The Hoya: October 7, 2022

GU Students Attend UN Meeting on Afghan Women’s Rights

Emily Han Special to The Hoya

The Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Securi ty (GIWPS) co-hosted a closed meeting at the United Nations General Assembly to discuss Afghan women’s rights.

Girls’ education activist Malala Yousafzai and For eign Minister of Sweden Ann Linde attended the Sept. 20 meeting, titled “The Role of Feminist Foreign Policy Champions in Securing Women’s Rights in Afghani stan.” Georgetown University students Alara Karahan (SFS ’24) and Nasim Azizi (GRD ’24) also attended the meeting, which covered ways to sup port women’s education in Afghanistan after the Taliban banned girls from attending

high school in March 2022, seven months after taking over the Afghan government.

Azizi, who lived in Af ghanistan and advocated for the rights of women and girls there for 13 years, said participants at the meeting discussed ways to convince the Taliban to open schools for girls and ways for girls to continue their education in the meantime.

Former Amb. to Ukraine Speaks at GU

The former ambassador to Ukraine spoke to the Georgetown commu nity about her memoir, diver sity in the U.S. Department of State and what a career in foreign policy looks like.

Marie Yovanovitch, who served as ambassador to Ukraine from 2016 to 2019,

reflected on her memoir “Lessons from the Edge,” at the Oct. 5 webinar hosted by the Georgetown Institute for the Study of Diplomacy. The memoir details Yovanovitch’s experience testifying before Congress during the first im peachment of former presi dent Donald Trump after he pressured Ukrainian Presi dent Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate then-presidential

Student Activists Raise $1,000 For Immigrant Legal Support

Alaina McGill Special to The Hoya

Georgetown University stu dents hosted a fundraiser to support immigrants in need of legal representation, rais ing over $1000 for the cause.

At the Oct. 3 event entitled “Iced Drinks Against ICE,” students from the Vietnam ese Student Association (VSA), Hoyas for Immigrant Rights (HFIR) and Mov imiento Estudiantil Chi canx de Aztlán (MEChA), a student organization whose

“The international commu nity is trying to find a way out of these problems because no effective action has been tak en so far, and it has been a year since schools were closed for girls,” Azizi wrote to The Hoya “Universities in the United States and other universities around the world can plan and mission is to empower Mexi can Americans through ad vocacy, sold iced beverages for $5 each, doubling their goal of $500 within the first few hours of the event.

Proceeds from the event went to Immigrant Defend ers Law Center (ImmDef), an organization that provides legal representation to thou sands of immigrants from nearly two dozen countries.

Mikhail Floresca (NHS ’24), co-president of HFIR, said immigration law and misconduct from the U.S.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Agency is a personal issue for many Georgetown students.

“Displaced communities hit close to home for many people who identify as firstgen or immigrants here at Georgetown,” Floresca wrote to The Hoya. “With the mis treatment at the border and the recent bussing of mi grants from Texas and Ari zona to D.C., the narrative of migrant hot potato contin ues –– the government keeps passing us around like cargo,

moving us back and forth without thoughts of our feel ings and plights.”

The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is a government agency tasked with securing the U.S. border and enforcing im migration law.

According to Human Rights Watch, over 160 reports of misconduct were filed against ICE from 2016 to 2021, including as sault, sexual abuse and dis crimination. In addition, ICE frequently conducts raids on workplaces and res idential areas, often arriving unannounced and separat ing families in the process.

Funds raised at the event went to ImmDef because of its work in uplifting mi grants and providing them with essential research, said Tahis Meza (COL ’24), copresident of MEChA.

“For our club, being inher ently political, it was impor tant to agree to work with organizations that further our political agenda aiding the Latine community and ultimately empowering and liberating the oppressed,” Meza wrote to The Hoya Annually, ImmDef helps more than 1,500 children defend themselves before judges and navigate the U.S. court system, something they would otherwise have had to do on their own. Cur rently, around 4,000 people are held in detention at the

candidate Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden’s involve ment with Ukraine energy company Burisma.

Following her testimony, Trump recalled Yovanovitch from her post in May 2019.

Prior to her recall, Yovano vitch told three House com mittees that Trump had pres sured the State Department to remove her from her role at the embassy.

Despite Trump’s accusa tions of disloyalty, Yovano vitch has won numerous awards for her contributions to U.S. foreign service — she earned the Senior Foreign Ser vice Performance Award eight times, the state department’s Superior Honor Award nine times, the Presidential Distin guished Service Award twice,

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Photo of the Week

Kitchen

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OPINION

Beware

Reject Pro-Gun Legislators

Confront

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

The former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine offered foreign service career advice to Georgetown undergraduate and graduate students and spoke on her role in former President Donald Trump’s first impeachment.

Georgetown students attended a closed meeting at the U.N. General Assembly alongside foreign diplomats and girls’ education activist Malala Yousafzai.

Kristin Chang Special to The Hoya

COURTESY OF ANGELA NGUYEN

Three Georgetown student organizations sold iced drinks to raise funds for ImmDef, a nonprofit which specializes in providing legal aid representation to immigrants.

JESSICA LIN/THE HOYA

Photo of the Week: A spectacular fountain captivates viewers on a beautiful, sunny day in the District.

Beware of Online Anonymity

Last spring, a new social media platform called Flok joined the likes of Instagram, GroupMe and BeReal in becoming a pervasive facilitator of campus communication at Georgetown University. Flok is an anonymous platform where students from the same university can publicly post messages to a live feed for other students to read, with the option to upvote or downvote a post. Posts are often intended to be ironic, satirical or comedic.

Flok is notorious for its anonymity, which has turned out to be a double-edged sword. It is a feature which many students appreciate, but has been ex ploited as a means of espousing hateful or disrespect ful messages. These messages range from targeting individuals to cyberbullying to hate speech. The abuse of the app ultimately defeats its main purpose of establishing a “an open, anonymous community” by contributing negatively to campus culture and enabling the spread of discrimination against mar ginalized groups.

The Editorial Board urges the Georgetown stu dent body to remain conscious of the consequenc es of abusing anonymous social media platforms like Flok on both individuals and the campus community as a whole. Additionally, the Board calls on Flok to implement a more effective ex ternal moderation system in order to prevent the proliferation of bigotry on the app.

Since Flok’s main functionality is based on amass ing as many points as possible, it creates a positive feedback loop where users use already popular topics to gain points, thus leading to a self-sustaining cycle of potentially harmful content.

Sanaa Mehta (SFS ’25) expressed concerns about the way that information is disseminated on the app.

“It also promotes regurgitation of the same gossip, drama, events on campus,” she wrote to The Hoya. “It’s a domino effect when one thing gets a lot of upvotes, people reflok or write very very similar opinions to it because it is clearly ‘liked’.”

Mehta said the anonymity feature promotes much of this toxicity.

“However I think it generally is stupid because it allows people to hide behind a screen and say what ever they want,” Mehta wrote. “There is no account ability for what people say.”

Flok’s initial user agreement clearly bans personal information being shared on the app. However, users frequently target specific individuals to be the focus of their posts, whether it be through veiled referenc es, asterisked letters or even stating their full names. This culture encourages dogpiling, and the lack of timely and effective moderation in removing posts pertaining to these individuals leads to unnecessary scrutiny and unwanted attention.

Anna Harpel (COL ’24) said that the app directly contrasts with the ideals of the university, such as respect, care, and diversity of thought.

“Anonymity on Flok enables the morally lowest form of cyberbullying. It shines a light on the dark side of a school that claims that its students embody Jesuit values,” Harpel told The Hoya Flok’s moderation process is responsible for much

of this individual targeting. Rather than screening posts through an algorithm or outsider, the commu nity moderators are just the top “Flokkers” within a campus community. In other words, the Georgetown students who have amassed the most upvotes are able to control what kind of content is regulated.

Flok did not respond to The Hoya’s request for comment.

Not only does Flok’s moderation style promote negativity on the app, it also allows for bigoted and hateful posts to remain on users’ feeds. In particular, Flok provides a platform for racist language on cam pus. An April 21 tweet from Finn Thompson (COL ’22) features images of offensive content and discusses the prevalence of racism on the app and the way it re flects upon and harms the Georgetown community.

“If you need any proof that there are racist george town students look no further than the campus flok. disgusting. The app has their GU emails and they should give them to the university asap. if flok doesn’t even have a basic filter for racial slurs it shouldn’t ex ist,” the user wrote in the tweet.

While this occured in April, Flok’s moderation policies have not changed since, meaning such lan guage can still proliferate on the platform. Discrimi nation in any form should not be tolerated on any platform, much less one as popular as Flok. As such, an external moderation structure that removes the responsibility of regulation from Georgetown stu dents is a critical step toward mitigating the effects of hateful anonymous speech.

Georgetown has the power to take action against students who violate the university harassment policy on social media, which includes “verbal abuse or ridicule, including slurs, epithets, and stereotyp ing; offensive jokes and comments,” according to a university spokesperson.

“Everyone in our community has a right to ex press their opinions, even when those opinions are unpopular or controversial,” the spokesperson said. “Students found to be posting content on social me dia that is in violation of the student code of conduct are subject to disciplinary procedures.”

Yet, the university policy cannot address this prob lem directly because Georgetown has no jurisdiction over Flok or students posting anonymously. Thus, the onus is on Flok to regulate the environment that its platform creates.

The Editorial Board implores the student body to understand that anonymity is not a mask to hide their hatred and that every post can affect both their peers and the overall campus community. Flok has the potential to be a positive, inclusive space, but when abused, it feeds a hotbed of spite and negativ ity. Updating its moderation policy promotes a safer platform free from hate that lives up to the standard of respect that everyone at Georgetown deserves.

The Hoya’s editorial board is composed of six students and is chaired by the opinion editors. Edi torials reflect only the beliefs of a majority of the board and are not representative of The Hoya or any individual member of the board.

Groups Consider Minus Grades

University officials are cur rently holding discussions to consider a proposal that would alter Georgetown’s grading system to include mi nus grades. If it is. approved, the policy would take effect for the 1992-1993 academic year.

Debate has begun across campus about a “fairer system,” according to Claire Carey, assis tant dean of the College. The new system would prevent “grade inflation,” give professors a more precise system and remedy the “inordinate number of B+’s and A’s,” Carey said.

Under the new proposal, which would be the first change in the grade scale since 1962, an A would represent a 4.0 GPA, an A- would equal a 3.67, a B+ would be a 3.34 and a B would be a 3.0, according to Registrar John Q. Pierce.

The deans of the School of Busi ness Administration (SBA) and the College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) have voted on the issue in recent council meetings, and opinions on the issue are divided.

The vote was split evenly for the CAS Executive, Council, the department heads, deans and three student representatives, according to Lara Coraci (CAS ’92), president of the College Academic Council.

In the SBA Undergraduate Curriculum Committee, four professors voted in favor and two students against the proposal to include minus grades, according to Laura Johenning (SBA 292).

In an informal survey of uni versity professors by Johenning and Cali, professors said they were “definitely in favor of” the change, Johenning said.

According to Pierce, the pro posal was brought up by faculty members who felt the gap be tween an A and a B+ or a B and a C+ was too large.

Pierce said the policy would change student grade point av erages, but said he was “unsure of what [positive or negative] ef fect it will have.”

Students had mixed feelings about the possible effects of a policy change.

Saskia Reilly (SLL ’94) said the plan was a “good idea depending on the grade scale. If it made a 9093 an A-, instead of a B+, I think it would be awesome.”

David Hibey (CAS ’94) said the proposed policy “would have helped me and if Georgetown had had A- grades, some of my B+’s would definitely have been A-’s.”

According to Lara Coraci (CAS ’92), president of the College Aca demic Council, the CAS Execu

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Living in this Georgetown bubble has affected my college experience by pushing me to think in terms of practicality and pre-professionalism, rather than developing an explorative and curi ous mind, which I had wanted to prioritize while in college.”

Exploring Effects of the ARP

This week, we are diving into Mickey Mas terson’s (COL ’24) Viewpoint concerning the legislative response to the Jackson, Miss., clean water crisis. For example, the Ameri can Rescue Plan Act (ARP) of 2021 was a sweeping aid package to combat economic challenges caused by the COVID-19 pan demic across the United States.

Totaling $1.9 trillion, the ARP was one of the largest economic stimulus packages in American history. It offered hundreds of bil lions of dollars in direct federal aid to state, local, territorial, and Tribal governments, in addition to $1,400 stimulus checks to indi viduals making less than $75,000, as well as other unemployment benefits.

The ARP’s investment in state and local economies allowed the nation to avoid the

high unemployment rate initially forecasted by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) in February 2021. The ARP fulfilled Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s March 2021 goal of returning the economy to full employment within one year, but its success combatted more than just unemployment. The ARP further helped relieve Americans’ financial suffering by both stimulating the creation of 550,000 jobs per month post-pandemic and increasing wages for the bottom 70% of the population. The federal government’s re lief could only go so far, however, as states were responsible for distributing all federal funds. Masterson’s analysis of the failures in Jackson powerfully calls on students to hold their state and local governments account able for all legislative decisions.

tive Council felt many students considered a B a bad grade and that with the addition of minuses “there would be more grades in the system, so professors could choose the A- option.”

Other council members opposed the proposal on the grounds that the scale would cre ate more tension and not help the students at all, she said.

The adoption of the proposal would benefit students who apply to law school, according to Pierce.

The Law School Data Assembly Service (LSDAS) uses formulas to convert applicant grades to a common scale. The LSDAS lowers Georgetown students’ averages because plus grades are rounded down to the nearest letter grade, which adversely affects many stu dents’ GPAs, according to Pierce. He said the proposed change would alleviate this problem.

One pre-med senior said the new system “would destroy a lot of GPA’s. It would hurt a lot of people applying to grad schools.”

Pierce said, however, that the proposal“definitelywouldnottake effect until next year,” and “grades given under the old system would remain” without change.

Sarah Thiemann Hoya Staff Writer

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EDITORIAL CARTOON by Rosy Lin

Ashok Ramkumar (SFS ’25)

Time to Pop the Georgetown Bubble” thehoya.com

Jared

Katie Hawkinson,

OPINION

State Lawmakers Must Be Held Accountable

From July 28 to Sept. 14, Jackson, Mississippi’s roughly 150,000 resi dents lacked access to clean water. The government failed in providing one of its most basic and crucial ser vices to its citizens.

It would be too easy to say that there wasn’t enough money to fix Jackson’s infrastructure, which has been decaying over decades. It would be too easy to say that the population of Jackson has been gradually declining and therefore, did not have enough of a tax-revenue base to fund structural repairs. Make no mistake: this was not an accident nor oversight. This was a clear policy choice.

For a city so long neglected, Jackson needed a lifeline — and nearly got one.

The American Rescue Plan Act of 2021provided a massive influx of federal dollars to local and state governments across the country, as a part of efforts to restart the economy. The bill was not just an attempt to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, but was also an opportunity for governments to start fresh with a clean slate. Although Jackson received money directly from the federal government, it was not enough to repair its water infrastructure.

In order to prevent a crisis, Jackson needed the State of Mississippi to pitch in. Despite having several billion dollars at its disposal to aid the capital city, the state legislature instead created more barriers to funding access.

The legislature singled out Jackson, alone among other Mississippi cities, to jump through bureaucratic hoops.

I would like to say that the state legislature was simply being overly cautious or fastidious, but the fact that no other city had to clear the same hurdles as Jackson leads me towards a

more cynical explanation. In a city that is 83% Black and 85% Democratic, the white Republican state legislators seemingly targeted citizens who did not vote for them or do not look like them.

Some may point to President Biden’s domestic legislation and federal action as a remedy to this problem, specifically the roughly a quarter-of-a-trillion dollars for environmental-related projects raised by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act.

Moreover, as part of the Justice40 Initiative, the Biden Administration has committed 40% of this funding to go towards disadvantaged communities.

However, state governments are left with the power to decide what qualifies as a “disadvantaged community.”

The Jackson crisis proves that we are past the point of GOP state legislatures feeling apathy towards its citizens.

Antipathy is now their modus operandi.

Think about dangerous gun laws, total abortion bans, antitrans bills, restrictions on free speech, and attacks on voting rights. Even if you live in a blue state, these issues affect you. Think about the fact that state legislatures are the ones who draw Congressional maps through redistricting.

Think about the alarming number of state legislative candidates, who could and would work to overturn the 2024 presidential election.

The most consequential and forgotten part of your ballot this November will be for state legislative candidates.

Students of Georgetown, vote.

Even if you are removed from the intense harm that state legislatures can cause, the next time you fill up a glass of water, imagine that water turning brown.

Mickey Masterson is a junior in the College.

It’s Time to Pop the Georgetown Bubble

One of my professors de scribed Georgetown University as “a school of escalators.” He said it consists of a couple well-laid paths for in coming first-years to work hard in, follow a predetermined route and end up with a job offer from one of a handful of industries. A large part of this thought process is rooted in constantly surrounding ourselves with the same environ ment that pressures us to think a certain way. I think the only real way to break out of that mentality is by consistently leaving campus.

Like most first-years, my pre-orientation mentors, New Student Orientation advisors and upperclassmen warned me about the “Georgetown bubble.” But the idea that I would only do the same activities thousands of Hoyas before me had done seemed unlikely; I thought I’d be ecstatic to see what a city like Washington, D.C., has to offer.

However, two semesters later, those upperclassmen were right. I suppose I have technically left campus by visiting shops and restaurants in the neighborhood. I’ve gone to social venues on weekend nights, and had the quintessential nighttime

Rethink the Language of Identity

Priyasha Chakravarti Columnist

As non-American indi viduals or those who have spent much of their lives abroad, I have seen non-Western international students fall victim to identity lingos like “whitewashed,” “co conut” or “fresh off the boat.”

It may exacerbate existing confusion we already face sur rounding the idea of home, cul ture and identity. The inten tion may be humor, but it can often indirectly foster more division and distance between groups. It is important for us to rethink how these terms af fect other people, regardless of intent, and be willing to em brace our own and other cul tures however we choose. Over 14% of Georgetown’s under graduate students are inter national, meaning they have lived in more than one coun try throughout their lives. We must understand the implica tions of certain identity lingos to help foster an inclusive and diverse campus experience.

Admittedly, I have both used and been on the receiving end of various identity lingos. I am originally from India, but have lived abroad in the Philippines for most of my life. My international exposure and family influence have shaped many of my interests. For example, I am not super into Bollywood movies or music, nor am I very religious.

As a result, I have previously been called “whitewashed,” by South Asian Georgetown students or a “coconut,” by my South Asian friends back home, implying that I am not a “true Indian.”

The term “whitewashed,” refers to becoming too assimilated with the West. “Coconut,” implies that though someone may be

brown or look Indian on the outside, they are white on the inside, or Westernized. I have been called this before and yet, I consider India home, visit twice a year, love Indian food and culture and speak my native languages. There is no determining factor in how “Indian,” or “not Indian,” someone is. If someone prefers soccer over cricket, but watches Bollywood movies everyday, they cannot directly be classified as “whitewashed,” or “uncultured.” There is no list of attributes one must meet to be Indian enough, or even Asian enough.

The term fresh off the boat (FOB) is often used to refer to immigrants or international students who have yet to integrate or assimilate into U.S. culture, or any other culture in question. Though the term may not inherently be an insult, it is often used with a mocking or judgmental tone. This word culturally distances international students from this new culture, and indirectly pressures us to conform to the culture of the country or place we have moved to.

Since I came to Georgetown University from abroad, I have also been called FOB once. During my first month here, when I was confused about some elements of U.S. culture like paying tips, I was called a FOB by some domestic U.S. students. I appreciated, however, that my friends were very willing to help me through the process of adjusting to a new culture.

Using the aforementioned terms may sow doubt or shame in the minds of these international students or third culture kids. This is why some of my ethnically South Asian friends feel ashamed when they cannot handle spicy food or don’t know how to dance garba. This is

why I feel awkward when I realize I don’t know as many mainstream Bollywood songs as mainstream English pop songs.

No student should be held back because they feel judged by others or a pressure to conform to certain aspects of a new culture. Rather than resorting to such terms, we should focus on both celebrating one another’s diversity and helping each other achieve their full potential at Georgetown University. We must understand that those who grow up in different countries and cultures will adopt and retain different parts of their communities. It is truly a beautiful thing to be immersed in a multitude of cultures. At the same time, that may naturally result in a breadth rather than a depth of understanding and experience. However, it is not necessarily our place to judge someone else’s cultural immersion or to what extent they belong to their culture. Instead, we can learn to appreciate each person’s unique makeup since Georgetown is truly a melting pot of so many different cultures.

Through conversations with my friends and South Asian events, I have started to become more familiar with Bollywood and South Asian music, elements that I did not grow up paying much attention to, but something that I am interested in diving into. Tapping into one’s own culture, while also appreciating other cultures, will allow us to become more open-minded and respectful individuals. International or not, our cultural and personal makeup is not up for judgment by other people.

Priyasha Chakravarti is a sophomore in the College. International Voices is published every other week.

“monumenting” experience. Still, the common thread between all those excursions is that I did them all within the confines of the Georgetown neighborhood and the National Mall.

Experiences like these are obviously integral to a freshman year at Georgetown. But the problem is that just doing activities like those pigeonholes us into a mindset that Georgetown implicitly pushes onto us all. Suddenly, the importance of getting into a club or finding the perfect friend group gets blown out of proportion. That’s the real concern behind the “Georgetown Bubble” – tricking one’s mind into believing life at Georgetown is one’s entire life.

Admittedly, this inhibition of independent experiences isn’t entirely all-consuming. Often, a close high school friend, a family member or a long-distance significant other may remind us to focus on activities and hobbies outside Georgetown’s campus, but those interactions largely occur digitally and are difficult to practice in everyday life.

Living in this Georgetown bubble has affected my college experience by pushing me to

think in terms of practicality and pre-professionalism, rather than developing an explorative and curious mind, which I had wanted to prioritize while in college. Obviously, both aspects of college life — learning for the sake of learning and preparing for one’s career — are important, but what the right balance is between both of those journeys is different from person to person. Georgetown’s heavy focus on career placement in traditional fields seemed imbalanced to me given my personal ambition to explore unique interests in college. But living in the Georgetown Bubble meant acclimatizing ourselves to its mindset, which is why I lived a freshman year that didn’t necessarily align with what I had envisioned for myself.

Thankfully, it’s quite easy to get around D.C. and the DMV area. On-campus organizations like Escape and Outdoor Education put on programming virtually every week to get students off campus. Moreover, D.C. itself contains virtually anything one might want to explore. Beyond the monuments, there are bustling areas like Logan Circle and the Wharf, and more offthe-radar experiences like concerts

THE SCALES

with Sofar sounds. Finding what to do on a weekend isn’t the hard part; being determined enough to push ourselves to leave is the real challenge.

A large part of why I hadn’t broken out of the bubble for so long was because I never took the time to stop and think about how I spent my time. Whether it was classes, extracurricular activities, or social gatherings, I hadn’t budgeted consistent time to sit and reflect on my college lifestyle thus far. Forcing ourselves to consistently examine our lives is a great way to break out of negative habits, and doing so for me has been incredibly rewarding. Obviously, everyone has a different conception of what matters most to them in college and what an ideal week looks like. To me, breaking out of the Georgetown bubble is a part of that ideal week. But only if we grant ourselves the time to stop and think about what that ideal lifestyle is and how we can work towards it can we make concrete changes to ourselves.

Ashok Ramkumar is a sophomore in the School of Foreign Service.

Reframe Gun Control Discussion

Grace Rivers Columnist

CW: This article contains refer ences to gun violence. Please refer to this article on thehoya.com for on-campus resources.

I remember sitting at fam ily dinner in June 2022, the news only a faint hum in the background of our lively conversation. Be fore long, a devastating seg ment on the Robb Elemen tary School shooting soon silenced the room. The faces of the 19 children who had been killed in the tragedy in Uvalde, Texas pierced the screen, a tangible reminder that no child in the United States is safe in the classroom while automatic rifles can be purchased at ease by civilians.

The news channel has become my daily dose of desensitization in recent years. More gun-related casualties, especially among school-aged children, occurred in the 2021-22 school year than any other school year on record, according to a federal report on school and crime safety.

This problem persists even where machine guns are prohibited, such as the District of Columbia. Gun violence is on the rise in the city and the country, and this is not a problem Georgetown students nor Americans at large can afford to ignore.

It is no secret that the United States has a significant gun problem — to which the only sustainable solution is widespread gun reform. An estimate from the Small Arms Survey, a Swissbased research project, found that there were 390 million guns in circulation in the United States in 2018

with 120.5 firearms per 100 residents, a number that easily surpasses every other country in the world.

Despite an evident link between gun ownership and gun violence, mainstream conservative media often draws a causal link between mental illness and gun violence. Outlets such as Fox News try to frame the United States’ gun violence endemic as a consequence of a lack of mental illness treatment and prevention rather than a gun problem.

However, a study conducted by Jeffrey Swanson, a professor at Duke University who examines policies related to gun violence, found that those with serious mental illnesses only account for 4% of all violent crimes. Additional estimates suggest up to 97% of homicidal gun violence is not carried out by individuals suffering from severe mental illness. Therefore, enacting policies that propose firearm restrictions based on certain mental illness diagnoses are ineffectual at best and stigmatizing of those with these serious mental illnesses at worst.

Thus, conservative media attempts to draw a causal link between mental illness and gun violence divert attention from the real cause of gun violence in the United States: guns. Data indicates that the higher the rate of gun ownership in a state, the higher the number of firearm-related homicides within that state. In Mississippi, for example, 50% of adults live in a household that owns a gun, and the gun death rate is 28.6 among 100,000 residents. The opposite can be observed in states with lower rates of gun ownership.

We can even look to other countries for a correlation between gun ownership and gun violence. There are an estimated 7.1 million

firearms in civilian hands in Canada, an unfathomable number in comparison to the United States’ 390 million. In correlation, the rate of firearm homicides per 100,000 residents is merely 0.5 and the United States is 4.12.

Simply put, reducing gun ownership correlates to a reduction of gun-related casualties. We must enact stricter child access laws and illegalize carrying a gun in public without a permit. States that have done so can expect to see an 11% reduction in annual gun deaths. However, the most crucial measure to ensure a drastic reduction in annual gun deaths is a ban on assault rifles, which accounted for 25% of gun casualties between 2009 and 2018. Thus, the United States could expect to see a decrease in gun-related casualties with the prohibition of these particular weapons.

With gun violence on the rise in the District, Georgetown students cannot afford to be silent on gun reform. We must vote in the midterm elections to ensure that Republicans do not secure control of Congress, which would give them the power to review, modify or overturn all legislation before it becomes D.C. law, including pre-existing gun reform laws in the District.

As the future of gun laws in our community may be at stake, Georgetown students must remain vigilant off campus and active in conversations surrounding gun reform.

With gun violence and gunrelated deaths reaching alltime highs across the nation, I sincerely hope one day conservatives offer widespread gun reform rather than simply thoughts and prayers.

Grace Rivers is a junior in the College. Tipping the Scales is published every other week.

Living and Learning: The Faculty In Residence Program

The Georgetown FIR program provides an opportunity for faculty members and students to interact and learn from one another in an informal environment while promoting Jesuit values.

Laetitia Haddad and Sydney Raymond Senior Feature Editors

On their way up to their dorms, residents of McCarthy Hall might run into Hugo and André, Professor Elizabeth Grimm’s (GRD ’10) two young sons, playing soccer in the lobby.

The family moved to campus in the spring of 2017. Grimm, the director of teaching at the Center for Security Studies, lives in McCarthy with her husband Jacques (COL ’01, GRD ’07), her children Hugo, André and Lulu and her threelegged dog, Crouton.

“They have said more than once that they’ve won the kid lottery,” Grimm said in an interview with The Hoya. “They think that it is very normal to live in a building with NCAA athletes and individuals who are TikTok celebrities and individuals who one day will be representatives and senators and thought leaders.”

Professor Grimm is one of the six members of the Faculty-in-Residence program, an initiative that works to connect students and faculty in residential spaces. The program works with Residential Living to strengthen relationships with students and faculty, as well as foster extracurricular learning.

Grimm’s children are immersed in campus life.

Beyond spending their days cheering for Georgetown’s various sports teams and taking walks around campus, they also frequent campus events such as the Cherry Tree Massacre, an annual a cappella show hosted by the Georgetown Chimes, and Rangilia, a yearly cultural show featuring South Asian song and dance, Grimm said.

Grimm said that students have welcomed her children and continue to be an important part of their lives.

“The way that students have embraced our kids in their lives has been really special,” Grimm said. “The women’s soccer team last year, every single one of them, every time the nets were up outside of our house, they would play with the kids, help them figure out how to be better goalies.”

Grimm said that she has enjoyed seeing campus through her childrens’ eyes.

“They are fully integrated into our community,” Grimm said. “The experience of raising a family in this place is magical.

Like truly, truly magical.”

The FIR Experience Amanda Phillips, a professor in the English department, lives in Arrupe with their partner, Shyama, and two dogs, Daisy and Yakshi. Phillips moved into their Arrupe apartment in December of 2021 and said that they have enjoyed the small moments of living on campus.

“Now that I’m on campus all the time, it’s a lot easier for me to connect with colleagues and with students,” Phillips said. “I think that’s been my sort of favorite thing is just all the chance encounters that happen.”

Phillips said they host monthly Arrupe Arcades, where students can play video games in the multipurpose room, and Walking Wednesdays, an

view on what we were eating,” Spielmann said. “So, in many ways, I try to seize opportunities when I see them, like I have certain students with certain skills or expertise or interest, and I say let’s do something around that. Rather than just my own stuff, which is not necessarily what students feel passionate about.”

Spielmann said he always strives for an informative angle to his events to foster personal growth and deeper learning.

“Maybe it’s self-assigned, but I have a mandate to pursue educational goals,” Spielmann said. “So I want to make sure that the activities that I do have some sort of educational aspect to them, it’s not just oh, let’s get together and whatever. Yeah, I mean, that’s going to happen anyways. But as much as possible, I tried to find some angles to learn something.”

Grimm said for many FIRs, the program provides an opportunity to engage with students outside of the classroom.

with their families to connect with students. The position can be held for three years, with the chance to remain for an additional two years. Faculty members can submit an application in the spring which is read by a selection committee before interviews are conducted.

The relationships constructed through this program benefit faculty members as well as the students they serve, according to the spokesperson.

“Faculty members also gain a deeper understanding of what the college experience is like for on-campus residents, which in turn provides a new perspective on how to approach teaching and learning within, and outside, the classroom environment,” the spokesperson wrote.

The FIR program is similar to programs at other universities, including the residential college system at Rice University, where each college also houses a faculty family, Phillips said.

situation for a very long time, at different institutions.”

Like Spielmann, Grimm’s previous academic experiences drew her to become involved in the FIR program. She said that her undergraduate years studying in the small-town environment of William and Mary University in Colonial Williamsburg, Va., allowed her to form lasting bonds with her professors.

“It changes the classroom dynamic because you see your professors more as individuals, and you continue to carry on those conversations that you had started at two in the afternoon, you continue at 6 p.m. over dinner,” Grimm said. “I wanted to replicate that experience that I had as an undergrad.”

Impact of FIR on Professors and Students

to academics, the hours they spend discussing what they are learning, their meaningful conversations about current events, their genuine care for each other, and the challenges they face. It was a privilege to be able to join in these learning moments,” Riley wrote in an email to The Hoya

The FIR program has also allowed students to see faculty in a more personal light, Phillips said.

“There’s just something really transformative about looking at folks that you think are authority figures, and then realizing that they’re real people,” Phillips said. “It helps you be comfortable talking to people like that in the future.”

Engaging with students outside of the classroom allows deeper relationships to flourish, Spielmann said.

opportunity for students to come on walks with Phillips and their dogs.

“It’s a fun way to connect,” Phillips said. “There’s something tremendously important about that relationship, that I hope that these Faculty-in-Residence positions become something that the students are more curious about.”

FIRs have flexibility when planning events and programming, and can host a variety of events as they see fit.

Guy Spielmann, a professor in the French department, who lives in Reynolds Hall, joined the FIR program at Georgetown around 10 years ago.

Due to his interest in the performing arts, Spielmann encourages students to see a cappella performances, dance shows and theater on campus. In addition to on-campus events, FIRs are encouraged to explore the greater Washington, D.C. region with students.

“A couple of weeks ago, I took a group to Mount Vernon,” Spielmann said in an interview with The Hoya. “Every fall, they do a Colonial Fair, which is a reenactment thing with costumes, and so we do things like that also to get students to discover some of the interesting opportunities in D.C. that you don’t always know about if you tend to stay a little too much on campus.”

Spielmann often takes inspiration from his students when planning excursions to ensure they are engaged in his programming. Recently, Spielmann said he hosted an event at a Vietnamese restaurant in Arlington with a student who had lived in Vietnam.

“She really knew about the food and she was able to give us a real, authentic point of

“The faculty in residence program is one of the best things about Georgetown,” Grimm said. “It has probably been the most rewarding experience of my personal and professional career.”

Grimm has hosted several events for students, ranging from events surrounding her studies of torture and counterterrorism to cooking lessons.

“We’ve had cookie-decorating competitions, we’ve had cupcakes, we’ve had gingerbread house parties, we had an event where I taught students how to make mousse,” Grimm said. “We do a lot of events around healthy eating and inexpensive eating.”

History of FIR

Founded over 20 years ago, the Georgetown FIR program provides an opportunity for faculty members and students to interact and learn from one another in an informal environment while promoting the academic and Jesuit mission of Georgetown.

The program is popular among faculty and students alike, as FIR conducted 366 events throughout the last academic school year, with 4,808 students attending various programs.

“FIRs work in close partnership with the Residential Living team to enhance the intellectual environment, support academic excellence and existing Living Learning Communities, provide opportunities for other faculty to interact with students, and engage in the day-to-day life of the residential community,” the spokesperson wrote in a statement to The Hoya

Every year, seven faculty members live on campus

“That was a huge part of my experience as a college student,” Phillips said. “And when I found out that there was a faculty-in-residence program here at Georgetown, I really wanted to be involved.”

Spielmann said he became involved in similar residential programs before he joined the Georgetown community in 1994. At Oberlin College, he served as an RA in the French House, a dorm dedicated to the sharing of French culture and language.

“The key term here is interaction outside of the classroom setting, no matter if you’re actually in the same building, or if you’re just there to share meals,” Spielmann said in an interview with The Hoya. “I’ve been in this type of

The FIR program has profound impacts on the way professors approach teaching students. Grimm said that her experience as an FIR has broadened her perspective as an educator.

“You really see their full personhood when you see them sitting around your dining room table,” Grimm said. “I think it has helped me in such a significant way to become a better professor by seeing the lives of our students, seeing the demands that are put on them.”

Joan Riley (NUR ’76, GRD ’97), a professor in the nursing and health sciences departments who lives in Copley Hall with her husband Steve (SFS ’76), also said living alongside students improved has given herher insight into students’ personal lives.

“I have witnessed students’ level of involvement in activities, their commitment

“One of the frustrations of teaching college is precisely that you see people in your classroom and you see only one dimension of them and you also see one dimension of your impact on them. I think most people who teach do so because they want to, and enjoy it and are interested in education. It’s important to them to know that they have an impact,” Spielmann said.

Grimm said that the interpersonal impact an FIR can have on students is essential to the experience and facilitates a welcoming living environment.

“If our family can provide any sort of support, whether that’s just listening, whether that’s food, whether that’s having my son cheat at UNO when they’re around, I mean that is what we can give back,” Grimm said. “That is truly the embodiment of ‘cura personalis’ for me.”

ILLUSTRATION BY: JASMINE CRIQUI/THE HOYA

The interpersonal impact faculty in residence can have on students is essential to creating a welcoming living environment.

“I hope that these Faculty-in-Residence positions become something that the students are more curious about.”

AMANDA PHILLIPS PROFESSOR AND FIR

YU

HOYA

Cohort of First-Year McCourt School Students Honored

Mia Streitberger

Special to The Hoya

Five first-year students in the McCourt School of Public Policy have been selected as the 2022 McCourt Scholars, an annual honor recognizing students who show exceptional promise in the field of policymaking.

Announced Sept. 26, the honorees include Kyuin Lee (GRD ’24), Sara Hidayatullah (GRD ’24), Jad Maayah (GRD ’24), Charlotte Bailey (GRD ’24) and Sumin Lee (GRD ’23). Each honoree will receive a full-tu ition scholarship, health insur ance, a stipend and coverage for mandatory fees. Cohorts are se lected based upon the strength of their applications to the Mc Court School, where their prior experiences and academic ex cellence set them apart.

McCourt School Dean Maria Cancian said this year’s cohort covers a wide range of focuses within policymaking.

“The McCourt School is proud to honor Charlotte, Jad, Kyuin, Sara and Sumin, whose back grounds, experiences and aca demic excellence qualify them for this prestigious award,” Can cian wrote to The Hoya. “This year’s McCourt Scholars have di verse interests in tech, health, im migration, criminal justice and climate resilience, and we look forward to seeing the impact they have as future policymakers.”

Originally from Seoul, South Korea, Kyuin Lee worked in voter education at the European Par liament during Brexit before moving to the International La bour Organization (ILO), focusing on development aid and diversity, equity and inclusion.

With this scholarship, Kyuin said she plans to ex pand her scope of influence to international development at the McCourt School.

“I would like to make a mea surable difference in the work

that I do and in order to make a measurable difference you have to know how to measure the ef fects, the impacts, of your work,” Kyuin told The Hoya. “I was al ways about putting my figure on the thorniest problems of the day,

and study this and enhance what you’re doing already,’” Hi dayatullah told The Hoya

Growing up in Sacramento, the capital of California, with a mother who worked as a journalist covering criminal justice policy, local politics have always been a point of interest for Bailey.

After graduating from college, she spent three years in Greece as a college counselor, helping students apply to and matricu late at U.S. universities. She now works at the Council on Criminal Justice, a nonpartisan think tank based in D.C.

Bailey said she looks forward to expanding on the work of those who came before her.

PAGE FIVE

THE

while finding solutions guided by artifacts and evidence.”

Hidayatullah, who studied predictive analytics as an under graduate at the University of Cal ifornia, Berkeley, began her career as a consultant at Applied Predic tive Technologies, a startup with a focus on predictive analytics.

The startup was later bought by Mastercard, where Hidayatul lah worked extensively with con sumer data to develop software that tracks inclusive, effective growth in impoverished neigh borhoods around the United States and the United Kingdom.

Hidayatullah said the scholar ship confirmed the importance of her work, which combined her expertise in data science with her passion for social impact.

“It was super exciting and humbling to get the scholar ship but also to give myself this verification of ‘what you’re doing is interesting and they think it’s valuable and they want you to actually come

“I was shocked and sort of overcome with how lucky I am, frankly,” Bailey told The Hoya. “I’ve been so unbeliev ably impressed with the cali ber of classmates, professors, staff, everyone at the Mc Court School, so I really feel just incredibly honored to be counted as a peer among these people.”

Coming from Jordan, May aah’s work has focused on im migrant and refugee support.

Most recently, he worked at the nonprofit Havenly, which provides refugee women with support on starting their ca reers in the U.S., including paid job training and English language classes.

Maayah said he is honored to have the opportunity to pur sue a graduate degree without worrying about costs.

“I was able to speak with some of the faculty before I was picked for that decision and I got along with them super well and they seemed very inter ested in my work,” Maayah said. “To have that be recognized, I just felt immense honor.”

Sumin Lee did not respond to The Hoya’s requests for comment.

Cynthia Wei, member of the Bee Campus Team, on Geogretown’s iNaturalist initiative. Story on A7.

Vital Vittles Employees Raise $800 For St. Jude Children’s Hospital

Michael Woch Special to The Hoya

The staff of on-campus grocery store Vital Vittles raised $800 for cancer re search through their partici pation in the Washington, D.C. 5K for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

Eight employees at Vittles, the flagship storefront of student-run business The Corp, participated in the Oct. 1 walk and run event, where 1,388 people from around the District collectively raised $180,836.61 for St. Jude’s. The hospital is dedicated to pedi atric cancer and life-threat ening disease research and to providing treatment for chil dren around the world, free of charge — efforts that are funded by events like the 5K.

Vittles Operations Direc tor Grace McSherry (COL ’24) said The Corp was drawn to St. Jude’s mission.

“It is a cause that has made such a difference in its years of operation, contributing to the increase in the child hood cancer survival rate from 20%-80%,” McSherry wrote to The Hoya. “After we researched more about every thing that St. Jude does, we were even more eager to sup port this great organization.”

McSherry said cancer sur vivors and family members of cancer patients were pres ent and shared their stories at the event.

“It was a really beautiful event that made the fundrais ing process that much more rewarding,” McSherry wrote.

Joshua LaRock (MSB ’23), the director of Vittles, said the team’s participation in the fundraiser was part of The Corp’s efforts to expand their community impact be yond the Hilltop.

“When our social committee

proposed the opportunity to run the 5K for St. Jude, we did not hesitate to organize a team,” LaRock wrote to The Hoya. “The store bonded over a shared cause to treat and defeat child hood cancer with support from family, friends, alumni, and the Georgetown community.”

Vittles customer Olivia Kruszewski (NHS ’26) said she was happy to hear em ployees at the store were rais ing money for the hospital.

“I love to see the students of Vittles finding a way to give back, engage with the local community, and ex emplify our Jesuit values by working for the greater good,” Kruszewski wrote to The Hoya LaRock said employ ees used connections with friends, family and The Corp’s alumni network to raise funds.

“We utilized our alumni communication channels to spread awareness; their sup port and thoughtful mes sages really made a heartfelt impact within our store’s community,” LaRock wrote.

The Corp also solic ited donations from cur rent Georgetown students, putting posters up in and around the storefront with links to the donation portal, according to McSherry.

The Vital Vittles team fell $200 short of their $1,000 fundraising goal, but LaRock said their fundraising efforts are still ongoing and com munity members may con tinue to donate through the portal through Dec. 31.

McSherry said following the success of the 5K, Vital Vittles employees hope to participate in similar events in the future.

“This experience was be yond fulfilling,” McSherry wrote. “We are so thankful

to everyone who has donated and taken time out of their day to raise awareness about our goal. We are looking for ward to future fundraisers

with them as well as collab oration with other impactful organizations!”

The Corp was founded 50 years ago as a way for stu dents to raise money to help community members in need, and LaRock said this principle still guides the or ganization.

“The Corp was founded in the spirit of philanthropy, and that remains as the driving mission of The Corp today,” LaRock wrote. “Thou sands of dollars in scholar ships and dozens of partner ships have occurred in the past 50 years, and we look forward to deepening this impact on and off campus in the next 50 as well!”

Significant Nursing Shortages Reported Throughout District

Washington, D.C., is expe riencing a nursing shortage that is heavily impacting the healthcare system as hos pitals struggle to maintain necessary staff levels to care for patients.

The District of Colum bia Hospital Association (DCHA) has struggled to re tain enough nurses to meet the intense demands of the COVID-19 pandemic, a pat tern mirrored in hospitals across the country. While many people have adjusted to living life as they did before the pandemic, nurses remain particularly strained, as the 7-day average of patients in hospital service areas in and around Washington, D.C., hospitalized with COVID-19 in the District sits at 149.

In 2021, more than 100,000 registered nurses left the workforce, the larg est drop in the past 40 years.

According to a Nurse Staffing Survey published in Septem ber by the DCHA, nearly 80% of nurses working in hospi tals and facilities in D.C. say they have to deal with staff ing shortages more than once per week, placing increased strain on nurses.

Georgetown School of Nursing Associate Profes sor Diane Davis said nurs ing shortages in the United States are not solely a result of the pandemic, but that they stem from a larger strain on nurses in the workplace.

“I think it started before that and I think nursing has been running with a nursing shortage for a very long time,” Davis told The Hoya. “I don’t know that there’s ever times where you feel like you’re flushed with nurses. It’s kind of an ongoing problem.”

Prior to COVID-19-related stressors, nurses reported feeling burnout from the strain of long hours, the pres sure of quick decision-mak ing that may affect patients’ health, and the strain of car ing for patients who may not fully recover.

Nurses’ feelings of stress and burnout can be increased by nurses who are forced to care for a larger num ber of patients, those who work longer hours, and those who specialize in stressful areas of healthcare, such as Emergency Department and ICU nurses.

This nursing shortage does not show signs of easing any time soon. According to re search conducted by consult ing firm McKinsey & Compa

ny on the impact of COVID-19 on the nursing workforce, by 2025, the U.S. could have anywhere from 200,000 to 450,000 fewer registered nurses than necessary to meet patient demand.

Davis said the School of Nursing at Georgetown pre pares future nurses for the challenges they may face in a strained healthcare system.

“We do a fair amount of work for wellness in nursing and how to take care of yourself and your colleagues and how to set up situations where you work that can promote wellness be cause nursing can be very dif ficult,” Davis said.

Maddie Flynn (SON ’24), a nursing student, said that Georgetown nursing students recognize the issue of the nurs ing shortage in the workplace.

“Nursing is a highly col laborative field — being sur rounded by a cohort of such driven and passionate peers that are supportive in the classroom makes me hopeful for support for our future af ter we graduate,” Flynn wrote to The Hoya. “We all recognize the high demand of our field, but are inspired by our profes sors and clinical faculty every day in class and the hospital.”

Flynn said she has seen the impacts of the short

ages affecting her clinical rotations at MedStar George town University Hospital (MedStar), a key component of her nursing education at Georgetown, in which stu dents spend time with mem bers of the medical field in a hospital setting.

“We do clinicals at Med Star, and a lot of times we’ll see nurses that are caring for six or more patients, which isn’t typical and while they’re able to manage it, you can tell they’re more stressed out than they would be if there was a better ratio,” Flynn wrote. “I’d say overall the worst part about having a nursing shortage is that you aren’t able to devote time in a more meaningful way to each of your patients.”

Despite challenges, many nurses continue to stay in the field due to their passion for the work, Davis said.

“It’s a very rewarding pro fession, but it can be a very dif ficult profession. A lot of peo ple that go into nursing take care of other people, but at the expense of themselves,” Davis said. “But there’s a lot of pres sures: work more shifts, work more hours, and fill in for this person so we try to also work with that. They need to take care of themselves as well.”

the

hospitals.

VERBATIM I hope people will be more aware of the pollinators around them.”

GEORGETOWN SCHOOL OF NURSING

Georgetown University School of Nursing professor Roxanne Mirabal-Beltran is working to offer informal health education in laundromats to help reach Spanish-speaking women and children.

Your news — from every corner of The Hoya

New restaurants and shops are set to open as a part of The Wharf’s Phase 2. Story on A8.

Venetia Smith Special to The Hoya

“This year’s McCourt Scholars have diverse interests in tech, health, immigration, criminal justice and climate resilience.”

MARIA CANCIAN DEAN OF THE MCCOURT SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY

“After we researched more about everything that St. Jude does, we were even more eager to support this great organization. It was a really beautiful event that made the fundraising process that much more rewarding,”

GRACE

Students Organize Fundraiser To Support Immigrant Aid

GIWPS Cohosts Closed UN Meeting About Afghan Women’s Education

UN, from A1 provide online learning plat forms and online programs for Afghan girls and help them continue their education.”

Melanne Verveer, executive director of GIWPS and former U.S. Ambassador for Global Women’s Issues, moderated the event and said the meeting was a valuable opportunity for diplomats to engage in discus sion with Afghan women who have been directly impacted by the Taliban’s suppression of women’s education.

“It was especially moving to have representatives of the Afghan community — both students and NGO leaders — speak directly and passion ately to the officials about the need for great action from their governments,” Verveer wrote to The Hoya

GIWPS collaborated with the Malala Fund, an organiza tion founded by Yousafzai that supports girls’ education, and the Swedish Mission to the UN, which represents Sweden internationally, to host the meeting. Organizers invited diplomats, leaders in feminist foreign policy and Afghan stu dents to participate in the dis cussion alongside Yousafzai.

The meeting followed the Chatham House Rule, where attendees are allowed to use in formation they gather from the

meeting to develop foreign pol icy in their respective countries but cannot attribute comments to specific people or countries, which Karahan said allowed participants to speak more freely about their opinions and capabilities to assist.

Verveer said participants fo cused on discussing actionable steps the international com munity can take to support Af ghan women’s rights.

“The discussion was not a lot of speeches, but rather one in which very thoughtful concrete commitments and recommen dations were made by the gov ernment officials on additional steps — from greater diplomat ic engagement, particularly in the region, and further UN ac tions to eliminating the travel waiver for top Taliban to tem porary ways to provide access to education through technology,” Verveer wrote.

The discussion highlighted several challenges that Karah an said she had not previously considered when discussing potential solutions in the con text of a classroom.

“Here are the people actu ally carrying out these plans and talking about its feasi bility, its probability and the dangers,” Karahan told The Hoya. “That was the most sur prising bit, seeing ‘okay, here’s the discourse in my mind.’ I just saw in real life whether or

not that’s even possible.”

It is vital for countries com mitted to feminist foreign pol icy to pay particular attention to Afghan women, according to Verveer.

“Countries that have of ficially committed to a femi nist foreign policy — that is, fully integrated a gender lens in their foreign policy — it seems have an added obli gation in their diplomatic work, to be more engaged on Afghanistan,” Verveer wrote.

“It is especially important to speak out and adopt concrete actions to support Afghan women’s rights, which are be ing assaulted by the Taliban.”

Azizi said individuals who want to support girls’ educa tion rights in Afghanistan can donate to USAID, the World Bank, the UN Develop ment Programme, UN Wom en and UNICEF.

Karahan said Georgetown students have a responsibility to be aware about women’s access to education in Afghanistan.

“You can take classes, you can talk to professors, you can attend events,” Karahan said. “Georgetown is giving you these resources so that when these conversations come up, you not only have a stake in them, but you’re educated, you have ideas and you can propel the conversa tion forward.”

Student organizations collaborated to raise over $1000 for ImmDef, a nonprofit organization that specializes in providing legal representation to immigrants.

ICED DRINKS, from A1 southern border in California every day, according to Freedom for Immigrants, a non-profit whose mission is to abolish immigration detention. Many have reported abuse in the detention centers, including medical neglect, limited food availability and inhumane soli tary confinement.

Meza said Georgetown students should be aware of the injustice within the im migration system.

“I think the overall im migration system is deeply flawed in creating a cycle of migrants forced to come to the U.S. as a result of the con ditions of their home state, only to be immediately ille

galized upon arrival,” Meza wrote to The Hoya. “Students, being future leaders, ought to be conscious of the structural issues present in our govern ment, present in our systems and present in the founda tions of this country.”

VSA community outreach chair Angela Nguyen (COL ’24), who came up with the idea to host a fundraiser for immigrant rights, said VSA wanted to create a truly mul ticultural event that engaged multiple student organiza tions in a common goal.

“We had 3 organizations collaborating: one cultural org, one cultural-political org and one activist org, and we all came together because we all believe in something, and

we made it work,” Nguyen said in an interview with The Hoya. “I feel like lots of times students feel like they have to do everything on their own, but that’s not the case. There is a whole community out there ready to support.”

Floresca said he hopes the event will inspire students to take further action toward immigration justice.

“Far too often are people tak ing a bystander’s view of the issue,” Floresca wrote. “When families and livelihoods are on the line, HFIR firmly believes that people should come to learn more about the issue at hand. Going beyond recogniz ing to understanding is a huge step toward finding and ad dressing these injustices.”

Former Ambassador to Ukraine Speaks at Institute for Study of Diplomacy Event

the Secretary’s Diplomacy for Freedom Award, the PEN/ Benenson Courage Award in 2020 and the Trainor Award for Excellence in the Conduct of Diplomacy from George town’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy in 2020.

Yovanovitch said her inter est in international affairs stemmed from hearing stories about her parents’ upbringing in the Soviet Union during World War II.

“My parents had always said we were fortunate to grow up in the United States, given the freedoms that this democ racy provided us,” Yovanovitch said at the event. “They knew what it was like to not live in freedom, and so they said we needed to give back. And so a career in foreign service and diplomacy, national security was a way of giving back, while also doing what I was most passionate about, what I was most interested in.”

In 1993, Yovanovitch served as a junior foreign ser vice officer in Moscow dur ing a clash between Russian President Boris Yelstin and the Russian Parliament over Yelstin’s attempt to dissolve the legislative body, an action that extended beyond his constitutional limits.

Being in a constantly evolving political environ ment in Moscow shaped her love for foreign service, Yova novitch said.

“I would lie in bed before the alarm clock went off, I would think, ‘I wonder what’s going

to happen today.’ I knew it was not going to be the day that I had imagined and planned for the day before, and while that may be somebody’s nightmare out there, but for me, it was just important and exciting,” Yovanovitch said. “That’s what I would say to people consid ering careers in the foreign service or national security, that you can make a difference from the very beginning.”

Yovanovitch also served as the deputy director of the Russia Desk in the U.S. Department of State from 1998-2000 and spoke about her struggles with sexism as a negotiator.

“In many places around the world, including, frankly, in the United States, there is discrim ination still, not just against women, but against all sorts of minorities,” Yovanovitch said. “It’s difficult to deal with, particularly in a foreign envi ronment, because in a foreign environment, you can’t say, ‘Hey, Mr. President, that’s an inappropriate comment. Don’t touch me like that.’ You can’t do that.”

Despite doubting her com petency, officials still had to recognize the authority af forded to her by her position as a representative of the U.S., according to Yovanovitch.

“At the end of the day, whether you are an American woman or minority in the United States, whoever you are, if you are over seas and representing the United States, most countries are going to deal with you because you are a conduit to the United States and you speak for the United States,”

Yovanovitch said. “Because over seas, we’re not just individuals, we are representing the flag and the people.”

In her three-year tenure as ambassador to Ukraine, Yovano vitch focused on addressing is sues of corruption, instability and poverty in former Soviet states.

Yovanovitch said the war in Ukraine is an issue that is

close to her heart.

“I was in Ukraine about three weeks ago for a con ference that was very short, somewhat sweet, also some what sorrowful,” Yovanovitch said. “But what impressed me is perhaps not something new to your audience, which is the continued courage of the Ukrainian people, the commit

ment to the cause and their confidence that they were go ing to win.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s actions pose an urgent threat not only to Ukraine but to democracy as a whole, ac cording to Yovanovitch.

“Our prosperity would be at risk, our security would cer tainly be at risk and even liberty

around the world would be at risk because he would be going in there and trying to under mine it at every turn, as he has tried to do in the United States itself,” Yovanovitch said. “So for me, this is the test of our times. I’ve never seen a challenge like this in my career or in my life. And I think we really need to step up.”

JESSICA LIN/THE HOYA

Retired diplomat Marie Yovanovitch offered foreign service career advice and spoke about what shaped her interest in the field at a webinar hosted by the Georgetown Institute for the Study of Diplomacy

@SWEDENUN/TWITTER

Attendees spoke about ways to support the educational rights of Afghan women and girls following the Taliban’s ban on women attending high school in Afghanistan.

AMBASSADOR, from A1

Georgetown Contributes to Project Mapping Global Biodiversity

Seth Edwards Special to The Hoya

Georgetown University is join ing an international initiative that will allow community members to upload photos of plants, ani mals and insects around campus to an app that will inform research about biodiversity on the Hilltop.

The Georgetown Bee Campus team, which consists of a group of five professors and several student assistants, is leading the university’s engagement with the initiative, entitled iNatu ralist. The network is an initia tive of the California Academy of Sciences and the National Geographic Society that tracks biodiversity and crowdsources information to help scientists understand when and where certain organisms are present.

In July 2020, Georgetown was designated a Bee Campus by the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, an international organization focused on the conservation of organisms cru cial to biodiversity. This certifi cation requires the university to make seven commitments that

support the presence of bees and other pollinating insects on campus, of which the iNatural ist project is one.

Any Georgetown community member can take photos of flora and fauna on campus and up load them to the iNaturalist app, where artificial intelligence helps the user identify the species of the organism in the image. Data is then added to the iNaturalist network, helping researchers bet ter understand what organisms are living in the area.

The Common Lantana, a red and yellow flower that blooms near the Healey Family Student Center, the Eastern Tiger Swal lowtail butterfly and the Florida Predatory Stink Bug are among the 115 species dozens of com munity members have already identified as of Oct. 6.

Edward Barrows, a Bee Cam pus team member and biology professor who brought the idea of joining iNaturalist to the team, said the data has already enriched his understanding of the species that exist on the Hilltop.

“We need a comprehensive list of GU organisms to help sus

Panel: Professors Discuss Political, Economic Crisis in Sri Lanka

Jack Willis Special to The Hoya

The Walsh School of For eign Service’s Asian Studies department hosted an inter disciplinary panel to discuss the ongoing political and eco nomic crisis in Sri Lanka.

The Oct. 5 panel, entitled “The Crisis in Sri Lanka: Per spectives from Economics, Politics and Anthropology,” was formed in response to the current political and economic situation in the island nation of Sri Lanka. The panel aimed to address questions regarding Sri Lanka’s transition to a nation in turmoil. Panelists also dis cussed proactive responses to the crisis, outlining specific op portunities to assist Sri Lanka.

The event panel consisted of Shanta Devarajan, a George town University professor in international development, Neil DeVotta, a professor of politics and international af fairs at Wake Forest Universi ty, and Santa Clara University anthropology professor My

“A lot of the problems that we see in the country are directly connected to this eth nocentric trajectory the state has pursued.”

worst economic crisis in its his tory, with GDP falling by over 8%.

Inflation is at 70%. And a people’s movement threw out the demo cratically elected president.”

According to Devarajan, economists that closely fol lowed Sri Lanka’s gradual debt accumulation have warned of an impending crisis for over a year, though the government consistently ignored warnings.

“I would say since the summer of 2021, I’ve been giving talks and appearing on various seminars and webinars because we saw this debt crisis coming, and we were trying to get the government to actually embark on a debt re structuring IMF program,” De varajan said. “But the government wasn’t listening, to be honest.”

Jegathesan said Sri Lanka’s national debt crisis has had a significant impact on the lives of Sri Lankans, especially the nation’s marginalized groups.

“The anthropological per spective provides a necessary centering on what people in Sri Lanka are experiencing on a day to day basis,” Jegath esan wrote to The Hoya. “The perspective accounts for how macro-level policies and in frastructures of fiscal and in dustrial governance directly impact individuals, house holds and communities, par ticularly those who are most marginalized in this crisis.”

Acknowledging the country’s historical ethnic issues and re cent violent marginalization of certain minority communities is essential to understanding the political environment in Sri Lanka, according to DeVotta.

tain them,” Barrows wrote to The Hoya. “iNaturalist could even tually database 1000s of GU’s organisms. I’ve been looking at GU organisms since 1975, and iNaturalist is showing me GU species on campus I have not previously seen at GU.”

Bill Hahn, chair of the Bee Campus project and adjunct pro fessor in the School of Foreign Ser vice, said the project will allow the Bee Campus team to improve and evaluate the effectiveness of their conservation plans.

“I hope that the project will bet ter document native and non-na tive pollinators on campus,” Hahn wrote to The Hoya. “The results of the project will help establish a baseline for future studies on campus biodiversity.”

Barrows said Georgetown’s participation in the iNaturalist initiative advances the Bee Cam pus team’s goal to preserve biodi versity on campus, an important measure that is often overlooked.

“Many people I know have biodiversity blindness, including plant blindness and pollinator blindness,” Barrows wrote to The Hoya. “Earth’s biodiversity is cru

cial to humans’ health and survi vorship as a species on Earth.”

Cynthia Wei, a member of the Bee Campus team and as sociate teaching professor in the School of Foreign Service, said she wants iNaturalist to inspire students to be more conscious of the hundreds of diverse species on campus.

“I hope people will be more aware of the pollinators around them and of nature around them more generally — I think it’s really easy to just not notice,” Wei said in an interview with The Hoya

In addition to joining iNatu

Wards 7, 8 Open 1st Full-Service Grocery Store in 10+ Years

Olivia Macaulay Special to The Hoya

The fourth full-service gro cery store to open east of the Anacostia River, the first in over a decade, recently wel comed its first customers last week. The stores will expand food access in Wards 7 and 8.

The store, a franchise of the Ger man retail grocery chain Lidl, is located in Skyland Town Center in Ward 7. Wards 7 and 8 have tra ditionally been considered food deserts, or urban regions where a significant proportion of the population lives more than a mile away from the nearest grocery store. The new Lidl location will help provide groceries for almost 160,000 residents that reside east of the Anacostia River. Its comple tion is a result of 15 years of work by residents, community leaders and Washington, D.C. officials, putting the count of full-service grocery stores in the District’s sev enth and eighth wards at four. D.C.

Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) said the opening of the new Lidl location serves as the culmina tion of hard work from residents whose efforts ensured increased food access in the area.

“For years, the community in Ward 7 has made clear what they want to see at Skyland Town Center – retail, housing and dining. I promised we would deliver, and we are keeping that promise,” Bowser said in a press release. “Today, I am grateful for the residents and community leaders who never gave up on

Skyland, and I’m grateful to Lidl for helping us accomplish some thing that hasn’t been done in 15 years: opening a full-service su permarket East of the River.”

Bowser has put forth signifi cant resources towards creating affordable food access for the community, including allocat ing $73 million to the Food Ac cess Fund, which awards grants to food-related businesses seek ing to open a new location in ar eas of the District that are desig nated as having low food access.

Bowser has also made altera tions to the Supermarket Tax Incentive, which waves taxes and fees to grocery stores to en courage development and in vestment in areas lacking access to groceries and fresh food, and increased funding for the Neigh borhood Prosperity Fund, which provides financing for projects that attract private investment to distressed communities.

Uwe Brandes, faculty di rector of the Georgetown Ur ban and Regional Planning Program said while more must be done, the addition of the new grocery store will provide more options to con sumers east of the Anacostia.

“There are two other large grocery stores east of the Ana costia river, so this one store does not represent a seachange,” Brandes wrote. “How ever, it is heartening to see more diversity in retail offer ings and since Lidl specializes in discount groceries, this will be a valuable and competitive

ILLUSTRATION BY: CLAIRE MIN/THE HOYA

ralist, the Bee Campus team is working on other projects to make the Hilltop more pollina tor friendly for bees. The team is working to plant native plants, create nesting sites for insects and emphasize the importance of education about pollinators, according to Hahn.

Their strategy also includes teaching material on pollinator conservation, expanding stu dent engagement in research re lated to pollination and posting flyers to inform about pollina tors. The team’s work is funded by the Georgetown Earth Com

mons and a 2020 grant from the Laudato Si’ fund, which spon sors projects that improve sus tainability on campus.

Wei said iNaturalist allows anybody to join a community of citizen scientists and engage with the preservation of biodiversity.

“When you learn more about something, you care more about it,” Wei said. “Once you know that it’s not just a bug, but actu ally a particular species with a name and history, behavior and how it’s different from others, it just becomes a lot more interest ing and valuable.”

thri Jegathesan. The discus sion was moderated by Cecilia Van Hollen, a professor of the Asian Studies department. The event comes on the heels of the Sri Lankan presi dent’s resignation in July 2022 when he fled the country in response to months of protests against the government’s mis management of the economy.

Though the Sri Lankan par liament has since appointed a new president, economic unrest continues as 86% of families are currently either skipping meals, eating less or buying worse food, according to the World Food Programme.

As of Oct. 4, Amnesty Inter national reports the nation’s bankruptcy and high rates of inflation are contributing to se vere shortages in food, fuel and access to healthcare services.

Given Sri Lanka’s relative stability in the past, the coun try’s drastic economic down turn was a surprise to many, according to Devarajan.

“Sri Lanka represents a bit of a puzzle, because on the one hand, it’s a remarkably successful econ omy with relatively rapid growth, enviable human development indicators and then an uninter rupted democracy,” Devarajan told The Hoya. “And on the other hand, it’s going through the

“I think the thing that has been consistently relevant is the ethnonationalism associ ated with the post-indepen dence development of the state and its link to democrat ic regression,” DeVotta said. “I think a lot of the problems that we see in the country are directly connected to this eth nocentric trajectory the state has pursued and the demo cratic regression that is asso ciated with the trajectory.”

According to Devarajan, it is important to understand histor ic ethnic and religious tensions when evaluating the current economic state of Sri Lanka.

“Sri Lanka has two large language groups, as well as three major religions, and there’s no secret that certainly the relations be tween the Tamils and the Sinhalese has been prob lematic, and recently there’s been quite a lot of violence against Muslims,” Devara jan said. “So underlying this economic problem that I just described, I think there is an ethnic tension as well.”

DeVotta said it is impor tant to examine the conflict from a variety of angles and not see the debt crisis as merely an economic issue.

“Being able to deal with the ongoing crisis, via differ ent perspectives, I think is interesting. The topic itself is timely,” Devotta said.

alternative to the other two.”

Brandes said the new store is also a part of a surge of new construction in the area which will offer additional options for the Anacostia community.

“The market demand is clear ly there. There is no reason why other retailers should not imme diately follow,” Brandes wrote to The Hoya. “This store opening represents a growing recogni tion that pent-up consumer de mand is already there and new opportunities for other grocery stores and restaurants will be embraced by the community.”

D.C. Deputy Mayor for Plan ning and Economic Develop ment John Falcicchio (D), said the store’s opening signals the end of long-distance com mutes in search of healthy food options for many resi dents and their families.

“Mayor Bowser remains com mitted to expanding food access points East of the River,” Falcic chio said in a press release from the Mayor’s Office. “We will not

stop this work until we eradicate food deserts in Wards 7 and 8.”

According to Ward 7 Coun cilmember Vincent Gray, Lidl’s decision to open a location in Ward 7 represents an invest ment in D.C. residents who live east of the Anacostia River.

“Lidl at the Skyland Town Center in Ward 7, which is also the first Lidl in the District, will provide residents with greater food access, healthier food options and serve as a vi tal retail anchor,” Gray said in the press release. “I am excited about the valuable location the East End provides for retail and hospitality opportunities.”

Brandes said it is impor tant to continue to work to wards ensuring all regions of the District are able to thrive.

“With about a quarter of the city’s population living east of the Anacostia river, there is no rea son why neighborhood centers cannot thrive to the same degree they are in other neighborhoods of the city,” Brandes wrote.

Professors Discuss Midterms at Mortara Center

Evie Steele Special to The Hoya

The 2022 midterm elec tions serve as an important signal for the state of Ameri can politics in the midst of increased polarization and threats to democracy, two pro fessors said at an event on the highly anticipated midterms.

The Oct. 3 event was the second of three discussions hosted by the Mortara Center for International Studies in an event series titled “In the News” and featured Vander bilt University professor of political science John Sides, and Georgetown University government professor Michele Swers. The event was moder ated by Mortara Center Direc tor Elizabeth Saunders. At the event, the professors discussed the trends that may predict the outcome of the 2022 midterm elections that will determine control of the House of Repre sentatives, Senate and gover norships across the country.

Sides discussed four pat terns that will affect this year’s midterms: tectonic shifts, identity shocks, political cal cification and political parity. Sides defined tectonic shifts as the trends of polarization con tributing to the growing longterm disparity between the

Republican and Democratic parties as each party moves to wards the extremes, which is a trend particularly visible in the current Congress.

According to Sides, together with identity shocks, or shortterm disparities between the two parties on identity-based issues such as race and gender, this tectonic shift has contrib uted to growing political polar ization and increased voter loy alty to one party over another.

“We’ve been living in an era of historically small shifts, but 2020 really was a smaller shift,” Sides said at the event. “I would invite you to go back and to reread news coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic, murder of George Floyd and racial justice protests, which framed them as potentially realigning events for Ameri can politics, where we would see big changes, big whole sale changes in the way that American politics works.”

Only six Senators and 16 House members currently rep resent states and districts that voted for the opposite political party during the 2020 presiden tial election. Swers said rigid po litical partisanship has resulted in a nationalization of politics, or rather that national trends affect results more than local issues or candidates’ characters.

According to Swers, this nationalization has led to a decline in split-ticketing, or voters selecting opposite par ties for different elected posi tions, which may see voters more hesitant to vote against the party they supported in the 2020 presidential election.

“It’s really hard for me, if I have a D or an R next to my name, to outrun the party based on you knowing me as an individual these days,” Swers said at the event. “We’re seeing more and more often that your House race decision, your Senate decision, is very tied to the presidential vote.”

While statistical analyses have proven that the presi dent’s party lose seats in the House during typical miderm election years, this year’s elec tion may be an exception due to renewed focus on abor tion rights in the wake of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization Su preme Court decision which overturned Roe v. Wade, ac cording to Swers.

“Generally, you’re more mo tivated to vote when you’re an gry than when you’re happy,” Swers said. “And the Dobbs decision made a change for Democrats so that you saw more Democrats now say ing that they’re enthusiastic

about voting, and particularly Democratic women.”

Swers also noted that 2022 is the year in which new dis tricts from the 2020 census go into effect, meaning that many members of the House have retired to avoid losing their seat or been defeated in pri maries as district boundaries and demographics shift. Many potential members are more extreme than the candidates they could replace, which could make it difficult for Re publicans to govern should they win a House majority. With a small majority, more extreme members could block vital bills from passing.

Sides said politically ex treme candidates, together with the consequences of in creased political polarization, is cause for concern as increas ing antidemocratic behavior from Republican legislators could potentially exacerbate polarization and delegitimize America’s democratic process.

“Some people who are in American comparative poli tics who have written about polarization and its impli cations for democracy have noted that one of the risks is that voters will countenance things that are borderline treason, blatantly anti-demo cratic,” Sides said.

@LIDLUS/TWITTER

The new store will provide more grocery options to residents living east of the Anacostia River.

NEIL

Medical Students Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month

Nina Raj Graduate Desk Editor

In honor of National Hispanic Heritage Month, the Georgetown University School of Medicine’s Latino Medical Student Associa tion (LMSA) is holding a series of events to celebrate Hispanic tradi tions and raise awareness about racial disparities in healthcare.

Led by co-Presidents Jacque line Pujol (MED ’25) and Alexia Mendivil (MED ’25), LMSA’s month of programming includes information sessions on the ef fect of diabetes on Latinx health, a heritage festival at the Smithson ian National Museum of Ameri can History, a health fair, a panel on Hispanic folk remedies and a Latin dance night.

Mendivil said she hopes events like these will help make Latinx medical students feel welcomed.

“Our mission statement is to encourage Latina, Latino and Latinx students to pursue medi cine, to advocate for increased rep resentation of Latino physicians and to improve the health of the Hispanic community in the DMV area,” Mendivil said in an inter view with The Hoya A central focus across LMSA’s efforts is developing cultural competence among the next gen eration of physicians currently studying at Georgetown, accord ing to Pujol. This month, LMSA began its Hispanic heritage pro gramming with a session on the gaps in health care professionals’ understanding of diabetes, specifi cally for Latinx patients.

Diabetes disproportionately af fects Hispanic or Latinx individu als — the percentage of Hispanic adults with diabetes is 80% higher than that of non-Hispanic whites, due in part to sociocultural factors like access to healthcare, income inequality and language barriers.

A key message of the event was the importance of integra

tive treatment, which consists of partnerships among primary physicians, endocrinologists and dieticians to provide holistic care, according to Pujol.

When planning LMSA’s panels, Pujol said it was impor tant to find speakers who were representative of the popula tions being served.

“Our first priority was finding physicians who were of Hispanic origin, of Latinx origin, who spoke Spanish. And the endocrinologist that we recruited from Arizona, he is known for promoting La tino health, especially with dia betes,” Pujol told The Hoya. “The other physicians that we recruit ed were from MedStar, and they also were Latinx origin. So that was basically our priority.”

Pujol said Latinos are un derrepresented in the field of medicine, as Latinos make up almost 19% of the total U.S. population but account for only 7% of physicians and surgeons in the United States.

Daniela Hernandez (MED ’26), a first-year medical stu dent, said she decided to enroll at Georgetown in part because of LMSA’s outreach.

“One of the reasons why I chose Georgetown was because of the LMSA Cafecito Hours and the community I found there,” Hernandez said. “It was those things that I did not find anywhere else that compelled me to attend Georgetown.”

As part of their dedication to greater inclusion, LMSA mem bers have personally reached out to over a hundred potential in coming Hispanic students like Hernandez to offer to answer questions about the school, ac cording to Mendivil.

“One of our biggest efforts has been calling and emailing, meet ing up with prospective students who got accepted to Georgetown and are interviewing at George

town,” Mendivil said. “We’re really determined with our goals to keep increasing the representation of the Latinx students at our school.”

According to Casey Sheahan, associate director of admissions at the Georgetown University School of Medicine, LMSA helps welcome Latinx accepted stu dents to the medical school and support them during their time at Georgetown.

“Many of the members are Student Ambassadors, which is a role where they interact with ap plicants throughout the applica tion process,” Sheahan wrote to The Hoya. “Some of the students that made calls last year are now friends/very close with the appli cants that they called that are now in the M1 class!”

Isela Melendez-Carpio, director of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) at the Georgetown Univer sity School of Medicine said the DEI office is excited to collaborate with LMSA throughout Hispanic Heritage Month.

“The momentum has grown over the past few years, a huge testament to our Latinx students for paving the way for future gen erations,” Melendez-Carpio wrote to The Hoya. “This year’s program ming reflects their excellence and urgency for bringing some of the most complex issues impacting the Latinx community.”

Through its Hispanic Heritage Month programming, Pujol said LSMA strives to encourage greater diversity in the future of the medi cal field by working to recognize and appreciate marginalized iden tities like Latinx physicians.

“As LMSA and as future Latine doctors, we feel it is important to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month to honor the richness of our cultures and to bring atten tion to help address the crucial needs in our community, includ ing Latine representation in medi cine,” Pujol wrote.

New Restaurants, Shops to Open At The Wharf in Coming Weeks

Representative Introduces Legislation To Establish LGBTQ+ History Museum

Rajaa Bint Talal Special to The Hoya

The Wharf will open new restaurants, office spaces, parks and luxury apartments as its second phase of develop ment nears completion.

The Wharf, a popular out door development in southwest Washington, D.C., is home to a number of restaurants, hotels, shops and apartment complexes. While The Wharf opened in 2017, its development was split into two phases. Phase 2 will com plete the remaining 1.25 million square feet of the development with the addition of new restau rants, office spaces, parks and luxury apartments, and expects these renovations to be complete by the end of the year.

A public celebration of the opening is planned to take place on the five-year anniversary of The Wharf’s opening Oct. 12, al though some Phase 2 locations will not open until renovations are completed.

The $3.6 billion expansion includes seven new restaurants that are set to open, including Gordon Ramsay Hell’s Kitchen, Kinfolk Southern Kitchen, Milk & Honey and Slice of Matchbox.

The Pendry Hotel, a luxury boutique hotel, will begin ac cepting guests Nov. 1. Along with the hotel, 255 apartments and 96 condominiums will also be add ed, bringing a fresh real estate market to The Wharf. Luxury apartment complex The Tides is open and has allowed residents to begin leasing.

marketing and communica tions manager for the District Wharf Community Association, said she is excited about the new recreational and cultural engagement opportunities that the expansion will bring.

“This is the completion of The Wharf that was always en visioned from the beginning,” Keleti wrote to The Hoya Georgetown University McDonough School of Busi ness (MSB) associate professor Christie Nordhielm said the expansion and opening of new locations in Phase 2 will likely expand the commercial suc cess of The Wharf.

“There is massive expansion down here right now, a com mercial expansion,” Nordhielm said to The Hoya. “The expansion thus far has been successful, so the only reason that any decentthinking business person will make an investment like that is because they believe that there is a potential profit in it.”

According to Keleti, The Wharf has seen a surge in business in the past few months as District officials have eliminated COV ID-19-related restrictions.

“The Wharf has been a place for years where local businesses have flourished,” Keleti wrote. “During the past 6 months, at least a quarter of The Wharf’s retail ten ants have repeatedly reported some of the strongest month ly sales ever, and The Anthem has sold over 19% more tickets between January and August of 2022 than they did during the same pre-pandemic pe

riod in 2019.”

The Wharf estimates that 12 to 15 million people visit its lo cation each year. Keleti said she hopes the new waterfront addi tions will further connect The Wharf to its local community.

“The Wharf as a whole has really connected DC back to its waterfront, and this Fall that is further highlighted by offering a full mile of waterfront experi ences from the Fish Market to Fort McNair,” Keleti wrote.

Nordhielm said she hopes the expansion will positively impact economic opportu nities in the neighborhood around The Wharf.

“For D.C., the trick economi cally is to bring in people from outside of D.C.,” Nordhielm said. “We have a fixed amount of people here in this area, so anything that attracts people from the DMV, the greater DMV, and of course nationally or even internationally, is what’s really going to benefit D.C.”

Keleti said she believes Phase 2 will serve as a positive contribution to the vibrant culture that is already promi nent in the District.

“DC is such a fun and dy namic city with something for everyone, and The Wharf is add ing to that energy in really excit ing new ways,” Keleti wrote. “We hope that another half-mile will continue to offer new reasons for Washingtonians to keep coming back to The Wharf and enjoying what has made it a beloved neighborhood and des tination in the District since it opened in 2017.”

Hayley Young Special to The Hoya

A U.S. congressman intro duced two bills to establish an LGBTQ+ history and culture museum in Washington, D.C.

Wisconsin Representative Mark Pocan (D), who is openly gay and serves as a co-chair of the Congressional LGBTQ+ Equality Caucus, introduced the bills Sept. 29, two days be fore the start of LGBTQ+ His tory Month. The first bill would organize an eight-member commission in the House of Representatives to investigate the feasibility of a National Museum of American LGBTQ+ History and Culture and sub mit a plan for its construction and maintenance to Congress within the next 18 months. The second bill would officially es tablish the museum within the Smithsonian Institution. Both bills must be signed into law to create the museum, which is likely to take multiple congres sional sessions.

In a press release, Pocan said establishing a national LGBTQ+ museum to honor and remember the commu nity’s history is essential in today’s political climate.

“It is vital to remember our collective past — particularly when certain states seek to con strain and repeal existing rights by passing bills that harm LG BTQ+ youth and our commu nity at large,” the press release read. “Let’s tell these stories, and honor the many contribu tions the LGBTQ+ community has made to this nation with a museum in Washington, D.C.”

The bills come on the heels of a record number of state leg

islatures passing anti-LGBTQ+ measures in 2021, according to tracking and analysis by the Hu man Rights Campaign. Pocan said because of the rise in antiLGBTQ+ sentiment, it is essen tial to establish institutions that safeguard against attacks on the LGBTQ+ community.

“As our community faces unprecedented attacks and at tempts to erase our history, we must preserve and protect our stories for future generations,” Pocan said in the press release.

April Sizemore-Barber, a professor in the women’s and gender studies program at Georgetown University, said the museum would be a pow erful show of national support for LGBTQ+ history as part of American history.

“Whether or not it passes, I think, symbolically, it is neces sary that the government or government representatives respond to make visible these histories and affirm them,” Sizemore-Barber told The Hoya

If the bill does not pass by the end of the current session of Congress, a spokesperson for Pocan told Washingtonian he will reintroduce it in the next session. 50 members of Congress, in addition to all nine openly LGBTQ+ repre sentatives, originally cospon sored the bills. All of the co sponsors are members of the Democratic Party.

Matt Shinnick (COL ’25), who serves as director of so cial affairs for GU Pride, said it is important to explore different voices within the LGBTQ+ community while highlighting different as pects of queer culture.

“It would also be great to see

an emphasis on the continuing fight for equality many queer people still endure, especially the specific struggles that many LGBTQ+ people of color face, since that’s often overlooked,” Shinnick wrote to The Hoya According to Sizemore-Barber, the museum should also focus on the intersectionality of queerness and its links to other identities.

“If you have a singular kind of gay narrative, there is a danger of erasing, of erasure,” SizemoreBarber said. “Bring in voices. Bring in art. I think that a good museum would look and inter rogate the idea of these catego ries themselves or historicize them. Like what does it mean when we say ‘gay history?’”

This LGBTQ+ history mu seum would join the National Museum of the American Lati no and the American Women’s History Museum as the newest additions to the Smithsonian Institution, which were ap proved by Congress in 2020 and are estimated to be completed within the next 10 years.

Shinnick said it is important to see increased representation in various communities’ histo ries and honor them through museums in the District.

“With Women’s history and Latino history museums on the way, it is clear that there’s a strong movement for diversity, and it would be amazing to see queer history be represented,” Shinnick wrote. “D.C. has so many great museums that edu cate on a diverse array of differ ent topics. However, there has been very little focus on queer history or culture. Having a mu seum specifically dedicated to it, rather than just temporary exhibits, would be wonderful.”

Asbestos Discovered in Reiss, Removal Process Underway

Brian Li Special to The Hoya

Reiss Science Building will undergo an asbestos abatement process set to end in November following the discovery of asbestos on the fourth floor of the building.

Materials containing asbes tos were detected by Georgetown University maintenance staff, along with the Capital Projects team, a department within Planning and Facilities Man agement that focuses on the planning, designing and con struction of Georgetown’s built environment, during prepara tions for an upcoming renova tion project in the building.

Upon discovering the asbestos, the university subcontracted a licensed asbestos abatement firm to remove the material. The work area will span approximately 4,300 square feet and will be cov ered to avoid spreading asbestos fibers throughout the rest of the building. As required by Washing ton, D.C. municipal regulations, the university placed posters in the building on Sept. 30, at least 30 days prior to the scheduling of the asbestos removal.

Asbestos, a naturally occur ring mineral, was commonly used in construction during the 20th century in insulation, floor tiles and vehicle brakes due to its resistance to heat and corrosion. Today, asbestos us age is highly regulated by health codes across the country.

Many people are exposed to asbestos through construc tion or demolition work that disturbs fibers, causing the ma terial to become airborne. Ac cumulation of asbestos in the body over a long period of time can cause serious health issues, including lung tissue scarring,

lung cancer and mesothelioma.

Angela van Doorn, a profes sor whose office is located on the fourth floor of the building, said that the flyers placed in the building were the only way that faculty members were notified of the presence of asbestos or the removal process.

“I only learned about the as bestos removal from the notifica tions posted throughout Reiss. As such I am unaware of the scope or the methods of the removal,” van Doorn wrote to The Hoya. “Just to be safe, I am not working from my office at this time.”

While van Doorn is choosing to work remotely, former Uni versity Registrar John Pierce (CAS ’72), whose office is also located on the fourth floor of Reiss, said he does not plan to change his working patterns.

“I haven’t made any changes to accommodate the work,” Pierce wrote to The Hoya. “I have no concerns. It seems to me that the project has been planned and handled well.”

The safety precautions taken during the asbestos removal will follow guidelines set by the Oc cupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), Environ mental Protection Agency (EPA) and the District, according to an email to community members from the Office of Planning and Facilities Management.

The university will take care ful steps to ensure the asbestos removal process is up to code and that community members are minimally exposed to as bestos, according to a univer sity spokesperson.

“Per asbestos-abatement regu lations and best practices, the entire work-space on the 4th floor will be tented during the asbestosabatement work,” the spokesper

son wrote to The Hoya. “Air quality is regularly monitored both inside the tented-work space and in ad jacent building spaces to ensure a safe environment, with reports provided to the DC Department of Energy and Environment.”

These precautions will en sure that normal workflow in Reiss will not be affected, the spokesperson said.

“The removal of asbestos-con taining materials (ACM) will take place within a secure and con tained area, and will not impact the operations or health of staff, students or faculty in the Reiss building,” the spokesperson wrote.

Georgetown’s asbestos policy requires all areas under renova tion to be reviewed for any toxic materials, such as asbestos, mercury or lead.

Edward Barrows, director of the Center for the Environment, said the current asbestos abatement process is not the first time this has occurred in Reiss.

“I really didn’t pay much at tention to asbestos removal in Reiss in the last 4 years,” Bar rows wrote to The Hoya. “I heard that the removal involved floor tiles, and that it was a low-risk removal. If the asbestos is ‘sta bilized’ and not in the air, I am not worried about it.”

Richard Squier, an associate professor in the computer sci ence department, said asbestos treatment has been common throughout his two decades working in Reiss.

“This started many years ago and has been ongoing from time to time,” Squier wrote. “I am glad to hear they are rehabbing some of the space in this building. There is a lot of unused space, and the more the space gets used, the more the maintenance will be paid attention to.”

@LGBTQEQCAUCUS/TWITTER

The bill, which was introduced by Mark Pocan (D-Wisc.), will create a commission to explore planning and fundraising methods for the proposed museum.

JOHN MATUSZWESKI/THE HOYA

The Wharf, which opened in 2017 in Southwest D.C., is set to conclude with Phase 2 of its planned renovations and additions by the end of next month.

Security Studies Professor Releases Book on Religious Terrorist Groups

Holly Delaney Special to The Hoya

A Georgetown University professor co-wrote a book on the different types of leaders who take over religious ter rorist groups and how these groups sustain themselves during transitions of power.

Elizabeth Grimm, a direc tor of teaching in Georgetown’s Center for Security Studies (CSS) and an undergraduate associate teaching professor in the Walsh School of Foreign Service, wrote “Terror in Tran sition: Leadership and Succes sion in Terrorist Organizations” alongside American University associate professor Tricia Ba con. In the book, which was published Sept. 13, Grimm and Bacon examine 33 terrorist groups including Sunni ex tremist group al-Qaeda in Iraq and the white nationalist Ku Klux Klan to analyze how ter rorist groups manage and adapt to major shifts in leadership.

Grimm said she and Bacon chose to research and write about leaders of religious ter rorist groups because of the fundamental role they play in influencing their followers.

“They often are imbued with a divine legitimacy in the eyes of their followers,” Grimm wrote to The Hoya. “Terrorist leaders are not just leaders of their or ganizations, but are perceived by the followers as religious or spiritual leaders as well.”

Grimm and Bacon identify five different types of leaders — caretakers, signalers, fixers, visionaries and figureheads — who differ in the degree to which they change their group’s ideology or operating tactics.

For example, caretakers make relatively minor changes to ei ther, while fixers conduct dras tic overhauls of both.

The book explains that coun terterrorism practitioners and other national security experts need to target terrorist groups from the top down in order to dismantle the whole organiza tion, according to Grimm.

“Founders play a critical role in establishing the how (tactics/resource mobilization) and the why (the framing) of terrorist organizations, which set a baseline from which successors execute either in cremental or discontinuous change,” Grimm wrote.

At a book talk hosted by the Center for Security Studies on Sept. 27, the authors presented to students about their work.

Gabrielle Ellicott (SFS ’25), who took “International Rela tions” with Grimm in Spring 2022 and attended the talk, said Grimm and Bacon’s book is groundbreaking in its approach.

“Being able to sit down and hear from Dr. Grimm and Dr. Bacon regarding their newest released book was fascinating to say the least,” Ellicott wrote to The Hoya. “They truly are the first in their field to write such an expansive and analytical work on terrorist leadership both past and present.”

When Grimm and Bacon began their research in 2018, they knew they wanted to ex amine leadership in terrorist groups. As they dug deeper, the direction of the book changed, Grimm said.

“Our initial interest was to examine terrorist leadership in between the large studies of effects of decapitation and

singular profiles of individual leaders,” Grimm wrote to The Hoya. “It then expanded when we began to observe the criti cal role that terrorist founders play in their organizations, but that this role had not been sig nificantly explored.”

Grimm’s book fills a gap in the scholarship on terrorist or ganizations, given the current lack of research that compares the types of leaders across groups, according to a review written by Brian Phillips in Small Wars Journal.

“Most studies of leader ship decapitation have ei ther been case studies of sin gle groups, or quantitative global studies of hundreds of groups,” Phillips wrote in the review. “More generally, the terrorism literature has insufficiently analyzed in dividual leaders of militant organizations — in spite of their obvious importance, and regardless of whether they were killed. To address these issues, Terror in Tran sition makes a highly valu able contribution to the study of leadership of terror ist organizations.”

Grimm and Bacon’s work is transforming the knowledge educators and students have about the nature of leadership within terrorist organizations, according to Ellicott.

“I had no idea what an im pact the founders of these terrorists organizations would have on their ultimate actions and timelines,” Elli cott wrote. “I’m so grateful to learn from Dr. Grimm and Dr. Bacon and cannot wait to see where their research takes them next. ”

DC Hosts 12th Annual Art All Night Weekend to Celebrate Local Artists

engagement with local arts.

Madhura Shembekar Special to The Hoya

Washington, D.C. hosted its 12th annual D.C. Art All Night celebration September 23rd and 24th.

The festival, hosted by the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities and the De partment of Small and Local Business Development, and led by D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) spanned all eight wards of the District and invited residents from 22 neighborhoods to par ticipate in local festivities.

According to the Art All Night press release, the event is meant to celebrate many differ ent artistic mediums.

“Art All Night 2022 is a chance for the city to celebrate the perform ing and visual arts. September 23 and 24, D.C. will be the center stage showcasing our city’s talent diver sity,” the press release reads. “The event highlights the intersection of art and business throughout our commercial corridors, placing art ists on the center stage.”

Art All Night, founded in 2011 by local nonprofit Shaw Main Streets and inspired by Nuit Blanche, is a two-day nighttime arts festival held annually in D.C. At its incep tion, Art All Night drew 30,000 at tendees. Last year, it attracted over 120,000 residents and visitors.

Megan Lu (COL ’26), who at tended the event, said it was an exciting experience.

“When I heard about it, I thought it was a really cool con cept that they would open all of these art spaces for students to explore because it’s not some thing that people have a lot of

opportunities to explore in high school, so it’s really cool that they’re doing it as a town and school thing,” Lu said.

According to the Art All Night press release, the festi val hopes to revitalize cultural engagement in the District to pre-pandemic levels.

“This year’s message is simple: D.C. is open after a challenging two years during the height of CO VID-19,” the press release reads.

“This District-wide festival en courages residents to get excited about being back outside to enjoy the District of Columbia they know while allowing new discov eries to be made in every ward.”

Bowser, who presented the fes tival last week, remains excited about the future of arts in D.C. and stated that Washington, D.C. is the “capital of creativity.”

“Artists and makers across D.C. help us celebrate the history and culture of our community, and this weekend, we celebrate and honor them,” Bowser said in a press release. “When we support our creatives and their businesses, we support the type of growth and innovation that help our cor ridors, neighborhoods, communi ties, and residents thrive.”

Georgetown University par ticipated in the festivities as well, featuring collaborations with lo cal small businesses, art galleries and musical performers aiming to revitalize Georgetown’s local arts and cultural scene.

Al Miner, founding director and chief curator of the George town University Art Galleries and associate professor at the university, said he was delighted to see the increased community

“As Director & Curator of the Galleries one of my tasks is to en gage our local audience, George town neighborhood residents,” Miner wrote to The Hoya. “I’m a member of a group called The Georgetown Creatives, which brings together neighborhood art-related business owners and key stakeholders. We’re trying to reinvigorate the neighborhood and make it a destination for all Washington residents.”

The university is new to this initiative, and it is only the first year that Georgetown University Art Galleries have participated in Art All Night, according to Miner.

“This was the first time our Gal leries have stayed open so late, but it won’t be the last,” Miner wrote. “We did have a robust attendance for our Friday September 23rd Gal leries reception, which implies our participation may have increased total attendance.”

Miner heads the Maria & Al berto de la Cruz Gallery, which held a special artist-led tour on Friday for Georgetown stu dents, as well as an evening re ception with a live performance inspired by the artist’s work.

When asked what his message about Art All Night would be to fellow Hoyas, Miner said students should look in their own backyard for arts, culture and entertainment.

“We have great things to do right in our own backyard. You don’t always need to go to The Mall to see interesting art, you don’t have to go to Adam’s Morgan or Logan Circle for fun,” Miner wrote. “Give Art All Night a try, you might discover spaces and meet people you wouldn’t otherwise.”

Medical Students Lead Training On Opioid Overdose Interventions

Nina Raj Graduate Desk Editor

Georgetown University School of Medicine students led a train ing for congressional staffers on Capitol Hill about the signs of opi oid overdoses and ways to safely intervene through the Hoya Drug Overdose Prevention & Education (DOPE) Project.

The training for congressional staffers took place Sept. 28 and was led by members of the Hoya DOPE team in conjunction with the Bipartisan Addiction and Mental Health Task Force, rep resented by U.S. Representatives David Trone (D-Md), Annie Kuster (D-NH) and Paul Tonko (D-NY), as well as National Drug Con trol Policy Director Rahul Gupta. Leaders of the training instructed participants on how to recognize the signs of opioid overdoses and how to intervene with lifesaving overdose antidote naloxone.

The students that comprise the Hoya DOPE team engage in train ing various groups on lifesaving treatments for reversing opioid overdoses. 93,000 people died from opioid overdoses in 2020, setting a new record high, accord ing to a 2022 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report. This year, the CDC has al ready recorded over 100,000 opi oid related deaths.

In addition to the training given to congressional staffers, DOPE educates future physi cians on how to best treat opioid use disorders and to improve pa tient care in the District, accord ing to Kira Chandran (MED ’23), a member of DOPE.

“We believe that community access to naloxone and overdose education are important parts of reducing opioid-related morbid ity and mortality in DC,” Chan dran wrote to The Hoya. “There are many people who have put a lot of work into reducing opioidrelated deaths in DC, and we hope that our small contribution helps

make DC a healthier community.”

As they enter clinical rota tions during their medical school training, Chandran said members of DOPE have person ally witnessed the impact of opi oid overdoses on D.C. residents.

“In addition to our experiences in the hospital and outpatient clinics, we were first responders to an opioid overdose last year on a side-walk in Ward 5 of DC,” Chandran wrote. “We had nalox one with us and we were able to reverse the overdose before EMTs arrived on the scene.”

DOPE was able to respond to the emergency because they are trained to recognize signs of over dose and because they carry nal oxone on them, Chandran said.

Regina LaBelle, director of the Addiction and Public Policy Ini tiative at the O’Neill Institute, a research institute within the Georgetown University Law Cen ter (GULC) focusing on national and global health law, said distrib uting and raising awareness for opioid treatment is particularly essential in the District.

“Given the high rate of over dose deaths in DC, it’s impor tant that we all do our part to address this important issue,” LaBelle wrote to The Hoya. “The mission of our initiative is to ad vance evidence based policies to reduce overdose deaths and im prove outcomes for people with substance use disorder.”

The opioid epidemic in D.C. has worsened in recent years, especial ly because of increased feelings of alienation due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Lawrence Gostin, faculty director of the O’Neill Institute.

“The O’Neill Institute believes that opioid and other drug de pendencies are among the most urgent public health crises facing America. The suffering, loss, and death has only escalated during the COVID pandemic, when so many people felt alone and iso lated,” Gostin wrote to The Hoya

“And yet this is largely a prevent able problem.”

Gostin said despite an increase in overdose related deaths, it is pos sible to avoid opioid overdoses with the right health policy measures.

“We can dramatically reduce opioid use and overdose with evidence-based solutions,” Gostin wrote. “It is our job as a Georgetown University insti tute to use our skills in law, pol icy, and research to make a dif ference in the lives of so many American families.”

As part of its mission to ad dress the District’s opioid crisis, the O’Neill Institute is advocat ing for legislative change that supports the direct efforts of organizations like Hoya DOPE, according to LaBelle.

“We’ve worked to encourage law enforcement in DC to carry naloxone; drafted model legisla tion which is currently before the DC City Council that will make certain that the proceeds of litiga tion brought against the opioid industry is used appropriately and expands access to evidence based policies; and removing legal and regulatory barriers that stand in the way of getting care to people in need,” LaBelle wrote.

The new legislation responds to the District’s past misspend ing of federal funds for naloxone distribution and harm reduc tion services. According to a 2018 Washington Post investigation, D.C.’s initiative provided naloxone kits at rates three to four times lower than peer cities with similar opioid problems.

As a part of the D.C. community, Georgetown holds an obligation to support the District in fighting the opioid crisis, Gostin said.

“The key points are that opioid use and overdose is among the most pressing health issues in America, but that there are clear policy steps we can take to save lives and reduce suffering among individuals, families, and com munities,” Gostin wrote.

ART ALL NIGHT

Washington, D.C., hosted its annual Art All Night festival Sept. 23 and 24, with events spanning across all eight wards, including festivities in Georgetown.

Hoyas Fall to High-Powered Fordham Despite Hot Start

Hunter Kates Hoya Staff Writer

On Oct. 1, despite posting its second-highest point to tal of the season, Georgetown football could not contain Fordham’s high-powered of fense as the Hoyas lost to the Rams, 38-59.

Georgetown (1-4, 0-2 Patriot League) charged out of the gates to start the game, as senior quar terback Pierce Holley threw for 3 touchdowns on each of the Hoyas’ first three drives. On the defensive side, sophomore de fensive lineman VeRon Garri son scooped up a fumble at the line of scrimmage, and the first quarter ended with the Hoyas taking a commanding 21-7 lead.

The Fordham Rams’ (4-1, 1-0 Patriot League) offense responded quickly, scoring 28 unanswered points on the back of quarterback Tim DeMorat’s 3 second-quarter touchdown passes. The Rams took the lead and never looked back, exploiting consistent gaps in the secondary en route to a 59-38 victory.

Fordham came into the con test fresh off an impressive of fensive performance against Ohio University on Sept. 24, a game in which DeMorat threw for over 500 yards and Rams receiver Fotis Kokosioulis re corded 318 receiving yards, a Patriot League record, along with 4 touchdowns. George town knew they would have to score early and often to keep up with Fordham’s prolific offense and relied heavily on graduate receiver Joshua Tomas to keep them in the game early.

Graduate running back Her man Moultrie III fueled the Hoyas’ hot start, catching 2 touchdowns out of the back field in the first quarter, in cluding a 42-yard score to put Georgetown up 14-7. Holley also had the deep ball working early, converting several third-and-

long throws to Tomas, includ ing a 37-yard reception on the Hoyas’ second scoring drive.

Fordham’s backfield duo of running backs Trey Sneed and Julius Loughridge led their dominant second quarter, end ing the game with 120 and 104 rushing yards, respectively. The air attack heated up as well, with senior receivers Jeff Cic cio, Dequece Carter and Koko sioulis all catching touchdown passses and carrying the Rams to a 35-21 halftime lead.

The second half began the same way the first half ended, with Sneed finding the end zone from five yards out to put Fordham up by 21 heading into the fourth quarter. George town attempted to mount a comeback, as Holley connected with Tomas for a 16-yard score on the first drive of the fourth quarter to cut the deficit to 14, with a score of 31-45. Eventually the Rams’ offense proved too much, as DeMorat and Sneed both had rushing scores in the fourth quarter.

Holley finished the game with 322 yards, 4 touchdowns and 1 interception, while his top receiver Tomas had 10 re ceptions for 129 yards and 2 scores. With his impressive outing, Tomas eclipsed the 2000-yard mark in his career on the Hilltop.

For the Rams, DeMorat threw for 348 yards and 4 TDs, while Sneed and Loughridge combined for 3 scores and over 250 yards from scrimmage. Fordham wide receiver MJ Wright led the Rams’ receivers with seven grabs for 120 yards.

Notwithstanding the result, Moultrie said he was proud of his team’s offensive output against the Rams.

“We did not get the result we wanted but I think we did some good things on offense and as a whole,” Moultrie told The Hoya. Moultrie, who had 97 total yards and 2 receiving touch downs, said Hoyas offensive co ordinator Rob Spence played an important role in his success.

“Coach Spence put me in good positions to be successful and Pierce Holley put the ball on me in space allowing me to do what I do best,” Moultrie said. “This team has a lot of tal ent and fight and we will con tinue to battle each and every Saturday for the remainder of the season.”

The Hoyas will look to build on their strong offensive show ing next week when the Penn Quakers (3-0, 1-0 Ivy League) come to Cooper Field on Oct. 8 for Georgetown’s Homecom ing game. Penn is fresh off a double-overtime road win over Dartmouth on Sept. 30.

U.S. Soccer, in its Latest Hypocrisy, Ignores Spanish Whistleblowing

Carrie McDonald and Maisy Liles

Writer

CW: This article directly references abuse. Please refer to this article on thehoya.com for on- and off-campus resources.

Having earned a spot in the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup, the Spain women’s national soccer team should be book ing plane tickets to Australia and preparing for its upcoming friendlies. However, in a move that could certainly jeopardize La Roja’s title chances, 15 of Spain’s top national team players sent emails to the Royal Spanish Foot ball Federation (RFEF) on Sept. 22, expressing their intention to go on strike until working conditions improve.

In their emails, the players blasted the toxic environment Head Coach Jorge Vilda has fostered for not only leading to disappointing match results but also detrimentally affecting their “emotional state” and “health.”

The unified effort came just weeks after a number of senior players met with RFEF president Luis Rubiales to air their con cerns over Vilda’s coaching style.

In response, the RFEF issued a statement threatening to sus pend the women for up to five years, calling into question the players’ “dignity” by stating they must “accept their mistakes and seek forgiveness” before return ing to the national team.

This is not the first time the Spanish players have had to take matters into their own hands.

After a poor showing at the 2015 Women’s World Cup, the entire Spanish roster led a charge to oust then-Head Coach Ignacio Quere da. The athletes alleged that Que reda fomented a culture of fear, bigotry and intimidation during his 27-year tenure as head coach.

Even though Quereda’s con tract was rightfully terminated, at least one whistleblower faced di

rect retaliation. Then-captain Ve ronica Boquete, who helped lead the movement against Quereda, was omitted from the national roster following his dismissal and never reinstated.

Despite the need for a prop er investigation into the allega tions levied against Vilda, the United States has remained si lent about the situation ahead of their matchup against La Roja on Oct. 11. And in this situation, silence can easily be interpreted as indifference toward the rights of Spanish soccer players.

While U.S. Soccer has ignored the Spanish players, several Amer ican players, such as forward Alex Morgan, have spoken out on their personal social media denounc ing the RFEF’s response.

“The federation is throwing their players under the bus for players asking for better protec tion, treatment, and profession alism,” Morgan wrote in a tweet.

While individual players have expressed support, U.S. Soccer continues to hold its cards close to its chest. The federation main tains that it is “monitoring the situation” but remains opaque regarding plans for navigating the Spanish shakeup.

Even worse is the fact that U.S. Soccer’s silence on this is sue was completely expected, given its own history of a toxic and harmful culture.

On Oct. 3, an investigation by former Attorney General Sally Yates and the King & Spalding law firm concluded with a report of the systemic abusive behav ior and sexual misconduct in the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL).

“Our investigation has revealed a league in which abuse and mis conduct — verbal and emotional abuse and sexual misconduct — had become systemic, span ning multiple teams, coaches, and victims,” the executive sum mary of the report reads. “Abuse in the NWSL is rooted in a deeper culture in women’s soccer, begin

ning in youth leagues, that nor malizes verbally abusive coaching and blurs boundaries between coaches and players.”

As the federation brands itself as the paragon of gender equality with the historic Col lective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) that guaranteed equal pay, working conditions and prize money for the U.S. men’s and women’s teams, don’t be fooled into thinking the moral compass of U.S Soccer spear headed the deal.

The USWNT had to win four World Cups, file multiple gen der discrimination lawsuits, earn more money than the men’s team for the federation and endure years of misogynis tic harrassment before U.S. Soc cer was even willing to come to the negotiating table.

If U.S. Soccer cared about athletes’ rights and safety and championing gender equality abroad, it would postpone the match against Spain at least until the RFEF resolves its internal dispute. It would stand in solidar ity with the Spanish players, who are risking their entire careers to demand a safe working environment.

This season was supposed to be one of reckoning. It seemed like women’s soccer was finally taking a step forward as the NWSL sacked personnel who enabled and reinforced abusive cultures. However, their silence in this crucial moment speaks as loud as those actions.

At the very least, U.S. Soccer should release a statement acknowledging the women’s concerns, which would help to normalize whistleblowing in abusive environments and signal it has learned some thing from past failures.

American neutrality does noth ing but patronize the Spaniards for speaking out, but what do we expect from a federation that con stantly refuses to protect its own players from abuse?

Georgetown Cricket Looks Ahead to First Regional Match

Julia Cannamela Hoya Staff Writer

After playing only one official game in program history last spring, the Georgetown club cricket team will play at a re gional cricket tournament for the first time.

The Hoyas will face George Washington University, the Uni versity of Maryland and Drexel University during the initial stage of the tournament from Oct. 7-9. If they do well enough in this group, they will get the chance to advance and play up to two more games to become regional champions.

Matthew Turner (SFS ’23), president of the cricket club, told The Hoya he has high hopes for the team’s prospects at the tournament.

“We’ve got a combination of some pretty good talent, with around 30 people on our match squad and we take about 12 to each game,” Turner said. “We are relatively confident. I know that George Washington University had a team for a while, but we have some alumni who are going to come and support us. We’re go ing to find out how good we are very quickly, but I hope we make it at least to the semifinal.”

Although this tournament sig nifies many firsts for the cricket team, Turner says the legacy of cricket at Georgetown goes far back into the school’s history, as there was once a club in 1861.

There was a semi-formal club that continued until the begin ning of the COVID-19 pandemic, but the team never played games

against other schools. After the pandemic, several students start ed the club again in Fall 2021, and soon had their first official match – and victory – in the spring against American University.

In addition, Turner said Georgetown’s position in the na tion’s capital and the large popu lation of international students on the team have helped foster a community of students who share a love for the game.

“We get this combination of a lot of people from all over the world who have played cricket be fore. From our most recent count, we have 13 different nationalities in the club,” Turner said.

“On top of that we have a lot of internationally-minded people at Georgetown who just want to learn about cricket or might have played some baseball and pick it up and this will be their first crick et match ever. It’s a real mix of peo ple which is what I love about it.”

The cricket club, however, is about more than just the competition. The club focuses on building a diverse commu nity where people of all back grounds can meet each other and become friends.

Vishwas Wadhwa (NHS ’23), vice captain of the club, told The Hoya he experienced this sense of community last year when the team was reformed.

“We like to have fun both on and off the field,” Wad hwa said. “Oftentimes a lot of players only might have one thing in common, which is cricket, but I met some of my best friends through the team last semester.”

Despite widespread interest in the club, with around 50 peo ple attending a team barbeque earlier in the fall and 140 mem bers in the team GroupMe, the team is still struggling to sched ule official practices and games on campus.

“We’ve also been trying to play on Cooper Field and Kehoe Field, but I think misunderstandings about cricket have been coming into play that have made it very difficult to get us face time with Georgetown Athletics so we can explain how it works and how we could adapt it to make it safe on Cooper,” Turner said.

The team had an exciting event planned for this fall: a game against the British embassy, in which the Dean of the SFS Joel Hellman was supposed to par ticipate. However, even though the high-profile game was sched uled, the game fell through at the last minute because the team was unable to secure access to Cooper Field.

Still, the team plans to play more games in the spring semes ter, and remains hopeful about possibly rescheduling the British embassy game.

Turner said the team is open to new members joining and takes pride in uphold ing a more than 150-year-old Georgetown tradition.

“Cricket goes back so far. The washing machine, gasolinepowered cars — Georgetown cricket is older than all of these things,” said Turner. “We are al ways looking for new members who want to come out and learn about cricket.”

ROUNDING THE DIAMOND

MLB Players Association Finally Recognizes its Minor Leaguers

While the MLB’s announce ment that minor leaguers will now be represented by the Ma jor League Baseball Players As sociation (MLBPA) may sound inconsequential, the inclu sion of minor leagues into the league’s trade union is a major victory for MiLB advocates and will play an important factor in the future of MLB.

When we think of minor leaguers, we often think of the former first round draft selec tions and top international signings — most of whom have received large signing bonuses and are financially set. But the rest of the other minor leaguers — who comprise the majority of a team’s farm system — are not.

For most of MLB’s history, mi nor leaguers have been treated like second-class players, mak ing barely enough to scrape by. Remember, the players for whom people have advocated and whom the union will di rectly address in bargaining and are not the all-star shortstops who demand nine-digit con tracts.

They are, rather, mostly late-round draft selections and fringe international prospects.

The minor leagues are so vast — with nearly 5,500 roster players overall — that many of its players are often forgot ten in the cracks. The majority of minor leaguers are paid low wages, even below minimum

wage, which is especially de manding on the players when they are expected to devote their time off the field to improving their baseball skills. While there have been some improvements as just last year MLB owners pledged to provide housing for road and home games for its mi nor league players, many players continue to struggle financially.

Now, though, formal par ticipation of minor leaguers in the MLBPA should lead to even higher salaries and ben efits for these players, who make up a crucial part of base ball in America.

According to ESPN, most mi nor league players earn between $400 and $700 a week, averag ing out to around $12,000 per season. With domestic team rosters of 180 players, increasing salaries by three times would incur a $4.32 million annual charge for each MLB team.

From the owners’ per spective, this is $4.32 mil lion invested into potential talent which may never pay off. However, I believe own ers will receive a higher re turn on their investment because they will create a new, higher standard of liv ing for their players. In a world where minor leaguers are well-nourished, don’t have to worry about shelter and won’t have to pick up a second job to survive, they can worry about speeding up their swing path and op timizing the spin rates on their breaking balls.

Tony Clark, the executive director of the MLBPA, said he

welcomes the inclusion of mi nor leaguers in the union.

“This historic achievement re quired the right group of players at the right moment to succeed,” Clark wrote in a statement. “Mi nor Leaguers have courageously seized that moment, and we look forward to improving their terms and conditions of employ ment through the process of good faith collective bargaining.”

Although union dues will cost money for the minor leaguers, they will most certainly not be the $85 daily cost expected of ma jor leaguers. Since they will likely be a fraction of that cost, their inclusion in the MLBPA will ulti mately lead to more revenue gen eration through higher stadium and television viewership for mi nor league teams that will offset the added expenditures.

Hopefully this step will help generate some more excitement for MLB’s young prospect stars, whom the league has consis tently failed since its creation. Just imagine a world in which Francisco Álvarez gets the Sa quon Barkley treatment. This would, of course, imply that the Binghamton Rumble Ponies could generate a comparable amount of attention to Penn State football, but I digress.

Ultimately, I believe the MLBPA will be a net positive for minor leaguers — especially those who are not name brands.

And I think the fact that minor leaguers themselves approved the measure to unionize only further validates this point. It’s about time the MLB recognizes the union rights of minor league players too.

GUHOYAS

Georgetown football stumbled to a 38-59 loss to Fordham despite starting with a commanding lead.

@GUCRICKET/INSTAGRAM

The Georgetown club cricket team will march into its first regional tournament in team history with high hopes, fueled by optimism surrounding the team’s identity.

Eli Blumenfeld Columnist

GUHOYAS

Georgetown Keeps Rolling, Remains Undefeated in Big East Conference

DEPAUL, from A12 to notch her fifth clean sheet of the campaign.

At the beginning of the season, Coach Nolan said that the coaching staff was assembling a new team following key departures from last year.

Nolan said the roster is deeper than in years prior, which has helped the team deal with adversity and prevail in close games.

“We do have a deep enough bench this year,” Nolan said. “We do have the ability to show up in pretty much every position and we are probably deeper than we’ve been in other years.”

In addition to defensive shakeups, the staff’s emphasis on setpieces directly impacted this game.

Although the Hoyas were more dominant in the first half than in the second, Georgetown ultimately scored off of a set piece in the second half, Nolan said.

The score by Leas off of the corner kick was her first of the season. These set pieces, though often monotonous to practice, give players a chance to win the game, Nolan said.

After scoring in the 79th minute, the Hoyas controlled

possession for the remaining 11 minutes to secure the 1-0 victory.

The Hoyas will hope to continue their Big East winning streak at home Oct. 6, when they return to Shaw Field against Xavier (10-2-1, 4-0-0 Big East).

Georgetown will look to secure its spot atop the Big East as it plays the only other undefeated conference team.

The Musketeers have been on a six-game winning streak following two key losses to the now-No. 6 Northwestern Wildcats and then-No. 15 St. Louis Billikens in early September, and they will hope to secure their first win against a ranked team at Shaw Field.

Georgetown narrowly defeated Xavier last season in a 2-1 overtime victory.

Nolan said the Musketeers are a tough conference competitor with a physical approach.

“We’re expecting a very tough game,” Nolan said. “It’s kind of sad that you’ve got the two top teams playing so early in the season, but it’ll be a good game. I’m sure the Xavier kids will be excited for it because I know our kids are, too.”

The game will kick off at 3 p.m. Oct. 6 and will be streamed online via FloSports.

The NBA Must Embrace Expansion

BRENNAN, from A12 and foreign leagues can more than hold their own against NBA talent, and with additional teams, they will get the opportunity to be on rosters permanently.

Based on historical precedent, the league is overdue for new teams. The last time it added a team was in 2004, when the Charlotte Bobcats — today’s Charlotte Hornets — joined the league. Before the current stretch, the league had never gone longer than nine seasons without adding new teams; every time there was such high saturation of talent, the NBA realized and adapted.

There has already been speculation about how these proposed additions could take place. The most likely expansion teams would be based in Seattle and Las Vegas. Seattle never deserved to lose their team in the first place; the city has always loved basketball, and a large contingent of SuperSonics fans still exists. It’s a no brainer.

As for the second team, Las Vegas makes the most sense. In the past five years, the NHL and NFL have expanded into Vegas, and the NBA would be wise to follow. The league already organizes

MEN’S SOCCER

the Summer League there every year, and it is a market that the NBA would greatly benefit from tapping into.

The only problem with adding these two cities is that it would create an imbalance of 17 teams in the Western Conference compared to 15 in the Eastern Conference, but there’s an easy fix to this as well. Moving any one of the

Minnesota Timberwolves, Memphis Grizzlies or New Orleans Pelicans to the East to balance the league would make sense geographically while ensuring 16 teams in each conference.

Expansion would be a boon for the NBA in fandom, revenue and most importantly basketball product. More teams and

players in the league means more competitive matchups, more difficult team-building and new rivalries. Expansion is an inevitability. The NBA should do it sooner rather than later.

Tim Brennan is a junior in the MSB. Around the Association appears online and in print every two weeks.

Hoyas’ Composure Leads to Tough Win

BOWLING GREEN, from A12 up 1-0 and increasing his sea son goal tally to 3. With a Bowling Green free kick from outside the box sailing over the crossbar right before the fi nal whistle, the Hoyas avoided a last-minute equalizer and se cured their victory.

Tabora emphasized the reasons for the Hoyas getting this impor tant team win.

“Bowling Green was defi

nitely a quality opponent that posed a lot of danger during the game,” Tabora said in an interview with The Hoya. “As a team, we are always focused on trying to get the details right. By doing that, it allowed us to fight out a gritty win against a good team despite bad conditions.”

While the defense had an outstanding performance in preventing a quality Bowl ing Green side from scoring,

Schewe achieved his first clean sheet of the season. Panayotou was able to increase his goal tally on the season to 3 off of a Tabora assist.

Battling the inclement weather to watch the game, fan James Iaropoli (COL ’26) said he is excited to continue watch ing Georgetown men’s soccer games as the season progresses.

“I love seeing these guys play and carry on the great legacy of Georgetown soccer,” Iaropoli

told The Hoya. “I’m looking for ward to the rest of the home games and hope we can make it to the postseason.”

Georgetown will look to carry this momentum forward as it faces tough Big East opponent Butler (6-2-1, 2-0-1 Big East) at the Bud and Jackie Sellick Bowl on Oct. 5. Butler is fresh off a 3-1 win over Marquette (4-5-1, 0-1-1 Big East) on Sept. 30. Kickoff is sched uled for 7 p.m., and the game will be broadcasted on FloSports.

GU Football Fights Mental Health Stigma

FOOTBALL, from A12 advocate, and eliminate the stigma associated with mental illness,” according to the H3H website.

Kym Hilinski said since Tyler’s death, the foundation has visited countless college campuses to advocate for mental health awareness.

“We have spoken on dozens of campuses to help encourage these conversations and share Tyler’s story,” Hilinski said in an interview with The Hoya. “We miss Tyler every day, but we are grateful to know that what we are doing is making a difference and that he would be proud of us.”

In 2021, the Hilinskis visited Georgetown’s campus to organize weeklong activities with the players and Dr. Erica Force, head of Georgetown’s Athletic Counseling Services and a licensed clinical and sport psychologist.

This year, Georgetown coaches

and players will wear the Hilinski’s Hope logo, a green ribbon with Tyler’s number 3, on their helmets and whistles. The athletic department has also worn green all week in support, but Sgarlata has a different favorite relic.

Sgarlata said the Hilinski’s Hope wristband is the item that carries the most weight for him.

“I have a Hilinski’s Hope wristband on my wrist, and the big thing about that that nobody really realizes is the suicide prevention hotline is on the other side of the bracelet that they give out,” Sgarlata said. “I know there is a number of stories where that has come in extremely handy for people in critical cases.”

In pursuing this initiative, Kym and Mark Hilinski hope to save lives by promoting a broader discussion about mental health across all sports and offering better mental wellness programs for studentathletes, particularly for college football players like Tyler.

While the NCAA constitution

commands schools to promote an atmosphere that supports mental health by guaranteeing access to adequate resources and open dialogue, student-athletes have continued to express concerns.

In a survey conducted by the NCAA in 2021, only 48% of female and 46% of male student-athletes felt comfortable reaching out for mental health support on campus. In the same survey, when asked whether they thought their athletic departments prioritized student-athlete mental health, 55% of male and 47% of female student-athletes agreed or strongly agreed.

Kym Hilinksi said difficult discussions on mental health are vital.

“While conversations around mental illness can be tough and at times uncomfortable, it is absolutely critical for the wellbeing of our student-athletes,” Kym Hilinski said.

The Hilinski family knows

this is easier said than done. Their younger son, Ryan, is a quarterback for Northwestern University and has first-hand experience with the battle to talk about mental issues in the world of college football.

Ryan Hilinski spoke to the value of sharing one’s mental health state with others.

“Talking about your mental health takes guts,” Hilinski said in an interview with The Hoya. “It shows strength to be vulnerable, but that is what is needed to be real with your teammates, coaches and family. I’m proud of my family for creating College Football Mental Health Week to help all student-athletes to know that they are not alone.”

Sgarlata said the week is significant for players and coaches alike.

“It’s a tool that they provide through an impactful, personal story,” said Coach Sgarlata, “And I think that is what has made an impact on my staff, myself and our players.”

First-year goalkeeper Cara Martin led the Hoyas to another shutout win, marking the team’s seventh straight victory.

Columnist Tim Brennan argues that the NBA ought to tap into new markets to boost its fandom, make

and create

league parity.

GUHOYAS

In a back-and-forth match that featured strong defensive efforts from both sides and several failed efforts to generate consistent offense, Georgetown men’s soccer emerged victorious over Bowling Green.

Georgetown Joins College Football Mental Health Week

Conor Geelan Hoya Staff Writer

CW: This article contains mentions of suicide. Refer to this article on thehoya.com for on- and off-campus resources.

The iPhone alarm blares at 5:30 a.m., summoning a Georgetown University student-athlete to a 6 a.m. weight lift, followed by an 8 a.m. class, an hour of body treatment, film review, a second class and team practice — all before late afternoon.

Day in and day out, this rigorous routine takes a physical and mental toll on Hoya athletes.

In response, during the week of Oct. 2, Georgetown joined over 120 universities participating in College Football Mental Health Week, which seeks to eliminate the stigma around mental health discussions, organized by Hilinski’s Hope Foundation (H3H). H3H organized the week around Mental Illness Awareness Week from Oct. 2 to 8, which culminates Oct. 10 with World Mental Health Day.

This week, H3H brings more hope to the Hilltop.

Rob Sgarlata, Georgetown football’s head coach, said the goal of the initiative is to bring attention to mental health for the whole university.

“For us, it’s trying to raise awareness through the game and around campus, not just within athletics but overall,” Sgarlata told The Hoya In 2018, Kym and Mark Hilinski founded the Hilinski’s Hope Foundation in honor of their son Tyler, a former Washington State University quarterback who died by suicide earlier that year. The organization aims to “educate,

A11

Senior Midfielder Leads Hoyas in Shutout Win

Colin McLaughlin Special to The Hoya

After nearly 80 scoreless minutes against DePaul, the Georgetown women’s soccer team finally broke through the Blue Demons’ defense with a goal off a corner kick from senior midfielder Julia Leas.

It would be the only goal in the game for the No. 18 Hoyas (8-1-3, 4-0 Big East), but it was enough to shut out the Blue Demons (2-8, 0-3 Big East), 1-0,

at Wish Field in Chicago on Oct. 2. The game was Georgetown’s seventh consecutive shutout and fourth straight win to start conference play. The Hoyas are now 4-0 in conference play, the only team to have not conceded a goal in conference play this season.

The only goal came off of the tenth of 11 total corner kicks, a product of the Blue Demon’s resilient defense.

Head Coach Dave Nolan said the Blue Demons’ strategy was

to defend in a low block for most of the game.

“DePaul’s approach to the game was to kind of sit in and bunker,” Nolan told The Hoya “Their game was to try and hang around as long as they can and hope to try to get something out of it.”

Playing conditions may have also hampered the Hoyas offensively. Instead of the Hoyas’ preferred grass, Wish Field is an artificial surface that is also significantly smaller than a

GU Squeezes Out Narrow 1-0 Victory

Ian Rasovsky Special to The Hoya

A strong defensive performance from Georgetown’s back four and junior goalkeeper Ryan Schewe secured Georgetown’s first shutout of the season and another win at home.

In a back-and-forth, rainy day match at Shaw Field, the Georgetown men’s soccer team (3-4-2, 1-1-0 Big East) clinched a 1-0 victory over the Bowling Green State University Falcons (2-4-3) in the final minutes of the Oct. 1 matchup. This victory was much needed as the Hoyas fight to remain on top after a rocky start to the season.

To begin the first half, Georgetown and Bowling Green played stifling high defensive presses, limiting overall attacking chances from either side. Junior forward Marlon Tabora made 2 shots in the 21st and 24th minutes, finally giving the Hoyas a chance to score. Yet, despite an accurate cross from Tabora that hit first-year forward Jacob Murrell almost perfectly in the box, Murrell slipped as the ball landed right in the goalkeeper’s gloves.

As the torrential rain continued to worsen throughout the half, Georgetown maintained crisp

passing but could not fully capitalize on its attacks.

After a barrage of attacking runs and crosses during the first 45 minutes by Bowling Green captain and midfielder Kale Nichols, the Falcons finally had a clear-cut chance to take the lead right before halftime. However, Bowling Green forward Trace Terry’s volley clanked off the right post because of pressure from Georgetown’s back four, allowing the Hoyas to breathe a sigh of relief.

Both teams remained scoreless at the half.

For much of the second half, the flow of the game remained the same with neither team able to capitalize on its chances. In a counterattack after intercepting a sloppy pass from the Falcons, Murrell skillfully dribbled into the box and faked a shot before passing it off to first-year midfielder Jack Panayotou, who slotted the ball out of play. Georgetown had another opportunity to score, but sophomore midfielder Joe Buck’s shot from just outside the box landed in the keeper’s hands.

As the half progressed, Bowling Green began to institute an aggressive pressing scheme that the young, inexperienced Hoyas could not handle. Georgetown’s passing became inaccurate, and Bowling Green often intercepted or

slotted passes out of bounds.

The Falcons took advantage of the Hoyas’ mistakes, playing much of the second half on Georgetown’s side of the field.

Despite the Falcons’ strength, the Hoyas managed to maintain an effective defense.

Finally — and seemingly out of nowhere — Georgetown

regained composure with seven minutes to go.

Tabora, dribbling with his favored left foot, blasted the ball at the keeper, who was unable to gain control of it.

With the ball deflecting off the goalie’s body, Panayotou received the rebound, shot and scored, putting Georgetown

regular field.

Nolan said the change of environment was detrimental to the Hoyas’ attack.

“The DePaul game was interesting because it’s on an artificial surface, which we’re never great on. We’re much better on grass,” Nolan said.

“The field is very small.”

The Blue Demons’ tactics seemed to pay off while DePaul’s defense held Georgetown scoreless for 78 minutes despite a shot disparity of 13-3 in favor

of the Hoyas. However, the relentless Georgetown attack eventually wore down the Blue Demons’ stingy defensive line as their 13th and final shot of the game found the back of the net.

DePaul had opportunities to score in each half coming off of counterattacks, but two of their shots sailed over the crossbar and one was saved by first-year goalkeeper Cara Martin, who finished the game with one save

It’s Time for the NBA to Expand

For much of the past decade of NBA basketball, we have seen many teams vie to be the worst. This idea, known as “tanking,” is when a team purposefully fields a bad roster in hopes of receiving high draft picks, and in turn, top-end talent. This strategy became rampant during the 2010s, the most famous example being “The Process” era of the Philadelphia 76ers. However, tanking has almost completely fallen by the wayside in the past few years. Why is that?

There’s a simple answer: the NBA has more talent than it ever has before, and that trend will continue in the coming years. All but four teams in the league are trying to make the playoffs this season, something that would have been unimaginable during the mid-2010s.

For the first time in my life, almost every team has a promising present or future. Despite another losing season, the Houston

Rockets are in a great position building around Jalen Green and Jabari Smith Jr. While the Indiana Pacers won’t contend for the championship this year, their young starting backcourt of Tyrese Haliburton and Ben Mathurin will be one of the most exciting in the league. Even the San Antonio Spurs have some hope for the future with young players like Keldon Johnson and Jeremy Sochan. In short, every team in the league has a reason to be excited about the next five to 10 years.

For that reason, the NBA must expand. As the player field in the league continues to improve, teams are only going to be more saturated with talent. While more talent is better than less, there’s simply too much to distribute. The worst teams today would destroy their counterparts of five to 10 years ago, and that’s a good thing.

However, the league needs bad teams. Otherwise, team-building becomes an almost impossible task as it increasingly becomes a crapshoot to create a winning team. Expansion also offers more spots for

GUHOYAS

The Georgetown women’s soccer team extended its seven-game winning streak, defeating DePaul 1-0 and also recording its seventh consecutive shutout to maintain its place as second in the Big East conference.

Georgetown women’s soccer just recorded its seventh straight

defeating

GUHOYAS

Georgetown men’s soccer recorded its first shutout of the season over the Bowling Green State University Falcons in a gritty 1-0 win.

Tim Brennan Columnist