Misc commencement

The Miscellany News

Volume CXLVII | Issue 23

May 31, 2015

Since 1866 | miscellanynews.com

Vassar College Poughkeepsie, NY

Helmsley trust awards VC smoking ban takes first steps campus sustainability W Eloy Bleifuss Prados Contributing Editor

Rhys Johnson News Editor

O

n April 27, the College announced that Vassar was recently awarded a grant of $997,564 from the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust to begin a new series of sustainability projects on campus, all of which will be centered around the establishment of the Vassar Conservation and Environmental Engagement Cooperative (VCEE-COOP).

The Helmsley Charitable Trust is a charitable foundation that seeks to provide financial support for various nonprofits and other

mission-centric organizations in the United States and all around the world in the fields of health, conservation, education and other place-based initiatives.

According to Professor of Biology and member of the College Committee on Sustainability Meg Ronsheim, the Helmsley Charitable Trust first became aware of Vassar’s conservation and restoration work in late 2013, when they first heard about her work on the restoration of the Edith Roberts Ecological Laboratory, as well as other projects like the initiative to restore parts of See AWARD on page 3

ith only two months remaining before the deadline, the College is preparing for the transition to a smoke and tobacco-free campus.

While the run up has dealt with education, how the ban will be enforced and what will its effect be on campus climate remain open questions.

Rules against open-air smoking are gaining traction in many colleges across the country. City of New York Colleges went smoke-free in the fall

of 2012, followed by State of New York Colleges in 2014. According to the Smoke Free website, Vassar will join the list of around 1500 smoke-free colleges and universities.

The new policy is expansive, prohibiting the smoking of cigarettes on Vassar grounds, from the Alumnae/i House all the way to Farm and Ecological Preserve.

Prior rules allowed for smoking 50 feet away from building entrances.

Along with cigarettes, other methods of nicotine consumption like

e-cigarettes, hookah, cigars, snuff and chewing tobacco will also be banned.

After more than a year of deliberation, the official announcement of the ban came in November 2013, in an campus-wide email sent by President Hill.

“By enacting this initiative Vassar is underscoring its commitment to a healthy environment for all members of the college community,” Hill wrote. “Our timeframe for this initiative allows for information dissemiSee SMOKING BAN on page 2

Elmegreen lights up lectures with stars Claire Standaert

Assistant Features Editor

f I wasn’t going to be an astronomer, I was going to be a baseball player,” commented Professor Debra Elmegreen, adding. “I was very young and torn between the two until my dad said ‘There aren’t any girls that play Major League Baseball.’ And there weren’t many girls that went on to astronomy either, but it was more than zero. By the time I was ten, I was pretty much sold on astronomy.”

Elmegreen is the Maria Mitchell Professor of Astronomy at Vassar.

Her title owes its name to Vassar’s

Sam Pianello/The Miscellany News

“I

earliest faculty member and the first female professional astronomer. Like the Maria Mitchell of the past, Elmegreen juggles teaching and research. She has contributed to the body of scientific knowledge and advocated for the imporance of the government’s investment in astronomy research.

Elmegreen served as president of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) for two years. She has twice testified before a Congressional Subcommittee. In 2009, she was invited to the Vatican to celebrate the International Year of Astronomy See ELMEGREEN on page 4

Vassar’s campus will be smoke-free as of July 1, and in preparation for the transition, the College has begun to provide services and resources for students to adjust to the new policy, so that it will be preventative rather than punitive.

Art’s in the name for Loeb’s latest Senior athletes leave lasting legacy D Hannah Nice

Social Media Editor

courtesy of Vassar Media Relations

ecked out in bristles and bowling balls, this summer’s exhibition at the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center showcases the legacy of the unconventional contemporary artist Richard Artschwager. Running from June 26 to Sept. 6, “Punctuating Space: The Prints and Multiples of Richard Artschwager” displays fifty-nine pieces from the American artist’s career.

This exhibition is the first to turn attention to Artschwager’s prints and multiples, and is guest-curated by former Curator in the Department of Prints and Illustrated Books at The Museum of Modern Art, Wendy Weitman.

Working with Weitman on the project is Patricia Phagan, the Art Center’s curator of prints and drawings. Phagan explained in an emailed statement: “[When] Wendy Weitman…proposed the show to me, I leapt at the opportunity because of the artist’s importance and the works’ engaging qualities. I thought our audience would appreciate the sometimes elusive and provocative work of this smart, elegant New York painter and sculptor.”

Punctuating Space provides a sharp contrast to the current exhibition, “Through the Looking Glass: Daguerreotype Masterwork from the Dawn of Photography.” It’s a jump of over 100 years of visual culture.

This summer’s exhibition at the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center features Richard See LOEB on page 6 Artschwager’s “Punctuating Space.” The display features 59 pieces from a 40-year period.

Inside this issue

5

Class flies overseas for immersive FEATURES Chinese experience

6

ARTS

Professor takes over Villard Room for summer concert

Zach Rippe

W

Sports Editor

ith finals and graduation looming over the last month of the school year, many of Vassar’s teams were busy finishing up their spring seasons. For senior athletes, this would be the last time they set foot on their respective fields and courts. Culminating in the Athletic Awards Banquet on May 14, the 20142015 season was quite literally one for the record books. Men’s squash won their National Tournament. Junior basketball player Caitlin Drakeley had a dominant year, winning multiple Player of the Week (and Month) honors as she joined the 1,000-point scorers club. Freshmen women’s tennis player Kate Christensen, who among numerous other accolades was also voted Liberty League Player of the Year, and freshman baseball player Bobby Kinne, who batted close to .400, were selected Vassar’s Rookies of the Year.

Roman Czula, a fixture at Vassar for several decades, retires at the end of this school year as well. Still, this year belonged to the seniors.

Senior soccer player Zach Nasipak was the recipient of the Athletics and Fitness Alumnae/Alumni

8

of Vassar College (AFAVC) Annual Award, an award given to a student-athlete based on overall grade point average, athletics ability, team spirit and leadership. Nasipak was the only men’s soccer player in Vassar history to be a part of four teams that went to the postseason. This year, they were impressive as well, yet they fell to #20 ranked Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in the Liberty League semi-finals.

Senior lacrosse captain Scott Brekne had an impressive year in his own right. For him, the defining moment of the season was the team’s Spring Break trip to Colorado where the team fortified its bond.

Brekne explained, “Playing in the bays during the harsh Poughkeepsie winter was starting to get some people down, so the trip out West was a nice way to regain excitement and prepare us for the remainder of the season.” Brekne too spoke about the incredible team environment fostered by lacrosse over the past four years. He noted that there is quite a bit of excitement for the future of the program. This has been rooted in the team’s dedication on and off the field. Brekne explained, “When See ATHLETES on page 7

Seniors look back at four years of Vassar

2011 -2015

The Miscellany News

Page 2

May 31, 2015

In wake of review, VSA reimagines future Noble Ingram

“I

Senior Editor

like to make a joke that my goal is to destroy the VSA and build something better but I really mean that,” incoming VP for Operations Ruby Pierce ’16 explained, speaking to her plans for change within the Vassar Student Association (VSA) next year.

The end of the 2014-2015 school year has featured several discussions within the VSA about the future of student government at Vassar. On May 22, incoming VSA President Ramy Abbady sent out an email advertising new appointed positions for next year. This was the culmination of a series of conversations meant to locate the VSA’s weakest points. These visions of student governance also come as a response to the VSA External Review, which was released in April.

Reflecting on his time in the VSA, Abbady, who served as VP for Operations this year, spoke to a concern he had with student representation.

He noted, “At this point, some of it is just thinking about, ‘Are we representative?’ gender-wise, race-wise, that sort of thing. Many years we’re not. But also, ‘Do people feel most represented by their house or their class or do they feel represented by some other thing?’ We are just trying to figure out what will be most effective and what people want to be represented by.”

Abbady’s concerns are echoed by many students on campus. The External Review expressed a general theme of discontent and disconnect between the governing body of the VSA and the students it seeks to represent. One of the issues the review focused on was a lack of communication between these two groups. According to the review, not enough people know what the VSA is doing.

Pierce hypothesized that this problem could be related to a general feeling among students that the VSA is inaccessible as an organization.

She explained, “We definitely throw around the word ‘transparency’ a lot but I think the VSA could really be improved in just being approachable. I think that it is a really alienating space for a lot of people...”

The VSA Council meets on Sunday evenings and though its proceedings are almost always open to the student body, except in particular cases, many students, including Pierce, feel as if the space is not always as welcoming as it could

be. One idea for the future she mentioned centered around the reworking of the Council itself.

“We might be moving towards a senate system where it’s less of a council. Right now, as it is, it is a hierarchical structure. When you walk into that physical space, there is the Exec Board at the front and the Council sitting on the sides,” said Pierce. “[W]e might operate better in a Senate system which would mean that it would be just an open big room with a lot of people. Anyone is welcome to come and vote and we also have senators from each house, each class.”

Outgoing Cushing House President Essie Asan ’17 also had concerns with the operations of the VSA Council. As a house president, she experienced a frustrating gap between the two bodies of which she was a part, the VSA and Residential Life. As Asan explained, “What I realized this year especially is that there is no communication between the VSA and Res Life.

Zero. It is crazy. Neither of them talk to each other at all. Res Life does not care about the VSA...”

Pierce and Asan acknowledged that many potential solutions to these issues are still being imagined and won’t be fully realized for some time. Abbady too, noted that although many discussions about next year’s VSA possibilities have been brewing, there are few concrete action plans. One idea that has been fully realized, however, is that new VSA positions will be offered next year. In Abbady’s email, he explained the purposes of each new role in the VSA. According to the attached document, the three positions comprise of a Public Relations Director, an Activism Liaison and a Training Director.

The Public Relations Director is in part a response to some of the concerns Abbady and Pierce have about the current VSA. It seeks to facilitate communication between the student body and their representatives. Pierce explained that the position would likely require using social media and email to bridge the gap between groups on campus. The Training Director is also intended to improve the actions of the VSA through equipping Council members with better preparation for their jobs.

The Training Director is intended to facilitate informed discussion and action within the Council. Asan reflected, “Not all VSA presidents have to sit down and read the VSA by-laws and memorize them. Instead, there should be a posi-

tion that does that and that teaches everyone.”

The most contentious position of the three is the Activism Liaison. Meant to serve as a representative for campus activists, the role has garnered some criticism as to the VSA’s relationship with student activism on campus. As Abbady explained, “That position in particular was kind of contentious when we talked about it. The idea isn’t to regulate activism or anything like that. The idea is that a lot of the things that activists at Vassar need to be successful is correct information and the VSA is privy to a lot of information that is not actually confidential but just isn’t transparent.”

Pierce confirmed this explanation of the position. She echoed, “We don’t want [the Activism Liason] to be a position that regulates activism or controls activism. It’s a resource, it is a system of support for activism. So there is no point at which we would be instructing people on how to practice activism.”

Though these new responsibilities will be a part of larger restructuring plans for the VSA, there is no guarantee that they will remain as they are now. As Abbady explained, “This is kind of a band-aid at this point. There has to be a bigger look but this was something that the External Review recommended that seemed easy enough to do at this point while working everything else out....Anything could happen at this point.”

In general, these former and incoming VSA members emphasized the importance they see in revising next year’s VSA. Asan said, “In the bylaws, the VSA is everyone. You are a member of the VSA, I’m still a member of the VSA. Every student is a member of the VSA. No one knows that. In peoples’ minds it is like, ‘Oh the VSA is just this bunch of assholes who are just talking about bureaucratic shit and not really doing anything.’ It’s not like that. It’s actually open to anyone who wants to come say anything.”

Pierce, too, felt that student participation in restructuring the VSA was essential. “We really want this project to be something that everyone has a hand in so that in the spring, when we present a new VSA, everyone feels that they have built it together and that their voices have been heard in creating that. Think about what you want in a student government and let us know,” she said.

Enforcement of smoking ban remains hazy SMOKING BAN continued from page 1 nation and education efforts.”

These two missions, spreading the word about the new policy and what it represents, are the responsibilities of the Smoke Free/Tobacco Free Implementation Task Force, a committee composed of administrators, staff, and students. Director of Health Services Dr. Irena Balawajder, who also co-chairs the Task Force, explained that the new policy will better the campus’s wellbeing.

“Something you have to understand is that, from a public health point of view, taking away second-hand smoke on college campuses is beneficial to health,” said Balawajder. “Faced with the choice of either not being able to smoke in the workplace, [people] think a little more seriously about ways to quit smoking.

Once you quit smoking, no matter what your age is, you do add years to your life.”

Strategies the Task Force have used to educate Vassar’s students and workforce include posters and tabling at the College Center. The campaign even extends to people who are not at Vassar right now but may be in the future.

Posts on the employment website tell job applicants, “Effective July 1, 2015, Vassar College will become smoke free/tobacco free campus.”

Meanwhile, visible effects of the new rules will soon be coming to campus. The receptacles used to discard cigarette butts in front of Main and the Library will be removed. The college will place new signs at all campus entrances. Finally, all visitor passes will be stamped “smoke free, tobacco free.”

Even if the Task Force manages to make everyone aware of the ban, questions of how to enforce it are still being determined. “At the moment, the main thing is still continuing education and seeing basically what happens,” Balawadjer remarked.

Assistant Director of Human Resources and

Employee Wellness Sarah Bakke is the other co-chair of the Smoke Free Task Force. Enforcement, she explained, would be handled with as much tact as possible. “We’ll be as respectful as we can be to smokers,” said Bakke.

“We don’t really have an idea as to how this is going to unfold, and security is very aware of what their increased responsibilities might be, and so is human resources.”

Acting Director of Safety and Security Kim Squillace described what the expected protocol would be if a student is cited for smoking.

“The officers will be asking smokers to please extinguish their cigarette reminding them that Vassar is a smoke free environment.

The officer will ask for them their name and a report will be generated as standard procedure. As with any violation of college regulations it will be addressed through the judicial process,” Squillace wrote in an email.

According to the Task Force, the application of the new rules would hew close to Vassar’s no-smoking policy in its offices and residences, and sanctions would be taken only for individuals who were found to be repeatedly defying the code.

Balawajder, however, believes that the ban can be enforced without punitive measures.

“We’re relying on a community enforcement in many ways,” she explained. “So if someone does see someone smoking they can go and respectfully say ‘this is a smoke-free campus.’”

Habitual smokers are a minority among students. According to a survey from 2010, two-thirds of Vassar students reported having never used cigarettes. Meanwhile, 16.2% of students reported smoking in the last 30 days.

Only 2.2% said they smoked daily.

Another job of the Task Force has been to organize smoking cessation workshops for college employees and students who would be interested in quitting before the first of July.

While some employees are joining the workshops, they have failed to draw students.

Last year, The Miscellany News reported that not a single student had signed up for a seven-week workshop in the spring of 2014.

Earlier this month, Bakke organized for a therapeutic hypnotist to come to campus for two free cessation sessions.

While over 20 people registered for the session, only one was a student. “I was surprised,” Bakke noted. “I thought the hypnotist might be a draw for students and employees.

Sometimes the classes because they are seven-weeks total for once a week, they’re too big of a commitment for some people.”

Student support for the ban has been generally mixed. A survey conducted by the Committee on College Life in 2013 found 55% of students not in favor of a smoke/tobacco free policy. An earlier survey by the Vassar Student Association found an even higher number, 65%, of students opposed.

Jared Davis ’17 is one such student against the ban. He believes that the Administration has overstepped its authority by moving unilaterally to become smoke-free. “Not that their decision has bad intentions or even a bad decision, but I don’t think they have the authority to make that decision they made,” Davis posited. “I would also like to say that in terms of enforcement and application I don’t think they’re going to have much success.”

The decision on the ban, however, shows no sign of being reversed. Vassar grounds are private property, and the administration holds a legal right to prohibit smoking.

Bakke sees the campus as joining the growing list of no-smoking areas. She said, “I think it is a culture change and it might take a year or two for people to get into that new culture, similar to when there became smoke-free shopping malls and smoke-free restaurants.”

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

Editor-in-Chief Palak Patel

Senior Editor Noble Ingram

Contributing Editors Eloy Bleifuss Prados

Opinions Arts Humor & Satire Sports Photography Design Online Social Media Copy

Emily Sayer Emma Rosenthal Zander Bashaw Zach Rippe Sam Pianello Sarah Dolan Elizabeth Dean Hannah Nice Anika Lanser

Crossword Editor Alycia Beattie York Chen Colin KnoppSchwynn Assistant Features Julia Cunningham Claire Standaert Assistant Opinions Sophia Burns Reporters Amreen Bhasin Emily Hoffman Ashley Hoyle Charles Lyons-Burt Connor McIllwain Sieu Nguyen Yifan Wang Columnists Sam Hammer Penina Remler Sarah Sandler Photography Cassady Bergevin Alec Ferretti Emily Lavieri-Scull Design Samana Shrestha Sixing Xu Copy Hallie Ayres Claire Baker Antigone Delton Christa Guild Alessandra Muccio Kelsey Quinn Jessica Roden Emma Roellke Sophia Slater Rebecca Weir Laura Wigginton CORRECTION POLICY The Miscellany News will only corrections for any misquotes, resentations or factual errors for ticle within the semester it is

accept misrepan arprinted.

May 31, 2015

COMMENCEMENT

Page 3

Renovated barn to house fledgling environmental co-op AWARD continued from page 1

the Vassar Farm and Ecological Preserve in cooperation with the Student Conservation Association (SCA).

This then led to a collaborative effort between the College and the Trust to draft a grant proposal that would best serve the goals of both organizations, a process which was spearheaded by Ronsheim, Dean of Strategic Planning and Academic Resources Marianne Begemann and Professor of Biology Lynn Christenson.

The grant that Vassar was awarded, under the field of conservation, will serve many purposes. The description of the grant on the Helmsley Charitable Trust website reads, “[This is] funding to support the growth of environmental education activities, scientific data collection and dissemination, and to repurpose an existing building as a center for environmental programming.”

Among the projects for which the College plans to utilize the Helmsley grant money is the renovation of the Vassar Barn on the Vassar Farm and Ecological Preserve. The College intends to renew a 5,600-square foot wing of the historic barn for the creation of offices and meeting rooms.

According to Sustainability Coordinator Alistair Hall, it is the hope of those in charge of the project that ground will be broken early in the summer, so that the new wing may be opened by early October. The College is currently in the process of obtaining planning board approval from the City of Poughkeepsie, and the architectural design of the project will be handled in-house, by Project Manager of Buildings and Grounds and licensed architect Bryan Corrigan, who has worked on such other projects at Vassar as the renovation of the Maria Mitchell Observatory to house the Education Department and the refurbishment of Davison House.

With these renovations, the Barn will aim to serve as the hub of Vassar’s environmental research and outreach efforts, and will strive to develop cooperative ties with surrounding communities and organizations in the Hudson Valley. Hall wrote in an emailed statement, “The

renovated barn will serve as a visitor center, a co-working space, an exhibit hall, a research center, and more, helping to further catalyze conservation efforts in the Hudson Valley.”

Renewal of the Vassar Barn for the VCEECOOP will also allow new programs and activities to flourish on campus, with new housing and resources available to the Vassar community as well as to sustainability organizations working in the greater Hudson Valley area, such as the Poughkeepsie Farm Project (PFP), the Environmental Monitoring and Management Alliance (EMMA) and the SCA. According to Begemann, the College has already begun working with members of EMMA to craft a job description for the position of EMMA coordinator, which will be initially operating out of the VCEE-COOP’s new home on the Farm and Ecological Preserve.

She commented in an emailed statement, “We see VCEE-COOP serving as both a physical and organizational structure that will enhance the capacity of those participating, whether they are Vassar initiated projects, organizations with which we partner already...or new organizations that we seek to begin collaborations with, to further education around environmental and conservation issues.”

The VCEE-COOP will also seek to use their modernized headquarters as a means of interacting with the local community on issues of conservation and sustainability. As Ronsheim explained, they plan to work even more closely with the PFP to provide more place-based educational opportunities for local school children, and to engage members of the surrounding communities in various citizen science projects on the Farm and Ecological Preserve.

One such project is the Vassar Farm Phenology Trail, a part of the greater network organization, the New York Phenology Project, which focuses on data collection, ecological research and environmental monitoring. They plan to use the VCEE-COOP as the opportunity to foster greater dialogue concerning how climate change is affecting local ecosystems, particularly those of the surrounding Hudson Valley.

Begemann wrote, “The most exciting as-

News Briefs Investigation Continues for Amtrak Engineer, Critics Blame Congress On May 12, Amtrak Train 188 derailed and crashed near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Eight passengers were killed in the crash, and dozens more were injured.

Several passengers have already brought lawsuits against Amtrak for negligence in the safety and operation of the train, Meanwhile, a federal investigation has been launched into the engineer on that day, Brandon Bostian, to determine if he was at fault in any way. (TIME, “Amtrak Train That Derailed Sped Up Before Crash,” 05.14.15) The exact cause of the crash is as of yet undetermined, and a federal investigation continues to look into possible causes. Data collected from technology onboard the train established that the train was traveling at 106 miles per hour at the moment that it derailed, when about a minute earlier it was traveling at only 70 miles per hour. The curve at which the train derailed, however, had a maximum speed limit of 50 miles per hour. (The Huffington Post, “Amtrak Engineer Investigated After Derailment,” 05.21.15) Investigators are currently trying to establish exactly why the train’s speed increased to a such a dangerous level so rapidly. There was reportedly a crack on the train’s windshield that investigators had originally suspected to have been from a bullet, but it was later confirmed to have been from a minor object striking the windshield.

Other potential factors under investigation as causes for the speeding and later derailment include lack of attention on the part of the engineer, potentially due to his cell phone use.

Although investigators have discovered that Bostian used his cellphone on the day of the crash, but his lawyer contends that Bostian was not using it at the time of the crash. Bostian himself suffered a head injury during the crash and reports that he has no memories of the

moments leading up to the accident. Defense lawyer Frank DeSimone commented, “Absent a failure of the train, what will his explanation be, if any, as to why the train sped off going 106 mph in the curve?” (Huffington Post) Train engineers have been convicted of manslaughter in the United States for causing crashes, but investigators are still working to establish whether or not any negligence on Bostian’s part was responsible for the speed, and thus the derailment, of the the train. A lawyer for several of the victims, Robert Mongeluzzi, said, “We look forward to deposing the memory-impaired engineer as to what he remembers happening.”(CNN, “FBI finds no evidence of firearm damage to train,” 05.19.15) Some critics contend that a lack of federal funding is what is truly to blame for the train’s derailment. Amtrak is currently in the process of installing new safety technology called “positive train control” throughout its lines, which would have been able to slow the speeding train had it been installed as quickly as advocates demanded.

The original deadline for Amtrak installing this safety technology was this year, but current estimates place actual completion of the safety technology as late as 2020. Critics believe that low funding for Amtrak over the past few years has, in addition to causing a number of other technical and operational issues, severely slowed the rate of safety updates. (The New York Times, “One Day After Wreck, Increased Funding for Amtrak Fails in a House Panel,” 05.13.15) As investigation continues into the underlying causes of the train’s derailment, victims are working to deal with the aftermath. Memorials have begun in the last weeks of May, and one victim has established a GoFundMe page to deal with his resultant medical bills.

Meanwhile, the investigation will seek to establish precisely who is at fault for the train’s derailment as regular passengers and policymakers alike come to terms with the tragedy and its implications.

pect of this project to me is the capacity it will provide for Vassar to engage with the broader Hudson Valley community on issues related to conservation, place based learning, and the environment by providing a physical space for partnership organizations to work together and with Vassar students on related initiatives.”

She went on to say, “We are already doing great things on this front, but with an umbrella organization such as VCEE-COOP, we will be able to bring people and organizations together that have common goals and interests rather than working independently.”

According to Begemann and Ronsheim, the goal of the VCEE-COOP is to bring sustainability activities, education and research under one roof so that they can run more fluidly and synergistically. Begemann explained the VCEECOOP’s ultimate goal. “The idea of VCEECOOP is to create something like an incubator– a place where organizations, students, faculty and community members can come together to engage deeply and in a sustained fashion with the environment and conversation, in our own backyard– the Vassar Farm and Ecological Preserve,” she noted.

Hall echoed the sentiment, and asserted that it is the College’s goal through this project to make the Farm and Ecological Preserve a more active space for students on campus. “We have 500 acres of forest and 6+ miles of trails just next to campus proper than many students don’t experience,” Hall added.

“We hope that VCEE-COOP will turn the Preserve into more of a destination, whether that’s for class, watching a rugby game, a student org retreat at the Barn, or a leisurely walk on the trails,” he went on to say.

To oversee the daily operations of the VCEECOOP, the College plans to allocate a portion of the grant’s funds towards hiring a manager responsible for daily operations and visitor services and a coordinator tasked with VCEECOOP programming and environmental monitoring. Working with them will be a small team of post-baccalaureate assistants, who will help to seek out new sustainability partnerships and engage local community members on issues of

Girl Scouts Resist Backlash for Transgender Inclusion Policy On Wednesday, May 13, the American Family Association (AFA) launched a petition challenging the Girl Scouts of the USA’s policy on transgender troops.

The current policy states that while the inclusion of transgender girls in the Girl Scouts should be decided individually by the troops involved, the Girl Scouts as an organization welcome and intend to work with any child who identifies as a girl and lives as one in her community.

According to their website, “If the child is recognized by the family and school/community as a girl and lives culturally as a girl, then Girl Scouts is an organization that can serve her in a setting that is both emotionally and physically safe.” This policy applies regardless of biological sex. (The Huffington Post, “Girl Scouts Have Awesome Response To ‘Family’ Group That Wants to Ban Trans Scouts,” 05.21.15) Implementation of the policy varies throughout the country, but Girl Scout councils faced with this issue have overwhelmlingly opted in favor of inclusion so far. One large council of Girl Scout troops throughout Kentucky and Indiana recently addressed the policy by asserting that while they haven’t yet had the opportunity to include transgender girls in their troops, they agree with the national policy and intend to see their organization move in such a direction.

“We don’t discriminate,” the council said. At the same time, a local conservative advocate from Family Foundation of Kentucky opined that Girl Scouts should stick to what he called “common sense” gender distinctions. He did not clarify that standard. (The Courier Journal, “Girl Scouts group to discuss transgender policy,” 05.21.15) Although this policy has been in place on the Girl Scouts’ website for years, the AFA has only recently launched backlash against it. The AFA, who the Southern Poverty Law Center

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

conservation and sustainability.

According to Hall, four interns have already been hired to work for the summer, and the College is still searching for candidates to fill the manager and coordinator positions, which they hope to fill by July. Two post-baccalaureate positions, one centered around environmental education and outreach and the other around environmental research and restoration, will most likely be filled by August or September, if possible.

Although the plans are still in their early stages, many have expressed their optimism about what their impact on the Vassar community will be. Ronsheim commented, “I am very excited about the opportunity to connect more broadly with other environmental groups in the Hudson Valley. We are already working to forge stronger local connections through our partnerships with EMMA and the SCA, and this grant will really enhance our ability to further those connections.”

Some others, however, argue that efforts like these have been long overdue, and perhaps insufficient in the greater struggle for climate justice. Vassar Greens Divestment Coordinator Ben Lehr ’16 posited, “Vassar has made significant efforts to reduce their environmental impact, and the farm is an amazing resource for ecological and environmental education. However, education and slow improvements in campus efficiency are not enough. Vassar needs to recognize that climate change is an urgent social justice issue.”

Despite some criticism though, faculty members and administrators responsible for the VCEE-COOP’s inception remain confident that its impacts on the Vassar community and on the larger Hudson Valley will be significant.

“I share both Marianne and Meg’s excitement of connecting with our larger local community in understanding conservation today. Our ability to serve as a hub for these interactions is an amazing opportunity for all members of the Vassar community,” Christenson remarked.

“We have some very challenging, yet great opportunities, to participate in a new way of thinking about conservation.”

have categorized as an extremist group, contend in their petition that allowing transgender children in the Girl Scouts will risk the safety of cisgender Girl Scouts and will promote the acceptance of lifestyles with which they disagree.

The petition criticizes the inclusion policy as an unfair attempt to force children to accept a lifestyle that many find immoral or unnatural, and even labels the decision as a slippery slope leading to such rules as mandated transgenderism. “This means girls in the organization will be forced to recognize and accept transgenderism as a normal lifestyle,” the petition states.

“Boys in skirts, boys in make-up and boys in tents will become a part of the program.”

The petition against the Girl Scouts’ new inclusion policy, demanding that it be rescinded, has garnered nearly 40,000 signatures online.

Although it is not clear why the AFA has only recently objected to this years-old policy, many conservative and religiously-devout groups across the country have come out in support of the petition.

The Girl Scouts have made no indication that they intend to change their existing policies on LGBTQ issues, however, and have only made minimal acknowledgement of the petition. In a blog post, Program Development and Officer at Girl Scouts USA Andrea Bastiani Archibald reiterated the policy and reaffirmed the Girl Scouts’ commitment to serving girls from all walks of life. (GirlScouts.org, “The Meaning of ‘Serving All Girls,’” 05.14.15) This type of inclusion for LBGTQ youth and leaders is expanding across organizations. On May 21st, the President of the Boy Scouts of America called for change in the organization’s policy that bans openly gay troop leaders. Despite backlash from conservative groups, the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts continue to redefine their policies to be more inclusive to troops and leaders of all orientations. (Newsweek, “Girl Scouts Faces Backlash Over Transgender Policy,” 05.21.15) – Elizabeth Dean, Online Editor

COMMENCEMENT

Page 4

May 31, 2015

Daisy Chain links commencements of past and present Emily Sayer

Opinions Editor

T

chosen to uphold this practice, dressing in white and parading with the Daisy Chain on the day of Commencement, guiding seniors to and from the service. Class years change, but the daisy ceremony ties generations of Vassar students together.

The flowers were originally six inches wide and one foot in length for each of the graduating seniors, packing roughly 100 pounds onto the shoulders of all of the six daisies. Local florist W. A. Saltford arranged the thousands of flowers gathered by the sophomores from both the campus fields and areas in Duchess County into the first commercially-made chain, which stretched out to 67 feet in length.

Traditional measurements unrealistically ordained that the rope span a distance of over 600 feet. The current chain, however, is fixed at a length of about 150 feet and is toted by a group of 24 daisies.

courtesy of Vassar Media Relations

he Daisy Chain, a tradition dating back to the late 1800s, celebrates the camaraderie and amiability fostered between the separate graduating classes on Vassar’s campus.

Drawing together both sophomores and seniors, the procession was originally a symbol of sisterhood but has evolved in recent years into a commemoration of the student individuality, leadership, and collaboration.

“Daisies,” as they are known, model the values of a quintessential member of the Vassar community, engaging in a spectrum of extracurriculars and devoting their time to volunteer work or class council-related services. A council of daisy coordinators selects a group of sophomores each year to assist in the graduating class’ activities, most notably the procession of the Daisy Chain at Commencement.

Of this year’s members of the Daisy Chain, Julia Wieczorek ‘17 exemplifies the high level of campus involvement and class spirit that the tradition seeks to promote.

Wieczorek is an International Studies and Chinese double major, an athlete for Vassar’s Women’s Swimming and Diving team, a participant in the Barefoot Monkeys and a finally Jewett house fellow intern.

Despite her busy schedule, she has stretched her responsibilities to include the demands of being a daisy throughout the year.

Wieczorek described some of her duties, writing in an emailed statement, “As a Daisy Chain member, I’ve worked on a few school and senior events throughout the year, such as Halloween, the “Dear White People” screening and some events that are coming up for Senior Week! Mainly our job is to assist in fundraising the senior class and help events run smoothly, making them enjoyable and memorable!”

She continued, “The process is by application and interview by some senior Daisy Chain members. Students interested in applying for the Daisy Chain can attend some infor-

mation sessions and then complete an online application.”

Historically, as the sister class to the seniors, sophomores would adorn the chapel in Main Building with daisies picked from around campus on Class Day. This day leading up to Commencement and the seniors’ final day as undergraduate students, became a ritual of festivities that dates back to about 1889. The flowers were later chained together to rope off the seats in the chapel reserved for seniors during the Class Day exercises.

Story holds that in 1894, senior Marshall Ruth Stickney, dismayed at the thought of leaving the beautiful daisy chain indoors as seniors departed the chapel and marched to their Class Tree, ordered the sophomore women to hoist in on their shoulders and carry it alongside the graduates.

Ever since, select sophomores have been

The Daisy Chain is a Vassar tradition dating back to the late 1800s. The tradition brings together sophomores and seniors. Now fixed at a length of 150 feet, the chain is featured at Commencement.

Wieczorek explained that during the week of Commencement she will help check seniors into Bounce, accompany the seniors to Formal, check seniors onto the evening cruise and check students into the champagne reception. “Besides these, I will be walking at graduation, in tradition!” she exclaimed.

“The most recent ceremony was Spring Convocation, and like tradition, the Daisies and Violets wore white dresses and led the lines of seniors into the chapel during procession, and following behind them in recession. We will carry the ‘chain’ at graduation as well,” Wieczorek wrote.

Former daisy Kelsey Karpman ’16 remarked that the celebration has evolved significantly since it began. She described her responsibilities in the Daisy Chain.

Karpman wrote in an emailed statement, “I was a daisy during the 2013-2014 school year.

As a daisy, I was expected to assist the senior class council in running events throughout the year including Halloween, 50 nights and various senior week events.”

She continued, “Most iconically, we also held the rope of daisies during commencement. There is a brief application process and interview with the daisy coordinators. In my interview, I was asked about my leadership experience, fundraising ideas and my favorite television show.”

Last year Karpman attended convocation and the preformal event that the Daisy Chain hosted. She recounted how the daisies were split up to assist with ticketing and the running of these events throughout the week. She also volunteered her services at the seniors’ booze cruise and champagne reception, but said that she was able to enjoy the events as well as help run them.

She wrote, “I really appreciated the idea of supporting my sister class in addition to being involved with a group of students in my class that I wouldn’t have had the chance to work with otherwise.”

Professor’s passion for the universe proves astronomical ELMEGREEN continued from page 1

with Pope Benedict XVI. Elmegreen’s passion for the universe beyond Earth began at an early age when she would go stargazing. “I lived along a river in a dark neighborhood and you could go out at night and see the Milky Way and it was that childhood wonder that never left me,” said Elmegreen.

Eventually, she got to do this through high-powered telescopes. Elmegreen recounted her time as a graduate student at Harvard handling what at the time was the largest telescope in the world.

“When I was using the 200 inch Palomar you’d sit at the top of the telescope and you’d be in this enormous dome, at the very top end of it where the light would come down and reflect and go up to the top, called the prime focus. You’d put a photographic plate in at the prime focus, all in the dark. You’d open it up and there you are:

there is nothing below you except the structure of the telescope and nothing above you but the sky and it is just incomprehendable,” she said.

Advances in technology have changed the field of astronomy since her younger days. Today, Elmegreen can sit in her dining room and download data from the Hubble Space Telescope with the click of a mouse.

One of her happiest memories was making a discovery with the help of this telescope. “In the last five or so years, I’ve been looking at the Hubble Altra Deep Field, which is a piece of the universe that has never explored, with 400 orbits of whole time pointed at a blank piece of the sky,” said Elmegreen.

This blank piece turned out to hold some key information for the origins of our own small spot of the universe.

“There are 10,000 galaxies in that blank piece of the sky that have never been seen before. And

courtesy of Vassar Media Relations

Professor of Astronomy Debra Elmegreen stays busy in and outside the classroom. In addition to a busy teaching schedule, she also studies the origins of stars and participates in astropolitics.

I looked at some very unusually shaped ones that turned out to be very distant and they are the precursors to our Milky Way,” she said.

Elmegreen described star formation then as more vigorous than what can be found today.

She added,“To realize that’s what came before our galaxy was a really fun discovery.”

In the past decade, Elmegreen has been mostly engaged with astropolitics and looking at the most pressing problems in astronomy today.

She served on the Decadal Survey Committee on Astronomy and Astrophysics, which comes up with a community consensus on what the federal government should be doing next. After being on this panel, she became president of the American Astronomical Society.

“It carried on some of the ideas that we wanted to accomplish and talked to Congressmen and funding agencies like the Science Foundation, NASA and Department of Energy—and explained why we wanted certain telescopes built and what lines of research were most pressing,” she said.

Elmegreen accomplishes this while also teaching at Vassar College. Many of her colleagues teach at a big university with a course load that is typically one class per semester.

Elmegreen, however, teaches an annual course load of five classes.

Often times she has to go to conferences during school, so her husband, also an astronomer, teaches her classes. Although she prizes teaching, Elmegreen admits that balancing it with her research can be daunting.

“What is hardest is to get research done during the academic year, so I do it in bits and pieces. I never have a long block of time for research so my computer is always open and an inch from my hand and whether I am at home or at work, I have pieces of time to do things. I never go home and leave work behind because there is always something more to be done,” said Elmegreen.

But patience goes hand in hand with the study of galaxies. Researching the lifetime of stars over billions of years can often feel like it is taking aeons of its own.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

“As I get older and more involved with what goes into having observatories, the funding that goes into having observatories and having the data you need to make discoveries, you realize that a lot of things are on a very slow timescale,” said Elmegreen.

She continued, “I think the wonder of it all is to keep realizing that we are an itty-bitty part of the universe, and yet it is a pretty important part, and how that all fits together.”

The joy of exploration and putting puzzle pieces together is what makes the difficult task of waiting worth it for Elmegreen. Astronomy is, in her opinion, a field that demands a certain type of mindset from its practitioner, one that can be difficult to pin down. “[It’s] a very different type of creativity than in literature, music, or art—but it’s creativity nonetheless—where you are thinking of some avenue to explore and along the way, you come up with a piece that no one else has ever thought of.”

An astronomer’s life revolves around trying to understand the universe—something that is nearly unattainable, at least tangibly, that is. In a speech, Steven Hawking compared humans to cockroaches: imagine trying to teach a cockroach what a human knows and then imagine what it’s like for the universe to teach humans what it is.

Delmegreen shared that she can occasionally feel frusturated by these very limits.

“I felt that way in class today in my last lecture. I was talking about the multi-verse view— maybe we are not just one universe even, but there are many other universes—and yet you have to sometimes throw up your hands and laugh at some of the ideas today because they are so far beyond anything that we can really grasp right now,” she said.

It is in the very pursuit of knowledge, however, that Elmegreen believes is worthwhile.

“I think we aren’t going to get it all. There is a basic human limit. We are going to keep on discovering more and more stuff, but there will always be something beyond us. So I just think ‘Just go for it and be a part of it and enjoy it.’”

May 31, 2015

COMMENCEMENT

Page 5

Main remains center of map, students’ hearts, 1862-2015 Anika Lanser Copy Editor

A

courtesy of Vassar College

common refrain heard on Vassar College tours is that every student passes through Main Building at least once a day. Many think of Main as the central hub of campus activities.

However, there was a time when Main Building was not just the physical center of campus life but housed almost all of the campus facilities, including the library, chapel and house of the President and Lady Principal. Since Matthew Vassar had wide hallways designed so students could exercise indoors, students had no reason to leave, other than to head to the Observatory for astronomy.

Main building was originally to be constructed as five interconnected sections designed

by Thomas Teft. However, after his untimely death, Matthew Vassar had to look elsewhere for the designer of the building set to house the beginning of Vassar College. According to the Vassar College Encylopedia, Vassar had been impressed with the architecture of the Palais des Tuileries while on European tour. He ultimately settled on James Renwick Jr., architect of the Smithsonian, and asked him to use the Palais as inspiration for the design.

Constructed over the course of four years, beginning in 1861, Main was designed in Second Empire Style, an architectural framework descended from the elements it gained from the architecture of the Second French Empire.

It was constructed by William Harloe, a onetime mayor of Poughkeepsie. Outgoing Main House President Drew Leventhal ‘17 clarified a little known detail. “The building, contrary to popular belief, was not the first building built on campus, it was built after the observatory in 1861,” he explained.

Containing the college to essentially one building also served other purposes. As College Historian and Professor Emeritus of English Colton Johnson noted, “A college that had all facilities was viewed as highly experimental.

Nobody was sure if women could stand up to the rigors of a Harvard or a Yale and if it was a good idea for society for women to be educat-

ed. Housing the entire college and all its functions in Main made it easier for outside skeptics to check in on the experiment.”

As the college grew, a 500 foot width and five stories were no longer enough to contain all that Main Building, the largest interior space in the country until 1868, needed to house. The growing need led to several different expansion projects that directly altered Main’s physical structure. The first of which was an extension to the dining room and kitchen designed

by James S. Post in 1872. Another designed to expand the library space in Main in 1893 was dubbed “Uncle Fred’s Nose” after its benefactor. The Frederick Ferris Thompson Annex was designed by the architect of Thompson’s mansion, Francis R. Allen. Despite acquiring an endearing nickname, the Annex was considered by many to be an architectural error, incongruent with the design of the rest of the building because it featured a marble porte-cochere that acted as the new entrance for the building.

The Encyclopedia explained, porte-cocheres or carriage porches stand at the entrances to buildings, allowing vehicles to pass underneath but also protecting occupants from weather.

They are mostly found on 18th and 19th century public buildings and are not typically features of buildings designed in the Second Empire architectural style. As a consequence of this contradiction of styles, funds donated by the Rockefellers in 1959 were used to remove the Annex and restore the original facade, although the added second story entrance remains. These funds were also used to remove the rear extension designed by Post in order to make room for the College Center.

Since the physical alterations directly to Main did not solve the College’s space problem, residential and academic aspects began to be designated outside of the building. When funds allowed for the construction of Strong House and Rockefeller Hall, Main no longer served as the primary location for housing and educating students.

The Fire of 1918 also necessitated a reconstruction of the back portion of Main Building

Considered the central hub of Vassar’s campus, Main Building has a rich history, drawing from Second Empire Style architechture. Despite numerous changes, the building stands the same as it did in 1975. during which many changes to the physical layout were made. As outlined in the Vassar College Encyclopedia, “The subsequent restoration part of what had been the third floor chapel was incorporated in a dining room below, which was endowed by the Class of 1880 as ‘Underwood Hall,’ in memory of their classmate Jennie Cushing Underwood.”

Another section of the third floor chapel was incorporated into the Villard Room as clerestory windows during the construction of the College Center. After these last physical alterations and the completion of the College Center in 1975, no major architectural changes have affected the stature of Main Building. In 1974 Main Building was listed as a Historic Landmark on the Federal Register and in 1986 the building received greater prestige as a National Historic Landmark, officially recognized for the place where Vassar education began. The

building stands today the same as it did in 1975.

One thing that remained consistent throughout Main’s history is it’s standing with the students. As was true when it was the only building on campus, today Main is the hub of student life and activity. Explained Leventhal, “Living in Main is an all inclusive experience, making it different from houses that do not have all our amenities. Having the retreat is a big help.

Having the ROC move over was a small but noticeable improvement, it’s awesome when you need to use it. And of course having all of the parlors and administrative offices downstairs makes going to rehearsals and meetings and appointments super easy.” Despite numerous changes to its physical appearance over the years and even though they no longer use the wide hallways for indoor exercise, Vassar students still consider Main Building to be the beating heart of campus.

Summer in China propels students forward in fluency Sarah Dolan

Design Editor

W

courtesy of Julia Wieczorek

hen you ask a college student what they are doing over the summer, most will tell you about their job or internship, or their plans to travel and spend time with their friends. But for a few Vassar students, summer means boarding a plane and flying across the Pacific to study for several months at Qingdao University in Qingdao, China.

Students travel to Qingdao to study Chinese language and culture for nine weeks, and receive three credits for completing the program. The program has received positive reviews from students, who report benefitting greatly from the immersive language study, exposure to authentic Chinese culture and camaraderie with their fellow students.

The primary focus of the program is to improve students’ language skills. Saisha Srivastava ’18, a participant in the program last summer, reflected on her experiences, saying, “I went into this program barely being able to string two Chinese sentences together...and I came back very comfortably conversational.”

Although travel is a part of their schedules, the language study is intensive. Students are completely immersed in Chinese language and culture, with very little opportunity to speak English. They spend up to five hours per day taking language classes, and after class they go out into the city to explore and practice their Chinese. This environment is extremely beneficial. students reported.

Added Srivastava, “[A]t Vassar, when Chinese is one of your five classes, it’s difficult to give it the attention that a language deserves.”

In contrast, living in China forced students to eventually gain the confidence to speak comfortably.

Students came back from the program shocked at the skills they have acquired. One participant, Julia Wieczorek ’17, recalled her growth as a Chinese-speaker. “I gained language skills that I couldn’t have imagined I would ever have,” she said.

Vassar students participated in the Qingdao Program in China to improve their Chinese skills. The program offers three credits over the course of the summer and is equivalent to third-year classes.

She went on, “I was put into advanced Chinese this year and I never would have guessed that I would be able to do that.”

Because the program offers three credits over the course of one summer, many students use it as an opportunity to double-major in Chinese and a second subject.

“I went into the program as a minor, but the language program accelerated my Chinese so much that it just made sense to be a major,” said Srivastava. Srivastava and Wieczorek both are double majors. Srivastava in Chinese and economics and Wieczorek in Chinese and international studies.

Chinese and Urban Studies major Eli Ness ’17, will participate in the program this summer. He remarked, “As a double major, it’s hard to fit in all the classes I need, so the Qingdao allows me to get a full year of language credit

in one summer.”

Ness will be taking an advanced Chinese course that is the equivalent of the third-year classes at Vassar, as well as a course on Chinese culture and literature. Like his peers who have participated in the program, he also feels that his improved Chinese will contribute to his other another field of interest.

“In a broad sense, China is a country on the forefront of urbanization, so Chinese language skills will be incredibly useful,” said Ness.

Over the course of the program, students also develop close bonds with the other participants. Both Srivastava and Wieczorek mentioned the friendships that they formed last summer in Qingdao.

Wieczorek remarked, “I think that it’s partially due to something I like to call the tourist effect...when you’re in a place you kind of

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

gravitate toward the people who speak a common language. I did that with the students I traveled with and with Professor Du as well, he became like a father figure to us.”

Another component of the program is a cultural education. Students take trips to historic destinations, including Tiananmen Square, the Great Wall, and Qufu, the birthplace of Confucius, and then write essays and give presentations about their experiences.

Wieczorek found the ancient buildings of China particularly fascinating. The Forbidden Palace in Beijing made a deep impression on her. “I was standing on a spot where people might have stood two thousand years ago...it was absolutely incredible,” she said.

In addition to traveling, students have a two-week long homestay in the middle of the program, where they live with a Chinese family in Qingdao rather than staying in the dorms.

Some students reported growing close to their family. Srivastava told an amusing anecdote about her insect-obsessed host brother, who would wake her up every morning by showing her a new bug he had found.

“I kept telling them in as much Chinese as I could muster that I’m scared of these bugs, and they just thought it was really cute,” she laughed. Wieczorek was also close with her family, remembering that “her homestay mom cried when she left.”

Apart from traveling and homestays, students learn about Chinese culture simply by being in the city. “What really hit me was seeing outside the pictures that you might see when you do a Google search of China. It really took me by surprise, the things that you see every day,” said Wieczorek. According to the students the city of Qingdao itself provides an excellent environment for both academic and non-academic learning.

Said Srivastava, “People in Qingdao are really laid back, and it’s definitely a much more conducive environment to learning a language because people are willing to slow down and talk to you.”

COMMENCEMENT

Page 6

May 31, 2015

An uncliched Main hosts Beethoven’s moving melodies look at seniors’ L last words Yifan Wang Reporter

Zander Bashaw

Humor & Satire Editor

C

Jacob Gorski/The Miscellany News

ommencement speeches have been riddled with cliches and pocketed with lies since the Middle Ages. See, I just completely made up a sweeping and entirely not factual argument in a sentence, and it fit right into the mold of the traditional address. So why are a bunch of brilliant and interesting students from the Vassar College class of 2015 going to all sit together for another cliche filled custard? To understand this we need to examine the long history of celebrating academic achievement that we get roped into when we are 11 years old.

When I made the momentous step in my life of graduating elementary school, our class of bucktooth or stringy-haired kids (I was both) got up on stage to say their name and a word that they had chosen that best described them. Naturally, this meant a lot of preparation, because most 5th graders don’t know polysyllabic words other than “McNuggets”. We were so busy learning about words that you don’t use in a typical game of “Shove each other into the asphalt”, that we neglected to even question the nature of the tradition. In fact, I think the word choice absurdity was the only time that every one of us followed instructions from our teachers.

I got up on stage and said, in a high pitched voice that I did not yet know would persist into high school: “I’m Zander Bashaw and I’m determined!” Determined to do what? Dive off of the stage into the arms of slightly proud, mostly bored parents? Eat Cristiano Ronaldo’s heart on live television? I could have meant literally anything, but people just smiled, which made me feel smart and important. These feelings distracted me from how idiotic it was to describe myself in one word, when in reality there were so many that I could have used at that time such as annoying, unclean or competitive.

I remember Middle School and High School graduations as times when people received awards in the names of people they didn’t know for things that they probably didn’t do. I recall both times sitting in formal clothes that didn’t fit me very well and listening to various deans say things like “Even though we have had our ups and downs, this class is a big family.” Why would a family of hundreds of people all go to the same school and all be the same age? Also at that point a lot of us had slow-grinded at dances and that is certainly not something that families do…

High school graduation had all the hormones of middle school, but somehow more references to that infernal Dr. Seuss book Oh, the Places You’ll Go. Don’t get me wrong, Seuss’ work on the Grinch was fantastic, and I have liked green eggs and ham ever since I tried them, but Oh the Places You’ll Go is one of the shittiest things ever. I think that the book encourages a dependence upon hallucinogenic drugs, because if you stay in school like the Dean reading an excerpt from this book wants you to, you are certainly not going to go to many of the places that Seuss sketches.

If there is a point in your life when you graduate or grow up, but I guarantee you it is not when you are sitting in traditional clothes and listening to old people say some shit about you. Imagine that college is like writing a paper, and that commencement is turning it in. Some people wrote it in 45 minutes, some people called their moms about it, others spent hours agonizing over it only to change topics later. In the end, everyone reaches commencement the way that you reach an unfamiliar professors office to hand in a final paper.

Sweaty, stressed, trying not to shit yourself as you run across the quad and realize all you have eaten for the past 9 days is ketchup and Deece coffee.

Graduating is not at all about graduation, it is about all the dusty dorms, late nights and Bud Lights you had along the way. It doesn’t matter that you turned in the paper that was due at 3pm at 2:59:56, it matters what you actually did before you got there. Now I’m sure that I will forget all of this by the time I graduate and allow the familiar cliches to wash over me like a cleansing rain, but I can assure you that if I hear anyone talk about that Oh the places you’ll go book on my commencement, I’ll set my cap, gown and (hopefully) diploma on fire.

ike wine and cheese, a classical concert and the wood-panelled Villard Room form a perfect match. While the music instills a sense of artistic vitality to the otherwise quiet room, the calming space allows the melodies flowing from the musicians to absorb the entire audience.

During one of the hottest months of the year in Poughkeepsie, Vassar’s Villard Room will offer more than just air conditioning as the site of a concert by Adjunct Artist in Music, Thomas Sauer. On July 22, residents from all around the Poughkeepsie area will funnel into the space most people reserve exclusively for tea and acapella rehearsals. The pieces performed will include works by Beethoven, Schumann, Darius Milhaud and Thomas Adès.

As a pianist, Sauer’s recent work includes ensemble performances with the Quad-City and Tallahassee Symphonies and the Greenwich Village Orchestra and solos at institutions like Carnegie Hall and St. John’s College, Oxford. He has also appeared on Broadway as the pianist in 33 Variations, a play about the composition of Beethoven’s “Diabelli Variations.”

A member of the music faculty of Vassar College and the piano faculty of the Mannes College, Sauer is also the founder and director of the Mannes Beethoven Institute.

For this particular performance at Vassar in July, Sauer explained his muscial selections. He wrote in an emailed statement, “I’ve been invited to a festival in Denmark in August, where I’ll play some of this same repertoire and I wanted to play some of it with friends before doing it with European string and wind players whom I’ve never met.”

He continued, “I like to present concerts with a variety of repertoire, something for everyone- Beethoven’s Piano Quartet Op. 16, Robert Schumann’s Fantasy Pieces Op. 73, and ‘Traced Overhead’ and ‘Court Studies from the Tempest’ by Thomas Adès.”

With this range of artists and pieces, Sauer faces two challenges. “Pulling together excellent musicians during the height of summer festival season was a past challenge, and preparing some very difficult music is the one we have now,” he commented.

The concert will also include a wide range of intruments. In one performance, Sauer hopes to feature the clarinet, violin, cello and piano.

Wolfram Koessel will be the cellist of this concert. Koessel is a soloist, recitalist and chamber musician who performs concertos with with the Jupiter Symphony, the New York Metamorphoses Orchestra, Jerusalem Symphony, the Osaka Symphony, the Mannes Orchestra and symphony orchestras in Stuttgart, Cordoba,

On July 22, Vassar’s Thomas Sauer will showcase his musicianship in the Villard Room. The performance will include pieces by Beethoven, Schumann, Darius Milhaud and Thomas Adès.

Mendoza, Costa Rica, Iowa and New York. A member of the American String Quartet, Koessel is on the cello and chamber music faculty at the Manhattan School of Music and also in residence at the Aspen Music Festival and the Great Wall Academy in China.

Moreover, Koessel is one of the founders of the group Trio+. Members of the group also include violinist Yosuke Kawasaki and pianist Vadim Serebryani. This ensemble seeks to expand the idea of a piano trio with unique programming in special spaces.

Koessel committed to music at an early age.

During his teenage years, he chose music over sports, a decision he still supports today. He explained, “I decided to become a musician around the age of 13. I had to choose between sports and music because doing both became too time consuming. I’m glad I choose music as you can have a much longer career.”

Koessel and Sauer’s friendship dates back much farther than the their time as professional musicians. Koessel recounted, “I have known Mr.Sauer since 1991 when we were both enrolled as students at the Mannes College of Music. He played with me at my Carnegie Hall debut in 1994.”

In terms of the organization aspect of the music event, Sauer, and Concert Administrator and Building Curator, Amy Kawa are the ones who made it happen. Sauer commented that his concert is part of a series of events held by the Music Department during the summer. He said,

“The music department has an annual summer series and despite this summer’s Skinner Hall construction project this year, we’re going ahead with a two-concert series, with concerts on July 15 and 22.”

Kawa elaborated on the process of finding a concert space outside of Skinner, saying, “The music department has often presented concerts in Skinner Hall over the summer. However this year, because of major construction... the department has had to relocate these concerts.

The Villard Room was a good choice because of its central location and—quite important for a summer concert—its air conditioning,” she said.

As concert approaches with the rising temperature, the artists discussed their expectations and goals for their performances. Despite the expected heat and previoulsy unknown campus, Koessel was optimistic. “It’s my first time at Vassar! I’m looking forward!”

At the same time, Koessel wishes to communicate their understanding of the musical works, and to inspire the audiences.

“We will try our best to give exciting and thoughtful interpretations of these works,” he said, “I hope the audiences will enjoy our efforts and the variety of the musical offerings, and maybe be inspired to invest more time listening to classical music.”

Sauer echoed this, saying, “My goal, as always, is to present a concert on the highest possible artistic level. This is what moves people most deeply.”

Show mixes media, four decades of work LOEB continued from page 1

“Not since our Saul Steinberg drawing retrospective in 2007 have we shown in exhibition by an American artist that spans that artist’s career.

In that regard, the Artschwager exhibition ranges from the 1960s through the 2000s,” Phagan explained.

Artschwager died in 2013, leaving behind a varied oeuvrer that can be difficult to pin down to one single style. He contributed to an array of art movements like Conceptualism, Minimalism, and Pop. What remained constant in his life, however, was his fascination with perception, the blurring of what is observed versus an illusion, remained constant throughout his life.

From 1949-50, Artschwager studied in New York under the French cubist painter, Amédée Ozenfant. Later that decade, after building furniture and being commissioned to make portable altars, Artschwager began using mass-produced materials in his art, indicative of Pop artists.

Wrote Phagan, “[Artschwager] had been in the New York art world since the Sixties, exhibiting at Castelli Gallery then with Pop artists Warhol, Lichtenstein, and Rosenquist. For decades later he constructed a substantial body of work that continued to achieve critical acclaim.”

Artschwager’s creations not only span across a variety of movements but also mediums, ranging from etching to sculpture. The etchings in the show provide insight as to how the artist worked, while the three-dimensional pieces can surprise viewers in more ways than one, such as

through their use of unique materials, both organic and synthetic.

In his art, Artschwager employed rubberized horsehair. animal hide, wood, glass and more.

The space of the Loeb itself opens new possibilities for considering Artschwager. The hanging sculpture Exclamation (orange variant) is juxtaposed with the other works currently on view at the museum.

Phagan wrote: “…one of [Artschwager’s] spiky bristle multiples will be installed high up in one of the corners of the galleries. If you contrasted that work with one of the daguerreotypes in the current show or with one of the Baroque paintings on view in the permanent collection, then I think you can see what an innovative and surprising artist Artschwager became.”

While the exclamation point has become one of Artschwager’s signatures, the artist is also well known for creating and coining the term “blps,” pronounced as “blips.” First established in 1960. blps are ovular sculptures.

Coordinator of Public Education and Information for the Loeb, Margaret Vetare, spoke to the event plans the museum has for the exhibition. As she said,“[Phagan] will give a guided tour of the exhibition. Families are encouraged to come to this event where children can go on a treasure hunt for blps and make their own summer garden party hats inspired by works within the exhibition.

The ones in the exhibition are also made from an array of materials: rubber, silver, and wood.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

In their own unorthodox way, the objective of Blps is to highlight elements of structure, surface, and architecture that are often overlooked.

Thus, focused looking is necessary when viewing Artschwager’s work.

Providing an explanation as to how viewers may respond to Artschwager’s creations, Phagan wrote, “[His] obsessions with animating space, on the one hand, and animating punctuation, on the other, are central to the show, and these themes will likely influence viewers to think unconventionally about the placement and content of art.”

While the majority of Vassar students will be gone during the summer, there will still be some time for them to experience the exhibit when they come back in the fall.

As Vetare said, “What I like about this line-up of programs is that we get to hear a variety of voices considering Artschwager’s work, whether it’s FLLAC’s own curator of prints and drawings, or the curator of the exhibition, or, in the case of the film, Artschwager himself and many of the artists who knew him. And the programs are in a variety of formats so that there should be something that appeals to everyone.”

An opportunity to learn more about the show and its formation will be available September 3, through Weitman’s lecture “From Ink to Formica: The Prints and Multiples of Richard Artschwager.” Students attending the lecture can watch the show go out with a bang, or, more appropriately, a punctuation mark.

May 31, 2015

Campus Canvas

COMMENCEMENT

Page 7

A weekly space highlighting the creative pursuits of student-artists

submit to misc@vassar.edu

We come to form distinctions (both physiologically and culturally) in our minds of a concept of human normality. When something does not look or behave as we think it should, it can give us the sensation of being “wrong.” This feeling is itself frightening and disturbing, and even when we consciously understand the reasons for the discrepancy we are prone to feeling disturbed. Horror movies often capitalize off of the idea of these unsettling human-like beings that are similar to a human in looks, and yet also different. The face, as opposed to the rest of the body, is particularly subject to these differences – a monster body with a human face is more relatable than a human body with a monster face. With this in mind, I had a lot of fun playing with shape, features, mutation/death and absurdity while trying to find a balance between humanity and monstrosity.

-Jennifer Silverman ’16

Record breaking seniors help redefine Vassar athletics ATHLETES continued from page 1

Last season, the men’s team made it to the Liberty League Championship game for the first time in Vassar’s history, yet lost to Hobart. Despite their disappointing record this season, the men’s team was able to defeat Hobart at home on senior day.

The male recipient of the Matthew Vassar Outstanding Career Award did the majority of his work in the water. Swimmer Luc Amodio has put together an extremely successful athletic career at Vassar, swimming team and personal bests in the 50 back and 50 free as well as being named to the Liberty League All-Academic Team. For Amodio, it was his last race at the Upper New York State Collegiate Athletic Association Championship meet that helped give him some perspective on the course of his career: “Swimming is cumulative, and until that point I had always been looking towards the next meet and the next race. I was relieved, but also proud that I had the opportunity to be part of what Vassar swimming has become.” Amodio is proud of the way the swimming program has developed over the course of his athletic career.

He added, “The position the team is in right now bodes well for the next four or five years, but it is up to those in the program now to keep it pointing in the right direction.”

Sophomore Julia Cunningham (Full Disclosure, Julia Cunningham is an assistant Features Editor for The Miscellany News) is one of those swimmers. Cunningham was the female recipient of the Betty Richey Performer of the Year

Award. She earned All-American honors with her seventh place finish in the 200-meter butterfly and already either owns or co-owns six school records. Still, she emphasized the leadership of the team’s senior swimmers. Explained Cunningham: “The seniors held the team together and kept us on track throughout countless hours of practices and meets, regardless of whether or not they were the captains or the lane leaders. They stepped up and found that motivation to push us a little bit further each day. They were the ones who always had the best mental game, and could talk us through a mental block. This year there was at least one senior in every lane. In my lane, Luc Amodio was the only person who ever actually knew what was going on through the whole practice.”

The male winner of the award, junior runner Taylor Vann, had an impressive season in his own right. Vann too spoke about the legacy of his seniors, specifically mentioning senior Heather Ingraham: “[Heather] is an amazing athlete, the likes of which Vassar may never see again. I’m so thankful to have been able to watch her become one of the fastest runners in Division III history. She has earned every single one of the accolades that she’s received over her career. I’ve spent a lot of time on the track, in the weight room, and running just about everywhere on campus with Heather, and I’ve never seen somebody work as hard, be as consistent, and be so incredibly humble, as Heather. The work ethic that Heather displayed has had a

courtesy of Vassar Media Relations

we came here as freshmen, our team had a roster of less than 20 guys when our Liberty League opponents had 40 plus. Although we came up short in a lot of those games, we gave 110% every single time and literally ran until we puked. I think that the guys who have come here in the last few years recognize how far this program has come in a short period of time… Seeing the progress the program has made over the past few years should make many opponents fear what is to come in the future. Our roster is growing in numbers and in talent and soon enough we will be knocking on the door of the top 20.”

Out on the farm, the men and women’s rugby teams have been dominant. This fall, the women’s team reached the Tri-State Rugby Championships, falling to Rutgers, as well as the USA Rugby American Collegiate Rugby Association Championships, where they fell to Kutztown.

The men’s team also reached the Tri-State Championships this past fall where they fell to Fairfield in the title game. This spring, they were the winners of the Tri-State 7s Tournament and went on to compete in the Division II National Tournament in Denver, Colorado.

Senior captain Nich Graham, the male recipient of the Frances Ferguson Coaches Award cited this as the defining moment of his season.

The award is based on sportsmanship, leadership and character. Graham has had great faith in the program over the course of his career at Vassar and hopes to leave a legacy of communication and companionship. He explained, “With a great coach like Tony Brown anything could be possible.”

The female recipient of the award, senior tennis player Samantha Schapiro also spoke about her favorite moments on the court this season, noting the team’s victory at the Seven Sisters’ Tournament and the team’s California trip over Spring Break. Schapiro’s perspective on her team’s legacy goes beyond the numbers: “Our legacy is not about the victories and personal wins that we have compiled over the past four years, but about the experience, leadership, and positive attitude we bring to the team dynamic everyday in matches and practices. We have worked hard on and off the court, and have set an example for the underclassmen to help preserve the Vassar tennis team’s reputation as a well-respected and successful athletic program on campus.”

Moving indoors, the men’s basketball team had a difficult season this year. Still, on the back of their seniors, they put together some impressive performances. Senior Alex Snyder scored his 1,000th point this season and he too spoke of the camaraderie he formed with his teammates.

Senior runner Heather Ingraham was honored with the Matthew Vassar Outstanding Career Award.

Ingraham bested her own record in the 400-meter dash to become the NCAA Division III Champion.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

profound impact on me and my teammates, because having an All-American on the team only serves to motivate everybody else to try their absolute hardest to try to keep up with her.”

Ingraham has had an extremely impressive career at Vassar, winning the female Matthew Vassar Outstanding Career Award at the Banquet. Last season, Ingraham became Vassar’s first ever track All-American, finishing fourth in the 400-meter race at Nationals. She is Vassar’s third female runner since 2010 to earn multiple appearances in the NCAA Championships and has held the nation’s fastest 400-meter time all season. She also broke the 100-meter and 200-meter records this year and was a part of the record-breaking 4x100-meter team. Ingraham competed in Nationals this past weekend and came in first place in the nation with a time of 53.89 seconds, breaking her 400-meter record in the process.

Ingraham’s teammate senior Cassidy Carpenter, who qualified for Nationals in Cross Country this fall, added, “This past track season, we have had an incredibly close-knit, positive team and it’s really been such a fun season because of it and we have had so many people get huge PRs and I think a lot of it is the environment we foster as driven students and athletes. The Twilight Meet just a few weeks ago, really exemplified what I love about running in college. Just before my 5K I saw Heather break 55 seconds in the 400, and set the new fastest time in the nation, and that inspired me and helped me set a PR in my own race. So while in some ways it seems like an individual sport, we all share the same passion.”

Ingraham pointed to this year’s Matthew Vassar Twilight Meet as the defining moment of her season. She has always had great performances at that meet and this year was no exception. Still, what she will miss the most about the Vassar Track experience is being part of a team. Ingraham stated, “I love my team here and being on the track team has been one of my greatest experiences at Vassar. Everyone is incredibly supportive of each other and it truly is like being a part of a huge family.”

Ingraham also noted the legacy her senior class will leave behind: “We have a very large senior class and our freshman year was really the first year that we had a large group of sprinters. So I think that we did a really great job at bridging the gap between the sprinters and distance runners and helping to create a more close and cohesive team.”

Congratulations to all of Vassar’s senior athletes for their contributions on and off the field.

The legacies they left both their respective teams and Vassar College itself will be felt for years to come.

SENIOR RETROSPECTIVES

Page 8

May 31, 2015

Marie Solis “‘A

ll my life appears to be one happy moment.’ This is what the first man in space said,” writes Jenny Offill in “Dept. of Speculation.” It’s easy to imagine why he was moved to say this. As the astronaut moved out of earth’s atmosphere, our planet would become increasingly smaller and drowned in the enormity of outer space; just a blip among millions of other blips, making his every sad memory fade into the cosmos.

Graduating can produce the same effect.

As my time at Vassar begins to feel like something I’m looking at through a rearview mirror, the bad will become hazy, the good into sharper focus.

Suddenly, all of my Vassar life appears to be sitting on the porch of 102 College Ave. with friends, listening to Fleetwood Mac. All of my Vassar life appears to be a single Founder’s Day. All of my Vassar life appears to be the feeling of getting the interview, of getting the internship. All of my Vassar life appears to be laughing over drinks with a professor after his reading. He signs in my book, “I am so proud of you and your writing.”

“...the bad will become hazy, the good into sharper focus.”

All of my Vassar life appears to be those classes that enlightened me, changed me and challenged me. It appears to be the four

I

women’s studies courses I took with the same professor, who made me feel smart and strong enough to shape the world in my vision. All of my Vassar life appears to be lazing in the orchard among the pink trees. All of my Vassar life appears to be a full Thanksgiving dinner my housemates and I decided to cook in April.

This collection of moments is one I will look back on most frequently, and together they create a snapshot of the joy I’ve experienced over the last four years. But without the other parts, this portrait is incomplete.

There were, of course, many tears. Stress tears, when there was too much work and too little time. Failure-feeling tears when I blew the job interview. Tears in a Strong stairwell.

Tears under the covers in my Cushing single.

Some of these came from temporary sadnesses and frustrations: the 15-page paper got written, another interview would come along. Others were deeper devastations. Still, with them, there was always a friend with a shoulder or an emergency bottle of wine hidden in a forgotten kitchen cabinet. In equal measure, these highs and lows formed the texture of my Vassar life.

Here, I became a smarter, more caring, more questioning and critically thinking version of my previous self. For that, I must thank my professors, peers, parents and Vassar proper, an institution that gave me the tools to see that it is just as wonderful as it is flawed.

While growing up just 20 minutes away from Vassar, I would drive by it at least once a year for my dance recitals at Poughkeepsie High School. From an eight-year-old’s vantage point, it was a castle, a magical utopia set aside from the humdrum of suburban life.

Little by little, some of the spell starts to

“My time at Vassar has been an experiment in stepping outside of my comfort zone.”

At some point that year, I decided to run for Raymond VP, in some form of decision making I can only attribute to my student fellow urging me to do so.

On top of house team, sophomore year was makred by taking academic chances. I was (remarkably) accepted into International Studies 110, which was to travel to Cuba over break. It would be my first time leaving the country, except for Canada, which doesn’t

“Here, I became a smarter, more caring, more questioning and critically thinking version of my previous self.”

And then there is The Miscellany News, this beautiful, terrible thing you are holding, or gazing at on your screen, or fanning yourself with on graduation hill. I started writing for The Misc the second semester of my freshman year and never looked back.

As a reporter, I learned to be curious. As Features Editor I learned how to forgo em-

barrassment so that I might not feel shame when knocking on a writer’s door at midnight to ask for her front-page article. As Senior Editor I learned the maximum number of puns you could fit into one headline. As Editor-in-Chief I learned to send the paper to print and to never look at it again. For sanity’s sake.

I lived some of my best memories in the Misc office, between the hours of 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. on Tuesday nights and Wednesday mornings; writing, editing, laughing, joking, complaining. Sometimes I was convinced I was going to crumble under the stress of it all, but just a computer or two over there was someone to help me co-write an article or think of a lede. Most often, this person was Chris Gonzalez, a friend whose endless support means the world to me. Thanks to you and to all of the Misc editorial board members who have made my writing better.

Thanks to my best friend Shivani Davé.

When I think of Vassar I will always think of you and how we first toured the campus together and how, when we found out we had both been accepted, we promised we’d always be there to play with each other’s hair when things went wrong.

Thank you to my housemates, Lorena, Kiran, Ben and Benno. Together, we made TH 132 a home. Thanks to TH 122—Cat, Ceci, Meesh, Alex, Katherine and sometimes Phil.

Our adventures won’t end here. And thanks to everyone in between, the characters who populate our tiny Vassar world, growing ever-tinier in our rearview mirrors.

—Marie Solis is an English major with a Hispanic studies correlate. She has held multiple positions on The Miscellany News, including Editor-in-Chief.

Ann Nguyen

Gwen Frenzel

’m writing this with a half-eaten pint of ice cream staring back at me, evidence of my frustration at the multiple drafts I’ve written in the trash. How can I reflect on Vassar, looking back on how it has been for me and hopefully for some of you, in less than 1000 words?

We all were accepted to Vassar, we decided to come here, and we liked it (or the financial aid) enough to stay until graduation.

And we all learned a hell of a lot along the way.

One of the reasons I decided to come to Vassar was so that I could learn to be a better writer. But I still can’t think of the words to say. So, I’ll talk about another reason I decided on Vassar: to test my ability to be hundreds of miles away from my family and friends.

My time at Vassar has been an experiment in stepping outside of my comfort zone. As I’m sure my family, friends, student fellow, Transitions intern, Luis Inoa and Ben Lotto can attest to, I was an emotional wreck first semester freshman year, unsure how to go about life without the comforts from back home that I had never been away from.

Thankfully, those same people were also full of resources that helped me open up and call Vassar home by the time I returned to campus in January.

wear off: The word “problematic” is now grating, the line for Express Lunch is too long, and the tulips in Main Circle will always wilt after two weeks. Even so, I never became disenchanted with Vassar’s beauty and I never took for granted the enormous privilege I had in being able to call this campus home.

If I ever came close to forgetting how fortunate I was, it was after spending hours doing work in the library. With final exams still fresh in our memories, we can recall the feeling well—the writer’s block, the exhaustion and those damn tour groups, noisy and chipper and oblivious to the fact that you’re about to keel over at your laptop. Yet these tour groups always filed in at the right moment, allowing me to feel the awe of experiencing Vassar for the first time.

feel like leaving the country when you grow up about two hours from the border.

I also applied for a class at Otisville Correctional Facility with Professor Larry Mamiya, which proved to be one of the most enriching experiences of my four years. I told my dad I was taking the class, because he was my emergency contact, and pressured him to not tell my mom, who I knew wouldn’t be happy with my decision. The men I met at Otisville brought a perspective to the classroom that is not present on Vassar’s campus.

I evidently decided that I should be making the most of my time at Vassar, and applied for a JYA program that traveled around the world. I ended up horribly sick, hospitalized almost every day for two weeks, on the other side of the planet from my mom, the only person I wanted with me through what felt like the last days of my life.

Coming back to Vassar from abroad is an odd experience, especially for those of us who traveled to countries with limited access to resources we are accustomed to. I decided I wanted to meet new people and try new things, so I joined the Misc.

Of course, senior year is full of new experiences, too: applying for jobs and preparing ourselves for the “real world,” all while writing a thesis and trying to enjoy every last opportunity Vassar has to offer before our time here runs out.

I was scared, nervous and quiet when I first came to Vassar. But I’m proud of myself for constantly challenging complacency, calamity and the status-quo. I have pushed myself to be a less quiet, more confident, and a more thorough thinker than I was when I came to Vassar. And if nothing else, my diploma is proof of my perseverance and growth.

As we move on with our lives, I want to encourage myself, and all of you, to keep challenging ourselves. Don’t become overly content with your job, with relationships, with your lifestyle. You all have taught me so much, and I know you can, and will, do great things.

—Gwen Frenzel is an environmental studies major. She is the outgoing online editor of The Miscellany News.

D

ear Vassar, This a thank-you card and break-up text.

You’ve shaped me, changed me. I will take you with me in all the coming chapters of my life because you are a part of me, but I will never be here again in the same capacity. I am no longer an undergraduate student.

I guess you could say my entire life has been a series of happy accidents. Make no mistake, I plan. I plan to excruciating detail, and nothing upsets me more than a paper jam in my printer or a wrench in the works, but you could think of it this way, now I have scratch paper, or someone took the time to give me a wrench I can use to build stuff. And then those accidents can give you new direction. Sometimes there are accidents that don’t even bother disguising themselves as silver linings and are just giant inyour-face gems.

Vassar, you are a giant in-your-face gem.

“Vassar, you are a giant in-your-face gem.”

It has been four entirely too short years. I knew it going in, eight semesters is nothing.

Blink and you miss it. How many plays have I not seen, how many parties have I not gone to, how many amazing people have I not met. The answer is too many. And yet, of the things I missed, how many of them could be as life-changing as the performances I have seen, the fun I’ve had, or the life-long friends I’ve made. Being at Vassar had its ups and downs, but coming out after four years I know I’ve been someplace special.

When I came to Vassar I already had my fouryear plan mapped out, but life changes, certain classes are available while others aren’t and some classes are more fun than others so you change your direction. I met some of my greatest mentors and closest friends in my freshman year. Spent four beautiful years in a fantastic lab. Founded a writing and media program at the Grace Smith House and spent four years teaching those stunning youngsters. Junior year, applied to engineering and genetics programs, got in and instead went to an entirely different

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

program to dissect cadavers.

I cannot describe how many happy accidents Vassar has given me, and then some really stressful and not so pleasant accidents, but overall I come out of Vassar a better person than I came in, or at least different.

My housemate, in reading over this for me suggested I use an anecdote to better illustrate my story. I have found that my time at Vassar cannot be contained or summed in one incident.

There have been so many different Vassar moments; whether it’s walking through the quad to Joss in the Fall and just feeling overwhelmed with the beauty of it all, swiping a family into the Deece, crying over how many labs you have in a week as a science major, or walking home at three a.m. from your research because it’s actually fun and an incredibly rewarding feeling to make progress on something on the edge of knowledge.

A parallel that emerges when contemplating research and college is the ever elusive point of success. We never reach the point where we are 100% in control and confident in our life, there are constant new challenges and insecurities to trip us.

Doesn’t it feel like you’re running up a hill on a treadmill? You can see the top and you’re running, but at you best you make some progress and at your worst you regress. Every few years you shed your skin for a new one, but that also means you’re growing. The world is growing.

You can think of it this way, you’re not on a treadmill, the mountain is actually growing and you are moving with it. So seniors, we are constantly growing and gaining new challenges. Vassar, you too though it seems like your challenges repeat, Vassar today is different from Vassar four years ago (gender neutral bathrooms!).

Anyways Vassar, this is my good-bye. I have grown I have made friends and family here and abroad who will come with me on all my future journeys. I’m more dazzling because of you Vassar, and you’re more amazing because of me.

Much love, your graduate.

—Ann Nguyen is the outgoing President of the South Commons and co-chair of the Finance committee. Barring extreme circumstances, Ann will be at the University of Cambridge next year getting her Masters of Philosophy in Engineering.

May 31, 2015

A

senior retrospective in three parts.

IT’S ALL ABOUT WHO YOU LIVE WITH

So many people here have complained about their roommates or housemates at one point or another during their time at Vassar.

Fortunately, I am not one of these people.

I lucked out big time and am so thankful I have been able to live with amazing people who have shaped my experience here for the best.

For my first three years here, I was able to live with one of my very best friends. Comically, Ariel and I requested to be roommates before we even met each other. We made a leap of faith. It made sense for us to live together—we were both interested in neuroscience and both going to be playing sports.

But us living together was so much more than the logistics.

From the day we decided to live together, I knew I had found someone who would be more than just a roommate to me. She became someone I could turn to at all moments in my life.

This girl has been through thick and thin with me. She’s supported me even before our first day here. And I could ramble on and on about all our memories together, but it wouldn’t do justice in explaining how much she means to me and how much she’s shaped my experience here at Vassar.

Ariel, I hope you know just how amazing you are and how much of a positive influence you are, and will continue to be, in my life.

As happy as I am not to live in Noyes anymore, I would do it all over with you again in a heartbeat.

Now of course, I can’t forget the lovely ladies of TA 8. Jen, Akaina, Madison—I am going to miss living with you three so much.

The amount of joy and laughter present in this house is unbelievable at times. Often, you will hear complaints that people don’t see or talk to their housemates for days, but that is definitely not the case in this house.

SENIOR RETROSPECTIVES Delaney Fischer From our Monday night Rupaul sessions to yoga bonding to basically anytime we spend time together, there is no doubt the best times of my senior year involve you three.

Jen, I really don’t know what I would do without you. You are my voice of reason. The one I can count on. I hope you know how much I appreciate everything you have done for me. Your kindness and generosity doesn’t go unnoticed. I am going to miss seeing you every single day and learning about life from you.

Akaina, you have such a kindhearted and honest soul. You never fail to amaze me with everything you do – from the Night Owls to writing plays to just listening to you talk about life and philosophy. You are one incredibly impressive lady.

Madison, you never fail to make me laugh.

You are so talented in so many ways. I don’t know how you wrote two theses this semester – probably with some serious help from Diet Coke. I am going to miss you and Akaina serenading this house with Fall Out Boy songs.

“...I have been able to live with amazing people who have shaped my experience here for the best.”

You all mean so much to me and I know, even with us all being a bit scattered postgrad, this is not goodbye. This is see you all soon. Very, very soon. Don’t worry though; I’ll bring the lemonade.

And to my future roommates, Kenta and Will —you guys, this is it. NYC here we come!! I am so excited for us to start the next

chapter of our lives together. I can’t wait to see what the future holds for us. I’m sure it is going to be amazing.

You know, it has been said that you should surround yourself with people who push you, who challenge you. Make you laugh.

Make you better. Make you happy. Thank you all so much, for everything.

SO MY ADVISOR IS KINDA A BIG DEAL

When I blindly asked Professor Cleaveland to be my advisor, his kindness and dedication to his students was obvious, but what I didn’t realize I was making one of the best decisions of my academic adventure here at Vassar.

Always full of support and advice, Professor Cleaveland probably doesn’t realize how much he has helped me through some of my toughest times here. When I needed help sorting through knee injuries, academic pursuits, and just life in general, I had an advisor that was always there. What more can you really ask for in an advisor?

Most importantly, he believed in me.

Through everything that has happened in the last four years, Professor Cleaveland was always there for me.

Sometimes, all you really need is someone to tell you they know you are going to do great things. That you have what it takes to be successful in the field you are pursing. Through all the self-doubt and doubt of others, his voice was clear, and his voice was right. Professor Cleaveland, thank you so much for everything you’ve done for me these past years.

BUT THAT BARELY EVEN SKIMS IT

Besides the amazing people I’ve been fortunate enough to live (and will live) with and having a super supportive advisor, there are so many other remarkable people I have been influenced by and so many unforgettable experiences I’ve been apart of here at

Page 9

Vassar. And while I don’t have the space to list them all here, there are a few things this reflection needs.

“Sometimes, all you really need is someone to tell you they know you are going to do great things.”

Chris Gonzalez. Cause this piece would not be complete without him. Honestly, what would I do without you? Thank you so much for putting up with me; I don’t know how you do it.

Alma Pietri. You are one of those people that brighten up a room when you walk in.

You have brought so much light into my life.

Thank you to the ladies of campus activities for being so caring and supportive of me—seriously, if you’re looking for an on-campus job, that’s where you want to work.

Thank you to the Misc staff for supporting my pieces.

Thank you to all of my professors and research mentors—especially Kate Susman, N. Jay Bean, and Stuart Belli.

There are so many people and experiences that haven’t been mentioned here, and thinking about it all is it a bit overwhelming.

I am so thankful to be apart of Vassar College class of 2015. Thank you to everyone who has helped me along the way.

Hey mom, I made it!

—Delaney Fischer is a neuroscience major.

She was a columnist for The Miscellany News and will be working at Weill-Cornell postgrad.

ADVERTISEMENT

H

Maddy Vogel

ow did this happen? When did I get this old? When did scrambling to get my requirements and thinking that problem sets were the be-all and end-all stop? When did I change into someone probably (maybe?) ready for the real world, ready for a world beyond academia?

I can’t remember exactly when I decided I was ready, but I do remember the 5 million times I was going to drop out and my friends had to say, “Don’t. It’s only a year. It’s a waste if you drop out now.” I’m not sure when my outlook changed from seeing this place as a never-ending purgatory to only feeling a sense of nostalgia and “lasts,” but it did, and now I’m unbelievably sad.

I was not sad to leave high school. At all.

One could not be more ready to peace out from suburbia into, well, technically more suburbia than I was. I didn’t know what I wanted out of college and I only had a vague inkling of what I would major in, but I knew that if I had to live in my town and socialize with those people for another week, I’d go crazy.

I love change. And yet, here I sit, a future waiting for me, and I’m sad. I hate goodbyes, and have an awful habit of just leaving a place without telling anyone, but, for once, more than anything I want to leave my goodbye, my mark, on this campus. I want to remember my last swipe into a dorm, my last Misc meeting, my last deece… well maybe not my last deece. These goodbyes feel important and significant because it’s more than goodbye to a place, it’s goodbye to a life.

I don’t know life outside academia—none of us do—and that’s maybe the most terrifying thing. What do people do when they aren’t dictated by semesters and midterms? When they don’t have at least a month off in the winter to recharge? When weekends are actually weekends and not just times I still have work to do in between copious drinking? I think amazing things await me post-academia, but without any concept of a five-day work week,

it’s still pretty intimidating.

But then again, the past four years were filled with more fear than I think the rest of my life can throw at me: the fear of failing, the fear of rejection, the fear that secretly all your friends hate you, I’ve done it all. I’ve cried in countless professor’s offices, had panic attacks over everything from social gatherings to a bad grade to whether or not I can afford pizza, and have gone abroad as an alternative to taking a semester off, but I’ve kept going.

I’m sure I’ve got plenty of crying left to do in my life (I can cry over anything if the moment is right) and I’m not sure anything will feel as awful as my first C or my last breakup, but I got through those, and I’ll get through more.

Congratulations Cass Carpenter!

“I think amazing things await me post-academia...”

Honestly, the only thing I’m scared of right now is walking in front of all those people at Commencement. Ten bucks says I trip or my cap falls off.

So I’m going to say goodbye, for real this time. I’m going to spend my last afternoon sitting on my porch; I’m going to go waterfalling one more time; I’m going to walk through Strong once more.

I’ll say goodbye to people, of course, and I’m sure I’ll cry, but I’ll see some of those people again (we’re connected on LinkedIn after all) and I’m sure I’ll get mad when I see your engagement photos on Facebook in a few years, but it’s the places I’ve grown to call home that I’ll really miss.

—Maddy Vogel is an economics major with a studio art correlate. She is the outgoing social media editor for The Miscellany News,

You rock!

We are all so proud of you today and looking forward to your bright future. We all love you.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

Page 10

SENIOR ADS

May 31, 2015

Congratulations Charley Button, ’15!

You have the gifts of creativity, originality, humor, wisdom, fun, and grace. Wishing the best of everything in your future career in film production, with much pride and joy!

Love, Mom, Candy, Joey, Benji, Betsy and Eddie "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.

In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths." (Prov. 3:5-6, ESV) ADVERTISEMENT

Congratulations, Kayla!

We are proud beyond words of all your accomplishments at Vassar!

Love you so much, Mom, Dad and Nana

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

SENIOR ADS

May 31 2015

Page 11

“Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art... It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give value to survival.”

C.S. Lewis

Congratulations Patrick, Frank, Ben and Sarah, Vassar class of 2015, With much love the Traisman Family ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

Congratulations Sasha!

Congratulations Sasha!

We are so pround of you and continuously We are soby proud you andand continuously impressed yourof creativity brilliance. impressed by your creativity and brilliance.

With Withlove, love, Mom, Mom,Dad Dad&&Zack Zach MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

SENIOR RETROSPECTIVES Carolina Gustafson

Page 12

I

chose Vassar on an absolute gut-whim.

Later in the process of deciding to apply early decision there was more detailed considerations in the form of a “Gilmore Girls”style pro-con list and a fateful visit with my father that sealed the deal (yes, Dad I am finally giving you the credit you deserve), but there was never any real doubt that this was where I was suppose to be.

And sitting here, on a beautiful late-spring day a week before I am to graduate, eating cherries, by far my favorite pitted-fruit, and watching sweaty underclasspeople move out, I know my immediate instinct four years ago was right.

Vassar and I were just meant to be. I have doubted our fate, like any good long-term relationship, many times in the last four years.

Vassar has frustrated me, disappointed me, made me promises it has failed to keep. We have fought and I have doubted whether our relationship would survive throughout the years, but again and again I have come to realize that there are things in this world deeper than logic.

The impulse decision by me at 18 to apply early decision to Vassar, to put all my eggs in this odd basket, was unheard of for me at the time, a girl who once sobbed so loudly over a Spanish final junior year that my mother threatened to lock me in my room and not let me take the test if I did not go to bed and let everyone get some sleep.

“Vassar has frustrated me, disappointed me, made me promises it has failed to keep.”

I was successful in high school but that was all I was in many ways. I was afraid and

I was lonely and I was on a treadmill going nowhere that I so desperately wanted to get off of.

I recently decided to go back through and read the words I wrote in my “Why Vassar?”

Application Essay.

I talked about a desire to be surrounded by intelligent peers, an attraction to Vassar’s high percentage of women in the sciences, an appreciation for Vassar’s beautiful campus. Those are all true and then some, but those are not the reasons Vassar has changed me.

Vassar was where I learned how to be a better, a more full, person. Vassar taught me the value of balance in life, not as an intellectual concept, but as a lived reality.

In my first semester at Vassar I enrolled in elementary French to fulfill my language requirement. It was a yearlong course, five days a week, and I figured I could do that.

That is until a week into the class when my professor called me into her office and, as nicely as possible, informed me that I should probably switch to Latin if I hoped to graduate.

I am fairly sure I was the first person the history of the French department to have this suggested to them. I knew Latin would probably go no better though and so I slogged through an entire excruciating year of decimating the French language.

If you need verification of how bad it truly was, just ask Kit Durr. I did pity-pass the class, but it was the first time I had tried (very hard in fact) at something and not done well.

The amazing thing though was life moved on: I am both graduating from college and going to my first choice graduate school. I thought at 18 that I was going to Vassar as validation of all that I was good at; instead Vassar helped me to realize it is fine to be mediocre (or down right terrible) at some things.

This past March, for reasons I do not wish to go into here, I convinced my best friend to

spend 36 hours on a Greyhound Bus to Atlanta, Georgia, for a three-day weekend away with me.

I had decided I wanted to go because it was warmer and I have friends there and so we set out on our own telling no one our plans other than my mostly-reliable older brother.

“Vassar was where I learned how to be a better, a more full, person.”

The trip could have been an absolute disaster, but instead it turned out to be some of the best 60 hours of my life. For the first time in many years I was living in the moment, excepting that I only had three days away from the snow and my thesis and so I was going to make the most of them.

And I did, I was happy just because life is good. At one point while drinking a fancy-pants drink with ground pepper in it and taking in Atlanta’s on-point-porch-game, a truly marvelous moment as you can likely imagine, my friend asked how I was doing.

I considered it for a moment and responded, quite honestly, that while I was a six in life overall, I was a nine in that moment.

And I was. I was surrounded by people who care about me. It was warm and beautiful and I had traveled 18-hours on a whim, something that only two years previously I would have been far to afraid to do.

When I was 18 and graduating from high school I had high expectations for Vassar.

But they were all the wrong expectations; I was mistaken in what I thought mattered. I now know that the things that make life good

ADVERTISEMENT

May 31, 2015

are not found in the big moments.

Things like walking my dachshund on a beautiful day, Thursday night dinners with my brother, watching my advisor explode with joy because I got into graduate school, meeting up with my dad every February to go to the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, talking to my mom on the phone for hours and feeling so unconditionally loved, these things matter far more than any grade or award.

I am so lucky to have loved and been loved so much in the last four years and I cannot express how grateful I am for that.

There are a lot of things I am taking with me as I graduate from Vassar: a better ability to write and think broader, a deeper appreciation for learning for the sake of learning, a bachelors degree, but what I most hope to take with me is a greater appreciation for the important things in life, like finding joy in the simple stuff and not worrying so much about the future or the past.

The last four years have shaped me in a number of ways, but mostly they have allowed me to become a better-developed and more content person.

Thank yous all around to the countless people who got me here: Professors and administrators who became my colleagues and mentors, friends that pushed me to be a better person, and most of all to my parents, my brother, and my Vassar-found best friend who have loved me unconditionally as I figured it all out.

I have learned so much in these last four years, but most of all, I have learned the value of committing myself to living a life that makes me happy. And I’ll admit, I’m pretty proud of that.

—Carolina Gustafson is a Science, Technology, and Society major from West Hartford, CT. She is the outgoing President of the Vassar Student Association and will be continuing on to the Yale School of Nursing in the fall.

ADVERTISEMENT

Evans, Congratulations on your graduation!

We are so proud of you and all that you have accomplished.

Love, Mom, Dad, Clark, and Maggie

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

SENIOR RETROSPECTIVES

May 31, 2015

Page 13

Chris Gonzalez

A

fter shoving a random guy outside a TH party and watching him slump away, his middle fingers slashing through the wind, I knew I was ready to graduate. He pushed me first, in my defense, and after 22 years of being overlooked, nudged aside, and seen but not acknowledged due to my height and relatively quiet demeanor, I realized it was quite possible and easy to reach outside of my unremarkable self for one moment and push back with confidence.

My “near-brawl,” as I shall refer to it from now until I’m quivering on my death bed, points to one of several common threads through my four years at Vassar: some of my most important learning experiences have occurred at night. (Note: In saying this, I do not wish to diminish the importance of the classes I’ve taken or my professors, to whom I shall be forever indebted for pushing me as a thinker, writer and first-rate drinker.)

“...some of my most important learning experiences have occurred at night.”

Through late-night talks I opened myself up to new friendships and accepted the fact that I’m an extremely sentimental and sensitive guy. And while that’s something I had been embarrassed about and shamed for in my formative years, as a college graduate I no longer have qualms about crying out of immense sadness, frustration or anger, especially if and when all three strike at once.

I’ve experienced a loneliness I didn’t know possible while at Vassar, which falters in daylight and returns with spiteful force between the hours of midnight and six in the morning. But I’ve learned how to combat it by leaning on the amazing friendships I’ve stumbled (honestly, the only word for it) into since freshman year. I have no idea how or why these amazing people have put up with my shit for so long (I’m sure they don’t know either; maybe they deserve some sweet, sweet cash, or, at the very least, a Deece swipe?), but they have become my family. So, you fuckers are stuck with me.

Of course friendships have come and gone, some taking with them a larger chunk of my heart than others, but Vassar has given me strength in times when I felt less-than strong.

And that strength came through writing.

During late nights, I was able to rekindle my passion for writing fiction, which carried me through the daunting task of having to produce a novel/thesis/creature this past year. I do much of my free-writing during the day, but the lull of darkness lures me into a dreamstate where I can apparently spend hours tweaking a paragraph or one sentence. In those moments of intense writing and revision, when I found myself sprawled out on a sofa in the Library or alone at Acrop, with a 4 a.m. backdrop and bruised ego, I believed both my draft and the world were erupting into flames. Still, I learned and now know more confidently post-thesis that there is nothing else I would rather do with my life.

I should mention: at night, I rarely slept.

I should probably do more of that sleeping thing. It’s a work-in-progress, I guess—some lessons take more than four years to learn.

And there’s one I’ve been struggling to grasp for a long time; one that’s been a prob-

lem for years before I even arrived at Vassar: getting over my irritating habit of regretting moments I let slip away and opportunities I made an adamant decision not to chase after.

When I showed up on campus to move into Noyes—the first time I had ever stepped foot on Vassar soil—I thought that standing on the other side of these four years, I would be a person who had partied more, dated more, transformed physically, become someone who was radically not me. With graduation only days away, I’ve accepted that college is not the be-all and end-all of lived experiences.

“...but Vassar has given me strength in timse when I felt lessthan strong.”

And so instead of spending my nights weeping over these never-happened memories, I’ll focus on what I did do. There was the night I walked over a frozen Sunset Lake with friends and fell though the ice; when I pulled myself up from the water I never felt more alive. Most nights I ignored writing papers and reading to just talk with my friends, which may have hurt me in the short-term as I pushed my own boundaries on how late I could start my work and finish it before a deadline, but will remain one of the few things I know I did right.

Finally, without my affinity for the “all-nighter” I would not have acclimated to or made a home of The Miscellany News. My time with the Misc has taught me what sports

Susie Martinez I

’m not sure what to write.

At the end of Commencement 2013, a friend and I joked that by the time we were seniors, we would write a senior retrospective. But here I am, writer’s block producing two unfinished drafts of what I could send.

But those beginnings do not feel honest.

My room is a mess, to put it gently. There are clothes waiting to be washed, clothes waiting to be packed, and two garbage bags—one for stuff to give away, another for stuff to throw away. I have a view of the TA quad, where once in a while someone will pass by on their way to some of the senior week festivities.

There’s probably a little panic somewhere in the mix. For some people, these last four years were some of the highlights of our young lives. And for others, these last four years were marred with some tough situations. Whatever the reactions to graduation are, to leaving Vassar, they’re all okay.

I am a little confused as to how I feel about leaving, which is probably why this is hard to write. It also takes me a while to settle on a feeling, since I weigh everything carefully (if you wanted to know, and you probably didn’t, I’m a Libra).

Do I feel sad or overjoyed? Do I allow myself to be grateful for the amount of opportunities I’ve been given while here, for the doors that have opened the day I accepted that offer to attend Vassar? Or do I tally up the painful events that have happened either to me or to the people I love and care for while on this campus?

“I’m a little confused as to how I feel about leaving, which is probably why this is hard to write.”

I don’t want to do either. To have the scales tip one way feels unfair. I don’t want to disregard one narrative because the other feels more...clean.

I want to be able to tie up my Vassar experience into a neat package with a shiny red bow on it. But the truth is that the last four years have been a roller coaster, and I am unsure if I actually regret getting on this ride or just regret not having prepared for it more.

I don’t think I regret anything. I became closer friends with people who would’ve remained acquaintances had I not had the opportunity to organize with them through MEChA, to facilitate conversations on consent with them and be a CARES listener, to not see them walk in and out of the ALANA Center. Maybe this is what people mean when they talk about seeing the silver linings.

Those friends introduced me to some wonderful faculty members and administrators that would become my mentors. I remember one of my professors showing up to my presentation a couple of weeks ago, and how seeing his face that looked like mine made me feel a bit more reassured that I wasn’t entirely alone in academic spaces.

Maybe this is what people mean when we say representation matters.

Through a network of empowerment, I became more confident in the things I believed in. I felt more comfortable asking for what I wanted and pushing back if I didn’t think things were fair. My mentor once sat me down as I explained to her a situation I was dealing with at the time, and we came up with the values I hold myself to. I’ve learned to harness a fire in me and use it to help others and myself.

Some of those troubling events I briefly mentioned earlier did test me. I learned how to be kinder to myself. By being kinder to myself, I learned how to care for everyone else around me.

And some days I still fuck up. Some days I am quick to anger and quick to protect myself and stay on guard. Some days I am weighed down by all of the fucked-up-ness that happens here, and the ways that we hurt each other. But somehow I found kind souls around me who encourage me every day to open up a little more, push myself to get over some fears, and to apologize whenever I hurt.

fans on this campus have known for the majority of their lives: how to care passionately about something no one else really gives a shit about. I never imagined as a freshman that I would one day become the Editor-in-Chief, and in truth I only ever dreamt of taking the reigns as Humor & Satire Editor. In a world of possibilities, though, I was able to do both, and I say that not to brag but to highlight how Vassar allowed me to develop as a student, leader, writer and masochist.

In the ten-to-12 hours of a production night, I felt untouchable. I’ve always found laughter in times of stress to be the most viable outlet, and the joking that took place in the Misc office healed wounds left by an overly-critical student body, an unresponsive administration and professors who thought it appropriate to belittle students figuring out how to be journalists for a paper with no guidance. I can say all of these factors have thickened my skin; if anything has prepared me to become an adult, more than my dependency on coffee and bitter cynicism, it’s been my time with the Misc.

Maybe I’ve done a horrible job at the impossible task of summarizing these last incredible four years, so I’ll end with this: While I know in so many ways I’m still similar to who I was at 18 (I’m unbelievably insecure and continuously enjoy lip-synching to my favorite songs alone in my room like the loser I am), I have evolved into a stronger, slightly more intelligent and socially conscious person, because of Vassar. And in four years, what more could anyone ask?

—Chris Gonzalez is an English major with an anthropology correlate, as well as the outgoing Humor & Satire Editor of the Miscellany News. He served as the Editor-in-Chief in the spring of 2014.

Cara Hunt

Maybe I will miss this place. I already know I will miss being in the Hudson Valley, riding my bike throughout Poughkeepsie, taking in the quiet nights. I will miss the ALANA Center, which has been a home away from home the last few years, and the students of color who remind me we’re not alone here.

I will miss CARES, and I’ve already had dreams where I am in the midst of another training semester with the group. I’ll miss knocking on my professors’ doors, asking if they have a second to talk about something that was going on around campus or something that came up during class.

“But the truth is that the last four years have been a roller coaster...”

I think what I’ll miss most is the people I’ve come across, who’ve either remained acquaintances, who have my closest friends here, or who I don’t really talk to anymore.

I do know what I won’t miss though. I won’t miss the violence, in its many variations, that happens here. I won’t miss the times people have accused me of not belonging here, based primarily on my ethnicity or my class. I won’t miss that weird smell behind the College Center.

My housemates’ muffled laughs travel upstairs and they seem to go along well with the music blasting from my laptop. There’s still so much to pack, but I don’t feel like I should be in a rush. More often than not it feels like I’ll still be here next year, but I know I won’t. Maybe it is too much to focus on the beginning and on the end of things.

I’m still unsure how I should feel. And maybe that’s okay, too.

— Susie Martinez is the outgoing CARES Intern, member of the MEChA de Vassar Organizing Team, and a former ALANA Center Program Intern.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

D

ear 2015 Classmates,

I sincerely hope that two or five or seven years down the line, when we inevitably run into each other on the World Wide Web, we remember more than what’s simply bullet-pointed under our fancy job titles, or lied about on our OkCupid profiles that we will surely get after the ink on our first divorce agreements dries.

Graduation marks the day after which we will be forced to answer the grim question, “what do you do?” continuously for the rest of our lives as we try to pack who and what we are into neatly worded one-liners.

The thing is, I didn’t really care what you did or even what your major was while you were at Vassar (sorry, I only asked out of etiquette).

You were the kid in the library that was always annoyingly too loud but actually quite funny; you were the kid with the kindest eyes and the biggest backpack; you were the nice punk type reading in the grass who always gave me snacks; you were the outspoken girl in my class who inspired me with your knack for argumentation; you were the girl who stole beers from my fridge but I forgave because of that other time you reminded me about our Spanish test el proxima dia.

And good or bad, weird or otherwise, this is how I choose to remember you all. Who you are violently defies the confines of your social media profiles.

Up until now, grown-ups have mostly asked us what we want to do, or what we see ourselves doing, and this gives us some freedom to imagine different, fascinating versions of ourselves.

But Cara, you might say, maybe it’s time for you to stop referring to adults as grownups? Perhaps you’re right, but at least as long as I refuse to label myself as a grown-up, I don’t feel the need to identify myself or any of you by where we work, what our job titles are, or our dateability as determined by OkCupid, and that gives me some peace of mind.

Also, shout out to my Mom, love you!

—Cara Hunt is the outgoing President of the Town Students.

SENIOR RETROSPECTIVES Meaghan Hughes

Page 14

A

teacher in high school told me once, “college is where you get to keep being a kid for four years before you have to get into the real world.” In some ways, this is completely true. I’m already dreading having to work for eight hours straight with no time to nap. Having no obligations on Fridays has also been a great perk of college. My fellow seniors and I have definitely joked about how ill-prepared we feel for the real world. Personally I feel that the fact that I don’t know how to change a tire or what exactly a 401K is disqualifies me from being an adult, and I really don’t know how they’re letting me get a diploma without knowing such things.

However I have learned so much in my time at Vassar—both in subjects I expected to learn about as well as some things I didn’t. I’m sure everybody says that, I mean who doesn’t learn anything in college? But it’s true. I have been blessed with amazing professors and fantastic friends who have been patient with me and have given me a completely new perspective on life, on politics and just about everything else. There have also been not so great people I’ve encountered, and great friends who are not currently close to me—in the physical sense anyway. From these experiences I’ve learned not to take everything so personally, and I’ve learned how to make the best out of what life gives you.

Because as awesome as my four years at Vassar have been, there have been a lot of hard times as well. I’m sure this is true for most of us graduating in different ways. For me, I came to Vassar thinking I’d be an athlete, have athlete friends and go to athlete parties. This was how my freshman year started, but for a variety of reasons, including but not limited to my lack of coordination and lack of an intimidating presence on the field, my college career did not turn out the way I had planned.

But I was lucky enough to live close to people who became my closest friends, and I am so incredibly grateful for that. This change in plans also let me explore other activities at Vassar, including the beautiful paper you’re reading right now, which has taken up a lot of my mental energy, time and sleep but has been worth every single second.

I could list out all the other difficult events that I’ve dealt with in my time at Vassar, and then I could balance all of those out with amazing experiences that have been fulfilling and inspiring. But that would be boring and not worth reading anyway. Suffice it to say, there have been some ups and downs. You might not necessarily come out stronger from the hard times, but you get to know yourself better, and you realize what you’re capable of doing.

I’ve dreaded leaving Vassar for a long time.

As someone who’s not from the East Coast, I know I’m going to be separated from some of my friends. I’ve gotten used to being within walking distance from the people I care about and whose company I enjoy. I’m not excited for the times when I’ll have to try to catch up via text or Facebook.

Though Vassar has done its best to prepare me for the real world, I’ve spent this last semester trying to figure out what I’m going to do in the next few years, and I still don’t quite have what you would call a “plan” or a “job.”

A lot of well-meaning people have told me that everything will fall into place somehow, but being a planner and an anxious person has made me pretty impatient, and I would really like things to fall into place sooner rather than later.

However I have learned at Vassar that hard work almost always pays off. So does taking care of yourself, which is equally important. It isn’t enough to spend hours and hours on papers without taking time to keep your sanity.

And even if I didn’t get the 30+ jobs I applied to, I can at least take pride in knowing that I sent in all those applications, and maybe reward myself with a pint of Ben & Jerry’s per cover letter, which is a reasonable ratio I think.

Living in the moment has always been hard for me, but it’s the approach you have to take, especially in the context of college. As much

absolutely love being nostalgic. It’s actually my favorite pastime. I’m that person who asks everyone about their fellow groups and freshman roommates. I love reminiscing about the first time I met my best friends, the first classes I took, or the first time I changed my mind about what I want to do in life. As I conclude my four incredible years at Vassar, I’m honored to share my immense nostalgia with you.

My freshman year fellow group is amazing. It all started with a bag of Skittles in the hallway of Noyes 2 East and chatting with the other half of the hall on Noyes Circle. Soon we were playing Bananagrams and Apples to Apples, making French toast at midnight with stolen Deece bread, “bowling” in the hallway, and cooking homemade dinners when it was someone’s birthday. My hallmates were my family that year and I’m so grateful to them for helping me feel comfortable away from my own family.

My first Vassar Haiti Project event was a “stretching party,” where we didn’t do yoga but instead stretched Haitian artwork. It was the first weekend of the school year and, as an international student, I’d received an email from Andrew Meade inviting me. I went to check it out and promptly stayed in the CCMPR for probably 4 hours until someone decided they’d had enough and ordered pizza. A few months later, I applied to go on the annual trip to Haiti on a whim. To my surprise, I was accepted and embarked on the most defining journey of my college experience. Launched into a world of questioning development and renegotiating identity across cultures, I discovered my passion for medicine and anthropology. Flash forward four years, three trips to Haiti, 20 art sales, and a million meetings, VHP still provides a home for me to question, while being supported by the most intelligent and caring people I know.

My first FWA show was “She Loves Me.” I was cast in the ensemble, a “shop girl” with no spoken lines, although I did sing quite a bit. I made my very best friends rehearsing choreography in Rocky, learning music with the out-of-tune piano in CC237, doing hair in 1940s fashion, and painting the Shiva floor.

After such a “Positive” experience in “Legally Blonde,” I decided to try out the other side of theater and do production. I signed on as Dramaturg/Assistant Stage Manager for “RENT” and realized that research is really fun. Whether WebMDing serious medical jargon for “Next to Normal” or scouring Playbill.com for playbills, I couldn’t get enough.

FWA has provided me with limitless fun, in the form of excessive amounts of pink, dance breaks, 1:00 am Shiva checks/production meetings complete with vending machine

as I don’t want these four years to end, I’m happy that I have had many many moments I can look back on and laugh or smile, or do both while shaking my head.

It can be difficult not to constantly try to figure out what I’m going to do next, and senior year has been full of those “lasts”—your last Halloweekend, your last winter at Vassar, your last final, and so on. As meaningful as those times can be when they’re given the importance as being designated as “last,” there are plenty more that you won’t even see coming. Sometimes you don’t know that that time you and your friends got dressed up and went out was going to be the last time you would all be together for the weekend. But that doesn’t make it any less important or fun. I’ve forced myself to realize that dreading my goodbyes only makes it harder to enjoy the people who are still with me.

If I had to sum up these four years in a quote, it would be the one that my parents gave me in a frame when they first dropped me off at Vassar: “She was not where she had been, she was not where she was going, but she was on her way.”

—Meaghan Hughes is a psychology major.

She has held multiple positions on The Miscellany News, including Contributing Editor, Senior Editor and Sports Editor.

Simon Patané

Sarah Oliver I

May 31, 2015

food, temporary tattoos, talkbacks, and really long excel spreadsheets of in-show references.

My first EMS shift was uneventful. It was a Thursday night. I got one call around 7:00 am for a slight stomachache and the patient ultimately decided to go to Baldwin when it opened. My last EMS shift was Seven Deadly Sins, quite the opposite of a quiet Thursday.

I’ll never forget those late nights and early mornings, sitting in the EMS Office, filling out PCRs, and checking equipment.

The first time I saw the names of my fellowees I was haphazardly checking my email, procrastinating studying for my summer EMT class. I got so excited and immediately started drafting my first email. I spent hours on it, even asking them their favorite colors so I could make incredible door signs for their new homes in Strong. I got one response. However, when I met these 12 wonderful women in August, I remembered all the fears and nerves of being a freshman in college. Between fellow group brunches and friendship drama, Serenading and stressing about classes, breakdowns and birthday door decorations, I realized that being a good Student Fellow is less about favorite colors and more about being there when you need to be, through good times and bad.

My second year on Strong House Team was definitely more challenging than the first.

Being House Student Advisor and balancing junior year was a lot to handle. One of my best friends went abroad, campus climate issues were bursting at the seams, and Organic Chemistry was just so freaking hard! I looked forward to weekly Student Fellow meetings, a truly safe space. My favorite moments were the times that all seven of us would sit in my room and just chat over tea and cookies, where it would be unclear of who was student fellowing who.

Now here I am, an almost Vassar graduate, about to embark on so many more firsts, with so much nostalgia for Vassar memories ahead of me. I’m sure I’ll ask my future friends about favorite classes so that I can relive my obsession with the Vassar Anthropology Department. I’ll ask about their college roommates, just as an excuse to brag about SLAJJ and the memories we’ve made together. I’ll ask about volunteering, theater, crazy parties, and freshman year memories.

And I’ll probably cry. Because really that’s what it’s all about. Moving on, but always looking back on the people and the moments that made you who are you.

—Sarah Oliver is a premed Anthropology Major. She was involved in FWA, EMS, Strong House Team, and Vassar Haiti Project.

T

hese past four years at Vassar have been, to say the least, unexpected. Looking back, there have been painful moments and struggles complimented by some of the best times of my life. At Vassar I have realized the cushions that propped me up and propagated some of the most traumatizing facets of society. I have been insulated from the worst failures of this institution by this privilege and I have seen many friends, both student and faculty, face the full violence of these failures.

Now, through the looking glass, these moments speed past like the receding blur of the world outside the highway that will take me back to my first home. I thought I would avoid saying this, but time flies. Leaving Vassar, one treasure that will always be with me is a learned appreciation for time. Time is only as valuable as the ways you chose to inhabit its tenuous, wispy paths.

Here I have been gifted the company of companions who have made my fleeting time here all the richer. This reflection is for you. If for some reason I forget to mention it to you before we depart campus, you are all such beautiful and amazing individuals. To those amongst you who I don’t mention by name, and you know who you are, I will never forget the times we shared. I make a point of allowing myself no regrets, but today, I have one. I regret that I haven’t reached out sooner to all you, the incredibly strong, supportive people who I have had the privilege of knowing.

If you told me four years ago that I would find myself helping plan events and participating in the labor of love that is, or attempts to be, a community, I would have laughed. To the inspiring and kind friends who I met while on Jewett’s House Team, thank-you for your friendship and unwavering care. You are all pillars of a family that pulled together something special for me and so many others and these efforts, especially with the chaos that can be communal living, often go unspoken and undervalued. I’d like to give a huge thanks to a few people in particular. Clayton, Ben, Tewa, and Calvin: you are superstars.

To Batia, Terry, and Kelly: wow, I could never do your jobs, you are unbelievable! And, of course, to Evelyn, Brooke, and Briana: so much love.

One of my greatest fears about life after Vassar is getting corralled into science and losing the amazing company of the family with whom I have shared in the joys of creative writing and spoken word at Vassar. My words cannot do justice to the empowering and welcoming fortitude germinated in my freshmen year and the beautiful community that has flourished in the wake.

Wordsmiths is an unbelievable collective and friendly space that, although not immune from the ups and downs of Vassar, is remarkable in its capacity to merge creativity with friendship.

To the absolutely wonderful and talented crew I was with this semester as part of Senior Creative Writing, I will never forget the strength and so-

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

lace of easy laughter and silences shared amongst friends. We made something simply fantastic and to Michael, thank-you.

I owe an immense debt to another community, my friends in political science who welcomed me without reservation. Our conversations and experiences have shown me an entirely different side of campus that I would have missed in these fleeting kaleidoscopic moments we call years.

As I see it, in my understanding, I will be hard pressed to find another community so entirely constituted by kindness, insight, criticality, and a willingness to listen, and one that allows me to listen and live, as much as you all have. To Sahara, Elijah, Lillian, and Henry, I hope you enjoyed these times as much as I have and wish you all the best of luck.

To those of you who helped enrich physics and astronomy in and outside of the classroom, thank-you for your patience and guidance. There is something indescribable and daunting about taking on physics and astronomy at an intellectual level. From the sleepless nights and hours in and outside Sanders, frozen nights at the observatory, uncountable hours at computers and wrangling our minds into problem sets, the real education fell far outside the problem sets and exams that constitute science education. To a good friend of mine in particular, Professor Krusberg, your wisdom and teaching will stick with me forever. It was an absolute privilege to both learn and meditate under your guidance. You will be missed, but I am sure your journey onwards to Yale will be infinitely rewarding.

To the wonderful people who have, in particular, made this final semester a real and meaningful last hoorah, your friendship is difficult if not impossible to qualify within the limits of this retrospective. A huge shout out to Jake, Marcos, Zach, Delaney, Alma, Deep, Sarah, Teddy, Katie, Ben, Brooke, Mark, Bobbie, Yasmeen, Saul, Henry, Rose, Leo, Ramy and Steph for being the amazing people you are.

Finally, for those amongst you, past and present, who organize with and help sustain the solidarity that is Students for Justice in Palestine, I am humbled by your friendship, tenacity and love. No journey is ever without its stumbling and coughing fits of infancy, but you have all reinvigorated my conviction in the simple ways that people call and make each others’ company a force for awareness and solidarity. To those at this college that make it their mission to extend oppression and vilify justice and solidarity, you will learn quickly what it means to swim against a tide of compassion and a justice that no knows no limits. ­—Simon Patané is a physics and astronomy major with a correlate in political science. After Vassar he will be pursuing a Master’s in Engineering from the University of Michigan.

SENIOR RETROSPECTIVES Derek Butterton

May 31, 2015

O

ne Thursday night in September 2011, I walked into the Math Lounge in Rockefeller Hall and recited a speech by Hephaestus from Book VIII of the Odyssey. Afterward, I talked about my previous experience with theatre, with creative writing, and with Greek Mythology. No, I said, I’d never written a play collaboratively before, but that sounded like a really exciting idea.

The project for which I was auditioning would eventually become harlot/nun, an exploration of Artemis and Aphrodite as archetypes throughout recorded history. It was the first of eight shows I would create with the troupe that—though it was nameless then—came to be known as the Britomartis Devised Theatre Ensemble.

College teaches us in diverse ways. Some of them are academic, but most are not. For all the classes I took, for all the lectures I attended and the articles that I read, it was Britomartis that taught me most.

Britomartis taught me that the best way to read a text is not always isolated on a page.

Sometimes the Faerie Queen makes most sense when followed by a Bikini Kill dance number. Sometimes Odysseus’ plea to Calypso sounds clearest at the end of a naturalis-

I

tic living-room drama. Sometimes the only way to understand a poem is by speaking it aloud and letting yourself live the emotions it describes, or to transform it, cut it to pieces and remake it in a strange new way.

I first encountered Paradise Lost in Sanders Classroom, but I learned it best in the Shiva Theater, as a rock-concert-music-videopuppet-show-camping-trip-balloon-animal adventure.

“For all the classes I took...it was Britomartis that taught me most.”

Britomartis taught me that art shouldn’t always be easy. Often, the most frustrating, difficult, heartbreaking moments are the ones that end up making the most meaningful theatre.

I’ve talked for hours about whether a

experiences of many different kinds. Yet sometimes we develop most through one experience, through finding one great thing and loving it with as much of ourselves as we can. I did a few other shows at Vassar; I worked on other extracurricular projects.

But I gave my heart to one group of people, to one organization and one set of shows, and it was that love, more than anything else, that changed me over these four years.

Britomartis is the Cretan goddess of fishing: her symbol is the net. For those of us in the troupe, this image carries several meanings. It represents the way we gather source material from literature, film, music, politics and our own lives. It represents the way we bind that material together into a single, cohesive whole. And now, for me, it represents the joy of finding something worthwhile and holding onto it tight.

May the Goddess grant us all this favor: to find something worth loving, and to love it as deeply as we can.

— Derek Butterton is an English and Philosophy Major. He has been a member of the Britomartis Devised Theatre Ensemble since Fall 2011.

ADVERTISEMENT

Erik Quinson

came to Vassar from overseas. As any of my teammates will be quick to point out, I am a faux Brit, both my parents are American but I spent the majority of my childhood in London, England. Needless to say Vassar was a bit of a culture shock, not only in its American-isms, but…it’s Vassar.

I would say that I was a less than exemplary student my first two years, finding my energy going in other directions, rarely constructive. It wasn’t until my junior year that I started to understand just how amazing this place is. I declared my English major at the beginning of my junior year, having taken only one and a half credits. Clearly I had a lot of catching up to do.

I got extremely lucky; I took courses with Professors Paul Russell and Karen Robertson. Prof. Russell would become my major advisor, and has helped me a great deal as I have navigated through a hectic couple of years. Prof. Robertson taught me Shakespeare, and it is to this day one of the best classes I have ever taken, and has inspired my interest in that area ever since. Although I did not end up writing my thesis on Shakespeare, it was Prof. Robertson who led me down the path to pursuing and completing a thesis.

At the same time that I began my English major I also joined the rugby team. This move has shaped my last two years more than anything else. The reader may not know this but we made it to the national championships in both of the past two years, last year it was for 15s, and this year it was for 7s. We were crushed in both cases, but the teams we played had rosters that stretch into the 60s, while we were lucky if we could field two teams.

It is also through rugby that I have had the pleasure of being coached by Tony Brown and Mark Griffith, two extremely good coaches, without whom our rugby program would not reach the heights that it does on such a consistent basis. Tony’s from England also, and this past year has seen the “locker room banter” reach new crassness, the content of which cannot be repeated on

scene should be realism or fantasy, about how furniture ought to be arranged onstage, about what the subtitle of a show should be.

In every case, what felt like a useless diversion ended up making a stronger play. Once, we gave up on a project and started fresh halfway through a semester—that decision, too, made a stronger play. For three days during my junior year, we lived together in a TA, in character. We ate meals as our characters, told jokes as our characters, played board games as our characters. We embraced the dysfunctional relationships of our show, the addiction and aggression and contempt, and pushed them to the point where we couldn’t tell which feelings were fictional and which were real. It was, from one perspective, probably the worst idea we’ve ever had. It was also one of the greatest acting experiences of my life, and the honest emotion born from those days ended up giving us a powerful show and—though it certainly didn’t look that way at first—making us a stronger troupe.

Most importantly, Britomartis taught me about depth. So often in our academic lives we encounter an emphasis on doing lots of things, on developing ourselves through

Page 15

this page, but I will say that the relationship that I have been able to foster, not only with Tony, but all the members of the rugby team has been one of the highlights of my time at Vassar.

We travelled to Denver this past weekend (the weekend before graduation) to take part in the 7s National Tournament, and as I have already said, we got crushed. However, my Dad said to me when I spoke to him afterwards, “How many people can say they’ve been to Nationals?” And it’s true, there aren’t many people who can claim to have competed at the national level, and at Vassar, even fewer. We are not a school that values athletics very highly.

One of my conceptions of America, living in England, had been cheerleaders and jocks, and all that good old American spirit, but to my surprise Vassar offered none of that, and I think that that is one of the details that sets us apart, and something that I have come to appreciate.

It was great to get some recognition for making it to Nationals, but I have always found that the recognition from a professor for a paper well written, or presentation done well has been the ground for my richest feelings of accomplishment.

And of course, as anyone who has ever written one of these must say, the friendships that I have made here have been some of the most fruitful of my life. One friend, who has unfortunately had trouble getting his life together and won’t be graduating with me, will always stand out in my mind and, even though he’s on the other side of the country, we still talk on the phone every now and then. And I don’t think that’s the exception, I think that’s the norm of the friends I’ve made here.

It hasn’t always been easy adapting to Vassar and America, but it’s not something that I would change.

David, Congratulations! We are proud of your accomplishments and the man you have become. We look forward to seeing where your talent and passions will lead!

Love, Mom & Dad

—Erik Quinson is an English major. Along with being a part of the rugby team at Vassar, he was also the Sports Editor of The Miscellany News.

ADVERTISEMENT

Teddy, we are very proud of you and your achievements.

May your future be as bright as you are.

Congrats and Love Always, Mom, Dad, Nicole, Baba, Nana and Geepa MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

Page 16

SENIOR RETROSPECTIVES

May 31, 2015

Lanbo Yang I

n my four years at Vassar, I learned things I never expected to learn. I learned that you can use dishwasher soap just like hand soap.

I learned that Main has the highest concentration of toilet paper rolls within a two mile radius of campus. I learned to make a decent-but-not-fantastic stir-fry in less than five minutes at the Deece. I learned that the people like you more if you have a bike.

But on a serious note, at Vassar, I have also learned other things. I learned about belonging and identity. I learned about love.

Growing up in a single-mother immigrant household, I knew that life does not come easy. Whatever I wanted, I would have to fight for it and I learned how to fend for myself constantly. I also faced the reality of living in between Chinese and American cultures: my mother urged me to watch Communist war movies but I stayed in my room and worked through an assignment, taking notes on the last chapters of The Great Gatsby instead.

Coming out, I found myself facing the many cultural and social walls of Chinese culture as my mother asked me to leave our home because I was gay. So I channeled this frustration to my work ethic and pushed academically. I learned to make more friends. I looked elsewhere for sources of strength and self-worth.

“...I knew that life does not come easy.

Whatever I wanted, I would have to fight for it...”

At Vassar, I became intensely aware of the worlds which were not my own. I met people

who, as I slowly discovered, had very different priorities than mine.

I grew up constantly and inescapably concerned with money (I remember my mother hunched over Costco coupons every Saturday morning) while many of my friends didn’t worry about costs as much as I did.

I said “Yes” to everything because I wanted new experiences.

Sometimes, I felt alone, dejected and alienated. I didn’t have the confidence to be doing the work that my mother had worked so hard to pay for me to come here and do.

And in these moments of loneliness, I found people who comforted me and supported me, who gave me the confidence to keep going—and these are the people I cherish and admire and who I hope to have in my life after Vassar.

So I channeled my energies into my academic work, social networks and extracurricular activities—I wanted to belong to something.

At Vassar, I pursued experiences that enabled me to build language, leadership and social awareness as the president of French Club, a student government representative, editor-in-chief of the college’s literary and arts magazine (Vassar Student Review). I was also co-founder and co-editor-in-chief of the social justice-oriented publication known as Boilerplate Magazine, a forum to facilitate conversations about identity that Vassar needed. I turned initial feelings of self-hate into self-pride.

At Vassar, I also found comfort in literature. Because I was pre-med (and still am), I had intended to major in Neuroscience or Biochemistry. But after taking a class on African-American literature with Prof. Eve Dunbar, I said to myself: “This is what I have to study. There’s no going back.”

Ever since, I have been amazed with the honesty and truth that I have discovered in the books that I’ve read for my many English classes.

Vassar has also allowed me, with its open

curriculum, to have the academic flexibility to pursue my interest in both literature and medicine, as I was able to pull off an English major while taking my pre-medical coursework.

I have found professors who endorsed my independent study in Narrative Medicine, a field that incorporates both the humanities and medicine, which I intend to pursue while in medical school.

In these four years, I have found that the Vassar faculty are an indispensable and sometimes magical resource. I have found not only professors but life-mentors and friends who have taken the time to get to know me during office hours, talk about my post-Vassar plans over a casual mid-afternoon drink and to dig deep with me on my senior thesis.

“At Vassar, I pursued experiences that enabled me to build language, leadership and social awareness...”

Vassar was also the place where I started to write about my personal experiences with my struggle to belong and to identify. During my sophomore year, I took my first creative writing course and for the first assignment, our professor asked us to write a “short scene.” I spent many nights in front of the laptop screen, typing and deleting, crafting metaphors, changing my tone and constructing dialogue between my father and me in the five-story restaurant in Beijing.

When I got the story back, my professor wrote, “Fantastic writing, great ending.” Af-

ter acknowledging the places I needed more work, I have pursued writing as a way to piece together the fragments of my life history and like patchwork, to synthesize—or at least, attempt to—my own coherent narrative.

By writing stories, I began to see the beauty of what fiction can do, the ways that language can provide bridges instead of creating gaps. It felt like waking up from a deep sleep. I started to chart the walls I have internalized and unconsciously built for myself over the past thirteen years.

Through writing, I also began to learn the financial and emotional sacrifices my mother and father have made and continue to make for me.

In my writing, I learned to appreciate the complexity of human life, to delve into raw human emotional power, and try to grapple with the love and pain of families, friends and loved ones.

Although there were many points during my Vassar career where I felt alone and rejected, Vassar has taught me, that in times of pain, I am cared for by friends, family and professors. Vassar has given me the tools to express my thoughts in prose.

Vassar has shown me the lifelong value of literature. At Vassar, I have learned who I am accountable to and who to love.

As I go ahead onto the next phase of my life, as I take the lessons I learned from Vassar with me to the world, I know that I will try to embody care and compassion in all that I do. I know that I will mess up and fail sometimes. I know that I will grow from these failures. I know that I will always try to love.

—Lanbo Yang is an English major. He has held many leadership positions on campus, including President of the French Club, a member of the Vassar Student Association, editor-in-chief of the Vassar Student Review and co-founder and co-editor-in-chief of Boilerplate Magazine.

ADVERTISEMENT

Congratulations Erik!

Let the adventure begin...

With lots of love from your proud family MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

May 31, 2015

W

hen I read all of those hundreds of books about the college selection process and the veritable national-security level background checks students are supposed to give to each school before they even send in an application, I’m fairly certain none recommend choosing a school based on how nice its library is; yet one look at the stained glass in the Vassar library marked the beginning and end of my college decision process. Even when I had my overnight visit weeks later and my host never came to pick me up, eventually sent the most hipster-looking goth I’ve ever seen, and was warned to shower quickly and, if possible, with a bathing suit on because there had been a string of people pulling the shower curtains to try and catch a glimpse— it was so bad that before the night was over I called my parents from a Raymond bathroom saying “maybe saying ‘no’ to questions like ‘do you see your style and attitude reflected in the students?’ and ‘do you feel comfortable with the living arrangement of the dorms?’ trump some cool glass”—the eternal nerd in me just kept reassuring myself that any place with such a beautiful library must be filled with people who appreciated it the way that I did.

Four years later and I can safely say that I’ve only studied in the library a handful of times. Instead, despite its many foibles, I have come to appreciate Vassar for more substantive reasons than a pretty window.

I never really understood myself or the world

SENIOR RETROSPECTIVES Bethan Johnson in which I lived until I came to Vassar. It is difficult to recall what causes I actually believed in, what wrongs I wanted to help right, what kind of person I wanted to be. This is not to say that my family and my friends from high school have not played a critical role in shaping who I am—they are the most constant influences and there are not enough words in this newspaper to adequately thank them—but rather, my Vassar professors, co-workers and friends were vital in my development as an activist and a person. I entered Vassar not thinking far beyond my own circle of friends and the present, and am leaving it for a position with a national social justice lobby firm. This is the work of the people I am fortunate enough to call my friends. All my reflections of my time at Vassar must begin and end with them.

I am fortunate that my time at Vassar has been filled with a particular kind of luck, as my friendships seem to have that element of magic called coincidence in them. I was placed with an amazing fellow group my freshman year in the best dorm on campus—Davison and its flaming udders forever!—with some truly inspiring people.

Although we first bonded over our Student Fellow’s borderline unhealthy love of sneaking up on us and forcing us to watch One Direction music videos with her, we were fortunate enough to find our friendships overcome the “are you a Harry or a Zayn lover?” question.

I signed up for an Andy Bush Jewish Studies class my first semester because the title ‘Politics,

Story, Law,’ sounded interesting. It has been four years and dozens of coffees with Andy and classmates who became friends later, and even as I leave campus I know that that single class has yet to be finished.

I sent an email the first week of school begging for a newspaper assignment with The Miscellany News, thinking that I was prepared for any and everything life as a collegiate reporter could throw at me and hoping to make some friends.

I was only right on one count. Having survived quite possibly the most boring article ever written that I maintain was a kind of sick initiation, I was fortunate to work with the News section and eventually to serve as the Editor-in-Chief.

With The Misc, I have not only learned about random topics—from the theft of a Mastodon tusk to the deer cull—that words can be orphans, that the AP style guide is utterly misinformed about the Oxford comma, and that InDesign will crash whenever it is least convenient, but also many answers about the human condition. I know now that a human being can function pulling all-nighters once a week for five months, that people have extremely strong opinions about Hawaiian pizza, and that sassy tweeting the VSA with my friends is the only way to attend a VSA meeting. Each week we created something together, something controversial and informative, and that has bonded me to each member of our staff in an indelible way.

I wandered into Rocky one January afternoon

Page 17

to try to befriend some fellow Shakespeare nerds, thinking that’s what being a member of Shakespeare Troupe meant. Roughly 1,000 emails and hundreds of Ryan Gosling Shakespeare memes later, I’m fairly certain that William Shakespeare is the least significant thing that brings us together. We create “wavy” theatre together, do Droznin together, party together, and that somehow makes for amazing performances, but also amazing and transcendent friendships.

I’ve done all these things and been Vassar’s only current triple major without any caffeine in my system, so one would imagine that I would be tired. While I always said that I had the attitude of an 86-year-old man and have sworn that my schedule has aged me about 50 years, I was never tired when I was with my friends and they have made me feel like my life is just beginning.

My apartment doesn’t have stained glass windows and neither does my office building, but I still feel as though my life will be reflected through the stained glass window of the Vassar Library. There will always be the glow of my time at Vassar, the light of the education I have received inside and outside of the classroom, and I will always feel the warmth of my friendships.

—Bethan Johnson is an English, History and Jewish Studies major. She has held multiple positions on The Miscellany News, including Editor-in-Chief, Contributing Editor and News Editor.

Kelly Schuster to-do lists/lovenotes to myself on graduating/growing pains on armpit hair on learning within institutions built upon power on unlearning without them on swallowing water down the wrong tube sort of a diary entry written in my davison dorm room with two walk-in closets, but no windows-november 28, 2012 “but it doesn’t come easily--to remind myself to take care, take time, take breath. body hurts and trying to inhale healing air but having enough trouble breathing, something like surviving. trouble keeping head above water. but maybe it’s time to grow some gills--to just accept drowning and that it’s temporary and that I need to just let myself be filled with waves, and trust that I’ll float to the surface soon. kel-- stop fighting it, stop thrashing in the undertow.”

I am collecting letters to me and that girl I used to be see: still am unequivocally “joie de vivre” just more... unadulteratedly. to the girl with the grown-out bob, a strawberry brown after an orange, like actually orange, catastrophe called freshman year: could you just? take a deep breath? could you please just let the sun set? let the moon take the night shift this time. take a rest, because you are no help to your community if you can’t help yourself. when you wonder: “where else but Schmasser School of Witchcraft and Misandry can I dance with the fiercest of goddesses whose armpits bloom with hair and whose fingertips tickle the moon?” remember, you find those places. or, with chapped knuckles, you make them. and when cramped toes well up in blisters of bug bites on sunset hill and you ask “why can’t mosquitoes just play along?” consider that mosquitoes might be ancestors of stolen land sent back to break the blood of those with limbs built for stealing

and bug-smashing. consider that your skin itself might be mosquito on this land. wikipedia claims dutchmen were the first settlers of Poughkeepsie. says they “bought” it. forgot to mention raped burned buried built over and kept the name. don’t forget the blood-saturated story of how this land came to “belong” to your pale ancestors, then how it was sustained by slave hands. remember that. and know that this place is, always will be, an institution. the carnage of mortar crammed between brick. and maybe there’s no such thing as “safe spaces” for everyone. and maybe learning can’t fully happen within a classroom. and maybe learning is what we create to share to survive. and maybe losing is not the same thing as loss, and maybe growing pains are just blood cells swimming backstroke into new crevices to ignite pockets of gratitude into sore necks and the swollen kidneys that sent you to the hospital the week before your first founder’s day. gratitude for failure and that fellowship that you didn’t know you didn’t want until you didnt get. gratitude for the women who planted flowerbeds of the holes within you that only he (plural) could drill, that only we could fill, and maybe your garden isn’t about (plural) him anymore. and maybe the art is not the therapy, and reckoning is a daily process of return and reframe, never done. of making art that heals, not the kind you need healing from. remember that feeling pain doesn’t mean you haven’t led a charmed life.

consider those whose pain is not prioritized, who may deserve the mic more than you do. who, unlike you, framed by white skin that sits mostly well within the limits of “woman,” are kept on mute. because the moment you assume that you are not part of the problem, you are the problem. start learning from, with, through absolutely everyone. to the me with the pixie called relief, the visible ears the visible queer, the learning to love me: stop telling yourself the same story stop calling it drowning just because your heart starts to beat. because it always grows back, doesn’t it? in new ways, and unexpected places. but I hope you never get “used to it.” this place will keep going. and maybe, fingers crossed, the feet on it will start tip-toeing to thank the security guards and cleaners and kitchen staff whose days start before some of us have even slept. and maybe gratitude can stop trashing this campus with beer cans brimming with entitlement. and maybe gratitude can start calling in and calling out, when our voices are too loud or our lips forget to ask. and maybe our lips can learn to be both critical and caring in the same breath, because maybe mindfulness is feeling every step. knowing the history of this land and what each footstep is complicit in. so archive everything with blistered heels, knowing that not everything wants to be archived in words. not everything can. don’t dwell in writer’s block-just sink into playdough with ready fingertips call it siap, when the clouds pee and the ground takes a sip, when your eyes leak a bit.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

it always grows back, doesn’t it? above brows to keep the sweat out of your eyes, so you can try to see somewhat clearly. so you can remember that cuci means wash mata means eye, and cuci mata is the cleansing of mindsight that only comes with being unsettled or unhome, a surge of tears or a tropical storm. because even when “goodbye” gets caught like a yawn in a sigh, it feels fucking alive to cry. to invest inhales into full lungs, tarik nafas panjang, sayang, it’s only an end if you make it one. you can still tap into your second tongue and channel Indonesian when English starts to dissolve. selamat jalan, for happy traveling, selamat tinggal, for happy staying, and sampai jumpa, for not goodbye but, until soon. you need not know all of the cosmic reasons that you’re here, or the tangible answers to “where are you from?” but remembering that whiteness is both the mosquito and the pesticide, you weave your capillaries with new roots in old dirt. and maybe you don’t have to drown first, to learn to freestyle. maybe it’s just a lot of doggy paddle and blowing bubbles and making friends like water wings. to these fingertips that grip the edge of the kiddy pool before that pixie cut and 5 feet 3 and a half inches of wet eyes and puffed chest and cerewet witch dives right in-I hope you never stop relearning to swim.

—Kelly Schuster is a drama major with a correlate in women’s studies. She has been involved with the queer lady and spoken word communities on campus. She hopes to pursue collaborative art-making as an avenue for social transformation and celebration of difference.

Page 18

SENIOR RETROSPECTIVES

Congratulations to our Miscellany News seniors!

We can’t wait to see what you all accomplish in the future.

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

May 31, 2015

May 31, 2015

FOUR YEARS AT VASSAR

ADVERTISEMENT

Congratulations Brendan !

We love you and are so proud of you!

Love Always, Nonna and Papa Brendan, Congratulations to my favorite son and Best Buddy!

All my Love, Dad MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

Page 19

Page 20

FOUR YEARS AT VASSAR

MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE

May 31, 2015