The Dartmouth 11/5/2021

VOL. CLXXVIII NO. 23

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2021

HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE

Community members express well Students report incidents wishes and mixed feelings at town of theft, unwanted entry manager Julia Griffin’s plans to retire

EMIL LIDEN/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF

As students reacclimate to living on-campus, some also reported incidents of unwanted entry into their dorm rooms.

BY Sam Brooks The Dartmouth

MADDIE COOK/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF

Griffin has served as town manager for the past 25 years.

BY Farah Lindsey-Almadani The Dartmouth

Following Hanover town manager Julia Griffin’s announcement of her intention to retire next year after the May 2022 Town Meeting, students and community members had varied reactions.

Over her 25 years as town manager, Griffin helped broker a deal between the town, the College and the Dresden School District to build Richmond Middle School. Under her management the town allocated land to the Mink Brook Community Forest and began the process of transitioning Hanover to renewable energy under the Sustainable Hanover initiative. Recently, the town signed a deal to join the Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire that promises to help Hanover meet renewable electricity goals.

Communications and legislative

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affairs director for the New Hampshire retirement board of trustees Marty Karlon praised Griffin’s work ethic. According to Karlon, Griffin represented municipal employers as a trustee when she served on the board from 2014 to 2017.

“On a personal level, I think she is one of those rare people you come across whose energy [...] leaves a lasting impression,” Karlon said, “We all are going to wish her the best in retirement, and we enjoyed having her on our board.”

Hanover Conservancy executive director Adair Mulligan commended Griffin’s work in environmental justice for the conservancy — the oldest local land trust in New Hampshire.

“She understands how important natural solutions to climate change are in dealing with that crisis in our community,” Mulligan said.

According to Mulligan, Griffin

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SEE GRIFFIN PAGE 2

College maintains virtual mental health resources

BY Jacob Strier

NEWS

frequently partnered with the Conservancy in efforts to establish recreational activities on the Trescott water supply lands in Hanover. To honor Griffin’s work, the Conservancy organized a public event on Oct. 2; Mulligan added that the Conservancy plans to host a second, more private event for Griffin in the future.

Griffin’s tenure, however, was not without controversy — on several occasions she had public disagreements with the New Hampshire state government and with governor Chris Sununu, most recently denouncing the state’s decision to exclude out-ofstate students from vaccine eligibility in April. In 2018 the governor chose not to reappoint Griffin to the New Hampshire Retirement System Board of Trustees despite support from several state officials.

Griffin has also raised ire in town

Mental health resources on campus continue to offer remote services due to the accessibility of digital support and concerns about COVID-19.

Although the vast majority of classes are now being held in-person, Dick’s House Counseling Center director Heather Earle wrote in an emailed statement that 60% of students continue to access counseling over Zoom. Earle added that digital counseling can expand the geographic scope of resources for students in need of help.

“If a student is looking for a counselor in the community, the geographic area opens up widely with Zoom,” she wrote. “A licensed counselor anywhere in the state of NH could conduct therapy with a student.”

Typically, the Counseling Center refers students to outside counselors for long term care if needed after an initial phone or Zoom triage appointment.

Some 25-28% of students will engage with the Counseling Center during their time at Dartmouth, Earle wrote.

The main reason that students choose to continue with Zoom counseling, Earle wrote, tends to be due to concerns about COVID-19. She added that though some students focus better during in-person counseling and find it easier to “open up,” others find Zoom more convenient.

Dartmouth Mental Health Union peer support program co-director Pulkit Nagpal ’23 said that remote peer support checks can remove the stigma associated with mental health and allow students to avoid a walk across campus. He noted that six days per week, trained MHU peer counselors are available over Zoom or in person to consult with students.

Before the pandemic, the MHU supported about one student every two weeks, Nagpal said. The pandemic, however, led to a surge in demand: by fall of 2020, the MHU was working with four people per week, a number that has since dropped to one or two

students per week this term.

In-person peer support has its benefits, according to Nagpal, who said that it may contribute to “more emotional connection.”

“I think that is vital to have, especially when the person coming in may be struggling,” Nagpal said.

Earle also noted that Zoom can make it “more difficult” for counselors to observe body language due to a lack of non-verbal cues. She added that digital sessions are subject to technical difficulties and that students sometimes struggle to find a private place to chat.

Student Wellness Center director Caitlin Barthelmes said that the center maintains a hybrid model, similar to the Counseling Center and MHU. She said that SWC online resources were limited before the pandemic, and the center now aims to provide as many “touch points” as possible for students to interact with wellness programming.

“The more variety you have, the more likely they can become embedded into your life,” Barthelmes said.

For example, Barthelmes said that in-person yoga and meditation offered by the SWC is complemented by an online library of recorded resources, available anytime to students. The SWC is currently collecting data about student engagement with its in-person and remote offerings, but Barthelmes said such information will not be available until the end of the term.

Barthelmes said that the SWC’s cohort of student interns helps staff stay on top of “the pulse” of students’ wellness needs. The center will be making adjustments to their services beginning this winter to ensure they “best meet student needs.”

“We know that being a Dartmouth student is complex and we want to continue to provide a menu of options so that folks can engage when, where, and how feels most supportive to cultivating their own wellbeing,” Barthelmes wrote in an emailed follow-up statement.

Following a mostly remote year, many students are reacclimating to the realities of everyday life on campus.

While some reported that they continue to feel a sense of mutual trust with other community members, others have reported being caught off guard by instances of theft and unwanted entry into their dormitory rooms.

Although Cooper Whalen ’25 said he has not experienced any theft firsthand, he said his friends’ bikes have previously been stolen. Despite this, Whalen noted that he feels comfortable leaving his belongings unattended in Baker-Berry Library.

“I’m confident enough that people here … respect everyone else’s spaces and objects enough to not steal them,” he said.

Other students recounted incidents of theft — some of which the Department of Safety and Security were unable to resolve — that altered their perspective on campus security.

Eva Hymes ’25 said that her bike, entire backpack, charger and laundry have been stolen on separate occasions. According to Hymes, while her stolen bike had been unlocked, she has heard rumors of other students’ “locks getting cut and tires getting removed.” She added that there have been multiple thefts in French Hall this term, including a bag she left in French’s common room overnight.

“I put up missing posters [for the bag], because it was a really important bag and had a lot of stuff in it,” she said.

“Then a janitor called me … and said she found my bag in the trash of the laundry room. But there was nothing in [it] — they stole all the clothes and everything else in it.”

Hymes noted that she reported some of the thefts to Safety and Security, but they “did not really do anything.” “[Safety and Security] just kind of said, ‘Oh, I’m sorry that you lost your stuff,’ [but] they said there was nothing they could do,” Hymes said. “It’s not my job to make sure things aren’t getting stolen from the dorms … I think if [the College] set up cameras in [French’s] common room, that’d be great.”

Rory Doyle ’25 had a similar experience with the theft of his bike — but unlike Hymes, Doyle retrieved his bike later that evening when he saw someone riding it across the Green.

According to Doyle, a Safety and Security officer told him that “nine times out of 10,” other students steal bikes to get to class and rarely take those bikes off campus.

“I live on the first floor [of Bildner Hall] and my window overlooks the bike rack … and I forgot to lock [the bike] that night, but I figured I’d hear if something happened … but then I woke up, and it was gone,” Doyle said.

“I had gotten home at [12:40 a.m.] and woke up at [6:40 a.m.], so in just six hours, it was nabbed. I’m never leaving my bike unlocked again.”

Doyle found that Safety and Security was “super helpful,” recalling that the officer he contacted drove around campus all day searching for the bike.

Julia Hoffman ’22 noted that she feels campus is a secure space, adding that she leaves her laptop “everywhere” and never locks her dorm room during the day. Although her possessions have never been stolen, Hoffman said that “somebody shirtless” entered her dorm room on Halloween night this year. She has not discovered the person’s identity.

“I was overall very confused and annoyed that I forgot to lock my door,” she said.

Despite the incident, Hoffman said she supports reinstating 24/7 universal card access to all residential facilities — a policy that was discontinued in 2019 following reports of “bias incidents.”

While the College has since relaxed its limited access policy to allow card access to all dorms from 8 a.m. to 12 a.m. every day, students still cannot enter dorms outside their house community after midnight. According to associate dean of residential life Michael Wooten, the new policy “strike[s] the right balance between security and flexibility.”

Some students besides Hoffman reported unwanted entry into their dorm rooms despite the limited access at night.

Heath Monsma ’25 said that this term, two graduate students broke into his dorm room in the middle of the night and slept on his floor.

“I was really confused … they said that they didn’t remember anything from the previous night,” Monsma said. “They had no idea how they got into the building.”

Wooten wrote in an emailed statement that residential life receives more reports of unwanted entry than theft. He also wrote that more than 95% of students picked up their keys for their dorms this fall.

The general feeling of safety on campus varies from student to student based on past experiences with crime and identity. Both Whalen and Monsma attributed their sense of security in walking around campus alone to being male.

“I feel like as a male, I don’t really feel unsafe ever,” Whalen said.

Hymes mentioned that she always walks home with a friend as she generally feels unsafe alone, citing her recent experiences with theft and issues with sexual violence on campus.

Hanover police chief Charlie Dennis and Safety and Security director Keysi Montás did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Monsma is a sports writer for The Dartmouth.

PAGE 2

Monica Morrison ’07 and Rob Langrick Tu’06 reach settlement in defamation case

BY CASSANDRA THOMAS The Dartmouth Staff

In September, a settlement was reached in a defamation case between Monica Morrison ’07 and Rob Langrick Tu’06, stemming from Morrison’s allegations of sexual assault by Langrick during their time at Dartmouth. In reaching a settlement, Morrison’s insurance company, Liberty Mutual, paid Langrick $175,000, avoiding a trial by jury that was originally scheduled for Oct. 25.

With the settlement, the roughly three year-long legal battle concludes without a court convicting Morrison of any of the charges brought against her. As the New Hampshire statute of limitations for prosecuting sexual assault committed against an adult is six years, it is also currently impossible for Morrison to litigate her claims.

Langrick’s lawyer Shannon Timmann alleged in an emailed statement to The Dartmouth that Morrison used the sexual assault claims for “publicity’s sake … to build her personal brand.”

“It was a long process, but the end result was that all of Ms. Morrison’s claims were dismissed with prejudice, the Court granted partial summary judgment as to all of Mr. Langrick’s claims — while noting that ‘there is record evidence’ to ‘corroborate his version of events,’” Timmann wrote.

The accusations of defamation brought against Morrison by Langrick evolved from an alleged incident in May 2005, when Morrison was a 19-year-old undergraduate and Langrick was a student at the Tuck School of Business. The two met at Bones Gate fraternity playing pong; both heavily intoxicated, Morrison invited Langrick back to her room at the Panarchy house.

Morrison and Langrick agree that she guided him to a social room outside of the “cupola,” where they kissed, according to court filings. From that point, the two moved into the cupola, where Morrison claimed that they had nonconsensual sex, as Morrison was too inebriated to provide consent. She also claims that after guiding Langrick to a couch to sleep, he moved to her bed and raped her while she was unconscious. Langrick denies any nonconsensual sex.

After meeting with a sexual assault peer advisor, Morrison reported the incident to the Hanover police department on May 27, 2005.

Detective captain Frank Moran concluded that there was not enough evidence to support a sexual assault charge, according to court documents.

Morrison’s lawyer Henry Kaufman said that Moran’s decision in 2005 did not vindicate Langrick. “… Moran confirmed [years later in court] that a refusal to prosecute did not mean that Langrick was exonerated,” Kaufman said.

After the alleged assault, Langrick

continued with his studies at Tuck while Morrison took time away from school to recover, according to Kaufman.

The case was buried for over a decade until 2016, when Morrison made new attempts to get in touch with Langrick — seeking “some kind of closure,” according to Kaufman. She did so by leaving a voicemail directly on Langrick’s personal phone, to which he never responded. In Langrick’s counterclaims, he asserted that Morrison, a freelance writer, claimed in the voicemail to be seeking a “press inquiry” for a story she was writing.

University of New Hampshire law professor John Greabe explained that the phone call may have been a misstep on Morrison’s part.

“If you’re securing evidence through misrepresentation, you’re skating [on] ice because the law doesn’t look favorably on people being misled into saying something or doing something,” Greabe said.

Beginning in 2018 — at the same cultural moment as the #MeToo movement — Morrison became determined to make her story public, according to Diana Whitney ’95, cofounder of the activist group Dartmouth Community Against Gender Harassment and Sexual Violence. Whitney and Morrison met through DCGHSV to support the plaintiffs in a 2018 lawsuit against three former psychological and brain sciences professors.

Whitney recounted that Morrison carefully weighed her decision to go public with Langrick’s name.

According to Kaufman, Morrison became newly determined to bring her case to light after she discovered that Langrick was visiting college campuses for work trips and felt that he might be a danger to other students.

In 2018, Morrison used various mediums to publicize her story online.

Morrison created a Vimeo group entitled ‘rapist’ which contained a single video of Langrick giving a presentation for Bloomberg. Morrison also posted an anonymous “personal review” of Langrick on MyLife.com, alleging that Langrick “penetrat[ed] and attempt[ed] anal sex with an unconscious woman.”

In November 2018, Morrison’s legal team motioned for a declaratory judgment, which, if successful, would have established that her calls to Bloomberg did not constitute

defamation. On July 9, 2020, this motion was dismissed with prejudice — meaning that the only possibilities were to appeal to a higher judge or file different charges in a separate case.

In response to Morrison’s actions, Langrick made three counterclaims against Morrison for slander and libel.

Later in 2018, he also demanded in a filing that Morrison enter into a broad non-disclosure agreement, according to Kaufman. Fearing that she would be required to recite Langrick’s version of events for the rest of her life — which stipulated his exoneration from the alleged sexual assault — Morrison refused to sign the NDA, according to Kaufman and Whitney.

Whitney said that DCGHSV supported Morrison’s actions, hosting Morrison and Kaufman at Dartmouth in March 2020 to brainstorm about her case and provide emotional support.

In 2021, Morrison filed for a summary judgement in the defamation case — a motion to decide on a claim without moving to trial. Her summary judgement was denied.

Greabe said that the denial was the result of the credibility of Langrick’s evidence.

“A denial of a motion … for summary judgment is a court saying: ‘Hey, there’s a reason to have a trial here because the jury thinks there’s evidence on both sides,’” Greabe said.

In September 2021, preceding the scheduled trial by jury on Oct. 25, the case was settled with a payment from Morrison’s insurance company to Langrick of $175,000, according to Langrick. Greabe explained that after a case moves past summary judgement, incentives to settle significantly increase because of the expenses and risk of trial by jury.

“For a jury trial in this case, it can be a crapshoot,” Greabe said. “People tend to minimize their risk, far more often than not, by agreeing to settle.”

In an emailed statement, Langrick expressed relief that this “draining” legal embroilment has drawn to a close.

“Overall, I am glad that I did not allow these accusations to go uncontested and took the necessary legal actions to protect my good name,” Langrick wrote. “It helped to know that I had the truth on my side, and I feel greatly vindicated.”

Morrison did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Griffin impending departure sparks reflection on long term at head of town FROM GRIFFIN PAGE 1

affairs. In a July 2020 guest column titled “Selfish Students,” Griffin wrote in the Dartmouth that students displayed “irresponsible behavior” during the pandemic. At the July 2021 Hanover Town Meeting, a studentinitiated article was put to a vote over maintaining the town manager position — passing with 1,200 votes in favor and 475 against.

DavidMillman’23,whocampaigned for the Hanover selectboard this past summer, said that the column was the most important motivation for his campaign. Millman said the town of Hanover’s lack of communication with the College was a catalyst for Griffin’s piece.

“There is no means of communication between these two bodies, and therefore it is very easy to see why [Griffin] would hold these attitudes,” Millman said. “If there was communication and engagement in a more official capacity before the pandemic, we might have seen [that] this op-ed would have never been written.”

The op-ed prompted a student op-ed in response in The Dartmouth

by Jordan Sanz ’22, who wrote that Griffin’s message only further divided the community in an already difficult time. Sanz said he noticed a “building anger” over the summer, as the town “felt like it was pitting community

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2021

THE DARTMOUTH NEWS

residents versus students.”

Nicolas Macri ’24 said he was disappointed in Griffin’s op-ed and her handling of the pandemic — claiming she prioritized the needs of Hanover residents over the feelings of students and that students were negatively impacted by her article.

“It sort of rubbed a lot of people the wrong way when she refused to apologize or acknowledge that some people’s feelings may have been hurt,” Macri said. “I feel like a relatively easy thing for a politician to do is say ‘Yeah, that wasn’t what I meant, I’m sorry. I didn’t want to give the impression that I didn’t care about you.’”

Sanz added that he wrote the article to communicate that Dartmouth students “want to help and want to make this community a stronger and better place.”

“We’re not the enemy here,” Sanz said. “And I wanted that to get across with my article.”

In response to the news of Griffin’s retirement, Sanz said he has no “ill-will” towards Griffin and said that she “has obviously done a great job managing the town.”

“Managing the town is not any kind of easy role,” Sanz said. “We should all be very thankful for the work that she’s done.”

In the search for Griffin’s successor, Millman said he hopes students will be involved in the process. He added that he is currently working with the

Student Assembly to create a liaison appointment between the College and Hanover, expressing hope for increased transparency in general.

Similarly, Sanz hopes that the search for the new town manager includes both Dartmouth officials and students, saying it would be a “great way to really show that the town of Hanover is committed to making sure that everyone in the town is heard and looked after.”

Miles Harris ’23 said he assumes the next town manager will be “very similar” to Griffin, as he expects the search process to involve the same people that chose Griffin.

Harris said he heard the news of Griffin’s retirement, but hasn’t thought about it enough to look into Griffin’s background and specific town policies.

“As a student, I don’t really have much say in those matters,” Harris said. “So I wouldn’t say [I have opinions on] any policies besides the general Dartmouth groupthink of being ‘Oh, Julia Griffin’s the worst — she makes us wear masks,’ but also it’s not that big of a deal. I figure she’s just the town manager and I never really thought too much about it.”

Macri noted how Griffin’s handling of COVID-19 does not completely overshadow her leadership in Hanover as town manager.

“I know it is difficult to lead in such a difficult time,” he said.

Arielle Beak ’22 contributed to reporting.

SVPP understaffing threatens anti-sexual misconduct initiative

MADDIE COOK/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF

BY TAYLOR HABER The Dartmouth

The Sexual Violence Prevention Project — the College’s fouryear sexual violence prevention curriculum — is currently contemplating canceling all of this academic year’s curriculum for the Class of 2023. SVPP officials expect to make a decision “over the next couple of weeks,” director Amanda Childress said.

For the past six years, the SVPP has had four per manent staff members responsible for creating a comprehensive four-year sexual violence prevention prog ram for the undergraduate student body, according to Childress. She estimated that SVPP would need anywhere between 12 to 14 fulltime staff members — at least three times the current staff — to carry out the program for all class years.

“Just next term, we’ll probably have to facilitate 120 in-person w o rk s h o p s f o r a b o u t 4 , 0 0 0 students,” Childress said.

The impending decision results from the pandemic-related restructuring of SVPP courses that put further strain on the already understaffed project, according to Student Wellness Center director Caitlin Barthelmes. Prior to the pandemic, the SVPP staff were able to develop programming for each rising class a year ahead of time.

“Our process all along has been to be really thoughtful and intentional about creating [programs] and piloting them before fully integrating them and expanding them to an entire class,” Barthelmes said. “[COVID-19] had us reevaluate what we’re able to do in the foreseeable future; I think we’re going to keep doing our best.”

As COVID-19 swept across the country, Childress’ team had to make a decision: either reformat the entire first-year and incomplete sophomore course material to a virtual setting — providing the Classes of 2023 and 2024 with some online curriculum — or dedicate their limited staff and resources to begin work on junior course material. They chose the first option, she said.

But by delegating resources to adapting the first-year and sophomore curricula to an online format, the SVPP gave up its oneyear lead on developing a junior program. According to Childress, the SVPP lacked the infrastructure to do both simultaneously.

“We’re behind in big part because of that,” she explained. “We do not have the capacity … to continue developing out. We’re working on that right now, and trying to get more staffing to do that, but our team is currently responsible for developing the curriculum, piloting the curriculum, implementing and facilitating it [and] evaluating it. It’s a lot.”

As a result, although the SVPP is in its third year of student training, only the first-year curriculum is complete. Two of the five sophomore courses have yet to be finished, and work has not begun on the SVPP courses for juniors.

The potential training cuts come

six years after the creation of the Moving Dartmouth Forward initiative. The campaign — which College President Phil Hanlon formally announced in January 2015 — strives to end harmful behavior related to high-risk drinking, sexual assault and inclusivity, according to the initiative’s website. The completion of the SVPP is the only item in the “sexual violence prevention and response” section of the College’s MDF implementation chart still listed as “ongoing,” as of 2020.

Training has previously been mandatory for all class years, but current staffing shortages and incomplete curricula threaten to put this requirement on hold, SVPP student advisory board member David Millman ’23 said.

“It just means that all of that [work] falls on the same four people,” Millman said. “And these are really good people, and they care about the work that they’re doing, but it just seems that the College should support [the SVPP] more than it is.”

Before the pandemic, Childress said there had been discussions between her team and senior administrative officials to add m o re s t a f f m e m b e r s t o t h e project. According to Childress, the transition to virtual learning, however, delayed hiring.

In an Oct. 29 meeting between SVPP staff, Hanlon, interim Dean of the College Scott Brown and interim Provost David Kotz ’86, the SVPP provided College administrators with a comprehensive update on its progress for the first time since the onset of the pandemic. The SVPP also put forth the idea of hiring eight to 10 additional staff members.

“In terms of the reaction … we felt very good about how we were having that conversation with them and their reception to the work that’s been done,” Barthelmes said, who was present at the meeting.

“We’re excited to see how things move forward.”

The exact hiring timeline, though, remains unclear, according to Brown.

“In a pure sense, it could take a while,” Brown said, who called the project update meeting both “compelling” and “helpful.”

Yet Brown characterized both the SVPP and the broader Moving Dartmouth Forward initiative as programs that operate without sweeping guarantees from the College administration.

“In general, in any presidential initiative, there is not a particular promise of a particular level of resources (or guaranteed unlimited support) and are supported and modified as available through our budget process,” Brown wrote in a follow-up email statement.

The merits of expanding the program are clear and have a potentially large-scale impact, Millman said.

“When you’re preventing sexual violence, the impact that has on someone is immense,” he said.

“When you invest in these resources, you are investing in the community’s mental health, as well.”

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2021

PAGE 3

THE DARTMOUTH OPINION

THE DARTMOUTH EDITORIAL BOARD

CONTRIBUTING COLUMNIST TALA MAJZOUB GR

Verbum Ultimum: The Selectboard’s Next Selection

Majzoub: Sudan’s Democratic Transition at a Crossroads

The Hanover Selectboard must choose a new town manager who supports a student-inclusive agenda and broad-based business and housing development in the town.

Together, protest and robust international pressure could restore Sudan’s democratic transition.

Since 1996, Julia Griffin has served at the helm of Hanover local government, in her role as town manager overseeing day-to-day operations and the town’s almost 30 departments. Now, 25 years later, her long career in public service will come to a close: Late last week, Griffin announced her plans to step down from the role following the annual town meeting in spring 2022.

As her nearly three decades of service to the town of Hanover reach their end, the lasting legacy of Griffin’s stint as town manager has started to come into clearer focus. This legacy will include Hanover’s recent joining of the Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire, a move that promises to help the town realize its goal of transitioning to 100% renewable energy by 2030, as well as the town’s acquisition of the land now known as the Mink Brook Community Forest, a space offering Upper Valley residents a venue to hike and snowshoe and securing a vital migration corridor for Hanover’s wildlife. From our perspective as student journalists, another defining marker of Griffin’s tenure has been her consistent openness and transparency with local reporters, including those from The Dartmouth — commendable for a government official often tasked with making and justifying potentially unpopular decisions. We wish her the best in her coming retirement.

In light of Griffin’s retirement, residents will no doubt begin to reflect on the role of the town manager and its significance to Hanover, contributing their voices to a vitally important conversation about the future of this town. As these conversations take place, we call on the Selectboard, whose search for a new town manager begins soon, to listen carefully, paying special attention to the suggestions of residents — including those made by students, who make up one third of this town’s population. To ensure student voices are adequately considered, two concrete steps that the Selectboard should consider are meeting with student leaders on campus — Student Assembly and Palaeopitus would be a good start — and holding events on campus to solicit student input.

Taking these steps will be especially critical in light of Griffin’s now-tense relationship with the student body, which has been especially bitter since July 2020, when she penned a guest column in this newspaper titled “Selfish Students.” In it, she chastised undergraduates for what she deemed “irresponsible behavior” during the COVID-19 pandemic while largely ignoring the comparable behavior of other Hanover residents. Regardless of the merit of her claim, the column alienated students

and inflicted lasting damage to the student-town relationship, damage that the next town manager will be tasked with repairing. To mend fences will require a town manager able to build coalitions between student and non-student residents on issues such as housing, public health policy and commerce in town. Holding regular events on Dartmouth’s campus — say, the equivalent of “office hours” on Collis porch, or other events intended to engage with students and explain policy issues to them — could go a long way toward mending fences. The continued happiness of all residents and the vitality of the town depend on the ability of the next town manager to represent everyone.

A keen eye for the town’s continued economic development is another essential quality the Selectboard should seek. Even before the pandemic, commercial turnover had long plagued Hanover, and if the economic vitality of this town is to continue, the next town manager will need to make attracting and retaining new and diverse types of businesses a top priority.

Even more importantly, the next town manager should be able and willing to address the town’s ongoing housing shortage. In large part because of the obstinate residents who block necessary College expansion projects and inflexible zoning laws — Hanover’s are some of the strictest in the state — the Upper Valley has for years dealt with a yawning gap between the number of housing units and demand. These rules and selfish objections prevent property owners and developers from doing what they’d like with the land they own and the supply from expanding to meet the needs of the community. To finally make headway in addressing the region’s housing crunch, the next town manager must be willing to advocate for strategic development in downtown Hanover and stand up to anti-development residents.

Hanover is currently at the precipice of what may be a monumental change for the town. The decisions of the Selectboard in the next several months will likely impact Hanover for decades to come, and as major stakeholders in the success — or failure — of the town, students cannot be shut out from conversations about who can best lead the town.

As students from a diverse array of backgrounds and experiences, we call upon the Selectboard to choose a town manager who represents all residents — student and non-student alike — with fairness and compassion, and who will lead Hanover into a successful and vibrant future.

The editorial board consists of opinion staff columnists, the opinion editors, the executive editors and the editor-in-chief.

NINA SLOAN ’24: IS IT WINTER YET?

On Oct. 25, the Sudanese military seized power and declared a state of emergency. In response, thousands of civilians poured into the streets of the capital, Khartoum, in protest against the prospect of military rule. General Abdel-Fattah al-Burhan, the head of Sudan’s power-sharing “Sovereignty Council,” which constitutes a lead civilian-military institutional setup, launched the military coup and took the prime minister captive. Although prospects of a return to military rule loom over Sudan, the counterrevolution could still be reversed with extensive street protest coupled with firm international pressure.

Tension between civilians and the military in Sudan began to manifest soon after the army pulled its support from former dictator Omar al-Bashir in April 2019. The military insisted on guarding the transitional period, but a coalition of civilian political groups, The Forces of Freedom and Change, called for a full return to democracy. In the end, military generals and civilian opposition leaders reached a provisional constitutional declaration establishing the power-sharing Sovereignty Council led by General Burhan.

The agreement stipulated that the governing body would cede the presidency of the council in November to a civilian, who would then lead it for another 18 months.

But since the agreement went into effect in July, the military has revealed its antidemocratic tendencies and shown no interest in relinquishing its control. Burhan has cited the strife and deadlock within the transitional government as justification for the coup — the popularity of which has deteriorated as the country’s economy has worsened. However, the true reason for the coup is a lot more direct than it first appears — simply put, General Burhan is not ready to give up power.

Despite his ambitious rationalization, it is difficult to see how military rule would reconcile the political differences or help address the record-breaking inflation in the country. The fundamental difference between the officers and civilians has always been about the extent to which they execute the democratic path charted by the 2019 agreement. Not only did the military dismiss the government and detain the prime minister — they also declared a state of emergency and imposed telecommunication blackouts to control the flow of information. And against the backdrop of international condemnation, the military leaders adamantly refuse to back down. In fact, the Sudanese security forces have barricaded the streets, responding violently to the anti-coup protesters by killing at least 12 people and injuring over 150.

If similar experiences in the region have taught us anything, it’s that with increased militarization come grim prospects for democracy — greater repression, tyranny and violence.

In the authoritarian-afflicted Arab world, leaders do not seem too keen on sharing power or yielding it to civilians: For example, Egypt’s democratic transition was cut short by severe fissures in the revolutionary coalition and a complete military coup led by General

Abdel Fattah el-Sisi in 2013. More recently, a video circulated of Lebanon’s minister of information stating in an interview that he wishes Lebanon would have a “temporary” five-year military coup to “give people their rights back.” To their credit, the interviewer laughed — and reminded the minister that there is “no such thing as a temporary military coup.”

Other uprisings have managed to avoid a full return to military rule, and the same could be true for Sudan. Old regime officers were met with a fierce revolutionary response when they attempted a coup in Burkina Faso in 2015 and power was quickly returned to civilians a week later. In Tunisia — while some activists encouraged the military intervention in 2013 — the main revolutionary parties opposed the temptation to turn to military rule and the coup failed. A decisive factor in whether a coup will successfully take hold is the scale of popular response. In Sudan, nationwide protests denounced the military coup and demanded that power be handed over to civilians. As of right now, the task of ensuring Sudan’s democratic transition falls chiefly on Sudanese supporters of democracy — a majority that showed its strength in ousting al-Bashir in 2019.

Yet, protest alone is inadequate. The pro-democracy movement can only be fully rectified with the help of foreign allies that hold the power to influence and dispel counterrevolutionary forces. In Sudan, the international response seems promising. Many foreign governments and human rights groups have demanded the immediate release of the civilian political leaders and condemned the coup. The United Nations Security Council expressed serious concern and solidarity with the Sudanese people — affirming its readiness to support efforts to realize Sudan’s democratic transition — and the United States halted $700 million in aid to Sudan. Unsurprisingly and unfortunately, the responses from the nearby authoritarian Gulf countries, like the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, have been performative in nature.

Little faith can be placed in Arab governments when it comes to standing in the way of authoritarian rule. In fact, they have consistently benefited from its regeneration.

It is thus imperative that other international actors do everything in their power to facilitate a continuation of Sudan’s democratic transition. However, support from foreign nations should extend beyond sharp rhetorical condemnations and financial suspensions that are more likely to hurt Sudanese people than persuade the military to change course.

Although the role of international actors is imperative in the fight for democracy, the role of those in the streets is equally indispensable.

In fact, the massive turnout of protestors signifies the people’s deep mistrust of the army, which will always be a self-serving institution. If the streets were instrumental in toppling Bashir’s dictatorship in 2019, then the streets today hold the power to derail Burhan’s autocracy and dictate the return to civilian rule.

DOMINIQUE MOBLEY ’22: WHEN THE WEATHER APP IS WRONG

KYLE MULLINS, Editor-in-Chief SAVANNAH ELLER & REILLY OLINGER, News Executive Editors COALTER PALMER, Production Executive Editor

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PRODUCTION EDITORS

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PAGE 4

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2021

THE DARTMOUTH ARTS

Spotlight: Juniors form alternative band ‘Microsoft Paint Shark’

BY DANIEL KANG

The Dartmouth Staff

This article was originally published on November 4, 2021.

Debuting during the summer of 2021, the six member band Microsoft Paint Shark aims to share their own take on music through the use of a diverse set of instruments in a variety of genres.

Microsoft Paint Shark includes acoustic guitarist and vocalist Jake Zikan ’23, keyboard player Tanner Rubeli ’23, accordionist Piper Stacey ’23, bass guitarist George Stain ’23, electric guitarist Jonah Weinbaum ’23 and drummer Luc Cote ’23.

Rubeli and Zikan began Microsoft Paint Shark last fall as a duo, playing in their off-campus house basement.

While just a hobby at first, they decided over the summer to expand the band and start performing publicly.

“I received an offer to perform at [a] Friday Night Rock event this [summer],” Zikan said. “I called George, Tanner and then the rest of our members, and boom, we became a band.”

According to Stain, Microsoft Paint Shark’s origins can be traced back to the bandmates’ shared involvement in the Dartmouth Outing Club. “[We were] basically just, like, a group of friends — who did different things through the Dartmouth Outing Club, who all loved music [and who] decided

to come together and form a band,” Stain said.

Microsoft Paint Shark combines the sounds of a wide spectrum of instruments, from acoustic guitar to an accordion, and performs songs from all types of genres. The group chooses their music based on each member’s strong suits and interests.

“We don’t have a defined genre, but if we had to say it in one word, alternative,” said Zikan. “We love it all: pop, rock, pop rock, alternative.”

For Mia Giallorenzi ’23, a fan who has attended both the band’s practices and their two on-campus performances, this versatility is something that she is drawn to.

“It’s always fun when they play pop stuff, but they also do a bunch of classic rock, which I love because it means that there’s something for everyone,” Giallorenzi said.

Giallorenzi added that she thinks the band is particularly well-fit for outdoor performances, pointing to a successful performance in August at FestNR, an outdoor concert at the Bema amphitheater on Aug. 7.

“It was super fun to have them playing with all of the other student bands and have all of the student bands cheering each other on,” said Giallorenzi. “I know they were nervous about FestNR because it was their first show, but they were amazing.”

Will Dowling ’23, who is a close friend to all the band members as well as a fan, praised Microsoft Paint Shark’s

PHOTO COURTESY OF TANNER RUBELI ’23

Piper Stacey ‘23, Luc Cote ‘23, Jake Zikan ‘23, George Stain ‘23, Tanner Rubeli ‘23 and Jonah Weinbaum ‘23 perform at FestNR this summer.

audience engagement.

“I really like that their music is more chill than some of the other on campus bands, but they still keep the audience engaged,” Dowling said.

Microsoft Paint Shark has not experienced any hiatus, like some other campus bands have, as the group was formed following the decline of

COVID-19 cases and the revival of oncampus activities. According to Stain, the group’s largest obstacle has been coordinating bandmates’ schedules during a busy fall term. Despite this challenge, Stain said that performing has simultaneously been a thrill and helped to alleviate the stresses of everyday academic life.

In the future, the band hopes to continue in-person performances and widen their audience, taking advantage of opportunities such as Friday Night Rock, according to Zikan.

“We do this for fun, and we enjoy having performances,” said Rubeli.

“We want to keep going, keep playing and keep learning more stuff.”

Review: ‘Squid Game’ Nails Portrayal of Vast Inequality

BY ELEANOR SCHIFINO The Dartmouth Staff

This article was originally published on November 2, 2021.

The Korean TV mini-series “Squid Game” seemed to appear out of nowhere, quickly receiving worldwide attention and inciting vast media discourse. Featured on Netflix, “Squid Game” tells the story of a cruel competition for immense wealth — won by playing children’s games with a deadly twist. The show is told through the perspective of player 456, Seong Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae). Created by South Korean director Hwang Dong-hyuk, “Squid Game” tactfully explores class issues and its viewers’ role in them through superb acting and character development that evokes strong emotional responses.

In an exposé of the effects of massive income inequality, “Squid Game” explores the desperation of the downtrodden, pitting the game’s cash-strapped participants against each other in playground games to the death. The show’s unflinching comfort with brutality is neither unfamiliar nor new. The exploration of social injustice through competition has been investigated previously in movies such as “The Hunger Games” and “Parasite.”

However, the willing involvement of “Squid Game”’s players leaves its viewer particularly haunted, as beloved characters choose to play the games and turn on each other as they succumb to greed.

“Squid Game” quickly revealed its affinity for violence in the first episode, “Red Light, Green Light,”

in which characters playing the game are gunned down if a robotic schoolgirl senses them moving.

Introducing the theme of “dogeat-dog” competition which runs throughout the series, competitors push each other out of the way to escape or even use one another as human shields — despite having been friendly earlier in the show.

With this game, the show rapidly shifts from slightly boring and confusing to astonishingly engaging and violent in just the last 15 minutes of the first episode. While the violence is gratuitous and intense, the raw and emotional response of the characters in their desire to survive is what makes the series powerful.

The impersonal nature of the violence in the show heightens the emotive experience of watching, as cherished characters die just like anyone else: painfully quick and without circumstance. There is no separation between the main characters and the background characters, and while there is more character development for the players who survive longer, they face the same fate as anyone else in the games.

With only one winner in the competition, viewers know that almost everyone will die. Yet, watching your favorite character be betrayed, then mercilessly slaughtered, is difficult to witness.

Furthermore, the face of death is unknown. All administrators in the game cover their faces with a black mask and act as the functionaries of a mysterious higher power.

The cold and detached treatment of death implies that the players

SOPHIE BAILEY/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

are replaceable and unimportant because of their lack of wealth, furthering the theme of differential treatment on the basis of class.

A character’s role in the game is indicated simply by the clothing they wear — with players donning minimal green track suits, guards holding large guns while wearing pink jumpsuits and benefactors behind gold, bedazzled animal masks.

With clear imagery separating the haves and the havenots, “Squid Game” delves into social injustice through its creation of outlandish and violent games with a kitschy neon aesthetic.

On Wednesday, Nov. 10, at 3:20 p.m.

Dartmouth will conduct a DartAlert test. DartAlert is an emergency mass notification system consisting of: • The Outdoor Mass Notification System (OMNS), which uses sirens and speakers that can be heard outdoors up to 10 miles from campus • The Alertus desktop notification system, which delivers notifications to computer screens that have installed the Alertus software • The delivery of automated messages to all Dartmouth-administered email accounts and campus phones, as well as to the personal phones of registered users • The activation of a number of strategically located beacons throughout campus

For more information, please go to: dartmouth.edu/prepare

Additionally, “Squid Game” introduces a Korean cast to an American audience with actors that tap into an intense vulnerability which heightens the many messages of the show. Lee Jung-jae portrays Seong Gi-hun with a skillfully intentional normality. He is easy to identify with and therefore project onto — maintaining his empathetic personality through the series and never succumbing to the same evil as other players until the final game.

It is not often that the titular character — an absentee father and son, albeit with a sweet disposition — is the most monotonous character. However, in the crowd of pickpockets, thugs, thieves and failed businessmen that all undergo phenomenal character development, Seong Gi-hun cannot compare to the complexity of these characters and their tumultuous backgrounds.

Kang Sae-byeok (Jung Ho-yeon), player 67, portrays a stoic woman and North Korean defector. She joined the competition to secure the funds to get her brother out of an orphanage and find her mother, who was sent back to North Korea. With her unwavering harsh disposition, her rare moments of emotion are heartbreakingly raw and show that even the strongest can fall. With a minimal acting career prior to “Squid Game,” Ho-yeon is one of many examples of the immense talent within the show being rightfully brought to international attention and fame. And with the option to watch in Korean or with an English voiceover, “Squid Game” demands to be watched in its native tongue to let the actor’s talents shine.

The character development comes

to fruition as players reveal their true selves in episode 6, “Gganbu,” when they must choose their partner for a game of marbles. When choosing, however, players are unaware that they will be opponents rather than teammates and that the game will inevitably end in one of their deaths.

The emotional turmoil runs high as characters must either betray their partner or negotiate the death of a friend. Reveling in the pitfalls of humanity, “Squid Game” reveals that no one is safe, and people will turn to immoral acts in times of desperation.

The enemy of “Squid Game” is its viewer. In the series, it is the benefactors who watch and cheer as 456 people betray, fight, and kill each other in the pursuit of wealth and social mobility. But are we, the viewer of the television show, any better, as we consume a series about the same thing? While watching a show about death is clearly different then witnessing it firsthand, we discuss the drama online, rate characters’ deaths and actors’ looks as we completely miss the point of the show. It is easy to pretend a pile of bodies is just a mass of skilled actors when it is in a show, but this fictitious violence is representative of the inequalities that haunt the real world. “Squid Game” is meant to make the viewer uncomfortable — to point out our complicity in the perpetuation of social divides — because this unease means that the desperation felt by the characters has successfully transferred onto the audience.

Rating:

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2021

PAGE 5

THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS

SPORTS

Last-minute field goal keeps football’s title hopes alive

BY WILL ENNIS

The Dartmouth Staff

This article was originally published on November 1, 2021.

Dartmouth football traveled to Harvard Stadium this past Saturday to take on the Harvard University Crimson. With both teams near the top of the conference standings at 5-1 apiece, this win was critical for the Big Green to remain in the race for the Ivy League championship. After a backand-forth affair full of big plays on both sides of the ball, the Big Green walked away with a nailbiter 20-17 victory, extending its record on the season to 6-1, trailing only the undefeated Princeton University Tigers in the Ivy standings.

With 49 seconds left in the game and a 17-17 tie on the scoreboard, Dartmouth faced a crucial 4th-and-1 on the Harvard eight yard line. Not for the first time this season, the Big Green’s hopes for the game rested on the right leg of placekicker Connor Davis ’22.

And also not for the first time this season, Davis came through. His kick gave Dartmouth a three-point lead. The field goal would prove to be the gamewinner as Harvard kicker Jonah Lipel missed a game-tying attempt into the wind from 53 yards out as time expired.

Davis praised quarterback Derek Kyler ’21 and his other teammates for putting him in a position to win the game and said that he trusted in the decision made by head coach Buddy Teevens ’79 to go for the kick.

“I trusted these guys. I knew [Kyler] would get us down there and — I know I’ve mentioned in the past — I think I have the best snap holder in the league for sure,” Davis said. “I’ve got the best group of guys on the sideline. … They have full faith in me.”

This win gave the Big Green its second consecutive victory at Harvard and third straight win over the Crimson overall. Its last win in Cambridge also came in dramatic fashion, after Kyler’s “miracle” game-winning hail mary in 2019. The team’s last two victories on the road came following a sevengame losing streak for the Big Green at Harvard Stadium.

“We were walking over here and I was like, ‘Man, I don’t mind this place,’” Davis said. “It’s a great place to play, incredible atmosphere.”

The game got off to a slow start for both offenses, with the first eight drives ending in punts, stretching the initial 0-0 tie into the second quarter.

“The field position stuff doesn’t really bother us,” Niko Mermigas ’21 said. “I thought, from the first series, we were playing, defensively, really fast and really physical. And I think we held that for the majority of the game.”

On the ninth drive of the game, though, Harvard broke the stalemate, putting together an 11-play, 81-yard sequence that resulted in the game’s first touchdown and a 7-0 lead for the Crimson.

Dartmouth responded quickly, though, as Kyler led an eight-play, 75yard drive on the ensuing possession, tossing a five-yard touchdown pass to senior tight end Robbie Mangas ’22 to cap it off, his first touchdown reception of the season. Kyler finished the day 20-for-27 passing the ball with 230 yards and the one score.

The Big Green got a stop on the Crimson’s next possession, receiving the ball for the final drive of the half.

Dartmouth drove down to the Harvard 37-yard line, where the offense faced a 4th-and-3 situation. Coach Teevens decided to go for it, the offense picked it up and pushed down to the Harvard 17-yard line, where Davis knocked

NAINA BHALLA/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

The win marked the Big Green’s third consecutive win against the Crimson — after a string of fourteen straight losses.

through a 34-yard field goal to give Dartmouth a 10-7 lead at the half.

The Big Green lead, however, did not last long. On the opening kickoff of the second half, Harvard returner DeMarkes Stradford received the ball and made an 89-yard house call on the return. After the extra point, the Crimson suddenly held a 14-10 lead just seconds into the second half. That would end up being Harvard’s last lead of the day.

Coach Teevens said that the quick score made him second guess his decision making on special teams.

“First thing was, I was cursing myself for not just squib kicking it,” Teevens said. “The nice thing is, we were able to overcome it, in a credit to our players.”

The 14-10 score held in a defensive battle until the last 30 seconds of the third quarter, when Nick Howard ’23, in at quarterback, completed a rare pass attempt — Howard is used more often in the run game in the Big Green offense. The pass was hauled in by Painter Richards-Baker ’25 for a 31-yard touchdown, also his first score on the season. Davis knocked through the extra point and Dartmouth took a 17-10 lead.

Teevens praised Howard’s ability to throw off the Harvard defense.

“He has the capability of throwing the ball, and in a big game like this and critical situations,” Teevens said.

“Certainly, it makes people think twice when 17 comes into the game.”

The fourth quarter was defined by the two teams’ kickers, who accounted for all of the remaining points of the game. Lipel first missed a game-tying opportunity from in close, pushing it wide right. The Dartmouth offense could not capitalize on the chance to extend its lead to two scores, and when Lipel got a second chance to even the score at 17, he made it count.That set the stage for Davis’s game-tying boot.

After the Dartmouth defense held firm against Harvard’s final drive, the win was secured.

The Big Green will next take the field when undefeated Princeton comes to town on Friday. The game will likely decide the outcome of Dartmouth’s season.

Owen Scannell ’13 launches Premier Rugby Sevens League

BY Emma Dantas The Dartmouth

This article was originally publihsed on November 1, 2021.

Dartmouth Rugby Football Club’s legacy runs deep. The team is sitting on a 12-year Ivy League championship winning streak in 15s — from 2008 to 2019 — and has won seven of the last eight Ivy League 7s championships.

Owen Scannell ’13 Tu’19 is now trying to expand that legacy to the national stage. After graduating from Tuck School of Business, Scannell has launched the new Premier Rugby Sevens (PR7) league in the United States.

“I was a rugby player in college, and I really saw an opportunity for rugby sevens in the U.S. as an entertainment product,” Scannell said. “Dartmouth had done really well back in 2012 and 2013 and I saw how excited that got people, so I figured there was an exciting chance to do something on the professional stage.”

The league, which currently has six men’s teams and four women’s teams, recently piloted in Memphis, Tennessee, and will begin its full, regular season schedule in 2022. The league functions in a tour format, with one-day events held in cities, which allows for tailgating and other social events. The teams play multiple fastpaced games in a tournament style, and each game features seven players on each side and lasts 14 minutes with two seven-minute halves.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Scannell said that the league has created jobs for athletes, media and marketing teams. Notably, Scannell has also committed to providing equal pay for men and women, which is atypical among professional sports leagues. Current DRFC player Sam Frohlich ’25 said he sees Scannell’s dedication to this goal and to entrepreneurship as inspiring.

“He took something that he’s passionate about and brought it to fruition, which is impressive to see,” Frohlich said. “I think the fact that it will be an equal pay league is great because it sends the message that rugby is a sport for everyone, and I think they should be providing equal compensation for every player regardless of gender, working to make this league a success.”

Scannell recognizes that equal pay is not necessarily enough to eliminate gender inequality in the league, and said that he has taken steps beyond that

to make PR7 as equitable as possible.

“Equal pay is the line, but it extends beyond that, and really it’s equal treatment,” Scanell said. “We felt like we had a really unique opportunity to make it an inclusive league from that perspective so that means equal access to facilities, hotels, flights, travel, high performance training staff and quality coaching.”

Alex Magleby — Scannell’s coach during his time at Dartmouth and someone he describes as “one of his biggest mentors” — expressed that he was proud of Scanell’s commitment to the equal treatment of genders in sports.

Magleby, a former United States national team player and captain, is the co-founder and CEO of the New England Free Jacks of Major League Rugby. When he first started the team, Scannell was one of his first hires. Scannell was initially brought on to access the financial model of the budding business and grew to be the director of operations or, as Magleby describes it, his “first hand-man.”

“We were in some pretty stressful situations and what I loved and appreciated about Owen was how he was able to find humor in difficult situations, which will continue to be a great attribute of his as he continues to grow,” Magleby said.

Scannell credits his leadership skill development to being a student in Hanover for six years. He praised Tuck Dean Matthew Slaughter and his Tuck professors for his education.

“Studying the leadership and business side of the equation in an academic context was an invaluable experience,” Scannell said.

Scannell points out that the fast-paced nature of rugby 7s is reminiscent of NFL games but with even more action. Generating an American market requires strategic marketing — Scannell said he must convince Americans, who are accustomed to the NFL or NBA, that their time watching PR7 is time well spent.

“The way that [rugby] connects with the participants is something that people have been trying to bring to the U.S. for quite some time now,” Scannell said. “It’s an ever evolving landscape because it’s a global game with a lot of pressure and a lot of different angles, so trying to fit the company into that landscape is something that’s constantly changing and shifting.”

Scannell hopes to grow the league and business in the coming years,

looking forward to commencing the first proper tournament tour in 2022.

According to Scannell, the league could function as a stepping stone from collegiate level rugby to professional national team play, which is missing in the U.S. “[Premier Rugby Sevens] provides an intermediary between university rugby to the top international game and also opportunities for athletes to specialize [in 7s rugby] and use that to leverage into a better Olympic team in the future,” Magleby said. “The great thing is now this also provides that pathway for women’s professional sevens rugby athletes, which then can help us as we try to establish women’s 15s professional rugby as that pool of athletes starts to get produced.”

PHOTO COURTESY OF OWEN SCANNELL

Position: Office Manager Contact: publisher@thedartmouth.com

The Dartmouth is an independent, non-profit student-run newspaper company located on the Dartmouth College campus in Hanover, NH. Job responsibilities include: ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ●

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Payroll - weekly check generation, quarterly 941 filing.

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Pay and Schedule: The Dartmouth office is located on campus at Dartmouth College. Remote work is possible as this is a fairly flexible position.

This is a 5-day/week, ~20-hour position during the Fall, Winter, and Spring terms. In the Summer term, the schedule is reduced for a total of ~10 hours. It is a salaried position starting at $23 per hour, depending on experience. The office manager is paid during all break periods.

If interested please email your resume and letter of interest to Olivia Gomez at publisher@thedartmouth.com

PAGE 6

MIRROR

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2021

THE DARTMOUTH MIRROR

Keeping Their Promise? A Look at Mental Health Resources STORY

By Arielle Feuerstein

This article was originally published on November 3, 2021.

Few would disagree that mental health has become a critical issue on campus. Last year saw the sharp increase of rates of anxiety and depression in students, as well as with four deaths among the student body, three of which were by suicide among the Class of 2024. An investigation by The Dartmouth last July confirmed that the College’s existing mental health infrastructure was insufficient to handle this rise in mental health struggles on campus, although College President Phil Hanlon pledged in an email to campus last May — days after the death of Elizabeth Reimer ’24 — to increase mental health support. Now, months later, students are wondering whether the administration delivered on its promise.

In his email, Hanlon outlined that the College planned to immediately — that evening — add a second oncall nurse to “minimize the chance that calls will be routed to voicemail.”

He also promised that there would be two new counselors and a student wellness coordinator added “as soon as possible.”

Currently there are 13 counselors servicing Dick’s House, up from 12 this past July. Dick’s House Counseling Center director Heather Earle confirmed in an emailed statement that the College has hired another counselor who will begin a four-year position beginning in January 2022.

Earle also wrote that in January, Dick’s House will “begin a national search for two Suicide Prevention & Outreach Specialist/Counselor.”

Last year, the shortage of counseling staff proved to be an issue as some students faced long wait times or found themselves routed to voicemail in times of crisis. Despite the College’s commitment to hiring new counselors, some students, like Anastasia Bryan ’24, have noticed that the problem persists.

“I know that they’ve since hired more staff, but I don’t think it even fixed the [counselor shortage] issue, because when I reached out [to Dick’s

House], I still had to wait almost an hour to talk to anyone this year,” Bryan said.

Further, Hanlon announced in May that the College would partner with the JED Foundation, which he characterized as “a nonprofit that works to protect emotional health and promote suicide prevention for teens and young adults.” This fall, Dartmouth launched the first phase of its partnership with the JED Foundation. On Oct. 20, JED sent out a “Healthy Minds” survey to students, which is designed to gather information about student perspectives on the campus’ mental health policies and climate. It has also formed interdisciplinary committees featuring students, faculty and senior leadership. These committees are tasked with devising plans to support student mental health needs.

Je s s i c a C h i r i b o g a ’ 2 4 , a student member of one of the JED Foundation’s committees, emphasized the importance of the current “brainstorming stage.” While students frequently call for increased counselors or a better crisis hotline — among other mental health fixes — these solutions don’t always fully address root issues that exacerbate the mental health situation on campus, such as the “distrust between students and mental health resources.”

Chiribog a said that these committee discussions provide a forum to consider these deeper fundamental questions that are not always comprehensively addressed by casual conversation.

“We can’t just ask questions that are like, ‘Why do you distrust?’ We need to know that answer too, but we need to probe even deeper to figure out what exactly are the reasons,” Chiriboga explained. “We need to find the reasons and more creative solutions than the ones we’ve considered before to solve the distrust.”

While some students applauded the College’s partnership, some — like Opinion writer Spencer Allen ’23 — confessed they see the partnership as a “total sham,” as Allen wrote in a column last week.

Nicolas Macri ’24, on the other

HANNAH LI/THE DARTMOUTH

hand, is conflicted — acknowledging that while this investigation phase is important, he is discouraged by the lack of tangible change in the College’s policies.

“Sure, I think conducting research is a good thing to form their decision — I understand that,” Macri said.

“Part of the JED Foundation’s business is that they’re conducting a survey so that they can then respond with recommendations. But I think … we already know what the issues are. You know, the lack of enough counselors, the lack of long term care, the terrible medical leave policy.

Dartmouth still hasn’t shown any interest in addressing those. That’s a big issue.”

Bryan expressed similar sentiments, explaining that her only engagement with the JED Foundation thus far has been through the Healthy Minds survey. Although she is “hopeful” that there will be real changes to mental health infrastructure, she added that she doesn’t necessarily feel that employing an outside organization is the most efficient way to address mental health problems at the College.

“I feel like real change comes from

identifying areas in which students are unhappy and fixing those with students — not partnering with an outside organization and making everyone fill out a survey,” Bryan said.

However, Chiriboga is confident that this initial discussion phase is only the beginning, and that concrete improvements for mental health will eventually follow.

“I’m not really sure what is going to be the full scope, but I do know that policy changes will come,” she said.

“It’s an absolute — they will come — it’s just ‘when’ is not certain and how they come is also not certain.”

In these committee meetings, Chiriboga said there has been considerable discussion about “pretty much everything that relates to student wellness and health, in terms of policy.” She noted how committee members were able to provide feedback on the medical leave policy and the good samaritan policies, among others.

From her perspective as a student working directly with the JED Foundation, Chiriboga says she can envision these committee meetings fostering improvements to campus

mental health — although she acknowledges this progress isn’t always obvious to the wider student population.

“I think that [the brainstorming phase] is going at a pretty acceptable rate, but I think what could be better is how we engage students in this process,” Chiriboga said. “I think that the approach so far has been bringing in students before our meetings — and that’s something I’ve tried to do — but I think that it hasn’t been as all encompassing as we had hoped.”

For now, it seems only time will tell whether the partnership with the JED Foundation or increased counseling support this winter will prompt any tangible improvements to the campus mental health infrastructure.

In the meantime, students like Macri remain frustrated by the slow progress visible to students. “[Dartmouth] responded late, and they haven’t delivered anything yet.

They have future promises, but a lot of those are slow and delayed,” Macri said. “They want to academically identify problems, but the problems that have already been identified otherwise have still not been resolved.”

Eight Eerie Weeks at Dartmouth: Students’ Biggest Fears STORY

By Gretchen Bauman

This article was originally published on November 3, 2021.

I spent many sleepless nights this summer consumed by worries about college; my thoughts whirled in endless circles as I contemplated all of the gruesome fates that could befall me at Dartmouth. As September arrived and I set off on the 15-hour drive to campus, I was still plagued by worries — and unfortunately, the long trip gave me ample time to grow increasingly stressed out by questions of whether I would make friends, keep up with the demanding academics and survive living 1,000 miles away from my Indiana hometown.

Many Dartmouth students have possessed similar concerns, especially as freshmen. Amanda Olsen-Dufour ’22 emphasized this as she reflected on what she was afraid of as an underclassman. “[I] definitely [had] a lot more fear about finding my group of friends and people and also finding activities that I liked and felt like I wanted to be a part of [as a freshman],” she said.

Furthermore, Olsen-Dufour noted that the prospect of making mistakes in her academic or social life still fills her with dread.

“I think I’m often afraid of messing up or doing something wrong or not showing up to something I was supposed to show up for,” she said. “I think that’s probably just a function of being in such a high-performing environment.”

Over the course of my eight weeks here, I’ve found myself afraid of many of the same things as OlsenDufour. Each time I’ve submitted a less-than-stellar essay or listened to a peer’s brilliant contribution to a class discussion without having anything to say in response, I immediately spiral into worries about whether my intelligence matches that of my peers.

Furthermore, though I don’t resent

my upbringing, it’s often difficult not to feel ashamed of my Indiana public high school when surrounded by students who attended the best private schools in the nation. Their credentials fuel my fear that not only my intelligence, but also the high school education I received, aren’t on the same level as other students.

Additionally, everyone I encounter seems to be committed to an endless list of clubs while still excelling in their classes and simultaneously having the most fun times of their lives. When I spend a night holed up in the library instead of going out or miss points on a test, the ease with which others appear to be gliding through the term often fills me with fear that I’m alone in my struggles.

Yet, Olsen-Dufour noted that this is a common problem here; the put-together appearance that students assume often belies their true challenges. In fact, she said the scariest aspect of Dartmouth stems from this dissemblance.

“A lot of people are really struggling a lot of the time — it’s pretty frightening how little you see that in superficial interactions,” OlsenDufour said. “It’s scary how little you know about what’s going on in someone’s life just from interacting [superficially] with them.”

The ability of students to disguise their struggles from others often only incites more anxiety in everyone, as each individual is left wondering if they are the only person on campus to commit errors or grapple with uncertainties. Yet, the truth is that students are often filled with anxiety about a slew of different topics.

For example, Catherine Chow ’24, a prospective engineering major, said that planning her off-terms induces fear, as she must rearrange her D-Plan based on when specific engineering classes are offered.

“I’m scared that I’m not [going to]

finish the five-year engineering degree in four years like I’m trying to do,” Chow said. “With course elections coming up and D-Plan changes and declaring your major [...] recently I’ve just been really worried about it.”

Julian Davis ’25, who is from Sydney, Australia, noted that D-Plan stress is often exacerbated for international students, who are required to be on campus for three consecutive terms before they can take a leave term in order to preserve their visa status, which can make it more difficult to fit sophomore summer into their D-Plans.

“I’m a bit scared about sorting out internships,” Davis said. “I might have to do an extra term longer so then it can line up better with internships.”

In addition to these scheduling conundrums, Davis said that Australia’s pandemic-related travel restrictions were also cause for

concern. When he left Sydney, he had to obtain a travel exemption from the government. At the time, he was uncertain when he would be able to re-enter the country after leaving for college.

“It was definitely scary leaving everyone and everything behind, not knowing when I would ever be able to go back,” Davis said. “When I left, I thought I wasn’t going to see everyone for a couple years.”

Although Australia has since lifted this travel restriction, which makes it possible for him to return home for winterim, he stated that he’s worried they will reimpose it in the case of a major outbreak, and that he won’t be able to come back to Dartmouth for winter term if this is the case.

Despite the myriad of diverse fears that plague everyone, students have found effective ways to combat them.

Both Olsen-Dufour and Davis said

they are able to overcome their fears by putting everything in perspective. “[I] just remind myself that nothing really matters that much, and that Dartmouth is such a bubble and not the real world,” Olsen-Dufour said.

“I tell myself I don’t need to worry about the future right now because I have four years left in this place,” Davis echoed.

Chow said that finding different niches on campus allows her to process her fears, as she can form diverse groups of friends with whom she can discuss her concerns.

Finally, she noted that thinking about emotions other than fear helps her conquer what scares her.

“Sometimes I get these brief moments [where] I’m really scared of something,” she said, “but oftentimes, when I’m scared, there’s also something to be excited about, which supersedes the fear.”

MICHELLE MULE/THE DARTMOUTH