Spring sports cleared

Emerson College’s student newspaper since 1947 • berkeleybeacon.com

Thursday, March 04, 2021 • Volume 74, Issue 19

@berkeleybeacon // @beaconupdate

Pelton poised to reshape Boston Foundation presidency Frankie Rowley Beacon Staff After Emerson President M. Lee Pelton steps into his new role as CEO and President of The Boston Foundation on June 1, he will be tasked with setting new priorities for the organization, managing its $1.5 billion budget, and serving as a liaison between donors and nonprofits.

Established in 1919, The Boston Foundation works as “Boston’s largest grant maker,” providing grants to nonprofit organizations in the greater Boston area through their endowment fund. The foundation also works to create “donor advised funds”— funds invested into donor-created charitable funds and dispersed over time.

Among its other duties, the foundation acts as a civic and research innovation hub to develop solutions for issues facing the greater Boston community.

“The job has changed a lot because the organization has changed a lot, mostly for the better,” current President Paul Grogan said. “It’s like a bank for community improvement.

Much of our money is supplied by donors [who] wish to do their charitable work in conjunction with the foundation. We’re able to assist generous donors, putting their money in the right place, identifying programs for them to fund, and so forth.”

Grogan, who led the Foundation for 20 years, said the President must manage relationships both with the board of directors and nonprofit organizations across the country and internationally—though most grants go to nonprofits in Boston and Massachusetts. The president is also responsible for hosting and organizing fundraisers, as well as determining the foundation’s priorities alongside the Board.

“Our goal is to work with all the major stakeholders in Boston to focus on the major challenges and opportunities facing our city,” Linda Mason,

A student walks down Boylston street. Alec Klusza / Beacon Staff

Exterior of The Boston Foundation. Zhihao Wu / Beacon Staff chair of the foundation’s board of directors, said. “That would be community leaders, the universities, the business community, the government, other foundations, [and] donors. We represent the city in its entirety [and] serve the city in its entirety.”

The organizations supported by the foundation typically align with one or more of the foundation’s “five impact areas,”—arts and culture, education, health and wellness, neighborhoods and housing, and jobs and economic development, according to their website. Nonprofits can also apply for “open door grants”—which envelops nonprofits that don’t fall under the impact area—or directly through donors-established funds. In the 2020 fiscal year, the foundation and its donors made approximately 12,000 grants, totalling to more than $215 million, according to Ted McEnroe, senior director of communications and digital media.

The job of the president has changed as the foundation expanded.

He said the most significant shift has been the financial responsibilities of the position. Grogan said it was time

to leave the foundation and allow a new leader to develop a fresh vision.

“Fresh blood and a fresh pair of eyes are needed in most institutions periodically,” Grogan said. “It’s a very demanding job and it’s relentless... I feel like I’ve had my experience with that and I think it went very well, and [now it’s] time to do something different.”

Grogan said Pelton could expect a steep learning curve after his induction into the foundation following commencement.

“Part of it is just a whirlwind that takes place as he gets into the job,” Grogan said. “Given the relationships that have to be built, the number of people who will want to be meeting with him and talking with him, there’ll be a lot of pressure.”

Pelton will be taking the helm as the 10-year priorities for the foundation are being set. ”It will be a real opportunity for him to put his stamp on the foundation and its activities and his priorities,” Grogan said. “He’ll have a lot of flexibility to do that.”

Foundation, Pg. 2

Administrators suggest restriction loosening on the horizon Charlie McKenna Beacon Staff

With coronavirus cases on the decline in Boston and in Massachusetts and the gradual lift of restrictions, positive COVID-19 tests at Emerson have begun to slowly dip back to fall semester rates, prompting administrators to consider loosening some on-campus restrictions.

For just the second time this semester, Emerson reported single-digit positives last week, with seven community members testing positive for the virus. The only other week in which fewer than 10 positive tests were reported was the first week of testing this semester—the week the fewest number of tests were administered.

This week, four community members have tested positive of the more than 2,400 tests administered.

This comes on the heels of Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker progressing the state’s reopening to Phase Three, Step Two, and Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh indicating the city would follow suit on March 22. Baker announced that the state will move into its fourth and final phase of reopening on March 22, allowing for the resumption of some large gatherings.

At Emerson, administrators wouldn’t say what restrictions might be lifted, but said as cases continue to decline, some aspects of “normal,” pre-pandemic college life could return, “COVID Lead” Erik Muurisepp said.

“Relaxing some of our regulations, we want to do that, we’ve started conversations of what could we do, knowing that the city has,” he said. “We are reviewing that, we hope that maybe in a few weeks we can start loosening some things up and allowing some more capacities. That would be my ideal, is if we can get back to some of those spaces and practices before the end of the school year.”

Muurisepp declined to provide any specific examples of restrictions that could be lifted.

Restrictions, Pg. 3

Emerson green lights spring sports Christopher Williams, Joseph Dubois Beacon Staff Nearly a year after their season came to an unexpected halt due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Emerson’s spring sports teams will be the first programs to compete in an official season since last March.

“When my coach told me at first, it didn’t really hit, and then when I was making my way to campus I was like, ‘Holy shit,’” junior baseball Captain Calvin Jacey said in an interview, “It just makes everything that we’ve really gone through really worth it.”

The New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference announced its plans for a spring sports season with ongoing COVID testing and mandatory masking on Monday. Emerson athletes were left in the lurch for two days following the announcement, unsure if the college would opt in to competition. The conference required each of its eleven member schools to independently determine if they would opt into the season, and Emerson was the second-to-last school to reach a decision.

Clark University, Springfield College, United States Coast Guard Academy, Wheaton College, and Worcester Polytechnic Institute all opted to participate in

149

positive COVID-19 tests

.18%

positivity rate

84,600+ tests completed *Accumulated from 2020-2021 school year

The men’s lacrosse team will soon compete for the first timesince March 2020. / Courtesy Justin Schmalholz the spring season following the announcement. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Mount Holyoke College, Smith College, and Wellesley College opted out, and Babson College has yet to reach a decision.

Junior softball pitcher and infielder Katelyn Torlincasi said in an interview the team “tried to remain optimistic,” but were left feeling anxious while waiting for the college’s decision.

Emerson announced its decision

Wednesday morning, allowing four of its six spring sports teams— baseball, men’s and women’s lacrosse, and softball—to compete this spring. The announcement, which set the season start date as March 13, left athletes feeling grateful and excited to be doing what they love once again.

“It kind of feels like we’re picking up where we left off,” Torlincasi said, “It’s a really cool opportunity, and we’re all really grateful we even get a chance to step on the

field this season.”

As part of the college’s decision, athletes must receive three COVID tests per week, are not permitted to travel overnight, have the opportunity to individually opt out of the season at any time, and will continue practicing in groups of seven to eight players. The official schedules are yet to be determined, but teams have already begun practicing. Fans are not permitted to attend games this season.

NEWMAC, Pg. 8

INSIDE THIS EDITION Spring sees rise in inconclusive COVID-19 tests Pg. 3 Editorial: Biden falls short on election promises Pg. 4 Op-ed: Confronting feelings of lonliness Pg. 5 ‘Coded Bias’ highlights racial prejudice in AI Pg. 7 Fall sports teams begin training for next season Pg. 8

News First woman of color VMA Chair The Berkeley Beacon

March 4, 2021

2

prioritizes inclusion, sustainability Ann E. Matica, Alec Klusza Beacon Staff

Since ascending to chair of the Department of Visual & Media Arts in July—becoming the first woman of color to take the helm of the college’s most popular major—Cristina Kotz Cornejo has prioritized making the department more inclusive, eco-friendly, and pandemic-oriented.

A 20-year veteran of the college, Kotz Cornejo’s new responsibilities as VMA chair include overseeing a vast population of Emerson’s student body— 30 percent, to be exact—and managing an annual budget of one million dollars.

She now also commands a department representing 21 percent of the college’s faculty, according to the most recent data collected by the college.

She previously served as an associate chair of the department for five of her 20 years working at the college, during which she led production operations and oversaw the facilities and equipment budget for the department.

“Some of the things that are important to me personally as the first female BIPOC chair are issues of racial and environmental justice and equity and inclusion,” Kotz Cornejo said. “It’s why I created the Women in Film Media Summit and why we are actively moving to decolonize the VMA curriculum and reflect on what accessibility means in media production and exhibition.”

The Women in Film Media Summit, which the former professor created in 2015 to bring together female filmmakers to share their experiences in the industry, is something she’s hoping to expand as chair.

“She had an idea for a summit of women who worked in key positions in the film industry,” Brooke Knight, for-

Cristina Kotz Cornejo, the current VMA Chair. / Courtesy Cristina Kotz Cornejo

mer VMA chair and now assistant provost, said. “She put together a terrific series of panels... that was a really big deal to recognize the importance of women in production.”

In the spring of 2020, Kotz Cornejo went on a presidential leave to pursue her own filmmaking project in Argentina.

After her predecessor, Brooke Knight, was promoted to assistant provost in March, sixty-two of Kotz Cornejo’s peer faculty members elected her for the chair role at an annual faculty retreat last May. Due to the pandemic, Kotz Cornejo was trapped overseas in Argentina for her filmmaking project until May. As chair of the VMA department, Kotz Cornejo says one of her focuses is on reducing the department’s environmental impact by promoting the Green Production Committee—a faculty-run organization with student advisors—to investigate ways to reduce the department’s carbon footprint. The committee was formed last semester.

“The green production committee, in collaboration with a national alliance of green production schools, is working on guidelines and resource materials to support and expand sustainability in the film industry,” wrote Green Production

Committee Head Homa Sarabi-Dauunais in an emailed statement. “We are planning an event for Earth Day on April 22nd to roll out our program, guidelines, and resource lists, invite the students to participate, and host a panel about the importance of sustainability and climate awareness in the film industry.”

Kotz Cornejo’s role as associate chair of the department for nearly half a decade has well-prepared her for the new role, Knight said.

“VMA is a terrific department, and they couldn’t be in better hands than with Christina Kotz Cornejo,” Knight, who held the position for seven years, said in an interview. “During really, really challenging times, it’s extraordinarily tough. Cristina really deserves a lot of credit.”

Throughout her career at the college, Kotz Cornejo also held chair positions for the Facilities and Equipment committee—which reviews proposals for facilities or equipment—and the Development, Promotion and Tenure Committee—which reviews materials submitted by individuals up for tenure review and makes recommendations to the Dean and Faculty Status Committee.

“She’s been involved in a lot of the

service work that faculty do that’s behind the scenes that a lot of students don’t see,” Knight said. “There’s committees for just about anything, and she’s really involved in that.”

While still stuck in Argentina, Kotz Cornejo spearheaded the creation of the VMA COVID 19 Production Safety Guidelines—a 54-page document outlining the protocols anyone on an Emerson film set must adhere to in order to be in compliance with the college’s COVID-19 guidelines. Some examples of rules include the instatement of the position of a “COVID Captain” on every set—someone in charge of making sure everyone on set is following the guidelines—and the requirement that all crew members wear face shields when an actor has their mask off.

“I want to make sure to give her credit for the safety protocols that are in place for COVID shoots, that allow students to actually shoot something,” Knight said.

“I was the one who shut stuff down when we had to in the spring—but Christina has found a way to open it back up.”

In addition to managing on-campus film festivals, like the Bright Lights Film Series and the Emerson Film Festival, Kotz Cornejo oversees workshops hosted by the department to aid students in production classes.

Workshops range from safety demonstrations to Steadicam workshops outsourced by the college, according to Kotz Cornejo. The department is continuing to hold workshops throughout the pandemic, though they have shifted to an online platform.

“The workshops were really [made to] support the classrooms,” Kotz Cornejo said. “We’re doing workshops in-house that are designed to support the curriculum.”

In September, Kotz Cornejo an-

Pelton to set the tone at The Boston Foundation

The exterior of the COVID testing site. Hongyu Liu / Beacon Staff

Paul Grogan, CEO/President of The Boston Foundation / Courtesy TBF.org Cont. from Pg. 1 When searching for Grogan’s successor following his resignation in January, J. Keith Motley, chair of the presidential search committee at The Boston Foundation said they sought an experienced leader engaged in all sectors of the community.

“The goal was... to find someone who has a proven track record of excellence, but also someone with a proven record of being able to get other people to participate in this work,” he said.

Pelton checked “most of the boxes” for the foundation, serving as the Board of Directors Vice Chair for the Boston Chamber of Commerce, the Chair of the Boston Arts Academy Foundation Board, a member of the WGBH Board of Trustees, and a Trustee at the Barr Foundation.

“He’s worked hard to make Emerson an incredible institution,” Motley said. “He’s also been engaged in the Boston community in a very complete

way… He has an understanding of Boston, Massachusetts in its politics, but he also has relationships which are key to a role like this. He also has experience as a leader.”

In November 2019, Pelton was one of the guest speakers at TBF’s Annual Campaign for Civic Leadership. The next month, TBF gave a $20,000 grant to Emerson to support the Emerson Prison Initiative.

Grogan said he wished his best to the incoming president, advising Pelton to be adventurous with his new role and to ensure the foundation’s finances, resources, and good reputation remain intact.

“He is so talented I expect him to have a lot of a lot of impact in a lot of different ways,” Grogan said. “We have a lot of big issues that require a lot of thought and effort, and we need institutions, like the Boston Foundation, to really step up and take on the tough issues.” frankie_rowley@emerson.edu

Spring semester sees rise in invalid COVID-19 tests, new ‘inconclusive’ designation Alec Klusza Beacon Staff

This semester, the college has reported a slight rise in COVID-19 tests coming back “invalid” and has introduced a new “inconclusive” category for tests, exacerbating the logistical inconvenience of retesting and sending more students into isolation.

The percentage of invalid tests, sometimes called “tests non-performed,” (TNP), signals an error in the testing process, such as a misplaced label or a low-quality specimen. Erik Muurisepp, assistant vice president for campus life and the college’s “COVID Lead,” says despite the uptick in invalid tests, the percentage is to be expected and is similar to that of other organizations using the Broad Institute for testing.

“We are roughly at a 3 percent TNP rate, [which] is on par with what is to be expected,” said Erik Muurisepp.

Student samples are tested twice for the virus in a “two assay test.”

When a student receives a TNP, they are required to get re-tested as soon as possible.

However, if both tests of a sample are reported positive, then it is considered a positive test result and the student must immediately enter into isolation. If the sample only results in only one positive, it is labeled inconclusive, and the student must go into temporary isolation until they receive a negative test. Muurisepp said the “inconclusive” result category was introduced for college tests about two weeks ago.

“That is in response to the ongoing tweaking and improving of the testing process over at the Broad Institute,” Muurisepp said. “Inconclusives we treat as potential positives.

And that’s at the direction of a medical team at Tufts, and so they then reach out, get that person in for a second test as soon as possible, and then pending that second test result, they

nounced via email to the VMA department she was holding socially distanced office hours for the fall semester. She has not held any in the spring but hopes to continue them in the future, she said in an emailed statement to The Beacon.

“I had in-person office hours in the fall and have been trying to find time this semester, but I lost my assistant so I haven’t had someone to manage my calendar,” Kotz Cornejo said. “I hope to try and bring back some in-person or online office hours once I have a permanent assistant.”

For Kotz Cornejo, adapting to the hybrid learning environment amid the pandemic has proven frustrating, as VMA requires a substantial amount of handson learning in certain on-campus spaces with specific equipment.

“I deal with challenges a lot in this position,” Kotz Cornejo said. “There’s more students going into quarantine and isolation and our faculty adapting.

Adapting to having their flex classes with a component of students Zooming [in] is confusing right now because in the fall we didn’t have that many COVID positives or a lot of people in quarantine.”

Kotz Cornejo added that despite the challenges of heading the department during a pandemic, she is dedicated to fulfilling the myriad roles her new position entails.

“Being a department chair is a difficult job,” Knight said. “You have multiple constituencies at all times—obviously students and faculty, but you also work with deans, and then you have parents, and then there’s the upper administration. A lot of people look at being department chairs as kind of part of their service. It’s service to the college.” contact@berkeleybeacon.com would be able to relieve temporary isolation.”

Tris Arthur, a first-year visual and media arts major, received three invalid test results since returning to campus in January, causing her to go several days without a conclusive negative result.

“It’s kind of ridiculous how often it’s happening,” Arthur said. “I know that I’ll be able to just go back the next day and get retested, and it won’t be an issue, but there is a small element of stress. It’s a bit concerning when you don’t know—when you don’t have the security of knowing—that you’re negative.”

Arthur received one of her invalid tests the Friday before Presidents’ Day weekend. Because of the holiday, the Tufts testing center was closed until the following Tuesday— meaning she was forced to wait eight days before she could receive a negative result.

“It’s particularly stressful if you get your [invalid] test on a weekend,” she said. “There wasn’t really anything I could do since I couldn’t get tested until Tuesday.”

Harry Robinson, a first-year business and creative enterprises major, was forced to quarantine in his dorm room in the Little Building after getting an invalid test in the fall. This was due to the college’s policy that all students moving into on-campus housing must quarantine in their dorm room upon arrival, before getting the results of their baseline test.

“I still hadn’t gotten a chance to be in Boston yet, I was really excited,” Robinson said. “I had to stay in my single room with no roommate for like three days. I basically was just like, ‘everybody stay away from me, I have to get tested again.’ And it was just really annoying.” alec_klusza@emerson edu

The Berkeley Beacon

March 4, 2021

3

CSD department grapples with hybrid learning Ann E. Matica Beacon Staff

Since the onset of the pandemic last spring, the Communication Sciences and Disorders department has adapted its program to function remotely, despite its highly hands-on and equipment-heavy pedagogy.

Because of hybrid learning restrictions, the department—whose 35 undergraduate students make it the college’s smallest major—shifted all its American Sign Language classes online, introduced simulated clinic computer programs, and shifted to telepractice for the Robbins Center clinic.

The CSD department houses an undergraduate program and two graduate programs, both of which earn students a Masters of Science in Communication Disorders with options for concentrations in speech-language pathology and audiology. One of the graduate programs, Speech@Emerson, which currently enrolls over 600 students, was designed in 2018 for a completely online modality.

Ruth Grossman, associate professor and Chair of the CSD department. said the department’s shift to pandemic-era learning has been a process of trial and error.

“This is a bad situation,” she said.

“It’s a particularly bad situation for a hands-on, clinically focused program.

Everybody recognizes that there’s only so much that we can do to adapt. People generally appreciate the effort that has gone into making those adaptations.”

The majority of the classes in the CSD undergraduate program have moved to a hybrid learning model, which includes an in-person class as well as a Zoom or asynchronous portion. Grossman said the department shifted the entirety of the ASL program online due to the difficulties of teaching the language while wearing masks and socially distancing. “[We] basically came to the conclusion that there was no COVID-safe way to teach ASL in a room appropriately,” Grossman said. “Because if you sat far enough away from each other you were safe but you couldn’t see each other’s faces anymore, you couldn’t see the nuances of the sign, it just wasn’t feasible.”

First-year CSD major Caroline Davis said she has been pleased with her experience in her ASL class despite the online format.

“My teacher is actually deaf, which is really cool because he speaks fluent ASL,” she said. “I’m still learning the same amount that I would be learning in person.”

In other cases, Grossman said, the department has had to completely halt field experience electives in clinical environments, which can take place in clinics, hospitals, and rehab centers, due to complications with having students shadow medical staff.

“Shadowing somebody in a clinical environment for an undergraduate, credit-bearing class is a complicated thing to set up right now,” she said. “If you want to be in the hospital and shadow a speech pathologist, that’s tricky business … we don’t currently have anybody doing field experience.”

Along with field experience electives, all clinic preparatory classes that prepare students for working with patients and clinical equipment, have been halted due to safety concerns.

“Introduction to clinical practices relies a lot on working with assessment tools, learning what the different assessment tools are, and how they’re used,” Grossman said. “It involves people clumping around a test and handling it and sharing it, and that’s also something that we decided that just couldn’t happen right now.”

Grossman said while some courses have been forced to pause, the department has worked with students on a case-by-case basis to ensure their path to graduation is not disrupted.

Robin Danzak, an associate professor

in the department said adapting to pandemic-era teaching has been a challenge.

This semester, Danzak is teaching an interdisciplinary course designed last year called “Arts, Health, and Community.”

The course allows students to work with community organizations in Boston—including Emerson’s own Robbins Center. The Robbins Center, a clinic within the Union Savings Bank opened in 1953, “provides evaluation and treatment for children and adults with communication problems as well as support programs for family members and caregivers,” according to the college’s website.

“Pretty much every week I think about things that we could be doing if we were able to really be live in person and engaged with these community partners,” Danzark said. “Instead of doing online interviews, my students could actually be going to the sites and volunteering or spending some time observing how these organizations work with their clients and the community.”

Danzak also teaches a language and literacy disabilities course for both of the graduate programs. She designed the course to fit the Speech@Emerson online format, but said she was taken off guard by the in-person to remote transition.

“Students choose an on-ground program for a reason versus an online program,” she said. “It’s not an easy translation, even though that online version was built. It was definitely very helpful, but not a one-to-one translation.”

Davis said her experience as a firstyear CSD major was vastly different than she expected due to the online format.

“Because learning is very different online than in person and because our major is so hands-on it was definitely harder… but I think they did a really good job,” she said.

Previously, graduate students enrolled in the Speech@Emerson program were typically required to come to campus

twice during the program, each time for a three-and-a-half day immersive experience. Since the pandemic, this in-person aspect has been suspended as travel is not feasible.

“We created a virtual immersion and the virtual graduation celebration and those have been nice, but it’s not quite the same,” Grossman said.

The MS in Communication Disorders graduate program, typically in-person, has shifted to a hybrid model. The 76 graduate students currently enrolled in the program are required to collect a total of 375 “contact hours,” or hours spent working in a clinic, before their graduation. Graduate students begin collecting their hours at the Robbins Center, which has moved now fully to telepractice, and then move to working at local schools, hospitals, nursing homes, rehab facilities, and private practices, where they collect the remaining hours needed to graduate.

Grossman said the department has been working on a one-on-one basis with graduate students to determine how to complete their required clinic hours.

Some have received clinical placements, while others chose to complete their requirements through computer-simulation hours.

Jesse Cohen, a senior CSD major, said since the department has shifted to a hybrid learning format, she has felt cared for by the close-knit community.

“I think the department did really well with making sure that we knew that they were still there if we needed anything,” she said.

As she waits to hear back from the graduate programs she applied to outside of Emerson, Cohen said she feels confident moving on from Emerson to begin her masters degree despite not having as many observation hours as she would have liked.

“There are some people coming in that have a business background, they

The Communication Sciences and Disorders Department. Zhuoli Zhang / Beacon Staff

don’t even have any CSD background, so I think having hopefully about 15 observation hours at the end of this semester… I think I’ll be okay,” she said.

Along with seeing patients, The Robbins Center also serves as a training facility for students in the CSD Department. Last March, when students were sent home to finish the remainder of their semester online, Grossman said she was proud to see her students care for their patients at the Robbins Center during the difficult transition period.

“They were really incredible in how thoughtful they were about their cli-

ents and knowing that the session that they were about to have with our client was going to be that client’s last session in-person and maybe last session for a while,” she said. “The students were just extraordinary about putting their clients first and thinking about their needs and what they needed in that last session … that was a really powerful and impressive moment in time from the perspective of seeing our students really blossom in the work that they’re doing—and that we are training them for it.” ann_matica@emerson.edu

Decline of college positives sparks optimism Cont. from Pg. 1 “We would look into it all, maybe room capacities,” he said.

Baker’s decision to open theatres and performance venues was ripped by several public health officials, who warned the state could be moving through its reopening too quickly. In the fall and summer, when cases reached their nadir in Massachusetts, Baker never moved the state into Phase Four—instead waiting for the approval of a vaccine.

Yet, cases now have yet to dip back down to summer lows—averaging approximately 1,000 per day. At Emerson, positives soared for the first weeks of the semester—reaching a high of 24 in a single week, more than a third of the fall semester’s total of 60.

Muurisepp repeatedly attributed the surge to a “new environment” of “higher positivity” where “more virus” was present.

“It’s more prevalent,” he said. “This is obviously virus that’s in the city. It’s because there is more virus out there and it is being transmitted.”

Now, Muurisepp says students are more strictly adhering to safety protocols, leading to not just fewer positives but also a decline in the number of students in isolation and quarantine housing.

On Feb. 19, five community members were in isolation and 28 were quarantined. Now, no students are in isolation and just two are in quarantine.

“I’m probably more excited about that part because it means people are adhering to our guidance of not becoming a contact, and not gathering in large groups,” he said.

A reopening poses the risk of increased spread, though, as when cases reached highs in the state, they surged at Emerson—prompting a flood of new restrictions. charles_mckenna@emerson.edu

The Berkeley Beacon

March 4, 2021

4

Opinion

President Joe Biden gives a speech. / Courtesy State House News Service

Editorial: President Biden leaves a trail of broken promises after a month in office Editorial Joe Biden took office just over a month ago, and we’re already disappointed. At a time when millions of Americans are facing illness and job insecurity, a drastic change from Trump’s presidency was a beacon of hope for struggling Americans.

Sure, it hasn’t been all bad. Biden has already issued 34 executive orders, many of which are reversals of orders Trump made in the White House. In just his first few weeks, he extended a pause on student loan payments until Sept 30, reversed Trump’s order allowing separation of immigrant families at the border, and instated a task force to address the coronavirus pandemic. Most recently, Biden has pushed for a nearly $2 trillion

COVID-19 relief bill that is currently headed to the Senate.

He’s also reversed some of Trump’s more infamous policies, including a rescindment of the Muslim ban, rejoining the World Health Organization, and reentering the Paris Climate Agreement.

Biden’s approval rating is also unusually high— 52.9 percent compared to Trump’s 44.3 percent rating at the start of his presidential term.

Still, there’s been a lot of questionable decisions from the Biden administration as well, mostly regarding campaign promises that he seems to have little intention of keeping. The airstrike he ordered on Syria Feb. 25 resulted in 22 casualties, further alienating allies in the Middle East. The Biden administration has said it’s unlikely a federal $15 mini-

mum wage will end up in the upcoming COVID relief bill. Biden has also fallen short on immigration—thousands of unaccompanied migrant children are still currently being held in government detention centers.

Much to the disappointment following this administration’s inauguration was due to a bar from the federal judge that stopped Biden from enforcing a 100day pause on deportations. U.S. District Judge Drew Tipton said the Biden administration had failed “to provide any concrete, reasonable justification for a 100-day pause on deportations.”

Knowing this, the living conditions for immigrants in the U.S borders are also not improving. In January, more than 5,700 unaccompanied minors crossed the border, arriving at the Carrizo Springs

facility on Monday, Feb 22. The White House reopened this facility used during the Trumwp administration, which has the capacity to house only 700 individuals between the ages of 13 and 17.

As mentioned previously, the Biden administration seems to be struggling to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, in part due to push back from Congress.

Republican Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa argued that this would hurt small businesses. Biden said on Feb. 5 that he doesn’t “think [the federal $15 minimum wage] is going to survive,” in the $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill Congress has struggled to pass since his inauguration. Now that there’s a Democratic majority, the Biden administration needs to heed this advantage and not constantly bow to Republican demands. It seems he is already

picking and choosing his battles, and the COVID-19 relief bill changes took precedence.

However, one of Biden’s more popular campaign promises was student debt forgiveness. Over 40 million students owe $1.6 trillion in federal student loans, and while many call for President Biden to forgive up to $50,000 dollars of student debt, he would only commit to $10,000 in a recent CNN town hall. He also commended programs like the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF), where over 95 percent of PSLF applicants have been denied.

This is disappointing, not only because Biden campaigned on cancelation of all undergraduate student loans, but because Biden absolutely has the authority to use executive power to cancel all federal student debt— an authority granted decades ago by the Higher Education Act. It’s discouraging that Biden has already let us down on several of his campaign promises; but this is exactly why we need to remind his administration of who elected him in the first place. It is our civic duty as voters to call out presidents for their inaction, even if we do (for the most part) agree with their stances and ideology. A healthy degree of criticism is necessary if we ever want to live in a country that acknowledges and supports all of its citizens’ needs.

The Berkeley Beacon Editorial Board is the voice of the student newspaper that looks to serve the Emerson College community with thoughtful insight into ongoings and occurrences affecting their everyday lives. The board’s positions are determined by its members. The board consists of the editor-in-chief, managing editors, and opinion editors. The opinions expressed by the Editorial Board do not impact the paper’s coverage. You can respond to a position brought forward by The Beacon Editorial Board in the form of a Letter to The Editor by email: Letters@BerkeleyBeacon.com. contact@berkeleybeacon.com

As students, digital knowledge is more important than ever Emerson does a great job at developing industry-specific digital skills, providing courses that go in-depth on video editing, electronic publishing, and more. Most of the courses that develop digital literacy are focused on the relationship between the field of study and the use of technology, helping students prepare themselves for the digital aspects of their industry. Courses like “Editing for Film and Video,” “Introduction to Electronic Publishing,” and “Advanced Audio Video Journalism” are some of the digital-focused classes available to students.

Illustration Lucia Thorne / Beacon Staff Ana Sophia Garcia-Cubas Assemat

Beacon Correspondent

We’ve all heard the short explanation for how computers work: ones and zeroes. There is electricity involved, algorithms, and some processing units that allow us to carry more technology in our backpacks than our grandparents saw in their entire lives. Most people don’t dive any deeper into technology, leaving the complicated tasks of programming and designing to those that wish to learn it. In high school, I tried asking my computing teacher for a more complete explanation on how computers work, and I left that conversation more confused than I

entered it.

Although Gen Z is well acquainted with technology, those who haven’t dedicated time to studying it are left in a gray area.

Gen Z may know how to use technology, but not how it works, and certainly not how to solve modern problems with it. We are all well acquainted with the digital world, but we cannot take our digital literacy for granted. The skills we have gained from existing in a digital world do not equate to the skills needed to use this technology to our advantage.

Although we already live in a digital age, the pandemic made us even more reliant on technology than ever before. Forbes writer Marco An-

nunziata wrote this past July, that “Universities that remain unable to provide the right skills at the right price will see students migrate away to other institutions and modes of learning.”

The EU Commissioner for the Digital Economy even said that 90 percent of jobs will require digital skills after 2020. One of the outcomes of this pandemic will be a more digital world. Now that we have gotten used to relying on technology for most aspects of our lives, it is difficult to see us reverting to how we were before.

We are going to graduate into a digital world; so how can we make sure that we are ready for the skills it requires?

These basic digital classes, however, are not enough. Although this practical focus is very much appreciated and necessary, many of us will still graduate without basic knowledge of some of the most valuable skills in the modern market, such as coding and web design. Digital literacy in college students has proven to improve academic performance and make graduates stand out in the job market.

As a liberal arts college, Emerson does not provide its students with comprehensive courses on STEM topics, such as programming or web design. If any of us wanted to study these topics in depth, we could have applied for a computer science or engineering degree somewhere else.

Even though most of us will not need to be proficient in any of these topics to succeed, all of us will have to work in industries that rely on digitalization. A basic understanding of software development, programming, and computing can be incredibly useful skills when it comes to

problem solving in the digital age.

Although our college has a very comprehensive set of skill-building professional studies courses, these only cover practical knowledge of programs like Adobe and Wordpress. In order to prepare ourselves for the current world, we need to not only be able to use these tools, but also understand how they work, and how we can build new solutions with them.

Going through the Spring 2021 course catalogue, I was happy to see that there were some classes I could take as a WLP major that would allow me to develop some of these skills. Unfortunately, this is not the case for most majors. The Data Marketing and Analytics Masters program provides a thorough training in digital skills, but we shouldn’t have to study a whole other degree in order to gain these skills, if only at the base level.

If we had access to develop these skills within the college— whether it were through introductory courses or a minor—we would be much more prepared for the digital world out there. We go into film editing without understanding how the software works, we manage online publications without knowing how to build a website, we work with social media without understanding what makes it tick. Emerson students are already leaders in their fields: how much more would we be able to accomplish if we could access all the resources the digital world has to offer? a_garciacubasassemat@emerson.edu

The Berkeley Beacon

March 4, 2021

5

Josh Sokol

This article is the first time I’ve actually confronted this period of my life in a concrete way. Putting these words out into the world is a reckoning of my own, something personal that I’ve grabbed out of the recesses of my mind, and it feels like an exorcism of sorts, a catharsis. If you talk about something, it cannot hide.

Beacon Staff I first moved to Boston in the fall of 2017 from Westminster, Massachusetts; a small, rural town. It was a move that filled me to the brim with anxiety and excitement—emotions at the opposite ends of intensity, caused by the same chemical reactions in your brain. I was excited for all the new challenges and experiences the city had to offer.

I was also excited for the sense of anonymity that a city provided. You are one out of so many, making it so much easier to hide from people’s memories. You are free to be a fuck-up in a sea of fuck-ups, and no one would have the time to care.

Something that I wasn’t prepared for, the sensation only a city of 617,000 would tend to bring; feeling entirely, utterly, and devastatingly alone at every turn.

This isn’t to say I didn’t have friends and social groups who supported me— I did. I went out to parties and engaged socially with people whom I considered close friends. I had the added benefit of being in an environment full of people with innovative and creative ideas that inspired me.

This loneliness was more of an existential feeling internally, rather than a result from outside interactions. I sat on the train, alone. I ate in the dining hall, alone. I went to bed, alone. No matter how many people I surrounded myself with, everywhere I went I felt like the only company I kept was my shadow.

Loneliness is not a foreign concept to me. Growing up gay in a rural, conservative community is directly correlated with the feeling of isolation that I’ve always carried. Small-town culture has a way of throwing you out early if you violate the status quo. The first time I was ever called a “fag” was in the fourth grade—before I even know what that word meant. Shame and social othering are tools of the oppressor to encourage loneliness.

As a result of this social othering, “Gay people are now, depending on the [academia.edu] study, between 2 and 10 times more likely than straight people to take their own lives,” according to a Huffpost article by Michael Hobbes.

Even in countries where performative social constructs, such as gay marriage are legal, the emotional and psychological weight of being a gay person (a social tabboo) are still very much apparent.

Hobbes writes about the social isolations of “being in the closet.” Feeling a complete disconnection from the heteronormative mindset around us. But what comes after, the “gay

Illustration Lucia Thorne / Beacon Staff

Confronting my loneliness was a double-edged sword men who have come out of the closet and still feel the same isolation,” is a part of the equation that is rarely addressed. The ritualistic “coming out” may seem celebratory, but it leaves in its wake further opportunity to be driven back in.

This urban loneliness that I felt had a heavier weight attached to it, because it revealed to me a singular truth: loneliness would follow me wherever I went.

In her novel “A Little Life”, author and Editor-in-chief of The NYTimes Style Magazine Hanya Yanagihara writes, “He is so lonely that he sometimes feels it physically, a sodden clump of dirty laundry pressing against his chest.” While the feelings of loneliness can often be heavy, and carry with them a wet musk, it can also be light, and cause our heads to become a mass of static with no pin-pointed direction.

On many occasions, I would wander around the Museum of Fine Arts or Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum on my own for hours on end. I knew I wouldn’t be alone when I was surrounded by museum patrons and art alike. Anonymous strangers became my gateway to socialization without uttering a single word to them. Sometimes I even talked to the art.

Around this same time is when I read Olivia Laing’s book “The Lonely City” for the first time. In this book, Laing chronicles her time living in New York City, alone and wandering as a spectator in a city full of vibrant opportunities for

connection.

She parallels her experiences of loneliness with famous artists who also drew from feelings of isolation in their own work. Andy Warhol, who barely spoke, and David Wojnarowicz, who would attempt to fulfill feelings of loneliness by cruising the New York waterfront for anonymous sex amid the AIDS epidemic.

Laing writes in her book about the phases of loneliness, a “period in which speech became an increasingly perilous endeavor.” There would be days where I would speak to no one, a task like ordering a coffee could leave me stuttering and anxious that I had fucked up my only social interaction of the day. This sensation only drove me farther inwards, afraid to interact with anybody. If I didn’t talk to anyone, I couldn’t be perceived.

I was afraid of judgment. “I was aware of a gathering anxiety around the question of visibility,” Laing writes. I didn’t want my physical identity to be a static singularity that people would remember.

I wanted to be invisible, but so badly craved to be understood. This internal struggle plagues my head to this day, only now I have the emotional comprehension to put it into words. Some would call that progress.

I got into the habit of staring out my eighteenth-floor dorm late at night, projecting life stories into the cars that drove by. Similarly, whenever I would look into apartment complexes, I would imagine what kind of life was

being lived inside each window, lit and unlit alike. This was my means of connecting with other people, a Hail Mary to practice and test empathy, because as Laing writes “loneliness inhibits empathy.”

I would spend hours on Twitter or various dating apps, just to feel like I had a sort of connection with the world around me. I hoped that if I scrolled through my feed long enough I would either achieve some sort of fulfillment, or the constant feed of the Trump administration, white supremacy, and Brexit would hinder me too apathetic to care about my loneliness. It was usually the latter. I overloaded myself with news in order to eventually become numb to it all.

In an article from The Guardian, Laing writes “our numbness facilitates precisely the cruelties it’s caused by, a vicious circle it’s hard to know how to stop.” I was lonely because I thought I deserved to be, that anything else was an unobtainable and selfish goal. Awakening yourself from that numbness is a need for survival, both within yourself and for the well-being of those around you.

My grasp on reality was obscured to the point where I wasn’t even aware that someone would be talking to me.

The dissociation I experienced was a way to look past the current moment I was in, because if I realized what was happening, I might have had a sense of permanence. Permanence was, at that point, my biggest fear.

This isn’t to say that spending time with yourself is a negative thing. In fact, it’s inherently beneficial to your well being to take care of yourself. But I was taking it to the extreme, finding myself surrounded by crowds of people (pre-COVID, of course) and feeling like if I touched another person, I would spontaneously combust or be accused of a crime I didn’t commit.

Every interaction felt like a trial, and the gallows were waiting for me.

I equally felt as though I was completely invisible while sticking out like a sore thumb. I convinced myself that people could see my loneliness, radiating like an inverted aura that stigmatized me into something wretched and weak.

Now, in 2021, we have been surrounded by loneliness because of a pandemic. For me, I have had to fight everyday to not fall back into these patterns of dissociation and apathy. Unfortunately, it has not been the easiest feat. Alongside COVID, loneliness is a pandemic that will have repercussions long after a herd-immunity is achieved.

The government of Japan announced that they are appointing a “minister of loneliness” as the country sees rising suicide rates amid the pandemic. There’s a word in Japanese, “hikikomori,” which translates into English as “pulling inward, being confined.” This generally refers to individuals who completely withdraw from society and seek extreme self-confinement. The concept of existential loneliness spans language and culture, it is universal and a collective feeling. In a sense, loneliness can be a fertile breeding ground for community and a catalyst for breaking out of the unrelenting cycles of numbness and passivity.

Just as all rivers run to the sea, all of our individual isolations lead to a greater, collective depth of loneliness.

In the closing chapter of her book, Laing writes “I don’t believe the cure for loneliness is meeting someone, not necessarily.” The cure for loneliness, she says, is that we should know how to “befriend” ourselves and realize that what afflicts one of us, afflicts most of us. That loneliness doesn’t exist on an individual scale, ironically enough. Concepts such as shame and anger are utilized to isolate us from one another. These afflictions, such as “stigma and exclusion,” exist to be resisted, and for the betterment of us all, they should be.

joshua_sokol@emerson.edu

A requiem for Daft Punk: The avant gardes of electronic dance music Soleil Easton

Beacon Correspondent The endangered Parisian robot duo, Daft Punk, has gone extinct, announcing the decision on Monday via an eight-minute sequence dubbed “Epilogue,” taken from their 2006 film, Electroma. Kathryn Frazier, Daft Punk’s longtime publicist, confirmed the breakup to Rolling Stone, but declined to provide any details on the split.

The universal pop stars had their appeal—an appeal my friends and I were instantly drawn to. I’ll never forget the night my girlfriends and I squished into my tiny Volvo and took a drive through West Hollywood to cure my broken heart. We took turns climbing through the sunroof, staring up at the neon rainbow lights and golden kitchen glows while blasting “Lose Yourself to Dance.”

Or the time I spent clubbing in Berlin like it was my last night on earth, while the DJ was toying with remixes of Daft Punk’s top hits as the dry-ice smoke swirled an array of blues, acid greens, and hot pinks. The music boomed over the dance floor as if it had merged with the bodies.

Or even the time I eagerly lined up at my hometown record store with my dad to grab a copy of the most recent

album, “Random Access Memories”, released on May 17, 2013, when it went on sale at midnight. We munched on our late-night In-N-Out snack and danced around the living room, much like how the vinyl spun on the turntable.

It’s safe to say we “got lucky” with Daft Punk.

The mystifying, influential electronic-pop duo goes against most of what history’s taught us about American pop audiences’ taste. For Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo’s, the two men behind the masks of Daft Punk, their music is based on the repetitive structures of French house music, blended with synth-pop and experimental 80s disco.

The vocal elements in their songs are so carefully engineered and produced, that their music could almost qualify as instrumental. Their euphoric sound is above anything else on the pop charts, and truly defines the genre of French electronic music.

Over the course of their nearly three-decade run, they made three gold albums in the U.S., along with a wallfull of gold and platinum awards from other countries. Their 1997 debut album, “Homework,” was an instant favorite, featuring hit singles like “Da Funk” and “Around the World.”

Daft Punk’s 2001 follow-up album, “Discovery,” had a handful of classics,

including “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger”— later sampled by Kanye West — “One More Time,” and “Face to Face.”

It was around this time the two began wearing their trademark robot helmets and black suits that finalized their iconic look.

In 2005, the pair released “Human After All,” and toured extensively in the two years after. In 2006 they headlined at America’s biggest music festival, Coachella, where they performed atop an elaborate LED-encrusted pyramid.

Daft Punk’s performances are some of the most talked-about concerts of the past decade.

In the years that followed, E.D.M. DJs and producers became a billion-dollar industry, leading Daft Punk to leave their robotic dance music that led them to their fame. For “Random Access Memories,” the group played instruments (including drums) by hand, rather than sequenced and recorded to tape.

They’ve collaborated with a wide range of guest musicians, including acid-techno icons like Giorgio Moroder and Chic’s Nile Rodger, to modern pop stars like Pharrel Williams and Julian Casablancas.

“Get Lucky,” the single album featuring Williams, goes down as the groups’ most successful song to date, hitting No. 2 for six weeks on the Billboard Hot 100. In 2016, Daft Punk achieved their

first and only No. 1 as guests on “Starboy” by the Weeknd, which they performed at the Grammys in 2017, along with another collaboration, “I Feel It Coming.”

As heartbreaking as it is to see the Daft Punk era come to an end, the duo gave us incredible music and will surely

be missed by many. In my abrupt transition to life in a new big city freshman year, Daft punk helped bring life to my otherwise concrete experience of Boston—and will continue to during my last few months here. soleil_easton@emerson.edu

Electronic duo Daft Punk. Courtsey Matt Sayles—Invision / AP Images

The Berkeley Beacon

March 4, 2021

6

Living Arts

New ‘Framing Britney Spears’ documentary reignites conservatorship discussion

Karissa Schaefer Beacon Staff

The New York Times’ “Framing Britney Spears” Hulu documentary was released on Feb. 5, 2021, yet Britney Spears has remained in a conservatorship since January 2008. Devoted fans are pushing the #FreeBritney movement more as time goes on, protesting on Britney’s behalf and calling for an end to her controlling father’s conservatorship.

Spears is accredited for her ‘90s and early 2000s revival of teen pop. The “Princess of Pop” released her debut album ...Baby One More Time on Jan. 12, 1999.

The title track is one of the best-selling singles of all time, topping a multitude of charts, including the Billboard Hot 100, and got Spears nominated for a Grammy award.

A conservatorship is when a guardian is legally appointed to manage another’s daily life and finances due to age, physical, or mental illness. Spears was placed under her conservatorship after her public struggle with mental health and drug abuse in 2007 and 2008.

Most notably, Spears shaved her head and hit a paparazzi’s car with an umbrella. Then in 2008, she locked herself in her room refusing to give her child

Britney Spears / Courtesy FX

to her ex-husband Kevin Federline, and was under the influence of an unknown substance, according to police. She went to a psychiatric hospital under a 5150 hold, which allows 72 hours of involuntary hospitalization for someone with a mental illness.

This was when Britney’s father, Jamie Spears, asked the court for a conservatorship. What was supposed to be temporary conservatorship ended up lasting 13 years.

Although fans have always questioned the necessity of the conservatorship, an episode of the “Britney’s Gram” podcast released a year ago, hosted by Babs Gray and Tess Barker, confirmed suspicions they’ve had about Britney being powerless in the secretive conservatorship through an anonymous source. The source was a lawyer who worked for the firm that oversees the conservatorship.

Much of the details about the conservatorship are still unknown. However, Britney’s brother Bryan did an interview with Drew Plotkin on “As NOT Seen on TV” on Jul. 23, 2020 speaking about his sister. Bryan made it a point to talk about how even if the conservatorship was necessary at first, Britney wants to get out of it and has wanted to for a while.

Britney’s cousin and former assistant Alli Sims, who was close with the singer

Museum of Science to host carbon neutral contest for students Lucia Thorne Beacon Staff

The Museum of Science, Boston is adapting to the pandemic while encouraging college students to combat climate change by holding its third annual “Go Carbon Neutral! A Transportation Challenge” online for their 2021 competition season.

In teams of one to four, students from New England, North Carolina, and the San Francisco Bay area can use their creativity with the help of industry professionals, and pitch their ideas on how to reach carbon neutrality by 2050 for a grand prize of $3,000.

The competition, traditionally held in-person, will be accepting submissions and hosting their awards ceremony virtually.

Marketing specialist Ryan Thomas said he and the museum believe student participation is crucial to solving the climate cri-

sis.

“The bulk of solving this issue is going to fall on this generation really,” Thomas said. “Trying to get people to think about it creatively now, and hopefully inspire them to really pursue career paths that help resolve the issue is key.”

Education associate Jonathan Fanning added that new ideas from the next generations are incredibly important for climate-friendly technological innovation.

“In order to solve a challenge as broad and all encompassing as climate change, it’s going to require us to inspire a next generation of STEM professionals that include diverse voices that are fresh voices to develop new technologies to help solve the problem,” Fanning said.

Both Fanning and Thomas discussed how they wanted to streamline the submission process in a virtual format by making mentorship accessible and easy for students to get involved.

“It’s great, it’s fun, we try to make

during the mid-2000s, came forward in Feb. 2021 after the Hulu documentary’s release. Sims told NBC News in her first interview in over a decade that Jamie threatened to cut off her contact with Britney for expressing her concerns about the conservatorship.

Other celebrities like Paris Hilton, Rose McGowan, and Miley Cyrus, have also shown support for Britney. Many tweeted in response to watching the documentary, and Matilda star Mara Wilson wrote an opinion piece in the New York Times showing solidarity with Britney as she discusses her “terrifying” treatment and Hollywood’s sexualization of young female celebrities.

With an influx in media attention to Spears in the past year, her sister Jamie Lynn Spears, the star of Zoey 101, responded to a fan’s comment on Instagram asking why she doesn’t speak out about her sister. Jamie Lynn told them they had no right to comment on Britney’s health.

Alongside media comments, Jamie Lynn is being criticized for being the trustee of Britney’s fortune, appointed in Aug. 2020. Jamie Lynn hasn’t spoken against her father’s conservatorship over her sister unlike others, possibly implying that she’s on his side.

Britney is strongly opposed to her father being the sole conservator. The most the process as simple as possible,” Fanning said. “The museum’s goal with this challenge is to help students feel more confident in these spaces.”

In addition to helping students build confidence in a STEM atmosphere, Fanning said he hopes that the resources they provide can

recent court documents point out Britney’s desire for gradual control over her own life. She would prefer her conservator to be Jodi Montgomery, who replaced Jamie temporarily in Sept. 2019 due to personal health reasons.

Britney’s mom Lynne, who is divorced from Jamie, supports her. Per Britney’s request, Lynne recently filed to be part of Britney’s revocable trust. Lynne was there for Britney in her early career, whereas Jamie wasn’t involved until the conservatorship was put in place.

Through her lawyer Samuel D. Ingham, Britney expressed how she welcomes support for the #FreeBritney movement, confirming she is on the fans’ side.

Though the conservatorship brought Britney troubles, it’s worth mentioning that it allowed her to focus on herself and her recovery following her meltdown.

Before making her music comeback, she gained back some custody rights to rebuild her relationship with her sons.

If a conservatorship is in Britney’s best interest, then that’s fine. It’s her father insisting on being in charge for so many years that raises red flags.

This topic brings the flaws of a conservatorship to light. How is one person able to have so much control of an adult’s life, especially when that person has put so much effort into regularly performing shows throughout the years?

Highlighted in the documentary, the #FreeBritney media coverage is in stark contrast to the paparazzi photos and gossip tabloids that painted Britney negatively in the 2000s.

Paparazzi followed the beloved pop star everywhere, watching for her next mistake. They exploited Spears for profit, yet the paparazzi reportedly have no regrets. Paparazzi highlight one harmful aspect of unethical tabloid journalism.

There’s no valid excuse for the dehumanizing efforts they took to bring Britney down.

Back to Britney’s conservatorship, someone that wasn’t mentioned by the documentary is Lou Taylor. She previously served as Britney’s business manager for more than a decade, was the mastermind behind the conservatorship. In

ing a voice in that space and feeling like they belong is what we’re here for. It’s what the museum is here for.”

The event normally takes place during the spring, and as Fanning recalls, having to adjust the competition to be accessible in a COVID-19 world was difficult,

2019 awards ceremony for the challenge. / Courtesy Jonathan Fanning continue to help contestants in the future.

“As nice as it is for us to hand out prizes and a $3,000 Grand Prize, ultimately, what I personally and what the museum is hoping will happen with [the competition] is that we’re establishing long lasting professional connections for these students,” Fanning said. “Anything that we can do to aid them in find-

but it was important to him to still hold the event.

“Part of what often sets climate change mitigation policies aside is the more urgent needs in the present,” Fanning said. “We felt very strongly that this is the moment when we’re supposed to be like, ‘Alright, we can persevere through this, we can find ways to continue to do good work like this in these

Through the Storm, Lynne noted how Lou and Jamie planned for the conservatorship weeks ahead of time.

In 2007, Britney allegedly called Taylor a “crazy lady” and “stalker” in an email to her lawyer, though the email’s validity hasn’t been confirmed. Still, Taylor was able to win Jamie over and made TV appearances as the family’s public spokesperson during Britney’s public breakdown in 2008. A Twitter thread by the user @BritneyHiatus compiled many sources pertaining to Lou Taylor’s involvement in the conservatorship.

Suspicions have also been raised about Jamie and Taylor’s monetary gain from Britney’s conservatorship. Taylor’s assets doubled once the conservatorship began.

Mercy Ministries, where Taylor sat on the board, got $50,000 from the Britney Spears Foundation charity when it was bankrupted in 2009.

Britney currently has a big presence on social media, posting regularly to Instagram and Tik Tok. Fans analyze her posts, believing she leaves secret messages in pictures and videos, like wearing a certain color upon a comment’s request to signal she needs help.

Though concerning to many, Britney’s social media manager Cassie Petrey posted on Instagram Feb. 2 to clear the air. She pointed out that Britney has fun creating her own post and caption ideas. Though she appreciates Britney’s fanbase, Petrey noted how these are “inaccurate theories,” saying there aren’t any secrets happening.

Petrey urged fans to stop making assumptions with no supporting facts.

Fans don’t know for certain what’s going on, but it can be noted that Britney’s posts, as well as performances, seem to be an outlet for her. During such a hard time in her life, this can be a way of feeling some kind of normalcy.

Although respecting a celebrity’s privacy is important, the FreeBritney movement must continue to be discussed.

Jamie was denied sole conservator on Feb. 11, with the court allowing Bessemer’s Trust to continue to be a co-conservator. Britney’s next hearing is scheduled for Mar. 17. karissa_schaefer@emerson.edu moments.’”

The event was still successful last year, as students were “enthusiastic” to continue developing their green ideas. Although the pandemic did provide some challenges for the museum, opportunities have also arisen as a result, allowing it to spread the competition to different regions of the country, which Fanning said he was excited about.

“What I love is the geographic distribution,” Fanning said. “Now, we’re spread out over a large section of the US and can get perspectives from coast to coast.”

Thomas said no matter what field students plan on entering after college, there is no limit to what jobs can help create a more climate-friendly society.

“Even if it’s something that you think is unrelated, everything can tie back to it,” Thomas said.

“Whatever industry, there’s some way in which it could be cleaner and greener, to help the planet.”

Both Thomas and Fanning encourage all students to register as soon as possible, preferably before March 5, and to reach out if any questions need to be answered.

The deadline to register and submit a proposal is March 5. lucia_thorne@emerson.edu

The Berkeley Beacon

March 4, 2021

7

FSL thinks up creative solutions to new member education amid COVID-19

Members of Xi Gamma Nu. / Courtesy Mari Kuwabara-Wagg

Mariyam Quaisar Beacon Staff

With the daunting effects of the pandemic, new member education for fraternities and sororities has been a challenge, to say the least. With all events hosted virtually, leaders of Emerson’s Fraternity-Sorority Life are working hard to keep festivities engaging as they welcome new member classes.

Emerson is home to nine fraternities and sororities, some of which did not take a new member class during Fall 2020. Senior Clarah Grossman, President of Sigma Pi Theta, said going completely online can create challenges for new members who are trying to see if they fit into the sorority.

“We took the fall semester off and didn’t do any new member education,” Grossman said. “We still went through with recruitment and had virtual events. We did an extended recruitment actually where people who were interested in further getting to know us could. We had Zoom events throughout the rest of the semester for them to come to which turned out to be really good for us.”

FSL organizations completed their recruitment week, a week dedicated to recruiting potential new members, virtually in mid-February. Now, they are finishing out their virtual new member education, a weeks-long process in which new members are inducted into the organization as active members.

Grossman went on to say that the extended recruitment prepared Sigma for this semester, as they completed the recruitment process online and are now doing new member education virtually as well.

“So far it seems to be going pretty well,” Grossman said. “We have nine new members, which is amazing, especially with the pandemic and with everything being virtual. Considering that last semester when everything went online, we only had three new members so then bumping it up to nine while still being online was really great.”

In order to appeal to potential new members, fraternities and sororities took advantage of various social media platforms. Co-new member chair, website chair, and alumni chair of Xi Gamma Nu, Mari Kuwabara-Wagg, said they used social media to help guide potential members into FSL. “We tend to use our socials a lot, on our website, which we used a lot this semester, we’ve created potential new member guides to help people kind of feel like they know how to go through recruitment,” Kuwabara-Wagg said. “[The guides have] everything they need to know including stuff they have to do with Emerson before coming to us and stuff they need to know when coming to us to try to make their lives easier when we know there’s a lot of stuff happening and things are very different.”

Vice President of recruitment for Alpha Epsilon Phi, Brianne Guanaga,

said they used digital marketing to put their name out there and continue to update potential members on the happenings of the sorority. Grossman said using Instagram for potential new members to ask active members questions was a huge hit as well.

Guanaga said one of the biggest challenges of virtual new member education is understanding the logistics of platforms like Zoom.

“Obviously we’re all pretty used to Zoom, but like I needed to do the breakout rooms and do it very specifically and everyone was patient, but there were times where I felt like I was unprofessional because it looked like I was struggling,” Guanaga said.

Making sure potential new members (PNMs) are comfortable on Zoom is another important aspect of the new member education process. One of the big differences between using Zoom

active members are paired with new members to act as a big sister or brother, essentially a mentor to the new members. Even with the difficulties of being virtual, the groups found creative ways to make it special regardless.

“We put all of the new members in a breakout room for about five minutes and we gave them an assignment to figure out and while they did that, all of the active members who were not Bigs changed their profile picture on Zoom to the Sigma emblem,” Grossman said.

“Then all of the Bigs changed their profile picture to a picture of their Little and wrote in ‘so and so’s Big’. I think it went really, really well. Everyone seemed very excited about it.”

According to members from various FSL organizations, new member education lasts about six to eight weeks depending on the organization, consisting of virtual meetings and bonding activities for the new member class.

“We want new member [education] to be an opportunity for our new members to feel comfortable and feel like they can get to know everyone,” Kuwabara-Wagg said. “It’s all based on bonding and getting to know one another and we utilize breakout rooms for online games. The first two days are more informational, but the rest of it is really a time to have some fun and for us to get to know [each other] more on a personal level.”

Without COVID, new member education consisted of members attending in person meetings, playing games, and participating in activities. “[In the past] we’ve done cute little games,” Grossman said. “There’s this one we do where a Big and Little sit back to back and one of them describes

Xi Gamma Nu Zoom meeting. / Courtesy Mari Kuwabara-Wagg

versus being in-person is not being able to talk at the same time, and being comfortable to speak up in a group of people you don’t know.

“I think my biggest thing was fearing that the PNM would be anxious, or uncomfortable in these breakout rooms,” Guanaga said. “Obviously, all the sisters know each other, we’re all friends, and when that happens, we dominate the conversation, so I think my biggest challenge was trying to instill that this isn’t about us, this is about the PNM.” Switching to virtual events meant translating in-person bonding activities to activities that could be done in breakout rooms through a screen.

Grossman said icebreaker activities were the most difficult to adapt to the online format, but the rest of the transition to online was easier once those events were changed.

“We usually have a craft philanthropy night, which we weren’t able to have so instead we watched a movie which was really fun,” Grossman said. “Most of the events, I personally felt like there wasn’t a super big disconnect because we were still getting to know the new members. We had our speed dating event, we had a trivia event and those translated really well into breakout rooms.”

A huge aspect of sorority and fraternity life is Big-Little Reveal, where

a picture and the other draws it. We do a lot of stuff in meetings, like trust falls and bonding activities that we had to cut this semester, because they were specifically physical contact things.”

Despite such setbacks, fraternities and sororities came up with new activities to accommodate the pandemic and safety precautions. Xi Gamma Nu encourages its members to participate in “Gamma Gal Dates,” where sisters can get together one-on-one to get to know each other. If students are comfortable with in-person dates, they are allowed to meet, otherwise they bond virtually.

Adapting to COVID-19 has been an obstacle for many clubs and groups who have persevered through the pandemic. Fraternities and sororities took advantage of virtual new member education, coming up with alternate activities to allow the growth of their groups and welcoming of new members.

“I knew I always wanted to be VP of recruitment,” Guanaga said. “It’s honestly one of the most rewarding positions in the sorority because you get to bring new people to our little safe haven. Obviously it’s super stressful, especially during COVID because you put a lot of weight on yourself but I wouldn’t want to be in any other position. mariyam_quaisar@emerson.edu

Joy Buolamwini showing the racist faults in the “Aspire Mirror.” / Courtesy Shalini Kantayya

‘Coded Bias’ highlights racial prejudice in AI Lucia Thorne Beacon Staff

Artificial intelligence, defined as “the development of computer systems able to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence,” has the potential to shape the future of every industry. Yet a distinctly human footprint lies in many artificial intelligence algorithms, one that often manifests in the form of algorithmic biases.

The Visual Media Arts department recently screened director Shalini Kantayya’s documentary, Coded Bias, in its Bright Lights Film Series, which focuses on the potential threat of biased algorithms for the future of society as well as the threats they pose, even in 2021.

When asked during a post-film discussion hosted via Zoom about her passion for the subject of the discriminatory algorithms, Kantayya said the purpose of her film is to alert the public that artificial intelligence and computer-generated algorithms are “becoming a gatekeeper of opportunity.”

To achieve this, Kantayya uses several situational examples, including the pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong, the facial recognition reliance in China, the corporate study and selling of personal data, the potential installation of facial recognition software at an apartment complex in Brooklyn, and inaccurate facial recognition being used by police in London.

The incidents Kantayya chose to document in her film show the negative effects that facial recognition is already having on today’s society, acting as a case study for the future of this technology.

The film follows algorithm bias researcher Joy Buolamwini, a Black woman, and her path towards fighting for algorithmic justice. While studying at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Buolamwini created the “Aspire Mirror,” a mirror meant to project one’s “inspirations” onto themselves using computer vision software.

When she tried out the mirror, her face was not detected. At first, she thought it was a lighting issue. But when she put on a white face mask, she was finally detected by the mirror.

Buolamwini then realized the technology could not recognize the faces of Black people.

After looking into the data sets used by this technology, Buolamwini found that the majority of faces used to teach the AI to detect faces were those of white men. Since the programmers had unconscious, or perhaps even conscious, biases, the computer vision software Buolamwini used had learned their bias.

A prime example of learned bias that more people are familiar with was demonstrated with the launch of Microsoft’s AI Twitter account, Tay, in 2016.

“The more humans share with me, the more I learn,” Microsoft AI Tay tweeted on March 24, 2016.

Within 16 hours, the AI was taken off Twitter for sending racist, sexist and anti-Semitic tweets after Internet trolls “shared” more with Tay during that time period.

While this instance involved a Twitter account gone awry, the issue lies within the nature of computer-generated algorithms. As stated in the documentary, algorithms are used in

daily life and can be applied to many different aspects of people’s lives, like job opportunities, housing, college,, and loans based on race, gender, and ability.

Buolamwini discussed the ways in which AI technology has inherited bigotry.

“When you think of AI,, it’s forward–looking, but AI based on data is a reflection of our history. The past dwells within our algorithms,” Buolamwini said in the film. “The progress that was made in the civil rights era could be rolled back under the guise of machine neutrality.”

Cathy O’Neil, the author of Weapons of Math Destruction, similarly stated the general public puts too much trust into technology, as if it is free of flaws, when in reality, technology often possesses very human faults.

“I’m very worried about this blind faith we have in big data,” O’Neil said.

“We need to constantly monitor every process for bias.”

What scares those fighting for algorithmic justice is the cementation of human bias as it exists today into future technologies. Meredith Broussard, the author of Artificial Unintelligence, stated the data we use to teach AI technologies is chosen by a small group of rich, white men.

“Our ideas about technology and society that we think are normal are actually ideas that come from a very small and homogeneous group of people,” Broussard said during the film.

“But the problem is that everybody has unconscious biases and people embed their own biases into technology.”

Buolamwini’s statement added to this sentiment, as she explained how concentrated data can lead to issues in the technologies’ analysis.

“If you’re thinking about data in artificial intelligence, in many ways data is destiny,” Buolamwini said. “Data’s what we’re using to teach machines how to learn different kinds of patterns, so if you have largely skewed data sets that are being used to train these systems, you can also have skewed results.”

During the Black Lives Matter protests this past summer, racist AI technology such as facial recognition software has been used by police to identify “suspects,” drawing attention to this issue in the public eye.

Kantayya gave the example of London police using faulty facial recognition technology, showing the police stopping a 14-year-old Black teenager, claiming his face matched with a suspect they were looking for. Because there are no legal protections that currently prevent the mass use of this facial recognition technology, many protesters have been targeted in this manner, including those at the BLM protests in the U.S. In the film, Buolamwini discussed both during her interviews and her Senate testimony that AI regulations are absolutely necessary, seeing how the technology is acting on its bigoted programming today.

“We’re at a moment where the technology is being rapidly adopted and there are no safeguards,” Buolamwini said. “It is, in essence, a wild, wild West.”

Coded Bias will premiere on PBS nationwide on March 22, 2021. lucia_thorne@emerson.edu

The Berkeley Beacon

March 4, 2021

8

Sports Joey Dubois Beacon Staff

Emerson’s fall sports teams began their spring training sessions on Feb. 17, nearly a year after their initial training for the later-canceled fall season was cut short by the pandemic.

These practices mark the first time that the soccer and volleyball teams can practice together since the onset of the pandemic and the New England Men’s and Women’s Athletic Conference’s cancelation of the fall 2020 season in July.

These Lions have not played a meaningful game since 2019. Still, each team stayed as committed as ever in the face of adversity throughout the past year.

“It’s been challenging, but we’ve tried to keep in contact as much as possible, just trying to keep the guys motivated,” head men’s soccer coach Bryan Harkin said in an interview.

Harkin said it was not always easy keeping players on the same page amid the pandemic. Players were scattered throughout the country over the summer with varying access to gyms and other facilities to hone their skills. Athletes and coaches credited Ron Smithers, manager of the Fitness Center, for sending teams workouts adjusted to the players’ unique circumstances. “[Ron] would know which of us had access to a gym and who didn’t and give us specific workout plans based on that,” sophomore women’s soccer midfielder Cali Bruce said in a Zoom interview.

Both players and coaches credited Smithers for getting creative when coming up with exercise plans since many of the Lions were unable to attend a gym while home for break.

“A lot of the things they were doing were body weight [exercises], less going to the gym,” head women’s soccer coach David Suvak said in a Zoom interview.

Staying in good physical shape was only half of the battle for stu-

Fall sports teams begin training for hopeful season after hiatus

Adhering to COVID guidelines, men’s soccer begins training for a potential fall season. Alec Klusza / Beacon Staff dent-athletes, as they noted the detrimental impact of the pandemic and isolation on their mental health.

Coaches and team leaders knew they needed to stick together and remain in contact during the pandemic, perhaps more than ever before, according to Harkin.

“We’ve always tried to look at the positive things, which is [that] we’ve probably been in touch with each other a lot more, building those relationships,” Harkin said.

“We had a lot of Zoom calls where we hung out and played games,” junior women’s volleyball player Lauren Quan said in an interview.

‘I’m pumped, I’m ready to go,’ Lions jump into Spring NEWMAC Cont. from pg.1 Athletic Director Patricia Nicol did not return multiple requests for comment on Emerson’s decision.

The past year hasn’t been easy for the baseball team, according to Jacey. Upon returning to campus last semester, Head Coach Nick Vennochi informed players their fall season was canceled, which left them to take training into their own hands.

Jacey and fellow captain Andre Padovani organized arrangements to

transport the team to Extra Innings Watertown, an indoor baseball facility in Watertown, where they collectively paid $300 to practice pitching and hitting.

“We were doing that like two or three times a week in hope that we’d be able to compete, and thank God it wasn’t a waste,” Jacey said.

He said that the team’s goal for the season is to qualify for the NEWMAC playoffs.

“That’s our number one goal right now because we haven’t been as competitive as we wanted to in the

Teams can finally assemble as they once did, except now with social distancing protocols and enforced mask-wearing at all times. Some teams, like the women’s volleyball team, have so many members that they are forced to split into smaller groups of about eight players to practice due to Emerson’s capacity restrictions.

While it may not quite be “back to normal” yet, athletes and coaches agree this new reality is better than nothing.

“It’s kind of weird that we can’t get together as a team, and that’s what we’re itching to do,” head past few years, but we see it as a much bigger opportunity this year,” Jacey said. “In my opinion, this is the [deepest] we’ve ever been as a program at every position, so hopefully that will prove to help us make a playoff push.”

For first-years like lacrosse player Josh Demattos, the chance to start their college careers in such a unique season is a welcome challenge.

“I’m excited to get going and hope we can all stay safe, and we look forward to hopefully winning the NEWMAC this year,” Demattos said in an interview. “I’m pumped up, I’m ready to go, and I’m ready to get after them on March 27.”

The men’s and women’s tennis teams were not included in Emerson’s announcement. Sophomore

women’s volleyball coach Ben Read said in an interview. “We just want to do more things as a team, we want to see each other, but honestly it’s just nice to be back on the court. To actually see people faceto-face and play volleyball is a joy.”

The spring season presents a unique opportunity for each Lion.

For juniors like men’s soccer defender Darius Boamah, these practices can be seen as a springboard towards a successful season next fall.

“We’re just trying to build a culture where we work as hard as we can all the time,” Boamah said in a Zoom

interview. “Hopefully people will continue pushing like this through summer then into fall so that by our season we’re all ready and we don’t have to do a fitness test when we get back.”

Grace Tepper, a senior on the women’s volleyball team, said this spring presents an opportunity that seemed like it faded away back in July. She said it was a difficult decision to dedicate time to the team knowing she couldn’t play another match.

“I think that in the end, it was like, ‘Well, yeah I don’t have a season.

This is all I have left,’” Tepper said in a Zoom interview. “No matter what, I love the girls; they’re my family.

As long as they’ll have me, I’ll hang around. It would be ten thousand times worse if I couldn’t play any volleyball at all this year than being able to go to practice three times a week with these girls.”

After almost exactly a year without sports, athletes and coaches said there is legitimate hope again in the Emerson Athletics program. From the players’ perspectives, these teams provided some of their best friends on campus, and not being able to practice with each other created a void in their personal lives. Being able to connect again through their common language of sport has been a welcomed experience, Quan said.

“This is such a good group of people, and I love all of them,” Quan said. “I’m just really excited to be back.”

As for the coaches, they spent the past year primarily on recruiting and preparing for their next season, which they now hope will be this fall. The opportunity to reconnect with their players in-person reminded them of why they got into coaching in the first place.

“I’m very excited to get outside of the office,” Suvak said. “To be on the field with the team and train and start thinking about the fall of [2021], I’m super excited about what this team is and can be next season.” joseph_dubois@emerson.edu men’s tennis player Nicolai Dalmau said neither of the teams have the six minimum players to compete in the NEWMAC, but they still plan to practice and play this spring. The details and schedule remain unclear at this time.

Dalmau said he’s glad the tennis team will be able to be together again, and his goal for the spring is to “get back on track and be ready for next year.”

“I think it will be nice for everyone to still have a tennis family vibe because we’re all pretty close to each other,” Dalmau said in an interview. “It will be nice for us to still have that a little bit this year and not be totally out of it.”

Courtesy @emersoncollegebaseball

contact@berkeleybeacon.com

Incident Journal © 2020 The Berkeley Beacon. All rights reserved.

The Beacon is published weekly.

Anything submitted to the Beacon becomes the sole property of the newspaper. No part of the publication may be reproduced by any means without the express written permission of the editor.

(617) 824–8687 berkeleybeacon.com contact@berkeleybeacon.com

Editor-in-Chief Katie Redefer Managing Editors Charlie McKenna (Content) Madison E. Goldberg (Content) Maximo Aguilar Lawlor (Multimedia) Dylan Rossiter (Operations) Section Editors Dana Gerber (News) Lucia Thorne (Living Arts) Juliet Norman (Opinion) Christopher Williams (Sports) Hongyu Liu (Photo) Advisor Rachel Layne

Letters to the Editor: If you want to respond to, or share an opinion about, an article in The Beacon, you can write a short letter to the editor. Email it to letters@berkeleybeacon. com. Please note that letters may be edited.

Submissions for print must be fewer than 250 words.

Wednesday, Feb. 24: A fire alarm with evacuation was reported to ECPD at the Park Plaza Hotel academic space. When ECPD arrived at the scene students were attending classes and the management team at the hotel advised they were testing fire alarms in the hotel and there was no need for an evacuation of the building.

Friday, Feb. 26: ECPD and Housing and Residential Education (HRE) staff responded to the Little Building for a reported bypass. The Emerson Community member that

failed to properly tap at the residential desk was identified and referred to HRE staff for whatever action their office deems appropriate.

Saturday, Feb. 27:Housing and Residential Education (HRE) staff requested ECPD to the W Hotel Residence Hall to secure confiscated drugs and drug paraphernalia for destruction. HRE staff identified the students that owned the contraband and they were referred to Community Standards & Student Conduct for whatever action their office deems appropriate.