May 11, 2013

F I N A L S

E D I T I O N SPORTS

OPINION

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Conduct code may vindicate survivors Univ. to investigate offcampus sexual assaults PATRICK WOJAHN, District 1 councilman, says some parties are enacting Neighborhood Stabilization and Quality of Life Workgroup plans. file photo/the diamondback

By Laura Blasey Senior staff writer

Work group completes neighbors’ strategies

With the University Senate’s approval, school officials are hoping an expanded Code of Student Conduct will allow them to better aid sexual assault survivors at this university, and awareness groups remain cautiously optimistic.

At their last meeting of the year May 2, the senate voted to remove the code’s geographic boundaries so officials could address code violations both on and off the campus.

It was touted in debate as a means to find justice for assault victims, who previously found themselves without an administrative ally if their assault occurred off the campus.

“They would come to us, and we would say, ‘Sorry, we don’t have jurisdiction; you’re going to have to call the police,’” Office of Student Conduct Director Andrea Goodwin said. “With the changes to the code, that won’t have to happen any longer.”

The expansion allows the university to better assist its students, said Stephanie Rivero, Sexual Assault Response and Prevention Program peer educator assistant coordinator.

“Our campus is growing year after year, and the amount of space we have on campus is limited,” Rivero said.

There’s an emerging pattern in the cases SARPP counselors handle, Rivero said — incidents are happening more frequently off the campus.

“A lot of sexual assault unfortunately happens at parties and things like that, which most occur off campus,” said Jill Santos, a sophomore psychology major and president of UMD Feminists for

By Teddy Amenabar Staff writer For College Park residents and students, an end to the high tensions, bad behavior and bad reputations hanging over the city may be in sight.

After six months of hearings, meetings and contentious discussions, the 26-member College Park Neighborhood Stabilization and Quality of Life Workgroup released a final list of strategies they hope will provide the key to easing growing tensions between students and residents and improving the area’s reputation.

On April 30, the work group held a public forum and presented potential ideas to the city council, local residents and university students.

See NEIGHBORs, Page 11

Open books gain traction among univ. professors Free, editable textbooks could revamp teaching

By Fola Akinnibi Staff writer Instead of asking students to go out and buy a textbook, Scott Roberts, the psychology department’s undergraduate studies director, decided to create his own.

In 2010, Roberts was a graduate student working for the federal government while teaching introductory psychology at night.

He didn’t set aside a summer, a month or a few weeks to prepare his book — he created it on a weekby-week basis, often putting sections together late at night or early in the morning.

See TEXTBOOKS, Page 3

INDEX

college park is a city in flux, but since the new millennium, age demographics have shifted downward. Long-term residents have seen plenty of problems from wild nights, but friendships have formed, too, and large-scale developments have helped businesses. file photo/the diamondback

younger by the year College Park’s age demographics trend toward age 20, affecting life for all

By Annika McGinnis Senior staff writer

2007-2011 AGE DEMOGRAPHICS 31.4

F

or Jissella Urquilla, Berwyn Road’s tree-lined row of brick houses and hole-in-the-wall shops is home.

She’s grown up surrounded by college students for 16 years, accustomed to ever-changing fast-food restaurants on Route 1, loud parties and not knowing many of her neighbors.

“It used to be more families, but now almost every house around is college students,” Urquilla said.

“Nobody’s really outside anymore.”

Between 2000 and 2010, the proportion of College Park residents aged 15 to 25 increased from 53 percent to 62 percent, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. City officials and long-term residents attributed the increase to housing developments, expensive rental houses and the university’s rising prestige, which draws in non-local students. With more students coming from farther away, said District 3 councilwoman Stephanie Stullich, more seek housing near the campus.

Kiersten Johnson, a Cherokee Street resident, said

27.9

10.4 5.4

2.7 10-14

15-19

20-24

25-34

35-44

College Park demographics, by percent, from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey. graphic by chris allen/the diamondback when she attended the university as a graduate student in the early 2000s, she couldn’t find anywhere to live in the ZIP code because of a lack of student housing.

In the past five years, the city “finally” built largescale student housing developments, Johnson said, See renters, Page 12

See ASSAULT, Page 2

Upscale East Campus hotel, conference center planned Plans replace former strategies after study

brought housing, retail and upscale dining to the city — in January, opting instead for a step-by-step addition of amenities on both sides of Route 1. The hotel will be the first step in the new development plans, said Rob Specter, administrative affairs vice president.

“It became a natural thing for us to think about welcoming visitors properly to the campus, and you do that when you have a nice hotel and conference center,” Specter said.

The university hired U3 Ventures, a multidisciplinary firm with expertise in college town development, and in a market study, the

By Dustin Levy Staff writer T he university is moving forward with plans for a hotel and conference center as the first part of a “parcel-by-parcel” community development plan officials said will better integrate the university with the surrounding city.

Officials announced they were tossing out more than 12 years of plans for the East Campus development — which would have

Rob Specter (left), administrative affairs vice president, worked with Omar Blaik (right), CEO of U3 Ventures, to develop plans for constructing a high-end hotel, possibly near Rossborough Inn. file photo/the diamondback

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THE DIAMONDBACK | NEWS | saturDAY, MAY 11, 2013

assault From PAGE 1 Sexual Health. Any step taken to combat sexual assault, she added, is a positive one.

But the policy expansion may not be a big enough step in the fight against the pervasive crime.

“It takes a lot of courage to speak out, and if they’re going to put that option out there, they need to understand it’s important to stick to that and follow through with claims they get,” Santos said.

Goodwin said she knows her office will be facing more cases when the conduct code expands in the fall, though she doesn’t know by exactly how much. She put in a request for additional help — a full-time coordinator and a graduate assistant — to work on the issues students bring to them.

A college culture of heavy drinking makes sexual assault that much harder to combat. Only some victims report their experiences, and an estimated 100,000 18- to 24-year-olds reported having been too drunk to know if they consented to sex at some point, according to the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

Alcohol plays a role in at least 50 percent of reported sexual assaults at colleges, according to the College Drinking Prevention campaign, which drew data from numerous studies published in the ’80s, ’90s and early 2000s.

Some estimates placed that number as high as 97 percent of sexual assaults.

The data also suggest assaults involving alcohol are more likely to fit the legal definition of rape and would be prosecutable if students reported them.

Between 2006 and 2012, two

students reported a rape or attempted rape to University Police, and during that same time, the Office of Student Conduct received 29 reports, though only nine of those resulted in disciplinary action. Between 2007 and 2012, 17 incidents were reported to the Department of Resident Life’s Office of Rights and Responsibilities, said Keira Martone, resident student conduct manager.

But while the code expansion could help, some students and officials expressed concerns about the vague language and the lack of oversight for the Office of Student Conduct, which some worry may not yield justice for students in the long term.

Even Goodwin has some reservations about the policy’s final language. The final version is different from the one she submitted in October, having gone through many edits to fit senate and legal standards.

“I was hoping the language

would be more specific,” Goodwin said. “If I see a lot of things that are coming in that are concerning, and they don’t really fit in to the new language, then we may have to revisit it.”

And there could be reason for concern — in the past five years, many universities have made headlines for easily manipulated campus judicial processes.

A sexual assault victim committed suicide after Notre Dame allegedly protected the football player who she said assaulted her; UNC Chapel Hill faced criticism for failing to report cases of sexual assault.

At this university, senate officials crafted the expanded policy based on the language used at schools in the University System of Maryland and the Big Ten, said Jason Speck, senate student conduct committee chairman.

That group of schools included the University of Iowa, where university President Wallace Loh

served as provost. Prior to Loh’s arrival at Iowa in 2008, that university was the subject of national media attention after a female student accused the school of covering up her report of sexual assault.

Officials allegedly told her not to press charges against the two athletes she said sexually assaulted her in 2007.

“The policies were so out of date at that institution,” Loh said, adding that proper training is the key to avoiding these situations.

Officials at this university insist that kind of incident wouldn’t happen here. The athletic department has strict policies and it shares conduct records with Goodwin’s office.

“People in the community are willing to report students no matter their status,” she said. “We would never look the other way if a student was an athlete.”

As for sexual assault committed by any student, Goodwin said there shouldn’t be any confusion,

regardless of the language, about the seriousness of the crime.

“That’s one of the most serious things that a student could do to another student,” she said. “I think that’s one of the things that will easily be understood with this policy.”

At SARPP and at Feminists for Sexual Health, they’re hoping to see even greater change. A senate bill mandating sexual assault education for incoming freshmen at orientation was tabled earlier this year, and another senate bill revising the conduct code’s evidentiary standards for sexual harassment and assault in compliance with new Department of Education requirements is making its way through committee reviews.

“Our society and culture has a long way to go before everyone who has been impacted by violence is ready to go ahead and tell somebody,” Rivero said. newsumdbk@gmail.com

saturDAY, may 11, 2013 | news | THE DIAMONDBACK

textbooks From PAGE 1 Roberts, who provides his book free of charge to the university’s PSYC 100: Introduction to Psychology classes, is part of a national growing open educational resources movement. These resources are published under a Creative Commons license, which allows for free use and sometimes editing, much like Wikipedia. Roberts’ psychology textbook draws from free online information, videos and graphics.

The process, Roberts said, really forced him to think about what he wanted students to learn.

“There was something liberating about not having to think about the course the way somebody else outlined it but really having the opportunity to step back and make my own outline,” he said. “It took a lot more time than I thought at the moment.”

Un iversit y of f ic i a l s a re looking for ways to encourage staff to take advantage of these resources. For instance, there are plans to give incentives to professors who adopt open textbooks, said Gary White,

libraries public services associate dean.

White believes such an approach could jump-start opensou rce projects. He added awareness is another major issue, as many students and faculty do not even know these resources are an option.

The movement is gaining steam, largely because of this country’s economic situation and rising education costs. In the past 34 years, according to the American Enterprise Institute, textbook costs have increased 812 percent, far outpacing the rate of inflation over the same period of time.

Students bear the brunt, paying more than $650 a year for required course materials, according to the National Association of College Stores. And when students can’t pay, the federal government is left to pick up the slack.

“States have been retreating from funding higher education,” said Richard Hershman, NACS government relations vice president. “State budgets have been cut, and higher education has been one of the first areas they have been cutting and removing support for. … That means more burden on the students with higher tuition

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and the federal government with providing Pell grants.”

A student in Roberts’ class, sophomore history major Ashley Peralta, said she wished more of her classes would move to using open textbooks. Peralta spent about $500 on books this semester, and her costs would have been much higher if she wasn’t using Roberts’ book.

“I work on campus as a community assistant,” Peralta said. “The paychecks that I’ve been getting, I’ve been saving for textbooks.”

Senior marketing major Matt Ellis recalled spending $600 on books one semester. He said he never had the chance to use an open textbook but was forced to scour the Web for the cheapest available options.

While students struggle, textbook publishers thrive. Course materials accounted for $5.5 billion in college stores’ sales alone, according to NACS. And college stores only receive about 22 percent of money spent on textbooks, with most going to the publisher.

Publishers reel students back into stores by releasing new editions. Roberts recalled a textbook request changing without his consent because the publisher released a new edition and stopped supplying old copies.

Even online-only versions have not slowed textbooks’ rising costs because printing and shipping costs do not account for much of a publishers’ overhead, Hershman said.

Some states are already on their way to an open-source future — Washington state has

open-source materials for 81 courses in its community college system, and in 2012, California passed a bill to begin creating open textbooks for its university system.

However, this state has not followed suit. Because of state and federal budget concerns, state legislators haven’t even been able to free students from sales taxes on textbooks. During the past session, for instance, a version of the textbook tax break was killed because of effects from the federal sequester.

“If we really care about education, let’s stop taxing the kids to get educated,” said Del. Michael Smigiel (R-Caroline, Cecil, Kent and Queen Anne’s), a major proponent of the now-dead bill.

In the university’s PSYC 100 classes, professor Ryan Curtis starts by giving students a PDF file with basic information and links to videos, articles and other content.

On l i ne cou rse materia ls can be accessed from a smartphone or a computer. The book is always being updated — a perk of the open system — and can be freely molded to specific classes.

Still, maintaining an open textbook isn’t always smooth sailing.

Sometimes, YouTube videos are taken down and content that was once free starts getting sold.

Open-source textbooks also aren’t practical for all fields — biology professor David Inouye said creating one for his introductory biology course would be tough because of a lack of free lower-level scientific information.

Even with the major time

MORE ONLINE An open-minded community?

Check out Fola Akinnibi and Asa Winborne’s video on diamondbackonline.com to watch students and professors, including Associate Libraries Public Services Dean Gary White, discuss the growing open-source textbook movement. commitment of maintaining the book, Curtis believes his efforts are worth it, saying they save students about $100. But others, such as economics professor Robert Schwab, said time is a major deterrent. At least two faculty members would have to be excused for a full year to create an economics textbook, he said.

Still, across departments, professors seemed to agree on a solution: Find a middle ground between open materials and commercial materials. This would ease the pressure on faculty to produce these resources and ease pressure on student budgets.

Professors could provide learning materials and readings, while

fola akinnibi/for the diamondback

publishers could provide additional content, such as Aplia and other interactive educational platforms.

Roberts has found his place on the open-source spectrum. He continues to update and improve his text in preparation for its release online — for free, of course, and for the world to use.

Open educational resources are the future, he said.

“There was a time when purchasing textbooks made sense; it was necessary because that was the only way information was available and conveyed,” he said.

“But so much has changed in a relatively short amount of time.” newsumdbk@gmail.com

PUPPY LOVE FOR FINALS Students flocked to this semester’s Puppy Palooza in Stamp Student Union on Thursday. The event, hosted by Student Entertainment Events, drew long lines of students hoping to de-stress before exams and play with puppies from local shelters. james levin/for the diamondback

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Opinion

THE DIAMONDBACK | SATURDAY, MAY 11, 2013

EDITORIAL BOARD

Mike King

Editor in Chief

DAN APPENFELLER Managing Editor

Tyler Weyant

Deputy Managing Editor

maria romas Opinion Editor

nadav karasov Opinion Editor

CONTACT US 3150 South Campus Dining Hall | College Park, MD 20742 | newsumdbk@gmail.com OR opinionumdbk@gmail.com PHONE (301) 314-8200

STAFF EDITORIAL

REPORT CARD: OUR VIEW WALLACE LOH

UNIVERSITY SENATE

STUDENT GOVERNMENT ASSOCIATION

A partnership with the Corcoran Gallery of Art. A move to the Big Ten and the Committee on Institutional Cooperation. A push for gun control and an all-inclusive Good Samaritan policy. An alliance with the University of Maryland, Baltimore. An increase in globalization and entrepreneurship.

University President Wallace Loh has either supported or accomplished all these initiatives this year — and he’s already proven to be one of the most popular university presidents nationally. Granted, some of these initiatives were planned at the beginning of this year, but what’s more impressive is Loh’s ability to adapt and make the right decisions.

We hope to see Loh continue along this path — working toward a more livable College Park and East Campus and increased globalization initiatives that directly affect students on the campus. We have already watched him take strides and urge him not to stop now.

After nearly six years of debate, the University Senate expanded the Good Samaritan policy this semester to cover all drug- and alcohol-related emergencies. This progressive, albeit much-delayed, initiative exempts students from punishment for reporting a drug-related emergency.

The Code of Student Conduct was also expanded. University officials will now maintain the authority to prosecute students for off-campus crimes, such as sexual assault, felonies and other serious offenses.

Yet this year was not without its blemishes. The smoking ban on the campus doesn’t seem enforceable, and the body has seemingly disregarded several other pieces of legislation. A petition to mandate sexual assault prevention education for all students has failed to generate much support in the senate, despite receiving more than 1,500 student signatures. These oversights have limited the scope of the senate’s success this semester.

After semesters of slashing group budgets, eliminating student programs and being generally lackadaisical, the Student Government Association has actually come through for students in 2013.

First and foremost, the simple but remarkably effective creation of WTF UMD — Facebook and Twitter pages designed to respond to student needs — has seen marked success, with changes already being implemented.

Meanwhile, the group has reinstated the Collegiate Readership Program, offering students free national newspapers, after it was cut in 2011. It has revamped the student group funding process to ensure money is doled out fairly. It finally seems the SGA has true dedication to student needs.

Additionally, SGA President Samantha Zwerling has led major lobbying efforts in both Annapolis and Washington to fight for college affordability.

With one year left to finish up her initiatives, we are eager to see how Zwerling’s remaining promises, as well as the future sustainability of the SGA’s current plans, play out.

UNIVERSITY POLICE

LAUREN REDDING At the end of fall 2011, when I was editor in chief of The Diamondback, I wrote a column titled, “An editor’s confession: I have depression.” I wrote it after a close friend attempted suicide — it was my way to shed a little light on such a dark, scary issue. The response was overwhelming: Hundreds of people wrote to me, thanking me for sharing my struggle with depression and my long-standing relationship with Prozac.

People told me I was brave. They told me I was inspirational. The love and support I received was amazing — but I also felt guilty. Because it wasn’t the whole story. I wasn’t ready to tell my whole story yet. A year and a half later, I think I am. So, (deep breath), bear with me. Here’s take two.

I was raped. R-a-p-e-d. God, that’s such a horrible word. As many times as I’ve said it since it happened — spring break of my sophomore year, right before I took over as editor in chief — it still hurts like hell to see it in front of me. But it’s the truth.

It’s the reason my depression took the sharpest nosedive of my life. It’s the reason I spent most nights sobbing, huddled in a ball on my bed, unable to find any word in the English language to describe how profoundly and desperately I was hurting.

I was raped. By someone I knew, trusted and valued. The worst part?

My inability to tell anyone. I felt like I was drowning and I couldn’t even shout for help — I didn’t think I deserved help. I felt worthless, dirty and guilty. So, so guilty. I just knew, I knew that I was the person responsible for what had happened, not him. I was too drunk. I was too flirty. I led him on. He didn’t know any better. I did want to have sex with him. He couldn’t hear me say, “No.” He was drunk, too.

I stayed silent for six months — six long months of constantly being on the verge of tears, not being able to eat, not being able to sleep and staying in bed for days. Six months of putting on a brave face as I put out this newspaper day after day and then going home and sobbing in the shower. (The sound of

the water covered my wails.)

It wasn’t until a complete breakdown landed me back in the psychiatrist’s office that I finally got some help — weekly therapy sessions and a prescription for Prozac. Finally, I could eat. Finally, I could sleep. And even though I couldn’t yet say the “R” word, I was beginning to accept what had happened to me — at least in my head.

It took several more months before I could tell my friends and family why I had suddenly gotten so passionate about feminism and violence against women — I became president of UMD Feminists and a peer educator for the Sexual Assault Response and Prevention Program. With the help and support of my amazing SARPP family — a group of people who saved my life — I slowly started saying the “R” word.

Now that my entire family and all my Facebook friends know, I’m ready to share it with you. Because I’m guessing, for some of you reading this, my story is all too familiar. And so I want to tell those of you in a similar position something you should have heard a long, long time ago. No one said it to me for a long, long time, so I’m going to say it to you now: What happened to you was wrong.

What he did to you was wrong. It was horrible and inexcusable. You did nothing to deserve it. You did nothing to bring it on. He is the one who should be ashamed — not you. I believe you. I believe in you. You have a friend here — I have been where you have been and I will walk this road with you.

Someday, the weight of what happened to you won’t seem so heavy.

But here’s the thing: The key is to let other people help you carry it. It will take time, I know. Maybe you’re not there yet. That’s OK. But I hope, just by reading this, that weight already feels a little bit lighter. I hope by sharing my story, you know it is safe for you to share yours.

When you’re ready, I’ll be here.

Thanks for reading, friend.

Lauren Redding is a senior journalism major and former editor in chief of The Diamondback. She can be reached at laurredding@gmail.com.

Mental health was a prevalent issue this year. After the news broke about graduate student Dayvon Maurice Green’s murder-suicide and his struggle with mental illness, the lack of resources was thrust into the limelight.

The issue is impossible to ignore. About 30 percent of college students reported feeling “so depressed that it was difficult to function” in a nationwide survey in 2011 by the National Institute of Mental Health.

This editorial board ran a mental health series that reiterated the same theme: a lack of accessible resources for students on the campus. Weeks later, the university secured $5 million of funding over the next 10 years to hire new staff members and better respond to increasing student demand.

The grant is a step in the right direction, though we don’t know if it will be enough to truly improve mental health services on the campus. Until every student receives the treatment he or she needs, there’s more work to be done.

MENTAL HEALTH

GENERAL ASSEMBLY

An editor’s confession: Part II

After a semester beginning with six armed or strong-armed robberies and a murder-suicide, it may seem hard to give University Police any credit.

But the department certainly deserves some recognition. After the men’s basketball team defeated Duke on Feb. 16, police handled an unruly Route 1 crowd sternly but without incident, minimizing damage and avoiding conflict. And despite common perceptions, police are continuing to oversee a broader downward crime trend in College Park.

Yet perception plays a large role in students’ safety. And many students’ discomfort walking home at night speaks to police’s inability to convey the safety of this campus and deter the major incidents that make it feel unsafe.

Add to that the relentless pressure from the county liquor board for officers to crack down on underage drinking, and student perception becomes even bleaker. Police need to brighten that perception.

State legislators deserve your praise. The past few months in the General Assembly featured a tremendous array of legislation, and the rewards from this newfound productivity will benefit state residents for years to come.

Unlike in 2012, when state lawmakers nearly failed to pass an operating budget, this General Assembly displayed a highly efficient effort.

Measures to repeal the death penalty and increase gun control regulations received praise both nationally and locally, but the success stories extend well beyond these bills. Legislators allocated $1.1 billion into the University System of Maryland in this year’s budget — a 7.5 percent increase from last year’s total — and appear committed to keeping college tuition from skyrocketing.

Yes, transgender anti-discrimination and recreational marijuana legalization died in committee, and residents’ tax burdens are growing. However, given what we witnessed in Annapolis in 2013, taxpayers are getting their money’s worth. It’s hard to imagine a more successful legislative effort.

EDITORIAL CARTOON

GUEST FEATURE

ASHLEY ZACHERY/the diamondback

The president’s year in review WALLACE LOH The end of an academic year is a time to celebrate the accomplishments of our graduating students.

It is also a time to reflect on the university’s progress over the past year and what it augurs for the future with respect to academic excellence, innovation, internationalization and the revitalization of College Park.

For the first time in several years, we received new state funding that will benefit students, faculty and staff. We will expand the number of science and engineering majors to meet the demand of students and the needs of our economy. Faculty and staff will receive merit and cost of living increases after years of flat salaries, enabling us to retain and recruit top talent.

To jump-start our new collaboration with the University of Maryland, Baltimore, we got state funding for research and innovation in the areas of bioinformatics, public health, entrepreneurship and technology commercialization. Both universities will accomplish more together than each could do alone.

The “Great Expectations” campaign achieved its $1 billion goal this year. It expands financial aid, provides matching funds for new buildings and

helps underwrite new professorships and academic programs. Now, we begin planning for greater expectations.

The 21st century is an age of interdependence. People, ideas and jobs circulate across boundaries in a world “flattened” by technology and jet travel. In my visits to universities in Asia and the Middle East, I saw their emphasis on education and research to promote economic vitality and improve the human condition.

On the campus, we launched the new Academy for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Its simple and ambitious goal is to prepare all students to put knowledge into practice — to empower them to create economic value, make a social impact or both.

More than 2,000 of our students studied abroad this year. Innovative, entrepreneurial and globally educated students will find, quite literally, a world of opportunities.

In fall 2012, we joined Coursera, a group of top-tier universities that sponsors “massive open online courses.” This is part of our campuswide effort to explore technologybased learning and teaching. The new Edward St. John Learning and Teaching Center will be used by 9,000 students a day. We are designing this building for pedagogy that blends online and face-to-face instruction.

We chose our future by joining the Big Ten Conference in 2014 and its academic consortium, the Council on In-

stitutional Cooperation, in 2013. This will secure the sustainability of our state athletics for decades to come. Our students, faculty and staff will find in the CIC extensive new opportunities for study, research and exchanges.

A university task force is examining the prospects for a partnership with the Corcoran Gallery of Art and its College of Art + Design in Washington. Such a partnership could galvanize transformative excellence in the visual arts and design that will benefit all areas of our university. It will also expand our footprint in our nation’s capital.

We are working with local officials to make College Park a top-20 college town. We expect tangible progress by this fall. A new charter school will open near the campus with some 200 students, attracting more faculty and staff to live here. Our campus police will patrol more areas of the city to increase public safety. We will announce plans for a hotel, conference center and upscale restaurant, which will catalyze retail development along Route 1.

To our graduating students who will commence a new chapter in their lives, I bid you Godspeed. Our future and reputations are entwined because your successes and the continuing excellence of your alma mater are our pride and measure.

Wallace Loh is president of this university.

He may be reached at president@umd.edu and @presidentloh on Twitter.

THE DIAMONDBACK | SATURDAY, MAY 11 , 2013

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Diversions

ON THE BLOG

POP CULTURE POTPOURRI

There’s no shortage of online content, including an appreciation of Arrested Development, a summer concert preview and a look at the decline of iTunes. For more, visit diamondbackonline.com.

REVIEW | THE GREAT GATSBY

YOU CAN’T REMAKE THE PAST

The new The Great Gatsby film isn’t quite the train wreck it could have been, but it proves the futility of attempting to adapt Fitzgerald’s masterpiece for the screen

By Robert Gifford Senior staff writer F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby might be the most perfect novel ever written. Now that doesn’t make it the best — not by a significant margin — but it’s brief enough and so meticulously crafted that every word feels perfectly chosen, every sentence perfectly balanced. There isn’t a comma out of place.

Baz Luhrmann’s (Australia) adaptation of The Great Gatsby is far from perfect. It’s loud, messy, garish and desperately unsubtle. With its anachronistic pop music, deeply unnecessary 3-D visuals and the flashy, hectic style of a late-’90s music video, it’s probably the last adaptation Fitzgerald would want or expect.

It’s also kind of awesome. I don’t want to oversell it — the film stumbles more often than it succeeds, and purists should avoid it like the plague — but no one could accuse it of being a bloodless CliffsNotes adaptation of a dusty old tome. It’s ambitious, hot-blooded and the product of an idiosyncratic personal vision.

That’s not to say Luhrmann’s vision syncs particularly well with Fitzgerald’s.

Fitzgerald’s Gatsby is notable for how distant he remains even when narrator Nick Carraway becomes his close confidant and learns the secrets of his origin.

Gatsby is fundamentally unknowable, a cipher solvable by no one, least of all himself. He cloaks himself in profligacy,

throwing lavish parties no one is invited to but everyone attends, but this only serves to underscore the loneliness of his muted tragedy.

Fitzgerald continually holds Gatsby just out of focus, and his mystery only amplifies his magnetism. Luhrmann, on the other hand, keeps Gatsby squarely in close-up. He’s an icon, not an enigma, and that’s ultimately much less interesting.

Everything is right there on the surface, both with Gatsby the onscreen character and Gatsby the film.

The film takes great pains to make sure the audience understands every character and every theme, leaving no room for mystery or interpretation. Not all of this is Luhrmann’s fault — a particularly egregious scene, in which one character simply states the movie’s theme (“You can’t repeat the past”) to another, is lifted straight from the page — but it’s indicative of his turn-it-up-to-11 style.

Sometimes a whisper works best, but Luhrmann only knows how to shout.

Yet what a shout it is. This is one of the most excessive, operatic, unrestrained films since … well, since Luhrmann’s own Moulin Rouge! The Great Gatsby contains both the worst and the best party scenes you’re likely to see all year.

At its worst, The Great Gatsby is like watching Michael Bay try to direct a period piece — the empty, incoherent spectacle of giant robots and explosions replaced with the empty, incoherent spectacle of rich people drink-

ing, dancing and screwing en masse.

At its best, it’s like watching a Busby Berkeley film, in which excess and a kaleidoscopic aesthetic are deployed so well they become their own justification. Luhrmann is like Spider-Man, swinging from building to building. He misses his mark and plummets half the time, but that only makes it that much more thrilling when he soars.

As fun as Luhrmann’s bacchanalian frenzy can be, the film’s best moments still come when he drops the stylistic artifice and just lets his actors chew on Fitzgerald’s ripe dialogue.

The true heroes of this production are the casting directors — every actor is remarkably well-suited to his or her role.

Tobey Maguire’s (The Details) constant, invasive narration is perhaps the film’s worst aspect, but his Nick Carraway is suitably out of his element, and Carey Mulligan (Shame) uses her talent for simply reacting to great effect as Daisy.

And then there’s Leonardo DiCaprio (Django Unchained) as the man himself, Jay Gatsby. He’s the best thing the film has going for it, nicely capturing how the character’s forced bonhomie just barely hides a childish impetuousness that easily boils over into rage when things don’t go as planned. The way he takes a moment to reset his posture whenever he’s agitated is the kind of minor but telling character detail that separates good performances from great ones.

Still, even the best scenes — the ones that remain truest to what Fitzgerald was trying to say — aren’t the equal of

THE GREAT-ISH GATSBY. Baz Luhrmann’s take on Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is a pale imitation of its source material, but its stylistic assault on good taste is a wonder to behold. photos courtesy of ew.com and policymic.com their source material. Luhrmann finds of the original. Luhrmann is chasing ways to inject new life into Gatsby but his own green light across the bay. The never finds a way to improve upon it. perfect Gatsby film remains elusive, but Try as he might, there’s just no way to no matter — the next director will run recapture the bliss of the first time you faster, stretch their arms out further... sat down and read The Great Gatsby, So we beat on, boats against the an experience as irrecoverable as Daisy current, borne back ceaselessly into Buchanan. No attempt to remake Gatsby the past.

— be it the 2013, 1974 or 1949 version — has ever been any more than a shadow diversionsdbk@gmail.com

OPINION

New beginnings to bittersweet ends Lessons from college JOSHUA DOWLING I frequently look back on my initial days at this university. I remember acute fear of having been placed in a quad — three other men with whom to contend.

Days before the start of class, a roommate requested to be reassigned, leading me to worry the worst.

I remember being afraid to let my roommates know I was gay because I was afraid of them letting me know they weren’t OK with gay people. My lack of fast friends often had me wondering if it might not be better to drop out and work instead of attending school, often wondering if the loneliness and displacement were really worth it. Thankfully, as I struggled through my first semester, I slowly situated myself among my peers.

Throughout my four years, I made and lost many friends and acquaintances. I skipped dozens of classes and enjoyed many, many more. I felt challenged by this school in ways I hadn’t considered. At the same time, though, I could always have tried harder, worked smarter and cared more. I often wonder if my seemingly lackluster attitude toward my education was insulting to those who worked harder and more diligently

than me.

A couple of moments stand out to me among all others. A floor mate had told me he met the boy who dropped out of our quad, and that the boy had requested to be removed because he didn’t want to live with a “fag.” My worst fears were confirmed — yet my floor mate smiled on: He called the former roommate-tobe an asshole and walked off.

Another powerful moment: During a multisession group dialogue on samesex marriage, my roommate Mohammad glanced at me cautiously before revealing that before meeting me, he had detested gay people. The act of getting to know me helped him realize gay people were no different from anyone else — that I deserved to be happy in the same way everyone else did, that I had helped him to realize he was wrong. What Mohammad couldn’t have known was that, more than anything else, he made me feel like I finally belonged.

My college experience probably peaked during the first semester of this, my senior year, as I witnessed my friends, family and community rally around Question 6, this state’s samesex marriage referendum. I vaguely remember other moments — birthdays, parties, exams and essays. I remember shaking hands and making promises. I remember hearing friends and ignoring strangers. I remember forgetting.

More than anything else, I remember waking up on the morning of Nov. 6 with a mixture of fear and hope.

Macklemore’s “Same Love” became my anthem for the day. And in those hours, as I watched election results pour in, everything was perfect. Everything was pristine. I knew this tranquility could only come as result of the choices I had made up until that point.

My decision to come to this university was a solid one. It was worth it to overcome the malaise and ennui of my initial weeks. If I have any advice to you, my reader, it is this — pillaged and plagiarized from Henry David Thoreau, a much greater man — “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.” Live unburdened by the restrictive expectations and understandings of others. Live unbridled. You are valid and you are free.

On May 19, I’ll leave this university feeling the same way I came — afraid of new beginnings, worried about friends lost and excited for a new chapter in my life. On May 19, I’ll leave this university feeling the same way I did on Election Day, filled with a melancholic mix of fear and hope, surrounded by friends and family.

Joshua Dowling is a senior government and politics and history major. He can be reached at dowlingj@terpmail.umd.edu.

GUEST COLUMN

Devote time to being a great person

W

hen former sports editor Connor Letourneau contacted me about writing a guest column for The Diamondback, I really only had one question: Why? Of all the people in the university community he could have asked to write a guest column, why in God’s name would he ask me? I thought, “Maybe it’s because the story he wrote about my life helped him finish second in the nation in a journalism competition and this is some kind of show of gratitude.”

But in the process of writing my story, Connor learned that’s not the kind of guy I am. He knows I have no problem telling anyone my story and I have no problem helping people out when they ask for favors — I never expect anything in return. So that couldn’t be the reason he asked me. Then I thought, “Maybe it’s my newfound celebrity since I signed with the Miami Dolphins.”

And then I chuckled because I remembered nobody outside of College Park

knows who I am — or gives a damn, for that matter. Maybe it was because my Twitter account was quoted in The Diamondback a dozen times anyway. Maybe it was because he was too busy spending his last week before he graduates in R.J. Bentley’s (which will forever be secondrate to Cornerstone Grill and Loft; oh, and #RIPSantaFe) to write a column for himself, so he passed it off to me.

However, as I was writing this column while 30,000 feet in the air (shoutout to Kendrick Lamar), I realized the exact reason he asked me to write this column.

He knows I will express myself like no one else because I am the consummate individual. I mean honestly, how many NFL signees do you know who graduated college in three-and-a-half years and began working on their master’s degree while still under scholarship, who have always been a big supporter of the LBGT community, used to perform in musicals in high school and have released five mixtapes since age 14? (Three are

god-awful; one is decent, and the last one, Checkmate, is certainly worth your listen if I do say so myself.)

But here is the problem with that being the reason why I am perfect for writing this guest column: We are all just as unique! I get more publicity than I ever should have because I am an athlete people perceive as “different” because I live my life the way I want to. That’s not a quality that should be admired because it’s a quality we should all have.

My message is simple: Live your life to the fullest. Sixty years from now, when you’re on your deathbed surrounded by the people you love, will you be thinking about all the diets you cheated? All the shots you didn’t take (metaphorically and alcoholically)? All the nights you got eight hours of sleep? As most of you who own a computer and have seen the YouTube video from last week, my entire life changed in a three-minute span.

That’s all it takes.

Love is the most powerful emotion

JAKE DeVIRGILIIS Here is what I learned about writing and what I learned about being a human.

I’ve written a column for this newspaper almost every week for the past three semesters. You teach yourself a lot when you sit down and make yourself think about something. Making yourself communicate whatever you’re thinking in 600 words or fewer to random people who might pick up the newspaper is another great teacher.

Here are five things I learned from writing these columns. It is a list of things I learned about writing and also a list of what I learned about living life while I was in college.

5. You don’t know anything.

One of the most important lessons you can ever learn. the sheer magnitude of knowledge, wisdom, factual information and experiences you will never have is staggering. “Be humble” is decent advice, but the reality of the universe is a humbling fact we all should remember.

My best columns were always questions, explorations — wandering around a topic I knew I didn’t understand. Living is the same wandering, exploring and questioning. Sure, we argue, trust and guess all the time, but the moment you think you know the answer, you’re as far from the truth as you can ever be.

4. Be concise.

A 600-word limit is not a lot of space. If you want to become a better writer, forcing yourself to say it all in 600 words — really thinking about the importance of each word — will make a difference.

If you want to become a better person, a better friend, son, daughter, employee or whatever else, odds

there is. Tell the people you love that you love them every single day. Be nice to people — not because you want anything in return, but just because it genuinely feels good to be nice to people. There is so much negativity in the world, so be a positive influence on people in your life. Whether you believe in God, karma, Buddha, the Dalai Lama or the boogeyman, believe in something and devote your life to being a better person.

If so many great things can happen to a scumbag like me, imagine how great

are you can also be more concise. Try listening more than speaking; you won’t look back.

Using fewer words to say more is key to writing. Try using fewer words to live your life, too — getting rid of labels, letting your actions speak for themselves, listening first and only saying the essentials.

3. Be sincere.

When you write, tell us how you really feel. There is a place for humor and irony and exaggeration (And I think we should leave sarcasm out entirely.), but those are poor substitutes for your honest opinion. It’s tough to put it all out there when you’re writing or talking, but you’ll go farther with sincerity than you will while hiding behind irony.

2. Do what matters to you.

When you care about something, passion reads in what you write. It also reads in what you do. Learn to selfmotivate so you can finish the tasks assigned to you. But nothing motivates like passion.

1. Make it matter to someone else.

As great as it’s been to see work I care about published, there is no more rewarding feeling than knowing it matters to someone else.

I like writing. I make no pretensions that my words will change the world or lead me to a lucrative career. But the overwhelming support I’ve received on so many of these columns has taught me it does matter to someone. I’ve taken something I love to do, brought some giggles and reduced some stress — best feeling in the world.

Life, too, has always been better when I had this in mind: You can make yourself happy all you want, but what you do for others is always the most rewarding.

Thanks, everyone. It’s been an honor to write for you.

Jake DeVirgiliis is a senior government and politics major. He can be reached at j.devirgiliis@gmail.com.

your life can be if you are just a genuinely great person. Good things happen to good people. I loved my time at this university, and if you have my number and you ever need anything, just text me. If you don’t have my number, don’t search for it because that’s honestly just weird. Love you guys. First round after finals at Bentley’s is on Connor.

A.J.Francis is a senior and former Terrapins football defensive end. He can be reached at ajfrancis96@gmail.com.

6

THE DIAMONDBACK | SATURDAY, MAY 11, 2013

Classified RATES 35¢ per word ALL CAPITAL LETTERS Bold Letters

$3.50 minimum 35¢ extra per word 70¢ extra per word

CLASSIFIED DISPLAY ADS • Larger type • Sold in 1” increments • One column wide • $33.00/column inch • Run online at no additional cost OFFICE HOURS 10AM – 4PM Monday – Friday • 3136 South Campus Dining Hall DEADLINES The deadline for ads is 2PM • 2 business days in advance of publication SPECIAL Run the same ad 4 consecutive days and get the 5th day FREE!

All Classified & Classified Display Ads will run online at no additional charge. ¿ ONLINE

To place an ad: PHONE 301-314-8000 | EMAIL advertising@dbk.umd.edu | FAX 301-314-8358 | v m A All ads must be prepaid

EMPLOYMENT Comfort Zone, the fashion-forward College Park retailer, is looking to hire a part-time salesperson. Qualified individual must be computer literate and people oriented. Convenient location – 9721 Baltimore Avenue.

Please forward resume to videoplusmd@gmail.com or call 301-4864548.

Appointment Setters Needed $12 per hour plus commission. Flexible hours. PT or FT. Greenbelt, MD. Email resume to dposner@beltwayblinds.com. www.beltwayblinds.com

Valet Attendant: $8.50 + Gratuity

• Must be able to drive manual transmission

Ramp Coordinator: $11.50/hr.

• FRI. & SAT. nights and Sunday mornings Contact TJ: Tholland@lazparking.com Contact Eric: Egomes@lazparking.com $ Bartending $ – $250/day potential. No experience necessary. Training available. 1800-965-6520 x116.

Paradise for Pets

is seeking part time kennel techs for the summer and beyond.

Work with pets in a fun, outdoor environment. Must have your own transportation and weekends are required. Competitive pay starting at $10/hr., flexible hours. Located in Beltsville, MD.

Please email resumes to paradise4pets@gmail.com or call 301-776-6353.

Design Student Needed!

The University of Maryland Center for Advanced Study of Language (CASL) is seeking an Undergraduate Student to join its IT team as a Multimedia Specialist.

Student must have experience using: Mac OS X; Final Cut or Premiere; After Effects or Motion; Photoshop. Must be able to provide portfolio of video and graphic design work. Must hold U.S. citizenship.

Sophomore or Junior preferred. Position is for the summer and possibly beyond, with a minimum of 20 hours per week. $10-15/hour.

Submit cover letter, resume, and portfolio of relevant work to:

hr@casl.umd.edu.

Personal Trainer Needs

Models/Athletes

The shoot is to create a website and fitness dvds. Experience not required.

Need models of various looks and fitness levels. Get paid to workout.

Email 360fitnessdvd@gmail.com.

Office Coordinator $10-$13 per hr.

Fast-paced office, build your resume, 30-40 hrs./week, no manual labor, fun atmosphere.

Home Visions Inc.

www.homevisionsinc.com 301-937-4663

EMPLOYMENT

Work ON the Beach This Summer!

Are you sick of classes?

Do you want to get paid to work on the beach?

Telescope Pictures and 85&Sunny are looking for dynamic, motivated, and hardworking college students ready to experience the best summer of their lives! We offer an exciting work environment. Housing and paid internships are available! 443-878-2377.

Apply Online NOW:

resortentertainmentgroupinc.com

Clinical Assistant

Part time/Full time. Excellent opportunity for a motivated individual who would like to pursue a career in the medical field and gain clinical experience. We are a cardiology clinic in the College Park area who provide comprehensive cardiology services. Attractive salary is offered ($35,000/yr.).

Please email, fax CV, or call.

Tel: 301-277-2290 Fax: 301-277-1241 Email: ashmuhammad@hotmail.com

Marketing Assistant/

Customer Service

FOR RENT

FOR RENT

House for Rent

Mazza Wishes Congratulations to UMD Graduates!

Townhouse with central AC, washer/dryer. 3 levels, 3 bedrooms, $1900/month. Walking distance to campus – Berwyn House Road.

Mazza GrandMarc Luxury Student Living New Low Rates for Fall 2013 Now Leasing!

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Call 301-792-0207 or 301-879-8178.

5-6 Bedroom House

HOUSES FOR RENT. Close to campus. cphouse4rent.com

Beautiful Cool Spring community. http://coolhousecollege.com/

Contact Don at 301-956-5501.

SFH. College Park. Off University Blvd./Metzerott Road. $2000/month plus utilities. Parking for 4. 1 year lease. Avail. 6/1. Call 410827-5997.

SUMMER SUBLET – One room in 4BR apartment available. Individual bathroom, kitchen, fully furnished, wifi, good roommates, parking garage, partial utility covered, rent negotiable. Call Brandon, 443-845-4267.

One block from campus – early signing bonus: $1000! Plus gas grill with lease signed in two weeks. Three residential houses in University Hills. Available June 1. 5 bedrooms, central ac, dishwasher, washer/dryer.

RENT range from $3100 up. Great location for students in team sports (lacrosse, soccer). Dr. Kruger: 301-408-4801.

WALK TO CAMPUS Apartment. 4502 Guilford Road (not a Knox Box). 3 bedrooms, fireplace, dishwasher and big walkup attic. $1850. 301-699-1863 or email dunnrentals@aol.com.

Walk to campus. 3 bedroom, 2-1/2 baths.

Sleeps 5. $2200. Open June 1st. 410-9257696.

Check Out

CollegeParkHousing.org

for your off campus housing needs

6 Bedroom House 3 blocks to downtown CP. 3.5 BA, hard-

wood floors, front porch, flat screen over the fireplace, W/D, off-street parking, garage. Available August 1. $2700 ($435 per person/month). 301-996-2230.

ROOMMATES Private room – 3 bedroom house of mature females, close, on shuttle. $370/month. 703509-7508.

Established 29 year old Beltsville distributor needs dependable, self-motivated, articulate individual for marketing assistant/customer service position. This individual must be detail oriented, able to multi-task & prioritize workload responsibilities and have terrific organizational skills. Great start in business! Good salary!!

Call 301-595-4627.

Personal Trainer Needs

Videographer

To shoot sports/fitness video. The video will need editing, sound, graphics and directing to create a professional look.

Please email 360fitnessdvd@gmail.com for further details. This is a paying gig.

LIFEGUARDS

FT/PT, flexible schedule. FREE training & competitive pay.

Work in MD, DC, VA, PA.

Call 301-210-4200 x107, aczyszczon@usaquatics.net.

CHILD CARE

After-School Babysitter

Seeking UMD senior or grad student as Fall 2013 after-school babysitter in Bethesda. Hours: Mon.-Thurs., 3-6 pm. Must have own car. Top-of-scale pay; UMD students have loved this job! Interested?

Email: phyllismarcus@verizon.net.

FOR RENT BIKE TO CAMPUS. 5718 Vassar Drive. 5 bedrooms, 3 full bathrooms, 2 kitchens, ac, 2 dishwashers, washer/dryer. 1.58 miles to campus. Shuttle stop .12 from house. Bike path end of street. Free parking spaces available on College Ave. $1895. 301-6991863 or email dunnrentals@aol.com.

Apartments as Low as $549/BR on a 3 Bedroom 1, 2 and 3 Bedroom Apartments Available 6200 Springhill Drive Greenbelt, MD 20770

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All utilities included. Free shuttle service to and from UMD campus. Walk to Metro and Beltway Plaza.

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We have a great software product for offices. All we need are office managers and business owners who will try it. If you know an office manager or business owner, get him/her to try it and get paid $500 if his/her office buys it. For details, call 202-466-0981 or email info@worksol.net today.

SERVICES EDITING / WORDPROCESSING — Theses, dissertations, papers. Style manual specialists. Call 24 hours. 301-474-6000. www.CompuMediaUSA.com/ academic BEST EDITING – dissertation, thesis, or research paper. Call 301-980-9772 or email besteditonline@gmail.com.

PREGNANT? Free confidential pregnancy testing & caring counseling help. www.optionline.org, 1-800-712-HELP. Continue education and career: 1-800-ANGEL-OK.

SATURDAY, MARCH 11, 2013 | THE DIAMONDBACK

7

Features ACROSS 1 Author Lucy -Montgomery 5 “Wayne’s World” pal 10 Earth, poetically 14 Ranch measure 15 Humble 16 Not a repro.

17 Trendy 18 Flat 19 Milan money, once 20 Have second thoughts 22 Roofer’s need 24 Kind of turtle 25 Calf-length 26 Attractive 29 Called from the Alps 33 Banish 34 Helsinki citizen 36 Malt brew 37 Ice hockey team 38 “Star Wars” director 39 Herd of whales 40 Lemony drink 41 City near Des Moines 42 Because of (2 wds.)

44 Bureaucrat’s delight (2 wds.)

47 Desolate

48 49 50 53

Pupil’s place Tractor-trailer Fable Thickens, as fog (2 wds.)

58 Livy contemporary 59 Permit 61 Cyrano’s despair 62 Slick 63 Wield power 64 Chowder morsel 65 Marseilles Ms. 66 Cry of dismay 67 Sean Lennon’s mother

CROSSWORD

27 28 30 31 32 34

Zinc -- ointment Blended Light beer Make happy Fiend Is hopping mad

35 38 42 43 45

Luge surface Gem pro Podium Need for speed Wild T-shirt (hyph.)

DOWN 1 Unit of speed 2 Tooth problem 3 “Mila 18” writer 4 Loudness unit 5 Telescope view 6 Foster a felon 7 Pan’s opposite 8 Mao -- -tung 9 Rowdy ones 10 Ms. Hawn 11 Bone-dry 12 The Emerald Isle 13 Culture dish goo 21 Enameled metal 23 Tote up 25 Caged talkers 26 Romero or Chavez

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46 Son of Val and Aleta 47 Subdued colors 50 Weaver’s frame 51 Black-hearted 52 Fish lung

53 54 55 56 57 60

Neaten the hedge Balcony section Like Lindy’s flight Baroness Karen Verne captain Aloha token

B

HOROSCOPE STELLA WILDER

orn today, you can behave rather abruptly, without so much as a warning or, in many cases, a plan -- but this often gives you the advantage over those who are more careful, thoughtful and slow in their approaches to life’s daily problems. Indeed, being quick is one of your trademarks; you are never one to put off until tomorrow what you can do today -- and even then you are likely to be much faster than most! You can be something of a perfectionist, however, which means that you’re not likely to leave something alone once you’ve done it; rather, you are probably going to go back and see if you can’t make it better in some way -- many times.

You are sometimes driven by a love of profit, but you must remember that profit itself does not always come to you in the form of financial gain.

You must be able to recognize other kinds of profit when they are presented to you -- and be willing and able to take advantage of them.

Also born on this date are: Natasha Richardson, actress; Martha Quinn, MTV VJ; Margaret Rutherford, actress; Martha Graham, dancer and choreographer.

To see what is in store for you tomorrow, find your birthday and read the corresponding paragraph. Let your birthday star be your daily guide.

SUNDAY, MAY 12 TAURUS (April 20-May 20) -You will be questioning your own

motives for a time today, even as you make remarkable progress.

Certain doubts prove stubborn.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20) -You may have to pick up the pace considerably if you’re going to have a project finished on time -- and under budget.

CANCER (June 21-July 22) -You must realize that your primary concerns may not be shared by the powers that be. It’s time to work toward a productive compromise.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22) -- What begins in one vein today is likely to change significantly and end in a very different one. Mood swings, too, are rampant.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22) -You may find yourself thinking about “the way things used to be” a great deal at this time -- but your memory may not be entirely accurate.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22) -What comes naturally and feels right is certainly worth a try, but if you cross paths with someone who is offended, changes must be made.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21) -You may experience some friction

with a friend as a result of a decision you feel you were forced into.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21) -- Now is the time for you to write down what you really think, so that you can keep it on hand for later. You can be brutally honest.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) -- You must be ready for things to turn on a dime today. You have reason to think that someone is throwing you a curve.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18) -You may not fully understand the significance of a certain prevailing metaphor today -- but a friend throws you timely hints.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20) -- You may be tempted to bend the rules just a bit to increase your advantage today, but be aware that someone is looking over your shoulder.

ARIES (March 21-April 19) -- You don’t want to miss out on what may prove to be just the kind of opportunity you’ve been looking for lately. Stay active and involved.

COPYRIGHT 2013 UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE, INC.

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8

THE DIAMONDBACK | diversions | SATURDAY, MAY 11, 2013

LASTING IMPACT | THE OFFICE

bears, beets, battlestar galactica After nine years of being average and thus appealing to TV watchers everywhere, NBC’s The Office says farewell

By Beena Raghavendran Senior staff writer I’m fairly certain that if I took a drive to Scranton, Pa., pulled into the parking lot of the Scranton Business Park and took the elevator up, I would walk into the Dunder Mifflin office.

I’d walk in, and there’d be a bench on my right and a coat hanger, too. There’d be a lobby in front of me, a carpeted lobby where Michael Scott danced in his Levi’s jeans, Dwight Schrute brought in a dead goose for Christmas and Kevin Malone spilled his famous chili.

On my right would be the reception desk, the desk where Jim Halpert met Pam Beesly and Jim fell in love with Pam and Pam was in love with Jim all along.

It was the

desk Erin Hannon inhabited — Erin, who was a bit insecure and didn’t know a thing about being a receptionist, but was bubbly and wonderful and whom people claimed to be in love with, too.

The middle of the office would be inhabited by a rotating cast of characters. The Jim and Dwight seating was my favorite. It’s where, famously, Jim put Dwight’s stapler in Jell-O. It’s where Jim made a pencil fence between his desk and Dwight’s. It’s where he popped the yoga ball Dwight was bouncing on. It’s where Jim pretended to be Dwight, saying, “Bears, beets, Battlestar Galactica.” In the ceiling above the desks, Jim threw Andy Bernard’s phone among the tiles, and when it rang singing “Rockin’ Robin,” it caused Andy to punch a hole in the wall.

Across from the desks would be the regional manager’s office, once inhabited by the legendary Michael Scott, who kept on his desk a mug

that read, “World’s Best Boss” — that he bought for himself. It was there that he lamented over a heartbreak by playing a sample of the James Blunt song “Goodbye My Lover” again and again and again, there that he schemed with Dwight, there that he did hardly any work at all.

The Dunder Mifflin of yore has disappeared; it hasn’t looked the same in years. The cast of characters has rotated in and out of bad writing, mediocre acting and flat plot lines. Ratings have plummeted. Some thought it was a relief when season nine was announced to be its last. Ed Helms brought the show down. James Spader made it creepy. Rainn Wilson and Steve Carell played off one another beautifully initially and worked well until Carell’s departure in season seven. photos courtesy of bwstatic.com and fastcocreate.com photo illustration by mary clare fischer

The Office has been my favorite television show for years. When episodes are great, I’m thrilled. When it’s been subpar, I’ve mourned for it like an old friend.

A poster of Dwight K. Schrute hangs in my room, covered with inspirational phrases such as,“Whenever I’m about to do something, I think, ‘Would an idiot do that?’ And if they would, I do not do that thing.”

We strive to succeed, to one-up ourselves in the race that is life. But sometimes happiness is found in making the best of situations when life deals us humdrum cards. It’s about getting pleasure from the small things in life — the office pranks, the romances, the holiday parties, the hirings and, of course, the firings. It’s a parody of the truisms that make up the majority of lives, telling us that being average is OK in a society that prides itself on success.

“Stop trying and live life simply,” the paper company’s workers preach in a Zen, Dalai Lamaesque spirit, and make the most out of situations. Beyond the series’ Netflix time capsule, the show’s bobbleheads and Dunder Mifflin T-shirts, that mantra will live on. diversionsdbk@gmail.com

SATURDAY, MAY 11, 2013 | THE DIAMONDBACK

9

10

THE DIAMONDBACK | DIVERSIONS | SATURDAY, MAY 11, 2013

PREVIEW | SUMMER MOVIES

LACKLUSTER BLOCKBUSTERS

Another year, another crop of cash-grab sequels and big-budget tentpole films that will make hundreds of millions of dollars despite being terrible

By Zachary Berman Senior staff writer Like clockwork, Hollywood is once again gearing up for its big summer blockbuster season. It’s that special time of year when one movie studio after another attempts to cram its multimillion-dollar franchise installments down the throats of its target demographics.

Between dozens of car chases, explosions and computer-animated monsters, there’s nary a sight audiences haven’t seen before. Yet what do we do, year after year? We throw down our cash in salute to this business model of lifeless regeneration.

Sure, not every blockbuster of 2013 promises to be a waste — J.J. Abrams’ (Super 8) Star Trek Into Darkness, Guillermo del Toro’s (Hellboy II: The Golden Army) Kaiju epic Pacific Rim and Neill Blomkamp’s follow-up to the Academy Award-nominated District 9, Elysium, all look stellar.

The rest, however, are just a big mess of genre cliches and pointless retreads of otherwise-dead franchises.

Below is a list of some of this summer’s worst blockbuster prospects.

Nothing is set in stone, of course — some of these just might turn out to be great — but chances are, these movies won’t be anything worth writing home about, massive budgets

be damned.

Keep your wallet where you can see it:

versal Pictures has already greenlit Fast & Furious 7.

The Hangover Part III — May 24 Fast & Furious 6 — May 24

Just admit it already: The original The Hangover is not as funny Of all the films on this as you remember. Sure, list, the sixth installits cutesy sing-alongs ment in the Fast & and Mike Tyson Furious franchise knockouts defined is the hardest to 2 0 0 9 ’s p o p predict. Granted, culture landmost entries in scape, but really, the series have most people only been awful — laughed because need I remind they like to think you of The Fast they’ve had nights and the Furious: that were equally as Tokyo Drift? — mixing legendary. After the dreadludicrous self-seriousness with an internal logic photo courtesy of geeklegacy.com ful deja vu of The Hangover so inconsistent that Vin Diesel had to Part II, wouldn’t we just be better off sit back for a few films to work it all with a brand new franchise? Director out. That being said, with the most Todd Phillips has promised the third recent installment, Fast Five, longtime installment will be a change of pace, franchise director Justin Lin finally including people actually dying for realized the intrinsic stupidity of the first time in the series. Yes, Philthe series and embraced it, creating lips, when people talk about Part II not a movie focused on awe-inspiring being good, the first thing that comes action sequences and tongue-in- to mind is the lack of death. cheek nods to the audience. It was a good show, but the question remains: How many times can we see fast cars smashing together before we are comAfter Earth — May 31 pletely desensitized? At least twice You would have thought M. Night more, apparently — incredibly, Uni- Shyamalan had burned every last bridge

in Hollywood when the absolutely abysmal The Last Airbender bombed in 2010, but alas, he’s returned again with After Earth. (Unlike all his other films, Shyamalan’s lighting rod name is mentioned nowhere in the promotional material.) The film stars a bored-looking Will Smith (Men in Black 3) and his son, Jaden Smith (The Karate Kid), as a father and son duo trapped on a hostile planet that should look familiar to anyone who has seen Avatar. Between the cheaplooking computer-generated creatures chasing the duo and the elder Smith’s ham-fisted “fear is a choice” speech, After Earth feels more like a birthday present from father to son than a worthwhile movie experience. Couldn’t the Smiths have just gone out for laser tag and saved us all the trouble?

World War Z — June 21 There’s been a lot of negative press surrounding this big-budget adaptation of Max Brooks’ best-selling zombie apocalypse novel World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, all of which has been merited. Suffering through long production delays, numerous script rewrites and infighting among the crew, this loose take on a fantastic novel felt tired long before any trailers were released. When audiences finally got a glimpse of the film, they were shocked — zombies

crash over one another in laughable “waves” of bodies that the distractingly implausible couple of Brad Pitt (Killing Them Softly) and Mireille Enos (Gangster Squad) evade — and so on.

If this apparent travesty isn’t the end of the zombie fad as we know it, then we may permanently succumb to the genre after all.

The Lone Ranger — July 3 For all intents and purposes, we may as well be calling The Lone Ranger by its true name: Pirates of the Caribbean Go West. Let’s run through the facts: The Lone Ranger is a film distributed by Disney, rebooting a well-known character under the direction of Gore Verbinski (Rango) and starring Johnny Depp (Dark Shadows) as an eccentric nomad. A whopping $250 million later, we’re left with what appears to be a loud, aimless self-parody of the successes of the original Pirates of the Caribbean. Either Verbinski and Depp have pulled a fast one on Disney and recreated the same film from scratch, or Disney is hoping to pull a fast one on all of us and simply take our scratch. diversionsdbk@gmail.com

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For more, visit diamondbackonline.com

A New View of UMD with Monumental Helicopters

Fly the Maryland Terps Tour Show your UMD ID and we’ll fly into DC’s Flight Restricted Zone to Terrapin territory! See the UMD campus, DC’s skyline, Goddard Space Flight Center, and Fedex Redskins stadium.

202-570-HELI (4354) 410-491-HELI (4354)

www.monumentalhelicopters.com/TERPS

saturDAY, may 11, 2013 | news | THE DIAMONDBACK

NEIGHBORS From PAGE 1 The draft presented to the council was open to the public on the city’s website until Tuesday, and a final draft will serve as a starting point for the complex problems the city and university are preparing to address in the coming months.

The suggestions in the draft encompass the efforts of four separate sub-task forces that met over the course of the semester to develop solutions for specific areas of concern — issue reduction, homeownership, community building and housing diversity.

They offered a mixture of long- and short-term projects for city officials, local landlords, university officials and students.

ISSUE REDUCTION After contentious debate, the task force finalized a list of goals to heighten noise control enforcement, install city surveillance cameras, establish clear rental property regulations and offer more university-sponsored entertainment to keep student parties from getting out of control in the neighborhoods.

Arguments arose over the group’s recommendations on how to handle noise issues.

Some membersof the workgroup thought fines and a larger code enforcement staff would help alleviate the issue of loud student parties, while others said the idea unfairly blamed students instead of calling for a collaborative effort.

“Increasing the fines isn’t going to change anything; it’s just going to agitate the people who are getting fined,” said Josh Ratner, Student Government Association city council liaison.

The greatest change in student behavior will come from the students themselves, Ratner said.

Through cooperating with groups such as the Interfraternity Council, a group that governs this univer-

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sity’s fraternities, and with an expanded Code of Student Conduct, students would be more likely to hold themselves and their peers accountable, he said.

University officials seemed to be most receptive to those ideas, and some of the stakeholders have already begun implementing strategies proposed by the task force, District 1 Councilman Patrick Wojahn said.

The University Senate passed legislation Sunday to extend the Code of Student Conduct, which will enable the Office of Student Conduct to punish student misbehavior on and off the campus.

Although the expansion was not linked to the work group’s suggestions, it shows the university’s priorities are in line with the city’s goals, said Stephanie Stullich, District 3 councilwoman.

Some campus student groups, such as the Residence Hall Association, have expressed reservations about the expansion, fearing the possibility of “double jeopardy” and university sanctions for minor offenses such as underage drinking. But university officials said the legislation will benefit students and residents by providing a safety net for assault victims and encouraging a positive residential environment.

“If there is misconduct off campus that directly impacts the university, we’re not going to push the problem farther and farther out of the city boundaries,” said Andrea Goodwin, student conduct director and task force member. “By and large, I think there’s a lot of sentiment around the table that we need to keep working towards these resolutions so we really can improve the quality of life in the city.”

COMMUNITY BUILDING Tasked with brainstorming ideas to foster friendly relationships between students and their older neighbors, the community-building task force focused on encouraging

student organizations to value city involvement.

The Greek life community received significant backlash in years past for throwing large house parties and failing to develop a respectful relationship with neighbors. As a result, the Interfraternity Council and the work group’s Greek life representative, Greg Waterworth, invested a significant amount of time in city affairs over the past semester, working with university officials to organize oncampus tailgating during football season and setting up an adopt-aroad program in Old Town College Park. At the forum, IFC members proposed requiring fraternities to include community-building work in the pledging process.

“I think that’s important for the city to see, as well as all the other members of the work group, that students are here at the table and we want to be involved,” said SGA President Samantha Zwerling.

Additionally, the SGA established a city committee in March to address off-campus issues in the upcoming school year.

With an organized structure of governance and regulations, the Greek organizations could be an effective way for students to self-regulate issues off the campus, Ratner said.

Some residents, such as Calvert Hills Civic Association President John Rigg, said they believe the relationship between students and residents off the campus appears straightforward — when this is simply not the case.

“The majority of people in the neighborhood recognize that we live in a college town,” Rigg said.

“There are many opportunities to work collaboratively together as a community.”

Members sought to address the complicated market for offcampus student housing, noting a need to enforce the appropriate city codes of rental properties.

Over-occupancy has allowed more than five individuals to live in a rented home at a time, and although this lowers the monthly rate, it also becomes a safety hazard for renters, according to work group members.

The first draft of proposals calls for uniform language on leasing applications, forcing renters to abide by city codes. In recent years, homeowners have been inclined to rent their homes because of the potential profits, though the city hopes to attract long-term residents who will benefit the local economy. To increase home ownership, the task force proposed a campaign to market university amenities, the College Park Academy and the possibility of home ownership grants to potential residents.

MOVING FORWARD The next step, according to Stullich, is the implementation of these ideas by the separate bodies involved.

“The ultimate proof of whether this process was effective will be if we see changes actually adopted and implemented and changing the patterns of behavior,” she said. “It sort of takes a while for all of this to come to pass, but at this point I think we have a really good set of strategies to work on.”

SPORTS

TILLMAN From PAGE 14 so I don’t think people realize what I’m doing off the field. But if I’m not doing those things, I feel like I’m not setting a good example for my players.”

WINNING ONE

“Coach Tillman always talks about enjoying the process,” long pole Jesse Bernhardt said in February. “So we try to put our effort into each step of the process before moving on to the next step.”

Those two qualities have helped the Terps achieve plenty of success. They’ve reached the national title game in both of Tillman’s first two seasons at the helm, and they enter this year’s NCAA tournament as the No. 6 seed with a matchup against Cornell looming tomorrow.

But for all his accomplishments, Tillman still hasn’t delivered a national championship to College Park. The team fell short the past two seasons, and pressure is mounting on the program, which earned its last title in 1975, despite reaching the tournament 31 times since then.

“It’s tough,” Tillman said.

“You know how much it would mean to our state, our school and our alumni and our kids to win a championship.”

Tillman, though, is dedicated to ending the team’s 37-year drought. Just like he did on the blacktop in Corning 30 years earlier, he’ll use his intuition to approach the problem and work endlessly to solve it.

“I feel very fortunate, just like I did 20 years ago, to be doing something that I love and that I’m passionate about,” Tillman said. “I still can’t wait to get to work every day.”

When Terps midfielder Jake Bernhardt scored the game’s first goal in an 18-6 victory over Colgate in the regularseason finale May 4, the sideline erupted. Players shoved one another, leaped and screamed in what the team calls the “Maryland mosh pit.”

Opposing coaches said that enthusiasm comes from the slim, unassuming man standing a few feet away from the ruckus. The unimposing Tillman stands about six feet tall. His players often tease him about his typical outfit: plain black sneakers, khakis, a Terps polo and a matching baseball cap.

He’s friendly, too, always eager to strike up discussions with fans, opponents or reporters.

Yet the fire and passion his team displays is tough to match.

“That energy comes from leadership,” Meade said.

“John’s got a certain way that he does things, and it elicits very positive responses from the kids that he coaches.”

Tillman also possesses a precise attention to detail, mapping out sportsdbk@gmail.com every step his team will take.

newsumdbk@gmail.com

CORRECTION

HOUSING AND RENT STABILIZATION

Due to reporting errors in Thursday’s article, “U. officials plan mental health fund staff hires,” how Get Help UMD was created, when money will be made available to the university’s mental health services and who provided the money were incorrect.

Two separate task forces have addressed the issues of homeownership and housing diversity, as the city continues to push rent stabilization in the neighborhoods.

Two students began Get Help UMD in a social change class outside of the Student Government Association, Active Minds and the Help Center; the state did not provide the money; and the money will be made available in $500,000 increments beginning on July 1 for the next 10 years.

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THE DIAMONDBACK | NEWS | saturDAY, MAY 11, 2013

renters From PAGE 1 including the University View and Domain at College Park. That gradual urbanization has helped revitalize the business scene, Stullich said.

Catering to a younger population, the city opened its first vegetarian/vegan restaurant this semester, as well as a Mediterranean eatery and a barbecue smokehouse.

“We have more than just pizza and beer,” Stullich said.

Still, Stullich said she leaves the ZIP code for most nights out.

“People look at something like Busboys and Poets in Hyattsville and say, ‘Why can’t we have that in College Park?’” she said. “We’re moving in a good direction, but we need to continue that trend.”

Although some city officials described relative harmony between

students and long-term residents, several older residents said problems have recently become insufferable.

Since she moved here 18 years ago, Stullich said noise complaints, crime and loud parties have significantly increased, leading the city council to create a Neighborhood Stabilization and Quality of Life Workgroup this year to explore the extent of the issues and propose ideas to address them.

“It’s a problem when parties disrupt your day or night, if you have trouble sleeping because of the loudness or if it’s a nice Saturday afternoon and you can’t enjoy being in your yard because the yelling or music is so loud,” she said.

Problems also include vandalism and public urination, said Bob Ryan, the city’s public services director.

Some houses lock their bathrooms to prevent partygoers from dirtying them, and “after a couple

of drinks, they end up peeing on yards,” he said.

Relations between students and residents are not always fraught with tension, however.

On a late-April Sunday afternoon, city resident Bill Coleman stood in the parking lot across from City Hall, joking with a group of students and older residents. During the second week of the College Park Farmers Market, Coleman cooked barbecue, as he does every weekend at the market.

“Having a barbecue business, I get to know most of the kids overall,” he said. “I tell them, ‘You treat me good, I’ll treat you good.’”

When Coleman and his wife first moved to their house on Dickinson Avenue 15 years ago, almost every house was owner-occupied. Now, all but two houses are rentals, he said.

The former Marine is raising his two granddaughters, and Coleman said

it’s not always easy for them to live alongside so many students.

“You all write in the [Diamondback], ‘How come the residents hate us?’” he said. “You want to know why? Come on Friday and Saturday mornings; let me walk you through my neighborhood. Do you think we’re the ones with the bottles on the sidewalk? Do you think the pee stains on the walls are what we’re doing on the sides of our house?”

He’s seen it all: Years ago, a student was stabbed at a party and died on Coleman’s front lawn.

“He was in my driveway, stumbled, and that was it,” Coleman said. “Those things should not happen. The parties, everything else, the people who just don’t think about what they’re doing, especially if they have drinks.”

On Berwyn Road, flowerpots and wind chimes add to a small-

town feeling. In restaurant Fishnet, Johnson and her 6-year-old daughter sat near a table of college students.

“You get off of Route 1, and you have a nice little feel in the neighborhoods,” Coleman said. “The farmers market helps … There was a good mix of students and residents.”

In North College Park, Johnson said, relations with students have improved. She sees dog walkers, stroller pushers and bike riders.

“I don’t see the same kinds of problem people. Maybe they’re more responsible,” she said. “I’m home at nights, and things used to wake me up at night. That doesn’t happen anymore … In general, it’s nice to see students around.”

University President Wallace Loh “reinvigorated” the city-university partnership, Stullich said.

One example is the College Park Academy Charter School, set to

open in the fall, she said, and the university is looking into expanding University Police jurisdiction and creating programs to encourage more faculty to live in the city.

The off-campus Code of Student Conduct expansion is also a “giant step” forward, Ryan said.

“The message that sends to students is that you represent the university wherever you are,” he said.

As students pack the city, Stullich said she’s concerned about the spike in problems. But she’s also hopeful Loh will help build positive university-city relations. As the city offers new retail and housing options, Stullich said she hopes mutual respect will also grow between the college-age renters and the families and older residents living next door.

“It’s important that College Park can be a place for people of all ages to feel comfortable,” she said.

newsumdbk@gmail.com

saturDAY, may 11, 2013 | news | THE DIAMONDBACK

hotel From PAGE 1 company found demand for a high-quality hotel in College Park.

“Many institutions fall in the trap of designing their campus from the inside out, and they end up putting some of the least attractive uses on the edges,” said Omar Blaik, founder and CEO of U3 Ventures. Blaik called the hotel and conference center plans a first step in bridging the gap between the campus and the surrounding community.

Campus officials have discussed the possibility of adding a hotel and conference center for some time and previously considered building it on East Campus.

“It’s our sense that this part of the city of College Park is underserved with respect to a higherend hotel,” Specter said. “There really isn’t a place to receive visitors for overnight stay.”

Officials have marked the area

close to the Rossborough Inn on the west side of Route 1 as a potential location for the hotel, and the university is beginning to solicit hotel developers for the project.

Specter estimated the cost of the hotel could range from $80 million to $140 million.

University officials said a hotel and conference center will be beneficial not just to students and their parents but to academic departments as well.

“One of the big opportunities is to expand the conference space so that academic units who often send their best faculty away … It would be nice to be able to host those professional societies in our own hotel,” Specter said.

The hotel could also have a major impact on staffing, he added. “[It] makes it so much easier when we go to fill a faculty vacancy in one of our departments when they already know something about the university because they came here for a professional meeting in their

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discipline,” Specter said.

The hotel would be able to accommodate visiting teams and fans for athletic events and could host wedding receptions.

“There are regularly hundreds of weddings that happen in the chapel by alumni who love to make the connection back to where they went to college,” Blaik said.

The university now uses Stamp Student Union and other facilities as conference spaces, but attendees have to stay at the UMUC Marriott, at the Greenbelt Marriott or in downtown Washington.

A hotel and conference center will allow for larger, more prestigious conferences, Specter said.

“If we had, say, 200 hotel rooms in this hotel and wanted to bring in, say, 400 conferees, we could partner with the UMUC Marriott to house all of the conferees on our campus,” Specter said.

Jayanth Banavar, computer, mathematical and natural sciences college dean, said a hotel

and conference center could house his school’s guests, visitors and visiting faculty within walking distance of the campus.

“It would allow us to hold highprofile conferences and workshops, which would bring us great visibility,” Banavar said. “It would improve the well-being of our students by allowing them to interact with world-class visitors and participate in exciting conferences, it would improve the quality of research on campus, and it would make us a better university.”

In his time at the University of Pennsylvania, Blaik oversaw the Inn at Penn, a 243-room hotel, which was instrumental in leveraging about $600 million in private development around the Penn campus, he said.

“We saw the impact of it,” he said. “That hotel is one of the most successful hotels in Philadelphia.

During alumni weekends and homecomings and graduations and many other days, it’s full with campus-related activities.”

University officials are also looking to repurpose the Rossborough Inn, a historical structure on the campus. Admissions offices are located in the building now, but it could soon house an extended-stay wing of the hotel, an art gallery or a visitor center.

“Whatever we would do, we would have to make sure that the potential use of the Rossborough is consistent with the constraints that we’ll have on changing the structure with regard to its historic status, make sure what we do, we do well and we do consistent with that status,” Specter said.

In addition to the hotel and conference center, university officials are working toward other goals on the campus and in community development, such as public safety, education, real estate and transportation.

“Some things take longer in the natural course of things, and there are other things that we can affect much more quickly, and we’re

focusing on the places where we can make the most impact the soonest,” Specter said.

Other anchor projects, such as the Toll Brothers apartment complex that will replace the Knox Boxes, a charter school launching in the fall and the expansion of jurisdiction for University Police to include the Crystal Springs region, the Lakeland neighborhood and The Varsity and University View high rises are still in the works, officials said.

“The university has ascended magnificently in the last decade, and we believe that we have the role and the responsibility to assist the community around us also at a magnificent pace,” Specter said. “We think if it’s good for the community, it’s good for the university. It helps us in every way, and we aren’t doing this independently of the community, we’re doing it with the community.” newsumdbk@gmail.com

MORE ONLINE FISHNET OWNER BRINGS TASTE OF THE MEDITERRANEAN TO COLLEGE PARK Walking into Fishnet, one almost catches a whiff of the Mediterranean.

Those shores were the inspiration for owner Ferhat Yalcin’s award-winning Berwyn Road seafood restaurant, a hole in the wall tucked away on a leafy street lined with small, colorful houses, an old bell tower and an herb shop.

At Fishnet, Yalcin hopes the fresh fish sandwiches, unique flavors and relaxing, airy atmosphere convey to customers a sense of Turkey’s “fish and bread,” a street food he enjoyed while growing up in Istanbul. As a child, he’d go down to the waterline in the mornings to eat fish straight off fishermen’s boats.

“You could just go up on small boats, and the fishermen catch the fish in the mornings and they pull them to shore, clean it … and either cook it or fry it on the boat,” Yalcin said. “You get a piece of bread; in the bread you get grains, onions and cooked fish — and it was delicious.”

To read more of Annika McGinnis’ story, visit diamondbackonline.com.

USM MUST JUSTIFY SPENDING TO GENERAL ASSEMBLY TO RECEIVE FULL FUNDING The University System of Maryland will have to tell the General Assembly how it plans to use new state funds secured in this year’s state budget, illustrative of a much more serious call by some legislators to produce results from state money.

This year, the system received a 7.5 percent increase in its funding from 2012. Included was $24 million to enroll more STEM students, fund the MPower the State initiative — the alliance between this university and the University of Maryland, Baltimore approved in fall 2012 — and explore technology-driven course redesign. However, the General Assembly would restrict $14.9 million until the system submits a report describing how it would be used and how progress will be measured.

“The General Assembly is very interested in ensuring that we’re spending money on worthwhile things,” said Zach Cohen, USM Student Council chairman. “I.e. making sure that [we] actually do increase the number of STEM graduates, that we do have these MPowering initiatives and tech transfer and that we do redesign courses.” file photo/the diamondback

To read more of Jim Bach’s story, visit diamondbackonline.com.

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THE DIAMONDBACK | sports | saturday, may 11, 2013

TILLMAN From PAGE 18 and not a lock to get onto the field, but he was desperate to play.

So when coaches explained they wanted a goalkeeper, he became enamored with the position. He worked and studied until he started.

Then, when Corning West needed a defender, he learned to play defense. Eventually, he played offense, too.

“If that was my ticket onto the field,” Tillman said, “I was just like, ‘OK no problem. I’ll do it.’”

T i l l m a n ’s ve rsa t i l i ty, a product of his plucky mentality and intellectual ability, led him to the college ranks. After a year as a backup goaltender at Colgate, Tillman decided to attend Cornell in 1988 to join the Ivy League school’s prestigious hotel administration program.

He was determined to play lacrosse for the Big Red, but it wouldn’t be easy. Cornell had reached the national title game in each of the previous two seasons, and National Lacrosse Hall of Fame coach Richie Moran wasn’t actively looking for players, so he didn’t recruit Tillman.

Yet in the fall, the Corning native impressed Moran in open tryouts with his overwhelming energy and made a strong case to earn a roster spot in the spring.

Still, there wasn’t room for another goalkeeper on the team.

“I had to be pretty up-front with him,” Moran said. “We already had two outstanding goalkeepers, and it didn’t look like John would get much of an opportunity. So subsequently, we moved him to a defensive position.”

Tillman yet again transitioned to new positions on the lacrosse field, playing long pole and short stick defense. But he didn’t care.

All that mattered was competing out on the field.

He played a significant role on the squad as a starting defender in his junior and senior seasons. By the time Tillman graduated in 1991, Moran knew he had the makings of a promising coach.

“We wanted our players to be almost like coaches on the field,” Moran said. “We wanted them to make on-field adjustments and be able to improvise.

That’s something that John did very well.”

NAVY BLUE Meade needed an assistant lacrosse coach at the U.S. Naval Academy in 1995. So he asked fellow coaches for recommendations.

“Everyone that I talked to would give me different names,” Meade said. “But everybody gave me John’s name.”

So Meade hired Tillman, who had worked as an assistant coach at Division III Ithaca just a few miles from the Cornell campus for the four previous years. The

aspiring coach was immediately thrust into an extraordinarily hectic situation, but the following 12 years at Navy ingrained core values into his personality that define his identity today.

At Navy, athletic coaches teach classes, too. In addition to Tillman’s hefty workload as a Midshipmen assistant coach, he also taught combat and physical education classes.

Tillman, already an assiduous worker, felt inspired to work as hard as the students he taught and coached.

“They — every semester — work 18 hours a day, do their military stuff and then play lacrosse,” Tillman said. “Doing things the right way was really important, and that rubs off on you.”

In his first few years in Annapolis, Tillman also played semiprofessional lacrosse on weekends and worked out frequently. He was a volunteer assistant his first year and made just $2,400 in the next few seasons, and he took on various part-time jobs — working as a mover, delivering pizzas, participating in sleep studies — to pay the bills. Combined with the demands of coaching, it seemed he should have been wiped out come nighttime.

Still, he obsessed over game planning and film study. Meade eve n re m e m b e rs T i l l m a n staying up past 4 a.m. after losses, trying to formulate adjustments the team could make.

“My parents were a little

concerned,” T illman said. “[They] were like, ‘Wait, what’s your plan?’”

Meade showed concern for his assistant, who never seemed to make any time for himself.

“The people that know John well think that he’s a wonderful guy and hope that he branches out in other parts of his life,” Meade said. “I don’t think that’s a negative thing. It’s just the way John chooses to do things.”

T h e s i t u a t i o n a t Nav y, though, thrilled Tillman.

“I knew it was my passion,” Tillman said. “I didn’t care what it was worth. I felt like I was the luckiest guy on Earth, doing exactly what I wanted to do.”

NEXT STEP Tillman’s Ivy League intelligence and diligent work ethic quickly vaulted him up the coaching ranks. During his 12 years in Annapolis, Navy complied a 104-63 record, and, in 2004, Tillman helped the Midshipmen earn a berth in the national title game by directing the country’s third-ranked scoring offense.

He developed quite the reputation.

“Everyone that you will ever talk to about John will tell you he’s a very hard worker and prepares very, very well,” Meade said. “And

he’s also great with the players.”

In the mid-2000s, Tillman fielded various offers for head coaching positions.

It would take a lot for a school to pry him away from Navy, but when Harvard offered Tillman its head coaching job in summer 2007, he couldn’t pass up the chance to return to the lacrosserich Ivy League.

“He looked like the coach at Harvard. He talked like the coach at Harvard,” Meade said.

“They really had to hire him.”

THE REASON WHY In mid-April, Tillman sat at his desk in a Comcast Center office decorated with trophies, newspaper clippings and pictures honoring past Terps teams, trying to explain why his job warranted endless hours of time and full-blown obsession.

Then he smiled, turned around in his office chair and pointed to a picture of the 2011 Terps huddled around the ACC championship trophy they earned in Durham, N.C. That year — Tillman’s first in College Park after compiling a 20-19 record over three seasons at Harvard — former Terps attackman Ryan Young’s mother, Maria, battled pancreatic cancer.

Young notched three points in that ACC title contest, exactly

one week after his mother died.

“It was an important thing for our kids to see how we supported Ryan, how we supported each other and how we can get through adversity,” Tillman said. “That was probably my greatest moment.”

“I just remember how much we all played for Ryan,” added Terps midfielder Landon Carr, then a sophomore. “It was really special for all of us.”

The combination of on-field success and helping studentathletes’ personal lives makes coaching Tillman’s ideal job.

But as a head coach, he’s made even more sacrifices.

His daunting work schedule isn’t relegated to the regular season, either. Lauded as one of the sport’s top recruiters, he pulled in the nation’s No. 3 recruiting class in his last season at Harvard. In the summer, he runs Ultimate Performance Lacrosse camps.

Still, Tillman — who lives as a bachelor in Bethesda — stays even-keeled. He works out, reads novels and visits Washington museums on the rare occasion he wants to let his mind drift from lacrosse.

“I put a lot of time in, but I think having balance in life is important,” Tillman said. “I don’t talk a lot about that stuff, See TILLMAN, Page 11

SATURDAY, MAY 11, 2013 | THE DIAMONDBACK

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THE DIAMONDBACK | sports | saturday, may 11, 2013

WHITE From PAGE 18 White said. “Pretend that I was up at bat. Pretend that I was on base, trying to get reads off of pitchers, trying to steal bases because I knew in the future I would be working towards that.”

A PERFECT FIT White entered 2013 a polished player. He was faster than he’d ever been and smarter, too. He understood pitchers’ tendencies and developed versatile approaches to stealing bases.

And Szefc, hired in July, brought an offense to the Terps ideal for White’s style.

The former Kansas State coach manages “small ball.”

Every player in the batting order is expected to bunt and steal, regardless of the situation —

exactly what the 5-foot-9, 178pound White has been doing since Little League.

“As a smaller player, you have to make yourself stick out,” Charlie’s father, Brian White, said. “And he did that with speed, bunting, getting on base and just playing scrappy.”

A speedy left-handed batter with soft hands, White can place the ball down the third-base line with precision and make it to first base without drawing a throw.

“It’s such a weapon to have,” White said. “If I get a bunt down a day, that keeps me out of slumps.”

White has flourished under Szefc, who has compared his center fielder to former major league center fielder Lenny Dykstra. The first-year coach gives White the green light to steal virtually every time he’s on base — which is often, considering his .357 batting average and .451 on-base percentage —

allowing him to put his improved speed and techniques into action.

“He runs, he can bunt, he steals bases, he doesn’t strike out much, and he normally hits in the clutch pretty well and gives us good defense,” Szefc said. “I mean, that is exactly what you’re looking for in a college baseball player.”

In Monday night’s series finale at No. 19 Clemson, White went 4-for-5 with two RBIs in a nationally televised contest on ESPNU. It was just another episode in a season that capped a comeback and built on a promising career.

After this past year, though, White is just happy to be at home on the base paths.

“I learned you can’t take anything for granted on the baseball field,” White said, “because in any instant, it can be taken away from you.” sportsdbk@gmail.com

CUMMINGS From PAGE 17 down in the 2012 IAAM final, Robinson knew whom he wanted to make the final play.

With everything — the l e n g t hy w i n n i n g s t rea k , another championship and the prestigious No. 1 ranking — at stake, Cummings had one last chance.

She desperately fired the ball toward the net. The goalkeeper had no chance.

“She put a huge exclamation point and closed the door on a phenomenal career,” Robinson said. “It was a statement: I’m the best player in the country, and look what I just did.”

ALL ABOUT THE RINGS Cummings knows her father’s story of being confined to his bed by a mysterious illness quite well, and she’s already started to look to the next step in her life.

She doesn’t know what her future holds, but she wants to be prepared for the end of her playing career.

So she currently works as an assistant coach for her old mentor Scott Robinson’s seventh-grade club team.

“I turned the offense over to her,” Robinson said. “Those girls idolize her. You could tell, whatever she says, they make eye contact and grasp everything she says.”

But for now, Cummings is a

collegiate lacrosse player and the ACC Freshman of the Year.

She doesn’t play lacrosse with the intent of accumulating individual honors, though.

She wants to see her team succeed. She wanted to win when she bullied her way through second-grade basketball and when she led McDonogh to four IAAM “A” conference championships. Tomorrow, the No. 1-seed Terps begin the familiar postseason march for their 11th championship in the NCAA tournament second round.

“We want four national championships,” Cummings said. “If you can’t win the big thing, then why even play?” sportsdbk@gmail.com

saturday, MAY 11, 2013 | Sports | THE DIAMONDBACK

17

WOMEN’S LACROSSE

Understanding her time Cummings brings championship pedigree to College Park

By Joshua Needelman Staff writer For 22 hours a day, Michael Cummings was relegated to the dreary shelter of the bedsheets and pillows of his bedroom.

It was 1988, and he was supposed to be preparing for his sophomore year with the William & Mary men’s soccer team. But instead of logging tireless hours lifting weights and sprinting across the turf, Cummings lay stricken by an unknown illness in his bed day after day, put on 30 pounds, redshirted and spent a year away from the Tribe.

Simply leaving his room was a taxing endeavor. Step-

ping foot on a soccer field was a pipe dream — Cummings just wanted to live.

Six months later, he finally recovered. He rejoined the Tribe a year after falling ill and would go on to earn team MVP his senior year.

Cummings never figured out the cause of the illness, but it would change his life: The lessons he learned while cooped up in bed would help shape the foundation for one of the most decorated all-around high school athletes in the history of this state. “ I l e a r n e d t h a t yo u ’ re not invincible,” Cummings said. “Things could change

quickly, and negatively.”

Six years later, Cummings and his wife, Carol, gave birth to their first daughter, Taylor.

Taylor Cummings eventually followed in her father’s footsteps, playing collegiate athletics at the highest level for the Terrapins women’s lacrosse team.

Her potential was evident when she played basketball in elementary school, and it transitioned into her youth lacrosse career.

Soon, the accolades poured in with Under Armour All-America honors and the 2011 and 2012 Baltimore Sun Athlete of the Year awards. But she knows she

could lose it all at a moment’s notice. All she has to do is look across the dinner table.

“You have to work for everything you get,” Cummings said.

“It can be taken away from you just like that.”

‘EXCLAMATION POINT’ McDonogh and Maryvale were tied, 11-11, late in the 2012 Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland “A” conference championship.

“I’m not sure I breathed during the last 30 seconds,” Michael Cummings said.

Taylor Cummings starred for McDonogh, the nation’s topranked high school team competing for its fourth consecutive conference championship.

But with the accolades came pressure. Cummings, the topranked player in the nation,

likely had the highest expectations placed on her.

“I get nervous before every game,” Cummings said. “But once the first draw happens, it goes away. I just worry about the game.”

But now, there was even more on the line. McDonogh boasted a 68-game winning streak and several future Division I players.

Cummings was prepared for this moment, though. She’d been around great players, battling older stars in practice since she first stepped on the turf at McDonogh’s Owings Mills campus.

“Every single day, she gave them fits,” McDonogh coach Chris Robinson said. “She was just coming and coming. You saw she had that type of potential. You don’t see freshmen play that way.”

At that point, the 14-year-old Cummings’ athletic ability was

still raw. She didn’t start during her freshman season but was a valuable asset for the IAAM champions.

She started by the time she was a sophomore. Cummings wasn’t a verbal leader, but her potential turned into advanced lacrosse skills.

After leading her team to another league championship, Cummings entered her junior year as the nation’s top player, a title she would carry through a third championship campaign into her senior year.

“By the time she was a senior, she had become a leader,” Robinson said. “She learned the ability to create off the dodge and help teammates. She was like Michael Jordan in the way that she made everyone better.”

So as the game clock wound See CUMMINGS, Page 16

SOFTBALL SISTERS

ON THE WEB

Kaitlyn and Lindsey Schmeiser go from training in their barn to the Terrapins softball team. For more, visit diamondbackonline.com.

Sports

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Page 18

Saturday, may 11, 2013

MEN’S LACROSSE

Working TilL he wins it

Driven Tillman uses unique problem-solving ability, work ethic to lead one of nation’s top programs

By Aaron Kasinitz Senior staff writer

It seemed every kid in Corning, N.Y., was on the same blacktop, trying to join the same pickup basketball game. There wasn’t much else to do in the small town in the early 1980s, so 20 to 30 middle schoolers would trek to the local park each summer morning, choose teams and play until sunset.

John Tillman often watched those games from the sidelines.

He was a late bloomer, weighing just 95 pounds as a high school freshman, and he typically wasn’t chosen to play in the pickup games. He’d stay at the park all day, waiting until someone got tired or needed to go home and a spot on a team opened.

Tillman wanted so badly to be one of the first 10 players picked. He grew obsessed with finding a way to get onto the court. He refused to accept a fate — albeit in pickup basketball — decided by his peers.

He wasn’t the biggest or quickest player, but Tillman wanted to be an unselfish distributor who understood the game, a tireless defender who displayed tremendous effort. He worked until he became those things. Soon, he didn’t have to worry about waiting for the numbers to dwindle before finding his team.

“People wanted to play with those guys who played the defense and get everybody else involved,” Tillman said. “So once I did that, people were like, ‘Yeah, I’ll take you.’”

That ascent, from blacktop spectator to pickup game participant, seems modest. But 30 years later, it aptly encapsulates Tillman’s rise to the helm of one of college lacrosse’s most storied programs.

The Terrapins men’s lacrosse coach used that

Coach john tillman has advanced to back-to-back national finals in his first two seasons at the Terps’ helm. He begins the quest for his first title tomorrow against Cornell at home. file photo/the diamondback dogged work ethic and adaptability to find his way into Division I lacrosse, climb the coaching ranks and lead the Terps to back-to-back national championship appearances in his first two seasons.

Just as he did on the courts of Corning, Tillman fixates on finding ways to win games and help his players succeed on and off the field. He’ll continue to test himself as the Terps open the NCAA tournament tomorrow against Cornell, his alma mater.

He spends sleepless nights crafting inordinately precise game plans and often leaves his friends

and employees worried about his own well-being.

He’s a prime example of the dilemma all college coaches face: In an insanely competitive environment, how much of their lives should they sacrifice to win?

The Terps’ third-year coach maintains he’s happy with what he’s doing because he’s simply pursuing his passion. And after leading the Terps to consecutive title games for the first time since 1997 and 1998, he seems to be doing it rather well.

“John puts everything he has into what he does,” said former Naval Academy coach Richie

Meade, Tillman’s boss from 1995 to 2007. “And that’s only a concern if you aren’t doing something that you love.”

GETTING ON THE FIELD When Tillman decided to take up lacrosse his freshman year at Corning West High School, he found himself eerily reminded of his absence from blacktop basketball games. He was small See TILLMAN, Page 14

BASEBALL

Running into record books During recovery from injury, White revamps skill set before thriving under Szefc

By Daniel Popper Staff writer Charlie White watches the pitcher bring the ball into his glove and rest his hands at his waist in the set position. He takes a two-and-a-half-step lead off first base, never losing sight of the mound. He spreads his legs into a wide, tense stance and drops both hands between his legs, each one firmly clenching a batting glove.

The right-hander lifts his front leg and White takes off, transitioning from baseball player to sprinter in the blink of an eye. The catcher pops out of his crouch and fires a bullet to second base, but it’s too late. White is already safe, asking the umpire for a timeout so he can wipe the dirt off his jersey.

The Terrapins baseball team saw this scene often during this season — 39 times to be exact.

Under first-year coach John Szefc and his up-tempo offense, the center fielder has burst onto the college baseball scene, cementing himself as one of the elite base-stealers in the nation.

The redshirt sophomore already broke Larry Long’s single-season stolen base record of 33 on April 17 against Mount St. Mary’s. He’s on pace to shatter the career record of 62 shared by Long and Alfredo Rodriguez — he stands just one steal shy with three games left this season.

Not many predicted his breakout season, though. The Naperville, Ill.,

native missed the final 39 games of 2012 with a broken hand, and former coach Erik Bakich left the Terps in the offseason to accept a job offer from Michigan.

It was not an ideal situation by any means. But that didn’t stop White.

He worked. He trained. He studied.

And he emerged as one of the most complete and electric players in all of college baseball.

“All of this is a credit to Charlie,” Bakich said. “He is the player who he is 100 percent because of the work ethic and the passion that burns deep inside him.”

LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT In summer 2009, roughly a month after he was hired as the Terps baseball coach, Bakich traveled to Marietta, Ga., for a Perfect Game USA scouting event.

It didn’t take him long to figure out which player he wanted for his program.

After all, the first-year coach had spent six seasons as Vanderbilt’s recruiting coordinator before joining the Terps and was regarded as one of the nation’s best talent evaluators.

He knows a baseball player when he sees one.

“You couldn’t find a better guy than Charlie White,” Bakich said. “He was everything we were looking for and what we were hoping to get in a leadoff hitter and center fielder.”

Bakich wasted no time. He approached White after the showcase

Center fielder charlie white stole 39 bases this season, a Terps single-season record, after missing all but 17 games in 2012 with a hand injury. file photo/the diamondback and invited him to College Park for an official visit in the fall.

“I came out here, and I fell in love with the place,” White said.

A week later, he committed.

“He’s not a guy who is going to hit the ball 400 feet,” Bakich said. “He’s not going to throw 95 mph off the mound.

He’s a baseball player, and if you watch him over the course of a week, you see the value of a guy like that.”

BLESSING IN DISGUISE White did not disappoint in his freshman campaign, batting .304 with a .396 on-base percentage in 51 appearances (46 starts). He led the Terps with 52 hits and stole 17 bases in 18 attempts.

He was poised for even more improvement his sophomore year.

But in March 2012, he broke his hand in a non-baseball incident 17 games

into the season, leaving him out for the year and watching from the dugout.

“Any time you lose a guy who’s a spark plug like that, that’s a catalyst who just by getting on base means that other guys in the lineup get pitched differently … it was really irreplaceable,” Bakich said.

The Terps started 13-4 that season with White in the lineup, including a season-opening series win over thenNo. 14 UCLA. Despite a .203 batting average, White was still a primary table-setter for the Terps, posting a .356 on-base percentage and stealing five bases in six attempts.

But in White’s absence, the team faltered in ACC play, finishing the season 32-24 and missing both the ACC and NCAA tournaments.

White tried to fulfill the duties of a teammate despite his injury. He couldn’t play, but he still tried to con-

tribute in any way he could.

In reality, though, White was lost. He had spent the majority of his teenage and adult life with either a glove or a bat in his hand. It was all he knew. But with the injury, playing catch or taking batting practice would be out of the question for at least two months.

So White did the only thing he could.

He ran.

Every day until team doctors cleared him to swing and throw again, White worked on explosive starts, agility drills, form running, sprints and steal techniques. His focus was singular: get faster.

White traveled with the team for the remainder of the 2012 season, watching every game from the dugout and studying the opposing pitchers. It still wasn’t the same, but it was all he could do.

“I would pretend I was out there,” See white, Page 16