs for Princeton. The team charged out to its best start in nearly 40 years at 5-0 and a national

“We’ve got a great new culture, and this year was a big step for us.”

Junior Zack McCourt ranking of 55. The Tigers gained valuable experience at the Blue Gray National Tennis Classic in Alabama and very nearly knocked off

No. 21 Clemson. Two wins over ranked teams came in early March, and the team reached its peak ranking of 50th. A bad loss to No. 40 Purdue over spring break was the first sign that the wheels may have been coming off, but there was still an air of optimism heading into Ivy League play. The Tigers came out f lat, though, and lost the opener 4-1 to a Penn team that would end up 6th in the league standings. However, the team immediately rebounded with a convincing 6-1 win over recently ranked Yale and a 4-3 nailbiter in the match of the season over Brown. The rollercoaster ride continued the next weekend when Har-

vard dismantled Princeton 4-0 and Dartmouth gave the Tigers a taste of their own medicine in an even tighter 4-3 match than the last one.

Though Princeton will lose the services of Bloom and Davies, it retains its entire top four, including three freshmen. Sophomore Jonathan Carcione will be back from a year off and is a phenomenal doubles player, having achieved a No. 40 national ranking with Bloom on the basis of their 8-2 fall season.

“Next year, we’re going to have an amazing team,” McCourt said. “I think we’ll win the Ivy title. We’ve got a great new culture, and this year was a big step for us. We have

South Division title likely out of range SOFTBALL Continued from page 8

.............

KRISTIE LIAO :: FILE PHOTO

Princeton’s team batting average is .238, compared with an average of .288 from its opponents.

ly, retiring Princeton by a lead of 10 runs after Penn’s Leah Allen hit her second home run of the game, an Ivy-leading 11th home run for this season.

During the second game on Saturday, Penn maintained only a one-run lead from the fourth through seventh innings, but solid fielding by the Quakers prevented Princeton from being able to tie the game. In the bottom of the sixth inning with one out and sophomore Emily Viggers on second after a double, Penn managed two solid defensive plays to extinguish the Tiger rally, a shoestring catch on sophomore Skye Jerpbak’s fly ball and a diving catch at shortstop of a line drive hit by junior Rachel Rendina, both preventing Viggers from scoring.

On Sunday during the first game, Penn picked up three early runs in the second, holding on to win the game 6-2.

The Tigers managed to scrape

up a run in the second and third innings, but Penn’s twotime first-team All-Ivy Alexis Borden locked down Princeton the rest of the way, allowing no additional runs. In the second game, with nine runs and 11 hits, Princeton played up to its potential. By the fourth

“That’s what we’ll be doing, wearing the name Princeton with pride.”

Shanna Christian sophomore pitcher

inning, Princeton was already up 9-1, and while Penn managed a run in the fifth inning and four in the sixth, it was not enough to catch up with the Tigers. Hineman played notably well on Sunday, going four for seven during the day, with three RBIs in the second

game. Unfortunately, Worden saw her nine-game hit streak end on Sunday.

“We did some good pitching and effectively hit with some solid defense and big plays when needed. It was just really exciting to see what we brought to the fourth game.

We played freely and had a lot of fun,” Christian said, who believes that the team can carry the momentum from the last game into this weekend’s games against Cornell.

“In the last game Sunday, we were just playing for pride, and that’s what we’ll be doing, wearing the name Princeton with pride.”

In order for Princeton to tie first-place Penn in the standings, Princeton will need to sweep Cornell in their fourgame series next weekend, and Penn would need to lose four of its last five games.

Such a scenario would leave Princeton, Columbia and Penn all tied at 11-9 at the season’s end, assuming Columbia hands Penn three losses in their four-game series this weekend.

Tuesday april 22, 2014

Sports

page 8

{ www.dailyprincetonian.com } MEN’S TENNIS

Tigers top Cornell on senior day, fall to Columbia in finale

By Eddie Owens associate sports editor

KRISTIE LIAO :: FILE PHOTO

Junior Zack McCourt, playing at first doubles and singles, had a three-set win over his Cornell foe.

Despite having already been eliminated from Ivy League contention, the Tigers played their hearts out in a senior day win against No. 52 Cornell last Friday. A sweep at the hands of Harvard and a devastating 4-3 loss to Dartmouth last weekend left No. 61 Princeton (13-11 overall, 3-4 Ivy League) with nothing material to play for. It certainly didn’t show this weekend, as the Tigers came out swinging and beat the Big Red (13-8, 3-4) 4-2, the highest-ranked team they’ve beaten this season.

“We knew they were PRINCETON 4 a really strong team,” CORNELL 2 junior Zack McCourt said. “Even though they COLUMBIA 4 weren’t thought of as one PRINCETON 0 of the better teams in the league, they were seen as a threat to any team. They’ve got a deep lineup, strong at the top and bottom. We knew it would be a tough match from the start but that the home crowd would be beneficial for us. We were expecting a battle, but we knew we’re battle-tested, having gone through a lot more this season.”

The freshman pair of Tom Colautti and Josh Yablon continued their winning ways, besting their opponents 8-4 to give Princeton a leg up in the doubles point. McCourt and freshman Alex Day pulled off a resounding upset of the 49th ranked duo in the country 8-4, earning the opening point for the team.

Princeton took four opening sets in sin-

gles, including an inspired tiebreak win from senior Dan Davies in his last outing at Lenz Tennis Center. A cascade of results poured in soon thereafter. Cornell evened the score when Sam Fleck won his match 6-3, 6-2 over Colautti. Princeton then retook the lead and widened it with Yablon’s 6-2, 6-4 victory and senior Augie Bloom’s 6-4, 6-3 triumph. Rounding out the two-set matches was the Big Red’s Bernardo Casares Rosa’s 6-4, 6-3 win over Day. McCourt found himself in a situation scarily similar to the one he faltered in last weekend at Dartmouth. With Davies locked in a third set battle and the team score at 3-2, he knew the match could very well come down to his play. This time, though, he saved the large crowd much anxiety in safely beating Stefan Vinti 6-4 in the final set.

“I thought my match would make it 3-3, and Dan would have to clinch. I was confused about how to score, so I was surprised when I won and clinched. I was still thinking about the weekend before, and I wasn’t going to let that happen by not being focused enough early in the third set. Losing last weekend made me hungrier to get the win and seal the deal.”

The team’s season, however, was not yet over. The final Ivy League match remained at No. 19 Columbia. The Lions (20-1, 7-0) had steamrolled their league opponents, losing just one singles match against Brown the whole season. Their only loss the entire spring came in a hotly contested 4-2 match at perennial powerhouse Georgia nearly three months ago.

See M. TENNIS page 7

SOFTBALL

Quakers win three of four

By Sydney Mandelbaum

losing the first game 6-2.

This weekend further solidified Penn’s (15-17 overThe South Division leading all, 10-5 Ivy League) lead in Penn Quakers held off the re- the Ivy South Division, with cently surging Tigers in soft- Princeton (15-24, 7-9) dropball over the weekend, win- ping to third place in the ning three out of four games standings. in two doubleheaders. The Ti“This weekend was a bit gers dropped Saturday’s twin- unfortunate because we are bill by scores of 11-1 and 4-3, competitors with Penn, and although they salvaged the we can go toe-to-toe with s e c o n d them, but it just didn’t go our PRINCETON 1 game of way this weekend,” sophoPENN 11 S u n d a y ’s more pitcher Shanna Chrisd o u b l e - tian said. “We put our best PRINCETON 3 h e a d e r stuff forward, unfortunately PENN 4 9-6, after not until the fourth game. If we had come out with PRINCETON 2 PRINCETON 9 that earlier, we could PENN 6 PENN 6 have had a different staff writer

outcome.”

On Saturday, the Tigers scored the first run of the game in the bottom of the first inning when junior Cara Worden singled in freshman Haley Hineman. Worden went three for six in Saturday’s doubleheader, including a home run in the second game, stretching her hitting streak to nine games, an impressive stretch in which she went 12 for 27 and batted .444. The Quakers scored a run in the top of the second inning to tie the game but later blew the game open, garnering three and seven runs in the fifth and sixth innings, respectiveSee SOFTBALL page 7

KRISTIE LIAO :: FILE PHOTO

The Princeton bats would only get hot in their final of four games against rival Penn this weekend.

TRACK AND FIELD

SPORTS SHORTS

Men and women have success at home in Larry Ellis Invitational

By Jack Rogers and Andrew Steele Associate sports editor and sports editor

CARLY JACKSON :: CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Tiger runners, having posted a strong showing at home this past weekend, look forward to the Penn Relays next week.

Men’s track and field posts a number of top finishes at Larry Ellis Invitational The men’s track and field team hosted the Larry Ellis Invitational at Weaver Stadium last Friday and Saturday, and the Tigers had strong performances from start to finish. Day 1 saw two victories for Princeton, as freshman Chris Cook won the shot put with a throw of 17.33 m. Senior captain Scott Rushton’s throw of 17.01 m was good for third and made Cook and Rushton just two of three competitors to throw beyond 17 m.

On the track, Princeton dominated the 5K, as senior Tyler Udland and senior Alejandro Arroyo Yamin went 1-2 in the event, and both ran personal bests of

under 14 minutes.

Day 2 saw more strong performances from the Tigers, as sophomore Jake Scinto recorded the top collegiate mark in the long jump with a leap of 7.14 m.

Senior Omar Jarrett made noise with a third-place finish in the long jump, as he cleared a personal best of 2.09 m (610.25) that was two inches better than his previous PR. Cook continued his strong weekend with a fifth-place finish in the discus, throwing just under 50 m with a mark of 49.95 m.

The Tigers will compete at the Penn Relays this week, as well as at the TCNJ Lions Invitational.

Ratcliffe breaks 70 meters to highlight strong weekend for women The women’s track and field team See SHORTS page 6

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