The Brandeis Hoot 09/20/2019

Volume 16 Issue 16

“To acquire wisdom, one must observe” www.brandeishoot.com

September 20, 2019

Brandeis University’s Community Newspaper · Waltham, Mass.

Philanthropist discusses her work for Heller’s 60th

By Emma Lichtenstein editor

Dr. Carmen Rojas spoke about her lifetime spent fighting for the rights of working people in a keynote address to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Heller School for Social Policy and Management.

David Weil, dean of the Heller School, sat down with Rojas for a discussion on her work as a “radical” philanthropist.

Rojas started the talk by mentioning her parents, who immigrated from South America to the U.S. in a critical period of social change and workers’ rights activism. She has taken these ideals that surrounded her when she was growing up to enact real change.

See HELLER, page 3

Rojas created a new philanthropy model with her foundation, Worker’s Lab. Her company pushes for collective bargaining, employee stock ownership, cooperative and certifications. The Workers’ Lab is different from other philanthropic organizations because of the employees. According to Rojas, the Workers’ Lab is made up entirely of people of color, as well as majority LGBTQ+ and majority immigrants.

Rojas is using her platform to help minorities. She said she is utilizing “innovation as a way to close the gaps… to bring the people who have been left behind to the current moment,” said Rojas. The Lab puts out a call for new innovation projects twice a year. Currently they are seeking projects involving new ways of looking at capitalism.

With the money she is giving to innovators, Rojas hopes she can

HELLER’S 60TH

Heller celebrated its 60th anniversary at Brandeis.

Former Carter administration official visits Brandeis

By Rachel Saal and Gunnar Johnson editor and staff

Former Ambassador to the European Union and Chief White House Domestic Policy Adviser Stuart Eizenstat wants his new book to catalyze a reassessment of the Carter administration, as

A PRESIDENTIAL BOOK TALK

he believes that President Jimmy Carter’s presidency was underappreciated. Eizenstat outlined his claims during his presentation in Rapaporte Treasure Hall on Thursday.

Eizenstat, a former member of Brandeis’ Board of Trustees, said that Carter’s political hero was President Harry Truman, and that while both presidents left office highly unpopular, unlike Carter,

Truman has since been remembered for having greater accomplishments than failures.

“I’m hopeful that this book will have a similar impact on a reassessment of the Carter administration, not just Jimmy Carter as an esteemed former president but as a consequential former presiSee CARTER, page 6

Former Chief White House Domestic Policy Advisor speaks at Brandeis.

Inside This Issue:

Women’s Soccer

Page 2 News: Brandeis falls in rankings Page 12 Ops: Let me into Linsey Page 7 Keeper keeping it up.

Features: Never fear, HAWP is here Page 10 Sports: Life of a Brandeis athlete Editorial: Working to a more inclusive Brandeis Page 9 SPORTS: PAGE 11

PHOTO BY GRACE ZHOU/THE HOOT

PHOTO BY CELIA YOUNG/THE HOOT

Recordings of Brandeis alumnus given to archives

By Victoria Morrongiello staff

Brandeis alum and activist Abbot “Abbie” Hoffman ’59 may have been a prominent protestor against the Vietnam war in the 1960s, but his work went largely undocumented in the Brandeis Archives. That was until August 2018 when a Brandeis University archivist was offered hours of audio tapes featuring Hoffman.

Hoffman was a self-proclaimed “activist and social organizer” who was involved in various social movements from the ’60’s to the time of his death in 1989. He had an active voice in the Civil Rights Movement and protested against the Vietnam War and corruption in American politics.

Hoffman was also the founder of the Youth International Party— an American radical youth group which fought for free speech and anti-war movements in the 1960s.

For as much change as Hoffman sought, however, there were very few documents regarding him in the Brandeis Archives in the Robert D. Farber Library Archives and Special Collections where his photo hangs in tribute to his work.

Zadie Smith It’s “Swing Time.”

ARTS: PAGE 14

This changed in August 2018 when Maggie McNeely, Brandeis University’s archivist, was offered hours worth of reel to reel audio—a form of tape recording— and casket tapes featuring Hoffman and secondary accounts of him and his work.

The tapes were recorded by Stuart Hutchinson, a friend of Hoffman and a broadcaster who was also involved in social activist movements. These recordings consist of one-on-one conversations between Hoffman and Hutchinson as well as a four part miniseries titled “Dear Abbie,” which was made by Hutchinson as a tribute to Hoffman after his suicide in 1989, according to McNeely. Much of the material that now sits in the university’s archives was likely never heard by the public, McNeely said.

“It’s mysterious. We don’t really know what we have,” McNeely continued.

Keith Armonaitis, who had been in possession of the materials since Hutchinson’s death in 2012, offered these tapes to McNeely. Armonaitis and Hutchinson met after their involvement See TAPES, page 3

NEWS

2 The Brandeis Hoot

Univ. developing new financial system for student clubs

By Zach Newman staff

Brandeis is developing a new financial system for clubs that the university hopes will be installed by the end of the year. University admissions has used the software, called Slate, for seven years. Now, the university is in the process of creating a separate portal within Slate that improves upon the design of the current club financing system, called the Student Union Management System (SUMS).

“It’s a significantly cleaner, better, nicer system. It will walk you through everything,” said Rebecca Shaar ’21, Chairperson of the Student Union Allocations Board.

Shaar was involved in the development of Slate, which began in the spring semester of 2019. As a member of the Allocations Board (A-Board), which distributed $2.1 million of funding to student clubs in the 2018-2019 school year, Shaar uses SUMS to make decisions about approving money for clubs. In SUMS, club treasurers create lists of items that their organizations need, along with the amount of money requested to pay for those items and submit additional Google forms to the A-Board for approval.

“It’s a tough system for clubs to learn how to use,” said Shaar.

With Slate, the Google forms will be integrated into the program, and the experience will be more user-friendly in general, said Stephanie Grimes, the Assistant Dean of Students, in an email to The Brandeis Hoot. Shaar said that Slate will use language that’s easier for club treasurers to understand and will account for some of the human error that causes problems in SUMS. According to Grimes, Slate will also connect to COUPA—a system for faculty and staff payment and invoices—and Workday, the university financial system.

“A lot of times it’s up to clubs to figure out, ‘Who do I need to contact to make this happen?’ Slate is going to tell you,” said Shaar.

At the beginning of each semester, student clubs request funding from the A-Board during a period called “marathon.” Some clubs, termed “secured” clubs, get funding for the full year. On the other hand, “chartered” clubs get funding for each semester, participating in two marathon periods each year. The $2.1 million in funding that the A-Board distributed last year is called the student activities fee, a sum collected through a 1 percent tax on tuition, according to the Student Union website. By streamlining the features of SUMS and the supplemental Google forms, Slate makes the marathon process easier for treasurers and the Allocations Board.

“We’ve taken all the functioning of A-Board and turned it into the Slate system,” said Shaar.

Grimes said that the university has used SUMS for 10 to 15 years.

The program was developed exclusively for Brandeis and cannot be purchased on the market.

Currently, the university has a contract with an individual who supports changes in SUMS programming. Shaar said the software is disliked by some students because it can be slow and difficult to understand.

“SUMS is widely hated amongst club treasurers. It’s a very primitive system. It’s awful,” said Shaar.

Slate, on the other hand, is commercially available and used by over a thousand schools, according to the company’s website. Slate, a customer relationship management program, is already used at Brandeis for processes like admissions and new faculty orientation, according to Grimes.

She also said that Slate is funded through the university’s Information Technology Services (ITS).

“Slate is licensed by the university and funded through ITS. We are contributing a piece of the ex-

penditure. Much like the support of the SUMS system, the fees are paid from the student activities fee,” wrote Grimes to The Hoot.

Shaar said Slate is an improvement over SUMS because it better aligns with the A-Board’s process.

“The system needs to fit like a glove to the way A-Board functions,” said Shaar.

Club treasurers may recognize Slate’s name because the university planned to release the program at the beginning of this semester.

In early August 2019, Grimes sent an email to club treasurers saying that Slate was “predicted to be ready for the start of the academic year.”

In early September, however, Grimes sent a follow-up email saying that Slate’s release would be delayed until later in the year.

Responding to The Hoot in an email, Grimes wrote that the “discovery process has been more detailed than was originally expected,” and to meet the needs of the A-Board, the Budget Analyst and the university, the development team decided to postpone the release. Speaking about the delay, Shaar said that the system is making process in development.

“What they have fully programmed right now looks great,” Shaar said, “But there are small nuances to be fixed, and certain aspects aren’t fully programmed yet.”

In terms of an install date, Shaar said that Slate will be ready “almost definitively by next fiscal year.” Optimistically, she hopes it will be running by this semester’s upcoming marathon, in November. Grimes said she hopes Slate will be in use by the end of the year.

Shaar is hopeful that Slate will make life easier for students when it is finally installed.

“Overall, it’s a lot more helpful in guiding clubs to the resources they need,” she said.

September 20, 2019

IN THE SENATE: September 15, 2019 •

The Student Union Senate swore in new members at the first senate meeting of the year on Sept. 15. They approved new members of the executive board and named chairs for senate committees.

•

The senate also announced the creation of a Senate Housing and Facilities Committee, which is being chaired by Mods Quad Senator Trevor Filseth ’20. All quad senators are required to serve on this committee.

•

The senate approved Ari Halalis ’22 as the Director of Technology and Media, Kendal Chapman ’22 as Director of Outreach, Jacob Diaz ’20 as Director of Academic Affairs, Nakul Srinivas ’21 as Union Diversity and Inclusion Officer, Sasha Manus ’21 as Director of Advocacy and Accessibility and Zachary Wilkes ’20 as Chief of Staff for the Executive Board.

•

Vice President Guillermo Caballero ’20, who presides over the Senate, confirmed five senate committee chairs out of eight. The rest will be confirmed at the next Senate meeting. Nancy Zhai ’22 was confirmed as the dining chair, Oliver Price ’20 is the sustainability chair, Josh Hoffman ’21 will lead the health and safety committee, Joseph Coles ’22 is the chair of club support committee and Filseth will lead the housing and facilities committee.

•

The senate has not determined a chair for the rules committee, social justice committee and the services and outreach committee.

•

Jake Rong ’21, Executive Senator and Senator for Class of 2021, was voted the Senate Representative to the Allocations Board.

•

A motion has been put into place by Halalis to make class senators moderators on the MyDeis Facebook pages for their respective class years.

-Sabrina Chow, Editor

Lower Usdan gains vegan action station, changes coming to Brandeis dining

By Celia Young editor

Students, faculty and staff dining at Brandeis can now enjoy a permanent vegan action station in one of its dining halls, Lower Usdan, which opened Monday and is here to stay, according to the Student Union Senator-at-Large and Dining Committee Chair Nancy Zhai ’22.

The action station opened Monday with a jackfruit sandwich bar, where students could watch their meals prepared in front of them and eat an optional side of black bean soup. Preparing meals in front of students, said Zhai, helps students with dietary restrictions and allergies feel more secure about what they’re eating.

“The action station is a really good way for students to see how the food is actually cooked so students will feel like… ‘I saw my food was cooked in that way, so I feel it’s safer to eat,’” said Zhai.

“Students don’t really feel that way

if they don’t really see how the food is cooked.”

“They might not feel that sense of security, so I feel like the action station is the best way to show that there is a transparent process,” continued Zhai.

The station was prepared by Rose Forrest, a vegan chef at Brandeis, said Zhai. The station is just one of the many changes coming to Brandeis dining.

The Brandeis Hoot reported two weeks ago that the university is considering proposals for a new dining services program, as the current provider’s contract, Sodexo, will end in 2020. And members of the dining committee, including Class of 2022 Senator Topaz Fragoso ’22, want to bring a new healthy restaurant to campus.

Zhai spoke about the changes, outlining her vision for a new Brandeis dining experience as healthier, with more diverse options that everyone can enjoy.

“Even students without allergies will still appreciate more diverse, healthy and nutritious options,”

Zhai said.

The new provider comes after months of reported issues between Brandeis students and Sodexo, including several mislabeled foods in the dining halls that contained allergens that caused some students to become ill. Sodexo has since updated labelling procedures, according to an earlier Brandeis Hoot article.

Zhai wants students to come to her when they have complaints and to come to dining meetings to discuss food issues at Brandeis.

“I’m always willing to hear from students, to really make sure that students have their best dining experience possible at Brandeis,” Zhai said.

The university is working towards creating a system that can receive Request For Proposals (RPFs) and will receive proposals from vendors in December. But before seeing the proposals, both the administration and the Student Union are working to host a public forum in October for students to discuss what they would want from a food provider, said

Zhai. Zhai encouraged students to attend the forum and voice their hopes and concerns—though if students can’t make the forum, there will be an online option.

Brandeis will likely consider six to eight vendors initially, wrote Executive Vice President for Finance and Administration Stewart Uretsky to The Hoot in an email, and will narrow the options down to three to four to provide final operating and financial proposals. Sodexo could remain as the provider, wrote Uretsky.

“Going out for an RFP allows a fresh look at the entire program.

This will generate information that will be incredibly valuable whether we renew with Sodexo or select a new vendor,” wrote Uretsky.

After the vendors have been narrowed down, said Zhai, they will be evaluated on two main factors: how much a vendor can serve students who have different dietary needs and if the vendor is within the university budget.

Zhai and Uretsky both anticipate a change to meal plan struc-

tures, with Zhai hoping to account for student concerns over high meal plan prices.

“The outcome of meal plan offerings will be a product of community input and vendor experience and support,” wrote Uretsky to The Hoot.

A potential new provider also opens routes for a new restaurant on campus. Fragoso has been working on the initiative for a new restaurant that provides a healthier option for all Brandeis students, she said. While Fragoso has been in contact with a restaurant, her project is still in very early stages, she said.

“I’m trying to eat healthy, and I found once I started doing that [that] it’s really hard,” Fragoso said. “Why aren’t there more food options?” She continued, “A lot of people are complaining, I’m finding it hard to eat healthy, why not do something about it?”

Fragoso hopes a new restaurant on campus will allow students to eat healthier and encourages students to visit the vegan action station in Usdan.

September 20, 2019

NEWS 5

The Brandeis Hoot

Recordings of activist Abbie Hoffman ‘59 donated to university archives TAPES, from page 1

in the movement to impeach former President George W. Bush, according to a BrandeisNOW article released regarding the tapes.

Armonaitis said that he decided to pass the ownership of these recordings to the university after learning of Hoffman’s wish for his personal materials to return to Brandeis after his passing.

The process for preserving these tapes and making them available to the public is quite tedious, McNeely said.

“AVs [audio visuals] can be really intimidating. It takes a lot of time to go through them,” McNeely said.

After Armonaitis donated the tapes last year, the university had to select which tapes would undergo digitalization first. The university eventually decided upon the four part “Dear Abbie” series, seeing as it pertains most to Hoffman and his legacy. The reel to reel audio was packaged and sent out to be digitized. It’s a risk having these reels digitized because the university doesn’t know what will be on them, if anything, or if they are still intact.

“There’s a risk in everything you do. You just hope it ships well and processes,” McNeely said.

The university also had to secure copyright of the material to be shared publicly so that it could be made available via streaming online rather than having to visit the archives in person and listen to the tapes there, McNeely said.

Both Hutchinson’s widow and Armonaitis granted the university permission to publicly share these documents via streaming services.

“Getting it out as soon as possible is really important,” McNeely said. “I know people will be interested,” McKneely continued, “Student activism is one of the most

visited collections in the archives.”

Currently, the archivists are testing a new system where they could potentially share digitized archives as an alternative to sharing through the Brandeis Institutional Repository. The hope is to have these recordings be available online on either platform by early next semester, McNeely said,

starting with the “Dear Abbie” series.

Currently the archive team is going through the digitized footage to create “broad strokes,” which sum up the footage that will be made available to the public along with the recordings themselves, said McKeely. Though the material is not yet available online, it can

be accessed in the archives section of the Farber Library.

Making these tapes publicly available is giving both Hoffman and Hutchinson’s work a second life, where students can trace back the roots of activism in the university’s alumni.

PHOTOS BY VICTORIA MORRONGIELLO/THE HOOT

CEO of The Workers Lab gives keynote address at Heller’s 60th anniversary celebration HELLER, from page 1

inspire creativity. She mentioned that in a capitalist society, money is what harvests imagination.

She continued this idea by saying that often, philanthropic organizations are afraid to invest in risks, and that they use a “bank” like logic when deciding where to send their money.

She also mentioned that philanthropic organizations are often sitting on 95 percent of money, while only giving 5 percent away.

When asked about the most

pressing issue to American society, Rojas said that it was the fact that working citizens could still exist in poverty. How someone could work 40+ hours a week, and still not have enough to pay bills.

Many other problems, like lack of healthcare and large debt, stem from this issue, Rojas said. She believes that these struggling people think they’re poor because of a bad choice they made when they were younger, rather than due to the systems set up to make them fail.

Rojas went on to talk about the new national foundation she

is joining, The Marguerite Casey Foundation. She described this as the “perfect next place” for her career. This foundation, based in Seattle, is also committed to helping people of color. According to Rojas, 98 percent of the employees are people of color, with only two white people on the staff.

At this foundation, Rojas hopes to be the person who brings up topics that are often overlooked by other philanthropic organizations.

She says that this is the most radical thing she can do, rather than radically change the government.

She acknowledged that private organizations are helping people and creating jobs, but she questioned whether this is the private sector’s responsibility rather than the government’s.

“Even the best nonprofits are privatizing functions of the government,” Rojas said.

The discussion ended with a Q&A from the audience.

When asked about her usage of the word radical to describe herself and her actions, Rojas said that she takes radical to mean socially just. She men-

tioned how the term “socially just” has become diluted to signify any little action someone takes.

“For me, social justice is fighting white supremacy… fighting for climate change and our planet,” Rojas said. “Social justice is good, we just have to be radical.”

To finish off the presentation, Dean Weil asked Rojas who her “social justice hero” was, her biggest inspiration. Rojas replied with Brandeis alumna Angela Davis ’65, who taught her that she can be the “protagonist in shaping the future we want to see.”

PHOTOS BY CELIA YOUNG/THE HOOT

4 NEWS

The Brandeis Hoot

September 20, 2019

Workday to replace PeopleSoft for human resources, payroll and finances

By Sabrina Chow editor

Human resources, payroll and other finance operations have shifted from the software PeopleSoft to Workday, Chief Information Officer Jim La Creta told The Brandeis Hoot in an email.

Brandeis has used PeopleSoft since 2002 and decided to change to Workday to reduce the complexity of administrative systems.

PeopleSoft systems are customized for each organization that uses it, La Creta added, making the system more complicated to use than Workday. All faculty, staff and student employees shifted to Workday on July 1, according to Christine Jacinto, the Associate Director of Change Management and Strategic Communications for Workday.

“These customizations added a layer of complexity to our administrative systems, making system

upgrades and modifications challenging and disruptive for our vendors and staff,” he wrote to The Hoot.

La Creta said in the email that the transition to Workday is representative of the university’s progress in “campus modernization.” Workday is much more user-friendly and enables all faculty, staff and student employees to access Workday from anywhere at anytime.

Workday also offers improved security to the university’s data and personal information of employees on campus, said La Creta.

Workday simplifies, standardizes and automates different human resources processes that originally needed to be done through paper with PeopleSoft. La Creta added that Workday would decrease the university’s carbon footprint by “eliminating paper timesheets and paper-based processes,” such as the new hire process and benefits enrollment.

The biggest difference between

the processors for PeopleSoft and Workday is that Workday is a cloud-based system.

“This will enable us to keep up-to-date with new versions and functionality more efficiently,” he wrote. “And it will enable us to run operations in a more secure environment using Workday’s strict security protocols.”

There was a lengthy evaluation process for multiple platforms before the university settled on Workday, Associate Vice President of Information Technology Services Anne Marando told The Hoot in an email.

“Workday integrates with dozens of other systems on campus including the system used by the finance department to process payments to vendors and the system used by the student financials department to process tuition payments,” she added.

Overall, Workday is a much more simplified system as opposed to PeopleSoft, Workday Systems Manager Cathy James-

on told The Hoot. Jameson added that Workday is a much more condensed system with a modern interface that is more intuitive and secure for users compared to PeopleSoft. She added that Workday updates itself every six months.

In the past with PeopleSoft, “updates were delivered to Brandeis and had to be installed manually.

It required teams from each administrative area to apply and test the updates. The upgrade process could span over several months,” Jameson explained.

Workday combines three previous PeopleSoft systems that the university used: PeopleSoft Human Resources/Payroll, PeopleSoft Campus Solutions and PeopleSoft Financials, according to Jameson. PeopleSoft Human Resources/Payroll, known to most as Brandeis University Self-Service (BUSS), was the original method to hire, pay and assign benefits to all employees on campus. PeopleSoft Campus Solutions, also known as Sage, was the student

information system. PeopleSoft Financials processed and maintained financial accounting for the university.

Marando told The Hoot in an email that BUSS and PeopleSoft Financials have already been upgraded to Workday. She continued that Sage’s upgrade to Workday is set to fall 2019. When the transition is complete, Sage’s functions will be performed in the “student implementation” section of Workday.

“This is a multi-year initiative and will provide updates to the community as the project continues,” Marando added.

Implementation has already begun. There have been over 450 new hires and rehires, almost 7,000 weekly timesheets filled out and nine weekly and four semi-monthly payrolls on Workday since Aug. 31, 2019, wrote Jacinto to The Hoot.

Agricultural practices raised disease rates in rural 20th century Egypt, says UC Santa Cruz professor

By Celia Young editor

As agricultural practices in Egypt changed under the British occupation, the new flooding cycle of the Nile River marked the lives of the rural farmers with more river borne diseases like hookworm, creating a new normal for lower-class Egyptians.

Associate Professor at the University of California-Santa Cruz Jennifer Derr presented her newest work, “The Lived Nile: Environment, disease and material economy in Egypt” on Wednesday—part of a brown bag lunch series hosted by the Crown Center for Middle Eastern Studies.

Derr’s talk focused on 20th century Egypt, specifically the Northern region—the first to adopt perennial irrigation, which floods growing fields multiple times a year—and the Southern region, which did not change its agricultural practices, letting the Nile’s natural flooding season dictate farming.

The practice of perennial irrigation allowed capitalists to profit from cash crops like sugarcane and cotton, Derr said, and divid-

ed Egyptian society into two main classes: large landowners and sharecroppers or laborers.

Fundamentally changing the nature of the Nile, Derr said, came with many consequences, including increased disease for Northern Nile populations. Schistosome parasites—worms carried in river snails that then infect humans—and hookworm became increasingly common, along with side effects including rashes that develop within days, muscle aches, chills, fever, anemia, malnutrition and inflammation or scarring of the liver or bladder when the worms travel throughout the body.

In the 1930s, the rate of infection in some rural communities was at 60 percent, sometimes even exceeding 90 percent, said Derr. Southern Egyptian communities had a rate of infection around five percent because they did not use agricultural practices that increased exposure to and survival of the parasites.

“The symptoms of these diseases helped to structure normative bodily experiences of colonial economies among rural populations—especially the laborers who built and practiced the river through the daily work of agricul-

PHOTO BY CELIA YOUNG/THE HOOT

ture,” said Derr.

While these diseases were a problem spread by new agricultural practices, Derr said, Egyptian citizens viewed symptoms on an individual basis, not as a systemic issue.

For Derr, the environment is not a “thing apart” from the rest of Egypt’s history. Instead, the changes to the Nile present an example of a new form of violence perpetrated against the Egyptian people: violence in the form of disease.

But this form of violence was not the only focus of Derr’s book, nor the only form that existed, said Derr.

“While disease was one form of slow violence that was wrought on rural populations it was certainly not the only form,” she said. “The book also traces the violence that stemmed from the social relations of the political economy, the labor relations that prevailed in sugar cane fields and agricultural factories and somewhat ironically, the very programs designed to treat parasitic disease that were established in the 1920s.”

Some programs meant to treat parasitic diseases in rural populations were brutally enforced, said Derr. Egyptians were beaten unless they agreed to undergo a long, painful treatment—despite the fact that they were very likely to be reinfected upon returning to the agricultural fields, said Derr.

Derr also spoke about how controlling the flow of the Nile was a process best understood by Egyptian engineers, and the British engineers worked to understand the Nile in Egyptian terms—not the other way around.

“While British engineers were certainly important to the construction of a river in the period of Egypt’s colonial economy, they did not land in Egypt fully actualized as experts,” Derr said. “What they came to know and how they made a performance of their expertise was a direct result of their experiences in Egypt and their interactions with Egyptian cultivators, engineers and the landscape itself.”

PHOTO FROM STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

Derr gave the example of a British engineer tasked with investigating irrigation problems in Egypt, who used Egyptian language and the Coptic calendar to describe proper irrigation practices. Egyptian engineers were also crucial for dam construction on the Nile, Derr said.

“The potential threat that Egyptian engineers posed to the presumption of British expertise was complicated by the nature of the British project during the first decade of the occupation,” Derr said.

“In this period no new irrigation works were constructed. The British appointees were tasked with the repair and maintenance of existing works in Egypt.”

“Maintenance... inherently attribute[d] value to the work of other engineers—the daily work of maintenance served to unsettle the claims of superior knowledge so often espoused by British engineers,” she continued.

Derr concluded her talk by taking questions from the audience.

One member asked about the net effect of changing the Nile on Egypt as a whole, and Derr clarified that agricultural growth is not always a good thing, and in this case, was not a net good.

She also spoke about a book she is working on, which traces the history of the liver in Egypt.

September 20, 2019

NEWS 5

The Brandeis Hoot

Self-study looks at governance, academic programs, undergraduate degree programs

By Sabrina Chow editor

Brandeis analyzed their organization, governance and academic programs in the second part of a Sept. 2018 self-study conducted as part of the university’s reaccreditation process by the New England Commissions of Higher Education (NECHE).

This self-study allows Brandeis to reflect on the nine standards provided by the NECHE. These standards of accreditation establish the criteria for institutional quality, according to the Brandeis website, with each standard looking at a specific aspect of institutional quality.

Standard III: Organization and Governance The third standard, organization and governance, ensures that each institution has a sustainable environment that is able to encourage teaching, learning, service, scholarship, research and creative activity, according to the NECHE website.

Following the start of Liebowitz’s presidency, new personnel filled five major senior administration positions, including the Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President for Finance and Administration.

At the start of the 2018-19 academic year, the new leadership team was finally in place, according to the self-study. Since this time, a number of other positions have been opened up and filled, including Vice President of Operations and Vice President of Student Affairs, according to earlier articles by The Hoot.

Brandeis’ Board of Trustees is the governing body of the university, with 32 voting members, and a number of additional non-voting members. The five main responsibilities of the Board of Trustees revolve around administration, faculty, students, academic programs and finances. The responsibilities include approving tenure for professors, awarding degrees to students (including honorary degrees) and approving all the budgets that the university utilizes.

In fall 2016, the board also saw significant changes after an internal review conducted with members of the board and an external source, Richard Chait, a profes-

sor of education emeritus at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. The board approved the changes in September 2016.

According to the self-study, the changes include abolishing the former Executive Committee and assigning its responsibilities to a new committee, called the Coordinating Committee. The Coordinating Committee oversees all other standing committees. There was also a consolidation from 10 standing committees to six, “allowing committees to have longer meetings with more extensive examination of issues,” according to the self-study.

The chair of the Faculty Senate was also added to the board as a non-voting faculty member. This seat was added following uproar from faculty and members of the Brandeis community about a $5 million executive compensation given to former President Jehuda Reinhartz, according to an article

by Inside Higher Ed. “That seat will allow faculty members to be in the loop and to put a president’s pay in a context as the [compensation] committee does its work,” the article added.

In terms of the other forms of governance of Brandeis, besides high senior executive officers that report directly to Liebowitz, the President’s Management Council has other senior leadership that regularly meets with Liebowitz to discuss major issues and coordinate activities.

At the same time the board was reorganizing, there were changes to the senior administration at Brandeis when former President Fredrick Lawrence was replaced by current President Ronald Liebowitz in July 2016.

University governance bodies also have representation by both undergraduate and graduate students. Two undergraduate students and one graduate student serve on the Board of Trustees as non-voting members. The Undergraduate Curriculum Committee (UCC)—charged with determining the new general education requirements that the class of 2023 will first experience—has three undergraduate students and one graduate student.

And the Committee for the Support of Teaching has two undergraduates and two graduates.

This committee works towards “efforts to improve teaching and learning on campus and mediate between the expectations of ac-

creditation bodies and the norms of faculty,” according to Brandeis’ website.

All the undergraduate student representatives are voted on by the undergraduate student body.

Graduate representative to the Board are typically members of the Executive Board for the Graduate Student Association, according to their website. Members of the Executive Board are voted on by the graduate student population.

Standard Four: The Academic Program The fourth standard, The Academic Program, looks to ensure academic quality and integrity for all academic programs on campus and what can be done to better execute teaching methods for both undergraduate and graduate degree programs, according to the NECHE website. It also looks towards general education requirements set forth by the respective university.

The university noted in the study that one of the biggest problems that faced them in the past years was the general education curriculum, which has not been reviewed in 25 years, the self-study stated. Brandeis’ basic premise on general education is “providing Brandeis students with a set of knowledge and skills that will prepare them to navigate and succeed in a rapidly changing

world,” according to the study.

Starting in fall 2019, all new students at Brandeis will take part in a new general education program. The new curriculum has five major themes under which all students have to take courses, according to an earlier article by The Hoot. This curriculum will undergo a fifth-year assessment by the UCC in 2024 as part of an internal review conducted every three to five years.

Internal reviews are conducted by the UCC and are limited to interdepartmental programs in the arts and sciences. External reviews are for departments, graduate programs and centers/ institutes, states the self-study. All existing academic programs must undergo various reviews, both internal and external. Both forms of review include “a self-study by the academic unit (department/program or center/institute), examination of relevant documents by the review committee and meetings with faculty and students,” according to the self-study.

Brandeis is also working toward improving degree audits, which are available in some, but not all undergraduate majors. Degree audits demonstrate the progress a student has made on completing their major/minor, according to the Brandeis website. These audit improvements will also be made in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences to expand online degree audits to the master’s

programs and refine the online degree audits that are currently at the Heller School.

Undergraduate Degree Programs The self study also reviewed undergraduate degree programs at Brandeis, and found that faculty teach all classes at Brandeis, besides basic calculus, pre-calculus and half of the University Writing Seminar (UWS) courses. Faculty members oversee all curriculum given to students.

60 percent of classes have fewer than 20 students, 15 percent less than 30 and 10 percent have more than 50 students, the self-study reported.

Students have the opportunity to major in 42 different subjects on campus. They also have the opportunity to study abroad with over 350 different approved programs in 70 countries to fulfill university requirements and 38 percent of students will have gone abroad by the time they graduate.

There are three Brandeis-led programs: Brandeis in Copenhagen, Brandeis in Siena and Brandeis in The Hague, according to the study, however, the Hague program was cancelled in August 2018 just before the publication of the study on Sept. 14, according to an earlier Hoot article.

This is the second part of a series that looks into Brandeis’ selfstudy.

GRAPHIC BY SABRINA CHOW/THE HOOT

Prof. advises University of Alaska consolidation

By Rachel Saal editor

A Brandeis professor is serving as a facilitator in the process of consolidating the three University of Alaska (UA) schools to fall under one accreditation.

Dr. Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld, a professor in The Heller School for Social Policy and Management, facilitated discussion groups regarding the consolidation of academic programs and other academic areas during the week of Aug. 19, according to the University of Alaska website.

The University of Alaska Anchorage, the University of Alaska Fairbanks and the University of Alaska Southeast in Juneau currently each have their own indi-

vidual accreditation. UA President Jim Johnsen’s plan would bring the universities under one accreditation with multiple campus locations.

“You’d use technology and people to provide academic programs and other services based on enrollments and based on where those people are, where the demand actually is,” said Johnsen.

According to Johnsen, University of Washington and the Kent State University system have similar models.

Johnsen said that consolidation would save money after deep state government funding cuts.

Under an agreement signed with the governor, university officials are looking at a $70 million cut over a three year period. This cut would occur in three stages: $25

million during the 2020 fiscal year, $25 million during the 2021 fiscal year and $20 million during the 2022 fiscal year. These budget cuts would reduce the state’s funding to the university by 20 percent, according to The Washington Post.

UA said that eight academic areas were reviewed during Cutcher-Gershenfeld’s workshops.

These areas included health, science/arts/humanities, management and business, eLearning, engineering, education, research and career and technical education for community campuses.

These meetings were to “explore options for academic organization and structure in the context of reductions in state support to the University of Alaska,” said UA’s website.

“For each area, we convened two sessions, the first in Fairbanks and the second in Anchorage,” said the university’s website. “Participants were selected by provosts, deans, directors and faculty leadership and represent a wide spectrum of interests across the University of Alaska system.”

During a Sept. 12 meeting at the Anchorage campus, the public gave testimonies on the possibility of consolidation, and the overwhelming majority were against single accreditation, according to KTUU-TV. The public expressed concerns about the potential loss of faculty, academic programs and the university’s reputation.

However, when Cutcher-Gershenfeld conducted a survey of students, staff, administrators and Alaskan tribal leaders he

found that 52 percent of people believed it was important to have all of higher education operate as a single, integrated system with programs and courses available at campuses statewide, according to KTUU-TV. The Hoot reached out to Cutcher-Gershenfeld who said that he was unable to comment on the process until after it is resolved.

The UA’s Board of Regents voted 9-2 on Sept. 12 in favor of receiving an expedited report on university programs to contribute to the research for statewide consolidation. The next meeting will happen Nov. 7 and Nov. 8 in Fairbanks.

This is a developing story, and The Hoot will keep you up to date as it evolves.

6 NEWS

The Brandeis Hoot

September 20, 2019

Official under Carter says president is underappreciated CARTER, from page 1

dent as well,” said Eizenstat.

“Almost 70 percent of all our legislation was passed by Congress. The president honored the institutions, the president respected the independence of the judiciary, of the FBI, of the Justice Department, and of the important role that the press plays in our democracy even when it was brutally negative toward him,” Eizenstat.

Eizenstat said that he attributes the “wrap” of the Carter presidency with what he calls, “the four ‘I’s:’” inflation, Iran, inexperience

by the president and his “Georgia Mafia,” and interparty warfare.

“All of those are very real,” said Eizenstat. “But they have obscured an enormous array of accomplishments at home and abroad that have had lasting impacts, more obvious today than they were then. I wanted to write this book while there are still living eyewitnesses to give a complete and accurate assessment of the 39th presidency: the mistakes and failures, including my own but also his successes.”

Eizenstat said that Carter convinced Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to attempt, after many failures, to negotiate with

Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, which eventually led to the Camp David Accords, the “greatest personal presidential diplomacy in American history,” according to Eizenstat.

Eizenstat gave several examples of many unpopular actions taken

by Carter, including the Panama Canal Treaty, which 80 percent of the public was not in favor of, according to Eizenstat.

Eizenstat also said that while their administration had inherited high rates of inflation from President Richard Nixon and President Gerald Ford’s administration, inflation had increased to double digits during Carter’s administration, and Eizenstat did everything he could to lower it.

He eventually made the decision to appoint Paul Volcker as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, since Volcker said that he was going to choke inflation and that it would tighten the money supply and raise unemployment and interest rates, according to Eizenstat.

“Not once did Carter point the finger at Paul Volcker. We took the medicine,” said Eizenstat.

“There is not one economist, not one successor of Paul Volcker, who won’t say that the reason you and I enjoy low inflation is because of Paul Volcker and because Carter let him do his job. And it worked—inflation dropped like a rock under Volcker after Reagan’s first year, too late to help us in our reelection. That was symbolic of so much of what we did. The seeds were planted and the fruit only became obvious years later.”

At the end of the Carter presidency, Eizenstat conjured a downturn in fortune brought on by the Iran Hostage Crisis. He recalled the Iran Hostage Crisis’ impact on the administration. He questioned the decisions made

by President Carter in this highstakes chapter of Carter’s term in

PHOTOS BY GRACE ZHOU/THE HOOT

the White House.

“This is one instance where I wish he had followed my advice because I recommended, along with [Former National Security Advisor] Brzezinski, immediate military action,” said Eizenstat.

“A sandstorm occurs when one of the helicopters tries to take off, it blinds the pilot, the motorblade hits the C130 filled with fuel, it bursts into flames eight servicemen are killed, and it ended up engulfing not only them, but our presidency.”

Gary Samore, Senior Executive Director of the Crown Center for Middle East Studies, said the reason he thinks that Carter lost reelection was because people saw him as a “weak and inept president.”

“The Carter administration is remembered for the problems that accompanied it more than the accomplishments,” said Samore. “Some of it wasn’t his fault. I deeply believe if the rescue mission had been successful, he would have been reelected.

I think it was that accident that doomed his presidency.”

Eizenstat’s tenure in White House politics goes back to Carter’s presidency in 1977. Eizenstat

also served as the United States Ambassador to the European Union from 1993 to 1996 and as the United States Deputy Secretary of the Treasury from 1999 to 2001.

When a member of the audience asked Eizenstat about Carter’s visit to Brandeis Jan. 23, 2007 in which Carter apologized for what he called an “improper and stupid” sentence in his book, “Palestine: Peace and Apartheid,” Eizenstat said that he actually wrote speaking points for Carter’s Brandeis speech. The speech was succeeded by a followup conversation by Alan M. Dershowitz, a Harvard law professor who had criticized the book but later praised Carter’s speech at Brandeis.

“You heard the Brandeis Jimmy Carter today, and he was terrific.

I support almost everything he said. But if you listen to the Al Jazeera Jimmy Carter, you’ll hear a very different perspective,” Dershowitz said in a later interview with The New York Times.

“I guess I was the Brandeis Jimmy Carter,” Eizenstat joked.

Brandeis falls in U.S. News rankings

By Sasha Skarboyvichuk editor

Brandeis dropped in the U.S. News and World Report Best National University rankings from a tie for number 35 in 2019 to a tie for number 40 in the 2020 edition.

Brandeis also ranked number 76 in best undergraduate teaching, tying with Boston University, Columbia University and others, while it ranked number 34 in the previous year.

In U.S. New’s 35th edition of best college rankings for 2020, Brandeis tied for number 40 with Boston University, Northeastern

University, Case Western Reserve University, College of William and Mary and Tulane University in the category of best national universities.

Brandeis dropped from number 35 in the 2019 Edition, where it tied with the Georgia Institute of Technology. It also ranked number 33 in Best Value Schools, and number 138 in Top Performers on Social Mobility.

In order to be in the National Universities category, schools have to offer a full range of undergraduate majors, as well as master’s and Ph.D. programs. They also have to “emphasize faculty research,” according to U.S. News and World Report.

To rank colleges, U.S. News and World Report uses 15 measures of academic quality. The evaluation utilizes a mix of interviews, tours and student polls, as well as data. The focus of the ranking are on “outcomes, faculty resources, expert opinion, financial resources, student excellence and alumni giving,” according to U.S. News and World Report.

U.S. News and World Report then maps all the categories to the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education’s Basic Classification system, which is also used by the U.S. Department of Education and many higher education associations.

Percentage-wise, outcome ac-

counts for 35 percent of the total score, faculty resources and expert opinion account for 20 percent each, financial resources and student excellence for 10 percent each and alumni giving for 5 percent.

Outcome refers to the school’s success at retaining and graduating students within six years. Faculty resources consists of five factors from the previous academic year to assess a school’s commitment to instruction. Those include class size, faculty salary, faculty with the highest degree in their fields, student-faculty ratio and proportion of faculty who are full time.

Expert opinion is a two year

weighted average of ratings from presidents and provosts, who then rate the academic quality of peer institutions which they are familiar with on a scale of one to five.

Financial resources is measured by using the average spending per student on instruction, research, student services and related educational expenditures in the two previous fiscal years.

Student excellence measures the achievement of incoming students in high school, which is then weighted and scaled. Alumni giving is the average percentage of living alumni with bachelor’s degrees who gave to the school in the last two years.

Students prepare for national climate strike

By Victoria Morrongiello staff

Brandeis students are joining the national outcry over climate change, with some planning to board a bus this morning to attend the Boston climate strike.

Ahead of the strike, students gathered Tuesday evening to create posters expressing their concerns over climate change.

Signs made by Brandeis students read: “Don’t Burn My Future,” “Planet Not Profit” and

“Your Mother is Watching.”

Members of the university has been supportive of students’ involvement in the current politics regarding climate change, including Associate Professor Tom King (ENG), one of the faculty coordinators of the aRt-ivist event. “Our goal was to get students excited for the global climate strike that Brandeis is participating in this Friday,” King said.

Creativity, the Arts and Social Transformation (CAST), the Brandeis minor which hosted the aRt-ivist event, is all about the

combination of theory and practice, King said. This is an opportunity to use creative techniques to build a social justice movement, he continued.

Many of the students who were in attendance making posters said they would also be involved in the march that is taking place later this week. Most of the students had received excused absences from class to leave campus at 10 a.m to attend the protest from their professors.

However, some students said they would have to use one of

their class absences in order to go. Miriam Berro Krugman ’20, a student participating in the climate strike said that going to the climate strike “should be encouraged. It’s dire and people forget about that in day to day life.”

One of the student coordinators of the aRt-ivist event, Zoë Rose ’20, told The Brandeis Hoot that she was amazed by the turnout.

CAST has held events in the past like this, and they did not get as many students as they had hoped, Rose said.

“We’re creating a space for

people to come together and have conversations that we don’t normally have,” Rose said about CAST’s intent with this event.

Other students talked about what they wanted to see happen after the march on Friday.

“It’s great to have one day of action, but you gotta make sure that once you return you pick up your phone or your laptop and make change happen. It’s a continuous process,” said Alina Sipp-Alpers ’21.

September 20, 2019

FEATURES

The Brandeis Hoot 7

HAWP aims to teach campus about health and wellness

By Sabrina Chow, Sabreen Huq and Shruthi Manjunath

editor, special to the hoot, editor

After a decade away from her alma mater, Leah Berkenwald ’07 is back as the Wellness Promotion Program Manager for Health and Wellness Promotion (HAWP).

HAWP helps to coordinate campus-wide health and wellness efforts through different methods, such as educational programs, peer educators and collaborations with other groups on campus, according to their website.

Berkenwald told The Brandeis Hoot in an interview that there hadn’t been an official health and wellness office prior to her arrival at Brandeis. She realized that she could shape the program however she saw fit.

She went onto explain the main purposes of HAWP: health education and training student leaders on campus on different health and wellness topics. Something that Berkenwald really likes about being a part of HAWP is her ability to partner with other departments all across campus.

“Health and wellness touches everything,” Berkenwald told The Hoot. “No department on campus isn’t involved with health and wellness so I get to work with people all across campus. I get to work with athletics, the library, students, etc.” She added that she really enjoys the collaborative aspect of all the work she does.

HAWP is split up into four main sections, Bridge to Wellness (BTW) peer educators, educational workshops and trainings, research and assessment and Body Positive Brandeis.

Bridge to Wellness (BTW) Peer Educators Bridge to Wellness (BTW) Peer Educators, has been working tirelessly to foster and prioritize healthy decision-making skills surrounding nutrition, stress management, mental health, fitness and substance abuse.

Through a series of workshops and training events, peer educators and students feel both educated and empowered to make the right choices.

Jack Rubinstein ’20, one of the BTW Peer Education Coordinators, briefly shared his experience with the BTW community in an email with The Hoot, saying, “So far my experience has been overwhelmingly positive. I really like my coworkers, and everyone has been really passionate about their ideas. I always feel inspired

to learn in that environment.”

The program works to promote accessibility and connectivity to campus resources in order to adhere to students’ concerns.

“I chose to apply to BTW because it’s the kind of group I really wish existed when I was a firstyear. I feel like a lot of my health needed figuring out in a way that a peer educator could’ve really helped me with,” wrote Rubinstein.

The 2019-2020 Peer Educators come from a variety of social and academic backgrounds, but all share the values that are at the core of the BTW Program: to empower, educate and meaningfully advise.

The intention of this program, alongside the numerous educational programs being offered, such as “Sleeping well @ Brandeis,” “Making Peace with Your Body” and “Watch Your BAC,” is to create a campus environment that values community health and general well-being.

Educators and staff are trained in manners that are tailored to their respective audience and have developed a toolbox of skills and a myriad of advising techniques that enable them to connect with other students, assign appropriate resources and/ or offer personalized advice.

Berkenwald also told The Hoot in an interview that, “I am a huge believer in the power of peer education. When I arrived, there was a gap. We have so many students interested in health and wellness, so it’s the perfect fit to create a peer education group to fill those [gaps].

With the peer education group, I can really expand my reach.”

Berkenwald found that there were many peers doing great work through various organizations across campus, but no one was doing things on specific topics such as alcohol and drugs, stress management and nutrition. The BTW Peer Educators have enabled more conversations on these critical subject matters and invite all students to openly and comfortably share their questions and/or concerns.

Educational Workshops and Trainings As a health education program on campus, HAWP offers a variety of different educational workshops and trainings, available to students, faculty and staff, on various topics including alcohol and drug interventions, managing stress and how to intervene as a bystander, according to their website.

Student programs are oftentimes taught by the BTW Peer Educators and include topics such as group bond-

PHOTOS FROM BRANDEIS.EDU

BTW

Peer educators are equipped with the knowledge to aid other students who are in need.

ing and intervention strategies.

HAWP also offers trainings for various student leaders across campus, including orientation leaders, community advisors, peer support organizations and campus volunteers. They also offer to teach a class on a health topic of a professor’s choosing if they are unable to teach a class, according to the HAWP website.

They also provide training for faculty and staff that focuses on motivational interviewing. “This training provides an introduction to motivational interviewing skills to build rapport and support behavior change with students,” states the website. “A counseling technique originally developed for substance abuse, it can be applied to any type of behavior change.”

The training is taught by Berkenwald and Carrie Eichmann, a staff therapist at the Brandeis Counseling Center (BCC).

Research and Assessment Berkenwald also explained to The Hoot that there are various national and internal assessments that HAWP conducts.

The main tool that HAWP utilizes is the National College Health Assessment (NCHA).

According to their website, this assessments helps different universities around the country analyze students’ health habits, behaviors and perceptions.

She really likes this tool because NCHA only provides Brandeis-specific data, and not national data on college students. Berkenwald added that the most recent assessment was conducted in fall 2018, with the one prior in fall 2016.

Another major project that Berkenwald spearheaded was a community needs assessment. “It brought together people from all over campus, and students, and we looked at the eight dimensions of wellness,” she told The Hoot.

The purpose of this assessment was to see where the university was on each of the dimensions and how we could improve in the future.

The university also participates in a biennial review that ensures that the university is in accordance with Drug-Free Schools and Campuses Regulations, part 86 of the Education Department General Administrative Regulations (EDGAR), according to HAWP’s website.

“The Biennial Review is a report to be completed on alternate

years, providing documentation of compliance with federal regulations, as well as recent data on student alcohol and other drug use, and updates on campus education, prevention, intervention, and treatment initiatives,” the website states. The next review will be conducted in fall 2019.

Body Positive Brandeis In the current day and age, body image has become a huge issue that many individuals struggle with. The rise in social media use leaves individuals, specifically adolescents, constantly comparing their bodies to others and feeling ashamed of the way they look. Individuals struggle with self acceptance and realizing they are worthy of other people’s love. This is extremely unhealthy and steps need to be taken in order to aid these individuals and boost their self esteem. Specifically, individuals need to have support outlets in which they can seek the help they need.

Here at Brandeis, HAWP and the BCC have partnered with The Body Positive, a non-profit organization, to create a new program on campus that promotes the acceptance of one’s body.

The Body Positive is “a lively, healing community that offers freedom from suffocating societal messages that keep people in a perpetual struggle with their bodies,” according to its website.

Berkenwald explained that HAWP received funding through the campus life fund to contract The Body Positive to come to campus.

The aim of Body Positive Brandeis is to conduct training for students and staff to lead groups that aid students in their quest to increase their self esteem and stop negative thoughts regarding their body image. These volunteer coordinators will work with students, focusing on The Body Positive’s five core competencies: reclaiming health, cultivating self-love, practicing intuitive self-care, declaring your own authentic beauty and building community, according to the facilitator application form.

“It is the first, and only, body positivity curricula that has a social justice lens,” said Berkenwald. “It creates opportunities for folks to think about their various identities and how that intersects with their body image.”

She went onto explain that the program was “designed to build

PHOTOS FROM BRANDEIS.EDU

community and encourage activism so that folks have the tools to fight size discrimation, sizeism and other types of stigmas related to appearance and bodies.”

According to Berkenwald, typical body image curriculum trainings tend to be designed for women and not addressing issues of diversity or identity. “They would only focus on the ‘thin ideal’ when we know that that’s not ideal for every person from every background,” she explained.

Body Positive Brandeis plans to host five groups in Spring 2020, with facilitators connected to specific identity groups leading.

These groups include the general student body, a gender identity based group, an athletics group, students of color group and a graduate student group, according to the facilitator application.

Rachael Pucillo, the Group Coordinator and an Eating Disorder Specialist, and Berkenwald hope that there will be more groups on campus that emphasize body positivity that discuss the differences in identities of individuals and how these differences affect one’s body image in the future.

They also hope that students will learn strategies to help themselves accept their bodies and create relationships with other students that allow them to feel loved and supported. Students can also take the message of body positivity to other communities after they graduate as accepting oneself in their own body is something that many people struggle with, and lots of individuals do not have the resources to ask for help.

Surround yourself with people who will love you for who you are and will support you when you are feeling down, Pucillo and Berkenwald added. Make sure that the people you surround yourself with do not say things like “Ugh, I am so fat.” “You’re not fat! I’m the fat one…” It is alright to cut people out of your life if you feel that they are having a negative impact on you. If you feel like you need more help, you can reach out to HAWP or BTW peer educators. We are all human beings in need of love and the best thing we can do is to love each other and love ourselves.

The Body Positive Planning Committee is made up of members from HAWP, BCC, the Department of Athletics, Recreation and Physical Education, Graduate Student Affairs, the Dean of Students Office and the Intercultural Center (ICC).

8 FEATURES

The Brandeis Hoot

September 20, 2019

Giving back to Brandeis: Leah Berkenwald and HAWP

By Sabrina Chow editor

Leah Berkenwald ’07 always knew she wanted to come back to Brandeis after she graduated. “I love Brandeis,” Berkenwald said in an interview with The Brandeis Hoot. “I can’t imagine my life not having had my Brandeis experience.”

And almost a decade after graduating, she is back on campus as the Wellness Promotion Program Manager for Health and Wellness Promotion (HAWP). HAWP “co-

ordinate[s] campus-wide health and wellness efforts through evidence-based promotion and prevention strategies, such as educational programs and events, health information and resources, and peer educators,” according to the HAWP website.

While at Brandeis, Berkenwald studied American Studies with a journalism minor. Following graduation, she got her masters in American Studies, thinking that she was going to get her Ph.D. and become a professor.

However, following the completion of her masters, Berkenwald

PHOTO FROM THEBODYPOSITIVE.ORG

BODY POSITIVE

realized that it was not the right fit for her. “I needed to do some exploring to decide what I really wanted to do,” she explained.

During this time, Berkenwald was working at a non-profit organization doing communications work and realized it was something she really enjoyed. However, she wanted to do communications work in something that she was passionate about, health and wellness.

After realizing she could study both, Berkenwald went back to school and received another masters degree in health communication in 2012 from a joint program at Emerson College in collaboration with the Tufts University School of Medicine.

She explained that for her final practicum at the end of her program, Berkenwald was required to design a communication plan for a client. Through her project, Berkenwald helped to design a body positivity campaign for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

“This made me remember that college health was an option,” she told The Hoot. “That experience made me think that I wanted to go into college health.”

After finishing her masters degree, Berkenwald went to work at the Wentworth Institute of Technology. In spring 2018, she learned that there was a full time position opening at Brandeis in

Features Calendar

Love Your Body Day

Friday, Sept. 20, 2019, 12-3 p.m., Shapiro Campus Center Join the Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance (FMLA) for the annual Love Your Body Day. We will be celebrating body positivity and radical self love with interactive booths and art in the Shapiro Campus Center (SCC) Atrium. Posters and booths will address fat-phobia, the stigmatization of queer bodies, decolonizing body love, and tips for loving your body where it’s at!

There will be candy and stickers as well as spray painting shirts so make sure to stop on by to participate in this empowering event.

Anarchitect: A Conversation on Gordon Matta-Clark Saturday, Sept. 21, 2019, 2-3 p.m., Rose Art Museum Join us during opening weekend for a conversation with exhibition co-curators Antonio Sergio Bessa, Bronx Museum Director of Curatorial Programs and Jessamyn Fiore, independent curator and co-director of the Matta-Clark Estate. Bessa and Fiore will discuss the affective politics embedded in Gordon Matta-Clark´s artistic interventions. Ruth Estévez, Senior Curator-at-Large at the Rose Art Museum will moderate the conversation.

Scholars Seminar on Israel Studies with Prof. Yair Lorberbaum Monday, Sept.

23, 2019, 12-1:30 p.m., Mandel Center for Humanities “The Barak Court’s Revolution

in Legal Interpretation at the Crossroads of Legal Theory and Israeli Politics” is the first Schusterman Center Scholars Seminar of the fall 2019 semester. It is presented by Professor Yair Lorberbaum, member of the Law Faculty at Bar Ilan University.

Resilience Fair

Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2019, 11 a.m.2 p.m., Shapiro Campus Center The Resilience Fair will host interactive tables and workshops for students to meet campus resources that support resilience— skills needed to bounce back from challenges, grow from failure and build capacity to navigate and overcome difficult situations.

Departments supporting undergraduate and graduate student resilience across campus will host tables. Workshops include Meet a Therapy Dog, Mindfulness and Yoga. Raffle for prizes, table giveaways, ice cream, and more!

The White House of Exile Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2019, 12-2 p.m., Faculty Club Lounge German Literary Nobel Laureate Thomas Mann’s grandson Frido Mann joins us at Brandeis on Tuesday, Sept. 24 for a luncheon talk. In 1942, Thomas Mann moved into his new house in Pacific Palisades.

Exiled from Nazi Germany, it was a refuge for the writer, a gathering place for émigrés and a place of safety for his grandson. Frido Mann returned to retrace his memories at his grandfather’s home in March 2018, shortly before the house was to

be opened by the German Government as a center for transatlantic dialogue. Professor Mann remembers the political commitment of the man in exile, and he saw himself confronted with the question of what influence open dialogue can produce today. His essay “The White House of Exile” presents a radical case for responsibility and communication in an age of global crisis.

Meet the Author: Charlotte Nassim, Author Of “Lessons From The Lobster: Eve Marder’s Work In Neuroscience,” In Conversation with Eve Marder Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2019, 3-4:30 p.m., Rapaporte Treasure Hall Are you interested in a career as a science writer? Curious about how this book arose? Nassim will provide her story as a writer and insights into what she learned as she wished to write a book to encourage young women to embark on a career in science.

Gabbay Award Lectures in Biotechnology and Medicine Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2019, 4-5 p.m., Shapiro Campus Center The 22nd Jacob and Louise Gabbay Award recipients Prof. Dario Campana from the Department of Pediatrics, Yoo Loo Lin School of Medicine in the National University of Singapore, and Michel Sadelain, Director of the Center for Cell Engineering at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center will give a lecture, “Engineering Immune Cells to Treat Cancer.”

Compiled by Shruthi Manjunath

PHOTOS FROM BRANDEIS.EDU

BERKENWALD

regards to a health and wellness program. And after applying, in July 2018, Berkenwald started her position at her alma mater.

“After working in college health for seven years, I learned so much about how to support student wellness, student well-being, happiness and health,” she told The Hoot. Through the lessons she learned from her studies and working at other institutions, Berkenwald hoped to use her knowledge base back at Brandeis.

“I’ve just been waiting for a chance to take all that I’ve learned and give it back to

PHOTO FROM BRANDEIS.EDU

Brandeis, which feels like my home,” she said in an interview.

During her time as an undergraduate at Brandeis, Berkenwald told The Hoot that she was also a part of Student Sexuality Information Services (SSIS). Berkenwald added that she works alongside SSIS through HAWP. “I still feel very connected to the community,” she told The Hoot. “I feel like Brandeis has given me so much and I’m just excited to be in a position to give back and I’m surprised everyday by how much Brandeis still feels like home.

September 20, 2019

“To acquire wisdom, one must observe.”

Editors-in-Chief Candace Ng Polina Potochevska Managing Editor Emily Botto Senior Copy Editor Natalie Fritzson Copy Editor Jennifer Cook Senior News Editor Celia Young News Editor Rachel Saal Arts Editor Jonah Koslofsky Opinions Editor Sasha Skarboviychuk Features Editor Shruthi Manjunath Sports Editor Sophie Trachtenberg Layout Editor Sabrina Chow Social Media Editor Emma Lichtenstein

Volume 16 • Issue 16 the brandeis hoot • brandeis university 415 south street • waltham, ma

FOUNDED BY Leslie Pazan, Igor Pedan and Daniel Silverman

STAFF

Medjine Barionette, Emma Belkin, Camila Casanueva, Chris DeMena, James Feltner, John Fornagiel, Lucy Frenkel, Madeline Herrup, Stewart Huang, Gunnar Johnson, Alex Kougasian, Aaron LaFauci, Dane Leoniak, Jesse Lieberman, Josh Lannon, Victoria Morrongiello, Zach Newman, Zachary Sosland, Emerson White, Grace Zhou

MISSION As the weekly community student newspaper of Brandeis University, The Brandeis Hoot aims to provide our readers with a reliable, accurate and unbiased source of news and information. Produced entirely by students, The Hoot serves a readership of 6,000 with in-depth news, relevant commentary, sports and coverage of cultural events.

Recognizing that better journalism leads to better policy, The Brandeis Hoot is dedicated to the principles of investigative reporting and news analysis. Our mission is to give every community member a voice.

SUBMISSION POLICIES The Brandeis Hoot welcomes letters to the editor on subjects that are of interest to the community. Preference is given to current or former community members and The Hoot reserves the right to edit or reject submissions. The deadline for submitting letters is Wednesday at noon.

Please submit letters to letters@thebrandeishoot.com along with your contact information. Letters should not exceed 500 words. The opinions, columns, cartoons and advertisements printed in The Hoot do not necessarily represent the opinions of the editorial board.

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EDITORIALS

The Brandeis Hoot 9

Working towards a more inclusive Brandeis Last week during her keynote address, Dr. Blanca Vega ’98 called Brandeis a “white space” that does not acknowledge minority groups.

Brandeis’ founding in 1948 is rooted in a set of Jewish history and experiences. During this time, the university stood out as a space which hoped to educate all students, regardless of religious affiliation or race. Decades later, as a non-sectarian university founded on Jewish ideals, Brandeis still prides itself as a university for all, despite a largely white and Jewish population.

According to the Brandeis website, as of fall 2018, 46.1 percent of undergraduate students identified as white, 14 percent as Asian American, 8.3 percent as Hispanic and 5.2 percent as black or African American.

Throughout the university’s short history, Brandeis has seen examples of racism, followed by outcry from both the student body and the surrounding community. Whether it be African American students on campus walking out in protest during Ford Hall 1969 for the creation of an African and African American Studies (AAAS) program or the petition for an Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) program on campus, our university’s values to social justice have been strongly advocated for by the student body.

As a university with a strong focus on social justice, diversity and inclusion, our editorial board cannot help but notice the resonating inequity that still exists on campus.

The Steinhardt Social Research Institution released a report in May 2016 that said, “Social interactions among members of different racial/ ethnic groups are limited despite the increased diversity of the student body. White, Asian and especially Black students, were more likely to form friendships with others of

their same group than would be expected based on how frequently they appear in the population.” We as Brandeis students need to create a space where we are comfortable and striving towards true diversity.

The report added that 60 percent of African American students at least “somewhat” agree that there is a hostile environment toward people of color at Brandeis, which was a higher percentage of students than in other racial/ethnic groups.

Three-quarters of all students also reported that they ‘somewhat’ belong at Brandeis. However, almost 60 percent of Jewish students felt that they ‘very much’ belong at Brandeis, compared to 44 percent of non-Jewish white students, 30 percent of East Asian and Hispanic students and only 13 percent of black students.

It is also important to note that “more than half of students (54 percent) disagreed with the statements that unpopular opinions can be expressed freely at Brandeis,” per the May 2016 Steinhardt report. The report suggests that many minority groups “feel that they cannot express their views on campus, including Black and Hispanic students, non-Jewish White students, and politically moderate and conservative students,” as seen in responses to questions about free expression of unpopular opinions and the use of trigger warnings. Part of belonging is feeling free to express your views without fear of retribution, and every student at Brandeis deserves to have a space where they can do this as well as be exposed to other points of view.

The university has made efforts to increase this sense of belonging on campus. This can be seen in the dramatic decline in the proportion of black students who feel that they did not belong at Brandeis at all

Corrections

since 2016, according to a follow-up news report “Race, Community, and Belonging: Revisiting Student Concerns at Brandeis University” published by the Steinhardt Social Research Institute in February 2019. Despite these improvements, the research showed that “the proportion of Black students who felt that they somewhat or very much belonged on campus also declined.”

While we reflect on the diversity that surrounds our campus, we also recognize that The Brandeis Hoot’s personal organization is also not that diverse. The majority of our editorial board and staff are white women, with only three members of our editorial board that identify as non-white. As a newspaper, we strive to make all voices of the Brandeis community heard, regardless of their ethnicity, race or gender. But we, too, find difficulty in increasing the diversity that is within our club.

Even though it is difficult for any institution to identify and correct its flaws that marginalize various groups, we believe that to unify the community, clubs and the university as a whole should focus on including marginalized groups in conversations about improving on-campus experiences. The burden of making Brandeis a more diverse community should not be placed on minority students, but rather all of us. The administration is making efforts to be more inclusive, but many clubs and groups at the school still remain fairly segregated and don’t often evaluate their role in including students from diverse backgrounds.

We hope that Brandeis continues to work toward making the school more inclusive and welcoming to all students, and we will continue to do our best to contribute toward that effort.

In an editorial "Hopes for positive change" printed on Sept. 13, 2019, the editorial incorrectly stated that two of the three Ombuds have transitioned to full-time positions. The two Ombuds remain part-time but exclusively do ombuds work.

SPORTS

10 The Brandeis Hoot

September 20, 2019

A day in the life of a Brandeis student-athlete: Andrea Bolduc ‘21

By Sophie Trachtenberg editor

This new column will highlight a different student-athlete each week, striving to unearth what the hectic life of a Brandeis athlete entails. With this in mind, such a collection of stories will serve as a testament to the hard work, passion and resilience that athletes at Brandeis specifically embody, hopefully working to bridge the gap between student-athletes and the rest of the Brandeisian community.

It is early on a Monday morning, around 7 a.m., as Andrea Bolduc ’21 wakes slightly earlier than usual to lace up her running shoes and head out to complete her first workout of the day. A fast-paced five mile spurt along the Charles River will do, before stretching at the bottom of the Gosman stairs with the accompaniment of NPR morning radio in the background, and finally a

quick locker room shower.

With a Clif Bar in hand, Buldoc is on to the other side of South Street, where her French class, the Art of Composition, awaits at the top of the Rabb Steps—which is a hike even for runners. The day continues with more classes for her politics major, undergraduate department representative duties and taking care of homework assignments in between these obligations.

By now, her second run of the day is due, with the same ritual following: run, stretch, shower, snack, class.

When dinner arrives, it is social hour, as the cross country and track and field teams sit together in the lower part of Sherman.

They occupy the dining hall’s longest table to ensure that there is room for everyone to eat, relax and enjoy the company of what is possibly most salient to the student-athlete experience: engaging with teammates. The day concludes with more homework, as it seems to never end, but a prompt

ANDREA BOLDUC ‘21 KICKS TOWARD THE FINISH LINE

TEAM CELEBRATES AT WELLESLEY INVITATIONAL

bedtime follows, as tomorrow morning’s run looms to wake Bolduc up the next day.

While this might sound overwhelming to some, such opportunities are exactly what Bolduc embraces on a daily basis. “I know my education is most important, but I also want to show up for myself and show up for the people I am now leading,” she said. This combination of factors, being able to take pride in one’s education while simultaneously competing at the highest of levels in athletics, is what she sees as the greatest thing about being at Brandeis.

Maintaining such a balance is noticeably difficult, but Bolduc’s approach eases this marriage. She finds that being a student and an athlete do not simply coexist but rather serve as complementa-

PHOTOS COURTESY ANDREA BOLDUC

ry elements that strengthen the deep commitment that both roles require. Whether she is in class, running or spending time with friends and teammates, Bolduc dedicates 100 percent of her attention to being in the present, saying “What is stressful is the in-between. But, once you are there, focusing all of your mental energy into the thing that is in front of you, you are able to just accomplish one thing at a time.”

Going on her third year here at Brandeis, Bolduc has grown to find a deep appreciation for everything she does as a student-athlete, commenting that, “I think about why I came to Brandeis in the first place and just try to pursue that to the fullest. There is something about the people here.

We aren’t afraid to try something new or build something from the ground up.” This fire, manifested by both students and student-athletes alike, personifies what it means to be Brandeisian: doing what you do and giving it all you got.

Before each race, as the team gathers near the start line, Bolduc reminds her teammates, “It’s a great day to have a great day.” It is with that mentality that student-athletes attack each and every day here at Brandeis, facing challenges and finding ways to lead everyone to success.

What is essential is simply to keep running one’s course, as student-athletes like Bolduc strive to find that happy medium between competition, academia and most importantly, being oneself.

Men’s soccer draws against WPI and falls against Tufts

By Camila Casanueva staff

Brandeis’ men’s soccer team came into the week ranked No. 25 in Division III in the latest United Soccer Coaches national poll. The Judges took on Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) at home on Gordon Field, and for the fifth year in a row, the two squads battled into overtime where neither team was able to come away with the win. The game finished on a 1-1 draw.

The WPI Engineers struck first in a counterattack in the sixth minute of action. The ball was hit over the top of the Brandeis keeper to open up the scoring. However, the Judges responded in the 25th minute.

With the ball on the left sideline, it was kicked by Dylan Hennessy ’20 and found its way to the foot of Noah Gans ’21 who onetouched the cross to midfielder Jared Panson ’22. Panson then struck home his first goal of the season, making it the first of his career as well.

The rest of the contest was filled with back and forth play as neither team was able to get it going offensively.

WPI had the edge in shots 1512 but just 5-4 shots on goal. The Engineers had the better play in overtime as they were able to out-

MEN’S SOCCER GATHERS MIDFIELD

shoot the Judges 8-0.

However, goalkeeper Greg Irwin ’20 did well, coming off his line making a diving save on one play to prevent several WPI scoring opportunities.

The Engineers had two shots in the final minute of play and

earned one last corner kick but were unable to score. Irwin ’20 finished the game with seven saves, one shy of his career best, to secure the draw.

In their second match of the week, the Judges took on the nationally ranked number one Tufts

PHOTO FROM BRANDEISJUDGES.COM

on Bello Field.

It was a tough loss for the Judges as they lost 2-0 falling to 3-21 on the season, while the Tufts’ Jumbos, the defending NCAA Division III champions, improve to 4-0.

Brandeis suffered some big blows in the 24th minute after a scrum in front of the net. The Judges put the ball into their own goal.

With the home team Tufts in the lead, 1-0, the teams began to scuffle. Forward Max Breiter ’20 was given a red card, meaning Brandeis had to play with one man down for remaining time.

Tufts added a second goal on a well-executed offensive play.

The Judges struggled to get any offensive going with 10 men, as their only shot on goal came in the 83rd as Hennessy got his foot on a good ball. Overall, Tufts outshot Brandeis 22-4. Goalkeeper Irwin made five saves in the losing effort.

The Judges will be off for a week until they head to Western New England University in Springfield, MA on Sept. 21 for a 2 p.m. game.

September 20, 2019

SPORTS 11

The Brandeis Hoot

Women’s soccer improves to 4-2, Richardson selected as defensive player of the week

By Francesca Marchese special to the hoot

This week, the Brandeis University women’s soccer team improved to 4-2 on the season, as they battled two Massachusetts rivals. The Judges found great success, winning their fourth straight game, 3-1, over Babson College.

However, on Tuesday evening, though the Judges fought hard, they lost to Tufts University, 2-0.

Saturday’s matchup against rival Babson College was an exciting game, as the players hit the ground running, scoring the first three goals in six minutes.

After gaining possession of a 50-50 ball, Makenna Hunt ’22

connected with the goal in the 21st minute, giving the Judges a one-goal advantage over the Beavers. Nearly two minutes later, Hunt rebounded a high shot, which ricocheted off the crossbar, exposing the Babson goalkeeper, who was out of position playing the initial shot. Hunt capitalized, sinking her second goal of the game, and her fourth goal of the season. Hunt’s second goal gave the Judges their fourth-straight game with a multiple-goal scorer.

“Babson is one of our rivals,” said Hunt to The Brandeis Hoot, “so we went into the game with a lot of energy, and I think we showed that the whole 90 minutes. Both of the goals were a full team effort—the first I scored off

of a cross, and the second was off of a rebound from a shot from one of my teammates. Everyone on the field knew what her job was and got it done; that’s what led to our success.”

In the 27th minute, Olivia West netted Babson’s first goal—her third of the season—making it a one-goal game. The game was a physical battle, and in the 68th minute, midfielder Daria Bakhtiari ’21 reestablished Brandeis’ two-goal lead over Babson.

Bakhtiari’s high shot from the left corner of the 18-yard box soared through the air, right under the crossbar, marking her first goal of the season and her seventh of her career. Brandeis goalkeeper, Victoria Richardson ’20, had

MAKENNA HUNT ‘22 HEADS THE BALL OVER HER DEFENDER.

DEFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK

three stops in this game, which was crucial to the team’s success; the Judges defeated the Babson Beavers for the eighth-straight time.

In the Tuesday night matchup against Tufts University, the Jumbos outshot the Judges 18-11.

Although Victoria Richardson ’20 played her heart out in the goal, as she made a career-high seven saves in the losing effort, it was not enough to keep the winning streak alive. However, Richardson was recognized as University Athletic Association’s (UAA) Defensive Player of the Week on Sept. 17.

In the last week, Richardson helped extend the Judges’ win-

Victoria Richardson ‘20 prepares her team to take on Tufts.

PHOTOS BY GRACE ZHOU/THE HOOT

ning streak to four in a row. In addition, she achieved her first shutout performance on Sept.10, with two saves against Clark University on the road. Richardson had three saves in Brandeis’ win over Babson; her season total of saves ranks third in the University Athletic Association and her .778 save percentage is tied for fourth in the conference. Since Richardson was named UAA Player of the Week, she has increased her save total this season to 21.

Although the Judges are coming off of a hard fought loss, they are ready to take on their next opponent, away at nearby Lasell University in Auburndale, MA on Saturday, Sept. 21 at 3 p.m.

Men’s tennis opens Volleyball plays three matches over weekend fall season

By Jesse Lieberman staff

The men’s tennis team opened their fall season at the Middlebury Invitational at Middlebury College in Vermont this past weekend, playing multiple matches on both Saturday and Sunday. The Judges were one of seven teams in the tournament, which had four singles divisions, or flights, and two doubles divisions.

The pair David Aizenberg ’20 and Anupreeth Coramutla ’21 had the best finish for the Judges, finishing second in the A-Doubles Flight. After defeating Colby 8-3, Aizenberg and Coramutla lost 8-7(4) in the final. In the B Doubles Flight, Ben Wolfe ’20 and rookie Simon Kauppila ’23 reached the semi-final. After winning their first match 8-2, the two

PHOTO FROM BRANDEISJUDGES.COM

upset the second-seeded pairing from Middlebury 8-3.

In the A Singles Flight, Aizenberg cruised to the semi-final, winning his first two matches in straight sets 6-2, 6-4 and 6-2, 6-3.

Sophomores Adam Tzeng ’22 and Jeff Chen ’22 each reached the semi-finals in the B Singles Flight as well. Hunter Levine ’23, Nikhil Das ’21 and Kauppila each won their opening singles matches before losing in the quarterfinal.

The Judges are looking to build on last year’s strong campaign, where they were ranked eighth nationally. The men also finished one win shy of the program record at 16-4, in which nine of the wins were against nationally ranked opponents. Finally, the Judges finished second last year at the UAA Championships, highlighted with an upset over number two University of Chicago.

The Judges, however, will be without Wilson/ITA National Division III Coach of the Year Ben Lamanna, who is now the head women’s tennis coach at Bowdoin. The Judges hired former Brandeis assistant coach Pauri Pandian last month in Lamanna’s place. Despite Lamanna’s departure, the Judges are returning all four All-UAA selections from last season.

The Judges have two more events this fall, at Colby College for the ITA Regionals Sep. 27-29 and the Wallach Invitational at Bates College Oct. 5-6.

Brandeis women’s volleyball team had a busy start to spooky season playing Bates College on Friday the 13th, followed by a double header with Worcester State and Amherst College the following day.

The Judges lost their first set 25-17, but made a strong comeback beating the Bates Bobcats in the second set. They were up 9-1 early in the set and although the Bobcats made some great plays, Brandeis was able to secure the set 26-24. The Judges began their

third set down 7-0 thanks to a fantastic serving streak by Bates’ Ruby Lightbourn.

As the set continued the Judges found themselves down 16-7, but Belle Scott ’21 had a run of six serves. Unfortunately for the Judges, this was not enough and they lost the set 27-25. The Judges began the fourth set hoping to push the game to a fifth but were unable to do so and lost the set 25-19, losing the game 3-1. Bates played a better game overall leading in hitting percentage (0.1350.086), digs (77-68) and aces (153); however, Brandeis did win the battle of blocks 10-8.

Unfazed by the loss to Bates,

BELLE SCOTT ‘21 SENDS BALL BACK OVER NET.

PHOTO FROM BRANDEISJUDGES.COM

By Courtney Thrun special to the hoot

Brandeis swept Worcester State winning three sets back to back to back. The first set between the Judges and the Lancers was a battle, but Brandeis came out on top winning the set 25-19.

The two following sets were light work for the Judges, who were able to hold the Lancers to only six points each set.

This win can no doubt be attributed to the hitting percentage of 0.296 for the Judges compared to the Lancers -0.013. These percentages paired with the 15 aces for Brandeis put this game in the bag.

The second game in this double header did not go as smoothly for the Judges as the first. Amherst, who prior to this game were 5-0, won the first set 25-13. The second set went even worse for the Judges who lost 25-10.

The third and final set was the Brandeis team’s best showing of the game, but they still came up short, losing 25-15. The Judges’ hitting percentage plummeted from earlier in the day to 0.04, while the Mammoths achieved a significantly better percentage of 0.38. Amherst played a great game, defeating the Judges and remaining undefeated with a record of 6-0.

Stay tuned as the Brandeis women’s volleyball team prepares to play Emory University, Carnegie Mellon University and University of Rochester in the first round of the University Athletic Association Round Robin this weekend.

OPINIONS

12 The Brandeis Hoot

September 20, 2019

One year later: 90 percent vegetarian

By Sabrina Chow editor

This week marks the one year anniversary of me going 90 percent vegetarian.

I’m not even sure if this is the right week, or if I’m really 90 percent vegetarian, but it’s a nice round number and fitting for my theme this week.

In order to really understand why I decided to (almost) go vegetarian, let’s take a trip down memory lane.

I arrived at Brandeis two years ago in fall 2017 as an eager-eyed freshman, taking too many classes (already) and part of a Leader-Scholar Community (LSC).

There were 18 people in my cohort. We all lived together on one floor and took an experiential learning course together one day a week. The topic of our course was sustainability, led by Professor Sabine von Mering (GRALL/ ENVS/WGS).

I wasn’t very attuned to sustainability and climate change efforts prior to Brandeis. I did my best to not use plastic water bottles, but that was about it. However, being in that class helped me realize the importance of saving our planet and doing anything we can to reduce our carbon footprint.

Within my first month at Brandeis, I stopped eating red meat. This wasn’t a huge issue because chicken was the main meat that I saw around the dining halls.

My second semester at Brandeis, I took another course with von Mering (European Perspectives

on Climate Change) and became a Brandeis Sustainability Ambassador (BSA), which I’ve been ever since.

Taking this course and being a BSA showed me how easy it is to make small changes that make the biggest difference. Whether it be eating no red meat or taking public transportation, I learned that every little action counts. And I wanted to teach people this ideology as well.

In the fall of my sophomore year at Brandeis, I did an internship with Sustainability Manager Mary Fischer, where I did research to look at the environmental impact of meat consumption on campus. My research found that in just one academic year, Brandeis consumed over 250,000 pounds of meat in the form of fish, chicken, beef, turkey and lamb. This equates to over 300 tons of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions being put into the air just from the meat that is consumed on campus.

Amid doing this research, I decided to go (almost) completely vegetarian. I cut out all meat products except for fish. I would cut fish, but I love sushi way too much to let it go. Nowadays, I eat fish about once every other week, if that.

Has it been difficult at times? Of course. But oddly enough, I don’t crave meat anymore. I would admit, at the beginning, and even now, I was tempted by a piece of chicken in the dining hall, knowing I had the freedom to eat it.

But the only thing I ever really craved was McDonald’s chicken nuggets. But my vegan substitutes

are close enough to the real thing.

I think.

I became vegetarian at a time when technology and food scientists were thriving. Everyone has heard about the Beyond and Impossible Burger, which are made to look like actually bleeding burgers!

I have had both, and I have very strong opinions about one over the other. I personally think they taste close to meat, but my friend tells me I couldn’t be more wrong.

I’m sorry I haven’t tasted a beef burger in two years.

But what I can’t stress enough is that these substitutes should not be seen as a healthy alternative to beef patties. Oftentimes, they are even worse for you because of the random proteins and binders that

are in the patty to get it to the texture that is close to meat.

But reflecting on the past year as an almost vegetarian, I have come to realize it’s really not that hard. There is always a good selection of options while at home, and it is super fun to see different ways that I can incorporate vegetarian alternatives into classic meat dishes.

At its core, my reasoning for being 90 percent vegetarian is meat’s environmental impact on the earth.

The effects of climate change are starting to take shape all over the world, even in the United States.

And if we do not act to reduce our carbon footprint and GHG emissions, we are screwed.

Going meatless for one meal a

week is already a good starting point toward reducing your carbon footprint. It’s a matter of taking baby steps when we are trying to tackle climate change that makes the biggest difference.

And for those who are passionate about the climate or want to do more for the earth, whether it be on a political or personal level, it’s completely possible.

People all across the world will be striking the day this is published, Friday, Sept. 20 in the Climate Strike. And there’s one happening in Boston!

Or if you want to make a difference on a personal level, think twice about those two burgers that you’re thinking about grabbing when you’re in the dining hall.

Grab some vegetables instead.

SABRINA IS THE LEFT-MOST DINOSAUR

PHOTO FROM PINTEREST.COM

Please let me swipe into Linsey, and other Gosman qualms

By Polina Potochevska editor

As the president of the Ballet Club and a previous member of Adagio Dance Company, I have spent many, many hours in the Linsey building of Gosman. For those unfamiliar with the gym, Linsey is the small building to the left of the main Gosman complex, which houses the pool. It also holds four multipurpose rooms, which are used by many different clubs on campus, including the Ballet Club for our dance rehearsals. Unfortunately, the one and only way to get to Linsey is by swiping into the main entrance of Gosman, trekking down the hall

BRANDEIS BALLET CLUB

and through the small basketball court, hiking up a flight of stairs and walking through a glass hallway until you have finally made it.

The amount of balls I have been hit with while going about this treacherous journey is infinite—soccer balls, basketballs, volleyballs and more that I can’t remember.

I’ve been yelled at by students and professional referees alike that I’ve interrupted games and sets, messed up someone’s shot, and generally interrupted the flow of the happenings on the basketball court. And you know what? They’re completely right.

Wouldn’t it be so much easier for me to just enter through

Ballet Club performs their annual Nutcracker show.

the Linsey doors? Oh wait, that’s right. I’m not allowed to. What is the point of having the swipe machine both on the outside of the Linsey entrance and on the desk right inside the Linsey lobby if I can’t use it?

I have been told that only those on the swimming and diving team are allowed to use their student IDs to swipe into Linsey, which I personally feel is unfair and unnecessary. I have been physically harmed and also publicly embarrassed almost every time I have to pass through Gosman to get to Linsey, which is about five times a week, when I could easily just swipe into Linsey and end up exactly where I need to be without

PHOTO FROM FACEBOOK.COM

bothering anyone else’s time or game. And it isn’t any less safe to swipe into Linsey than using the swipe machine in the Gosman lobby. I’m not saying the door should be open for anyone and everyone, but anyone at Brandeis with a student ID should be able to use the facilities in Gosman safely.

Additionally, all dance groups on campus know the struggles of finding and booking a rehearsal space. The most coveted studios include the Gosman Dance Studio, which is often booked by fitness classes, and Linsey Multipurpose Rooms (MPR) one and two. Until, of course, last year when Linsey MPR two was unexpectedly and permanently closed and transformed into a “human performance lab,” leaving student groups the smaller Linsey MPR one, which had stationary bikes all of last year (I was happy to see the room empty for our first rehearsal this semester). What is the lab being used for? No one knows.

But that big, beautiful mirrored room is closed to the public for reasons unknown.

And while I’m on the topic of Gosman itself, I’d just like to make a comment on the weight room (ballerinas can do much more than just pirouettes and cardio, you know, but that’s a topic for a different opinion piece.) Of course, the general weight room open to non-varsity athletes is not as well kept or as stocked as the varsity weight room. I can live with that—there is always some-

thing for me to do there, even if it is a little bit run down or noisy, and the air conditioning is very much appreciated.

However, when I see varsity athletes using my creaky leg press and cable machines, I can’t help but be a little bit confused. Don’t they have a beautiful weight room of their own? Wouldn’t they much rather be there instead of in the general weight room, which is always crowded? Can’t us NARPs (Non-Athletic-Regular-People, for those who don’t know—I didn’t until a week ago) have a space just to ourselves? Is nothing sacred!?

Gosman is a building that I’ve spent countless hours in. There are activities for anyone and everyone there, and working toward a healthy and active lifestyle is something I am very passionate about. I am grateful to have a space in Linsey with rehearsal rooms, mirrors and speakers that make it the perfect place for dance groups to rehearse.

That being said, allowing student dancers and all other Brandeis students and community members to swipe into Linsey instead of passing through the entirety of Gosman for their rehearsals and meetings would be beneficial for both them and for athletes in the building. It would avoid injury and humiliation. Despite this, I still will face this risk multiple times a week in order to rehearse for The Nutcracker (Dec. 7 and Dec. 8 in the SCC Theater, wink wink hint hint.)

September 20, 2019

To study or not to study

By Sasha Skarboviychuk editor

College is this funny thing. On one hand we are here to study, get a degree, and then go out and get a job. So the most important thing for you to do in college is to study and to get good grades, right? For those who are interested in going to graduate school, that is probably the most important thing. But what about those of us who are no longer interested in school and just want to go to the “real world” and work? Well, that seems to be the trickier part.

College is supposedly the best time of our life, so what should we be doing with this great time? If you go around asking people what the most important thing to do in college is, you will get a variety of answers. Some will say that getting good grades is the most important part. Others will say that you need to make connections.

Some might even say that college is the place where you should find your lifelong partner.

College is also known as the place where people find themselves, figure out who they are and what they want to do. That seems to be important as well, since you can’t really get a degree without choosing what to get that degree in. Other, more chill people, might say that college is a place for you to have fun and truly enjoy the best years of your life. I am sure all our parents hope that college will teach us practical life skills, like doing our own laundry, cooking, paying bills, etc.

With so many important things to do, where should our priorities lie? Summer just ended, it is the beginning of a new year. Now is the time to tell everyone what you have been busy doing for the past three months.

A large part of what people did

OPINIONS 13

The Brandeis Hoot

seems to be internships. Why is everyone so crazy about getting an internship? Well, because everyone needs to have skills that go further than being able to read a textbook or solve a problem.

If you’ve ever tried to find an internship, you know what that looks like: endless applications, perfecting your resume, long interviews, all that fun stuff. What I always find interesting is the fact that on your resume, the academics section is just two lines. The rest of the space is filled with all your other, non-academic skills, and things you do outside the classroom. Have you ever heard of someone not getting an internship because their GPA is too low?

Sure, potential employers may ask for a transcript, but not many will ask about it or the grades themselves. The main focus during interviews is the experience one has in the field or what one likes to do, or their specific skill set.

To me this is the paradox of college. We are here to get an education, and part of that means getting decent—however you choose to define the word—grades. But when it comes to sticking your toe into the “real world” it seems that extracurriculars become the most important part, since they are what defines the experience you have. So what does one do?

Where should the priority lie?

I’m not trying to say that you should not care about your grades or give up studying because there are things more fun and useful to do. No; you are still here to learn and get a degree. But don’t forget about all the other things we are supposed to learn in college. Join a club to show some of those practical skills people are looking for.

Get an internship to test out the field you potentially want to go into. But first, finish that reading that was due a week ago.

PHOTO FROM TEODESK.COM

SSIS: advice column Welcome back to the Student Sexuality Information Service (SSIS) column, where we answer any and all of Brandeis students’ questions about sex, sexuality, identity and relationships. If you have a question you’d like answered in our next column, email ssis@brandeis.edu or leave a question in the Google Form link on the Student Sexuality Information Service Facebook page. Any and all questions are welcome: there are no bad, stupid or weird questions! (Note: These answers are good-faith attempts by SSIS to be helpful to the Brandeis community, and are by no means exhaustive or to be taken as universal. If these answers don’t resonate with you, either pay them no mind, or reach out to us with suggestions for improvement!)

By SSIS

special to the hoot

PHOTO COURTESY SSIS

“I haven’t been as excited to give my partner blow jobs recently, but I don’t want him to think I’m not interested in our relationship anymore. What should I do?”

Thanks for opening up about this. It seems like recultivating your desire to give your partner blow jobs is important to you. In order to do this, it can be helpful to think about why you’ve lost your excitement.

Has the experience become less enjoyable for you? As far as actual strategies for making the experience more enjoyable for you, there are a few things you could do depending on what is causing your lack of excitement. If taste is something that is making the experience less enjoyable for you than it could be, you could consider trying flavored lube. We sell many different flavors of water-based lube at SSIS from blue raspberry to pina colada. Similar to this, we also sell flavored condoms in the office, with options including mint chocolate chip, chocolate strawberry and island punch.

Do you feel a repetitive routine is what’s making you less enthusiastic? Some people find experimenting with new techniques can not only make them more excited but also cause their partner to have an increase in pleasure, which can be super motivating!

One possible technique could include changing up the position. Some example positions could include having your partner lie down on their back and you could rest on your hands and knees between his legs. Perhaps your partner could stand and you could kneel on the floor, or you could try sitting up with your back against the headboard of the bed and your partner could straddle you on his knees. If you are interested, there are also positions

that would allow your partner to reciprocate either manual or oral sex while you are giving him a blowjob.

Other forms of techniques include temperature play (you could try giving him a blowjob with an ice cube in your mouth), teasing your partner or tying your partner up or using blindfolds. There are tons of resources for blow job techniques online but also feel free to browse the technique section of our library in the SSIS office. Hopefully, this was helpful to you. And keep in mind that if you are having a pleasurable time, you partner will have a better time too.

In addition to working through this on your own, do you think you’d feel comfortable talking to your partner about this? Communicating how you are feeling might illustrate to him that you are very interested in him, even though you are enjoying this one physical aspect of your relationship less than you usually do.

Conversations like these can be difficult to have, but your partner may not know you are less interested in giving him blow jobs and may even want to figure out ways to make the experience more enjoyable or exciting for you, or even experiment with other ways of pleasuring him that do not include blowjobs. That said, deciding to disclose that information to him is totally up to you.

“I’m interested in experimenting with bondage, but I’m kind of scared to run into anyone at the sex store . . . or even have to explain what I’m doing there in the first place. Any advice?”

Thank you for your question! It seems like you want the freedom to experiment with bondage but also maintain your privacy. This is a totally valid concern and actually more common than you might think. Luckily, there are

a few ways you could get access to materials to experiment with, without having to risk running into someone you know at a store.

Let’s start with the nonphysical aspect of experimentation. A huge aspect of experimentation is just figuring out what your options are and how you feel about the prospect of trying them. This can be done in private through research online or with books.

We have some books in our library that anyone can check out confidentially, such as Jay Wiseman’s Erotic Bondage Handbook.

Using these resources can allow you to explore what you’re interested in, as well as reflect on your boundaries and how you might communicate them in a bondage scenario, which is so important for safety. One fun way we often suggest to do this is to make yourself a “Want, Will, Won’t, What?” list. What are the things you absolutely want to do, things you’d be willing to try but aren’t necessarily super excited about, things that are past your boundaries and things you want to learn more about, respectively?

Once you have an idea about your interests you could try browsing online stores. Some we recommend are Good Vibrations, Pleasure Chest or Wild Flower.

Just type the word “bondage” into the search bar of the website, and you’ll be able to browse all their products from bondage rope to blind folds to bed restraints and much more.

The stores above should have any of the types of products you’d see in store, and you can purchase them without having to enter a physical store.

If for any reason you are unable to purchase products with a credit card or online, doing research as well as browsing online beforehand can greatly reduce store time even if you decide to go in person because you’ll already know what kinds of products you want!

ARTS

14 The Brandeis Hoot

September 20, 2019

Author Zadie Smith explores identity and belonging with students

By Zach Newman staff

The narrator in Zadie Smith’s 2016 novel “Swing Time” exists within two different identities, belonging to neither. Quiet and introspective, the book’s main character goes unnamed throughout the novel, observing the lives of her friends, family and coworkers as she struggles to define herself. At the Brandeis New Student Book Forum on Thursday, Sept.

12, Smith explored the same ideas of chance, identity and belonging presented in her novel in a discussion with Professor John Plotz (ENG) followed by a Q&A session with students.

“Swing Time” tells the story of two best friends who grew up in London. Both are mixed-race and dancers, who meet at a church dance class in 1982. Tracey, the narrator’s best friend, has a white mother who buys her everything she wants. Tracey’s father, Louie, spends his daughter’s formative years in prison, leaving Tracey with the lie that he’s one of Michael Jackson’s backup dancers.

The narrator’s mother is Jamaican.

She is a student of African cultural history and a dedicated community organizer—who sometimes spends more time working than raising her daughter. The narrator’s father is white and from a working-class background.

The story traces the narrator’s journey from her childhood to her thirties, culminating in her time as an assistant for “Aimee,” an international pop star. When Aimee attempts to build a school for girls in the West African nation of Gambia, the narrator feels torn between her mother’s Jamaican heritage and her father’s English identity and watches her life diverge significantly from Tracey’s.

The novel expertly navigates the confusion of living without a sense of belonging, an idea that Smith discussed repeatedly at the book forum. Answering Plotz’s opening question about the origins of her desire to write, Smith said that she was inspired by Jamaican Anansi stories, particularly moral fables about a trickster spider that she heard as a child. She talked about writing like a ventriloquist, using

PHOTO BY KATE ROSS/THE HOOT

multiple voices and perspectives.

“I wanted to do something with the voices in my head. We work in voices,” she said, referring to her brothers Doc Brown and Luc Skyz, both of whom are rappers.

Born in London in 1975 to a Jamaican mother and an English father, Smith graduated from Caimbridge in 1997. She earned numerous awards for her first two novels: 2000’s “White Teeth” and 2002’s “The Autograph Man.” Today, she teaches creative writing at New York University.

The diverging destinies of the narrator and her best friend in “Swing Time” bear a striking similarity to a story that Smith told students at the forum about her childhood. She recalled seeing homeless people from her neighborhood that she went to school with, emphasizing the period of remarkable wealth inequality that we currently live in. She said she aimed to “humanize” this phenomenon with her book.

The inequality that afflicts our world is partially determined by random chance—a “contingency” that Smith said quietly determines all of our lives. “The things I most strongly believe would have been different if I had been born next door,” she said. As a result, national pride sometimes feels trivial to her. “Extreme feelings of patriotism I find hard to take seriously given the accidental nature of birth,” she said.

Smith’s willingness to explore the perspective of a character disconnected from their identity and surrounded by culture makes her novel fascinating to read. Her narrator feels out of place in England, not “completely” white like her father, nor “completely” black like her mother. In Gambia, the locals identify her as being from London, treating her like a child who cannot deal with the difficult living conditions in their reality.

Yet Smith does not judge her narrator for not knowing where

PHOTO FROM BRITANNICA.COM

she belongs. During the Q&A, Smith applauded those who grapple between different identities.

She said that negotiation between places is a part of life, and those who are completely sure of their identities can be a danger to the world.

Returning to the subject of inequality, Smith expressed her disbelief at the world’s wealth gap.

While doing character research for Aimee, she described reading about pop stars and bankers who are worth more than entire countries. One student asked about the novel’s references to the Illuminati, a conspiracy theory about a small group of powerful people controlling the world. Some Gambian characters in the book believe in the group’s existence.

Smith explained that we all tell ourselves stories to rationalize the misery in our world, whether we learn them in a college course or read them on the internet. “We all need ways of explaining power to ourselves,” she said.

In the absence of a personal

or cultural identity, Smith said that we can define ourselves by our relationships with others. In response to a student question about character development, Smith said that after we pass away, people gather to remember their memories of us. As the class of 2023 embarks on their college journey, Smith’s words can provide advice for dealing with hardship, since we are all guided by random chance. She encouraged students to improve as people over time. “We’re very attached to the idea of sameness and consistency,” she said, explaining that personhood is a constantly changing series of relationships, evolving over time as we meet new people and grow.

Zadie Smith’s novel “Swing Time” is an excellent deep-dive into identity and loneliness, which was complemented by her thought-provoking discussion at the New Student Book Forum.

Her short story collection, “Grand Union,” will arrive in early October 2019.

Charli XCX’s album fails to meet expectations

By Emma Lichtenstein editor

I bought my tickets to see Charli XCX on her headline tour the minute they went on sale in June.

Now that the album “Charli” has dropped, I’m starting to question that decision.

Prior to this album, I was a huge Charli fan. I first got into her music when I saw her open Tay-

PHOTO FROM INEWS.CO.UK

lor Swift’s “reputation” stadium tour. After the show, I went home and listened to her discography, quickly falling in love with some of her old work. I was sure “Charli,” her third studio album, was going to be a phenomenal album.

Guess I was wrong.

It isn’t bad per se, but this record isn’t as good as her earlier work. The album starts off weak, with songs that sound like auto-tuned messes. Every aspect of these opening tracks are loud and obnoxious, but not in the good way.

Her signature style, a scandalous bubblegum pop, remains, it’s taken too far. After about a minute into the first three songs, I was desperate to hit the skip button.

The first track of the album, “Next Level Charli,” starts off too strong.

The opening production makes it seem like a catchy track that’s great for dancing. But as the song goes on, you realize that she’s just yelling the whole time. It’s like an EDM song where the entire track is the drop. There’s never a moment to breathe; it’s all noise.

Unfortunately, half of this al-

bum is a mess of experimental sounds, cumulating in whatever “Shake It” is. This track features Big Freedia, CupcaKke, Brooke Candy and Pabllo Vittar; not a single one of these artists has a good verse. The song starts with Charli whispering “shake it” as a bunch of different auto-tune styles are layered over it. She sounds like she’s an alien, underwater in an old TV full of static.

This is the most memorable song on the album, but not for a good reason.

The closing track “2099” is perhaps the biggest disappointment.

Her earlier track with Troye Sivan, “1999,” was an instant pop hit. It wasn’t long before I heard it constantly. But “2099,” the new collaboration with Sivan, is a mess of “futuristic” sounds. I can’t understand a single word either of them say; it feels more like an EDM track than a pop song. If that’s the future of music, I’m terrified.

But the album isn’t all bad. The high points are genuinely good—I just wish there were more high points.

“1999,” which features Troye

Sivan, was the first song I heard from the album. Like I mentioned earlier, I love this song. When it was released back in October 2018, I was thrilled. It was the start of a new Charli XCX album cycle, and she was collaborating with one of my favorite artists. It’s easily one of the strongest songs on the album.

Oddly enough, the middle of the album is the strongest part.

From track six to 12, the album remains interesting. These songs make me want to actually listen, and then go further and learn the lyrics so I can scream the words on tour.

Haim’s verse on “Warm” brings a warmer sound to the album.

This song is softer, with significantly less heavy production than most of the tracks which works to create an amazing song.

Another stand out is “Blame It On Your Love” featuring Lizzo.

This song also dropped early, another great decision by Charli to promote her album. “Blame It On Your Love” is that pure pop sound that I love from Charli.

“Thoughts” might just be my favorite song on the album. For

PHOTO FROM WIKIPEDIA.COM

Charli, it’s a slower track. That is to say, the tempo is still fast, but not nearly as overwhelming as many of her others. I love Charli’s usual pace, but the decision to slow this one down (and place it immediately after “Warm”) was smart.

I’m still stoked to see Charli on Oct. 17 at the House of Blues, but I’m definitely hoping that she chooses to play some of her older tracks.

I eagerly await her next album, cautiously optimistic that it will be an improvement.

September 20, 2019

ARTS 15

The Brandeis Hoot

Koslofsky’s Corner: Jonah’s not in class, but he’s got thoughts about lots of movies

By Jonah Koslofsky editor

Oh, Israel. You’re the one topic students on the Brandeis campus don’t rush to argue about. What am I going to do with you? The truth is, there’s probably no time when Nadav Lapid’s Israeli maximalist opus “Synonyms” wouldn’t have deeply resonated with me.

It was the first of twelve films I’ll be watching at the New York Film Festival, but the circumstances around my viewing (early Monday morning) meant my response was… heightened.

After all, this was a week after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised to annex enormous portions of the West Bank if re-elected, and a month after the same Prime Minster po-

nied-up to our neo-Nazi friendly President to ban two Congresswomen from entering the Jewish State on explicitly racist and anti-democratic grounds. My viewing was also directly following yet another allegation against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh which broke last Saturday—which of course has me thinking about toxic masculinity on my own college campus as well as the harmful lessons I myself can’t pretend I haven’t internalized.

Lapid’s film, “Synonyms” draws a link between these two issues.

But I’m getting ahead of myself, providing context for my viewing before providing context for the movie itself. “Synonyms” follows Yoav, a confused twenty-something who has just left the Israeli military and Israel itself. He

PHOTO BY JONAH KOSLOFSKY/THE HOOT

moves to Paris, with nothing but what he can carry on his back (a rucksack that’s quickly stolen).

He swears to never speak Hebrew again. Yoav is a mess of contradictions, a sensitive guy with harmful instincts towards violence and nation conditioned deep within his being—“Synonyms” follows his quest to find some alternative to what he’s been taught.

It’s a dense, and at times, exhausting film, but one I genuinely think every Brandeis student should take the time to see. Put it this way: if Nadav Lapid is so interested in the conditions that generate toxic masculinity in Jewish men, I invite him to visit our campus. That word that starts with an “M” and rhymes with “asterpiece” is severely overused by critics attending film festivals, so I’ll break from my usual habit and hold my tongue. But boy, “Synonyms” hit home. This is just the first writing I’ll have on the film— my full, formal review will be online next Friday, and I’m sure that piece won’t be the last; I have a lot to say about this exceptional motion picture.

With the limited space I’ve got left, let me at least scratch the surface of some of the other movies I’ve seen this week. I really dug Bertrand Bonello’s “Zombi Child,” while Mati Diop’s “Atlantics” didn’t quite work for me.

Tackling similar subject matter with distinctly different staging, both movies are about historically oppressed groups—those descended from the direct victims of French colonialism—reckoning with the current state of their cultural history. But for all there is to like about “Atlantics’” moody, impressionistic cinematography and quality character work, I couldn’t sink my teeth into its elliptical, poetic rhythms. “Zombi Child” is great, though (again, I’d say more, but I already have, with a full review coming soon).

Still, I’d rather watch “Atlantics” any day over Dutch drama “Young Ahmed,” the latter being the only movie I’ve seen at the festival this year that I absolutely cannot recommend. Meanwhile, Romanian filmmaker Corneliu Porumboiu has delivered his most straightforward feature yet in the pulpy “The Whistlers.”

But without a doubt, the film I’ve seen here with the widest appeal has to be “Bacurau.” It’s difficult to classify Brazilian writer/ director duo Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles without spoiling: the movie is set “a few years from now,” and the worldbuilding is best left to the text itself. But this is also a deeply anti-colonial film, albeit with much more explicit, sensational and violent consequences for the

colonizers.

I loved it. While other current genre-fare has critiqued American ideals using equally gory means (think “Get Out” or more recently “Ready or Not”), “Bacurau” is structured in a way you’d never see a domestic picture operate: instead of following an individual protagonist, we follow a whole community (the titular “Bacurau”). Trauma, labor grief and action are all distributed across a group—heads roll, but there isn’t a single person holding the machete. The anti-individualist sentiment is woven directly into the fabric of the film. My only concern is that the film doesn’t have a U.S. release date yet—it’d be a shame if we don’t get to hear the message it has for us.

But perhaps another reason I went wild for “Bacurau” is that its energy was contagious, when so many of the selections I’ve seen so far are so measured. Either way, I’m doing my best not to run out of juice on my end—I’ve been reminding myself that covering a film festival is a marathon, not a sprint. But with so much to see—and even more to write— maybe exhaustion is a reasonable response. Then again, there’s still so much to still be excited for over the next week and a half. Check back in two weeks to see if my optimism holds!

Writer-in-residence Grace Talusan discusses memoir ‘The Body Papers’

By Emma Lichtenstein editor

Grace Talusan is Brandeis’ new Fannie Hurst Writer-in-Residence in the Department of English. She has turned her story into a powerful memoir, “The Body Papers,” which she read excerpts from at an event hosted by the creative writing department on Wednesday, Sept. 18.

The event began with an introduction from Stephen McCauley, the co-director of the creative writing department. His description painted Talusan as a remarkable woman, something I found to be true after hearing her speak.

The entire Bethlehem Chapel was packed, every chair filled, with a few people standing in the back just so they could hear her.

Talusan came to the microphone after the introduction and first thanked everyone at Brandeis for being so supportive of her story and her transition to Brandeis.

Prior to Brandeis, Talusan worked at Tufts University, which also happens to be her alma mater.

She seemed excited about this new opportunity and encouraged students in the audience to take a risk and go after what they want.

She mentioned the importance of literature in her life growing up, something that I—and presumably most of the other members of

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the audience—related to. Her story is much different than my own, but the feeling of seeing yourself represented in the pages of books is an inspiring feeling that resonates through so many.

Talusan said that it was this inspiration that led to her finishing her novel. She mentioned being trolled by questions of “who cares?” and “why bother?” But each time she was challenged, she remembered the significant impact of seeing herself represented in novels.

The first passage Talusan chose to read from her memoir was about her time in high school. She mentioned how easy it was to forget that she wasn’t like all of her friends. That she wasn’t white. At least until they bleached their hair, and Talusan’s black hair turned orange while her white friends got that coveted blonde look.

Growing up in a predominantly white neighborhood, Talusan recalled some of the racism thrown her way—the implications that her college acceptances were only because she’s a minority, that she was stealing some more deserving white person’s spot, the mocking of her future children since she was dating a white boy, a friend telling Talusan that she didn’t see color, that she saw Talusan as white.

Talusan talked about that friend, Becca, for a little while. Becca was her best friend, and Talusan imagined that the two would be best friends forever, that they’d buy houses next to each other and always stay close. The two remained friends throughout college but hit a rocky patch shortly after graduate school. Talusan was doing well, renting her own apartment

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with the money she made from a job she liked. Becca, on the other hand, was miserable working as a waitress at a pub. When Talusan visited, Becca made some offhand comments about African American people; Talusan said that she couldn’t be friends with someone who could say something like that.

The next passage she chose to read was about the struggles within her family, the “intergenerational trauma.” She set the story up by talking about her grandparents’ childhood in the Philippines, their lack of education and how that lack of education led them to push the importance of learning on their children.

School was always the number one priority. While all of this is going on, the Philippines were fighting with Japan, causing fear to run rampant. She mentioned that her family all knew that it was “better to be killed than be caught alive

by Japanese soldiers.” At the end of this passage, she hinted at some of her own trauma, caused by her grandfather who sexually assaulted her. This particular passage she read wasn’t graphic, though she

did give a trigger warning before she started, encouraging anyone who wasn’t comfortable with this type of discussion to step out and take care of themselves.

After these readings, the floor was opened for a Q&A. The first question was hard-hitting, asking about her decision to write the full truth about people and to publish their wrong-doings. Talusan said that writing about their misdeeds “expands the notion of who people are.”

She also mentioned that for her it was more important to share the whole story with the new generation of her family than to try to please everyone in the older generation who was clinging to the past.

Answering a later question, Talusan discussed the joy of writing.

She stated that the act of writing is the best payoff, that it’s not about the awards a novel wins or the number of copies sold but rather the pure satisfaction of putting her thoughts on paper.

Her advice for aspiring writers?

“Read, read, read” and “write, write, write.”

16 ARTS

The Brandeis Hoot

September 20, 2019

‘The Steven Universe Movie’ captures the essence of the show, unfortunately

By Samuel Finbury special to the hoot

“Steven Universe” is a show with the premise of “Avatar: The Last Airbender” and the execution of “Adventure Time.” It sets up a very heavy and interesting world where our heroes face off against a galactic empire run by god queens with which each of our protagonists have an intimate personal connection, and yet it maintains a very mellow tone and focuses on the interactions and arcs of its characters. I believe you can be both low and high key, but “Steven Universe” keeps its own set up and world at arms length, never really exploring all the opportunities and implications that arise from this worldbuilding.

It tries to keep a very large and interesting plot as small and inconsequential as it can. Seeing so many storytelling opportunities and directions be either ignored or toned down is infuriating. When Steven’s confrontation with The Diamonds, something built up for eight seasons, was pressed into a single episode and wrapped up tepidly and with little depth, I felt my patience with the show had finally been worn into non-existence. But morbid curiosity took hold when I heard the announcement of “The Steven Universe Movie” and the new seasons to follow. I watched it with low expectations and disappointingly, I was not disappointed.

This film opens with Steven telling the audience he bloodlessly dismantled the entire militaristic

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Gem Empire off-screen, without new conflicts or storytelling opportunities arising. He celebrates with his friends Pearl, Amethyst and Garnet, until a mysterious new character, Spinel, arrives bent on destroying Steven’s happy ending. Spinel dispatches Pearl, Amethyst and Garnet with a scythe that erases their memories and reverts them back to who they were long before the series began.

Steven must change his friends back, discover Spinel’s past, and save the world once again, in a film that fails to justify its own existence.

The good first. The animation is fluid and beautiful. The music is wonderful, though there are no instant classics like “It’s Over Isn’t It” or “Here Comes a Thought” (for context, these are two songs from previous seasons of the show and probably two of the best songs in any cartoon ever made). The character interactions are all on point, which is expected. “Steven Universe” is a show that is completely devoted to creating endearing protagonists, and while I wish they would truly explore the world and narrative,

watching these characters interact makes me too happy to complain.

However, this movie seems a little too enamored with its characters.

Because the Crystal Gems are set back to factory settings, Steven spends the bulk of the movie trying to rush each of his friends through eight seasons of character arcs.

While these scenes are fun and have some catchy songs, they come at the expense of interesting development since the Crystal Gem’s “character progression” is them returning to the perfect versions of themselves. I guess it wouldn’t be “Steven Universe” if it didn’t feel like we were treading water.

Speaking of Steven, you would think that the movie named after him would send him on some deep emotional journey that sets up his character going forward.

But you forget, this is “Steven Universe,” where opportunities for satisfying storytelling are punted into the ocean. The big realization that Steven has in this film is that he has previously changed over the course of the series, and that there will always another villain

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to fight, both things he should have already known. In addition, every conflict in this film (the destruction of Earth, fighting with his friends, etc.) are all things Steven has faced before. There is nothing in “The Steven Universe Movie” that sets it apart from the rest of the show. It doesn’t change, progress or illuminate anything about the characters or the world.

Instead, it’s simply a very long and meandering episode, devoid of anything truly special.

Except the villain. Spinel is the the best singular element of anything “Steven Universe” related in the last few years. I’m convinced.

She is the best villain in the show’s history, both charismatically lovable and threatening, with an emotional depth that rivals some of the shows most developed characters. Spinel’s backstory is shatteringly tragic, her motivations are understandable, her movement is prestinely and uniquely animated, and she has the two best songs in the film to boot. Spinel is the emotional and narrative centerpiece of this film, the thing that genuinely sets this picture apart and earns “The Ste-

ven Universe Movie,” that moniker.

“The Steven Universe Movie” is thoroughly passable. Besides Spinel, everything good about the film is found elsewhere in the series, and everything bad in the film is simply a continuation of something bad about the overall series. Even my frustration feels like a rehash of old annoyances. If you still love the series then you will love this movie because it’s a long episode, and if you fell out of love with “Steven Universe,” watch it for Spinel and then never think about it again.

Honestly, I am at a loss for how this series is supposed to continue from here. Every character has grown into the best possible version of themselves and trying to manufacture new development will likely come off as weak. “The Steven Universe Movie” made me neither excited nor enthused for more “Steven Universe,” and its failures simply accentuate how definitively this series has concluded. The only thought I came away from this movie was “the show’s over, isn’t it? Why can’t it move on?”

The women of ‘Hustlers’ make money moves

By Grace Zhou staff

It’s 2007, and strip clubs are having a kind of cultural moment.

As we see in the opening of “Hustlers,” that means the dancers are wearing designer furs and leather boots, and the customers, former fraternity brothers working on Wall Street, are more than happy to blow thousands of dollars after a grueling nine to five. Destiny (Constance Wu) is the newest performer at the club Moves, and she’s quickly taken under the wing—or in this case, the fur—of veteran dancer Ramona (Jennifer Lopez), who teaches Destiny how to work the pole, give a proper lap dance and even introduces her to some regular customers. The two soon discover that their double act makes seducing men, and earning tips, all too easy.

But “Hustlers” isn’t just hedonistic escapism. The film is in fact based on actual people and actual events: Destiny’s off-screen equiv-

alent is named Roselyn Keo, and Ramona’s character represents real-life Samantha Barbash. In 2015, Keo and Barbash, dancers at real-world club Scores, gained notoriety when an article published in “The Cut” described the duo’s years-long operation of drugging white-collar men and maxing out their credit cards.

And that’s exactly what happens in the movie. First, the 2008 financial crisis strikes, and nearly all the Wall Street bros stop partying. Strip clubs, once a glittery oasis of beautiful women and bottle service, now sit half empty.

So with children to raise and the future uncertain, Ramona introduces a plan to Destiny: along with associates Mercedes (Keke Palmer) and Annabelle (Lili Reinhart), the dancers will target rich men at bars, get them drunk and then escort them to Moves. While there, the women will coerce the guy into racking up charges on his credit card, having worked out a deal with the club to ensure the quartet gets a cut of however

PHOTO FROM OXYGEN.COM

much he spends.

Wu is wonderfully textural in these spaces, much more so than in “Crazy Rich Asians,” deftly balancing her character’s sharklike acumen (like when she cries crocodile tears while dropping off an unconscious guy at the hospital before cooly sauntering back to her car) with her introspection (like when she breaks down in actual tears of regret during a post-factum interview with a journalist). Lopez also delivers a solid performance in “Hustlers.”

Her best scene, which appears early on in the movie when Ramona performs a solo dance at the pole. It’s an impressive display that is equal parts sexy, playful, and powerful, and required Lopez to train for weeks. Also notable is that the film had a female director, Lorene Scafaria, behind the camera, and therefore avoids the typical male gaze in these shots, always maintaining a certain physical distance from Lopez, never lingering on her body and altogether respecting the actor’s space.

The rest of the cast, too, is impressive. Though Mercedes and Annabelle aren’t particularly dynamic characters, Palmer and Reinhart deliver amusing performances. There’s also a cameo from Usher, whose appearance leads to one of my favorite scenes in the movie: when the dancers hear that the famous musician has arrived at Moves, all the women get on stage for a fun and convivial group dance, backed by “Love in This Club.” Among these performers are rapper Cardi B

PHOTO FROM COSMOPOLITAN.COM

and pop sensation Lizzo, who are greatly entertaining in their bit parts.

Of course, Cardi’s role in “Hustlers” is also notable given that the artist’s own backstory nearly parallels the film’s plot. Earlier this year, a clip from an old Instagram Live video resurfaced, featuring the rapper claiming she used to drug and rob men who offered her money for sex when she worked as a stripper. In response, many likened her actions to that of R. Kelly, using the hashtag #SurvivingCardiB, a reference to the title of a Lifetime docuseries about R. Kelly’s predatory and abusive behavior.

What differentiates Cardi B, and real-life Keo and Barbash, from the ranks of R. Kelly? First and foremost, comparing rape and theft is simply a false equivalency.

Moreover, the latter has been accused by many, over an extended period of time, of using his power as a celebrity to rape and abuse women and young girls.

Meanwhile, Cardi, Keo and Barbash were in vulnerable posi-

tions and have argued that they drugged and robbed men to survive their circumstances.

It’s worth remembering that strip clubs are structured in a way that exploits the dancers, forcing the women to pay clubs for the “privilege” of working there and requiring that the women also tip the bartender, hosts, DJ and house mom. The men who frequented Scores (and Moves) were oftentimes sexually aggressive, and even verbally or physically abusive. These were also the men whose entire life on Wall Street was predicated on stealing from others.

If the movie has anything to say about Cardi B, Keo or Barbash, then, it’s perhaps not a message of justification but one of explanation, at the very least seeking to humanize sex workers and their courses of action for survival. So, with Scafaria’s help, maybe strip clubs are having another cultural moment, now in 2019—the workers who make their living there certainly deserve it.