VOL 7, NO. 3
FEBRUARY 5, 2010
B R A N D E I S U N I V E R S I T Y ' S C O M M U N I T Y N E W S PA P E R
Program cuts to be announced this month BY ARIEL WITTENBERG Editor
The Brandeis 2020 Committee will announce its proposed academic cuts on Feb. 24, the committee’s chair Dean of Arts and Sciences Adam Jaffe told Thursday’s faculty meeting. The 2020 Committee has three major criteria for deciding which academic programs should remain intact: Programs needed in order to maintain Brandeis' standing as a respectable research and liberal arts
university, programs that distinguish Brandeis from other universities, and programs at which Brandeis excels. "The problem is that one could argue everything we might want to cut would fall under that criteria," Jaffe said, adding that student demand and interest in programs is also being taken into account. Chairs of departments that the committee is considering phasing out will be notified on Sunday, and the committee will meet with members of
WA LT H A M , M A S S .
UNION JUDICIARY NIXES ARONIN
each School between Tuesday and Thursday of next week to discuss the effect the proposals could have on the school. Jaffe reassured the meeting that tenured-track faculty of the phased out departments will be reassigned to other departments, rather than having their contract ended; however, contract faculty of the phased out departments will not have their contracts renewed. "I'm not going to sit here and try to sugar coat it for you See CUTS, p. 2
Vote to remove unanimous BY NATHAN KOSKELLA Editor
PHOTO BY Max Shay/The Hoot
MEET THE PRESS: New York Times Jerusalem Bureau Chief Ethan Bronner spoke about the Middle East on Tuesday.
Bronner discusses impartiality in Israel BY JON OSTROWSKY Staff
New York Times Jerusalem Bureau Chief Ethan Bronner spoke to the Brandeis community Tuesday about the necessity of objective reporting in Israel, and the difficulties reporters face in pursuit of it, in the International Lounge of the Usdan Student Center. Bronner explained to his audience how he tries to report on two opposing narratives, Jewish-Israeli vs. Palestinian, in an unbiased manner in his lecture sponsored by the Schusterman Center for Isreali Studies and the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism titled “Covering the Middle East in 2010: A Report from the Field.” When covering events in the region, Bronner said he hears both points of view but that much of the conflict and controversy is due to misunderstand-
THIS WEEK:
ing and an unwillingness to listen. Bronner, who also served as Middle East bureau chief for The Boston Globe in the 1990s, explained that throughout his experience there, he had tried to write a neutral view. “In a world which tends traffic in black and white, I traffic in grey," he said. "What seems to you to be true may not be true to someone else.” “The problem is that I have two completely contradicting narratives,“ Bronner said. “You have to find a new way to describe things that doesn’t offend people.” Professor Troen, director of the Shusterman Center for Israeli studies, introduced Bronner by encouraging the concept of listening to all sides of the conflict in Israel. “What we like is a multiplicity of voices,” Professor Troen said.
The correspondent has recently come under fire from some in the media over the fact that he continues to write on the conflict while one of his sons has joined the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). But Bronner insisted, See BRONNER, p. 5
The Union Judiciary (UJ) voted to remove former Union Secretary Diana Aronin ’11 from office Sunday following last week's impeachment trial. The ruling by the UJ found in favor of the senate which claimed Aronin “willfully corrupted and violated the duties set forth to her in the Constitution." According to the Union Constitution, in order for Aronin's removal to be finalized, Union President Andy Hogan '11 had to formally announce the new Union vacancy, and the special election to fill the post will be held Tuesday. Aronin's conviction followed the Jan. 24 UJ trial where Aronin presented three separate ar-
guments defending her refusal to call a referendum vote for the Senate proposal to create a midyear senator position. Aronin had argued that her noncompliance with the Union Constitution was justified because one of the Senate sponsors was no longer an undergraduate by the time she could call a vote last spring and because she was ordered by Hogan to wait to call a vote until this spring’s Constitutional Review Committee. The court dismissed each argument in its ruling, writing, "We disagree with Respondent’s first argument, find the second to be prima facie [on first appearance] valid yet ultimately critically uninvolved and fundamentally flawed, and expressly reject the third."
Storebeck Pimentel to assist in pres. search BY ARIEL WITTENBERG Editor
The executive search firm Storebeck Pimentel & Associates will aid the Brandeis Presidential Search Committee in its quest to find the next university president, the committee announced via their Web site Monday. The committee will be directly working with the firm's managing partner Shelly Storebeck and partner Chuck Bunting. Prof. Len Saxe (NJES), chair of the subcommittee charged
Our next president? Impressions, page 16
with finding a search firm said the committee had looked at "lots of great firms," but rested on Storebeck Pimentel because of its experience working with small liberal arts research universities and colleges such as Wellesly College, Swarthmore College and Rice University, Saxe said. Storebeck Pimentel's experience working with the Jewish Theological Seminary shows "an understanding of the Jewish Community," Saxe said. Storebeck has also been involved in previous Brandeis
Hooked on tap Arts, Etc. page 10
Presidential searches, assisting with the query that brought current President Jehuda Reinharz to the post. The search firm will facilitate the university in strategizing its presidential search, marketing Brandeis to prospective presidents, soliciting new presidents and vetting candidates. According to the search committee Web site, they will be announcing presidential finalists by the end of February. "Now the presidential search is in full gear," Saxe said.
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