VOL. CLXXIV NO.180
PARTLY CLOUDY
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2018
HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE
College to form sexual misconduct steering committee
SNOW DAYS
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By GIGI GRIGORIAN
The Dartmouth Staff
SABA NEJAD/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF
ARTS
JAZZ SINGER GREGORY PORTER TO PERFORM TONIGHT PAGE 8
FILM REVIEW: ‘CALL ME BY YOUR NAME’ PAGE 7
OPINION
SHAH: IT’S BEEN A SLICE PAGE 4
ADELBERG: LAISSEZWELFARE PAGE 4
Students build a snowman outside Baker-Berry Library.
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Dartmouth reports Alumnus resigns over College growth in net assets response to ending of DACA By SABA NEJAD
The Dartmouth Staff
Dartmouth’s financial statement for fiscal year 2017, released in October 2017, shows strong endowment performance and a decline in operating expenses compared to the previous year, alongside
relatively small growth in revenues. Net assets grew from $7.26 billion to $7.89 billion, an increase of 8.7 percent. Net assets from endowment activities grew by $482 million, compared to last year’s SEE FINANCIALS PAGE 5
By SABA NEJAD
The Dartmouth Staff
On Jan. 30, Unai MontesIrueste ’98, for mer vice president of the Dartmouth Association of Latinx Alumni, published an open letter on Facebook declaring that he is cutting all ties with the College over its handling of issues
surrounding undocumented students. Montes-Irueste announced that he would be resigning as vice president, as well as resigning from the board of the Dartmouth Club of Los Angeles and the board of the Class of 1998. He has also decided to refrain from donating to the College, interviewing
prospective students and attending his class reunion, his letter stated. T he impetus for his decisions, according to the letter, was the College’s inaction in protecting its undocumented students. In his letter, Montes-Irueste d e s c r i b e d h i s mu l t i p l e SEE ALUMNUS PAGE 2
Apparel store Game Set Mat prepares to close By HARRISON ARONOFF
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On Jan. 29, the College announced the creation of a Presidential Steering Committee on Sexual Misconduct. College spokesperson Diana Lawrence said in an email statement that the committee will review existing policies across the institution about sexual misconduct. The committee will then present suggestions intended to improve campus policies and training about sexual misconduct at the College, Lawrence wrote. Subjects considered in the committee’s review will include “sexual misconduct response, prevention, education
The Dartmouth
Game Set Mat, an apparel and accessory store located on 15 South Main Street, will close on March 3 after five and half years of operation. “I tried everything,” owner Susan Valence said. “I tried an online business. I tried trunk shows. I tried discounts, marketing to different people. But there
was not enough customer traffic. I tried locating my store to street-level, but the rents were too high.” While the store saw double-digit revenue growth in 2014, 2015 and 2016, Game Set Mat’s revenue grew only 1 percent in 2017, according to Valence. Valence attributed the loss in revenue to a number of factors, including the SEE GSM PAGE 5
CAROLYN SILVERSTEIN/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF
Game Set Mat, located on Main Street, will close on March 3.
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2018
Unai Montes-Irueste ’98 pens letter and resigns from boards effects on [its] students caused by possible revisions to DACA and attempts to have the administration other immigration policies.” address the needs of vulnerable Hanlon also co-signed a Nov. 21, students and what he considers 2016 letter with over 600 university inadequate responses from the presidents entitled “Statement in Support of the Deferred Action for College. On Nov. 18, 2016, shortly after Childhood Arrivals Program and the presidential election, several our Undocumented Immigrant alumni organizations, including Students.” DALA, on whose board Montes- De La Rosa said this response Irueste previously served, penned was vague. According to Montesa letter to College President Irueste’s letter, Hanlon’s response Phil Hanlon and several higher- “contained no commitments.” level administrators and faculty “Those of us within the Latinx members. The letter called for the community wondered if this meant College to protect undocumented the College would actually help students and other vulnerable undocumented students or help them pack their bags,” De La Rosa groups on campus. Amaris De La Rosa ’16 Th’17 said. was among the 14 alumni who She added that she did not hear anything signed the letter from the in 2016. administration “ [ P r e s i d e n t “[Montes-Irueste] regarding Donald] Trump’s has been someone support for campaign and his undocumented supporters made actively involved students prior to it clear that his for many years, so her graduation presidency would I understand his in June 2017, nor dismantle [the has she heard Deferred Action frustration.” anything since for Childhood becoming an Arrivals program] alumna. a n d b o l s t e r -AMARIS DE LA ROSA “This has not [ I m m i g r a t i o n ’16 TH’17 been surprising, and Customs as [Hanlon] has Enforcement],” never seemed to De La Rosa said. “As an alum and B.E. student care about the communities of at the time, signing this letter students of color on campus,” she felt like one of the few ways I said. could try make a change. I felt an De La Rosa heard about urgency to help students from my Montes-Irueste’s letter through community on campus and a hope multiple Facebook groups, such as that Dartmouth’s name could help DALA and Hij@s de Dartmouth. “[Montes-Irueste] has been inspire other college campuses.” On Nov. 16 2016, CoFIRED someone actively involved for petitioned the administration to many years, so I understand his release a statement “declaring frustration,” De La Rosa said. “As a [Dartmouth a sanctuary city] in young [alumnus], I feel that myself, its efforts to continue supporting and others who have recently undocumented students. The same graduated should continue to day he received the Nov. 18 alumni try to pressure the College. I feel letter, Hanlon sent a campus-wide like a lot of this is about power email in which he stated that the dynamics, and as I personally gain College “will work within the more influence, I want Dartmouth bounds of the law to mitigate any to reflect and support its diverse FROM ALUMNUS PAGE 1
CORRECTIONS We welcome corrections. If you believe there is a factual error in a story, please email editor@thedartmouth.com. Correction Appended (Feb. 12, 2018): The Feb. 8 article “AMES and AMELL to restructure and refocus” has been updated to reflect that the two new entities — Middle Eastern Studies and Asian Societies, Cultures and Languages — are programs, not departments, and that the proper title of the ASCL program contains plural noun forms. The article has also been corrected to reflect that only AMES is interdisciplinary, not AMELL, and to correct Smolin’s title as well as add clarifying information from a later email statement. A reference to MES focusing on “social studies” was corrected to “social sciences” and a reference to language study abroad programs was clarified to indicate that only the study abroad programs were considered for expansion and not the language programs themselves.
community.” Yaritza González Rodríguez ’15 signed the November 2016 letter on behalf of the Dartmouth Coalition for Immigration Reform, Equality and DREAMers. While she declined to comment on the number of students affected by DACA’s rescission, she said that “even if it were just one [student], that matters.” On Sept. 5, 2017, the day Trump rescinded DACA, CoFIRED wrote a letter to the administration calling on Hanlon to meet a list of demands. These include releasing a statement committing to undocumented students’ safety, declaring that the College will refrain from cooperating with ICE in localizing and detaining students and providing financial aid to cover undocumented students’ contributions, among other things. In a Feb. 5 statement, the College posted an update on DACA and on the College’s current actions to “assist, support and protect its DACA students.” “ D a r t m o u t h c o n t i nu e s t o meet the full need of all admitted students,” the statement said. “If students are unable to work for any reason, we assist them in identifying outside scholarships and Dartmouth loans that enable them to defer payment until after graduation.” G o n z á l e z Ro d r í g u e z s a i d she does not believe that undocumented students should have to receive loans, given that their political situation is out of their control. Furthermore, if DACA is not reinstated, these students will still not have a work permit after graduation, making it difficult for them to pay back their loans, she said. For this reason, the “Women of Dartmouth” alumni group has been trying to create a fund supporting undocumented students, she said. What Montes-Irueste said he found most frustrating is that instead of responding to the specific demands in CoFIRED’s letter, the College instead sent out two emails. One email, sent by the Office of Visa and Immigration Services to members of CoFIRED on Sept. 8, 2017, offered individual advising sessions
with an attorney scheduled almost been in contact with the American two weeks after the Sept. 5, Civil Liberties Union with the 2017, letter was sent. Hanlon aim of sharing “the most timely also sent an email, addressed to and accurate information with all students, faculty and staff, students about invoking their expressing disappointment in rights,” according to Lawrence’s Trump’s decision to rescind statement. It also stated that OVIS DACA. Additionally, he wrote that recently offered a “Know Your College officials would be in direct Rights” session that was open to communication with members of all students, faculty and staff. Congress to continue advocating “ OV I S p rov i d e s a n d w i l l for DACA or an alternative over continue to provide outreach the following six months. and training to departments, Montes-Irueste was critical of offices, and individual faculty and the College’s staff members as responses. well as an annual “ S i n c e “... what students session for senior N o v e m b e r are asking for administrators of 2016, on the status of D a r t m o u t h and deserve is DACA and issues C o l l e g e ’ s leadership that rises f a c i n g DA C A / president, undocumented to the level of the p rovo s t a n d s t u d e n t s , ” e x e c u t i v e titles of those who Lawrence wrote. c o m m i t t e e have been entrusted I t a d d e d t h a t have of fered “[Dartmouth] r h e t o r i c wtih the charge of remain[s] steadfast w i t h o u t caring for the sons in [its] commitment substance,” to maintaining an and daughters of M o n t e s environment free Dartmouth.” Irueste said. of harassment and He added discrimination that there has b a s e d o n b e e n a l a c k -UNAI MONTESimmigration or o f r e s p o n s e IRUESTE ’98 citizenship status.” to students’, Montes-Irueste professors’ said he sees this and alumni’s statement as “in explicit requests, such as for Hanlon of itself a betrayal.” As someone to declare Dartmouth a sanctuary who has been on the board of the c a m p u s, f o r u n d o c u m e n t e d ACLU in Southern California students to be freed from financial since 2013, he said that the ACLU’s obligations and for the Dartmouth work in the area of “Know Your Coach to be made a safe zone Rights” training occurs completely against Immigration and Customs independent of what Dartmouth Enforcement and border patrol says or does. officers without warrants. “Dartmouth is trying to convince In an email statement, College her critics that offering ‘Know Your spokesperson Diana Lawrence Rights’ training through OVIS is reiterated points from Hanlon’s the same as preventing ICE or September 2017 email, writing the U.S. Customs and Border that College of ficials “have Protection from boarding buses been in direct and frequent and stopping them from coming communication with members of on campus,” Montes-Irueste said. Congress to advocate strongly for “You don’t have to have any degree the continuation of DACA.” of investment in this issue to know Additionally, Lawrence wrote that what the College offers can that the College covered the costs be found via a Google search, of one-on-one consultations with and what students are asking for attorneys, offered in fall 2017, and and deserve is leadership that rises that students are able to request to the level of the titles of those assistance with the cost of DACA- who have been entrusted with the related fees through the Student charge of caring for the sons and Affairs office. The College has daughters of Dartmouth.”
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2018
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
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College to create presidential sexual misconduct committee O’Connell said that she appreciates the College’s ongoing and accountability,” Lawrence’s focus on sexual misconduct, which is furthered with the creation of statement said. While the College has not yet this committee. announced the makeup of this “It’s always important to new committee, its members look back at policies and make will include faculty and staff sure that we are consistently doing the best that from each of the we can in creating different schools “How can the fair and equitable and divisions at workshops feel processes, but also the College in in offering the order to include more specified most effective and a wide range of and helpful to engaging training perspectives and students? How opportunities for experiences. our campus,” she The timeline of do we engage t h e c o m m i t t e e ’s staff and faculty added. O’Connell work has also not yet a l s o n o t e d t h at been announced, as well?” continued revision but Title IX and assessment of coordinator Allison sexual misconduct O’Connell said she -BEN BRADLEY, policies is necessary expects that the MANAGER OF to comply with committee will make DARTMOUTH changes to federal recommendations regulations from to College President BYSTANDER the Department Phil Hanlon by the INITIATIVE of Education. end of this school The College year. “The issue of sexual misconduct “revamped” sexual misconduct is a nationwide problem that training in 2017, according to the senior administrators have been College press release. discussing regularly,” Lawrence In order to assess the efficacy of the College’s current sexual wrote. FROM COMMITTEE PAGE 1
misconduct policies, the committee will consider the findings of two recent surveys regarding the topic. The first survey, conducted in 2015, was organized and performed by the Association of American Univer sities, a consortium of 27 colleges in the United States and Canada, including the College. T his survey could not be personalized with questions geared toward College-specific programs, but it provided an important baseline for future surveys about sexual misconduct, said associate provost for institutional research Alicia Betsinger. B ets i n g er a d d ed th at th e AAU 2015 survey allowed for the comparison of data from students at the College with responses from students at other intuitions, providing researchers with indicative data that would not have been available in a single institution’s study. The second survey relevant to the committee’s review is one conducted in 2017 by the College’s Office of Institutional Research. This survey incorporated questions from the 2015 AAU survey in order to assess response trends and improvement over time. The 2017
survey also included new questions s ex u a l m i s c o n d u c t , B r a d l ey that, according to Betsinger, considered the ways that DBI can “better addressed issues around become more successful. Dartmouth’s student population “Who are we missing?” he or just gave us more information asked. “How can the workshops than we were not able to get in the feel more specified and helpful to 2015 survey.” students? How do we engage staff B e t s i n g e r h o p e s t h at t h e and faculty as well?” c o m m i t t e e w i l l ex p l o re t h e B r a d l e y a d d e d t h a t t h e significance of the results of both Presidential Steering Committee the 2015 and should consider “A committee that 2017 surveys. the same kinds of One major is looking at the q u e s t i o n s wh e n finding from the crafting suggestions survey results issue from many to Hanlon. pointed to the points of view is Like O’Connell, effectiveness of B r a d l e y the Dartmouth really important.” acknowledged the Bystander importance of this Initiative. Data -BEN BRADLEY, new committee collected in the as a step forward 2 0 1 7 s u r vey MANAGER OF in the College’s i n d i c a t e a n DARTMOUTH continued focus on improvement sexual misconduct. from the 2015 BYSTANDER INITIATIVE “A committee survey reports, that is looking at O’Connell t h i s i s s u e f ro m said. many points of Manager view is really of DBI Ben important,” he Bradley said these “encouraging said. “We continuously, as an numbers” reveal how students are institution, have to work to think recognizing sexual misconduct and about how we are making sure our intervening accordingly. work is comprehensive, effective With the survey data regarding and far-reaching.”
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2018
THE DARTMOUTH OPINION
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STAFF COLUMNIST RACHNA SHAH ’21
CONTRIBUTING COLUMNIST STEVEN ADELBERG ’21
It’s Been a Slice
Laissez-Welfare
Here’s what local restaurants in a college town can teach us. Affordability and accessibility are particularly valuable for college students, especially when it comes to food and dining options. With busy schedules and varying needs, students seek out options that are convenient. To make the most of Dartmouth Dining Services’ meal plans, students tend to eat at places that accept College dining dollars, like the Class of 1953 Commons or convenient campus snack bars. Many first-years rely on venues that accept meal swipes, particularly during their fall terms when the SmartChoice 20 plan is mandatory. As a result, local restaurants, which rely heavily upon student engagement, can be crowded out. Dartmouth and its students should support local restaurants through building community character and economic advantages. Many student-athletes, visiting families, alumni and large student groups were known to have heavily frequented Everything But Anchovies. The local pizzeria’s late-night food and delivery options were hailed as incomparable. EBAs operated for 38 years — and suddenly, last year, on 8:38 a.m. on a Tuesday, the venue was closed. As CNN anchor Jake Tapper ’91 tweeted, “It was a small pizzeria, but there were those of us who loved it. RIP EBA’s.” EBAs closed for three main reasons: high rent payments, changes in business and competition. Operating in college towns, which are densely populated with students, is a major benefit for local restaurants. However, rent in areas such as Hanover is higher than that of neighboring towns, such as West Lebanon. Business and competition also go hand in hand. Competition from Domino’s (and from Dartmouth Dining Services’ food truck, the latter of which accepts DBA and meal swipes) likely contributed substantially to EBAs’ downfall. From the time the Domino’s franchise opened in West Lebanon, Hanover’s EBAs saw a 20 percent decline in late night deliveries. This may have occurred because Domino’s has a shorter delivery time since its pizzas are premade or because of its better name recognition for students. C&A Pizza and Ramunto’s Brick and Brew remain as Hanover’s pizza shops. Perhaps due to a different branding strategy or customer base, these venues have not closed their doors. While all three restaurants primarily sold pizza, EBAs was specifically known for its late-night delivery options, not for its superior quality — some have designated Ramunto’s as the “best slice of pizza.” Domino’s recently announced that it applied for a
building permit to open a restaurant in Hanover. In considering the impact of such a move, we can turn to a similar relationship between local cafés Dirt Cowboy Café and Starbucks. Dirt Cowboy claims on its home page that it serves over 600 customers every day, while the average Starbucks store serves 500. Dirt Cowboy serves freshly roasted and individually brewed coffee and has been voted the “Best Gourmet Coffee Shop” in the region for the past seven years. Coffee shops play a unique role in a community — they connect people through conversations and interaction during hangouts and study or work sessions. However, shortly after Starbucks opened in Hanover in 2012, Dirt Cowboy — which has been operating since 1993 — reported a drop in business. Starbucks opens at 5:30 a.m., 1.5 hours before Dirt Cowboy; moreover, Dirt closes at 5 p.m., and it does not offer Wi-Fi. By 2020, Starbucks is projected to serve 750 daily customers per store. The local versus chain restaurant debate extends beyond Hanover. Across the country, nearly 7,000 independent restaurants closed for financial reasons. This is particularly problematic as local restaurants contribute three times as much money into the local community than chain restaurants. Local restaurants also often support local vendors. They arguably strengthen the middle class in their regions. Nonetheless, most chain restaurants offer more consistency and a wider range of options, deeming them convenient options for consumers. For instance, the Domino’s products one may eat in California will most likely be similar to those one can order in West Lebanon. These national franchises, with efficient production structures and distribution channels, may also offer costs that are low enough to offset even great reputations of local restaurants. Dartmouth prides itself on a “vibrant community.” Supporting local restaurants is one way to work toward the College’s mission. Unlike students at many other colleges, students at Dartmouth can access off-campus restaurants and businesses within a five-minute walk. Dartmouth could encourage students to explore these options, perhaps by initiating agreements with local venues to accept college dining dollars. Nonetheless, at the end of the day, only students can really make a difference in whether a local restaurant or business stays up or goes down. It is up to us to choose.
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Modernizing the welfare state can empower struggling Americans. America is a nation built by powerful ideas. In the 18th century, the Framers wove the democratic, individualistic ideals of the Enlightenment into the moral and constitutional fabric of the nation. In the 19th century, laissezfaire liberalism allowed free men and free markets to unleash an unprecedented wave of innovation and growth while uniting the country through commerce. In the 20th century, the revolution spearheaded by then-president Franklin D. Roosevelt brought the struggling masses back into civil society by establishing an expansive, ambitious welfare state and restoring America’s commitment to egalitarianism. In the 21st century, our nation must wrestle with the ramifications of these past revolutions and use new ideas to actualize our timeless values of liberty, equality and prosperity. While democracy and free markets have succeeded in expanding liberty and prosperity, the 20th century Franklin D. Roosevelt-Lyndon B. Johnson welfare state has failed to produce real equality. After spending a staggering $22 trillion and 54 years in the War on Poverty, the federal welfare state has failed to meaningfully decrease America’s poverty rate. Entitlements like Social Security face insolvency as they explode the federal debt to over 100 percent of GDP. Rife with welfare cliffs, fraud and low rates of aid directly reaching recipients, the 20th century welfare state has failed to adequately address American poverty. The achievements of the 18th and 19th centuries teach America a fundamental lesson reinforced by the failures of the 20th century that is necessary for success in the 21st century: Government works best when it uses loose legal frameworks to co-opt individual liberty, not when it employs sprawling, restrictive bureaucracies to work against it. As America grapples with systemic poverty and faces a new wave of globalizationinduced structural unemployment, the old system is leaving millions economically marooned and politically disenfranchised by distant bureaucrats. Welfare is meant to provide a basic standard of living and social mobility to those who struggle to climb the ladders of a free market system — bureaucratic state-activist welfare has not achieved its purpose. The over-regulated system of today is heavy-handed and ineffective. We need a simplified system that acts in bold strokes and empowers individuals to improve their position in society. In the 21st century, the clunky welfare state must give way to a self-driving, hands-off framework of negative income taxes and a universal basic income. The earned income tax credit is a step in the right direction, but much more substantial reform is needed. Negative income tax rates for the lower class would restore the incentive to work and reduce the role of the state in welfare. The convoluted welfare system of the 20th century forced many recipients of aid to choose between their benefits or a pay raise, creating a perverse incentive that perpetuated poverty. This conditional “aid” also brought unprecedented amounts of state intrusion into lower class households — as Malcolm X described in his autobiography, “[the social workers] acted as if they owned us, as if we were their private property.” This cannot be tolerated. We need negative income tax rates to keep meddling agents of the state out of lower-class family lives
and redouble the incentive to work. Negative income taxes would also reverse decades of stagnant wage growth and help workers afford key investments that drive upward mobility. The average median income has stagnated or declined since 1999 as the costs of higher education and healthcare continue to sky-rocket. Poor health care and poor education are known poverty traps — by empowering the lower class to pursue new skills and healthier lives, the negative income tax promises to keep social mobility within closer reach for millions of Americans. To reach the Americans who do not have an income that can be negatively taxed, the United States should sweep aside the 83 overlapping federal welfare programs and entitlements with a single universal basic income. Universal basic income directly ensures a minimum standard of living to every American, actualizing the FDRLBJ social contract with the American people in full while erasing the bureaucratic mess they left in their wake. If the purpose of welfare is to ensure a basic standard of living for all people, why not directly provide it to them? Direct cash transfers are among the most efficient ways to fight poverty, putting economic power where it is needed and keeping decision-making close to the ground. A regime of paternalistic programs aimed at improving social choices, the U.S. government gives only 26.5 percent of welfare spending directly to the poor through cash assistance. But the poor do not need Washington bureaucrats to stage an intervention. They need the necessities of life. By ensuring that every American family can put food on the table and have a roof over their head, the universal basic income sets the working class free from a zero-sum struggle to live paycheck-to-paycheck and allows them to work toward positive goods like healthcare and education that generate upward mobility. The universal basic income alone could practically eradicate poverty in the United States. Despite overall spending on social insurance totaling about $2.7 trillion in fiscal year 2016, over 43.1 million Americans lived below the poverty line that same year. A universal basic income of $8,000 would have brought any individual earning at least $4,000 per year above the poverty line; universal basic income could potentially be cheaper than the present system. This program could succeed where the 20th century welfare state failed. Spending on entitlements is expected to increase in years to come, making it imperative to render the ways in which we fight poverty more efficient and impactful. If America remembers the fact that all men are created equal and provides federal benefits equally through a universal basic income program, the United States can virtually eliminate poverty within its borders. Each century of American history is defined by a revolutionary idea that pushes the boundaries of liberty, equality and prosperity. Implementing universal basic income and establishing a negative income tax rate would provide liberty to lower class families like the one Malcolm X grew up in, equality to the 43.1 million Americans living in poverty and prosperity for all Americans. With the promise of progress before us and the lessons of the past behind us, the time is now to redefine the 21st century and trigger a fourth American revolution in our civil society.
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2018
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College 2017 financial reports shows growth in net assets FROM FINANCIALS PAGE 1
decline of $189 million, while revenues increased from $860 million to $889 million. While there was a loss in net assets from operating activities, the loss was much smaller than last year’s, at around $12 million compared to $112 million. Some of the decreases in losses of net assets from operating activities are related to last year’s reorganization of the Geisel School of Medicine. Last year, all of the costs related to the reorganization — about $53.5 million — were listed under the College’s fiscal year 2016 expenses, even though they will be paid across future years. This year, many employees were moved off of the College’s financial statement and onto the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center’s. E x e c u t i ve v i c e p r e s i d e n t Richard Mills added that there has been slower capital spending — money spent on constructing or renovating buildings — for fiscal year 2017, and that he expects to see similar behavior in fiscal years 2018 and 2019. He explained that as the College approaches a major capital campaign, it attempts to obtain funding for the project through a combination of fundraising and borrowing money. “Dartmouth is still financially quite strong relative to many other institutions in higher education
by most metrics of endowment wealth, size of the operating budget, things like that,” chief financial officer Mike Wagner said. He added that the College is currently working to improve its standing compared to peer institutions with greater resources. Wagner pointed to inflation as a challenge that the College has faced in the past year, noting that it has put pressure on Dartmouth’s ability to hire and maintain faculty and staff. It has also made it more difficult to keep utility rates and other costs the same year to year, he said. He also noted that there have been pressures in the current political climate to decrease research funding, which could affect students’ opportunities to work in labs and conduct research, both at Geisel and the College of Arts and Sciences. In addition, the College continues to be committed to meeting students’ full demonstrated financial need and offering needblind admissions to domestic students, Wagner said. While investment performance over the past year was good, there is no certainty that it will remain so in the future, Wagner said. Therefore, the College does not plan its budget with the assumption that future years will look like this one. A major difference for the College this coming year is a new tax on endowments from
the landmark Republican tax bill passed last December. It adds a 1.4 percent excise tax on realized gains from the endowment — interests, dividends and other income realized in cash — for any university with more than 500 students and an endowment worth over $500,000 per full-time student. Around 30 colleges and universities have large enough endowment-per-student ratios to be affected by this tax. This ratio comes to around $720,000 to $750,000 of the endowment per student for Dartmouth, Wagner said. He noted that some other schools have much larger endowments per student, some in excess of $1 million. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, Harvard University, Princeton University and Yale University all have endowmentper-student ratios over $1 million. The College would have paid about $5 million per year on average over the last five years if the new tax bill had been in place, Wagner said. “In any one year, $5 million against $5 billion is relatively small, but over five years, that’s $25 million,” he said. “And if you invest that in the endowment, it really compounds and grows. So that’s what we’re more worried about ... the growth opportunity.” The investment of Dartmouth’s endowment is closely governed by the College president, the
Main Street apparel store Game Set Mat to close in March FROM GSM PAGE 1
changing retail market. She said when Lucy Activewear, a clothing brand that made up over a quarter of Game Set Mat’s sales, merged with the clothing brand North Face, Valence could no longer sell the brand at Game Set Mat. She also had to drop a few other popular items after their clothing brands went out of business. Valence added that the New England market is challenging in and of itself, especially for boutique shops like hers. “[Sales] are very weather dependent …You do not know what each day is going to bring traffic wise, customer wise,” Valence said. “Some days are great, and some days are dead.” Zimmermans The North Face general manager Bill Boyle added that Dartmouth students do not shop in Hanover. “The trend is more online and less in stores; that’s why Game Set Mat is closing,” Boyle said. “We’re a dying
breed.” Valence said she is content with her decision to close the store because it has been time consuming — with no other full-time staff, she is responsible for the store’s accounting, staffing, payroll, management and inventory. In the future, Valence plans to continue to sell her inventory in trunk shows “on her own time,” traveling to Upper Valley tennis clubs and homes to sell her apparel. Many students seemed indifferent to the store’s closing. A few knew enough about the store to provide comment. Former customer George Easley ’18 said that the store’s closing is interesting because the store has little to no competition for certain product categories. “There isn’t [another] purveyor for high-end tennis equipment and yoga gear in the area,” he said. Jessica Rosien ’21, in contrast, said she was surprised at the specificity of Game Set Mat’s market. “I’m originally from Hanover, so
when it opened, I thought it was weirdly niche for a town this small,” Rosien said. Game Set Mat is having a closeout sale until March 3, with all inventory marked down. Because Game Set Mat’s lease is not set to expire until July, Valence is looking for another company to sublet her retail space. However, Hanover town manager Julia Griffin said that she is not aware of any business or individual who has expressed interest in renting the retail space that Game Set Mat is occupying. When a retail store on Main Street closes, another one usually replaces it soon after, Griffin said. She recalled how when five retail stores closed in 2016, and their spaces were then “filled up very quickly.” However, Griffin said replacing Game Set Mat will be hard to do because the retail space is below street level, meaning that people cannot look in and assess the store through its windows.
investment committee of the Board of Trustees and the College’s investment office, Wagner said. These three bodies design an investment allocation portfolio that distributes portions of the endowment across different types of investments, such as private equity, venture capital, marketable securities, real estate and other hard assets. Hundreds of managers invest the money, monitoring the markets closely and aiming to maximize returns. Dartmouth’s endowment has about a 5 percent distribution rate, meaning that five cents are given to the College to spend on different programs for each dollar donated to the school. Though it can be tempting to distribute more in the short term, investing more in the College’s endowment is more beneficial in the long run because funds will accumulate and result in different programs having more money in the future, Mills said. “It comes down to balancing between short-term spending and long-term investment,” he said. A article published by The New York Times in November reve a l e d t h at D a r t m o u t h i s one of several colleges and universities that have used “blocker corporations” to partner with hedge funds and private equity groups to invest borrowed funds in profitable offshore holdings. While endowment earnings have traditionally been tax-exempt,
these funds earned with borrowed money can be taxed because they are not related to the universities’ education missions. By forming corporations to receive these investment profits, rather than having them go directly to the endowment, universities are able to avoid these taxes. The New York Times reported that under the House version of the Republican tax bill, these blocker corporations would also be exempt from the new 1.4 percent endowment tax. Asked about the College’s overseas investments, Mills said that the College’s goal is to minimize its effective tax rate to earn money and support its continued functioning. “When you think about the purpose of the endowment, it’s to maximize returns to support the academic mission,” Mills said. “And taxes dilute returns because if you invest and it’s taxed, the net return after taxes is smaller. So ever y endowment, ever y investment vehicle, looks at, ‘How can we invest?’ and ‘What are the investment options to minimize tax exposure?’ And that involves all kinds of different techniques.” He noted that the College has not moved all investments overseas in order to maintain a diversified portfolio and because some U.S.-based investments are still more profitable than overseas investments, even with higher tax rates.
PAGE 6
DARTMOUTHEVENTS
THE DARTMOUTH EVENTS
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2018
32°F — WINTER OR SUMMER?
CECILIA MORIN ’21
REMEMBERING WINTER CARNIVAL 2018
CECILIA MORIN ’21
TODAY
4:45 p.m. - 5:45 p.m.
Lecture: “Dartmouth and Mid-Century Modern: A House Style Develops in Hanover and Norwich,” with Norwich Historical Society director Sarah Rooker, Loew Auditorium, Black Family Visual Arts Center
5:00 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.
Conversation: Lisa Monaco, former Homeland Security Advisor to President Barack Obama, Filene Auditorium, Moore Building
7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.
Performance: Jazz singer-songwriter Gregory Porter, Spaulding Auditorium, Hopkins Center for the Arts
TOMORROW
2:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.
Lecture: “The Social Black Bear: What Bears Have Taught Me About Being Human,” with wildlife biologist Ben Kilham, Fireside Inn, West Lebanon, New Hampshire
4:00 p.m. - 5:30 p.m.
Lecture: “Unite America: Bridging the Nation’s Political Chasm?” with economics professor Charles Wheelan, ’88, Haldeman 41 (Kreindler Conference Hall)
7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.
Film: “The Princess Bride,” directed by Rob Reiner, Loew Auditorium, Black Family Visual Arts Center
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THE DARTMOUTH ARTS
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2018
PAGE 7
Review: ‘Call Me By Your Name’ is curiously haunting By SEBASTIAN WURZRAINER The Dartmouth Staff
As the 90th Academy Awards ceremony draws closer, it’s hard not to compare the various nominees, particularly those in the Best Picture category. After all, cinema does not exist in a vacuum. When one considers “Call Me By Your Name” from that perspective, it does have at least one noteworthy quality that, for better or for worse, distinguishes it from the pack: The film has the ability to haunt the viewer. One leaves the theater enveloped by the film’s narrative and everything it entails, both the good and the bad. “Call Me By Your Name” didn’t move me as much as “Lady Bird”did, nor did it elicit the same visceral bodily reactions as “Dunkirk.” It didn’t make me think as much as “Get Out,” and it wasn’t as beautiful or profoundly simple in its execution compared to Guillermo del Toro’s “The Shape of Water.” But “Call Me By Your Name” stayed with me. In fact, it is still with me — even as I try to write this review, I occasionally find myself not being able to decide how to address my overall experience. For a film that tries so hard to be like a window into reality, it has a surprisingly hallucinatory power.
In 1983, 17-year-old Elio lives in northern Italy with his parents, idling away his summer days with books and a flirtatious but ultimately irrelevant relationship with Marzia, his girlfriend. Oliver, a 24-year-old American graduate student, interrupts Elio’s tranquil existence when he arrives to assists the boy’s father, who is an archeology professor. After some initial tension, Elio and Oliver begin a tenuous, secret romance that — surprise, surprise — must end when Oliver returns to America as the summer draws to a close. As I revised the previous paragraph, I contemplated whether there was anything else worth adding to my brief synopsis of the film — yet there really isn’t. One of the reasons the film left such a strange impression on me was that it so thoroughly defied certain conventional story mandates. In essence, screenwriter James Ivory’s adaptation of André Aciman’s book positions itself as a 1980s “meet cute” for the LGBTQ+ community, but the honesty and fluidity of the deeply humanist storytelling negates the clichéd plot beats of a typical romance film. Speaking of Ivory, it is worth noting that he was originally set to co-direct the film before stepping down so he
would not conflict with director Luca Guadagnino. Guadagnino has since confirmed that Ivory’s version of the film would have included a voice-over and would also have been considerably more explicit in terms of nudity and sex scenes. Of course, we will never really know how Ivory’s unfettered vision for the film might have played out. After all, Guadagnino has also implied that the original screenplay would have been far too expensive to film with their modest budget. That said, I constantly wondered if Ivory’s more aggressive, more explicit vision might have better suited the film or at least resulted in a more engaging final product. “Call Me By Your Name,” to be clear, is beautiful. Guadagnino excels at composing images that drip with sensuality and grandeur. He’s also a master of the smaller moments, artfully capturing the awkward, unnatural early stages of many romances. There’s a wonderful scene early in the film where Oliver rolls over into a small pool so he can avoid further conversation with Elio — it’s an ingenious little touch that speaks volumes. That said, the film is also painstakingly slow and perhaps a touch pretentious for its own good. It name-drops German philosopher
Martin Heidegger and Spanish filmmaker Luis Buñuel as if such topics are normal, even pedantic, for these people. Don’t get me wrong — there’s nothing intrinsically problematic with a film that cushions itself in references to “high culture,” but such an approach can also distance the spectator from the film. I wanted to be pulled into the world of these characters, but I felt too often as if I was watching them through a glass window. Again, nobody knows if Ivory’s more extreme approach could have resolved any of these complaints, but a part of me wishes that he had the opportunity to complete what he started. That said, perhaps no other director but Guadagnino could have elicited such stellar performances from his actors. Timothée Chalamet’s work as Elio has garnered enough praise to rightfully net him a Best Actor nomination. The film is told almost entirely from his point of view, and Chalamet has to convey a lot without dialogue; almost all of the weight in this story exists purely in the subtext. Nonetheless, Armie Hammer deserves just as much, if not more, praise for his portrayal as Oliver. His humor, confidence and self-assured swagger provides some much-needed levity during some of the film’s slower
sequences. Michael Stuhlbarg is also excellent as Elio’s father. For most of the film, he is little more than a background character, but during the final act, he’s granted one of the most unexpected and moving monologues I’ve had the delight of experiencing in recent memory. Indeed, that monologue alone is worth the price of admission and is in no small part why the film managed to stick with me despite my initial lukewarm response. Sadly, the film almost completely ruins the goodwill built up in that scene by squandering the audience’s time with a tedious and mostly pointless epilogue which does little more than reinforce what Stuhlbarg eloquently spoke about minutes earlier. In a sense, that monologue juxtaposed with the epilogue encapsulates the overall experience of watching “Call Me By Your Name.” It’s a bumpy ride — sometimes tedious, sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes pretentious and sometimes charming. Yet once it’s all over, you forget the weaker moments and instead focus on those moments that soar in often inexplicable ways. You may not always be able to fully comprehend why or how these moments moved you, but what matters is that they did.
Review: MGMT’s ‘Little Dark Age’ shows maturity-in-progress By HABIB SABET The Dartmouth
Last Friday, alternative rock band MGMT released “Little Dark Age,” its first album since 2013. With refreshingly catchy psychedelic-pop tracks reminiscent of the group’s first album, “Oracular Spectacular,” “Little Dark Age” also thematically reveals the band’s development. However, the presence of a few severely convoluted and borderline unpleasant tracks prevent the album from truly demonstrating the band’s potential. Following the commercial success of “Oracular Spectacular” in 2007, MGMT has digressed wildly from the synth-pop that brought it to fame. The band’s last two albums, “Congratulations” and “MGMT,” contain little to none of the mainstream pop melodies and hooks — like “Kids” and “Time to Pretend” — found in the first album. The two albums are immensely experimental, dark and psychedelic. Though “Congratulations” and “MGMT” were fairly well received (I personally loved them), they were often criticized as an over-intellectualized, almost pretentious reaction to the band’s early mainstream success. Some critiqued Ben Goldwasser and Andrew VanWyngarden for trying
to prove to their listeners that they were not just fun-loving college kids who happened upon a few hit singles. This narrative is plausible, especially for a duo of music majors from Wesleyan University, but make no mistake: The albums are bravely exploratory and cerebral, with clear underpinnings in late twentieth-century experimental British progressive rock. One of the tracks on “Congratulations,” “Brian Eno,” is actually named after and pays homage to the British musician of the same name. “Little Dark Age” represents a definite shift from the dark experimental sound of the previous two albums and a return to the more synth-driven, radio-friendly melodies of MGMT’s first album. From the opening track, the album has listeners tapping and nodding along. “She Works Out Too Much” has an upbeat melody punctuated with phasors and effects that establish the playful synth-heavy mood present throughout the album. The melody of the titular track, “Little Dark Age,” proves much darker than the opening song, but its driving rhythm provides a hypnotic segue into “When You Die,” a track with a spritely melody that impressively layers at least four guitar parts on top of a synth. “Me and Michael,” the fourth track on the album, is an ethereal, bass-
driven love song that is simple but elegant. Although “Little Dark Age” is sonically much more similar to “Oracular Spectacular,” MGMT does not do a complete reversal and departure from its style in “Congratulations” and “MGMT.” In a certain way, the new album maintains the cerebral, anticommercial feel of the band’s previous two albums. Although I wouldn’t go so far as to call “Little Dark Age” a concept album, a definitive theme pervades much of the work: disgust with modern technology addiction and social media and a subsequent loss of true personal connection that — as the album’s name hints at — has left us in a “Dark Age.” From the outset, the album laments the way technology has negatively impacted our lives. “She Works Out Too Much” entertainingly points out the insidious nature of dating apps and their effect on people’s selfperception and esteem by breeding an obsession with appearance. The track opens by mocking the bubbly nature of personal trainers or possibly spin-class leaders, as a grotesquely peppy voice announces, “Get ready to have some fun!/ Alright here we go!” Lines like “I’m constantly swiping it, tapping/ It’s not that relaxing”
and “The only reason we never worked out was/ He didn’t work out/ (He’s trying)” depict dialogue to the listener between the singer and a past lover. Through those lines, the band seems to denounce t h e i m p o s s i bl e ex p e c t at i o n s imparted on dating app users. Goldwasser and VanWyngarden’s expression of their frustration with technology, however, can at times be fairly ham-fisted. The track “TSLAMP,” which is apparently short for “Time Spent Looking at My Phone,” doesn’t provide a very nuanced presentation of the band’s opinion on cell phones, with lyrics like “I try to pull the curtains back/ Turn you off, can’t be touched/ When all I want and all I know/ Is time spent looking at my phone.” Despite such disappointing moments in the album’s lyrics, the thematic coherence of much of the album provides another level of enjoyment. The duo gives a relatable and mostly entertaining criticism of the ubiquity of technology, revealing the impressive development that took place during its experimental and non-mainstream phase. “Little Dark Age” takes an odd turn after “TSLAMP,” as the playful synth-driven mode of the album’s first half is replaced with pounding rhythms and melodies impossibly convoluted by phasors and effects.
MGMT overindulges in microtonal experimentation in “Days That Got Away,” a nearly five-minute long track overblown with effects and devoid of vocals, excluding an occasional distant blurt of the lyric “Days that got away.” The slow airy track “When You’re Small” provides a nice moment of relief from the aggressive and obtuse use of effects, but it mainly just casts into light the over-production of the other songs surrounding it. Ironically enough, an album decrying our reliance on technology is ultimately somewhat tainted by an excessive use of phasors, microtones and futuristic effects. The departure from the simple, enjoyable melodies driven by synths and guitars prevents “Little Dark Age” from achieving its potential as an artful synthesis of MGMT’s two styles of synth-pop and progressive, experimental rock. Perhaps, more charitably read, the slight nosedive the album takes can be seen as an intentional portrayal of what seems to be the album’s thesis: The ubiquity of aggressive futuristic sounds in several tracks perfectly illustrates how destructive technology can be. In any case, this otherwise enjoyable album is slightly muddled by a few songs that I’ll invariably skip each time I choose to listen to “Little Dark Age.”
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THE DARTMOUTH ARTS
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2018
Grammy Award-winner Gregory Porter brings soulful vocal jazz bringing a contemporary vibe to it,” he said. The Dartmouth Bynum said he suggests audiences This evening, contemporary look for communication between jazz singer and songwriter Gregory Porter and his accompanying Porter will bring his soulful, melodic jazz band, which includes Chip style to audiences at the Hopkins Crawford on piano, Emanuel Center for the Arts. Porter, who Harrold on drums, Tivon Pennicott has won two Grammy Awards, on tenor saxophone, Jahmal Nichols most recently in on bass and 2 0 1 7 f o r h i s “I think that when you Ondrej Pivec album “Take Me p l ay i n g t h e to the Alley,” had listen to a new form of Hammond an unorthodox music and [try] to find o r g a n . rise to fame. He Porter the humanity and the Because initially worked is a veteran in as a chef in New artistry in the music, the jazz genre York and sang [it] makes it so much and has played in various bars with his band and restaurants more enjoyable.” for years, their in his spare chemistry is t i m e . H e av i l y p a r t i c u l a rl y i n f l u e n c e d by -CHARLIE JOHNSON ’19 special. Nat King Cole “They have through his developed a mother, Porter really intimate became a recording artist at the communication,” he said. “They age of 40 when his independently- know what songs they’re going to released debut album “Water” play [and] what’s going to happen gained attention from studios. in those songs. You can really hear Taylor Ho Bynum, director of the give and take, the response the Barbary Coast Jazz Ensemble, ... And I think one of the things said he was enthusiastic about the that is great with [Porter’s] stuff is performance because of Porter’s you can hear how much soul, how voice. much funk and how much can be “[Porter] really bridges roots and expressed with completely acoustic techniques [within jazz] but really instruments.”
By MELANIE PRAKASH
COURTESY OF THE HOPKINS CENTER OF THE ARTS
Gregory Porter, a two-time Grammy Award-winning jazz singer and songwriter, had an unorthodox path to fame.
Barbary Coast trombone player Charlie Johnson ’19 said that although jazz can sometimes feel inaccessible, audiences should not be intimidated by Porter’s performance. “Vocal jazz, which is what this upcoming concert has, is in general more tailored to be a pop tune
COURTESY OF THE HOPKINS CENTER OF THE ARTS
Gregory Porter cites his mother, his father and Nat King Cole as the most influential figures in his music.
because, back in the day, that was the popular music,” Johnson said. “I would say that vocal jazz is one of the easiest to approach forms of jazz, and I really like it as something to listen to alongside pop music.” Connor Quigley ’21, who plays tenor saxophone for the Barbary Coast, said that a certain level of capability is necessary to effectively deliver a vocal jazz performance, which is something a bit out of the ordinary in terms of music experiences. “The amount of talent it takes to play vocal jazz without all the aftereffects [of autotuning and sound engineering] is staggering,” he said. Quigley said Porter’s tone can be characterized as smooth and soulful. “He’s kind of associated with [Cole],” he said. “He associates him as one of his big influences, and if you listen to [Cole], you can hear that influence in [Porter’s] singing.” Johnson said that there is something very honest and personal about Porter’s style, suggesting this may be one of the reasons why Porter’s music is so popular and resonates with so many people. “I think that when you listen to a new form of music and [try] to find the humanity and the artistry in the music, [it] makes it so much more enjoyable,” he said. “And I think that [Porter], as well as a lot of
other jazz musicians, have their own way of putting their own humanity and artistry into their music.” Stephen Langley, the ensemble assistant at the Hop, said he agrees with Porter’s approach to the genre. “Jazz can be seen, by some schools of thought, as a direct extension of the feel songs and spirituals that grew out of slavery,” he said. “Artists across genres ... have always been barometers for what is current and soon to be [in the] future in most societal groups. [Porter] is singing ... based on his past, singing his present and probably singing his future given current situations that we’re dealing with in this country.” Langley said Porter’s lyrics often contend with the racism he himself experienced in America as an African-American. Porter’s songs are often mournful of the experiences he has witnessed, and Langley said he hopes audiences might be affected by his message. “If I have a hope for folks going to this concert, [it’s] that they listen to [Porter’s] music and the lyrics but also the pain that he sings,” he said. “Hopefully, that can break through some [of the] indifference, and people can begin to see that pain is very present and it’s not going away.” Porter and his band will perform tonight at Spaulding Auditorium.