The Hoya: February 18, 2022

GUIDE

FEATURES

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Valentine’s Day Celebrations

Restorative Justice Since 1920 FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2022

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Georgetown University • Washington, D.C. Vol. 103, No. 11, © 2022

GU Recalls Select KN95 Masks Over Authenticity Concerns

KIRK ZIESER/THE HOYA

Georgetown Unversity recalled KN95 masks manufactured

by Makena Electronic on Feb. 17 over authenticity concerns following an investigation this week by The Hoya.

Clara Grudberg Hoya Staff Writer

Georgetown University has recalled select KN95 masks distributed on campus while administrators ascertain whether they meet standards for efficiency and safety.

The university pulled masks made by Makena Electronic, a Chinese company that manufactures digital consumer electronic products, as well as personal protective equipment (PPE).

Last week, The Hoya submitted to the university examples of masks available on campus that did not visibly meet international standards for quality KN95 respirators. In response, a university spokesperson told The Hoya that administrators decided to pull Makena Electronic masks from distribution until additional details about their authen-

ticity had been gathered.

“Upon additional review of our current stock, out of an abundance of caution we have removed Makena Electronic masks from campus distribution,” the spokesperson wrote in a Feb. 17 email to The Hoya. “While the Makena Electronic Masks are certified by the manufacturer to meet the standard for KN95 masks, we are seeking additional confirmation that these masks meet the applicable efficiency standard.”

The Hoya identified several examples of masks in circulation on Georgetown’s campus that did not visibly meet standards laid out by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for KN95 respirators. According to these standards, KN95 masks should include markings identifying the mask’s See MASKS, A6

JEOPARDY PRODUCTIONS INC.

Nam Vu (COL ’22) competed in the Jeopardy! National College Championship, where he advanced past the quarterfinals, beating students from Tulane University and Spelman College. He was eliminated in the Feb. 17 semifinal round.

Nam Vu Represents GU on Jeopardy Adora Zheng

Student Life News Desk Editor

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am Vu (COL ’22) represented Georgetown as a competitor in the 2022 Jeopardy! National College Championship.

Vu won the quarter final round on Feb. 16 with a final score of $17,000 after correctly answering trivia questions about topics including Marvel, current events, literature and three-syllable words. The win advanced Vu

to the semi final competition that aired Feb. 17, where he was ultimately eliminated. Vu won $20,000 as one of the eight semifinalists to be eliminated.

After his success in the initial quarter final competi-

tion, Vu said he was proud of his performance but wanted to stay calm and prepare for the following rounds of competition.

“It was definitely exciting See JEOPARDY, A6

The Corp Honors 50 Years GUSA Debates Legitimacy of Service to the Hilltop of Wolfe-Ume Election Caitlin McLean and Samuel Yoo Senior News Editor and Student Life Desk

The Georgetown University Student Association (GUSA) Senate voted to certify the spring 2022 GUSA executive election results after over two hours of debate regarding alleged campaign violations.

At 3:30 a.m. on Feb. 13, the GUSA Election Commission (EC) announced that Kole Wolfe (SFS ’24) and Zeke Ume-Ukeje (COL ’24) won the 2022 GUSA

executive election. At a GUSA Senate meeting 12 hours later, the EC recommended the senate vote to not certify the election, alleging the Wolfe-Ume ticket committed campaign violations, including bribing students with alcohol for votes.

Despite the accusations, the GUSA Senate ultimately voted to certify the results of the executive election by a vote of 21 in favor, 3 against and 1 abstaining.

[Full disclosure: Wolfe is a former Hoyas taffer]

ommended the senate vote against certifying the election results, alleging the WolfeUme ticket offered students alcohol in exchange for their vote in the election.

To substantiate their claim, the EC presented a screenshot of an email they received from a ProtonMail email address — which provides end-to-end encryption — that claimed Wolfe and UmeUkeje offered alcohol for votes.

The name Carlton Zumm appeared in the account. A student

At the meeting, the EC rec-

See GUSA, A6

KIRK ZIESER/THE HOYA

The Corp celebrated its 50th anniversary this week, offering promotions for students such as free coffee and a fundraiser for Georgetown Mutual Aid.

Julia Staley

Hoya Staff Writer

Vital Vittles began in 1972 as a small food co-op selling only yogurt and Coke in the lobby of New South Hall, against the backdrop of anti-Vietnam War protests.

Fifty years later, it’s the centerpiece of The Corp, which is staffed entirely by Georgetown University students. The Corp

turns 50 years old this week, and celebrations have abounded, featuring promotions like free coffee from Compass Coffee, free Yerba Mates and an open mic fundraiser night for Georgetown Mutual Aid at the Midnight Mug, a Corp coffee location.

Matt Davis (SFS ’22), CEO of The Corp, said the celebration marks an important milestone in the organization’s history.

“This is kind of a once-in-alifetime opportunity for a studentrun business and to my knowledge, there’s never been a student business of our caliber or size that’s celebrated something as big as a 50th anniversary,” Davis said in an interview with The Hoya.

Celebrations will continue Feb. 18-19 to include a ceremony in See CORP, A6

@WOLFEUME22/INSTAGRAM

The GUSA Senate voted to certify the win of executives elect Kole Wolfe (SFS ’24) and Zeke Ume-Ukeje (COL ’24) following concerns about alleged campaign violations.

NEWS

OPINION

GUIDE

BLOG

Oppressive Office Culture

Isolation Injustices

Healing From Heartbreak

Attack on Titan

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GUSA Sentator Lara Santana (SFS ’24) resigned Feb. 14, citing a tense work environment and decline in advocacy.

A lack of adequate food and water supply, coupled with confusing isolation protocols, cause concerns among isolating students.

Mislabeling Mistakes

Destigmatizing Addiction

Cratering Disappointment

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The downstairs section of the Leo J. O’Donovan dining hall has inaccurately labeled items as vegan and allergen-free.

Using person-first language when discussing substance use and addiction can reduce barriers to treatment.

Check out an analysis of Attack on Titan’s latest season from The Hoya’s blog, 4E. blog.thehoya.com

Mitski’s “Laurel Hell” compresses complex emotions into poetic lyrics accompanied by dazzling melodies.

“Moonfall” falls flat due to predicatable, generic science fiction plotlines that should have stayed out of this world.

Published Fridays

Send story ideas and tips to news@thehoya.com

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THEHOYA.COM | FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2022

OPINION EDITORIAL

ONLINE THIS WEEK

Improve Isolation Conditions As of Feb. 14, 128 residential students are in COVID-19 isolation either in the Georgetown University Hotel and Conference Center or the newly introduced Glover Park Hotel Georgetown. Despite the recent surge in positive cases, students in isolation must continue their classes and other activities virtually.

As students fill all available isolation rooms at the Georgetown University hotel, some have expressed frustration over subpar food quality and quantity, as well as confusing messaging about isolation protocols. Students isolating in the Glover Park Hotel Georgetown, which is located over a mile from Georgetown’s main campus, have voiced even stronger discontent about the university’s handling of food and water distribution.

The Editorial Board urges the university to provide clearer communication about the testing and isolating process, improve conditions for isolated students by ensuring reliable access to food and water and create a new line of support specifically dedicated to meal distribution issues.

According to the university’s COVID-19 guidance website, students who test positive for COVID-19 receive a message from the Care Navigator team providing them with information about the isolation guidelines.

Although the university has updated its protocols so that individuals in isolation who test negative on the fifth day no longer need to isolate, its contradictory messaging about isolation testing protocols left students like Oliver Charaf (MSB ’24) confused.

“I received an email that I would be out on the 21st which is the fifth day after I tested positive. I was still testing positive so I had to stay in quarantine but then I was instructed that after I tested positive I should no longer test and stay until day 10,” Charaf told The Hoya. “This was a little confusing because it was not in accordance with the new CDC rules. They later followed up saying I could actually take a test and try to get out of here today, which was on day seven.”

Alison McLeod (COL ’24) told The Hoya she encountered a similar lack of clarity in the university’s isolation guidelines after she tested positive for COVID-19, specifically regarding the length of her isolation and how to access pain medication.

The university has acknowledged that its updated isolation guidance is more intricate, given that it follows individualized, rather than a universal, protocols.

“The new protocols are more complex and nuanced than the previous ones,” a university spokesperson wrote in an email to The Hoya. “Previously, every person who tested positive isolated for the same length of time (10 days) as a standard, universal rule. Now, an individual’s isolation length is tailored to their specific circumstances and whether and when they meet a number of criteria.”

This nuance does not excuse the consistently confusing isolation guidelines, and the university must create a more streamlined communication network between the

COVID Care Navigators and students.

The university is also failing to meet basic needs of students in isolation.

Isolating students receive instructions with contact information to coordinate meals, allowing them to both request additional meals and inform staff of allergies or dietary restrictions, according to a university spokesperson.

However, Charaf said he received food that contained allergens he informed staff about when he entered isolation.

“I have a severe allergy to chickpeas and on multiple occasions got things like hummus and falafel,” Charaf told The Hoya. “I’m lucky I know what to look out for, but it is potentially very dangerous.”

This dangerous oversight is not an isolated incident. In a Feb. 17 article from The Hoya, Carly Finley (MSB ’23) also noted that despite informing the front desk that she does not eat red meat, she nonetheless received foods with red meat.

“The next day I was brought a roast beef sandwich … it’s pretty much a coin toss, some days I am brought a bag that says ‘No Beef’ on the outside, and some days I’m not,” Finley told The Hoya in the article.

As a result of the university’s neglect, many students have to rely on food delivery services like Uber Eats and DoorDash to meet their basic needs. These additional costs pose an undue burden on students, who are forced to remain on the meal plan.

Casey Rae Borella (COL ’24), who was isolated in the Glover Park Hotel from Feb. 10 to Feb. 15, experienced serious issues accessing water.

“They only gave us one water bottle per day in the box. You could call downstairs for water but sometimes they just wouldn’t bring any,” Borella said.

Moreover, Andrew Dunn (MSB ’23), who has been at the Glover Park Hotel since Feb. 9, had serious issues with the irregular schedule of food delivery.

“I have gotten three boxes of food delivered: on the 10th, 11th, and 14th. This created a major issue as the mini fridge couldn’t hold the food from both boxes on the 11th, forcing some of it to go bad.” Dunn said to The Hoya. “Since the 14th, I have not gotten a food box each of the last 3 days.”

COVID-19 isolation is already physically and emotionally taxing. Confusing protocols and inadequate living services only make the experience worse. While coordinating and implementing isolation protocols for a large number of students is undoubtedly a difficult task, the university must nonetheless implement a new line of support to streamline the complaint process and provide more specific guidance for isolation protocols. Isolation must be conducive to basic student needs.

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[T]here is a legion of Black female jurists, advocates, and attorneys competing to earn similar qualifications to merit a spot on the highest court. President Biden does not “invite suspicion” by nominating a Black woman to the Court — instead, he confirms to communities everywhere that hard work and dedicagtion are rewarded.”

Warren Geary (LAW ’24)

“The Disquieting Defense of Ilya Shapiro” thehoya.com

DEEP DIVE

US Immigration Laws: A History This week, we are diving into Christina Suh’s (SFS ’25) column on the history of U.S. immigration laws. The article highlights the United States’ discriminatory legislation towards immigrants in the context of the sociopolitical culture of the time period. Although the United States is often hailed as a “melting pot” and a “nation of immigrants,” the country has consistently passed legislation that hinders the immigration and naturalization of non-white individuals, which influences present-day anti-immigration sentiments.

The Naturalization Act and Chinese Exclusion Act are examples of how U.S. immigration policy is tainted by discriminatory attitudes. The Naturalization Act of 1790 prevented non-white individuals from attaining citizenship at the same time as when the United States prevented Black

people from receiving birthright citizenship. Similarly, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 excluded Chinese laborers from immigrating to the U.S. for the next decade, and those who were permitted to remain in the U.S. were not able to become naturalized citizens.

Understanding the history of immigration legislation is a critical step toward fostering a more inclusive and accepting society, along with advocating for those whose voices have historically and deliberately been silenced. Additionally, studying these examples is important for recognizing the plight of modern immigrants and how their status may be shaped by past injustices. We encourage everyone to continue researching immigration legislation and to reach out to your representatives in Congress to advocate for immigrant rights.

EDITORIAL CARTOON by Tim Goh

The Hoya’s editorial board is composed of six students and is chaired by the opinion editors.

Editorials reflect only the beliefs of a majority of the board and are not representative of The Hoya or any individual member of the board.

HOYA HISTORY

Special Committee Investigates SC February 18, 1960 The most important issue confronting the Student Council this year is one which concerns the internal nature of the Council itself.

During the course of the current scholastic year, the question has been raised as to the effectiveness of the present structure of the Student Council. A committee has been recently established to look into the problem.

The issue is more complicated than appears at first glance. One of the greatest intellectual assets is the ability to ask the proper question. The Council has unfortunately failed to ask the newly formed committee a clear-cut question, but nonetheless expects a quick answer. The main difficulty for the committee is to establish what the problem is before they begin to tackle it.

The problem has arisen out of the feeling of certain Council members that there is something wrong with the Council as it now stands, that it requires a change. The discontent grew

mainly from the membership distribution comprising the Council. Some members feel that the Council could be more effective and representative with an increase in elected members and a decrease in the number of activity heads. Others feel just as strongly for maintaining the status quo. The Council now consists of 13 activity heads and 12 elected officials, the latter group including the three yard officers, eight class officers, and a non-resident representative.

The first concrete move towards revision was the establishment of a committee at the end of last year. At the request of the president-elect of the yard, George Giard, the committee wrote to 90 colleges requesting reports on student government structure with special emphasis on the type of membership of each school council. The committee, headed by Bob Donovan, received replies over the course of the

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summer from less than 20% of the schools contacted. The information received, however, indicated that the majority of responding schools had student governments comprised predominantly of elected members rather than organization heads.

It was the majority opinion of Donovan’s committee that the council ought to establish another committee to look into the possibilities of changing Georgetown’s Student Council. The major factor at this point was still, implicitly, the question of membership. At the Dec. 9 meeting, during which Donovan submitted his report, a resolution was introduced by Mario Mirabelli to establish the requested revision committee and the motion was approved.

The motion is ambiguous and concerns the question of change without specifying in what respect.

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OPINION VIEWPOINT • DREWER

Oppose Renovations To Philodemic Hall

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s a graduating senior, I often reflect on my time at Georgetown. I have mused on how a chance encounter led to my breaking a campus news story, how arriving early to a capture the flag game on Cooper Field helped me land my first internship and how my friends and I honed our hand-eye coordination battling armies of cockroaches in Darnall Hall. But most of all, I have thought about my time in the Philodemic Society, Georgetown’s student debate society, and the oldest secular student organization on campus.

When I heard there was an effort by some misguided Philodemicians to partner with the Georgetown administration to alter the Philodemic Hall — the physical representation of almost 200 years of enriching, inspiring, and civil student discourse — I was heartbroken. I also knew that a vital part of being a Philodemician is taking a stand.

So, during my final semester, I have decided to demonstrate my gratitude to the Philodemic Society by joining in solidarity with students and graduates to speak out in support of its history and traditions. I invite you to join me.

During my first semester, when I was still getting used to life on the Hilltop, I sat in on Philodemic debates with no intentions of speaking. I was captivated by the confidence, eloquence and boldness of the speakers, and spent most of my time taking notes on how to emulate them. In my second semester I was called on. Even though I stumbled, I was hooked. A year-and-a-half later, despite the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown, I became a member.

Eventually, I took for granted the grandeur of Philodemic Hall and our long history of student discourse. Great minds were formed and strengthened in the crucible of debate that is the Philodemic Hall. From its start, the society debated the most glaring issues at the time — abolition and slavery — and from the Philodemic president’s chair came the rallying cry for a campus-wide student walk-out to demand that the Jesuit priests desegregate Georgetown College.

The University President’s Office has taken it upon itself to reimagine the interior decor, design, woodcraft, artistry and historic content of Philodemic

Hall. The administration has convinced a donor to give a few million dollars and now they are off, degrading an endowed historic space into a multipurpose meeting room with a completely different style of decor.

Like Gaston Hall and Riggs Library, the Hall is classified as a protected interior room of Healy Hall, a designated National Historic Landmark. For this reason, I have joined with students and alumni to establish “The Sodality for the Historic Preservation of Philodemic Hall.”

Some students advocated for the removal of just a few portraits from the room (mostly of people related to Georgetown University or the Philodemic Society who either fought for the Confederacy, or had family ties to it), but the university has taken advantage of this activism. It has instead removed all portraits and pitched an expensive alteration of Philodemic Hall, as if that is what students requested. No matter — the Sodality does not need to engage with the years-long debate about the portrait removals.

Its sole purpose will be the preservation of Philodemic Hall.

To borrow the words of William F. Buckley Jr., it simply “stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no other is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it.”

I prefer to leave Philodemic Hall unaltered, and now set off to restore it. But, one could install portraits of a few key members of the Philodemic from the 20th century on the long-standing and historic wall of portraits.

One could also replace just a very few others, chosen for whatever reason, all without altering the Hall’s “Victorian” decor and design (a gem of the university), or changing its historic, endowed purpose as stated in official documents: “Debate.” Philodemic Hall embodies the Jesuit Ratio Studiorum’s place of privilege for Rhetoric. It honors Georgetown’s heritage perhaps better than any other space, and it deserves — even demands — to be protected.

We cannot ensure success in preventing the execution of the university’s plans, but we pledge that we will do everything in our power to prevent the destruction of this sacred space.

Justin Drewer is a senior in the College.

ILLUSTRATION BY: NATASHA LEONG/THE HOYA

THE FEMINIST INTERSECTION

Deconstruct Pillars of Toxic Masculinity Grace Rivers

Columnist

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ver since I was little, my mother has instructed me to give an extra long hug to male family members at funerals. “They don’t always show it,” she would say, “but they are having a tough time right now.” This small gesture showed them that their vulnerability was safe with us, even if society made them to feel like outwardly expressing these emotions was a threat to their masculinity.

Men are often taught to express their emotions in a way that averts femininity. Don’t cry. Be strong. Don’t be vulnerable. Men are encouraged to adopt qualities of control, strength, forcefulness, rationality, strong work ethic and competitiveness, which are often considered antithetical to vulnerability. These expectations hinge on the same patriarchal ideals that deem women overly emotional, irrational or weak, and thus underline the need for feminism to expose and advocate for the reframing of masculinity.

It might sound counterintuitive for feminism to advocate for an issue affecting men. While feminism central-

IDENTITY IN DEPTH

izes women’s experiences, it more broadly attempts to dismantle a patriarchal system that can oppress anyone.

This form of toxic masculinity — which promotes male domination and aggression — has a strong grip on many of the men in my life.

For example, many men feel the need to withhold emotional reactions through no fault of their own. In one instance, when my family members and friends gathered at my house one afternoon, my dog started to breathe irregularly for hours.

Although my dad reassured me she would be okay, I knew he was secretly fearing for his companion’s wellbeing. My dog was taken to the hospital, from which she never returned. My dad never talked about it nor shed a single tear in front of my family. I could tell he was hurting but was simultaneously barred from expressing that hurt given the harmful constraints of toxic masculinity.

In a study conducted by the Social Issues Research Centre, 28% of men said they would cry in front of their children compared to 48% of women.

The survey also revealed that only 30% of men indicated they cried in the last month compared to 70% of women.

The explanation is simple: Men are often discouraged from being in touch with their sensitivity under the patriar-

chal system, which dissuades them from showing emotion lest they be shamed for appearing weak. This results in detrimental implications for men’s mental health and promotes acts of violence that materialize in sexual assault and gun violence.

While nearly one in four women will seek some form of mental health treatment in a year, only about 13% of men will do the same. Men may often refuse therapy or other forms of mental health treatment, which has adverse consequences for the future.

Consequently, in 2010, men accounted for 79% of the deaths by suicide, according to a study conducted by Mental Health of America .

Men are often positioned as the protectors under the patriarchy and are, thus, encouraged to engage in competition for status, which can take the form of violence.

Women only account for around 20% of committed sex offenses according to the National Sexual Assault Research Center, leaving men to comprise the remaining 80%.

A study by the Women’s Aid Federation of England found that 92% of defendants in abuse-related prosecutions in 2020 were men.

Additionally, men are three times more likely than women to own a firearm in the United States and account for more than 80% of perpe-

trators and victims of gun violence, according to Men Against Gun Violence.

Addressing the problem of toxic masculinity begins with encouraging men in our lives to be comfortable expressing their emotions. We have to show them that despite the limits that patriarchy places on their gender expression, their masculinity is not defined by suppressing emotion.

Sometimes we can even do this in ways that seem insignificant. When I am saying goodbye to my dad, I make sure to give him a hug and say, “I love you.” He used to awkwardly say it back, but I hear the confidence returning to his voice in regards to expressing this emotion. This is a small gesture that communicates a big message: It is okay for men to show affection. It is okay for men to hug, cry, be vulnerable and talk about their emotions.

As true feminists, we need to be conscious of the ways that oppressive systems don’t just harm women, but all people.

In deconstructing toxic masculinity and social norms that discourage men from displaying vulnerable emotions, we are one step closer to dismantling a system that oppresses people of all genders.

Grace Rivers is a sophomore in the College. The Feminist Intersection is published every other week.

VIEWPOINT • KISSEL

Fixing the Immigration Narrative Destigmatize Addiction Language Christina Suh Columnist

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onald Trump made his stance on immigration clear when he reestablished the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services’ (USCIS) mission from “securing [its] promise as a nation of immigrants” to “securing the homeland [and] safeguarding its integrity.”

Notoriously regressive efforts like his unwavering visions for a U.S.Mexico border wall and brazen implementation of a Muslim travel ban further contributed to the obliteration of America’s reputation for being open-armed.

Now, more than a year past his inauguration, President Joe Biden still finds himself in the midst of his post-Trump cleanup where he aims to reverse the damages caused by his predecessor.

The new administration has recreated USCIS’ image under a revised mission statement — one that replaces Trump’s degrading diction with more cordial parlance like “welcome” and “respect” to reflect Biden’s less cynical view towards immigrants.

But will Biden take the initiative to translate those soft words into hard action?

In reality, the country needs change that extends beyond editing a mission statement. The immigrant community holds something substantive within its esoteric experiences, and the U.S. ultimately disservices itself by shrouding the opinions of this community in fear and distrust.

As a nation that prioritizes its exceptionalism above all, this facet of immigration should

intrigue even its most nativist fringes. We must work to shape an environment that better supports the assimilation and amplifies the voices of immigrants.

The U.S. sees its immigrants as embodiments of utility, transplanted here to serve the most practical purpose facing the country at any given time.

This monolithic perception of immigrants is a product of U.S. history. At the height of the 19thcentury industrial age, the U.S. opened its gates to an influx of foreigners who were myopically appreciated as outsourced labor that could help the economy.

But these gates were slammed shut as soon as white Americans began viewing immigrants as a threat. Racist legislations like the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 exemplify America’s shamelessly exploitative perspective of immigrants. The Japanese internment camps of the 1940s further attested that immigrants were less respected than their “native” white counterparts.

Even with such heinous edicts repealed, victim-blaming sentiments continue to resonate today. The easiest response to nuanced domestic problems like U.S. unemployment is to look beyond its borders and place responsibility on the shoulders of immigrants,. Such willingness to address these issues in the most expedient manner possible reveals the harsh reality that immigrants are perpetually trapped in their strictly practical roles even as the world around them changes. When the U.S. needed workers, they served as the dutiful industrial laborers.

Now, when the U.S. needs an explanation for unemployment, they serve as scapegoats.

Therefore, while the U.S. reaps the benefits brought by these foreigners, it is unable to look

beyond its rigidly utilitarian outlook. Trump-era rhetoric substantiated the idea that immigration taints the white canvas of America by “chang[ing] the culture.” When the person who is arguably the most powerful figure in the political world preaches such an ideology, immigrants internalize beliefs that they are unwelcome. In order to develop even a semblance of belonging, immigrants are often forced to sacrifice a part of their identity — the part that diverges from the dominating norms of American life. Instead of fully assimilating, they put forth a facade of the person America wants them to be. This not only hinders the individual right of selfexpression, but also jeopardizes the greater American ideal of freedom upon which the country has founded itself.

Trump was correct in acknowledging that immigrants do, indeed, change the culture of our nation. But viewing this potential as corruptive rather than transformative implies the failure of the U.S. to embrace change. This cultural change risks toppling the current power hierarchy preserved in a culture that upholds white supremacy at the expense of its non-white Americans.

Immigrant identity is a critical component of the larger American identity, and by hindering the development of the former, we are simultaneously hindering that of the latter. These two identities are deeply intertwined.

The gap between “us” and “them” may seem large, but we have a responsibility to build the bridge to better the country for all.

Christina Suh is a first-year in the School of Foreign Service.

Identity in Depth is published every other week.

CW: This article discusses addiction and substance use.

Please refer to the online version of this article on the hoya.com for resources.

I

n Summer 2021, the inaugural Addiction Policy and Practice cohort met in class. In this unique Master of Science program based in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, led by Director Regina LaBelle, we have had the opportunity to delve into the literature of addiction psychiatry, neurobiology, the United States’ drug policy and the financing of healthcare, among other topics.

Our cohort quickly realized we all arrived ready to tackle a preeminent challenge facing our communities.

The U.S. drug overdose mortality rate reached a new apex in 2021 with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimating that over 101,000 people died of drug overdoses in a 12-month period.

While tied to the proliferation of fentanyl, the increase is, in part, associated with a wide treatment gap created by complex health inequities and barriers in access to evidencebased treatment for substance use disorder (SUD).

Stigma, or the processes of labeling, stereotyping, status loss and discrimination, drives many of our discussions about addiction. Our assignments in class often focus on the negative impact of stigma on people who use drugs and people living with SUDs. Despite stigma’s centrality to our conversations and the recognition of its pervasiveness by our professors, we have encountered uncomfortable

moments with the stigma surrounding people who use drugs or people with SUDs in the broader Georgetown community.

These situations reveal a disconnect between the discussions we have among our cohort and the tenor of conversations throughout Georgetown more broadly.

As expressed in the National Institute on Drug Abuse’s national survey Monitoring the Future, substance use is common and prevalent among college students, and certainly, among our own students.

We believe the Georgetown community should cultivate a compassionate environment that aims to be stigma-free by implementing a person-first language protocol when it comes to addiction.

The language we use when speaking about substance use is the common thread of this disconnect, and our cohort believes that a change in language can provoke a steep reduction in stigma-related barriers to SUD treatment.

People who use drugs or are living with SUDs face stigma that directly impacts their access to and quality of care at the individual and policy levels. When dealing with these issues, words are a matter of life and death.

Stigma, including internalized stigma or negative self-value, can impede recovery by encouraging a recurrence of use or preventing an individual from seeking and adhering to treatment.

Addiction is a disease that affects a person’s brain and behavior; it causes changes to brain circuits and function that lead to an inability to control use, despite the consequences. Stigmatizing words, like “addict” or

“alcoholic,” are rooted in the belief that addiction is a moral choice, rather than a medical problem. A 2010 study of medical professionals found that people are more likely to blame someone for their addiction when they are described as a “substance abuser” rather than as someone living with “a substance use disorder.” Researchers found that these labels have strong negative associations which influenced medical practitioners’ perceptions to recommend punitive rather than therapeutic measures.

The Georgetown community should adopt the use of person-first language when speaking about people with addiction. Person-first language refers to a person first, and any disability, disorder or characteristic second.

Georgetown should follow the lead of the Associated Press Stylebook, which in 2017 offered new guidance to avoid stigmatizing addiction in news media. For example, AP advises avoiding the word “abuse” or “problem.” The word “use” should be modified with words like “risky,” “unhealthy,” or “heavy.”

Prioritize phrases like “they were addicted” and “they used drugs” over words like “addict,” “alcoholic,” and “abuser.”

The Georgetown community should strive to use this language and eliminate other words and phrases in all academic forums. As members of this community, we must use our positions of privilege to educate others and change the narrative.

Julia Kissel is a student in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

A4 | THE HOYA

THEHOYA.COM | FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2022

FEATURES

The Long Road to Implementing Restorative Justice at Georgetown

ILLUSTRATION BY: TIM GOH/THE HOYA

The Student Advocacy Organization is calling on Georgetown to implement restorative justice practices in the disciplinary system, citing inequity in financial punitive sanctions.

GU Student Advocacy Organization members say there is inequity in punitive disciplinary sanctions and are calling for the university to implement restorative justice practices.

Alex Brown and Sydney Raymond

Special to The Hoya and Features Deputy Editor

I

n fall 2020, Felicia Miller (COL ’23) began working on a solution for a problem she had identified in Georgetown University’s disciplinary process — a fully punitive system with no opportunities for restoration or rehabilitation.

For violations ranging from marijuana sanctions to harassment to noise violations, the university punishes students with fines, work hours or written sanctions.

But Miller saw another option: one that focused on restorative justice through conversation between parties and community engagement.

“We’re interested as representatives of the students in introducing new forms of justice that might better serve the community and support students as opposed to punishing them for violations,” Miller said in an interview with The Hoya. “Restorative justice instead is the idea that when harm is committed, you want to restore what was harmed.”

Miller is the policy chair for Georgetown’s Student Advocacy Organization (SAO), a student-led group that supports students through the disciplinary sanction process.

Joining with other members of SAO, the organization’s policy and advocacy teams are researching and working with the university to implement restorative measures, according to Miller.

“I led the team through the fall and the spring of last year, and then first semester,” Miller said. “Then we came up with a product at the end, that was a suggestion for a way that the Office of Student Conduct and the university as a whole could potentially begin to implement restorative justice.”

Over the last 18 months, members of SAO have identified central equity issues in Georgetown’s sanction process and code of conduct, and have researched solutions that would approach conduct violations from a restorative perspective, allowing students to rehabilitate their community.

Now, as the work continues, the organization is continuing to collaborate with the Office of Student Conduct (OSC) and administrators to implement their proposals.

From Punitive Measures to Community Restoration Current sanctions are not proving to be equitable or focused on community rehabilitation, a cause for concern within the SAO, according to Max Preiser (SFS ’24), a member of the SAO advocacy team.

Georgetown’s Student Code of Conduct relies largely on punitive sanctions, including monetary fines and required work hours for a variety of conduct violations, including alcohol and drug violations, disorderly

conduct and harassment.

These sanctions serve to promote students’ development and support the Georgetown community, according to the Code of Student Conduct.

“The fundamental principle guiding the imposition of sanctions in the student conduct system is founded on the University’s effort to balance upholding community standards with the educational development of its students in addressing individual behavior,” the guidelines read.

Yet, these sanctions — especially monetary fines — unfairly target lower-income students, according to Preiser.

“All students are required to pay the same fines if they’re given a sanction, and therefore it’s going to be punitive, and regressive to students who are less able to pay those fines,” Preiser said in an interview with The Hoya.

The policy currently allows for a combination of work hours and fines, and, if students are financially unable to pay fines, they can replace monetary sanctions with work hours.

Students who are unable to pay fines must often choose to substitute them for work hours, which takes time away from jobs, school work and extracurricular activities — a consequence students with higher incomes do not face — according to Brenda Zhong (SFS ’24), a member of the SAO advocacy team.

“The disparities we see are that a lot of the higher income students will pay the fine and a lot of lower-income students are being forced to take on

“We’re interested as representatives of the students in introducing new forms of justice that might better serve the community.”

FELICIA MILLER (COL ’23) SAO POLICY CHAIR

those additional hours on campus to pay it off,” Zhong said in an interview with The Hoya.

The university understands that lower income students may have a more difficult time paying fines, and has thus paused the use of fines as disciplinary sanctions for many first-time violations, according to a university spokesperson.

“OSC is sensitive to the personal and financial challenges facing many of our students during this difficult time of the COVID-19 pandemic and recognizes that fines may be par-

ticularly burdensome at this time,” the spokesperson wrote in an email to The Hoya. “Until further notice, fines will not be assigned as a disciplinary sanction for any first-time violations except trash and property maintenance citations.

Second-time violations will be assigned fines consistent with the Code of Student Conduct sanctioning guidelines.”

To combat the inequity that develops between students who can and cannot pay the fines, the SAO believes the OSC must implement restorative justice principles, according to Miller.

“It’s always been something that we’ve been interested in because we work a lot with the Office of Student Conduct, which obviously uses punitive justice,” Miller said in an interview with The Hoya.

Restorative justice practices have gained momentum across the country, both on college campuses and within criminal justice systems.

What started as a collective resolution to a vandalism spree in Kitchener, Canada, in 1974 soon became a worldwide phenomenon, as Howard Zehr, a professor of restorative justice at Eastern Mennonite University’s Center for Justice & Peacebuilding continued this work. Zehr led trainings, workshops, conferences and reform on the principles of restorative justice and advocated for its implementation.

From Zehr’s work, other universities and criminal justice systems around the country followed suit in implementing restorative justice practices, according to Josh Bacon, former dean of students at James Madison University and director of student conduct.

“Once I saw what restorative justice was about, I was hooked,” Bacon said in an interview with The Hoya. “Anyone who works in conduct in the criminal system, usually over time realizes that it doesn’t work. So we do the best we can to be educational, but it is nothing compared to restorative justice.”

The current punitive system also fails to offer transparency, especially in terms of monetary sanctions, as many students are left wondering what their fines are used for, according to Rishma Vora (SFS ’23), the SAO advocacy team lead for restorative justice.

“It’s really suspicious in terms of where that money is actually going,” Vora said in an interview with The Hoya. “The university isn’t very transparent about, okay, they’ve collected this, you know, essentially a punishment money, like, where’s it going?”

However, the university does use funds collected through fines to assist students and campus initiatives, including the HoyaHub, an oncampus food pantry, according

to the spokesperson.

“All fines collected are used to support initiatives that benefit the Georgetown community,” the spokesperson wrote.

Policy and Activism

While internally the SAO has worked on implementing restorative justice practices since fall 2020, the first concrete action came in spring 2021. SAO representatives submitted a written proposal to the OSC on June 3, 2021, on limiting the use of punitive sanctions and increasing restorative practices in order to create a more equitable sanctions process.

The proposal outlines several initiatives already implemented by James Madison University and the University of San Diego, including restorative justice conferences, restorative justice circles, and restorative justice boards, all of which aim to foster community support and restoration following conduct violations.

“The colleges and universities that have implemented restorative justice practices have a clear dedication and commitment to restorative justice programs within their own institutions,” the proposal reads.

Restorative justice conferences, meetings between the offender and the party that has been harmed with the intention of arriving together at a solution to the harm, and restorative justice boards, which combine a standard conduct board with restorative justice conferences, are two practices the SAO hopes to implement into the sanctions process.

“After discussing the harm, the parties and any other relevant participants — not a hearing officer or conduct board — decide together on actionable steps to repair the harm,” the proposal reads.

In addition to the boards, the SAO proposed a threestep policy reform for bullying and harassment, which includes voluntary participation from all parties, a caseby-case restorative justice “contract” and conferences between parties, focusing on voluntary participation from all parties and aiming to improve community relations, according to the brief.

Many incidents are not directly included in the university’s code of conduct, such as less severe cases of harassment, and cannot be prosecuted directly through the university, according to Miller.

“Introducing restorative justice as an avenue to handle these cases, when they’re not necessarily Code of Conduct cases, can be really valuable to both the harmed student and the student who’s committing the harm,” Miller said.

The SAO wants to go further than all of these practices, however, and eventually establish a Restorative Justice

Center, a physical space on campus devoted to restorative justice, according to Vora.

“Our end vision with this entire team and this entire project is to one day establish a Restorative Justice Center at Georgetown,” Vora said. “Generally, just there being a center that’s dedicated towards taking certain cases that happen, and bringing that restorative process and offering students the option.”

After submitting their proposal to the OSC, the SAO has continued to pursue changes to the code of conduct. One

“Our end vision with this entire team and this entire project is to one day establish a Restorative JusticeCenterat Georgetown.”

RISHMA VORA (SFS ’23) SAO ADVOCACY LEAD

team is specifically conducting research into the university’s “More Likely Than Not” off-campus sanction policy, according to Vora.

“We’re trying to gather students’ testimonies and understand their experiences on why and how it’s unfair for students off campus to automatically be seen as more culpable,” Vora said.

The current university policy only requires a “More Likely than Not” standard of proof for off-campus allegations, which means that students are considered guilty if it is more probable than not that the violation occurred.

SAO’s policy team argues that the burden of proof should be higher in order to make the sanctions process fairer, according to Vora.

“The odds are completely not in their favor, just automatically, under that system,” Vora said.

Looking Toward Collaboration

After submitting the proposals, SAO representatives are now focused on the implementation of the policies they have researched, through collaboration with the OSC and other students on campus, according to Miller.

“We started getting into that first semester, but we’re hoping to really ramp that up this next semester,” Miller said. “And see how the SAO can help, whether we can do more research, whether we can look into restorative justice facilitators, whether we can like put them in contact with people that our team worked with, and just of-

fer our help in any way so that the university can get the ball rolling on this project.”

The OSC has made some progress in bettering the disciplinary process, according to the SAO advocacy team, such as raising the minimum wage students receive for work sanction hours to $15.00 per hour, according to Preiser.

The university has also changed its marijuana sanctions, removing a previous policy which stripped students of their financial aid if they were found to be in possession of marijuana, according to Vora.

“Obviously a clear showing of targeting students with low income and directly using that essentially as a scare tactic,” Vora said. “That has since changed.”

The university currently includes certain restorative measures for cases of sexual assault allegations, or in other disciplinary hearings when agreed upon by all parties, according to OSC Assistant Director Heather Kimball, such as voluntary participation, explicit conditions for participation in the alternative process, and an agreement mutually designed by the involved parties.

“SAO named many key components that the Office of Student Conduct employs when facilitating alternative resolution processes,” Kimball wrote in an email to The Hoya.

“Depending on the particular needs and desires of the parties involved, we may facilitate a restorative conference or we may facilitate more of a ‘shuttle negotiation’ process to reach an agreement.”

During the 2020-21 academic year, the Division of Student Affairs hosted conferences and meetings for students interested in the implementation of restorative justice, according to Kimball.

“I’ll say that for myself the group, which often practiced restorative circle processes, was also just a wonderfully grounded and connected space as we all navigated the upheaval of 2020,” Kimball wrote.

The Division of Student Affairs will announce future plans this semester for the implementation of restorative practices in the form of a pilot program, which will have outside educators and facilitators run restorative justice circles for students along with university officials, according to Kimball.

While the SAO has made progress on research and early steps of implementation for restorative justice practices, there is still significant work left to be done by students and administrators to emphasize “That’s kind of where we see that lack of character shown, is that there’s so much talk about these Jesuit values but we don’t really see them really manifesting themselves, at least within the disciplinary system at Georgetown,” Vora said.

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Inside Look at Childcare Wage Increase

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Your news — from every corner of The Hoya

VERBATIM

INSIDE THE ISSUE

Every day was different, exciting, challenging and fast-paced.” @COUNCILOFDC/TWITTER

The D.C. Council passed a bill Feb. 1 to raise the wages of early childhood workers throughout the District, making use of a new income tax affecting the District’s wealthiest residents.

Timothy Thomas, Graduate students recieved paralegal program gradu- grants from the Cosmos Club ate, on his experience. Foundation. Story on A8.

Leo’s Falsely Designates Menu GUSA Senator Resigns, Cites Items as Vegan, Allergen-Free Alleged Toxic Work Environment Akashdiya Chakraborty Hoya Staff Writer

Multiple items at Leo J. O’Donovan Dining Hall, Georgetown University’s main dining location, are inaccurately labeled or fail to comply with dietary restrictions.

Students noticed that Hoya Hospitality frequently labels food items as vegan in the downstairs portion of Leo’s despite the ingredient lists including milk or eggs, and fails to ensure vegetarian meals do not include meat products, according to multiple student testimonials.

Sam Dorsey (COL ’22) received mislabeled items from Leo’s on multiple occasions over the past few months, including a brioche burger bun that was labeled as vegan but actually contained milk and eggs and “vegan” pita bread that contained buttermilk and clarified butter.

“I had stomach problems for more than a month because of this — I tried varying my diet and taking supplements, but I couldn’t figure out what the issue was until I saw an employee at Leo’s opening a package of the naan,” Dorsey wrote in an email to The Hoya. “I recognized the brand, since it’s one that my parents buy, and I realized that I had been feeling sick for so long because the hummus bar was not vegan.”

Dorsey said the mislabeling could pose severe health risks like anaphylaxis, a lifethreatening allergic reaction, if meals were incorrectly labeled as allergen-free.

“Mislabelling allergen-containing food displays a reckless disregard for the safety of students with food allergies,” Dorsey wrote. “Leo’s has displayed little to no respect for folks with special dietary needs or preferences.”

The university is aware of some inconsistencies between menu labels and food being offered, according to a Hoya Hos-

pitality spokesperson.

“Recently, Hoya Hospitality was made aware of menu items on stations outside of the allergen-free station that were not properly reflected on menu boards and the website, and addressed these issues immediately,” the spokesperson wrote in an email to The Hoya.

“These incidents did not occur at the allergen-free station.”

Julia Skeen (COL ’22) ate a curry and noodle dish that was advertised as vegan for her entire first semester in 2018 before finding out that the sauces contained fish.

“When I reached out to the University, they basically told

“In my sophomore year, there were two instances in which I ate a dish that was advertised as vegan but had cheese in it.”

JULIA SKEEN COL ‘22

me to stop eating anything with the sauce and just eat plain rice and tofu,” Skeen wrote in an email to The Hoya.

“In my sophomore year, there were two instances in which I ate a dish that was advertised as vegan but had cheese in it, which has the potential to make me really sick.”

Skeen said that the frequent mislabeling of food at Leo’s, which has occurred for years, takes both a physical and mental toll on her.

“Since I’ve been vegan for 6 years, eating animal products can and has made me physically ill,” Skeen wrote. “It’s also really frustrating and emotionally exhausting to not be able to trust that the food I’m eating is safe for me.”

Gwyneth Murphy (SFS ’23) is vegan and was served regular crab cakes instead of vegan ones.

“I would’ve eaten them without knowing and gotten incredibly sick since I’ve never had seafood before and it’s been 14 years since I’ve had meat, but luckily another worker saw the mistake happen and chased me down right before I walked out of Leo’s to let me know what had happened and to tell me to throw it out,” Murphy wrote in an email to The Hoya.

“But that kind of situation, as much as a crab cake seems like a small risk, can turn into a major liability when longterm vegans consume meat that gets them hospitalized.”

Murphy has medical dietary restrictions, but Georgetown rejected her request for an exemption from the meal plan.

“Despite my doctor asking Georgetown to exempt me from the meal plan, the university put financial needs above student wellness and refused to offer an exemption,” Murphy wrote. “Now I pay thousands of dollars per semester for a meal plan that I’ve only used twice in the last seven months, once to get a cup of lemonade and once to get a to-go container of broccoli.”

Exemptions are not considered for those who are voluntarily on a vegan, vegetarian or gluten-free diet.

The university’s strict meal plan policies and limited offerings for students with dietary restrictions force students to choose between their beliefs and their health, according to Dorsey.

“No matter why a person chooses their particular diet, they have a right to eat what they want and control what goes into their bodies,” Dorsey wrote. “Attending Georgetown means gambling your health on a shockingly expensive meal plan that does little to feed you.”

Samuel Yoo

Student Life News Desk Editor

A Georgetown University Student Association (GUSA) senator resigned from the GUSA Senate citing oppressive behaviors and a chaotic work environment.

Lara Santana (SFS ’24) announced her resignation in a letter sent to GUSA senate and executive leadership, including GUSA President Nile Blass (COL ’22) on Feb. 14. Santana cited a hostile work environment, ongoing restructuring efforts and internal reforms, and decline in student advocacy efforts as reasons for her resignation.

Santana said GUSA’s culture no longer made her feel comfortable in the organization.

“I cannot stay in an organization that continues perpetuating the same oppressive and toxic behaviors it claims to want to eradicate,” Santana wrote in the letter.

The controversy surrounding the 2022 GUSA executive elections pushed her to resign, according to Santana.

“It was absolutely disgusting to see how far people would go to ensure that their favorite ticket would win,” Santana said in an interview with The Hoya. “To be honest, I think everything about this election just kept demonstrating how broken GUSA has gotten. I said that in my letter, and I meant it just because all the meetings were absolutely extended long fighting debates.”

At a Feb. 13 GUSA senate meeting, senators debated for over two hours on whether to certify the win of GUSA presidential elect Kole Wolfe (SFS ’24) and vice-presidential elect Zeke Ume-Ukeje (COL ’24) after the ticket was accused of exchanging alcohol for votes. The

senate ultimately decided to certify the results of the election on a vote of 21 in favor, 3 against and 1 abstaining. Santana was not present at the meeting.

GUSA Senate Speaker Leo Rassieur (COL ’23) said he regrets seeing Santana’s departure from the organization.

“Senator Santana did a great job in her role, and I’m sorry to see her go,” Rassieur told The Hoya.

The GUSA Senate will continue to investigate the allegations surrounding the election of Wolfe and Ume-Ukeje, according to Rassieur.

“There are a lot of students who are concerned with very valid accusations and allegations that the newly elected executive may have seriously violated campaigning roles, and I think that’s something that GUSA is going to take a closer look at moving forward,” Rassieur said “I don’t think anyone who, for example, was trading alcohol for votes should be representing the student body.”

Issues in GUSA arsie from a decline of civility within the organization, according to GUSA Senator Dominic Gordon (SFS ’24), who accepted Santana’s resignation.

“We get candidates that openly act hostile to the election commission. There’s just the lack of seriousness,” Dominic said in an interview with The Hoya. “We control a million-dollar budget. We don’t need to act like senators all the time, but we do need to ask for some decorum.”

GUSA has strayed from student advocacy to an organization entangled in internal affairs, according to Santana.

“It’s been months since anything’s been getting done.

They spent so many months

doing the whole abolish GUSA and that went nowhere,” Santana said. “The proposal was absolutely incomplete, it was not properly written, or properly detailed, and a big part of that is also as time has progressed, they stalled everyone’s projects.”

A referendum that would restructure GUSA, including abolishing the senate, in attempts to promote increased student advocacy on campus failed to pass in the fall 2021 semester after too few students participated in the November election.

Reform attempts are essential to promoting student advocacy in GUSA, according to Rassieur.

“I think the internal reforms and changes go totally handin-hand with helping us to better respond to student needs and making GUSA run smoothly,” Rassieur said. “The whole idea is that we want to cut out some of the bureaucracy and red tape that makes it difficult for students to participate in GUSA and advocate for their needs.”

This is not the first time a GUSA senator has resigned from the senate. In 2020, a senator resigned citing a toxic and unsupportive working environment.

Santana said GUSA must undergo fundamental, institutional change beyond internal restructuring attempts.

“I think what needs to happen is a whole new election of new senators, not just the consecutive people that consecutively destroy and destroy and destroy this institution further and further,” Santana said. “They issue blanket statements that they’re trying to, quote, revamp it, and that’s nowhere true.”

Students in COVID-19 Isolation Face Difficulties Accessing Food Giulia Testa

Hoya Staff Writer

After a surge in positive COVID-19 cases on campus, students isolating in two different locations on and off campus face difficulties receiving adequate food.

Between Feb. 8 and 9, over 80 undergraduate students tested positive for COVID-19;

by Feb. 12, the number of COVID-19 cases increased to 205 throughout the Georgetown University community. With an increase of community members in isolation, students have expressed frustrations over receiving adequate access to necessities like food from university officials.

The increase in cases filled all available isolation rooms at the Georgetown University Hotel and Conference Center and prompted the university to acquire additional isolation rooms at the Glover Park Hotel Georgetown, located 1.5 miles from Georgetown’s main campus, according to a Feb. 9 email to community members.

Some students, including

Spencer Woodall (MSB, SFS ’24), who was in isolation at the Glover Park Hotel, say they did not receive enough food or water throughout the isolation period.

“I was told that we only get 3 boxes of food per week, which to my memory is 4 boxes a week less than my previous quarantine in the Georgetown hotel,” Woodall wrote in an email to The Hoya. “The boxes only include 3 bottles of water each, which means only 9 bottles a week. This is most concerning to me as I only drink water, and it’s not very helpful to people who need fluids because of COVID.” The university provides students in isolation with multiple meals and snacks that meet dietary restrictions, according to a university spokesperson.

“In both the on- and offcampus hotel and residence hall isolation scenarios, students are provided with three meals per day as well as snacks and beverages (including water),” the spokesperson wrote in an email to

The Hoya. “Students in isolation are always allowed to request additional meals and make requests for meals to accommodate allergies or dietary restrictions.”

Other students say they received meals that violate their dietary restrictions.

Carly Finley (MSB ’23), who has been in quarantine at the Georgetown University Hotel and Conference Center since Feb. 8, specified her dietary restrictions when she checked in at the front desk before beginning her quarantine period.

Despite listing that she does not eat red meat, Finley said the university delivered foods with red meat.

“The next day I was brought a roast beef sandwich — it’s pretty much a coin toss, some days I am brought a bag that says ‘No Beef’ on the outside, and some days I’m not,” Finley wrote in an email to The Hoya. “Either way, I pretty much don’t eat any of it except if it’s a turkey sandwich, a croissant or a snack like pretzels and hummus.”

Rakhi Parikh (COL ’25), who follows a vegetarian diet, tested positive for COVID-19 on Feb. 13 and isolated in the Glover Park Hotel.

Parikh said that after receiving an initial box of food when she arrived, no one delivered her food until 4 p.m. on Feb. 14, and the food that did arrive was very limited.

“That box was all glutenfree vegan, even though the night before it was like normal vegetarian,” Parikh said in an interview with The Hoya. “I guess for the boxes they just combine all dietary restrictions into one which is unfortunate.”

Students can drop off meals at the front desk for friends quarantined in the Georgetown University Hotel and Conference Center, an option those at the Glover Park Hotel cannot rely on because of the significant distance from campus.

“I have to rely on my friends to bring me food to the front desk because the meals are just gross,” Finley wrote. “For people who can’t afford to

DoorDash every meal cause they’re already paying a fortune for a meal plan, it really sucks feeling like you have to burden your friends to bring you like 2 meals a day because you can’t stomach the

food they give you.”

The university resumed public health measures Feb. 12 as they were during the fall 2021 semester, including expanding operations to include indoor dining at full capacity.

KIRK ZIESER/THE HOYA

Students in isolation expressed concerns about being delivered low-quality, limited servings of food.

A6 | THE HOYA

THEHOYA.COM | FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2022

NEWS

Nam Vu Competes on Jeopardy, GU Pulls Certain KN95 Masks Faces Defeat in Semifinal Round Out of ‘Abundance of Caution’ MASKS, from A1

JEOPARDY PRODUCTION INC.

Nam Vu (COL ’22) competed in the Jeopardy! National College Championship, where he advanced past the quarterfinals but was eliminated in the semifinals.

JEOPARDY, from A1 to be moving on, but I also wanted to keep my head in the game as I knew I had a game after that,” Vu told The Hoya. “I wanted to stay as focused as I could, but I tried to give myself a little bit of a breath for a celebration to show off for the university and win a game of Jeopardy on live TV.” The Jeopardy! National College Championship, hosted by actor Mayim Bialik, gives 36 college students the chance to compete against one another for the grand prize of $250,000. The final round will air Feb. 22.

Vu and his family are avid Jeopardy fans — his brother even competed on the official Jeopardy show in 2016 but did not advance to additional rounds — so when the opportunity to apply for the show arose, Vu took the chance.

“We used to watch it pretty much every night in high school,” Vu said in an interview with The Hoya. “I already had an idea that I wanted to try at some point. It just was more of a matter of when and where makes sense for me.”

Vu decided to apply for Jeopardy after seeing an advertisement for the college tournament in 2020. Vu said the audition process consisted of a timed test in October 2020,

followed by a strictly proctored second test in January 2021 and a mock game audition over Zoom in March 2021.

Going into the audition process, Vu kept his expectations low.

“I didn’t want to get my hopes up in any sense, especially because I had idea of the sheer number of people that ended up auditioning,” Vu said. “I knew there was always a chance, as long of a shot as it was, so I just wanted to enjoy the process.”

Vu found out that he was being considered for the show in September 2021 but did not get confirmation that he would be competing until November, the same month he flew to the Culver City, Calif. set to film the show.

Vu said that he did not prepare excessively beyond reviewing authors, authors’ works and state and country capitals.

“There was definitely not a point where I thought, ‘I need to prepare for this audition in case I get on the show or to maximize my chances,’” Vu said. “For the show I prepared a little bit, but I didn’t want to psych myself out too much.”

During the quarter final round, Vu competed and won against students from Tulane University and Spelman College. While in the semifinal competition, he went head to head against students from

Harvard University and Kennesaw State University.

Filming took less than a week and involved a lot of waiting around and watching the filming of other games, according to Vu. “It wasn’t a live audience for this event. It ended up being just the other competitors and a lot of their crew,” Vu said.

“It was surreal to be on that stage, or to be in the approximate area in the audience and watching that happen.”

Vu’s first game was filmed in the afternoon, which meant that he spent the morning nervously watching his competitors and waiting.

“It got more and more stressful to wait and sit on set, but during the games, it was kind of fun to even just quietly play along by myself in the Jeopardy live audience in the Jeopardy studio,” Vu said.

Donning a Georgetown sweatshirt while competing, Vu said that it was exciting to have the opportunity to represent the university at the famous competition.

“It was definitely super exciting and super cool to show up for the university specifically, but also to show up for myself,” Vu said. “Especially with how hyped-up the episode ended up and everything, I hope I made Georgetown proud.”

manufacturer, model, size and a number and publication standard that usually reads “GB2626-2019” or “GB-2626-2006.”

The Makena Electronic masks were available at campus PPE distribution stands as recently as this week, including in White-Gravenor Hall.

While masks still in circulation on campus lack the markings that indicate authenticity, the university spokesperson wrote that now all available KN95 respirators have been vetted as authentic.

“Georgetown has confirmation from independent laboratories that all masks currently in circulation meet the applicable efficiency standard,” the spokesperson wrote.

The spokesperson said that masks pulled from circulation have been replaced with some that were either approved by the CDC’s National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) or tested independently to confirm authenticity.

While guidelines provided by the CDC are useful for spotting potential counterfeit masks, the criteria alone cannot establish whether or not a mask is authentic, according to Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease expert and professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

“The CDC criteria is a guide and may or may not be completely sensitive or specific

for identifying counterfeit KN95s,” Adalja wrote in an email to The Hoya.

The manufacturer of the recalled masks did seek Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Establishment Registration.

However, the registration process in no way certifies FDA approval of a product.

The Makena Electronic masks require additional verification of authenticity, according to Anne Miller, executive director of Project N95, a Buffalo-based nonprofit organization that reviews the quality of masks and PPE for consumers and governments.

“Establishment registration does not mean approval,” Miller wrote to The Hoya.

“This product would need to be tested.”

The recall follows this month’s discovery that American University unknowingly distributed counterfeit KN95 masks after an investigation by the school’s student newspaper, The Eagle.

The university spokesperson said Georgetown procures masks from several manufacturers and implements a vetting process to ascertain the respirators’ quality.

“We regularly obtain testing results or other proof of certification or efficiency from the manufacturer and/ or independent laboratories to ensure the masks provided to the community meet appropriate standards,” the spokesperson wrote. “Staff members also review the

university’s mask stock to ensure quality.”

The CDC found that counterfeit respirators made up about 60% of the KN95 masks they evaluated in 2020 and 2021. Similarly, fake N95 masks are common. These masks, which offer increased protection and filtering capabilities than cloth masks, have become more widely recommended in past months.

Georgetown University updated its mask guidelines for the spring semester to ask community members to wear KN95, N95 or comparable masks while on campus, according to a Jan. 24 email from Provost Robert Groves.

“Given the respiratory nature of COVID-19 transmission, students, faculty and staff should wear a properly-fitted, high-quality mask (e.g., N95, KN95, KF94) while on campus,” Groves wrote in the email to students. “Individuals cannot wear a cloth mask, or a mask with a vent or valve, because these masks do not sufficiently reduce the transmission of the virus from exhaled droplets and aerosol particles that might contain the virus.”

Georgetown is not the only stakeholder having to deal with the question of potentially inauthentic PPE, according to Miller.

“There are a large number of these companies who have pivoted to make PPE and it is sort of a vast unknown as to their performance,” Miller wrote.

The Corp Celebrates 50 Years of Service to Georgetown Students

GUSA Certifies Executive Election Results After 2 Hours of Debate GUSA, from A1 named Carlton zum Brunnen (SFS ’24), who was contacted by the EC to determine if there was any relation, denied sending the emails. The EC said they suspected that an untraceable individual was impersonating Brunnen.

Additionally, the EC provided a screenshot of an email they received from Otice Carder (COL ’23), a write-in candidate for GUSA vice presidency, who claimed he and Wiggan heard multiple students say that Wolfe and UmeUkeje offered them beer in exchange for votes.

[Fulldisclosure:CarderisaHoyastaffer] GUSA Election Commissioner Owen Posnett (COL ’24) said he could not recommend the senate certify the results in light of the allegations against Wolfe and Ume-Ukeje.

“A lot of things are not adding up and we have a lot of questions about how this election possibly could go. The benefit of the doubt is no longer viable. And this recommendation against certification is maybe the only one of this that makes sense and that is very important,” Posnett said at the meeting.

Wolfe and Ume-Ukeje denied all claims that his campaign offered alcohol for votes.

“I would just like to say that the allegations pertaining to beers to put in the exchange for their votes is categorically false,” Wolfe said at the meeting.

GUSA Senator Manahal Fazal (SFS ’24) said she would not certify the election results due to concerns from some students that the new executive would decrease advocacy and support for marginalized communities.

“The people I represent don’t support such candidates and the

presence of their supporters indicates the kind of space they will host in GUSA and it’s not going to be a proper working and advocacy space, respectfully. I will not vote in favor for verifying this,” Fazal said at the meeting.

GUSA Senator Sanjana Ranganathan (SFS ’25) said the senate cannot deny the certification over disagreement with the Wolfe-Ume platform.

“Our personal concerns about the ticket can impact whether we decide to certify an election. That’s not our job. Senators don’t get 500 or 600 times the voting power,” Ranganathan said at the meeting.

According to Ranganathan, who voted to certify, the senate should wait for more evidence before making a decision.

The Wolfe-Ume administration looks forward to serving the student body, according to Wolfe.

“We’d like to thank the EC for their work, and are relieved to see the democratic process fully play out,” Wolfe wrote to The Hoya.

“We are excited to represent the student body and work to make Georgetown a better place.”

Wolfe and Ume-Ukeje, who have no prior GUSA experience, centered their campaign around increasing student participation in GUSA. Their policies included collaborating with the Georgetown Center for Social Justice to create more accessible campus clubs, providing grants for lowincome students to purchase textbooks and laptops and pressuring the university to act on the GU272 referendum.

This year’s executive election cycle was marked by two defining characteristics: rank-choice voting and the new addition of a write-in option, which the EC announced on GUSA’s Instagram account in a Feb. 10 post.

The rank-choice voting system allowed voters to rank three tick-

ets, including a write-in option.

The EC eliminated tickets with the lowest numbers of votes and transferred the vote to the next ranked option for 52 rounds. In the 50th round, Thomas Leonard (COL ’23)and Nirvana Khan (SFS ’24) were the last remaining ticket that could not meet the threshold of required votes and were eliminated. Therefore, Leonard-Khan first-choice voters’ second choice votes were redistributed in the 51st round. More votes were given to Wolfe-Ume, placing them over the Marcella Wiggan (COL ’23)-Carder ticket who were eliminated, leaving Wolfe-Ume to be the last ticket standing.

Carder said he hopes to continue the dialogue started by his campaign and that Wolfe and UmeUkeje understand the responsibility the executive office holds.

“We’re going to keep these important conversations going and hope the WUME ticket realizes how much harm they can do with such little knowledge of the university’s workings and seeming lack of care for issues affecting the most vulnerable communities on campus,” Carder wrote to The Hoya.

Leonard said he wishes GUSA well as he departs the organization.

“I wish GUSA all the best and am looking forward to better days for the student body,” Leonard wrote in an email to The Hoya.

Khan said the election results may erase the sentiment that GUSA does make a difference in students’ lives.

“If there’s one thing we hope comes out of the Wolfe-Ume administration, it’s an awareness of how much of an impact GUSA had on the student body during the time we’ve been in it — especially the most marginalized members of it, which means this impact hasn’t always been seen but it has surely been felt,” Khan wrote in an email to The Hoya.

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The Corp, a non-profit founded in 1971 and run entirely by Georgetown students, celebrates its 50th aniversary this week.

CORP, from A1 Riggs Library on Feb. 18, an exhibition of the organization’s history, and a gala at the Smithsonian Museum of American Art. About 400 former members of the organization have RSVP’d to the gala and are returning to campus to celebrate, according to Adam Shaham (SFS ’22), advancement chair for The Corp.

Originally established in 1971 as the Students of Georgetown, Inc, The Corp was created to advocate for students amid antiVietnam War protests. Now it is the world’s largest student-run 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation.

According to The Corp’s cofounder Roger Cochetti (SFS ’72), inspiration for the organization originally came after the university prohibited students from hosting guests in their dorms and prevented protestors from camping overnight on sport fields around the time of one of the largest antiwar protests in 1971.

Cochetti said he felt compelled to create an organization that would give the student body greater freedom.

“Whatever this entity was going to be, it had to be structured so that it made money,” Cochetti said in an interview with The Hoya. “If it had no assets, if it had no financial basis and no income, then it could never do any good.

So it had to be a merger of idealism and pragmatism.”

In 1972, The Corp began with

a $10,000 investment Cochetti and other members of the undergraduate student government raised by a donation from the Tennis Association and by publishing an ad-based student directory, according to Cochetti. Its first employees sold Coca-Cola and yogurt on Healy Lawn to continue funding their efforts, according to The Corp’s website.

This week’s celebrations also included free yogurt and Coke in Red Square, according to Shaham.

“Coke is one of our oldest partnerships. We started selling Coke and yogurt out of the New South closet back in 1973, so this is a vendor that’s been with us and partnered with us for almost the last 50 years,” Shaham said in an interview with The Hoya.

The anniversary presents an opportunity for student employees and leadership to ensure The Corp can continue serving students for years to come, according to Davis.

“We can use this moment and the momentum that comes with something like a 50th anniversary to ensure that we recommit to our mission of students serving students and — more specifically — our philanthropic and community engagement efforts to ensure that we are actually serving the students both on campus and serving student interests off campus,” Davis said.

Bennie Smith (COL ’86) began working at one of The Corp’s locations during the second semester

of his first year at Georgetown in 1983. Smith was hired at Saxa Sundries, the former sister store to Vital Vittles, as a cashier and stocker. From there, Smith then became a shift manager and was eventually promoted to The Corp’s vice president of operations.

The Corp provided both a stable income as well as a community during his undergraduate career at Georgetown, according to Smith.

“It was this really fun combination of a fun, built-in social network,” Smith said in an interview with The Hoya. “But it was also hard work. But because you were working with your friends and your peers, it didn’t always feel like hard work.”

Davis said the 50th anniversary is something the entire campus community should enjoy.

“It’s not just a celebration that we should share within our company internally. I mean, it’s really a celebration for the entire Georgetown community to be a part of and enjoy,” Davis said.

The success of The Corp is a testament to the decades of hard work from all past members, according to Cochetti.

“I can’t help but be proud of having gotten it started, but the real credit goes to the hundreds and perhaps thousands of people who worked on it over the 50 years that it existed and breathed life into the idea,” Corchetti said. “They’re the ones who made The Corp.”

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FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2022 | THEHOYA.COM

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Georgetown Entrepreneurship Program Welcomes New Mentors Laetitia Haddad

Academics Desk Editor

The Georgetown Entrepreneurship Initiative welcomed three new entrepreneurs-inresidence (EIRs) to its industry mentorship program as part of its twelfth cohort.

The Entrepreneurship Initiative at the McDonough School of Business (MSB) provides students with opportunities to learn about entrepreneurship and apply those skills through pitch competitions and events with distinguished visiting speakers. The new EIRs are Karima Ladhani, David Goldberg (GRD ’94) and Nkechi “Payton” Iheme, all of whom will advise and mentor students, alumni, faculty and administrators in the Georgetown community.

The EIRs’ diverse expertise is a valuable resource to the Georgetown community, according to David Lange, the initiative’s program manager.

“We have assembled a team of incredible entrepreneurs from a wide variety of backgrounds and industry experiences who together have combined experience of hundreds of years span-

ning everything from health to tech to finance to real estate to consumer packaged goods,” Lange said in an interview with The Hoya. “They are here to help our students with any questions that they may have.”

Students can connect with EIRs by attending weekly Chalk Talks or by browsing through entrepreneur biographies and messaging directly through the initiative’s website, Lange said.

Ladhani is the founder and chief executive officer of Barakat Bundle, a nonprofit that works to provide health and education packages to mothers and newborns in South Asia. Although it primarily partners with communities in India, Barakat Bundle also has a branch called Giving Cradle, which sells cribs in North America to expand the organization’s market.

Ladhani developed Barakat Bundle when she was a student and encourages students to take advantage of the resources available to them in college.

“Knowing how to leverage those opportunities is really important, and as an entrepreneur, you don’t know what you don’t know,” Ladhani said in

an interview with The Hoya. “As an entrepreneur-in-residence, I hope I can shed some light on those things that students may not even know to ask about or have the foresight to see. Hopefully that can allow them to be even more prepared as they move forward with their ventures or ideas.”

Ladhani’s goal as an EIR is to advise each individual student with entrepreneurship projects that they are passionate about.

“My role as an entrepreneurin-residence is in many ways directed by students. I’m here to be able to advise students on thinking through the ideas they may have to solve a particular problem, whether that is creating a startup or facing a communitybased challenge,” Ladhani said.

“We’re here to be able to provide advice based on our experience.”

Iheme is the head of public policy for North America, Latin America and the Caribbean for Bumble Inc., a social network for dating, looking for friends or growing one’s professional network, and will also serve as a new EIR. Goldberg, who has leadership experience in the education, hos-

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The Georgteown Entrepreneurship Initiative welcomed three new entrepreneursin-residence who will support students in networking and industry advertising. pitality and franchise industries, recently retired from his position as president, chief executive officer and board member of Cadence Education, the fourth largest provider of early childhood education in the nation.

The scope and convenience of the EIR program for aspiring entrepreneurs is a testament to Georgetown’s prominence in education, according to Goldberg.

“In my short time with the program, I have been incredibly impressed with the faculty, the entrepreneurs-in-residence that I have met, and the program itself, which is incredibly wellorganized, expansive and accessible,” Goldberg wrote to The Hoya.

“This is an incredible resource for students and alumni of smart, experienced, dedicated people who are giving their time and expertise back to the Georgetown community. It’s a great example of what makes Georgetown such a special place.”

Mike Malloy, who is in his seventh year as an EIR, said that EIRs play an important role in assisting students with entrepreneurial research and implementation of ideas.

“EIRs give students advice on how to navigate the lean startup methodology to bring their ideas to reality,” Malloy wrote in an email to The Hoya. “We help students identify hypotheses about

the problems they wish to solve, and then encourage them to conduct customer discovery interviews to (in)validate their hypothesis. We also help students pitch and present their ideas.”

Goldberg aspires to support students as they realize the potential of a variety of entrepreneurial opportunities.

“The most important skill for young people to develop is the skill in being able to ‘figure it out’, which means finding a way to solve a problem or take advantage of an opportunity - through research, seeing advice from the right people, trial and error, or just being persistent,” Goldberg wrote in an email to The Hoya.

GIWPS Launches DC Residents Raise Initiative in Support Quality Concern Over Of Afghan Women Free KN95 Masks Caroline Bomeni Special to The Hoya

The Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security (GIWPS) has launched Onward for Afghan Women, which will provide Afghans in exile with a network of resources and opportunities.

The program was launched earlier this month.

Spearheaded by GWIPS Executive Director Melanne Verveer, the initiative draws upon years of partnerships with Afghan leaders, journalists, NGO heads, parliamentarians and activists, many of whom are under active threat from the Taliban, ranking high on their kill list. The initiative is centered around supporting Afghan women leaders in their advocacy efforts on the behalf of women and girls in Afghanistan.

Verveer said the initiative supports women in Afghanistan after the fall of the government to the Taliban last August.

“They have either arrived halfway towards their final

“These are very deep and important lessons for students in Georgetown and around the country” ROYA RAHMANI Former diplomat

destinations, or they are in their final destinations, until pray to God, they get to go back to their country one day,” Verveer said in an interview with The Hoya. “But right now that seems far off. And so Onward for Afghan Women is a way in which we can continue to support them, so that they can be contributing in all the ways that they would like to the future of Afghanistan.”

Project Onward is committed to promoting the education of its hundreds of female members, according to Verveer.

“We have enabled many of them to get to other colleges and universities complementary with their skill sets so that they can have gainful employment that is commensurate with their skills, their experience and their education,” Verveer said.

Roya Rahmani, a former diplomat and Afghanistan’s first female ambassador to the United States, is one of the initiative partners living in Washington, D.C. She works at the Walsh School of Foreign Service where she is an expert on issues of foreign policy, security and women’s rights.

Rahmani joined GIWPS as a distinguished fellow in July 2021, shortly after complet-

ing her mandate as ambassador and just weeks before the Taliban took Kabul in August 2021. She is pursuing her own research on the application and history of Islam and Sharia law, Rahmani said.

Project Onward increased awareness about the complex challenges facing people in Afghanistan today, through a series of public events led by Afghan experts, according to Rahmahi.

“These are very deep and important lessons for students in Georgetown and around the country, for those who will be leaders and policymakers in the future,’’ Rahmahi said. ‘‘There is always room for students to come forward. And if they want to discuss their interest, to take on roles and support, be part of research, be part of developing different initiatives, they have the opportunity to learn hands on some of the challenges that we discuss.’’

The panels are meant to help students better understand the perspectives of Afghan women who have worked in advocacy for years, according to Rahmahi.

The panels reached thousands of people in over 100 countries, covering policy, the future of female education under Talibal rule, the rapidly growing humanitarian crisis in the country and what peace talks and negotiations should look like, Rahmahi said.

Onward for Afghan Women supports Afghan women leaders who have already done advocacy work in support of women and girls in Afghanistan through engaging with GWIPS to conduct research, host global convenings and support the future generation of leaders.

Allie Smith, director at Onward for Afghan Women, said that although Afghanistan now finds itself in a dark place, a hopeful future is possible.

“To evacuate them from their home country, and to have them into the United States is heartbreaking,” Smith said in an interview with The Hoya. “To be able to facilitate opportunities for these women to continue to be the leaders that they are and to continue to contribute to peace and security and equality for Afghanistan, for the women and girls that were made in Afghanistan, is a privilege.”

Rahmani said she hopes the resettlement of experts abroad will sustain their work for the reconstruction of Afghanistan.

“And then also to think of how to help them resettle, how to help them continue their work, how to make sure that the connection to the ground is not lost,” Rahmani said, “And how to continue the advocacy so that as soon as a new issue comes up and absorbs the entire attention of the international community, the Afghan women would not

Minoli Ediriweera Special to The Hoya

Washington, D.C. residents have raised concerns about the authenticity of free KN95 masks distributed by District officials.

The issue was first reported

by The Eagle, American University’s student newspaper, which claimed American University unknowingly distributed counterfeit KN95 masks to students after The Eagle found masks that were inconsistent with the standards set for the masks by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The KN95 masks D.C. officials have distributed at the city’s COVID Centers, which serve as hubs for District residents to get tested, vaccinated and boosted, cause similar concerns, according to the Washington City Paper.

Counterfeit masks can be less protective against the highly transmissible omicron variant, and do not meet standards set by the CDC. Authentic KN95 masks should present specific markings that indicate manufacturer name and date, according to the CDC. A clear way to determine whether a mask is poorly made is checking for packaging with misspellings, as the masks handed out to American University students show. After an investigation, American University later confirmed that the masks they had acquired and handed out to

students during their first week of in-person instruction did not meet these standards.

Many organizations unknowingly purchase counterfeit masks, according to Project N95, a nonprofit working to make respiratory protection nationally accessible.

“The reality is that many procurement professionals simply do not have the information they need to make good purchasing decisions,” the project N95 spokesperson wrote to The Hoya. “They are usually doing their best to protect students and teachers, but knowledge about the high level of fakes, counterfeits and substandard masks is not widely known.”

D.C. government officials acquired two procurements of masks for its COVID Centers from V-Tech Solutions. However, KN95 masks distributed by the District at COVID Centers do not contain text providing manufacturing information on the face of the mask, similar to the masks handed out at American University.

According to Evan Yeats, an advisory neighborhood commissioner in Ward 4, many people in his ward have shared their concerns about the authenticity of masks being handed out in D.C. “I believe masks work, and I believe good masks work even better,” Yeats said in an interview with The Hoya.

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Washington, D.C. residents have raised concerns about the legitimacy of free KN95 masks distributed by the District.

Masks distributed by the District exhibit the issues that health professionals have identified in counterfeit masks, according to Yeats.

“When you look at them, both me and my constituents have noticed that they seem to be of a lower quality than authentic KN95s from reliable sources,” Yeats said. “They seem to be thinner, they seem to be flimsier, they don’t have the markings that they tell you to look for.”

Around 60% of KN95s imported to the United States could be considered counterfeit, according to Project N95.

“You cannot look at a mask and tell it is authentic,” the spokesperson wrote. “The active part of a mask is the electrostatically charged meltblown layer, and that is on the inside. What you have to do is know who made it and be assured that it is not expired.”

Masks that do have markings on them can often be traced to

manufacturers that produce insufficiently protective masks, according to Yeats.

“When they do have markings, like one that a constituent provided to me from the Police Academy, came from a factory that has failed performance testing for its masks,” Yeats said.

The questionable quality of these masks has increased concern over the safety of vulnerable populations throughout D.C., according to Yeats.

“It is great that the government wants to step up and fill that role, that is exactly the role for the government,” Yeats said.

“But you allow the inequity to persist if people who rely upon free masks from the government get lower performing masks than people who buy their own on their private sector and verify themselves like me, and that makes things harder for lowwage and essential workers who are critical to keeping our city going every day.”

Professors Publish ‘Racism and Health’ Article Nina Raj

Special to the Hoya

A team of researchers at Georgetown University published an article Feb. 7 in the Journal of Health Affairs on the impact of race on medical treatment.

The article, titled “Race, Place, and Structural Racism: A Review of Health And History in Washington, D.C.” used historical data on federal, state, county and city policies to examine how disparities in medicine have disproportionately impacted the health of Black D.C. residents. The research, led by Christopher King, chair of the department of health systems administration in the School of Nursing and Health Studies (NHS), provides an overview of the history of social, economic and political forces that have created differential health outcomes between people of color and white people.

Health disparities are evident even in studies that control for socioeconomic variables, according to King.

“Even though it’s 2022, a wide body of evidence suggests the pulse of racism in medical settings continues to reverberate,” King wrote in an email to The Hoya. “Even

when income, insurance status, and level of education are controlled, we continue to observe differences in patient experiences by race.”

The Black community has faced higher rates of viral transmission, hospitalization and mortality of COVID-19 compared to other demographics throughout the pandemic.

Recognizing that the medical field has historically ex-

“Even though it’s 2022, a wide body of evidence suggests the pulse of racism in medical settings” CHRISTOPHER KING Department of Healh chair

cluded topics of race is important to determine how education on race can be expanded, according to Jerome Murray (MED ’22), student co-chair of Georgetown’s Racial Justice Committee for Change (RJCC).

“I think it’s important to understand that many suffer from a lack of knowledge

and understanding of when and how these policies came to be,” Murray wrote to The Hoya. “I think that’s the beginning of how we recognize, acknowledge, and ultimately change these historically harmful policies.”

Understanding historical racial bias in medicine will help the field to evolve to be more inclusive and equitable, according to Theodora Danylevich, adjunct lecturer in the College who has taught courses such as “Medicine, Race & Gender” and “Health Inequity in the Time of Covid.”

“It’s not a question of regaining trust, because there is not some sort of pure space in history where medicine was free from bias,” Danylevich said in an interview with The Hoya. “As practitioners, I think it’s important to learn the unsavory histories, and to ask questions that can help them to exercise empathy, where they can step outside of their own experiences and preconceptions, which is also along the lines of what some scholars and activists call ‘structural humility.’”

The article drew attention to the fact that many policies continually cause disproportionate harm to Black Americans, such as the uneven distribution of grocery

stores and hospitals in minority neighborhoods.

The inconspicuous nature of medical practitioners’ racialized impact often goes undetected and unchallenged, according to Danylevich.

“There’s rhetoric that is inconspicuously racist: a rhetoric of personal responsibility, such as we often see with fatphobia, rather than looking at the environmental and historical context that could be leading to these conditions that often are the consequences of centuries of racism,” Danyelevich said.

A report published by the NHS found that Black residents in D.C. live on average considerably shorter, less healthy lives than white residents because of systemic racism in the healthcare system, as well as wealth and education disparities.

The authors of the study, most of whom are current professors at Georgetown, find hope in training the next generation of medical practitioners in a way that addresses race and medicine, according to King.

“It is critical for medical students to know this and help us discover better ways to teach and design systems of care with a biopsychosocial orientation,” King wrote.

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Professors Collaborate on New Formerly Incarcerated Individuals Book About Race, Religion Graduate From Paralegal Program Laetitia Haddad

Academics Desk Editor

Georgetown University professors collaborated on a book that examines the complex relationship between Black and Jewish communities in political and religious life.

The book, titled “Blacks and Jews in America: An Invitation to Dialogue,” analyzes democracy in the United States through underrepresented perspectives. Jaques Berlinerblau, the Rabbi Harold White Professor of Jewish Civilization in the School of Foreign Service (SFS), and Terrence L. Johnson, associate professor of religion and politics in the government department, released the book in February.

“Blacks and Jews in America” aims to investigate and clarify the connections between race relations, religion and politics, according to Johnson.

“We really wanted to tell this message in terms of the complicated ways race, religion and democracy intertwine and tell the story through the particularities of Blacks and Jews as a starting point for reinvigorating not only conversation between the two groups but also a broader conversation in terms of political solidarity,” Johnson said in an interview with The Hoya.

The Unite the Right rally — a deadly 2017 far-right rally in Charlottesville, Va., where white supremacists marched, chanted racist and antisemitic rhetoric and became violent — initiated Berlinerblau and Johnson’s decision to write the book as both authors felt the need to speak about the hateful ideas expressed at the rally.

“I think what triggered the idea that we needed to do something within the Georgetown community was the Charlottesville incident,” Johnson said. “When they were chanting, ‘Blacks and Jews will not replace us,’ I

think we were both stunned.”

The book explores why Blacks and Jews are not more united in the fight against white supremacy, as well as the deep roots between the Black and Jewish communities extending to before the mid-twentieth century.

Berlinerblau and Johnson co-teach an undergraduate course titled “Blacks and Jews in America,” where they utilize dialogue to approach

“We really wanted to tell this message in terms of the complicated ways race, religion and democacy intertwine.”

TERRENCE L. JOHNSON AUTHOR AND PROFESSOR

intimate issues with sensitivity and structure.

Students’ reaction to the material in the class, as well as the discussions that took place in the classroom, also inspired the book “Blacks and Jews in America,” according to Berlinerblau.

“We started teaching the class in 2015 and there was tremendous student excitement around the project,” Berlinerblau wrote in an email to The Hoya. “We were propelled by their energy I guess.”

The book, which is intended to be an invitation to dialogue, builds upon classroom experiences, discussions and essays, according to Johnson.

“We decided to take a portion of that style and then add a couple of our original essays and also interviews with two

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leading women scholars in part because we find that the discussions around Blacks and Jews are often centered on men and on exchanges between them,” Johnson said.

Student teaching assistants and researchers worked behind the scenes on the book in collaboration with Berlinerblau and Johnson. Ria Pradhan (SFS ’23), who took a proseminar class with Berlinerblau in the fall 2019 semester, worked on a variety of projects with him in the past related to political secularism.

According to Pradhan, the work that went into “Blacks and Jews in America” required her and another student researcher, Alexander Lin (SFS ’23), to complete a variety of tasks, including general research, drafting and providing editing assistance.

“The research tasks Alex and I conducted ranged from transcribing and editing conversations between the Professors (which were then adapted into the content you see in the book), finding topical journal articles, collecting primary sources, and providing feedback to the Professors on chapter content,” Pradhan wrote in an email to The Hoya. “I feel really grateful to have been able to delve into Black-Jewish relations with Professors Berlinerblau and Johnson as they are both experts in the field.”

Johnson hopes that the book will urge readers to evaluate their perceptions of Black and Jewish relations in a new light.

“All the issues that I think divide us come up in between these two groups, and I think that we can dissect what’s happening and what has happened historically,” Johnson said. “It’s not about reviving any kind of alliance, but it’s about how we make this sort of alliance and what we take away from it so that we can push and broaden our imagination about democracy.”

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The second class of graduates from Georgetown’s Prison and Justice Initiative received certificates in paralegal studies after participating in a 16-week program.

Samantha Sinutko Graduate Desk Editor

The second class of formerly incarcerated individuals graduated with a certificate in paralegal studies Feb. 4 through a program at the Georgetown Prisons and Justice Initiative (PJI).

The Mayor’s Office on Returning Citizen Affairs (MORCA) and Georgetown’s paralegal program, which launched in 2019 and is supported by the D.C. Department of Employment Services (DOES), consists of a 16-week intensive coursework certificate program followed by a one-year paid fellowship with law firms and employers in D.C. The program provides returning citizens who were formerly incarcerated with opportunities for education and employment that would otherwise be unavailable to them, according to Marc Howard, PJI’s founding director.

“Returning citizens bring an incredible value to their communities and employers, but are so often overlooked or excluded without being given a chance,” Howard wrote in an email to The Hoya. “Returning citizens have personal experience, and often self-taught legal knowledge and skills, that can be an asset to employers, particularly in the legal field. This program aims to equip students with the formal training they need to open doors for themselves and to shift the policies and perceptions that hold returning citizens back.”

The program began in 2019 through a partnership between MORCA and DOES under the leadership of Brian Ferguson (COL ’18), who was the director of MORCA at the time and now serves as senior advisor to President John J.

DeGioia (CAS ’79, GRD ’95).

Timothy Thomas, one of this year’s paralegal program graduates, previously worked as a law clerk in a federal penitentiary assisting other prisoners with research on their cases. His newly acquired paralegal certificate now provides him with a legitimate social credential in the industry, he said.

“The paralegal profession allows me to think, research, discuss, and write on a heightened level of legal analysis, beyond what an attorney or jurist may currently know about a problem,” Thomas wrote in an email to The Hoya. “I want the opportunity to prepare the core issues involved in a case.”

Guy Redford, another graduate of this year’s paralegal program class, said that the program provided him with applicable knowledge about the legal system.

“The most valuable part of my studies within the program included gaining an overall understanding of the legal system and its basic everyday functions,” Redford wrote in an email to The Hoya. “Understanding the law as written, how to apply the law, and the responsibility to ensure the law is carried out.”

The paralegal program is one of four programs at PJI, alongside the Prison Scholars Program, which is a for-credit program at the D.C. jail that offers courses to currently incarcerated people.

The Pivot Program, which was founded at PJI three years ago, gives formerly incarcerated individuals the opportunity to earn a non-credit certificate in business and entrepreneurship.

The Making an Exoneree program is an undergraduate course at Georgetown where

students release documentaries advocating for the exoneration of prisoners who they believe were wrongfully convicted.

According to Thomas, the coursework of the academic portion of the paralegal program classes was intense and intellectually demanding.

“Each day was different, exciting, challenging, and fast-paced.

The professors started at 9:00 AM sharp. I had to be fully alert and take copious notes,” Thomas wrote. “The interesting part was that our classmates supported each other, despite the competitive nature of legal classes.”

The graduation ceremony showcased the success of this year’s cohort of program graduates, according to Kelly Otter, dean of the School of Continuing Studies.

“They honored us with their hard work awnd commitment to their studies. They seized the opportunity provided to them and they expressed gratitude to their faculty, the program, and the university,” Otter wrote in an email to The Hoya. “I saw in them people who have powerful lived experiences that they brought to the classroom, to a learning community, and are forging new paths.”

The program went above and beyond to prepare graduates for the legal field, according to Redford.

“This program was so much more than I expected. The professors have been so helpful and such an inspiration,” Redford wrote. “The information I learned now seems to come into the everyday conversations around me, and it feels so good knowing I understand and can participate in these conversations.”

Graduate Students Earn Grants From Cosmos Club Foundation Samantha Sinutko Graduate Desk Editor

Georgetown graduate students received 10 of 26 grants awarded to students in the Washington, D.C. region to go toward graduate research projects.

The Cosmos Scholars grants are awarded by the Cosmos Club Foundation, an organization for advancing science, literature and humanities through awards for charitable and educational purposes, and range up to $5,000. They cover the costs of travel, special supplies and other expenses that would enhance the scholarship for recipients in various academic fields, including literature, biomedical sciences, regional studies and engineering.

In addition to the 10 award winners this year, the Cosmos Scholars grant program has awarded 120 Georgetown graduate students with research grants since its founding in 1998.

The Cosmos Club Foundation and Cosmos Club members learn about research in their field during the annual presentations by award winners, according to John Lange, a Cosmos Club Foundation fellow.

“It’s a way to foster new scholarship; it’s really a source of funds, rather than an accolade,” Lange wrote in an email to The Hoya. “It’s so enjoyable if you’re one of the foundation members to learn what’s going on in your field at the universities in the metropolitan area and to support new generations of scholarship.”

Erica Lally (GRD ’24), a 2022

Cosmos scholar whose research project addresses the history of a volunteer organization that surveilled private citizens in the United States during the First World War, will use her grant to cover the costs of a research trip to Stanford University to examine rare archival materials central to her dissertation.

“Without the Cosmos funding to help cover the costs, it is unlikely that I would have been able to take this research trip,” Lally wrote in an email to The Hoya. “My research trip isn’t until August, but the content that I expect to review with this funding will help me to add an important set of perspectives to my dissertation research.”

Tianna Mobley (GRD ’22), a 2022 Cosmos scholar whose research project will address African history in the Spanish Atlantic, will use the grant to visit archives in Madrid and Seville this year.

“I decided to apply for the Cosmos Club grant because of its emphasis on scholarly research and because it would provide funding for me to conduct research internationally,” Mobley wrote in an email to The Hoya. “I received the 2022 Cosmos Scholars grant in support of my research proposal entitled, ‘Legal Personalities of Early Modern Afro-Colombians in the Spanish Atlantic.’”

Scholars from each field review the proposals first, then the entire committee reviews finalists, ranks them and provides comments, according to Lange.

“We read submissions explaining the scholar’s dis-

sertation or master’s thesis, which these grants help fund,” Lange wrote. “If the proposal is a well-presented piece of scholarship and the budget is reasonable, it’s a fairly easy decision to give them the grant.”

The Cosmos Club Foundation hosts an annual event to celebrate the grant winners and to give them the opportunity to present their research with their academic advisor present, according to Lange.

Charles E. Kiamie, III (GRD ’04, ’08), a 2003 Cosmos Scholar, said that it was exciting to go from a graduate student presenting to the room of Cosmos Club members to being in the audience listening to proposals himself.

“It’s actually very humbling to be in the presence of some really famous people in the audience among the membership of the club, who were showing interest in the limited research of a graduate student at the time,” Kiamie said in an interview with The Hoya. “Then I was in the audience to honor those who came after me and it was really lovely.”

The success of Georgetown graduate students who receive Cosmos Scholars grants demonstrate that Georgetown emphasizes individualized research in the graduate experience, according to Kiamie.

“Georgetown is a campus that really inculcates from the earliest days of the graduate experience, the importance of looking outward,” Kiamie said. “It’s baked in the DNA of the school itself.”

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NEWS

GREEN Thrift Store Upcycles Accessible Clothing at UG Amberley Nuttal Special to The Hoya

A thrift rack filled with clothes and accessories donated by Georgetown University students opened at The Corp’s Uncommon Grounds (UG) location.

Georgetown Renewable Energy and Environmental Network (GREEN), a campus organization promoting environmental activism, teamed up with UG to open and operate the thrift store. Proceeds from the thrift store will be donated to Georgetown University Mutual Aid Network, a student-run fund that financially assists members of the Georgetown community.

The project aims to reduce fast-fashion waste while giving back to the campus community, according to Rita Alan (SFS ’24), GREEN events chair.

“Textile waste generates a huge amount of energy and water use,” Alan said in an interview with The Hoya. “As fast fashion grows, more energy is being used to make these products. GREEN was talking about that and how

there aren’t many good thrifting options available in the Georgetown area.”

The project started developing last semester as an idea to repurpose dorm materials, but soon became a chance for the Georgetown community to upcycle and reuse clothes, according to Brooke Hodge (SFS ’24), co-president of GREEN. “We started with an empty table for our first clothing swap, and people brought trash bags and bins full of clothing,” Hodge said in an interview with The Hoya. “At our first swap we were left with four bags full of clothing.

So many people had this leftover clothing, like party shirts or dresses with tags on them that people didn’t want to return or things that weren’t in season that people didn’t want to use, but that other people loved and were really excited about buying.”

Following these initial clothing swaps, GREEN brainstormed ways to expand the project. After learning about The Corp Green Initiative that aims to make storefronts as sustainable as possible,

GREEN reached out to UG to forge a partnership.

Helen Martin (COL ’22), director of UG, said the coffee shop would provide the space and manage the thrift store while GREEN sourced and priced the clothes.

“It’s kind of the perfect balance of what we both needed, and I’m really excited about it.

I think it’s a great use of space and it’s helping a great cause,” Martin said in an interview with The Hoya. “We signed a contract between GREEN and UG so that we have this ability to keep going until one party says they can’t any more, which I think is really important because it allows the store to not just be a popup, but allows the store to be in UG with help from GREEN for the foreseeable future.”

The partnership hopes to expand the thrift store in the coming months to serve a wider variety of student needs beyond just clothing, Hodge said.

“I think that our grand, long-term vision is to have some concept of a reuse thrift store that can be used to buy clothing, but also school sup-

JESSICA LIN/THE HOYA

GREEN and Uncommon Grounds teamed up to open a thrift store, with all proceeds donated to Georgetown University Mutual Aid. plies and dorm materials,” Hodge said. “We’ve also talked to Mutual Aid about creating a clothing closet where students are able to access clothing for free rather than pay as a resource for when they have interviews, or if they need winter coats. This would link

upcycling clothing and sustainability with elevating accessibility on campus.”

The thrift store project provides students with an ongoing and flexible way to engage with their community through a lens of environmental stewardship, Alan said.

“We may change up the organization that we’re donating to, because all the money we make from the store is donated,” Alan said. “Right now, we don’t have any concrete long-term plans, and we’re letting the project grow organically.”

MSNBC President Calls for New Voices in Media Georgetown Increases Undergraduate Tuition 3.5 Percent for 2022-23 Claire Stowe

Senior Features Editor

New voices are entering national conversations as women and people of color realize their power, MSNBC President Rashida Jones said at a Feb. 16 event at Georgetown University.

The event, titled “Know Your Power,” featured Jones and Ashley Etienne, a GU Politics Fellow and former communications director to Vice President Kamala Harris, and discussed Jones’ career journey, the difficulties women and people of color face in politics and the media, and the future of MSNBC. Hard work and a focus on delivering tangible results even in the face of discrimination were essential to her rise to success, Jones said at the event.

“My tactic was always head down, pencils up, do the job, because they can’t deny that. They can challenge what you say about yourself, they can challenge how you position yourself, but the results don’t lie,” Jones said. “My focus was always do the work, because they can’t debate the performance, they can’t debate what your output is, and that’ll kind of shut them up.”

Jones is the first Black woman to lead a major cable news network. She began her role as MSNBC president in February 2021 following the departure of Phil Griffin, who served as the president since 2008. Before becoming MSNBC president, she led breaking news coverage, including the 2020 election cycle, and won an Emmy for her coverage of the Supreme Court’s 2015 decision to legalize same-sex marraige.

Using power in a supportive

way is critical to building an inclusive professional environment, according to Jones.

“It’s not only what your power is, but how you use it,” Jones said. “It’s also how do you transfer it to other people, how do you position yourself to be able to uplift and help other people.”

The overwhelming majority of employees in the field of journalism, including reporters, editors, photographers, broadcasters and videographers, are white and male, with 77% of newsroom staffers being nonHispanic white individuals.

As the journalism industry continually undervalues the work of women and people of color, improving representation is vital, according to Jones.

“How do I use this platform for all of the other young women journalists who didn’t know it was possible, the students who were thinking about where do I go and hadn’t seen somebody who looked like them,” Jones said. “I didn’t see anyone who had done this job, but it didn’t mean that I thought I couldn’t do it.”

As a young reporter, Jones constantly felt underestimated and underappreciated for the work she was doing, she told Etienne.

“I felt like I wasn’t getting credit for what I was doing, I was getting credit for who they thought I was,” Jones said. “Because of that, I always felt like I’ve got to try harder to make sure they see what I’m doing.”

However, despite these challenges, it was important to volunteer for every possible opportunity that arises, Jones said.

“I was always inclined to raise my hand for whatever the next new big project is,” Jones said. “It was that idea of raise your hand

Samuel Yoo

Student Life Desk Editor

@GUPOLITICS/TWITTER

Rashida Jones, president of MSNBC, discussed the difficulties women and people of color face in politics. even if it doesn’t make sense, even if it doesn’t feel like it leads to a specific place or thing. Just always being hungry for opportunities, always being hungry for learning, and I think especially in places that take you just outside of your comfort zone or your area of expertise, because you never know where it could lead.”

Moving forward in her role at MSNBC, Jones hopes to continue to expand the network’s outreach, especially to a younger audience through more digital and streaming content.

“My vision for the network is to be the brand for everyone,” Jones said. “One of the things I’m really focused on is how we broaden how we define and how the audience defines MSNBC, because we’re a very successful channel, and I want to look

for opportunities to bring those successes elsewhere.”

In 2021, the median age of MSNBC viewers was 68, an increase from 65 in 2017 and a trend shared by other cable news networks. In her first months as president, Jones immediately began to address the lack of younger viewers through increasing the use of streaming services and giving younger, rising commentators spots on prime-time.

As the network continues to expand new digital frontiers, Jones committed to bringing more voices into the conversation.

“It’s very important to me to use the platform and opportunity to help other people along the way at all different levels,” Jones said. “For me, there’s nothing more important than pay it forward.”

Library Auditorium Named After Toni Morrison Kirit Minhas

Hoya Staff Writer

Following backlash from the Washington, D.C., Public Library’s (DCPL) Board of Trustees’ vote to name an auditorium in the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library (MLK Library) after Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Bezos has requested the auditorium be named after Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison.

The move comes after thousands penned letters demanding the board of trustees reverse their Jan. 26 decision. DCPL Executive Director Richard ReyesGavilan had recommended naming the main auditorium of the library, which underwent a three-and-a-half-year, $211 million renovation ending in 2020, after Bezos following his December 2021 $2.7 million donation to the library system.

Bezos’ donation is the largest contribution in DCPL history and will support Beyond the Book, the library system’s flagship literacy program, according to a DCPL spokesperson.

Following the board’s vote, MLK Library Friends and Mt. Pleasant Library Friends, nonprofits that provide support for their respective libraries, sent letters to Reyes-Gavilan and the

board demanding the reversal of the vote. Additionally, an independent petition campaign has delivered over 19,000 letters of disapproval to library trustees.

Bezos does not have a connection to the D.C. community, according to a Feb. 3 open letter written by the MLK Library Friends.

“Bezos played no role in building or preserving the DC public library system,” the letter reads.

“Bezos, we must note in connection with taxpaying residents, is also controversial for paying a lower rate of tax on his income than average Washingtonians pay on theirs.”

Bezos paid $1.4 billion in personal federal taxes between 2006 to 2018 on the $6.5 billion he reported in income, a tax rate of 1.1%. Meanwhile, the average District resident pays 11.63% of their income in combined taxes annually.

Bezos’ actions do not live up to King’s values and activism, according to the letter, which was written following the approval of the naming proposal.

“Most importantly, as many have already noted, Bezos’ operating principles to date have often been at odds with the values for which Dr. King gave his life,” the letter reads.

The Board’s vote was a cause of concern for Mt. Pleasant Li-

brary Friends because of the negative effect his past actions have had on libraries, according to Carlos Izurieta, president of the board at Mt. Pleasant Library Friends.

“Jeff Bezos has no deep ties to the D.C. area and his treatment of his workers has led such organizations as Amnesty International to ring alarm bells,” Izurieta wrote to The Hoya. “In addition, some of Bezos’s work has been directly harmful to public libraries.”

Amazon has historically refused to sell e-books to libraries, severely restricting access to low-income readers. The American Library Association has denounced bans like Amazon’s as major obstacles to libraries.

Following the backlash, Bezos requested the auditorium be named for Morrison instead of himself. Bezos noted a personal connection with the late author, according to an email Bezos sent to DCPL Foundation Executive Director Rob Hartman obtained

by The Hoya.

“I never sought naming rights associated with my gift to the library. When you subsequently informed me it was the largest gift in the library’s history and offered to name the auditorium the Bezos Auditorium, I was honored and grateful,” Bezos

wrote. “Since then, some in the community have suggested a person of color would be more appropriate as a name for the auditorium, especially as it sits inside the Martin Luther King Jr. library. That makes considerable sense to me.”

The DCPL welcomed Bezos’ suggestion to rename the auditorium after Morrison, according to Reyes-Gavilan.

“We are thrilled that Jeff Bezos has recommended that the MLK auditorium be named for Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison,” Reyes-Gavilan wrote to The Hoya. “We could not think of a better individual to be honored in our beautiful new building.”

While Izurieta endorsed Bezos’ request that the auditorium be named after Morrison, he said community members should have a voice in the decision.

“We are huge fans of Toni Morrison, but we believe that DC public library patrons should have a chance to be heard on who they think the library auditorium should be named after, not Mr. Bezos,” Izurieta wrote.

“We are seeking transparency on how the naming process works as well as implementing a procedure for naming the auditorium that involves the input of DC Public library patrons.”

Georgetown University announced plans to raise its undergraduate tuition by 3.5%, increasing the cost from $59,784 to $61,872 for the 2022-23 academic year.

The university notified students about the annual tuition increase in a Feb. 14 email from Provost Robert Groves. In accordance with the higher tuition cost, the total cost of attendance will increase by approximately 3.3%, citing inflation, the COVID-19 pandemic and providing more resources for academics and student programs as the reason for the increase.

The tuition increase was unnecessary, and the university should look toward alternative means of funding its operations, according to Georgetown University Student Association (GUSA) Senate Speaker Leo Rassieur (COL ’22).

“I understand that the university is going through some hard times financially and that inflation has impacted everyone in this country,” Rassieur said in an interview with The Hoya. “But I also know that the university’s top executives are paid obscenely large amounts of money and that the university is looking for ways to cover those costs.

Maybe they should start looking at the salary of their top executives, not at the pockets of low-income students who are already struggling to pay tuition.”

The tuition increase will hurt low-income students, especially those who rely on external scholarships — for which the university only takes off $3,000 maximum from a student’s family contribution — to help cover the cost of tuition, according to GUSA President Nile Blass (COL ’22).

“It’s going to negatively impact a lot of students who have outside scholarships because of the way Georgetown calculates aid,” Blass said in an interview with The Hoya.

“This just seems like creating a bigger chasm between how students, especially those with aid, are going to be able to meaningfully support themselves and to maintain some level of stability in the academic environment.”

The university aims to minimize the amount by which tuition increases every year, while taking into account economic conditions that impact the school’s finances, according to a university spokesperson.

“Difficult decisions have to be made with regard to providing for our students, updating infrastructure, improving teaching practices and meeting growing student services-based needs,”

the spokesperson wrote in an email to The Hoya. “Balancing these competing demands is an ongoing process and includes consideration of the rising costs of providing services and attracting strong faculty.”

For the 2021-22 academic year, the total cost of attendance increased by 4% from the previous year, while tuition increased by 3.5% for the 2020-21 academic year.

The projected distribution of undergraduate expenses for fiscal year 2023 includes 30% of tuition dollars allocated to instruction and 21% of tuition dollars allocated to financial aid, according to the Feb. 14 email.

GUSA will meet with various university organizations, like the Georgetown Scholars Program (GSP), which provides support for firstgeneration and low-income (FGLI) students at Georgetown, to gain a better understanding of how the tuition

“I know a lot of students who saw that announcement and are already having very tense conversations with their family, their parents to see how we’re going to be able to adjust to this ”.

Leo Rassieur (COL ’22) GUSA Senate Speaker

increase will affect different communities before meeting with the administration, according to Blass.

During the fall 2020 and spring 2021 semesters, which took place online, the university instituted a 10% tuition discount for all undergraduate students. Despite beginning the spring 2022 semester virtually, students were not given a discount.

The university currently has no plans for offering tuition refunds for the spring 2022 semester, according to Rassieur, but will reconsider if the university goes back to virtual learning.

The tuition increase announcement itself is a significant source of stress for the student body, Rassieur said.

“It’s really worrying to me,” Rassieur said. “I know a lot of students who saw that announcement and are already having very tense conversations with their family, their parents to see how we’re going to be able to adjust to this and how this is going to impact us.”

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THEHOYA.COM | FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2022

SPORTS SOFTBALL

WOMEN’S LACROSSE

Georgetown Obliterates American to Start Season

Hoyas Fall 4-6 to Purdue In Kickin’ Chicken Classic

Christian Baldari

Demi Pappas Hoya Staff Writer

Hoya Staff Writer

The Georgetown women’s lacrosse team opened its regular season with an emphatic road win, triumphing 20-8 over crosstown rival American University on Feb. 12. After finishing the 2021 season with a 6-10 record, including a loss to the University of Connecticut in the first round of the Big East tournament, the Hoyas were looking to rebound.

Georgetown (1-0, 0-0 Big East) started the game on the back foot as the American Eagles (01, 0-0 Patriot League) won the opening two faceoffs and scored twice within the first two minutes to take the lead 2-0.

The Hoyas quickly responded by winning the third faceoff and moving the ball into the Eagles’ attack area. First-year attacker Emma Gebhardt got Georgetown on the board, 2-1, with 11:07 left in the first quarter.

Georgetown dominated draw controls in the opening period – winning 9 of 12 in the first quarter – but was unable to capitalize, allowing American to keep the score close. On 12 possessions directly after a draw control, the Hoyas scored only twice and turned the ball over 4 times. As a result, the game remained tight entering the second quarter, with Georgetown leading 6-5.

Whatever advantage the Hoyas had on draw controls early in the game slipped away after the first quarter, as they won just 4 of 10 in the second. Nonetheless, Georgetown was patient on offense, capitalizing on American’s turnovers and missed shots. The second quarter would

GUHoyas

Sophomore midfielder Tatum Geist led the Hoyas in scoring, logging four goals against the Eagles. prove to be Georgetown’s most prolific of the game as its clinical offensive unit found the net on 7 of its 12 shots.

The Hoyas’ defense improved in the second quarter, conceding just two goals while forcing 5 turnovers. Junior goalkeeper Emily Gaven anchored the Georgetown defensive, making four of her nine saves in the second quarter.

By halftime, the Hoyas started to pull away decidedly and their ascendancy continued in the second half, which they entered up 13-7.

Despite winning just two of 6 draw controls in the third quarter, Georgetown consistently threatened the American goal.

The Hoyas converted four of their 10 shots this period into goals, compared to the Eagles’ 1 in 5 successful shot attempts.

Georgetown’s defense, led by Big East Defensive Player of the Week graduate defender Nicole Massimino, continued to frustrate the opposition’s offense, recovering 4 ground balls and clearing the ball on 6 tries.

Heading into the fourth

quarter, Georgetown held a comfortable 17-8 advantage.

The pace of the game slowed in the fourth quarter but the Hoyas continued to keep their foot on the pedal, winning 3 of 4 draw controls and scoring three unanswered goals to secure a 20-8 victory. American sat back in its own half for much of the fourth quarter, trying to stop the bleeding. On the other end of the field, the Hoyas’ defense proved dominant once more, limiting the Eagles to just two shots, both of which were saved by Gaven.

On offense, Georgetown sophomore midfielder Tatum Geist led the way, tallying 4 goals and 1 assist. Graduate midfielder Erin Bakes and Gebhardt also chipped in with 3 goals and 1 assist each.

On defense, Massimino finished with 4 ground balls and 1 forced turnover. Gaven finished with 9 saves for a .529 save percentage — the second highest of her career.

The Hoyas return to action Saturday, Feb. 19 against the Rutgers Scarlet Knights.

On a cold and rainy Sunday in Conway, S.C., the Georgetown softball team concluded their seasonopening weekend with a 4-6 loss to the Purdue Boilermakers. The Feb. 13 matchup was characterized by early back-and-forth offense, a game-winning fifth inning from Purdue (5-0) and a stifled comeback effort from the Hoyas (1-4, 0-0 Big East).

The game was the last of Coastal Carolina’s Kickin’ Chicken Classic, the first of three preseason tournaments on the Hoyas’ schedule. After two losses on Friday, Georgetown defeated East Carolina University (1-4) 3-2 and suffered a heartbreaking 9-13 loss against Coastal Carolina (3-2) in the bottom of the seventh on Saturday.

Against the Boilermakers, the Hoyas opened up scoring in the bottom of the second inning. A double to left-center from graduate outfielder Alyssa Chavez brought junior infielder Brittany Lew home and gave Chavez her first of three runs batted in on the day.

Purdue responded quickly at the top of the third, tying the score at 1-1 after a single

to right field from pitcher Alex Echazaretta and a score from infielder Rachel Becker.

In the fifth inning, Purdue upped the ante again with a homer to center-field from outfielder Kiersen George, giving the Boilermakers three unearned runs. In the

“Though the outcome was less than desirable, Georgetown’s battle with Purdue showed grit and character.”

DEMI PAPPAS Staff Writer

following minutes, Purdue infielder Jade Moy tripled and sent outfielder Kiara Dillon home, bringing their lead to a daunting 6-2.

In the sixth inning, though, Georgetown nearly came back. Chavez homered the ball to left field, bringing the game to within 2 runs. Still, this effort was not enough and Purdue walked

away with a 6-4 win, rising to 5-0 on the season.

While the Hoyas now sit 1-4 on the season, their first Big East contest against Creighton (3-2, 0-0 Big East) is still nearly a month away on March 11.

Though the outcome was less than desirable, Georgetown’s battle with Purdue showed grit and character, qualities that will undoubtedly be useful throughout the entire season. Not only were the Hoyas coming off four games in just two days, but this is also the first competition the team has participated in since their 2020 season was cut short due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

On the field, there are many silver linings from this opening weekend outing.

Prolific scoring from Chavez and dominant pitching from sophomore pitcher Julia Parker are just some of the weapons in Georgetown’s arsenal.

The Hoyas will look to shake off their losing weekend with the upcoming Furman University Tournament in Greenville, S.C. Their tournament play will begin with a Friday, Feb. 18 doubleheader against the University of South Dakota Coyotes at 11:30 a.m. and the St. Francis Red Flash at 2:00 p.m.

ROUNDING THE DIAMOND

Recent CBA Negotiations Alter MLB for the Worse Eli Blumenfeld Columnist

In his most recent press conference about the ongoing Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) negotiations, Major League Baseball (MLB) Commissioner Rob Manfred confirmed some major changes for the new labor agreement, including the addition of a universal designated hitter (DH), the elimination of draft pick compensation and the introduction of a draft lottery.

Let’s take a closer look at some of these changes.

To start, I believe the universal DH is a good implementation for baseball and will increase the quality of play. I understand the complaints about the history, interleague differentiation and strategy, but pitchers in 2021 batted a putrid -18 on-base slugging plus (OPS+). They slashed an unimpressive .110 batting average (BA), a .150 on-base percentage (OBP), a .142 slugging percentage (SLG) and totaled 4829 plate appearances and 2135 strikeouts. This means that 44.2% of all pitchers’ plate appearances ended with a strikeout, curbing much offensive momentum and diminishing the quality of play.

Adding a universal DH would promise more at-bats for better hitters and fewer at-bats for worse hitters while also decreasing injury risks for pitchers. This addition was a no-brainer decision, and should have been implemented years ago.

Now, regarding the more intriguing inclusions in the newest-proposed CBA, draft pick compensation is a great place to start. When a free agent rejects a qualifying offer from their current team and subsequently signs with another club, the previous team receives an early draft pick — after the first or second round, depending on the length of the new contract

— while the new team loses their second-highest draft pick.

I don’t think the elimination of such draft pick compensation from the CBA will do as much as the MLB and the MLB Players Association have hoped. Instead of gaining a significant prospect return for a player on the way out via trade, selling teams will now have to settle for a lesser offer from opposing teams and thus accept a lesser return on their players, since removing draft pick compensation will eliminate sellers’ leverage.

Why would a team not just wait to sign a player in the off-season, thereby giving up no draft capital? Buying teams know that their selling counterparts cannot receive any compensation for a player who leaves in free

“Teams do not purposefully tank for higher draft capital; they lose because it is economically encouraged.”

ELI BLUMENFELD Columnist

agency and that these sellers will have to settle for lesser offers on impending free agents.

The elimination of draft pick compensation will only worsen the league’s parity; bad, small-market teams will lose their best players for less while good teams will get better without having to trade away their elite prospects.

To touch on the final component, the inclusion of draft lottery, I believe the implementation of an MLB draft lottery is worthless and disregards the unique na-

ture of the draft.

First, prospect success in the MLB is much less guaranteed than in other professional American sports. Unlike the NBA and NFL drafts, where the number one overall picks are the leagues’ best, the touted “best” player in the MLB Draft class is often not selected first.

Instead, with the unique structuring of the MLB Draft, in which teams are allotted only a certain pool of cash to sign their picks, many MLB teams economically strategize their draft capital — rather than simply choosing the best player available.

Take the 2019 draft class of the New York Mets with the selection of Brett Baty.

A “reach” in the first round, the Mets signed Baty under slot value with a $3.9 million deal, below the $4.37 million value of the 12th overall pick. With the money saved by opting to not go for the consensus best player available, the Mets were also able to sign Matt Allen, a projected first-round pick with a strong commitment to Florida, in the third round for $2.5 million — well above his $667,900 slot value.

Simply put, teams do not purposefully tank for higher draft capital; they lose because it is economically encouraged. Team owners are to blame for the league’s competitive problem; many owners of small market franchises enjoy the revenue received solely by existing as an MLB franchise and league-wide revenue sharing and are content to lose.

Rob Manfred has failed to recognize that the MLB has a competitiveness problem, not a tanking problem.

We’ll just have to wait and see how all changes will affect the future of the MLB –– and hopefully with an end to the lockout period, we can get back to some good baseball.

GUHoyas

Georgetown’s softball team was unable to break even at the Kickin’ Chicken Classic, going 1-4 and ending the stretch with a 4-6 loss to Purdue.

SQUASH

GU Beats No. 31 Denison 9-0, Falls to No. 21 Dickinson 0-9 Brendan Quill Hoya Staff Writer

Coming off of a disappointing performance at the MidAtlantic Squash Conference Championships in early February, the Georgetown squash team returned to the home court with two matches. The Hoyas split the weekend series, defeating No. 31 Denison University 9-0 on Saturday, Feb. 12, before falling to No. 21 Dickinson College on Sunday, Feb. 13. As Georgetown’s first home match of the season, the weekend was a welcoming experience after traveling on the road for the past five weekends.

With a win and a loss, Georgetown’s record moves to 8-12 before the season closes with the College Squash Association National Championships next weekend. Despite their sub-500 record, they currently sit as the No. 25 ranked team in the nation.

The Saturday match began at 9 a.m. at Squash on Fire, a squash club located in the West End neighborhood of Washington, D.C. To kick off the action, sophomore Caroline Wilcox defeated Denison’s (1-6) Antoinette Ramsey 11-4, 11-2, 13-11 to give Georgetown (8-12) a 1-0 lead. Senior Cornelia Thomas followed suit, defeating Charlotte Sigg 11-0, 11-3, 11-3.

Senior Julia Sachman added yet another impressive vicEli Blumenfeld is a first-year tory for Georgetown, defeating in the College. Rounding Jaz’mene Little 11-2, 11-3, 11-2. the Diamond appears online With the Hoyas’ top three and in print every six weeks. players winning the top of the

ladder, the rest of the team built on the momentum to win each of the remaining six matches. Junior Margaret Rand and first-year Chloe Kim delivered strong performances with 11-2, 11-3, 11-1 and 11-2, 11-1, 11-2, respectively.

Wilcox remarked that playing at home for the first time provided a much-needed boost for the Hoya team.

“We’ve been traveling every weekend since January 15 so it was very fun and refreshing for everyone to be home and have lots of people come on Saturday. There was a lot of crowd energy and buzz,” Wilcox said.

Saturday’s match against Denison was also senior day, with the team honoring six seniors and one graduate student for their leadership and commitment to the program during one of their final home matches. These seniors witnessed the squash program transition from a club sport for the first three years of their career to a varsity sport in their final season.

In addition to a strong showing from the seniors, the Hoyas’ younger players also performed well. With both starting first-years and the team’s sole sophomore winning, Georgetown’s future in squash is secure.

After the impressive 9-0 Saturday victory, the Hoyas faced a quick turnaround, going up against a strong Dickinson team on Sunday afternoon. This was the second matchup between the Hoyas and Red Devils in seven days,

with Dickinson winning 9-0 on Feb. 6 in the final match of the Mid-Atlantic Squash Conference Championships.

Dickinson sits four spots ahead of Georgetown in the national rankings at No. 21.

Unfortunately for Georgetown, Sunday’s matchup proved to be the same result as the Hoyas fell 9-0 once again.

Despite being ranked just four spots away from Dickinson in the national rankings, Georgetown was unable to come out victorious for the second consecutive time.

While the final match total proved to be a disappointment, Georgetown fought hard and played much better, keeping many of the individual matchups extremely close. Senior Feagin, first-year Nina Flinn, Kim and first-year Catherine Friendly all forced four game sets in a much more competitive overall team effort than the first matchup.

The team is trending in the right direction before its final games of the season.

After the tumultuous weekend, the Hoyas will now prepare for the final event of the squad’s inaugural season as a varsity team: the College Squash Association National Championships at Harvard University and Tufts University in Boston, Massachusetts.

Georgetown will have one final opportunity to compete against the best squash teams in the nation to be crowned collegiate national champion. The event is scheduled to begin Feb. 26.

THE HOYA | A11

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2022 | THEHOYA.COM

SPORTS MEN’S LACROSSE

AROUND THE ASSOCIATION

Daryl Morey Wins Sixers-Nets Trade BRENNAN, from A12

GUHOYAS

Georgetown men’s lacrosse won its whiteout-themed season opener 16-8 over Johns Hopkins in snowy whiteout weather.

GU Defeats Blue Jays, Starts Season With Win

a career-high 15 points this season, and two first-round picks, which helps replenish their draft capital from their own Harden trade just a year ago. So, in pure value alone, the Nets won.

But when considering the 76ers’ circumstances, they won the trade as well. Giving up Simmons hurts a lot less when it seemed impossible that he would ever play for the team again, and has not played for the team this whole season due to mental health issues.

In addition, Philly swapped out Curry for Harden by giving up two firstround picks — now that’s a deal. This immediately puts the Sixers in a different tier than they were before. Harden steps in as the best guard — and perhaps player — that Philadelphia’s franchise player, Joel Embiid, has ever played with, plain and simple. With Embiid averaging the second most points per game in the league this season and generally playing at an MVP level, the Sixers cannot afford to waste this season. Keeping Simmons past his deadline would have done just that. Instead, Philadelphia added a former MVP and catapulted them-

selves into the inner circle of title contenders.

Clearly, both teams won.

The Nets added another long-term piece whose slashing and passing mastery will be maximized with the plentiful shooting in Brooklyn’s lineup, while the Sixers became a true Finals contender with an All-NBA talent. The biggest winner of them all, though, is neither team — it’s actually Sixers President of Basketball Operations Daryl Morey.

When Simmons first made it clear he would no longer play for Philadelphia, many clamored for Morey to move Simmons while he still could for fringe stars like CJ McCollum or D’Angelo Russell, thinking his value would tank once he stopped playing. Morey was mocked endlessly for asking every team for their best player and a cornucopia of draft picks in exchange for Simmons. Until this past week, most thought he would be content to keep Simmons through the trade deadline, essentially wasting a historic season from Embiid.

Despite the pressure from 76ers fans, sportswriters, and the public, Morey stayed patient. In the end, he flipped Simmons for another superstar, and not just any superstar

@SIXERS/TWITTER

Both the Nets and the Sixers are better teams after a blockbuster trade involving stars James Harden and Ben Simmons.

— his guy, James Harden. Morey was always Harden’s most adamant supporter as they battled together in Houston for almost a decade, and now they’ve reunited with one of their best chances to win an NBA title.

Everyone thought Daryl Morey would be this trade deadline’s

biggest loser, but he ended up being its biggest winner.

on target. The Georgetown Tim Brennan is a sophomore offense was firing on all in the McDonough School cylinders; throughout the of Business. Around the match, nine different Hoyas managed to find the back of Association appears online the net and etch their names and in print every other week. on the scoresheet.

As is customary for Georgetown lacrosse, the defense had another stellar performance. Last season, the MEN’S BASKETBALL Hoyas led the Big East, only allowing an average of 8.31 goals per game. Excluding the rocky start, Georgetown held the Jays to three goals through the vast majority of the game. The Hoyas’ dominant defensive performance as a team was highlighted by their successful defense of two different man-down situations. In all, this could signal the start of another top-flight defensive season.

This impressive early showing by the Hoyas bodes well for the team’s later season hopes. Taking down a fellow top-20 ranked team sets Georgetown off on a good foot in targeting a fourth consecutive Big East title and a deep run toward the National Championship. In the past three seasons, the Hoyas have gone a combined 32-8, meaning expectations are high once again for this squad. However, the Hoyas will have to wait a while before their first Big East competition in early April.

The Hoyas will travel for KIRK ZIESER/THE HOYA another early season test Despite first-year guard Aminu Mohammed scoring 27 points and grabbing 10 rebounds, the Georgetown against the No. 11 Penn Quakers at 12 p.m. on Satur- men’s basketball team was unable to snag the win in a Valentine’s Day away game at Creighton. day, Feb. 19. halftime, the Bluejays held a com- found another gear to fight their they managed some impressive CREIGHTON, from A12 manding 48-31 lead. way back into the game. They runs, they ultimately fell victim to giving the Bluejays two techniCreighton opened the second pushed the pace on offense and their inability to get stops on the cal free throws. They converted half just as it closed the first, scor- attacked the Bluejays in the paint, defensive end. Creighton scores, both to go up 24-19, their largest ing quickly and leading 56-33 putting together a game-chang- on average, 31.4% of its 3-pointers 8 lead of the night to that point. with 18:06 left in the game. Har- ing 21-6 run. With 2:45 remain- yet shot 41.4% from beyond the arc With an 8-4 run later, Creighton ris provided some necessary of- ing, Georgetown trailed by only 6 against the Hoyas. extended its lead to 32-23 with fense, hitting 2 short jumpers in points and had all of the momenGeorgetown first-year guard 6:33 to play in the half. It seemed a row to push his point total to 12 tum going into the final stretch.

Aminu Mohammed turned in as though the Bluejays were and bringing the Hoyas within On two consecutive trips a career performance, with 27 3 2 ready to put the Hoyas away.

17 points of their opponents. Af- down the court, graduate guard points and 10 rebounds, while Although Georgetown man- ter this short burst, Georgetown Kaiden Rice missed 2 crucial Harris chipped in 23 points of 4 aged to hold off the Bluejays for a struggled to convert and watched 3-pointers and failed to cut the his own. few minutes, cutting the lead to the Creighton lead grow to 20 lead to a single possession. The The Hoyas sought to earn their 4 five points on a dunk from red- points with 12:51 remaining.

Hoyas never managed to creep first conference win of the seashirt sophomore center Malcolm When Creighton slammed back any further and allowed son and end their losing streak at 5 3 Wilson, their comeback was home a fast break dunk with 9:44 Creighton to cushion their lead Marquette University on Feb. 16, short-lived. Creighton connected left in the game to push ahead 75- and win the game, 88-77. but ultimately fell 66-77. George8 on back-to-back 3-pointers to go 54, the game looked to be all but This was another heartbreak- town’s next contest will come Feb. out on a 16-4 run. Heading into over. But, the Hoyas dug deep and ing loss for the Hoyas. Although 19 at No. 10 Villanova University.

JOHNS HOPKINS, from A12

National Team of the Week.

At the start of the second quarter, Georgetown flipped the script and did not look back. Behind another three goals from Watson and two more by graduate attacker and midfielder Alex Trippi, Georgetown scored seven unanswered goals, ending the quarter up 7-5. Johns Hopkins narrowed the gap with two late scores in the third quarter, but the Hoyas’ defense showed no signs of faltering. Going into the final period of play, the Hoyas had an 11-7 edge on the Jays.

Despite a huge offensive spark by the Jays in the middle of the game, the Hoyas’ defense held them scoreless for the entire second quarter, ultimately posting a 24-minute shutout midgame. Johns Hopkins was unable to find the net from the 1:50 mark in the first until the 6:43 mark in the third.

The fourth quarter was much of the same, with Georgetown winning the frame 5-1 and punctuating a dominant opening-day win. The Hoyas held possession for a majority of the final quarter, dashing any thoughts of a late Jays comeback.

Offensively, Georgetown junior midfielder Graham Bundy Jr. had four assists while also succeeding in netting a goal of his own. Watson had a standout game with six goals and 10 shots

Georgetown Drops 16th Straight Game

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WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

Hoyas Lose Despite Offensive Outburst DEPAUL, from A12

the final minute, the score was tied at 83.

Although Ransom took a strong drive to the basket to put the Hoyas ahead by 2 points, the Blue Demons were able to find Morrow with seconds left to score a buzzerbeater in the paint and send the game to overtime.

The first period of overtime featured more scoreboard pingpong, with neither team able to pull away. Ransom took control for the Hoyas, shrewdly finding paths to the hoop or dishing the ball to an open teammate, which helped her team recover from

4 unanswered DePaul points to stay in the game.

Ultimately, the contest remained tied at 94 apiece in the final minute of overtime, sending the teams to another five minutes of tough competition.

Although Ransom opened up the double overtime with an impressive 3-point drive to the basket, DePaul was not deterred and pulled ahead 101-97 with two minutes to go.

Georgetown fought until the end to regain its lead, but to no avail, with the score settling at 105-101 with four seconds left. Bolden-Morris sank an incredible deep 3-pointer at the buzzer to bring the final score to 105-

104, but victory had slipped through the Hoyas’ fingers.

Although suffering a hardfought loss, the Hoyas left the court with much to be proud of. Ransom scored a careerhigh 29 points, and Wright and Bolden-Morris each contributed an impressive 18 points, helping the Hoyas break the 100-point barrier for the first time since 1998.

In addition, senior forward Jillian Archer recorded a double-double with 14 points and 15 rebounds, aiding the Hoyas in out-rebounding the Blue Demons 45-38. Georgetown also held DePaul to 46.8% shooting from the field while sinking 51.2% of its own shots.

Head Coach James Howard said he wished the hard work of the team had paid off in a victory, but commended the grit of the Hoyas in taking on a tough DePaul team.

“For them to come back out after St. John’s to play this way, that’s what I love about this team. People can think they’re down, they’re done, like they’ve given up, but not this team,” Howard said in a post-game interview. “They have not given up, and that showed tonight against a team that was seeing Top-25 votes.”

The Hoyas will return to McDonough to face Marquette University on Feb. 18.

Sports

MLAX

Georgetown (1-0) vs. UPenn Saturday, 12 p.m.

Philadelphia, Pa.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2022 TALKING POINTS

MEN’S LACROSSE Georgetown men’s lacrosse opened

NUMBERS GAME

People can think they’re down,

their regular season by trouncing

they’re done, like they’ve given

Johns Hopkins 16-8.

up, but not this team.”

See A12

WBB Head Coach James Howard

29

Sophomore guard Kelsey Ransom scored a career-high 29 points in a thrilling loss against DePaul.

MEN’S LACROSSE

GU Hammers Hopkins 16-8 In Season Opener Jeremy Fang

Special to The Hoya

Sporting their all-white jerseys, No. 3 Georgetown men’s lacrosse (1-0) braved the cold, snow and a very slow start to beat No. 16 Johns Hopkins (21) for the first time in school history Feb. 13. With high attendance at Cooper Field, the match had a great atmosphere despite the conditions.

Winning the season opener 16-8, the strong showing from Georgetown snapped Johns Hopkins’ hopes to extend its early-season twogame win streak, dropping it to 2-1 on the year.

The Hoyas had a shaky start with the Jays netting five goals in the opening frame and taking a 5-2 lead.

Thankfully, Georgetown senior faceoff James Reilly’s heroic solo-effort goal, a goal from graduate attacker Connor Morin, and another by senior attacker Dylan Watson with seven seconds left in the first quarter acted as damage control.

However, the Hoyas did not maintain this momentum for too long, After the first five minutes, the Jays were able to settle into their offense with sustained possession and pressure. Hoya graduate student goalkeeper Owen McElroy was forced to make four saves as he faced 14 shots throughout the quarter. By the end of the game, McElroy had made 17 saves en route to earning a spot on the United States Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association’s See JOHNS HOPKINS, A11

GUHOYAS

Although Georgetown women’s basketball logged a triple-digit game for the first time since 1998, they lost in double overtime to DePaul.

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

Hoyas Suffer Double-Overtime Loss to DePaul Julia Cannamela Hoya Staff Writer

After battling through four competitive quarters and two overtime periods, the Georgetown women’s basketball team (7-15, 2-12 Big East) lost to the DePaul Blue Demons (20-17, 12-4 Big East) 105-104.

Despite maintaining a lead for most of the Feb. 13 game, the Hoyas were unable to stop the Blue Demons from sneaking back into contention, forcing extra play and wrestling the win from them.

Despite coming into their fourth game in an eight-day

span off of a tough 79-45 loss at St. John’s, the Hoyas entered with high energy and aggression on both sides of the court.

While in the previous matchup with DePaul Georgetown fell behind early on its way to a 33-point loss, it was the Hoyas who took charge this time in McDonough Arena.

Georgetown immediately got to work in the paint with help from two first-years, forward Brianna Scott and center Ariel Jenkins. In addition, sophomore guard Kelsey Ransom found an offensive rhythm early on, pushing the team to a 22-18 lead by the end of the first quarter.

On defense, the rebounding and strength of Georgetown’s bigs allowed them to quiet the dynamic play of DePaul’s star forward Aneesah Morrow and keep her from overtaking the game.

In the second quarter, Georgetown continued to hold their composure and built a lead against the talented Blue Demon team. A 3-pointer from graduate guard Milan BoldenMorris extended the Hoyas’ lead to 11 points midway through, making the score 37-26.

Although DePaul cut the lead to 4 points in the final minute, Hoya graduate guard Mary Clougherty made an in-

credible last-second play, intercepting the Blue Demons’ inbound pass and swishing a long buzzer-beating jumper to send Georgetown into the second half up 43-37.

Georgetown held steady throughout most of the third quarter, battling and winning offensive rebounds to obtain second-chance opportunities. Offensive contributions from senior forward Shanniah Wright in the paint bolstered the Hoyas back to a 10-point lead, but DePaul would not give up the fight.

Quick points from the Blue Demons brought the game

much closer leading into the final quarter, with Georgetown barely leading DePaul 61-60.

In the fourth quarter, the teams battled back-and-forth, each going on impressive runs to try to turn the tide. Despite Bolden-Morris opening up the quarter with back-to-back 3-pointers, DePaul managed to go on a 10-2 run to take the lead for the first time in the game with seven minutes left.

The lead popcorned backand-forth seven times between the teams in the next three minutes, and as the game entered See DEPAUL, A11

AROUND THE ASSOCIATION

MEN’S BASKETBALL

Georgetown Collapses at Creighton Harden for Simmons: Everyone Wins Caden Koontz Hoya Staff Writer

The Georgetown men’s basketball team mounted a furious comeback attempt at Creighton University on Feb. 14, but ultimately lost 77-88. This marks the Hoyas’ 14th consecutive loss and they have yet to win a game in the Big East conference.

Monday’s matchup was the second in a row between Georgetown (6-19, 0-14 Big East) and Creighton (16-8, 8-5 Big East). The Bluejays came out on top 80-66 at Capital One Arena in the previous showdown Feb. 12.

Sophomore guard Dante Harris opened the scoring for both teams with a pull-up jumper on the Hoyas’ second possession of the game. He added a second pull-up with 17:30 remaining in the half, giving the Hoyas a 7-3 lead.

At the under-16 media timeout, Creighton led 11-9. The two teams traded baskets over the next several minutes, with graduate guard Donald Carey finding junior center Timothy Ighoefe on a smooth dish for a dunk at the 12:44 mark.

With 10:49 remaining in the half, Head Coach Patrick Ewing (CAS ’85) was handed a technical foul for accidentally tripping a Creighton player,

Tim Brennan Columnist

ANNA YUAN/THE HOYA

Despite mounting a late comeback against Creighton, the Georgetown See CREIGHTON, A11 men’s basketball team fell 77-88, marking its 14th straight loss this season.

Visit us online at thehoya.com/sports

Last Thursday, the Brooklyn Nets traded James Harden, 2018 MVP and perennial all-star, to the Philadelphia 76ers for a couple role players, some picks, and Ben Simmons, who has not played a minute of basketball this season. Clearly, the 76ers won the trade.

Yet, at the same time, the 76ers traded Simmons, a 25-year-old All-NBA talent with three years left on his contract, Seth Curry, Philadelphia’s best shooter and an above-average starter, their serviceable backup center in Andre Drummond, and two first-round picks for Harden, who has quit on two teams in the past two seasons and is a free agent this offseason.

Clearly, the Nets won the trade — wait a second.

Mere minutes after an NBA trade is announced, one team is declared the “winner” of the trade by everyone from Twitter users to beat writers. These assessments are obviously not the best indicator of who got the better end of a deal — usually, a

winner of a trade cannot be named until years after the fact, when all facets of the deal play out. Even so, there is usually one team that gets the better of the other.

Rarely is a deal a completely fair trade, or a win-win. This, however, is one of those trades.

Looking strictly at player and pick value, one can conclude that the Nets won.

While they gave up a superstar in Harden, he’s clearly begun his decline, even if it is coming slowly, and he is on the final year of his deal.

In addition, it was pretty apparent that Harden was already on his way out — he privately requested a trade to Philly and said he was unlikely to re-sign with Brooklyn this summer. Finally, his contract is massive: he can opt in to a $47.4 million player option in June, putting the 76ers salary cap under serious strain.

Simmons, while flawed, has already made an All-NBA team, finished second in Defensive Player of the Year voting last season and has three years left on his deal after this season. They also got back Seth Curry, a career 44% three-point shooter averaging See BRENNAN, A11