The Hoya: February 14, 2014

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD SINCE 1920 thehoya.com

Georgetown University • Washington, D.C. Vol. 95, No. 34, © 2014

FRIDAY, february 14, 2014

THE ‘V’ WORD

Sex culture often ignores an important part of the story: virginity.

EDITORIAL Alcohol amnesty for sexual assault survivors puts the right issue first.

GUIDE, B1

DELEGATES DELAYED Snow stopped half of NAIMUN’s delegates from reaching D.C. on time.

OPINION, A2

SEASON OPENER No. 10 women’s lacrosse will play host to Delaware Saturday.

SPORTS, B10

NEWS, A4

Amnesty Proposal Approved Alcohol amnesty added for sexual assault survivors Madeleine Thornburn Special to The Hoya

See POPULATION, A6

After extensive petitioning from the Georgetown University Student Association, the university has officially added an alcohol amnesty clause in cases of sexual assault to the Code of Student Conduct to reduce barriers to reporting sexual assault on campus.

“The Disciplinary Review Committee recently revised the Student Code of Conduct in response to community concerns that the potential for adjudication for underage possession or consumption of alcohol might prevent students from reporting alleged sexual assault or misconduct,” Director of Media Relations Rachel Pugh said.

The alteration means that, in cases of sexual assault or misconduct, neither the complainant nor the respondent will be charged with alcohol-related violations. Although the policy was in place in practice, its formal addition to the code of conduct is notable.

“The university was typically practicing this type of thing already, but because it wasn’t in the code [of conduct] itself, and because it wasn’t advertised as widely as it will be now, we’re really hoping that this is a moment where we can tell all students that if you know someone this has happened to or if this has happened to you, you can report it and you can say you were drinking, but it won’t come back on you,” GUSA President Nate Tisa (SFS ’14) said.

Vice President for Student Affairs Todd Olson reviewed and approved the GUSA proposal, which was then studied by the university’s legal department. The policy received support from students, as it creates a safe reporting environment for survivors.

“A lot of people were advocating for this policy … we want survivors of sexual assault to feel as confortable as possible in a reporting position,” Student Advocacy Office Co-Director Ben Manzione (SFS ’15) said. “When a survivor has gone through a trauma, they need as much support as they can get. They shouldn’t feel like the fact that they were potentially under the influence of alcohol should be a barrier for reporting [the incident].”

Alcohol is involved in at least half of sexual violence cases each year in the United States and even more frequently on college campuses. The National Institute of Justice estimates that a fifth to a quarter of female students experience rape or attempted rape over the course of their college careers.

“When alcohol is used to facilitate an assault, it can make it difficult for survivors to come forward, especially if it is believed they will get in trouble due to their use of alcohol,” Sexual Assault and Relationship Violence Services Coordinator Jen Schweer said.

“Removing this as a possibility means there could be more who feel comfortable reporting what happened to them.”

At Georgetown, sexual misconduct and sexual assault violations are viewed as an offense by the Division of Student Affairs and Office of Student Conduct as well as a breach of District law, resulting in charges and potential prosecution in District courts and disciplinary action at Georgetown, including the potential for suspension or expulsion.

Through initiatives like RU Ready, Take Back the Night and Sexual Assault Peer Educators, Georgetown is attempting to foster a community that engages in dialogue around sexual violence.

“The more we can talk about it … the more we are able to create a survivorcentered community where students feel comfortable coming forward and accessing resources,” Schweer said.

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Members of Ben Weiss’ (COL ’15) and Sam Greco’s (SFS ’15) campaign team, left, attempt to hang a sign during inclement weather shortly after midnight Thursday. After 11 minutes, candidates agreed to retreat and regroup the next day. All posters were hung by Thursday evening.

Race for Red Square Ends in 11 Minutes Matt Gregory Hoya Staff Writer

As snow blanketed Georgetown on Wednesday night, candidates for the 2014 Georgetown University Student Association executive election and their respective staffs waited in Red Square for the clock to strike 12, signaling the official beginning of the campaign season.

While around 30 candidates, campaign staffers and onlookers were present in Red Square on Wednesday, each team experienced difficulty taping their banners to the brick walls of the archway because of the cold and the effects of precipitation.

After 11 minutes, all parties agreed to give up and try again the next day.

Candidates for the 2014 election have been unofficially known to the public for several days, as the GUSA Election Commission mandates attendance at information sessions for all prospective candidates.

However, Feb. 13 marked the of-

ficial commencement of the cam- Republicans.

Weiss noted that although the paign period, during which candidates and staffers are allowed snow was making the first night of to knock on doors, table in Red campaigning difficult, he was opSquare, hang advertisements, speak timistic for his team’s prospects in to the media and hold other promo- the contest.

“We’re going to try and proceed tional events. The election itself will as usual,” Weiss said. “We’ve got be held online Feb. 27. a great team of Supporters of seasoned camBen Weiss (COL paigners, so we ’15) and Sam know exactly Greco (SFS ’15) what needs to be arrived in Red Candidates present their done.”

Square well becampaign platforms, Dan Silkman fore midnight, (COL ’15), who is claiming a spot released Thursday. See running for vice on the Interculstory on A5. president alongtural Center wall side presidential facing outward hopeful Zach into Red Square for their promotional materials. Singer (SFS ’15), also arrived well beAround 10 campaign staffers came fore midnight to stake out a spot in to assist with the process, includ- Red Square.

“It’s been so far, so good, but I ing prominent College Republicansmembers such as chair Patrick guess we got here much earlier Musgrave (COL ’16). Although Weiss than necessary,” Silkman said. Singis an active Democrat, Greco has ex- er was not present at the kickoff, as tensive experience with the College he was attending a campaign event

GUSA PLATFORMS

in Alumni Square.

GUSA election procedure stipulates that campaign teams are to have no direct interaction with the media prior to 12 a.m. Thursday.

However, Singer and Silkman’s campaign manager, Megan Murday (SFS ’15), released a media packet, embargoed until midnight, to campus press organizations at 11:02 p.m. Wednesday night. The packet described the candidates’ backgrounds, positions on key issues and budgetary proposal.

Thomas Lloyd (SFS ’15) and Jimmy Ramirez (COL ’15), running for president and vice president, respectively, were both present in Red Square.

Ramirez noted the difficulties his team, as well as all of those present during the snowstorm, were facing trying to hang their signs.

“It looks like we’re going to have to play it by ear and hopefully not get snowed in,” Ramirez said.

Although Trevor Tezel (SFS ’15) and Omika Jikaria (SFS ’15) were See KICKOFF, A6

Changing Character Candidates Compete Of DC’s Population MAYORAL RACE

Newsroom: (202) 687-3415 Business: (202) 687-3947

WARD 3

WARD 2

WARD 1

60% 47% 33% 19% 15% 9.8% 4.9% 6.2% 5.6%

WARD 4

A Reversed White Flight?

Beginning with the “white flight” to the suburbs of D.C. after World War II, the District has been a predominantly black city, boasting a 70 percent black majority by 1970. However, the past two decades have witnessed a reversed white flight as wealthy white residents move into historically black neighborhoods, such as Brookland in Ward 5 and Petworth in Ward 4.

As of 2012, the city’s black majority had diminished to 50.1 percent, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

“I think gentrification is responsible for forcing many low-income Americans out of the city,” Butler said.

From 1990 to 2010, the average black population per ward decreased from 65 percent to 51 percent. This average, however, is computed from extremes in three of the city’s eight wards: Wards 7 and 8 have 95 percent and 94 percent black populations as of 2010, and Ward 2, which contains Georgetown, has a black population of just 9.8 percent.

The lack of affordable housing options in downtown D.C. has sent many lower-income residents

PERCENT IN 1990 PERCENT IN 2000 PERCENT IN 2010

79% 71% 59%

WARD 5

“Young people have every reason to be disillusioned.”

Once called America’s Chocolate City, D.C. has lost some of that distinction over the past decade with the advent of gentrification across many of the city’s wards. Sheryll Cashin and Paul Butler, two professors of law specializing in the area of race relations at the Georgetown University Law Center, opine on the state of race in the District.

BLACK POPULATION IN WASHINGTON, DC

86% 88% 78%

WARD 6

18 and 34 — a percentage that is on the rise as D.C. continues to attract young professionals to techWhile student political at- nological and startup industries tention is currently focused on — the youth vote will be crucial Georgetown University Student to the April primary and general Association elections, D.C. may- election Nov. 4. oral candidates competing in Candidates challenging Gray the April 1 Democratic primary say that access to those opportuniare trying just as hard to engage ties, while plentiful, will hinge on young voters. how the local government choosIn formal and informal debates es to include young people in the since the Jan. 1 deadline to enroll political process. in the primary, candidates have “Cities are the energy hubs for discussed government transparen- new jobs, new opportunities, and cy, transportation and job creation it’s very likely that most college as three areas that will affect the graduates are going to participate lives of college in that developstudents and rement here in cent graduates D.C. If you eiin the District. ther work, live In the 2012 or play in citpresidential ies, how they’re election, votgoverned has ers aged 18 to a huge impact TOMMY WELLS 29 made up 19 on the type of Ward 6 Councilmember percent of the place they bevote, according to Politico, and the come,” Councilmember Tommy youth vote is even more essential Wells (D-Ward 6) told The Hoya. in the District.

This influx of young profesCandidates, including incum- sionals, however, must be met bent Mayor Vincent Gray, are push- with adjustments from the local ing their own visions for the trans- government to incorporate these formation of D.C. into what many new individuals into the local call a “world-class city” among the workforce. ranks of New York or London.

“We’re expecting 200,000 more “Economic development is con- residents by 2040, and we’ve got to tinuing across this city, along with make sure we’ve got a mayor who our investments in affordable understands how to make sure the housing and infrastructure. I think city is ready for it from a budgeteveryone in this race would agree ary standpoint, from a jobs standwe’re better off than we were four point and from an infrastructure years ago,” Gray said at a mayoral standpoint,” said Bo Shuff, camdebate last month. paign manager for Councilmember With just over 30 percent of District residents between the ages of See VOTE, A6

Hoya Staff Writer

Hoya Staff Writer

66% 64% 43%

WARD 7

Johnny Verhovek

Suzanne Monyak

96% 97% 95%

WARD 8

For DC Youth Vote

92% 93% 94%

A2

OPINION

THE HOYA

FRIday, february 14, 2014

EDITORIAL CARTOON by Janet Zhu

Founded January 14, 1920

EDITORIALS

Giving Voice to Survivors On Feb. 10, GUSA and university administrators introduced to the Code of Student Conduct a new alcohol amnesty policy for cases involving sexual assault, which protects students who report sexual assault from being charged with an alcohol violation. This long-awaited shift in campus policy is a commendable example of the university exercising common sense to improve student life at Georgetown.

Though Georgetown University Student Association members originally petitioned for an amnesty clause that protects students from being penalized for drug use, trespassing and noise violations in addition to alcohol consumption, this initial change to the code of conduct is a step in the right direction. It demonstrates that administrators are aware of the issues important to students and are unafraid to take the appropriate steps to address them.

According to the National College Health Assessment, about one in four females and one in 33 males will experience sexual assault in college. The National Institutes of Health added that about half of all those cases in-

volve alcohol consumption by the perpetrator, survivor or both. Before the introduction of Georgetown’s alcohol amnesty policy, fear of being punished for alcohol violations could have deterred students from reporting incidents of sexual assault. Sanctions for alcohol violations vary depending on the presence of an accompanying violation, the time frame between violations and the student’s disciplinary history. Without the alcohol amnesty policy, a student who experiences sexual assault would have to weigh the costs of a possible alcohol violation with the benefits of receiving help.

The alcohol amnesty policy brings attention and conversation back to the real issue at hand: sexual assault.

Creating an environment that allows a student to comfortably report sexual assault is imperative to creating a safer and more supportive campus. Implementation of this change is certainly reason to applaud university policymakers, but students should continue to demand resources to prevent sexual assault, promote awareness of sexual assault issues and support survivors of sexual assault on the Hilltop.

On the first day of class it is common for teachers to tell students that participation will account for a large portion of their grade. Because this assessment is often based on a teacher’s subjective observations, it is only fair that students have access to the grade associated with this assessment prior to the end of the semester, lest they need to change their in-class habits.

We are lucky to attend a university that values engagement of class material, but if so much of a Georgetown GPA comes from participation grades, then students deserve feedback periodically throughout the semester on their performance, just as they would receive on their writing or knowledge of subject material.

The registrar should set a date approximately halfway through each semester by which point professors are required to post an accurate representation of

the grade that each student has thus far earned. For participation-based classes, an evaluation halfway through the term would be especially helpful. Professors and students often have different standards for what constitutes fruitful class participation, and clarifying those standards early enough in the semester to rectify their differences would avoid endof-semester surprises or complaints.

While putting unnecessary administrative requirements on professors should generally be avoided, in this case, a unilateral date for midsemester grades would solve more problems than it would create. Students are better able to meet their professors’ expectations when their performance is assessed at least once before final grades are released. Posting midterm grades could prove to be a worthwhile inconvenience.

An Appropriate Audit

Making Campus a Canvas Wellesley College made headlines last week after unveiling the “Sleepwalker,” a 5-foot-9 realist statue of a man wandering around campus wearing only his underwear. Some residents of Wellesley objected to the piece as a potential trigger for survivors of sexual assault or as simply distasteful; others defended the statue as a creative addition to the campus landscape. No matter the sentiment, the fact that students at Wellesley are having this conversation speaks to the ability of artwork to ignite productive debate.

When a chalk rendition of Van Gogh’s “Starry Night” appeared on the walls of Red Square at the end of last semester, the campus community applauded the anonymous artist and his work. However, this drawing also made many Georgetown students realize that works of spontaneous art on our campus are few and far between. A diverse student body like ours is not void of students with artistic ability, but as

an institution, Georgetown does not regularly offer many opportunities to share that talent with the wider campus population.

We do not wish to overlook the work of campus artists. The art galleries of the Walsh Building, the first floor of Lauinger Library and Carroll Parlor in Healy Hall boast impressive exhibits of the creative talent on the Hilltop.

Our a cappella groups and campus theater organizations produce work of which all Georgetown students should be proud. But despite these individuals’ efforts, it is still unlikely that one would encounter art on campus without seeking it out.

Making campus artwork more publicly available would enable Georgetown students to engage with the wealth of cultural diversity on campus, and the efforts of campus artists would be better realized by the student body.

The Hilltop stands only to gain by encouraging art in the public sphere.

Emma Hinchliffe, Editor-in-Chief TM Gibbons-Neff, Executive Editor Sheena Karkal, Managing Editor Lindsay Lee, Online Editor Mallika Sen, Campus News Editor Madison Ashley, City News Editor Carolyn Maguire, Sports Editor Kim Bussing, Guide Editor David Chardack, Opinion Editor Alexander Brown, Photography Editor Ian Tice, Layout Editor Robert DePaolo, Copy Chief Karl Pielmeier, Blog Editor

Contributing Editors

Katy Berk, Zoe Bertrand, Chris Bien, Pat Curran, Victoria Edel, Danny Funt, Chris Grivas, Penny Hung, Sarah Kaplan, Hanaa Khadraoui, Hunter Main, Eitan Sayag, Sean Sullivan, Emory Wellman

Deputy Campus News Editor Sam Abrams Deputy Campus News Editor Kit Clemente Deputy City News Editor Suzanne Monyak Deputy Business Editor Natasha Khan Deputy Sports Editor Andrew May Deputy Sports Editor Tom Schnoor Sports Blog Editor Max Wheeler Deputy Guide Editor Allison Hillsbery Deputy Guide Editor Jess Kelham-Hohler Deputy Guide Editor Lindsay Leasor Deputy Opinion Editor Matthew Grisier Deputy Photography Editor Julia Hennrikus Deputy Photography Editor Daniel Smith Deputy Photography Editor Michelle Xu Deputy Layout Editor Michelle Cardona Deputy Layout Editor Kennedy Shields Deputy Copy Editor Jackie McCadden Deputy Copy Editor Zack Saravay Deputy Copy Editor Sharanya Sriram Deputy Blog Editor Emma Holland

Editorial Board

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

On Georgetown’s Overreaction To the Editor: The cascade of whining and ignorance written by nearly 300 Georgetown graduates and found on the university’s Facebook page in regard to my recent article on the citizen’s responsibility to protect liberty is very interesting. It testifies as to just how close Georgetown is to becoming a member in good standing of the Ivy League: ignorant of U.S. history, anti-American and not at all bothered but rather enthusiastic about the advance of tyranny in America under the auspices of the national government’s executive branch.

My article, of course, never “called” for the assassination of Obama or Cameron. It was, rather, a warning to them, their parties and to their successors that no republican people is obliged to sit quietly like lapdogs and watch their nation become a tyranny, although those Georgetown graduates who commented on Facebook appear to be largely that poodle class. The U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment, of course, expresses the idea of the citizen’s duty to resist tyranny much more clearly and concisely than I ever could.

Whether The Hoya or its readers like it or not, both the Obama and Bush presidencies were marked by studied advances toward tyranny. Foreign wars without a congressional declaration of war; signing statements and executive orders to circumvent laws or make them dead letters; and amending laws with the stroke of the executive pen are all unconstitutional measures which — if not opposed by means appropriate to the times — will make the national government a tyranny. Perhaps such an advance to

tyranny is okay with Georgetown and its graduates, but it is not okay with me, and I think not okay with plenty of other Americans.

A good many of the comments on the Facebook page also cry out in apparent pain: “What are the Jesuits doing letting Scheuer teach at the university?”

Simply put, I am the best at what I do; indeed, no one’s predictions of where the war on Islam is going have been more accurate than mine since 2002.

But I think the just-noted question would have been a good one had it been truncated to “What are the Jesuits doing?” Clearly, what they are not doing is teaching with any talent, depth or frankness — given the substance of the Facebook comments — about the history of liberty in the United States and AngloAmerican world; the founders’ views on the issue or the work of our English forefathers, which provided the basis for the founders’ thought. Even with this clear failure, one might have thought that Georgetown’s Jesuits would at least have been teaching St. Paul’s guidance that rulers are to be obeyed only so long as they rule justly. The idea of “unlimited obedience to rulers” cannot be found in St. Paul’s writings, although it is rife among my Facebook critics.

Perhaps it is time for Georgetown’s Jesuits to return both St. Paul and crucifixes to the classroom, if only to repair some of the damage my Facebook critics caused to the university’s claim of producing superior graduates who are ready — God and St. Paul help us — to be America’s future leaders.

M.F. Scheuer Adjunct Professor Center for Security Studies

How the CSJ Helps the Homeless To the Editor: We applaud Grace Fenton’s [The Hoya, “Ending Homelessness One Act at a Time,” A3, Feb. 4, 2014] call to our fellow Hoyas to recognize the important social justice issues beyond the Healy Gates.

In a winter with record low temperatures and continuing disparities in housing access, paying attention to issues of homelessness is a particular concern.

In addition to simple acts of kindness, we encourage Georgetown University community members to get involved with organizations and programs committed to serving the homeless community. All of these programs can use our energy now.

HOPE, a Center for Social Justice student organization, offers multiple programs from fundraising efforts to support Martha’s Table in Grab ‘n’ Give to meals programs such as Friday Foods and Mobile Soup Kitchen. Campus Ministry and the Interfaith Council organize a weekly sandwichmaking activity to provide meals for the homeless community. The Medical Center runs, among multiple initiatives, a health clinic at D.C. General, the city’s family homeless shelter; the Center for Child and Human Development continues to take the lead in developing new partnerships.

Georgetown University is a founding member of the Georgetown Ministry Center (GMC), a non-

profit organization that strives to support the men and women experiencing homelessness in our neighborhood. GMC operates a drop-in center on Wisconsin Avenue, does street outreach and coordinates an emergency hypothermia shelter.

There are many opportunities to volunteer with GMC; this semester, CSJ has partnered with them to begin a regular program to support their socialservices activities five days a week.

Over 20 Georgetown students, staff and faculty members have been trained for a new Hypothermia Outreach Team (HOT). The HOT volunteers will reach out to men and women in the community on an as-needed basis during extreme weather to offer emergency supplies and assistance to hypothermia shelters or warming buses.

In addition to these programs, there are opportunities for involvement through community-based learning courses and D.C. nonprofit organizations. Simple acts of kindness are a start, and we share a responsibility to do more. We’re located in Poulton Hall; feel free to contact us at the CSJ to take that next step.

Andria K. Wisler, Ph.D. Executive Director, Center for Social Justice Research, Teaching &Service Ray Shiu Associate Director, Center for Social Justice Research, Teaching & Service

CORRECTION The headline for the article “Knights Are First Test for Hoyas” (The Hoya, A10, Feb. 11, 2014) incorrectly identified Mount St. Mary’s University’s nickname as the Knights. The correct nickname is the Mountaineers.

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OPINION

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2014

THE HOYA

A3

VIEWPOINT • Edelstein

THROUGH THE GLASS CEILING

America’s Recycled Cold War Strategy

T

Allie Heymann

Fixing the Gender Status Quo A

few days ago, one of my friends posited that we are born with our sex but not our gender. It was a very simple, straightforward statement — but it caused me to do some serious reflection. Why does our society and everyone in it work so hard to make clear distinctions between masculinity and femininity?

The concept of gender has been hundreds if not thousands of years in the making. We have come to accept a certain set of values, traits, appearances and interests that constitute the male and female genders. As we grow, we are increasingly expected to fit into these categories, lest we be saddled with cruel and unforgiving stereotypes or labels. But here we are in the 21st century, nearly a hundred years after women won the right to vote in U.S. elections, and society is still battling to maintain the gender status quo. Despite conversations of feminism that permeate the government, music and business industries, it seems that gender norms have remained stagnant.

To illustrate my point, I will start with an example. As kids, girls can experiment with their dress — some of us went through a tomboy phase, during which we donned oversized basketball jerseys and shorts and rocked Converse high tops. We went out to recess and proceeded to school many of our male friends in sports ranging from tetherball to soccer.

Sometimes our parents had to steer us toward more feminine attire, but by the time middle school came around, the fad of dressing like a boy seemed like it had worn off. We started carrying ourselves different-

Society must rise above the binding concepts of what it means to be male and female. ly, we invested in fashion accessories and we spoke in demure tones. We began to mold ourselves to fit the expectations of femininity, narrowing our interests and opinions to blend in. The same was true of our male counterparts; as they grew and matured, they became boxed into being more masculine. People who defied this process were seen as anomalies and were shamed or worshipped on a case-by-case basis.

The boy who played both violin and football? He was both sexy and a catch.

The girl who played violin and tried out for the football team? Who did she think she was?

The girl who played soccer but could also dress to impress? What a babe.

The guy who liked theater and connected more openly with his feelings? He was probably gay.

These types of crossovers between the masculine and the feminine manifested differently for different people, either shooting stereotypes to bits or simply enhancing them.

Today, feminism is highlighted in both national and international news. Female politicians, business leaders, fashionistas and even the legendary Beyoncé Knowles have labeled themselves as feminists. But it’s not enough.

I look at Beyoncé, and I am impressed by her tongue-in-cheek sensibilities. She advocates for women’s rights and equality while maintaining her status as a sex symbol and icon. While she appeals to female activists, I am dubious that she would relinquish her femininity and sexual power too quickly in a fight for gender equality.

In the end, to really achieve equality between men and women, society needs to rise above the binding concepts of what it means to be male and what it means to be female. People should be allowed to dabble in whatever they so choose: music, art, sports, education, dress and sexual identity. Until the notions of masculinity and femininity supported by the media, by our parents, by our friends and by even ourselves start to subside, gender equality remains an impossibility, plain and simple.

Allie Heymann is a sophomore in the School of Foreign Service.

THROUGH THE GLASS CEILING appears every other Friday.

his fall, the world will mark the 25th anniversary of the Berlin Wall’s fall. Those of us who lived through that period in history vividly recall the euphoria of the moment as celebrating Berliners climbed atop the remnants of the wall. The subsequent break-up of the Soviet Union signaled the end of the Cold War that had shaped the world since 1945 and its replacement by a general sense of optimism. With the Cold War over, tension evaporated and many hoped that the United States would benefit from a financial “peace dividend.”

Nearly 25 years after the fall of the wall, however, America’s commitments around the world — its “grand strategy” as scholars and pundits call it — look similar to those maintained during the Cold War. To be sure, the United States no longer stations the hundreds of thousands of troops in Europe that it did during the Cold War, but the North Atlantic Treaty Organization survives, as do America’s formal and informal commitments to Japan, South Korea and Israel. Despite the end of the Cold War era, the subsequent dramatic structural transformation in the nature of the international system and the traumatic events of Sept.

11, 2001, America’s grand strategy for engaging the world looks remarkably familiar.

To some, this may not be all that surprising. Even if the structure of the international system is different, America’s interests in that system are not. As the argument goes, the U.S. still has an interest in spreading democracy, enhancing international economic openness and promoting cooperative international institutions. Even if the specific threats to America’s interests have changed, the allies that the United States relied upon during the Cold War remain the best allies for confronting today’s threats. Even if the need to address America’s decaying infrastructure at home is only growing, the investment in the American military is justified not only in the short term, but also in anticipation of potential long-term threats,

Twenty-five years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, America’s international commitments appear unchanged. including the rise of China with its unclear intentions.

But this continuity also raises some puzzling questions. Does it really make sense that the United States would maintain a largely similar strategy when everything has changed so dramatically? Are the alliances consummated during the Cold War to confront the Soviet Union necessarily the right alliances to deal with the threats that the United States faces today? And does the extraordinary amount of human and financial

resources that the United States expends on its military continue to make sense in today’s world?

If the answers to the questions above are no, then what are the alternatives? One possibility is that the United States ought to retrench and restrain itself, pulling back from its existing commitments around the world and redistributing those resources in ways that are more focused on the specific threats that it currently faces. A more restrained United States would resist the urge to become involved in the

VIEWPOINT • Albornoz

world’s problems wherever they may be. America has wealthy allies, and those allies ought to be encouraged to provide for their own defense rather than continuing to rely on the same American security blanket that they depended upon during the Cold War. This strategy would have the potential benefit of conserving some American resources and focusing others more efficiently. It would also discourage the United States from feeling obligated to intervene in disputes around the globe, especially when it does not necessarily have any great interest in those disputes or any great idea on how to resolve them. This might also provoke the United States into thinking more seriously and more creatively about how best to address those threats that do demand attention, like the continuing threat of transnational terrorism, or the instability that has roiled the waters of East Asia over the last year.

On the other hand, a strategy of retrenchment and restraint has a number of substantial potential downsides. Encouraging allies to provide for their own defense could foster instability as these countries develop their own militaries. Washington may regret distancing itself from conflicts where the United States has the capability to prevent genocide and other crimes against humanity but has chosen, as a matter of grand strategy, not to do so.

No matter which side of the debate you find convincing, the remarkable continuity in U.S. grand strategy is striking. Either this continuity reflects a sensible adaptation of existing institutions and commitments to respond to the markedly different threats of the post-Cold-War era, or it reveals a regrettable inertia that had rendered U.S. grand strategy ill fit to the challenges the country presently faces and is likely to face in the future. Indeed, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

DAVID EDELSTEIN is an associate professor in the School of Foreign Service and the department of government.

COLLEGE ON A HILLTOP

In Death, a Humbling The Value of Liberal Arts Moment of Humanity In New-Age Academia

W

e’ve heard the sons of Harvard tell how Crimson lines could hold them, as the Georgetown fight song pokes fun of a so-called rival up north, but now, I write about Harvard as a friend. On Feb. 10, slightly after midnight, a Crimson daughter named Angela Mathew was killed in a tragic car accident on her way home from a mock trial tournament in Richmond, Va. She was 20 years old.

I had watched Angela compete with her team at the regional tournament held at the University of Richmond the weekend spanning Feb. 8 and 9. Georgetown Mock Trial sent two of its three teams to compete, and I had the privilege to drive them there and cheer on my teammates and friends. In the second round of the day, the Georgetown B-team competed as the defense against the Harvard A-team’s prosecution. Angela played a witness, and she was talented and beautiful. Her teammates were collegial and admirably skilled as well. Three of them were also injured in the tragic accident that took Angela’s life just hours after the competition ended.

At around 5:30 p.m. Sunday, at the closing ceremonies of the tournament, Harvard was announced as the first-place team with seven wins and one loss.

They were all deeply admired for their success — it was one brought about by clear dedication, passion, hard work, determination, skill and consideration. Seven hours later, that elation of victory was defeated by tragedy.

The fragility of life bore heavily on my teammates and loved ones who were informed of the news; it sent us all into a state of grief that evening. We felt pained for those innocent friends from Harvard driving back home after an exhausting weekend, competing in an activity they poured their hearts into. I struggle to infuse these words with enough love to express how deeply sorry we are for their loss.

As a member of the Georgetown Mock Trial team for three and a half years and as the team’s current president, I wish to convey how much of

a connection a member of the mock trial community feels with those around her or him. There is a competitive edge of strategy and finesse that goes into a round, but within this world of law and trial, there is transparency when it comes to the human relationships we form.

Within these relationships, there is no theory, plan or competitive edge — there is merely an understanding of mutual passion and youthful joy. To think that our friends at Harvard have had joy stripped from them by senseless loss brings great anguish to all of us here at Georgetown.

Some of my fondest, most profoundly moving experiences during my time at Georgetown have come from the long practices, car rides, tournaments and celebrations shared with the members of Georgetown Mock Trial. Each and every person on the team is a brother or sister to me. I left the weekend at Richmond with a feeling secured in my soul that I was surrounded by some of Georgetown’s finest human beings and by some of my best friends. By extension, Harvard’s entire team is a family that we call our own and mourn for and with deeply. To imagine their loss is to tangibly feel the proximity of life’s end happening to any one of our own.

In the spirit of Georgetown, processing this loss involves discernment of the meaning behind the incomprehensible. As mock trial members, my teammates and I are accustomed to logical reasoning and problem solving. This accident, however, is irresolvable, senseless and subsequently humbling for us — it is a quiet reminder that while we share the same passion for law as Harvard’s team, we also share the mortality of humanity.

However, in the lesson of life’s brevity, there is the eternal verdict of God’s redeeming grace. In the seeming injustice of tragedy, we pay witness to the unfailing justice of God’s love. It is through this that we are all set free.

There is transparency when it comes to the relationships we form during mock trial.

BEBE ALBORNOZ is a senior in the College. She is president of the Georgetown University Mock Trial team.

O

n Jan. 20, Georgetown played touched. Georgetown breaks these host to former Massachusetts down with philosophy and theolInstitute of Technology Presi- ogy classes and a litany of resources, dent Susan Hockfield (MED ’79) for most notably the Jesuits, which help the second installment of the “De- students engage these questions. signing the Future(s) of the UniverThis is certainly a public good. The sity” series that President DeGioia market does not explicitly demand launched in November 2013. The two that people study ethics or think administrators discussed their views about the definition of social justice. of Georgetown’s role in society, vari- It demands critical thinking and anous challenges to the modern univer- alytical and quantitative skills. sity and how they use their positions This unique character formato effect change. tion — soul craft— is One of the most our comparative adnotable digresvantage as a universions during the sity. Some argue that discussion revolved our priorities need around the role that to shift. Universiresearch plays in the ties must be able to modern university. progress and adapt The university, Hockto new environments field asserted, was by funding different Kent Carlson a place for research forms of study. While and the collection of this is all well and information. In othgood in the theoretiGeorgetown provides cal, a university that er words, the university should position is strapped for cash the public with itself to be the basmust make choices. soul craft. tion of knowledge Even in subtle ways, for the community.

Georgetown is asking This is an important aspect of the itself, “Should this funding go to university. With some of the largest our traditional strengths — governconcentrations of experts, academ- ment, theology and international ics and researchers, universities relations — or should it go to build have an undeniable obligation to new programs like the hard scipursue new information through ences, thus allowing us to compete experiments and studies. This work with other research universities?” not only gives our society new techWhat is the cost of moving fornologies and medicines, but also ward? This is the question that we gives us tools for understanding hu- must all address. Will Georgetown man nature and beyond. have to leave some of its traditions Yet, the things that differentiate behind in order to make room for universities are the public goods that new opportunities and programs? they choose to provide. State univerWhile market forces are certainly sities in the Midwest were founded dictating the types of research that to bring education to more people are valuable and the types that are in order to develop local agricultural worthless, the university has an obeconomies. Seminaries were to train ligation to fight back. Institutions religious leaders. One of MIT’s pri- like Georgetown, with centuries mary public goods is stellar research of experience in teaching the libthat builds new machines that en- eral arts, understand the value that able mankind to reach new heights these pursuits have on a person’s and be more efficient. soul. They make us better citizens.

But what is Georgetown’s public While other universities may feel good? comfortable shedding the old in faGeorgetown provides the pub- vor of the new, Georgetown should lic with “soul craft.” Programs like seriously consider what it has to ESCAPE, Agape and the Spirit of lose if it is not careful.

Georgetown seminars provide stuWe must understand that there is dents of all faith backgrounds with a balance between developing new the tools and environment for in- specialties and keeping our old distrospection. Georgetown asks ques- ciplines strong. Georgetown must tions about God, faith and morality resist promoting one without em— topics from which many other phasizing the need for the other. universities shy away. So many people take the stance that we are all Kent Carlson is a senior in the rational creatures who have our School of Foreign Service. own views on religion and politics COLLEGE ON A HILL appears every and thus those issues should not be other Friday.

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FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2014

INSIDE THIS ISSUE Caine Prize winner Tope Folarin gave a reading as part of his Lannan Center residency. See story on A8.

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grams “ The have fun things like ‘no glove, no love.’

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H*yas for Choice Vice President Abby Grace (SFS ’16) on condom grams.

See story on A6.

from

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WHO’S YOUR TV CHARACTER VALENTINE? This Valentine’s Day, find your own television sweetheart using 4E’s handy list.

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Former Republican Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert reflected on his political career and spoke on the future of bipartisanship in an event co-sponsored by the College Republicans and the International Relations Club on Tuesday. See story A6.

blog.thehoya.com

GU Behind Peers in Peace Corps Ranks KATHERINE RICHARDSON Hoya Staff Writer

The Peace Corps released a list of the top volunteer-producing colleges and universities Feb. 11, with Georgetown securing the number seven spot of all medium-sized schools. Georgetown’s neighbors, American University and The George Washington University, both placed in the top five, ranked third and fourth, respectively.

According to Peace Corps Acting Director Carrie Hessler-Radelet, the organization ranks institutions based on the number of students a university provides to the Peace Corps and publishes the rankings for multiple reasons.

According to a Peace Corps press release, 27 Georgetown students were accepted as volunteers for the Peace Corps in 2013.

“We’ve been ranking since 2001, and there are many purposes,” Hessler-Radelet said. “The first is to thank those universities that have been such great supporters of Peace Corps over the years and to celebrate their success. Another is to educate the general public about Peace Corps and what a great opportunity it is as a springboard to a career and great preparation for life.”

Hessler-Radelet said she believes that Georgetown’s ranking, although below its peer institutions’, demonstrates the student body’s commitment to service.

“Number seven is a great ranking,” Hessler-Radelet said. “We’d love to see Georgetown move up, and they have throughout the years. … All the schools in the D.C. area are very competitive and very internationally focused, and all are really focused on service, but I believe that Georgetown is a great contender and a fantastic Peace Corps school.”

The Peace Corps recruits Georgetown students each year with a series of events. The most recent event, an information session entitled “Mapping Your Peace Corps Career,” allowed Georgetown students to find out more about their options.

Molly Douglas (SFS ’09), a Peace Corps recruiter, helmed this latest information session and will return to Georgetown for another session in late February.

“It’s an opportunity for them socially for networking, but it’s

also an opportunity for outreach to students here on campus to communicate to them the Peace Corps experience and to serve as mentors to students who are interested,” Douglas said.

The Cawley Career Education Center hosts these events each year, according to Manager of Student Resources Gregory Wilson.

“These events are really important for students both to offer them a chance to connect with Peace Corps alumni, but also to answer their questions about the application process,” Wilson said.

Wilson said he could not account for the fact that Georgetown is ranked below American and GW, but said that he is pleased with the fact that Georgetown’s ranking has moved up in the recent years. In the past three years, Georgetown has gone from tenth to seventh place.

“I think that [the rise in rank] speaks to how greatly aligned the mission here at Georgetown is with Peace Corps,” Wilson said. “I think in terms of what students are looking for, students really like Peace Corps because it’s a service organization, and that fits so well into our service-oriented learning here at Georgetown. I feel that so many students are interested in that line of work.”

Hessler-Radelet agrees that the Peace Corps and Georgetown have similar values.

“Georgetown is a great place for [recruitment],” she said. “Your whole ethos is around service, so it’s a natural progression. I would say … Georgetown’s international focus and commitment to service, which is really core to its Jesuit foundation, is really important.”

Douglas, who worked in Albania for two years during her Peace Corps career, attributed her preparation for the Peace Corps to her student experience at Georgetown.

“Georgetown’s approach to the way that they cultivate their students and support them and their mission in the world and engagement with D.C. is all about service,” Douglas said. “I think that service organizations like Peace Corps are a very natural step for a lot of volunteers, not just in checking off a box, but saying that you really do believe this kind of work, want to engage with the world, want to be of service to someone else, challenge yourself and go big or go home.”

BRIAN CARDEN/THE HOYA

Snow surrounds the Washington Hilton in Dupont Circle, which had yet to welcome half of the expected delegates by the opening ceremony of the Georgetown International Relations Association’s NAIMUN conference Thursday.

Snowstorm Waylays Delegates KIT CLEMENTE Hoya Staff Writer

This week’s snowstorm delayed approximately half of the high school delegations set to arrive at the 51st North American Invitational Model United Nations conference, which runs from Feb. 13-16 and is held and staffed by the Georgetown International Relations Association.

With over 150 high schools attending the conference, many faced trouble in arriving in time for Thursday’s 7:30 p.m. opening ceremony and 9:00 p.m. committee session.

Georgetown staffers additionally faced trouble arriving to the conference, held at the Washington Hilton in Dupont Circle, as both the Georgetown University Transportation Shuttle and public transportation did not run.

The NAIMUN LI team began to anticipate the effects of the forecasted weather and contacted the team that led NAIMUN during the 2010 “Snowpocalypse.”

“They said first of all that we should inform our staff and make sure that we’re prepared to be able to run committees if we have fewer people there, especially for the Thursday session.

The other thing was to send out a letter to the moderators and students to make safe travel arrangements as alternatives to whatever they had planned as necessary,” Executive Director Sarah Pemberton (SFS ’15) said.

The 2010 conference took place during a weekend that saw 18-32 inches of snow.

“NAIMUN has happened for 51 years and it hasn’t been cancelled yet. Actually, ‘Snowpocalypse’ in 2010, basically

all airports were shut down for almost a week. Georgetown staffers walked all the way from the front gates to Dupont Circle to make the conference happen, and if that’s the kind of dedication our staff has had in the past, I see no reason why this year we can’t make things work,” NAIMUN LI Secretary-General Pavan Rajgopal (SFS ’15) said. “We have to adapt and it will be challenging, but at the end of the day, the snow won’t stop us.”

In order to help staff members arrive safely, NAIMUN staffers are offered $5 subsidies for cab rides, among other support and planning.

“We’re still working on trying to arrange it with staff to make sure that we can send people out in groups and make sure that it’s not too much of an expense for staff, but we’re still working out the kinks and making sure that staff can safely arrive and arrive on time before the first committee session,” Pemberton said.

Many members resorted to taking taxis or Uber to arrive at the Washington Hilton.

“My original idea was to walk, but I walked to Wisconsin and I started walking down to Q [Street] and the snow was up to my ankles and it was sleeting out, so I took a cab,” NAIMUN staffer Jason Petty (SFS ’17) said.

Besides the snowfall in D.C. itself, the weather patterns affect the origin cities of the delegates, as it started in the South, hit the D.C. area and then travelled to the tri-state area, from where many of the delegations hail.

“It’s really the perfect storm, pardon the pun,” Rajgopal said.

However, late arrival for NAIMUN delegates poses difficulties, as late

delegates will cause committees to be nearly empty.

In relation to assessment of delegates and awards, late delegates will not be penalized.

“We’ve instructed our chairs and crisis managers to take appropriate measures to make sure that no delegate is put at a disadvantage because of the time that he or she arrives,” Rajgopal said. “Obviously, the weather is something that’s outside of their control and they shouldn’t be penalized for that, so we’re taking the appropriate measures to make sure that everyone is on a level playing field on Friday afternoon.”

Pemberton said that the staff was well-equipped to deal with the twist in weather fortunes.

“One of the benefits of having such a large travelling team, as well, is because a lot of us have had to face similar circumstances in terms of arriving at the conference so I think our staff is aware of how we can make it easier for delegates to transition late into the committee,” Pemberton said.

Staffers remain unfazed and confident in the success of the rest of the conference.

“Considering all of the planning that had to go into the conference as a whole, I think that [the weather] is not as big of a factor as compared to the other things,” Petty said. “I don’t think it will be as big a deal as it could be just based on how much they put into alternative planning and coming up with contingency plans.”

Hoya Staff Writers Katherine Richardson and Mallika Sen contributed reporting.

News

friday, february 14, 2014

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Provost Regulates Joint Candidates Talk Platforms Appointment Guidelines Matt Gregory Hoya Staff Writer

Michael Mischke Special to The Hoya

Seeking to standardize university joint appointments, Provost Robert Groves proposed revised standards to the Joint Appointment Guidelines for Tenure Track Faculty, released Jan. 8. The provost’s revised guidelines were then endorsed by the Executive Faculty.

Georgetown’s joint appointment program began during the 1990s and has grown to the point where approximately 10 percent of the university’s main campus faculty is jointly appointed.

“There was an existing document. It was just a question of having to update it a little bit because the kinds of cases that needed to be dealt with in, say, 1996 were different from the cases in 2013 just because of how interdisciplinary work is increased,” Main Campus Executive Faculty Chair Ian Gale, an economics professor, said.

Before the recent changes, the university’s joint appointments were made in an ad hoc manner. The revised guidelines seek to standardize the appointments by creating three tiers of joint appointments, the lowest of which is called an affiliate status where a faculty member in one unit may teach one course in another or conduct some research, but it remains only a mild, secondary interest.

“The second [tier] is a so-called courtesy appointment which has more defined duties. And the third [tier] is fully shared joint appointment where the salary of the faculty member lies in two different departments. There are agreed-upon duties and rights and responsibilities,” Groves said.

The revisions also clarify payment policy. In particular, the new guidelines standardize how jointly appointed professors are treated when one of the departments that they are a part of supports their tenure, while the other department does not.

“The resolution was that the individual would now be 100 percent in the unit that supported tenure. The question is where does the salary come from and the resolution here was that the amount of the budget would be taken from the one and given to the other,” Gale said.

Professors and administrators praised the joint appointments program as a means for im-

proving the quality of Georgetown’s academics.

A strength of the joint appointments program is that it encourages greater cooperation between departments.

“It works very well. I mean I used to teach at Brown and there were very few joint appointments and the turf battles between various units and centers were pretty vicious, whereas here everyone is kind of sitting on the opposite side of the table in a way and so it actually serves to bind the units together in a very productive way,” joint SFS and government department appointee professor Jeff Anderson said.

The program’s revisions also address one of the primary drawbacks of joint appointments, which arises when professors are overwhelmed by the responsibilities of teaching in multiple units.

“One of the big concerns [is] that people are being stretched too thin, demands are being made on their time because they are in some sense being treated as if they are fully in two different groups. That was one of the things that was also made clear here that there has to be limits on the amount of service that is required [of] people.

The amount of service should be proportional to the percentage of your appointment that is in one or the other [department],” Gale said.

All professors in joint appointment agreements will continue those agreements as before, although possibly under different titles due to their tier level of involvement. Enhanced standardization for future joint appointments is likely to be the largest effect of the revised procedure.

“What has happened is the provost has kind of formalized the system with these new guidelines, but in reality it will have very little or no effect on the existing system of joint appointments,” SFS Acting Dean James Reardon-Anderson said.

Joint appointments are an important part of the plan for the future of Georgetown academics.

“We’re building the future Georgetown, and we think interdisciplinary work is being demanded by the students and the world is presenting us problems that interdisciplinary work can solve, and we want to be right there at the forefront,” Groves said.

Researcher Explains Modern Political Religious Landscape Nick Simon

Hoya Staff Writer

Religious policy researcher Jonathan Fox discussed church-state relations and secularization at the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs on Tuesday afternoon, highlighting government religious policies across the globe.

The event, titled “Political Secularism, Religion and the State” featured Fox, a professor at Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan, Israel, who specializes in the influence of religion on politics, domestic conflicts and international relations. Fox is the founder and coordinator of the Religion and State project at Bar-Ilan, which seeks to understand the factors that influence religious policy and how it interacts with other political, social and economic factors.

“I have two goals. One is to provide an accurate description of government religion policies worldwide,” Fox said. “Once I have that information, I look at how it affects other political factors and social factors and economic factors as well as how government religion policy is influenced by them.”

As stated by Fox, the RAS project includes statistics from 177 countries, which is every country in the world with a population greater than 250,000.

Fox and his colleagues have collected yearly data for every year between 1990 and 2008, and have documented 151 variables for state-related policy and 154 on religion and constitutions.

“I look at four types of religion policies: official religion policy, the extent to which the government supports religion, the extent to which the government regulates all religions in the country and religious discrimination, which I define as restrictions placed on minority religions that are not placed on the majority religion,” Fox said.

Fox discussed the rise and fall of secularization theory, a pervading early 20th-century

academic argument that theorized religion’s eventual decline.

“Academics believed secularization theory because they wanted religion to go away, and they didn’t really check their facts,” Fox said. “Secularization theory predicted religions’ extreme decline, and religion has competition now. I just would not call that secularization.”

Fox’s research directly challenges secularization theory. He reasons that while a quarter of the countries in the world have an official religion, there are a number of countries that do not declare an official one, but rather they have one religion that in all other respects gets treated as official by the state.

“This is not what I would call a secular world.

If we had a secular world, you’d expect countries to be a little more neutral. Less than 20 percent of the world’s countries are neutral,” Fox said.

Fox discussed his findings on religious policies from the world’s democracies.

“The breakdown for democracies is very similar to the breakdown for the rest of the world. This is not a breakdown that is driven by non-democracies. Democracies resemble the rest of the world in this respect, except less of them are hostile towards religion,” Fox said.

Vebjorn Horsfjord, a researcher at the Center for Christian-Muslim Understanding at the University of Oslo, discussed the advantages of Fox’s approach to political and religious interconnectedness.

“I think what’s fascinating is to do a quantitative study of these questions and go through every country in the world because that is such a huge job and there are so many questions involved.

Hearing somebody who’s actually done it is the most interesting thing,” Horsfjord said. “Because of the diversity of questions it’s so difficult to find variables that make it possible to compare different countries, and I think that shows that this is a very ambitious project.”

Volunteers Needed for Tanning Research!

Are you a woman between the ages of 18 and 30 who has used an indoor tanning bed in the past year?

Researchers at Georgetown University are looking for young adult women to volunteer for a research study about tanning and skin cancer risk. The principal investigator is Dr. Darren Mays, PhD, MPH. The purpose of the study is to learn more about how young adult women use indoor tanning beds and how that may relate to skin cancer risk.

What’s Involved?

• Females ages 18 to 25 who have used a tanning bed or other indoor tanning device • Complete a brief online survey • Some will be asked to provide a DNA sample and complete up to two telephone interviews • Receive up to $70 in gift cards for your time

Interested? Please email habit@georgetown.edu or call (202) 784-2202

Following the official beginning of the Georgetown University Student Association executive election campaign period at midnight Thursday, the four tickets each released platforms illustrating priorities they would pursue if elected. The presidential candidates will meet in a debate Feb. 23, while the vice presidential candidates will face off on a yet undetermined date between Feb. 18 and 20. The election takes place online Feb. 27.

Thomas & Jimmy: Together With Georgetown Thomas Lloyd (SFS ’15) and Jimmy Ramirez (COL ’15), seek to guide their campaign by adhering to their motto, “Empower Hoyas to build vibrant communities by using innovative tools.”

In order to accomplish this empowerment, Lloyd and Ramirez suggest adopting more liberal open container and medical amnesty policies, expanding the role of the Student Advocacy Office in the judicial process and increasing opportunities for undergraduate research and crossdisciplinary study.

“Vibrant communities” refers to the promotion of free speech rights, increasing space for artistic pursuits, the refurbishment of spaces such as Kehoe Field and initiatives designed to promote diversity in student leadership.

Lastly, “innovative tools,” includes a housing points bonus to incentivize student participation in student group-run events, as

well as technology and sustainability initiatives.

Lloyd emphasized the importance of cultivating an inclusive, welcoming community that fosters diversity and interorganizational cooperation, and how he plans to use incentives to achieve this goal.

“The idea of community is particularly important to

Jimmy and I as people who worked to increase diversity in different organizations,” Lloyd said. “In the GUSA executive, we would want to actually cut the budget of the GUSA Fund to establish incentives for groups to collaborate, so that money is earmarked specifically for programs that deal with collaboration, diversity or safety.”

Zach & Dan: Building Your Georgetown Zach Singer (SFS ’15) and Dan Silkman’s (COL ’15) platform promotes a three-pronged approach to addressing student life at Georgetown. It stresses collaboration between different student groups, particularly through the “What’s a Hoya?” program and GUSA support of previously unrecognized groups on campus.

Additionally, the team seeks to further pluralism at Georgetown through the creation of a leadership fund, which would help students overcome financial burdens, as well as through initiatives designed to enhance the experience of sophomores and transfer students.

The platform additionally includes sustainability, quality student housing in the former Jesuit residence buildings and a fair judiciary process for students as central tenets of its vision for Georgetown’s future.

According to Silkman, the proposed Leadership Fund is a particularly unique and valuable means of promoting opportunities for financially constrained

students.

“We talk about the financial barriers that exist at Georgetown, and we mention the establishment of a leadership fund,” Silkman said. “It will consist of money earmarked in our budget for student leaders on campus who are looking to run for positions that may or may not require financial contributions beyond the candidate’s means.”

Singer described his campaign’s larger theme as a mediator between the student body and the university administration.

“On a lot of the issues, we ask what GUSA can do to address the problem, and what can we do with the administration and how can we convey the needs of the students to the administration,” Singer said.

Trevor & Omika: Connect to Georgetown Trevor Tezel (SFS ’15) and Omika Jikaria’s (SFS ’15) platform is divided into three sections, entitled “connecting to your values,” “connecting to your community” and “connecting to your world.”

The “values” portion deals with issues relating to promoting and expanding free speech, student rights, transparency within GUSA and intercultural understanding on campus. The “community” section addresses the lack of space for the arts on campus, the necessity of renovating Kehoe field and the promotion of entrepreneurship and improvements in campus club funding, among other issues.

The “world” segment advocates the improvement of relations with the larger D.C. community, the implementation of sustainability projects on campus and the adoption of technology designed to improve student life.

Tezel views GUSA’s role as facilitator and advocate for student rights as one of the most

important points of his ticket’s platform.

“We want to connect students to both GUSA and the administration, through things like the multicultural council and holding office hours for GUSA,” Tezel said. “We also want to shore up the code of conduct processes for handling sexual assaults, as well as looking at some of the social polices.”

Jikaria additionally noted the platform’s emphasis on

the promotion of free speech on campus. “Our goal would be to create a campus-wide free speech zone,” Jikaria said. “We want to extend the current freespeech zone and allow for more dialogue.”

Jikaria cited the recent removal of H*yas for Choice from Healy Circle by the Georgetown University Police Department as a restriction she and Tezel would seek to protest if elected.

Ben & Sam: Working for You Ben Weiss (COL ’15) and Sam Greco’s (SFS ’15) campaign focuses largely on eliminating obstacles to student achievement and improving the quality of student life. One of the platform’s five subsections,“#AchieveYours,” stresses the creation of an inclusive campus community dedicated to promoting student growth.

Another section,“Cultivating Student Potential,” advocates a club-first funding approach and the creation of a Central Programming Board to better coordinate large events. Additionally, “A Better Campus,” stresses more green space, food options and study areas, and “Unity, Community and Service” advocates an increased emphasis on pluralism, freshman communitybuilding and the prospect of allowing freshmen to drink in dorm rooms.

The fifth section, “Academics,” addresses the need for standardization of midterm exam timing and more credit opportunities for internships.

Weiss described his ticket’s platform as seeking to drastically alter the role GUSA plays in university life.

“It’s a fundamentally different vision for GUSA. My vision is to help the students of Georgetown achieve their goals,” Weiss said. “I want GUSA to be the facilitator of all of the different passions and initiatives and goals of this incredible student body that we have.”

Weiss additionally mentioned

his student-first funding initiative and focus on entrepreneurship as two factors that particularly differentiate his ticket from the others.

“Everyone has different ideas on things that already exist, but I think these speak to this vision of students and student organizations first,” Weiss said.

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fRIDAY, february 14, 2014

GU Prepares Panel for SXSW Andrew Frank Special to The Hoya

A host of familiar on-campus faces will join the confluence of musicians, intellectuals and techies convening in Austin, Texas, for the annual South

by Southwest Conference including Georgetown University’s Provost Robert Groves, Chief Information Officer Lisa Davis, and Chief Innovation Officer Z. Michael Wang (MSB ’07).

While the conference is held from March 7-16, Georgetown will participate in a pre-conference panel in March, “Designing the Future University From the Inside.”

The path to this year’s conference started last summer when Wang entered Georgetown’s new tech-education proposal to SXSW’s PanelPicker, which decides which entries will be showcased in the conference in March.

After a selection process consisting of both public up-voting of the proposal on PanelPicker and voting by advisory board of educators, administrators and students, Georgetown’s panel was selected to appear at the SXSW conference.

“We had a strong social media push.

We were tweeting about it; we had it on Facebook pages, to generate excitement

and get people to vote for our proposal,” Davis said.

Wang described the panel’s congruence with the university’s current initiatives.

“Being a staff member I saw we were doing these things — we were doing [Initiative on Technology-Enhanced Learning], we were doing Designing the Future. It was a question of how do we get out there and how to get on a platform where people are talking about this and be seen as the leader that we are,” Wang said.

As past attendees of SXSWedu, a three-day educational conference preceding the larger SXSW event SXSWeduattendees, Wang and Davis have found that Georgetown exceeds its peers in synchronizing technology into education.

“We went to SXSW two years ago and there was a lot of conversations that were not happening about some of the simplest things, like Blackboard,” Wang said. “Over the last years we’ve gone more as observers and the thought was this year to have Georgetown be more of a leader in the space and to share what they’ve done.”

One of the biggest challenges Georgetown will have to address in its panel is how to ensure coursework is designed

to account for the rapidly developing knowledge in fields that may render older forms of work obsolete.

“What ‘Designing the Future’ is about is innovating at the degree level so we’re going to experiment with whole new degree programs. Every one of those has some impact on the cost structure of getting that degree,” Groves told The Hoya. “We’re actually anticipating that what you’re learning right now will be obsolete at some point in your life. That’s our burden.”

Georgetown has already incorporated technology like SMART Boards and i>clickers into classrooms and begun to develop massive open online courses like “Globalization’s Winners and Losers: Challenges for Developed and Developing Countries,” which was completed in October 2013 on the edX platform.

Additionally, the university will be holding its second Hackathon SkillHack on Feb. 15, when students, faculty and alumni come together to share ideas about how to design the future of the university, per this year’s initiative.

“The education sector is changing and the goal is to figure out how to adapt with time but also at the same time keep at our core the values of who we are,” Wang said.

DC Candidates Vie for Youth Vote VOTE, from A1 Muriel Bowser (D-Ward 4).

Former State Department official Reta Jo Lewis was quick to point to her experience in local government and continued focus on issues that affect young people — including access to healthcare — as reasons why she is the right person to lead the District.

“I’ve fought for issues all my life that matter to students — good-paying jobs, access to healthcare and health services and equality and inclusion for all people — and throughout my career, I have always had students and young professionals involved in the work that I do,” Lewis said.

With the current Democratic primary shadowed by an ongoing ethics investigation into campaign finance violations during Gray’s 2010 campaign, Gray’s challengers have been quick to point to the need for a leader that young people can trust.

“I think young people are tired of business as usual. They’re tired of seeing politics as a tainted game with money scandals always constantly hovering over the city,” candidate and local restaurateur Andy Shallal said.

Shuff touted Bowser’s role in creating a Board of Ethics and Government Accountability in November 2011 to hold city officials responsible if found guilty on corruption charges or other ethics violations.

“Muriel introduced, passed and then enacted the bill that created the Board of Ethics. She saw what many younger people saw over the last seven years on the council with their behavior and decided she was going to do something about it,” Shuff said.

Improvement of the District’s transportation system is another platform that candidates think appeals specifically to young voters. Wells emphasized his push for a streetcar that would connect Georgetown to the rest of the city.

“The current candidates for mayor voted to end the streetcar for D.C.; I saved it. Running a streetcar to Georgetown and all the way down to the east side of the city really is a way to connect Georgetown and the university to the rest of the city,” Wells said.

Councilmember Jack Evans (D-Ward 2), whose area of representation includes the university, noted that he would use his position as mayor to

move forward plans for a Metro stop in the Georgetown neighborhood.

“Georgetown needs to have a Metro stop after the next round of building.

Metro needs to continue to expand, and we have plans to build another 100 miles of Metro throughout the region. There will be more inner-city lines and more lines in the suburban communities,” Evans said during a December debate in Georgetown.

This field of candidates recognizes the crucial role that D.C. students and young professionals will have in the city’s future. According to Wells — though ultimately no candidate will completely rid the local government of its reputation for corruption — young people shouldn’t be discouraged from engaging in local politics.

“Young people have every reason to be disillusioned — look no further than D.C. government. It’s one of the most corrupt elected governments in the country right now. But while they have every reason to be disillusioned, they have every reason to believe they can help change it,” Wells said.

Mayoral candidate and Councilmember Vincent Orange (D-Ward 5) could not be reached for comment.

Professors Discuss District Diversity POPULATION, from A1 across the Anacostia River to Wards 7 and 8 in search of less expensive housing, creating not only a geographic, but also racial and economic divide.

“I think there are a lot of neighborhoods east of the river that feel left out of the city’s bloom times, and there is a racial dimension to that, as those communities who are left out are almost exclusively African-American communities,” Butler said.

Cashin, author of the forthcoming book “Place, Not Race,” credited this polarization across wards to a recent rise in high-income development in downtown D.C. “I think what’s happening in the District is that higher-income people are pricing out lower-income people, and it may have racial implications,” Cashin said. “People of color, on average, have less money than whites do, but that’s what’s happening. It’s getting more expensive to live in the District.”

Increasing Diversity in the District The growth of the white population, Cashin noted, is a trend unique to the District, as white populations across the country continue to lose their majority status.

“The white people are experiencing a loss of majority status and it isn’t happening everywhere, but a lot of places, and white people have to adjust to that reality. Everybody has to adjust to that reality.

In the future, nobody’s going to be the dominant group,” Cashin said. “[Black people] experienced a loss of political dominance and maybe even cultural dominance. [D.C. is] no longer the Chocolate City; it’s the multiracial city, and black people have had to adjust. But the same thing is happening nationally,” Cashin said.

According to Cashin, with increasing levels of diversity, the District has emerged as a culturally vibrant location with an environment of tangible inclusivity.

“The city is more livable than it used to be, and it’s an exciting, multiracial, I would even say international, place, where a lot of people of all different types come, and there are people who are attracted to it because of that vibrancy and diversity,” Cashin said.

Institutional Polarization This diversity, however, has yet to manifest itself in institutions such as the D.C. Court System or D.C. Public Schools.

“If you go to criminal court in D.C., you would think that white people don’t commit crimes … and we know that for drugs, for example, white residents of D.C. use drugs just as much as the black and Latino residents, so there’s clearly inequality in law enforcement for those kinds of crimes, and that’s a concern,” Butler said.

According to Butler, the high rates of black drug offenders could be due to a higher number of police deployed in predominantly black neighborhoods.

“If the police increased their drug law enforcement in Georgetown or Foggy Bottom or Cleveland Park, then there’d be more white drug offenders who are locked up, so there are racial dimensions to where the police enforce the drug laws,” Butler said.

Georgetown students who tutor in Wards 7 and 8 see that the D.C. Public School System exhibits similar levels of racial polarity across wards.

“I have never seen a student that was not African-American in the schools I’ve worked in,” D.C. Reads Coordinator Emilie Uhrhammer (SFS ’16) said.

Mellie Corrigan (COL’14), who has been a tutor and coordinator for D.C. Reads for

four years, agreed.

“It’s always been predominantly black,” Corrigan said.

Moving Forward Cashin stressed the need for more affordable housing to be built in the city in order to promote greater racial inclusivity.

“We have some policies in place that are designed to retain the affordable housing stock, but my fear is that the city is becoming more like Paris where, in Paris, lower-income people and communities of color can live out in the suburbs,” she said.

Cashin cited the District’s inclusionary zoning ordinance, a requirement that all new residential developments set aside a certain percentage of their units for affordable, lower income housing, as one way to increase the city’s diversity by ensuring that less wealthy families are afforded the same opportunity to live in the District as higher-income individuals.

“It’s weak. It’s not as robust as it could be,” Cashin said.

Butler agreed that the D.C. should prioritize lower-income housing to maintain its current levels of diversity.

“I always think it’s a problem when cities lose their diversity, including racial diversity, and class diversity, so I think the city should make a black warranty of establishing low-income quality housing,” Butler said.

Nevertheless, Cashin is hopeful that the District’s increasingly multiethnic identity will work to inform the diversity of its institutions.

“I do think that where the District is going with this can be a positive story and there are very positive aspects to it, but we have to have the right policies in place for making our neighborhoods and our institutions inclusive in the way that works for everybody,” Cashin said.

GUSA Race Starts With a Whimper KICKOFF, from A1 not present in Red Square to the walkway leading to the Leavey Center, opposite where the Singer-Silkman and LloydRamirez teams were attempting to hang theirs. Many of these individuals were members of the College Democrats, for which Tezel served as president, including Joe Laposata (COL ’16) and Bethan Saunders (SFS ’17). KC Crewdson (SFS ’15), an events coordinator for the TezelJikaria campaign, had offered the use of the team’s ladder to any team that

needed it at the start of the night.

“I think this is hysterical,” Weiss said, after the truce was called. “Honestly, campaigning is so much fun, crazy stuff happens and I’m sure this won’t be the last thing like this.”

Silkman felt confident that his staff would complete the task once the weather allowed it.

“It’s unfortunate, but we’ll give it another stab at it tomorrow, whenever the snow stops or it gets warmer,” Silkman said.

Although they could not make it

to Red Square, Tezel and Jikaria have been planning different types of advertising, including setting up a table on the second floor of Lauinger Library, knocking on doors and posting flyers inside buildings, as is common for GUSA candidates.

“I’m really excited for it to get going,” Tezel said. “It was a whirlwind of activity right at midnight, and that carried over into today.”

By Thursday evening, after the snow had turned to a light rain, all four teams had managed to hang their banners.

ERICA WONG/THE HOYA

Tyler James (COL ’15), left, sells a Valentine’s Day candy gram to Sydney Clairborne (COL ’17) in the Leavey Center on Wednesday.

Clubs Ready for Valentine’s Day Maddy Moore

Special to The Hoya

Through various campaigns and events, Valentine’s Day marked a special day for campus groups, as several organizations planned fundraising campaigns, selling a range of items from roses to condoms, while others used the day to advocate on behalf of their club.

Candy grams remain a popular tradition, as this year the Georgetown College Democrats sold them as a fundraiser. Students may send the candy grams to a person of their choosing, along with a personalized note.

“We usually just raise money through Semi-Formal, but this semester we have a new department and it is the first of many new fundraisers to come,” GUCD Board Member Sara Margolis (COL ’16) said.

For unofficial clubs, Valentine’s Day marks a great opportunity to receive donations since they do not receive funding from Georgetown.

H*yas for Choice, for example, put its own creative twist on the gram tradition by attaching one condom to each.

“It’s important for us to come up with creative and fun ways to generate revenue. … The [grams] have fun things like ‘no glove, no love,’” H*yas for Choice Vice President Abby Grace (SFS ’16) said.

The Campus Life Working Group additionally organized a semi-formal event, HeartBEATS, sponsored

by The Corp, WGTB and the Senior Class Committee. Friday’s 9 p.m. event in Copley Formal Lounge will feature five different musical groups from the Georgetown community. Groups will include The Ripples, a student jazz combo, the GU Chamber Quartet, the ladies of Georgetown’s Resonant Essence Live and Atomic Man.

“We wanted to create an event where the diversity of music could be highlighted in one show,” student organizer Brian Moran (COL ’14) said. “This is not a couples’ thing and is not supposed to be exclusive of anyone. … This is a great opportunity to showcase music on campus.”

Some organizations use the holiday to promote their mission and recruit more students to join. Georgetown’s Sexual Assault Peer Educators is hosting SAPE-ACERTS, where members will hand out free Sprinkles cupcakes and explore healthy sexuality.

GlobeMed planned a Valentine’s Day fundraiser central to their mission, with members selling roses and donating all the profits to Primeros Pasos, a health clinic for women and children in Guatemala. At time of writing, the club was unsure whether the sale would proceed because of the inclement weather.

“GlobeMed might have to cancel the sale because the flowers couldn’t be delivered Thursday,” GlobeMed Co-President Aishling Thurow (NHS ’15) said. “It’s unfortunate because we were slated to raise $500 for Primeros Pasos.”

The Georgetown 1634 Society will also continue their One for Georgetown Campaign throughout Valentine’s Day with a cupcake and rose giveaway. The campaign hopes to encourage philanthropy among young students through fun events centered on professionalism, networking and alumni relations. The ultimate goal of the Valentine’s Day event is to be a presence on campus and encourage students to show their gratitude to both the university and its alumni.

“It’s a symbolic gesture. We want to say that we are grateful,” member Sara Carioscia (COL ’17) said.

Former Speaker Talks Bipartisanship Laura Owsiany Special to The Hoya

Former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert (R-IL) engaged students with a discussion of his lengthy career in Congress as well as the future of bipartisanship in an ideologically divided Congress Tuesday evening in Reiss.

The event, sponsored by the GU College Republicans and the International Relations Club, began after Hastert greeted many in the audience personally. The former speaker detailed his rise in politics from Illinois high school teacher to longest-serving Republican Speaker of the House, from 1999-2007.

“People in politics are just real people. I was a kid in the cornfields, I never expected ever to have a role in government, but I did. Everybody has an opportunity to do it,” Hastert said.

Hastert cited ideological differences between parties as the main source of heated policy battles in today’s government while emphasizing the need for trust and bipartisanship in politics.

“I would tell everybody who came in, whether Democrat or Republican, what the bill was, what the amendment was … I got to know everybody in the Congress, both sides,” Hastert said of his time as Chief Deputy Whip.

“And there was this trust that you built up … If you’re not honest with someone, if your word’s not good, in politics trust is everything.”

Hastert spoke at length about immigration reform, about which he expressed regret for being unable to implement during his time as Speaker.

“We need to secure our borders.

There’s a lot of drug stuff that has to be secured, but along with that, these people need to have some sort of legitimacy in our society and take

a road to citizenship just like everybody else,” Hastert said. “A lot of immigrants are entrepreneurs, business people; they want to come here and improve their life and their economic value for their family. So support for those other diverse groups, too, that we need to bring in the party, and I think what we’ve done is kind of narrow down the party and be exclusionary.”

When asked his views on improving the Republican Party’s prospects for the 2016 presidential election and beyond, Hastert touted the need for inclusivity.

“It has to be a party of inclusion, not exclusion. And so I think we ought to open the doors and bring in as many people as possible, people who have philosophical agreement with us, people who are center-right … ” Hastert said.

Hastert’s informal approach and humble backstory garnered approval from student attendees across the aisle.

“I call myself a Democrat, but that doesn’t mean I’m not open to hearing a Republican … I come to Georgetown from a very similar place, from a farm community, and to have an opportunity to come to this school and to hear people like him speak is an amazing opportunity,” Tyler Bridge (COL ’17) said.

IRC Deputy Director of Outreach Sam Kleinman (COL ’16), was pleased with the event’s uniqueness.

“The IRC was just so excited to cohost an event with a group we don’t often get to interface with … And it’s incredibly important, not only for the IRC, but for the Georgetown community in general, to engender a wideranging discussion for every kind of viewpoint and every kind of opinion on campus, not just the ones we usually hear,” Kleinman said.

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VALENTINE’S DAY MESSAGES To Copley 321-323, I love you all more than Group Nap, Sundaes on Tuesday, Coptoberfest shenanigans, and dressing up Lamp for the holidays. The chocolate milk may have gone bad yesterday but, hey, what we’ve got has no expiration date.

Madison

To all of our wonderful members: “Roses are red, Violets are blue, I’d sprain my ankle any day Just to call any of you” Love from the GERMS seniors

Mern, Hello, this is Flern. I’m writing to you today to invite you to my youse to snugeru and catch fish.

Perhaps we can dine on some delicious smushi as well. I like when you hold my yams and tell me I’m perfect. I think you’re perfect, too.

Love, Flern

To City News Dep Suzanne Monyak, There once was a Dep With a pep in her step Who kicked all the blues Out of City News With her horseback riding shoes And inability to booze We all know that you, Suze, Are da best part of da News Crew.

Love, Mama Mads Rohan Shetty, You are one of the kindest gentlemen on campus. You have a great smile and an infectious laugh, and I just can’t stop thinking about you.

You complete me. I just wish you knew. Happy Valentine’s Day. Anonymous

Maddie Augostini, To the girl who fell at Yates in the last snowstorm...I can’t stop thinking about you, the way you can’t stop thinking about that bruise. I wish you would fall into my life the way you fell down those stairs.

Anonymous

Dear Catholic Daughters & GU Right to Life, Thank you for your constant support and defense of the “Right to Life” on our campus. Be our valentines?

Happy Valentine’s Day Georgetown Knights of Columbus

From The Hoya’s Fall 2013 production staff

Hope you get what you want this Valentine’s Day

It ain’t no skit; your love is no skam: you’ve deputised each other’s hearts, such is the way of the Campus News fam.

Love, your very supportive editor, Mallika

Happy Birthday and Happy Valentine’s Day Michal.

Love, the Directors

This could be you.

Love, the Sales Department

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fRIDAY, february 14, 2014

Symposium Sparks Curiosity Institute Already Gene Choi

Hoya Staff Writer

Bright-eyed, budding young scientists and researchers got the rare opportunity to present amateur scientific research to a professional audience when Georgetown played host to the Junior Science and Humanities Symposium Jan. 9 to 10.

Held at the Georgetown University Medical Center, the annual event brings together high school students across the region to present independent research and attend lectures from leading researchers, including those representing the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and the Army Research Laboratory.

“This event allows Georgetown to exemplify our commitment to excellence and scholarship and supports our area high school teachers’ efforts to groom future science scholars,” Program Director Joy Williams said.

Now in its 52nd year, the Symposium was the brainchild of Fr. Francis Heyden, S.J., a professor of astronomy and director of the university observatory, who pioneered research in solar eclipses during his time on campus.

“The goal of JSHS is to encourage high school students to prepare for careers in science and research and introduce them to people who are creating new knowledge and love what they are doing,” Williams said.

Extending an invitation to all high schools in the D.C. region, this year’s symposium was attended by 130 students from 26 local schools.

“The tours, seminars and keynote speeches were fascinating and inspirational. The presentations allowed stu-

dents to be exposed to a variety of different topics and excited us about science,” winner of this year’s $2,000 scholarship Kristi Kan, said.

In April, Kan, a 12th grade student at Centennial High School in Ellicott City, Md., will bring her research project on “The Effects of LED Light Exposure on Strawberry Quality in a Simulated Retail Setting” to the national level of the symposium in D.C., where she will compete for up to $12,000 in undergraduate scholarships. For Kan, however, the regional win has been enough to buoy her interests in food science and nutrition.

“Winning this competition and advancing to the nationals gave me confidence to pursue the sciences further,” Kan said. “Last year in my physics and chemistry classes, I was one of the few girls, and that was a bit intimidating. But winning the Greater Washington JSHS really encouraged me to pursue STEM research further.”

The collaborative nature of the symposium not only gives students an opportunity to interact with leaders in the scientific field, but provides a platform for students to engage professionals in stimulating discussion on some of the largest challenges facing the scientific community.

“It is exciting to bring together students from across the metropolitan area and to encourage their interaction,” Williams said. “The scientists and professors are often inspired by the students’ enthusiasm and encouraged by their commitment which assures some of the unrelenting challenges of today may have solutions tomorrow.”

According to former program director Douglas Eagles, by targeting talented

youth, the JSHS has been able to instill a spirit of curiosity and creativity in promising young minds.

“The beauty of this competition and the entire event lies in the innocence of scientific discovery and in catching these kids while they are still curious,” Eagles said.

Beyond intellectual curiosity, participants have the opportunity to be awarded financial scholarships for their showcased research.

“The opportunity for students to submit research projects in competition for the regional scholarships has provided an incentive to area teachers to encourage their students to expend the time and effort required to develop a worthy project,” Williams said. “Seeing and hearing their peers’ presentations has encouraged students to seek research opportunities they might not have considered.”

The competition also provides opportunities for participants to network with peers and professionals alike, with many participants going on to intern for scientific organizations.

“I also met other talented high school students who did amazing research, and I look forward to keeping in touch with them,” Kan said.

For Williams, the competition has provided an invaluable opportunity for GUMC faculty members and scientifically engaged youth to interact.

“My involvement in this program has been immensely rewarding because it keeps me in touch with the excellent science that is being done on this campus and allows me to connect the broader community to our extraordinary faculty,” Williams added.

GUSA Restricts Door-Knocking Sydney Winkler Special to The Hoya

Door-knocking for the upcoming Georgetown University Student Association will be restricted to weekdays between 6 p.m. and 10 p.m., with the exception of election day, after the GUSA senate passed a recent resolution to restrict doorknocking hours, which was signed by GUSA President Nate Tisa (SFS ’14) Feb 3.

Any door-knocking outside of the specified hours will be a violation of election campaign rules.

“It shows that GUSA is listening to students,” Tisa said. “It’s pretty simple and just common sense.”

Senator Cannon Warren (SFS ’14), a former presidential candidate, introduced the bill, which his former running mate, Senator Andrew Logerfo (COL ’14), and Senator Patrick Spagnuolo (SFS ’14) cosponsored.

The resolution is similar to a past failed bill, in which Warren attempted to pass a campus-wide referendum to prohibit all door-knocking during GUSA Senate and executive elections. The bill, which was introduced in February 2013, failed by a margin of 17 to 3.

“If you ever catch the Senate by surprise or they think you are trying to pull one over on them, they will react very negatively,” Warren said.

“Hopefully, people are going to see how much better their life is,” Warren said referring the recently passed bill.

“The people who suffer most from doorknocking aren’t necessarily the people who are having their door knocked upon but the stupid campaign staffers who are somehow roped into knocking on 8,000 doors for a GUSA candidate.”

However, some attribute the large voter turnout in recent student elections, over 50 percent, to door-knocking efforts.

“An outright ban would start tak-

ing away from the legitimacy of what GUSA has built up over the past several years,” GUSA presidential candidate and senator Ben Weiss (COL ’15) said.

“To entirely ban door-knocking would have been to drastically step back how much GUSA could be able to do for the everyday student.”

The limitation of door-knocking will remove the emphasis from knocking on the most doors possible during campaign season.

“It should actually give the campaigns a breather of their own because now it is guaranteed that only during that four-hour window will people be door-knocking,” Tisa said.

Candidates are hopeful that this resolution will focus the scope of communication between students and candidates.

“I think each year you are starting to see GUSA campaigns that are continuing to innovate and figure out ways to get their message across, which I think is incredibly useful for an informed electorate,” presidential candidate Trevor Tezel (SFS ’15) said.

As a previous door-knocker and active member in GUSA, Tezel asserted that he can see how other students, with no direct role in GUSA, can find it vexing.

“I was in GUSA, I was interested in a lot of these issues, so it never annoyed me personally, but I could sometimes see how students could be a bit annoyed by the frequency of door-knockers,” Tezel said.

Although the regulation of doorknocking will diminish its prominence in campaigning strategy, Tezel does not foresee an elimination of door-knocking altogether.

“A lot of people who vote on those bills are the ones who might be needing to utilize that the next time they are running,” Tezel said. “I think there still is an intrinsic value in having that face-to-face

connection with voters.”

While the bill was centered on protecting the privacy and peace of mind of students, some students don’t hold strong feelings about door knocking.

“I don’t have strong feelings on the policy either way,” Scott Syroka (COL ’16) said. “Plus, life is too short to waste your energy getting angry about someone knocking on your door during campaign season.”

Eamon Johnston (SFS ’17) is witnessing a GUSA campaign for the first time.

“I feel like I might have preconceived notions of the candidates from very limited interaction, so it might be nice to actually talk to them or talk to someone who works with them,” Johnston said.

Although a poll conducted by The Hoya after the GUSA executive election last year indicated that 58 percent of the 793 students polled specified that they disliked door knocking the most out of all campaign methods, Zach Singer (SFS ’15), another presidential candidate, is confident that students want to know about the issues and happenings in GUSA. “I have personally seen a big change in the way people responded to GUSA my freshman year and the way people respond to GUSA today, which is a positive change I think,” Singer said. “GUSA is becoming more and more relevant, which means the elections have become more relevant.”

Overall, candidates agreed that it is important for students to be informed about candidates and what GUSA is doing.

“The way that GUSA has worked is that there are roughly three weeks a year, one week during Senate elections and two during the presidential elections, when GUSA tries to go out and let everyone know what we have been doing and what we want to do,” Weiss said.

A World Player Hannah Post

er, is steered by a three-person faculty committee: Robert Egnell, the institute’s senior research advisor who The Georgetown Institute for Wom- is director of teaching and a visiting en, Peace and Security has striven to associate professor in the security incorporate the female role in peace studies program, Susan Martin, the and security agreements, negotia- director of the Institute of the Study tions and movements since its incep- of Migration and Katherine Marshall, tion in December 2011. It is now at the an SFS faculty member and senior felforefront of women’s involvement in low at the Berkley Center for Religion, international affairs characterized by Peace and World Affairs. Its home a rapidly changing global landscape. within the SFS has allowed it to gain “The institute was established with attention on the international stage. an ambitious but focused objective: “Georgetown, especially the SFS, is a to serve as a hub for knowledge, in- pretty big name school and it is very novation, research, information and visible. The institute helps to bring a platform to better understand and the issue of women and security to illustrate to the effect of women’s the international stage to Georgeparticipation in peace and security town in a much bigger way than it efforts and what impact that has,” has before,” Sackler said.

GIWPS Assistant Director Mayesha Verveer described the reception Alam said. the institute has received as positive.

The institute, which was launched “I would say that it has been particuby honorary founding chair Hillary larly gratifying to get more support Rodham Clinton, has been hailed from multilateral institutions, from as a vital effort to ensure women’s upper governments, from governroles in peacekeeping efforts. ment leaders, from people who un“We are trying to look at the gap derstand the importance of the issue, about why women are such powerful and our plea is that we have such a actors in the grassroots civil-society singular focus in the importance for sector but their role is not translated research on these issues, so the recepinto formal peace negotiations. Why tivity has been particularly encouragaren’t women getting a seat at the ing,” Verveer said. table?” GIWPS Research Assistant The GIWPS serves the Georgetown Hannah Beswick (GRD ’14) said. community through promoting Currently, the institute is focusing on awareness, research and discussion. It how women has organized find success events like in peacekeep“Advancing ing negotiaAfghan Womtions. en: Promot“Right now ing Peace and we are trying Progress in to narrow our Afghanistan,” case studies in which Secand focus on retary of State cases where John Kerry, jenna sackler (sfs ’14) women were Laura Bush GIWPS Student Contributor active in civiland Hillary society efforts but also active in the Clinton spoke. actual, formal process. We’re looking “The event was a huge statement at these success stories to see what that the institute is a really big player made these women successful,” Bes- in the field and a really important wick said. source of information for activism On campus, the institute, which is and research,” Student Contributor housed in the School of Foreign Ser- Rachel Firestone (GRD ’15) said. vice, created its first graduate-level Since its founding, the institute seminar this semester: “Women, has upheld its goal to support the Peace and Security.” The course is role of women in peace and security. jointly led by Alam and GIWPS Execu- “It has been particularly gratifying tive Director Melanne Verveer (I ’66, to get more support from multilatGRD ’69). eral institutions, from upper govern“It is extremely important be- ments, from government leaders, cause, as an educational institution, from people who understand the imwe are supposed to be preparing the portance of our issue. We are off to a next generation of leaders and well- very strong start,” Verveer said. equipped professionals no matter GIWPS aims to continue serving what arena you go into. More and the Georgetown and global commumore there are issues related to peace nities in the future. and security, and it is no longer just “We have proven that we are here left to politicians and government of- to serve the Georgetown community ficials,” Alam said. but we are bringing added value to GIWPS provides research as- the Georgetown community and sistant and fellowship pro- Georgetown’s outreach to the larger gram opportunities; it also al- community,” Alam said.“We have belocates a small research fund for come a global convening power. We faculty to encourage those interested are here to stay but we are also here in women’s peace and security. to be a resource for the wider world, The directors of the institute are ac- which requires growth, innovation, cessible to students due to the inti- flexibility and adaptability.” mate nature of these programs.

Verveer spoke on her hopes for the “Because the institute is small and future of the institute. relatively new, it is all very personal.

“I want it to grow in both in recEven with how busy Mayesha is, she ognition and capacity to address has still been able to get me on Am- the critical issues that is our misbassador Verveer’s schedule. They sion. I would like to see it have both have been super helpful to students,” a continuing strong impact for the said Student Contributor Jenna Sack- university, as well as the betterment ler (SFS ’14), who is an Institute for the of the world,” she said. “The ability Study of Diplomacy Humes Fellow. to have a growing positive impact The institute, which is under the is something we certainly hope for guidance of SFS Dean Carol Lancast- and well work for.”

Special to The Hoya

“Because the institute is small and new it’s all very personal.”

Lannan Center Writer-in-Residence Recounts Tales of Youth Hannah Post

Special to The Hoya

Tope Folarin, the Caine Prize Winner for African Writing, read his short story “Miracle” aloud to a packed audience at Copley Formal Lounge on Feb. 11.

Folarin, a Lannan Center Writer-in-Residence, read the entirety of “Miracle,” which details his upbringing as a son of two Nigerian citizens in the United States.

This piece explores an experience Folarin had in a Nigerian evangelical church in Texas and highlights his desire for miracles and hope.

“I tried to expose the lies in the interest of truth. The core of the story is that the miracle doesn’t necessarily happen; it just matters that these people leave with hope. They need this miracle to happen. It is absolutely necessary,” Folarin said at the reading.

Folarin will reside at Georgetown for a month to meet with students, visit classes and take an active part in the intellectual life of the university as part of his Caine Prize.

“Folarin is an exciting new voice in American and African writing, bringing an extraordinary attention to craft to bear on challenging questions of identity. We are very privileged to have him with us at Georgetown for a month, as part of the Caine Prize residency,” English professor Coilin Parsons said.

Judges selected “Miracle” from over 100 stories, compared it with four other finalists and then chose it as the winner of the Caine Prize.

Tope used his experiences to speak to the larger immigrant community about identity issues.

“We need our parents to realize that we are American, and we need our children to realize that they are Nigerian,” Folarin said.

Listeners were moved by Folarin’s story.

“I found the presentation excellent. As an immigrant, I really related to the dysphoria he was writing about,” said Jason Park, a student at American University.

Other students were impressed with Folarin’s early success as a writer.

“For an author so young in his literary career, to win such an award and be such a composed reader was very cool,” Danny Falasca (MSB ’16) said.

The highly attended event filled Copley Formal to its capacity.

“He was a very powerful speaker. It was fascinating how his life and African-American roots contributed to his identity as a writer,” Irene Koo (COL ’16) said.

The Lannan Center for Poetics and Social Practice, which sponsors this event annually, picked Folarin according to the Caine jury, which the English department holds a seat on.

“Tope Folarin is not only a very gifted writer, but a talented public reader of his work. The students have been thrilled by their discussions with him and his visits to classes,” Lannan Center Director Carolyn Forche said.

Folarin’s February residence entails classroom visits and meetings with students.

English Professor Nathan Hensley, who delivered Folarin’s introduction, served as one of the five judges on the panel for the 2013 Caine Prize.

“The Caine is supremely important in identifying new talent, and Tope is a brilliant and exciting winner in that respect,” Hensley wrote in an e-mail.

CHARLIE LOWE/THE HOYA

Writer-in-Residence Tope Folarin reads from his short story “Miracle” in Copley Formal Lounge on Tuesday.

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Pinstripes Bangladeshi Workers Recount Collapse Looks to Impress Sydney Winkler Special for The Hoya

PINSTRIPES, from A10 Wisconsin Avenue, Pinstripes aims to differentiate itself through the bowling and bocce aspect as well as its capacity to host large events.

“We can host sororities, fraternities, graduation parties, you name it. We can do events for 20 people; we can do private parties for 800 people,” Shwartz said. “Of course we can always do lunch, dinner and brunch for when students have parents or family in town. It’s a terrific venue to come and enjoy with the family.”

Having over 30,000 square feet of space makes the restaurant a prime location for events. Pinstripes plans to target public and private sector retreats, conferences and receptions in its upscale space, while also providing a unique entertainment experience.

Shwartz is confident in the success of the Georgetown location because of the uniqueness of the company’s business model.

Shwartz indicated that “the bowling and bocce is a differentiator for events” relative to other entertainment options in the area.

“Instead of just going to a hotel or a restaurant, the fact is that people can enjoy socializing with bowling and bocce during, before or after eating and drinking,” he said. “For a lot of our customers our food is strikingly good, so a lot of people come just to eat with us for lunch or dinner, but there’s added luxury of coming to eat and then playing bocce or bowling, or having a filet mignon and cocktail while bowling; it’s just a more dynamic space.”

Pinstripes aims to capture the college and young adult crowd through live jazz on Friday and Saturday nights with no cover charge, happy hour Monday through Friday, 3pm7pm and 9pm till closing. Sunday brunch will be starting this week.

Students are enthusiastic about Pinstripes’ opening.

“I’m really excited to go bowl at Pinstripes,” Corey Hsu (COL ’16) said.

“It harkens back to the days of high school and offers a new option in the already diverse scene that is Georgetown nightlife.”

In the near future Pinstripes is also looking to open locations in the Bethesda/Rockville, Md area and in Tysons Corner, Va.

The Georgetown Solidarity Committee, in coordination with the United Students Against Sweatshops organization, held an event on Wednesday with survivors of the 2013 Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh, discussing the struggle for safe workplaces in the wake of deadly factory disasters.

According to USAS International Campaigns Coordinator Garrett Strain, poor conditions in factories are becoming a growing issue because of the competition between factories to produce goods at a lower price.

“It puts factory owners in a position that they are operating on such low margins that there is not even enough money left over to do basic things like make their factory safe for their workers,” Strain said. “No factory owner wants to operate a factory that could burn down or collapse at any minute.”

USAS, founded in 1997, is an independent monitoring organization that investigates working conditions in factories all over the world that produce collegiate apparel. Its goal is to put pressure on factories to improve labor conditions and to pressure universities not to do business with companies with unhealthy working environments.

Last year, USAS ran a campaign against Adidas after the apparel conglomerate refused to pay $1.8 million in severance pay to disadvantaged workers. The campaign produced the largest collegiate boycott of a major sportswear company in history, after which 17 universities ended their contracts with Adidas, including Georgetown. Adidas came to an agreement in April 2013 to compensate 2,700 former Indonesian garment employees.

“That victory came about because of students like you who made an intentional decision to stand in solidarity with workers on the other end of the supply chain,” Strain said.

The guest speakers at Wednesday’s event, Kalpona Akter and Reba Sikder, have spent years working in Bangladeshi factories.

Sikder, 19, was trapped in the rubble of the Rana Plaza for two days before she was finally rescued. She is now actively involved in organizing efforts to reform Bangladeshi labor practices. Akter

translated the story on her behalf.

“I started as a domestic worker when I was seven years old,” Sikder said. “When I was 14 years old, I began to work as a factory worker in an attempt to earn more money.”

When Sikder finally found job stability at Rana Plaza, she was paid $90 a month for 110 hours of work per week. Her shifts lasted on average from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m.

On top of the low pay and long hours, the working conditions at the Rana Plaza were subpar.

“One day, after working two hours, I saw that my coworkers were rushed to leave the factory,” Sikder said. “There was a crack in the building and that’s when they said we should go home now and come back at 2 p.m.”

When they came back to work, managers told the workers that the building was fine and that they should come to work the next morning. The next morning, though, workers were in a dilemma whether they should go inside or not.

“Managers started yelling at them and said ‘Are you afraid to die? Let’s go inside and die together,’” Sikder said. “Then I went to the machine and started my work.

When they started the generator, I heard one big sound and everything started collapsing.”

Sikder then remembers regaining consciousness and struggling to find her way around in the darkness. Sikder recounted the screaming and crying of her coworkers from every direction. She found a way out when a coworker felt air from outside.

“Suddenly, one of my coworkers found that there was some air coming from outside,” Sikder said. “We saw someone breaking the wall and rubble and we started screaming and finally he heard our voice.”

Sikder was rescued after two and a half days of being trapped in Rana Plaza. She broke down into tears when she recalled losing many of her coworkers. Sikder has used this traumatic experience as her motivation for fighting against poor working conditions in Bangladesh and abroad.

“I want my compensation and all of the factories to be safe for us,” Sikder said.

Akter is a former child garment worker herself but now serves as an internationally recognized labor rights advocate. She travels from university to university with USAS to spread her history of fac-

CHARLIE LOWE/THE HOYA

Left to right: Reba Sikder and Kalpona Akter recount their experiences working in the Rana Plaza apparel factory in Bangladesh. tory labor.

“It’s happening because of the huge ignorance from the factory owners, the government, and especially from the companies who let our workers die in these factories,” Akter said.

Akter advocated for the importance of the Accord on Fire and Building Safety, a legal code that has been signed by over 150 apparel corporations from 20 countries in Europe, North America, Asia and Australia. The accord was drafted in May 2013, following the disaster in Rana Plaza.

“For the first time in history, it is signed by the companies with unions,” Akter said. “That has never happened.”

The accord also states that independent inspectors will look at factories for fire or electrical violations and, after the inspection, the report will be brought to the workers on what needs to be improved. Then the company must pay for the repairs that are listed in the report without docking employee wages to cover the expenses.

As reported in a recent The Hoya

article (“GU Protects Bangladesh Workers,” A1, Feb. 7, 2014), Georgetown signed the accord and now requires all trademark licenses that produce products in Bangladesh to abide by the new legal code in order to protect workers.

“The main culprit for these factory disasters in Bangladesh is a company called VF Corporation, which owns Jansport, North Face, Timberland and several other companies,” Strain said. “And if you want to take action and improve working conditions in Bangladesh, you can go to your nearest store to put pressure on the company to take responsibility for safety conditions in Bangladesh.”

In an interview after the event, Akter reemphasized her call to action for Georgetown students.

“We are calling them to look on VF, because they are one of the suppliers for your university so, if they don’t sign the accord, students should raise their voice to the university to cut their contract with them,” Akter said.

“Without the accord, it will be the same disaster as Rana Plaza.”

Professors Top Dean’s List Andrew Frank Special to The Hoya

German professor Astrid Weigert, Department of Performing Arts Chair Maya Roth and biology professor Gina Wimp received the Dean’s Award for Excellence in Teaching at the Convocation of College Faculty on Jan. 23.

In order to be considered for the award, a professor must be nominated by their department, with a letter of nomination from the department chair and two colleagues’ recommendation letters. The professor must also draft a statement of teaching philosophy.

In the final decision, the teacher’s syllabi and past student evaluations are also considered.

“Before electronic student evaluations, you had to say how many students were in each course, how many actually filled out the application and how many didn’t. It’s a good chunk of work,” Weigert said. After being nominated several times, she considered declining this year’s nomination because of the amount of work entailed.

This year’s professors have each taught at Georgetown for at least six years and developed their own courses in their respective fields.

Roth is one of five facultyin-residence on campus, living in LXR. Roth became a faculty-in-residence in 2008 when she had a son and, as it enabled her to continue some of her work more easily.

“I don’t know how I could have been a mother and be in rehearsals at night times without being a faculty-inresidence,” Roth said. “It also made my experience more integrated, allowed me to interact with a much wider range of students and gave me a better pulse on what students’ experiences are and that has shaped how I structure my courses.”

Roth began teaching at Georgetown in 2003 and served as the founding Artistic Director of the Davis Perform-

BENJAMIN APPLEY EPSTEIN FOR THE HOYA

Professor of biology Gina Wimp was one of three professors awarded the Dean’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. ing Arts Center from 2005 to 2007. She has developed 14 different courses and directed 10 original shows, in addition to her role in opening the Davis Performing Arts Center. In her position as department chair, she shaped the theater and performance studies major to emphasize artistic excellence and the liberal arts.

Of 54 total recipients in the award’s history, she is only the fourth performing arts professor to be recognized.

“I’m moved, proud, honored by the folks who are going into other fields and other traditional graduate jobs, for whom [a performing arts class] was central to their formation. To have them affirm that was really meaningful,” Roth said.

Wimp played an integral part in designing the environmental biology major, and she helped to develop two new courses, “Ecological Analysis” and “Global Climate Change Ecology.”

Wimp additionally researches genetic and environmental factors that structure biodiversity, all while teaching.

“The time allocation pro-

cess can be incredibly difficult, but I’ve learned you have to use every single time slot as you can as efficiently as possible,” Wimp said.

Despite Wimp’s many commitments, her favorite part of her profession remains her interactions with students.

“Really students are the best part of my job. You do feel a sense of elation when you get your papers published or a grant funded, but there’s something different about actually watching somebody grow up as a scientist and watching them succeed,” Wimp said.

Weigert has developed classes about German business culture, Romanticism and German-speaking countries.

“I really would like to dedicate this award to my entire department because my development as a teacher really didn’t happen in isolation,” Weigert said. “We have a very collaborative process here and that really allowed me to try out different things, to develop, to consult my colleagues. I think that’s incredibly valued here.”

BUSINESS FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2014

COMMENTARY

Innovators Laud Beeck Center Launch

NATASHA KHAN Hoya Staff Writer

Cherie Chung

Startup Spirit Across Campus

‘S

o if you’re interested in entrepreneurship, why aren’t you in the business school?”

I’m often asked this by my peers who don’t understand why I am part of StartupHoyas, the Compass Fellowship and have interned at the Small Business Administration and with D.C. Entrepreneurship Week — all while studying political economy in the School of Foreign Service. However, I have found that there is a unique synergy between the content of my classes and what I’m learning through entrepreneurship.

My classes strive to understand poverty, inequality, unemployment and economic development through a systemic approach, that focuses on the big picture. But entrepreneurship provides me with greater perspective because it dives into the details. It focuses on the individual actors in the system and how they can tackle these seemingly insurmountable problems through startups. Entrepreneurs are the ones that put wheels into motion and spark change, and through their startups they spur economic growth and create jobs. Because of that, entrepreneurship is an important economic tool for many countries; in the United States, spurring entrepreneurship is a crucial part of both our domestic and foreign policy agenda.

But entrepreneurship doesn’t just

Why don’t more students outside the MSB engage in entrepreneurship? relate to my major; it complements any field of study because entrepreneurship is not just an economic tool. It is a mindset — one in which you constantly envision new solutions to old problems. It’s about igniting your passion and applying innovation, creativity and risktaking to it.

As a result, entrepreneurship does not, and should not, belong exclusively to any particular school, major, career or vocation. In fact, the most successful startups are the ones that can capitalize on the synergy created through collaboration across sectors and disciplines. Here at Georgetown, we need students from the School of Nursing and Health Studies to create medical technology startups, we need computer science majors to code applications and build websites and we need science majors to create clean energy startups. We need students studying government, writing, law, international relations and linguistics to contribute their expertise to startups. We need anyone that wants to shake up systems and fundamentally reinvent the way we do things.

Here is the question I’d like to pose to my peers: Why aren’t there more students getting involved with entrepreneurship from outside the MSB? To students in the College, NHS and SFS, I would encourage you to seek out opportunities to develop this entrepreneurial mindset within you, no matter what your major. Everyone has a crazy idea that they want to realize. What distinguishes an entrepreneur from anyone else is that they go out and make it happen — so get out there. Take an area that you’re really passionate about and pursue it. Broaden your horizons by attending a workshop or speaker event, pitching an idea at a competition or by starting your own venture. In the end, college is all about having learning experiences, and there is no better way to learn than through entrepreneurship.

Cherie Chung is a sophomore in the School of Foreign Service and the editor-in-chief at StartupHoyas.

The Beeck Center for Social Impact and Innovation’s launch Tuesday included speeches and workshops by some of the new center’s key figures, who stressed the center’s global role at the university and the social impact it hopes to achieve.

The activities at the launch included a speech by donors Alberto and Olga María Beeck (SFS ’81), a panel discussion with the center’s Executive Director Sonal Shah, founder of HopeLab and Humanity United and co-founder of the Omidyar Network and Ulupono Initiative Pam Omidyar, and Case Foundation co-founder and CEO Jean Case. Afterward, Singularity University Founding Executive Director Salim Ismail shared his thoughts on technological change and growth in today’s world, and attendees participated in two workshops on design thinking and storytelling.

The day’s events were held in celebration of the $10 million donation given by the Beecks to launch the center, which is located in ICC 100 and will operate under the Office of the Provost. Former economics professor and Founding Director of the White House Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation Sonal Shah will lead the center as founding executive director.

“The Beeck Center for Social Impact and Innovation enables Georgetown to more quickly anticipate and respond to the everevolving and shifting challenges of contemporary society,” University President John J. DeGioia said. “As our world changes, we too must evolve.”

Alberto and Olga María Beeck have a longstanding relationship with the university, beginning with Olga María Beeck’s enrollment in the School of Foreign Service in 1977. She currently serves on the SFS Board of Regents and Board of Visitors, and her husband Alberto Beeck founded and chairs the Georgetown University Latin American Board. The couple are also parents of Georgetown students Leticia (COL ’17) and Matias (COL ’15). Alberto Beeck is director of Virgin Hotels and formerly served as the president of a Peruvian cement production and distribution company, Cementos Pacasmayo.

“We’re very proud to launch a center that will serve as an amplifier of existing initiatives as well as an igniter of new ones at Georgetown and outside of Georgetown,” Alberto Beeck said. “The center will educate by inspiring and preparing students, faculty and global leaders to generate and innovate solution-based change.”

MICHELLE XU/THE HOYA

From left to right: Beeck Center Executive Director Sonal Shah, founder of HopeLab and Humanity United Pam Omidyar and Case Foundation co-founder and CEO Jean Case discuss social innovation.

Beeck pointed to the success of GU Impacts, which was founded two years ago to allow students to participate in social impact work in Latin America and Africa and has already had 38 participants.

“We have come from an existentialist and individual model that measures the number of people served and hours spent to asking ourselves how we can solve problems and achieve impact in a sustainable and scalable way that measures the improvements in the lives of people around the world,” Alberto Beeck said.

“I want to tell you [the students] this is your center, this is your launchpad for becoming and developing into social change actors, and you will be integral to its success.”

The center hopes to function in line with the Georgetown value of cura personalis.

“Our ethos, like the Georgetown ethos, will be to do this with humility and compassion for those we serve. None of this matters if we don’t keep in mind who we are serving,” Shah said. She added that the center will offer skills-based

New Bowling Alley Opens on M Street DAVID BROWN

Special to The Hoya

Evoking an image of luxury and class, Pinstripes, an Italian restaurant, bowling alley, and bocce club, opened its newest location in the Shops at Georgetown Park on M Street last Saturday.

Pinstripes was conceived by founder and CEO Dale Schwartz in 1987 while he was working for a venture capital firm in New York. However, the idea didn’t play out at the time and instead Schwartz moved into the biotech industry and founded his own natural pharmacy company Pharmaca Integrative Pharmacy Inc., in 2000. Finally in 2006, after

BENJAMIN APPLEY-EPSTEIN FOR THE HOYA

Students can bowl and enjoy Italian food at Pinstripes.

immense emotional support from family and friends, Schwartz took the plunge and founded Pinstripes Inc., opening its first location in Chicago.

Eight years later, Pinstripes now has four locations across the Midwest in addition to its new Georgetown location, and another site set to open shortly in Overland Park, Kan. Pinstripes’ M Street location was initially opposed by Advisory Neighborhood Commission 2E, whose commissioners cited concerns about noise levels near Georgetown Park Condominiums. The alley eventually won the approval of the Board of Zoning Adjustment in January 2013 after agreeing to strict sound requirements in its building code.

Schwartz says the company is looking at select markets all over the country, hoping to eventually operate 50 to 100 locations nationwide.

Schwartz intends to open a handful of locations yearly until this goal is met.

Pinstripes specifically came to Georgetown to access the greater D.C. area. Schwartz added that he chose Georgetown because it is unique and gorgeous and because of its iconic Chesapeake and Ohio Canal.

Competing with other Italian restaurants in the Georgetown area in addition to the numerous other restaurants on M Street and See PINSTRIPES, A9

Visit us online at thehoya.com/business

classes for students, experiential opportunities and methods of developing key thought leadership.

Pam Omidyar and Jean Case shared insight from their experiences working in social impact and innovation.

Omidyar discussed the necessity for systematic change.

“When you move a lever here the whole system works to counteract that, when you’re working multiple levers in the system then you can see change,” she said.

Case agreed, emphasizing the importance of a mixed approach.

“We’ve divided the sectors so specifically (nonprofit and for-profit), they’re really just tax-regulated entities. The excitement of those entities coming together is that we’re beginning to break these barriers.”

Program Manager for Innovation and New Media Strategy in the Office of the CIO Michael Wang (MSB ’07), who helped develop the Beeck Center and will work there, believes student ideas will be key to the center’s success.

“Having an intentional space focused on social impact and innovation will really build a communi-

ty,” he said. “All the student-driven ideas that we help to empower and scale will impact change.”

Students involved in the organization of the launch event were pleased with the results.

“It was a great success. Each attendee I spoke with said how inspiring Pam Omidyar, Jean Case and Salim Ismail’s talks were, and that they wanted to find ways to get involved,” Craig Cassey (COL ‘15), one of the two student organizers of the launch, said. “I look forward to seeing the partnerships [the Beeck Center] will continue to make and the opportunities the center will bring to Georgetown students in the form of impactfocused internships, skill-based workshops and our speaker series.”

SIPS Representative Kyle Rice (SFS ’16), who was also involved in organizing the launch, agreed.

“The speakers that the center brought to Fisher Colloquium were engaging and gave some great insight on the current state of social innovation and philanthropy. The workshops were also fun and participants really benefited from attending them,” he said.

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