December 17, 2021

December 17, 2021

Established 1874

Volume 151, Number 9

Author, Former Oberlin Professor bell hooks Dies Kush Bulmer News Editor

Eighty-two percent of faculty voted to approve a motion to ask the Board of Trustees to reconsider the change to a Consumer-Driven Healthcare Plan and Health Savings Account that will begin Jan. 1.

Photo by Khadijah Halliday, Photo Editor

General Faculty Calls for Recommitment to 2013 Compensation Goals Anisa Curry Vietze Editor-in-Chief Ella Moxley News Editor In a General Faculty meeting on Wednesday, the faculty voted 82 percent in favor of a motion that calls for better faculty compensation and options in health care plans.

The motion will go to the Board of Trustees, which will likely respond after its next Board meeting, currently scheduled for March 3.

Wednesday’s motion calls for the College to recommit to a 2013 plan to bring faculty salaries up to the median of Oberlin’s institutional peer group. In recent years, some faculty members have criticized Oberlin’s compensation rates, pointing out that faculty salaries are falling behind those at our 16 peer institutions.

The motion also asks President Carmen Twille Ambar and the Board to restore faculty’s ability to choose among available health care plans. This summer, the College announced that it would move all faculty and non-unionized staff to a Consumer-Driven Healthcare Plan, starting January 2022. Previously, faculty and non-unionized staff had the option to choose between a Traditional Preferred Provider Organization plan and a CDHP. Switching all faculty and non-unionized staff to CDHP is expected to save the College $1.2 million per year.

Despite the savings, some professors believe that the new health care plan may make it harder to recruit new professors or even retain faculty currently employed at the College. Professor of Mathematics Jeff Witmer believes that if the College neglects faculty compensation, it will be much harder to maintain the exceptional educational quality Oberlin is known for.

“It’s very important that the College attract and retain high-quality faculty if we’re going to have the education program that students and their families are willing to pay for,” Witmer said. “For me, the big message is the Board is willing to spend money on things it thinks are

important, like the heating system; and it’s not that we absolutely can’t afford to spend certain dollars — we choose to spend certain dollars. So, where do you spend your money? My argument yesterday was that the most important expenditure is on the faculty, because students choose a college based on the educational program offered by the faculty.”

Professors have been working to get the motion on the agenda since May, but due to challenges with scheduling, it wasn’t raised until the December meeting.

Still, President Ambar hopes faculty will remember the findings of the One Oberlin plan. On May 15, 2019, the General Faculty voted in favor of approving the recommendations of the Academic and Administrative Program Report, which eventually became the One Oberlin plan. The implementation of the plan was aimed at dealing with an annual $9 million structural deficit.

“It’s not that we have to find $9 million for today, and then that’s it — you have to find $9 million every year,” President Ambar said. “This is not the only area where the institution has had to rethink its costs. It’s been in benefits, it’s been in the size of staff in multiple divisions, it’s been in how we deal with maintenance. The truth of the matter is that the College has taken a wide look at cost management across the institution — this is not the only place.”

The passing of Wednesday’s motion does not directly affect faculty compensation, which is set by the Board.

Still, Chair of the French and Italian departments Matthew Senior, who brought the motion to the General Faculty, is hopeful that the overwhelming 82-percent vote is evidence of the pressing need many faculty members feel to reevaluate cost-saving plans proposed by the College.

“We hope that the Board of Trustees, who ultimately has the authority on this, will communicate with us and promise to revisit the health care issue,” Senior said.

“That’s the most burning issue right now. It’s going to go into effect in January and I don’t know how soon we could

Gloria Jean Watkins, the renowned author, feminist theorist, and cultural critic known to most as bell hooks, passed away on Wednesday from end-stage renal failure at the age of 69. hooks taught at Oberlin College as an associate professor of English from 1988–94, as well as at many other higher educational institutions including Yale University, the City College of New York, and Berea College. Before her death at her home in Berea, KY, she founded the bell hooks Institute and taught as the distinguished professor in residence of Appalachian Studies. The news of her death came in an announcement from her family on Twitter.

“The family of Gloria Jean Watkins is deeply saddened at the passing of our beloved sister on December 15, 2021,” the statement from her family read. “Gloria was a native of Hopkinsville, Kentucky. Born September 25, 1952 to Veodis and Rosa Bell Watkins, she was the fourth of 7 siblings. In 1978, she published her first book of poems “And There We Wept,” under the pen name bell hooks, honoring our great-grandmother. Her written works include some 40 books that are now published in 15 different languages making her an international favorite loved by many.” hooks’ numerous publications include the books Ain’t I A Woman: Black Women and Feminism, which Publishers Weekly called one of the “20 most influential women’s books of the last 20 years;” Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center; All About Love: New Visions; and dozens of other works of feminist theory and cultural criticism. hooks maintained the use of her pen name throughout her writing career, choosing to use lowercase letters to direct the reader’s focus to the work itself rather than toward the author of the work. Yet, through her writings, public speaking, and teaching, hooks became a towering figure in the disparate fields of scholarship and activism.

Associate Professor and Chair of the English department Gillian Johns reflected on hooks’ legacy following her passing this week.

“The world of black feminist critical theory and cultural studies has lost an incredible treasure with bell hooks,” Johns wrote in an email to the Review. “hooks initiated many thousands of students and other readers into the critical practice of thinking intersectionally about domination and race, class and capitalism, and gender, sexuality, and love, as well as many other crucial topics. … One of the hallmarks of her practice (both lived and theorized) was approachability from both within and beyond academia. She was truly always down to earth, a woman from a close family in a small, segregated town in Kentucky.”

Donald R. Longman Professor of English, Cinema Studies, and Comparative Literature Anuradha Needham worked with hooks during her tenure at Oberlin and stated that hooks was not only beloved by students, but was also a significant reason for Needham coming to work at the College.

“I like to think that I’m here because of Gloria,” Needham said. “She was very influential in my being hired here. … When I came here, I met her

See Faculty, page 3

See In Memoriam, page 2

CONTENTS NEWS

OPINIONS

02 Insufficient College COVID 05 Presidential Initiative Model Testing Causes Students to Turn to For Collaboration Community Resources 06 College’s Financial Struggles 04 Former DoS Meredith Raimon- Exacerbated by Lack of Alumni do Leaves Oberlin Donations

The Oberlin Review | December 17, 2021

THIS WEEK

ARTS & CULTURE

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08–09 10 Things to Do if You’re Staying in Oberlin for Winter Term

10 Solarity Celebrates 10th Anniversary with Bloom

15 Phoebe von Contra, Fourth-Year and Track Star

12 Junior and Senior Recitals: Culminating a Conservatory Education

16 Spring Sport-Athletes Must Remain on Campus to Train During Winter Term 2022

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In Memoriam: bell hooks, 1952–2021 Continued from page 1

and she invited me to her house and she spoke about what it would mean to work here. It was very important to hear from her because she was, at that point, the only woman of color in the English department and she herself had come here the year before. She had come on a visiting professor position and the students petitioned the College and they got her hired on a tenure track position.”

Novelist Zoe Zolbrod, OC ’90, commemorated hooks’ death in a Facebook post in which she described her experiences with hooks during her time at Oberlin. “[I] took Black Woman Writers with bell hooks at Oberlin in 1989,” she wrote. “She lit the room with a crackling light. … We read Morrison, Larsen, Shange.

Over the years, moments from that class have returned to me repeatedly. What a profound impact she has had and will continue to have.”

Needham explained that, along with prolific and groundbreaking writing — which was her main pursuit — hooks was also an engaging public speaker, a good friend, and an attentive teacher.

“If you look at obituaries and look at the superlatives — well, all obituaries use them,” Needham said. “But I would never say that about Gloria, because it seems like each one of those superlatives belongs with her work. And with how she spoke, how she interacted.

I remember her at talks where she would interrupt her talk if she saw someone putting up a hand or expressing something. She had this incredible sort of ability to constantly engage with her audience. … She was teaching people — not just teaching them in terms of knowledge production, but in order to live their lives.”

Johns related her latest experience with hooks’ moving and insightful writing, after expressing gratitude that hooks was able to create the bell hooks Institute at Berea College before her death.

“I’ve just finished reading Belonging: A Culture of Place, which is partly about her return to Kentucky to teach at Berea College and reconnect with her family home, and I was moved again by her unique gift to communicate intimately with readers about complex and meaningful theoretical and social questions,” Johns wrote. “She wrote in the preface: ‘The idea of place, where we belong, is a constant subject for many of us. We want to know whether it is possible to live on the earth peacefully. Is it possible to sustain life? Can we embrace an ethos of sustainability that is not solely about the appropriate care of the world’s resources, but is also about the creation of meaning — the making of lives that we feel are worth living?’”

bell hooks, renowned writer, cultural critic, and former associate professor of English at Oberlin, died this week at the age of 69.

Courtesy of Karjean Levine

Insufficient College COVID-19 Testing Causes Students to Turn to Community Resources Lauren Krainess Staff Writer This semester, some students have turned to COVID-19 testing resources offered

by Oberlin community providers rather than the College. As a result, community providers such as the Oberlin Public Library have struggled with the increased demand. However, the College maintains that its testing protocols and facilities are adequate and meet Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines.

Currently, students who are unvaccinated receive weekly tests from Student Health Services. Students who are symptomatic or who have been exposed to COVID-19 are assessed by Student Health to determine if they meet the CDC criteria for a test. Many students who wanted a test due to exposure or other symptoms were told by Student Health they do not qualify, prompting them to seek tests from other sources.

The OPL provides self-administered COVID-19 rapid tests for anyone who requests one on a first-come, first-served basis. Adult Services Team Leader Rebecca Wedge said that the library typically runs out of rapid tests between shipments and cannot provide rapid tests for every person who requests one.

“We run out of them as soon as we get them,” she said. “We can’t keep up.”

Wedge said that the library’s test distribution doubled between September and October and has probably doubled

again since then. Though the library does not track whether test recipients are students, Wedge has noticed an increased number of younger individuals she believes to be students receiving tests.

“I don’t think it’s more students than community members, but I definitely noticed an uptick in the number of students accessing them,” Wedge said.

College second-year Aidan Sweney sought out a COVID-19 test from Student Health after an individual in his dining co-op, with whom he had dined in the same room, tested positive for COVID-19.

However, according to Sweney, Student Health did not fulfill his request because he had no COVID-19 symptoms and had not spent an extended time unmasked within six feet of the individual who tested positive.

“Everyone’s eating together and cleaning together,” he said. “I would have expected the College to be more concerned.”

Sweney took a self-administered rapid test he received from another coop member that he said he believed had been purchased online. Although he did not attempt to access Oberlin community COVID-19 resources, he heard from other co-op members in similar situations that the OPL and Oberlin CVS were out of COVID-19 rapid tests. Although he said that contacting Student Health had been his first choice to receive a test in this situation, he said that he might be more averse to utilizing Student Health’s Editors-in-Chief

The Oberlin R eview Dec. 17, 2021 Volume 151, Number 9 (ISSN 297–256) Published by the students of Oberlin College every Friday during the fall and spring semesters, except holidays and examination periods.

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COVID-19 resources in the future.

“It’s a lot less likely that I would go straight to the College,” he said.

According to Campus Health Coordinator Katie Gravens, students who are not symptomatic, have not been officially contact-traced by the College, and do not meet CDC definitions of close contact with a COVID-positive individual will not always have access to a Collegeprovided COVID-19 test. Gravens believes these testing protocols fulfill the needs of the College’s current COVID-19 situation.

“There is adequate symptomatic testing,” she said. “I have not gotten reports of any student being tested offcampus. If they are, they must be testing negative because we’re not hearing about it.”

According to Gravens, Oberlin College Chief of Staff David Hertz speaks with the Oberlin City Manager, Rob Hillard, every week and has not received any complaints about Oberlin students accessing community testing resources.

However, in October, concerns regarding COVID-19 prompted 12 students to request COVID-19 tests from Mercy Allen Hospital, after which the hospital requested a meeting with Gravens.

According to Gravens, Student Health could not handle increased demand for COVID-19 tests, so the College reinstituted Mercy Allen Hospital into Hales Gymnasium to meet demand and alleviate their concerns. Gravens has since confirmed with the hospital that the Anisa Curry Vietze Kushagra Kar Gigi Ewing Ella Moxley Kush Bulmer Arman Luczkow Emma Benardete Maeve Woltring Lilyanna D’Amato Zoe Kuzbari John Elrod Zoë Martin del Campo Anna Harberger Mads Olsen Khadijah Halliday Eric Schank Walter Thomas-Patterson Sydney Rosensaft River Schiff Kathleen Kelleher

College has resolved the issue.

“We had a quick meeting,” she said. “I told them how we were addressing [it], and they’ve had no complaints.”

Gravens also said that students might believe they had close contact with an individual who tested positive even if they did not have close contact per CDC guidelines. Although these students may request COVID-19 tests from the College, Gravens said she wants to reserve resources for symptomatic students or for those who meet the CDC definition of close contact.

“The supply is limited, which again is where we say, ‘Let’s keep our resources for students who truly need it,’ because they are identified as symptomatic or a true close contact, as opposed to it being based on fear,” she said.

Gravens emphasized that the College monitors relevant data, maintains contact with public health officials, and follows public health guidelines. So, she wishes that more students would trust the College’s testing protocol.

“I think you have people at Oberlin who truly care about the health and safety of the campus, but we want you to focus on enjoying the experience and we will look at keeping you safe,” she said.

According to Gravens, the College is prepared to adjust testing protocol if it encounters a change in its current COVID-19 situation. However, she says that there is no need for a policy shift right now.

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Replanting of 126 Trees Underway Catherine Lee The College has begun the process of planting 126 trees to replace those that were cut down this summer. This is the final step in the first phase of the $140-million Sustainable Infrastructure Program.

In June, 97 trees were removed to allow for the construction of underground distribution pipes.

Campus Energy & Resource Manager for the Office of Environmental Sustainability Joel Baetens says that Oberlin consulted an arborist to help select species of trees that would withstand the Ohio elements and beautify Oberlin’s campus over the next several decades.

“We want a diverse selection of trees resistant to climate change, disease, and pests, and that also have structural integrity and complement campus activity,” Baetens said.

Right now, the roster includes the American larch, bigleaf magnolia, hackberry, Kentucky coffeetree, and basswood. The planting of these trees will likely take several weeks but is currently underway.

College fourth-year and TreeCo instructor Max Bauders looks forward to the introduction of the new trees.

“I think replanting trees will relieve the temporary eyesore of not having any planted there,” Bauders said. “I find them extremely soothing and comforting during periods of high stress.”

Since the College’s decision to outsource Student Health Services to University Hospitals Health System, many students have complained about long wait times and a lack of available appointments at Student Health Services. This summer, when the College announced the outsourcing, the College said they would be able to offer expanded hours using the UH resources.

The shift to UH, made in order to meet the increased demand for services due to the pandemic, has led to some students to waiting multiple days to obtain tests and appointments for COVID-19 and other health issues.

Student Health is currently searching for an additional registered nurse to help address the large influx of students seeking health care and COVID-19 tests.

“As Oberlin entered a second academic year under the threat of this pandemic, leadership felt that students would be best served and the health and safety of our fully occupied campus best maintained if Student Health was closely affiliated with a major local health care system,” Chief of Staff David Hertz wrote in an email to the Review. “Implementing this transition and meeting the medical needs of our students in the midst of the pandemic has been challenging. … We are discussing the most effective approach to bringing specialists on campus on an intermittent basis, even as we consider how Student Health will play an even larger role in the campus’ response to both the Delta and Omicron variants.”

University Hospitals Administrator Gene Hartman replaced former Medical Director Cristal Tomblin, who was not asked to reapply after her position was terminated during the switch. According to Hartman, the shift has created challenges for UH as they adapt to providing services to the College and an increased student population this fall. Additionally, Hartman stated that the Student Health Center is different from many of the other institutions he serves in his role.

“This is a unique situation for me,” Hartman said.

“Most of my offices are physician offices where you have three or four or five doctors with a full staff — they see patients every day. Here, there is a lot unknown because of the nature of the campus, … the school, and the students. … It’s a learning process, and we’re a few months in.”

For College second-year Becca Galbraith, the long wait time for an appointment meant that she was unable to use Student Health Services to get a prescription and instead had to have a roommate pick up generic, overthe-counter medication from a pharmacy.

“I was hoping to schedule an appointment for an

The Oberlin Review | December 17, 2021

Saturday, Dec. 11, 2021 11:06 a.m. An unknown caller stated that two paper towel holders in a Barrows Hall bathroom had been knocked off the walls and were on the floor. A photograph was taken and custodial staff picked up the broken pieces.

Monday, Dec. 13, 2021 9:08 a.m. Officers and the Oberlin Fire Department responded to a fire alarm at Talcott Hall. Upon entry, they observed a puddle of water on the floor and water dripping from around the smoke detector. Plumbers were on scene working on a leak on the second floor. The alarm was reset when repairs were completed.

3:52 p.m. Facilities staff reported an unauthorized structure built in the rear of an Elmwood Village Housing Unit. The wooden structure had two compartments and there were several items found in one compartment. It is unknown who was responsible for the construction.

Tuesday, Dec. 14, 2021

Photo by Mads Olsen, Photo Editor

Outsourcing Affects Student Health Accessibility

Walter Thomas-Patterson Senior Staff Writer

Security Notebook

ointment prescription, but they said they were all booked,” Galbraith said. “This was on a Friday, and they said their next available appointment was on a Wednesday. What I ended up doing is having my roommate go to CVS and pick up the ointment.”

Galbraith also said that she struggled to get an appointment with the Counseling Center for a psychiatrist, which interfered with her ability to receive adequate health care.

“At the end of October, I went to the front desk and asked how soon I could schedule an appointment,” Galbraith said. “I was told the next available appointment was not until December. I had to wait [over] a month to see a psychiatrist.”

Similarly, College second-year Ben Reider encountered scheduling issues when he was trying to receive COVID-19 testing. Despite multiple requests, he was unable to obtain a COVID-19 test from Student Health even after reporting his symptoms.

“I remember, this was a Tuesday night,” Reider said.

“I’m feeling really sick. On Wednesday, I didn’t go to class and went to the Student Health Center and told them I wasn’t feeling well. I asked for a COVID test, but they said they didn’t have any time slots until Friday. Later on Wednesday, in the afternoon, I go to Hales to try to get a COVID test, but they said, ‘No, you’re vaccinated.’”

After unsuccessfully trying to obtain an at-home test from CVS and Walmart, Reider went back to Student Health one last time, but they were still unable to test him. Finally, Reider went to Mercy Allen Hospital, where he tested positive for the flu.

Despite many students reaching out to community resources like Mercy Allen Hospital or the Oberlin Public Library for COVID-19 tests, Hartman emphasized that it was not common for students to be referred outside of the College for testing.

“Without knowing the specifics of that case, I don’t think it’s standard practice for students to be referred to Mercy,” Hartman said.

The limited staff available at Student Health along with the influx of students seeking care has prompted the search for an additional registered nurse.

“We could probably use an additional RN to support our providers here, and they can function at a higher level than a medical assistant,” Hartman said.

Hartman also reiterated that regardless of staffing needs, the Student Health Center is committed to helping students who come in without appointments, even though they do not advertise walk-ins. He emphasized that Student Health employees remain devoted to serving students despite the challenges they’ve been facing.

“I can tell you that [the employees’] compassion for the students on this campus is enormous,” he said.

8:36 p.m. Officers and Oberlin Fire Department members responded to a fire alarm at a Union Street Housing Unit. The parents of a student resident were cooking steaks. The oil heated too fast, creating a haze and activating the alarm. The area was cleared and the alarm reset.

Faculty Calls for Competitive Pay Continued from page 1

rectify this, certainly by next year. … If we can’t literally change the policy for a year, [I] personally would hope that in this coming year that the administration would set up some kind of emergency fund for people who are gonna be pushed into tough financial circumstances by the new high deductible plan.”

Still, President Ambar says given the timeline for the change in health care plans, it is unlikely that there will be a change in policy any time soon, especially since discussions about the motion won’t happen until the Board meets several months from now.

“I would never speak for the Board — I think that they will have their own consideration,” President Ambar said. “But what is true is that the transition to the CDHP happens on Jan. 1. And so, that will go forward because that is the timing of that change. And as you could imagine with an organization and an institution that’s large and complex like Oberlin, you wouldn’t be able to totally reshape a new health care framework in less than two weeks. So that will happen on Jan. 1, as was planned.”

Although the Board will be unable to address the specifics of the faculty’s concerns until March, Chair of the Board of Trustees Chris Canavan is aware of the motion and says he shares many of the faculty’s desires.

“I appreciate the concerns raised by the faculty, and I know that the Board shares the goals implicit in this motion, which is to make sure that Oberlin can provide faculty and staff with good health insurance and competitive salaries well into the future,” Canavan wrote in an email to the Review. “The One Oberlin report calls on us to find ways to address ballooning health care costs.”

Despite these commitments to faculty’s wellbeing, some professors point out that the change comes after a particularly difficult few years in the midst of a pandemic and financial uncertainty at Oberlin. Witmer specifically points out that over the last five semesters, faculty members have gone above and beyond to adapt to the difficulties of the three-semester plan, remote teaching, and other challenges generated by the pandemic.

“When the pandemic set in and we had to scramble in the spring of 2020, and then we had to adopt a new academic calendar and people teaching extra courses, people rolled up sleeves and did that because it had to be done,” Witmer said. “We had our retirement contributions suspended for a year, [which] took money out of the pockets of faculty and staff. … We pitched in and did a bunch of extraordinary things to get through a very difficult time. … I think [the Board] is in dangerous territory of going too far in that direction when faculty morale is as low as it is right now.”

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Linda Slocum, Outgoing City Council President Can you tell me a little bit about what you did before you joined City Council?

I worked at Oberlin College, actually. I was the Gifts Librarian in the Mary Church Terrell Main library, and I was also Managing Editor of the Oberlin College Press. Those were two part-time jobs that I put together for a full-time job. The reason I thought I might run for Council was because I’ve been a member of the League of Women Voters for a long time — since the 1970s — and I just realized there was some difficulty on Oberlin Council at the time. It was very split over what to do with the renewable energy credits that the City had accumulated, and I just thought that my experience in the League, my ways of looking at issues from all sides, and my approach to working with people might be helpful on Council.

City Council President Linda Slocum has served Oberlin’s community as a member of City Council since 2016. Slocum chose not to run for reelection this fall. After working for 17 years as the Gifts Librarian and the Managing Editor of Oberlin College Press, Slocum retired from the College in 2012. A small reception will be held on Dec. 20 to celebrate Slocum and fellow outgoing Councilmember Mary Price.

What accomplishments are you the most proud of?

One of the things I’m most proud of is that from the beginning, I’ve encouraged cooperation among Oberlin City Schools and Oberlin College. I had said the perfect place for the City and the schools to work together would be in the new high school, to make it more efficient. Although they didn’t come to the Sustainable Reserve Program funds for money for their electric lights and things like that, they did decide to put in a solar array, and the City was able to help them out with around $250,000 that we were able to give the schools toward the array. I just think that’s the perfect example of what that money was meant to be used for, because that will also save the taxpayers money in the long run because the school will have less of an electric bill. In the end, it’s a winwin situation for everyone.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Could you describe some of the other challenges you’ve faced in the years you’ve served Oberlin?

Oh, well, that’s an easy one, right? It’s COVID-19.

Linda Slocum

Courtesy of Tanya Rosen-Jones

Eric Schank Senior Staff Writer

I mean, that’s always going to be the first part of the sentence, “Despite COVID-19, we accomplished this or that.” COVID added layers and layers of difficulty. It’s been very hard, and when I say COVID, that kind of includes what happened right after that with George Floyd and all the unrest during the whole Trump era.

It was just very difficult. We had just started with the new Council in January. It was March, so the new Council hadn’t really gelled that well. We were just trying to get our rhythm and then this happened. It really was always the giant elephant in the room.

I can imagine. Well, I don’t have to imagine — We all have been living with that for the last two years.

Exactly. That was the good part, right? We all were in it together, and I think there were a lot of good lessons. I certainly realized there’s beauty around us.

Just to walk in my own neighborhood is wonderful.

I don’t have to travel to other places. There’s lots to learn: how do you help people? Who do you help? How do you help them effectively? And then what can you do legally? It gets really complicated. But I’m so glad.

This has been such a privilege. I’ve learned a lot, and I’ve been really challenged. I hope I’ve grown in the job. I’ve done my best.

So what made you want to retire? It seems like you were going strong.

Can I say my husband? [laughs.] I retired from Oberlin College in 2012. I’d like to have more freedom to travel, visit my grandkids, things like that. Work does tie you down. I don’t think it has to, but I’m the type of person where it does take a lot of time and thought. It lives in your head a lot, so it will just be nice to clear that a little bit. I also think you should always leave a party when it’s going well, and I think we’re heading in such a good direction and accomplishing so much, so I think this is a good time to go.

Former DoS Meredith Raimondo Leaves Oberlin Anisa Curry Vietze Senior Staff Writer

Former Dean of Students and Vice President Meredith Raimondo left Oberlin in October to begin her role as vice president for student affairs at Oglethorpe University.

Raimondo has been on sabbatical since stepping down from her position at Oberlin in early April, six weeks before she was originally scheduled to leave. When Raimondo left this spring, communication from the College indicated she would take a sabbatical and then return to Oberlin as a professor in the 2022–23 academic year.

However, Raimondo will not be returning to Oberlin next fall. She cited her dedication to building intentional learning communities as the reason behind her decision.

“I am really passionate about doing leadership work in the field of student affairs, because of my interest in cultivating holistic learning environments where students

can thrive,” Raimondo wrote in an email to the Review.

“As much as I loved the time I spent in the classroom at Oberlin, this is the work I want to spend the rest of my career doing.”

Raimondo began her time at Oberlin as a professor of Comparative American Studies in 2003 and was one of the first tenure-track faculty hired for professorship within the department. Following her time as a professor, Raimondo worked as associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, special assistant to the President for equity, diversity, and inclusion, and Title IX coordinator.

Raimondo was named dean of students in November 2016 after serving in the position on an interim basis for several months. During Raimondo’s tenure as dean of students, the College dealt with significant challenges, including a structural budget deficit, the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and the Gibson’s Bakery lawsuit — in which Raimondo is a defendant.

“Dr. Raimondo was a much beloved and highly

respected teacher who taught queer studies and classes about AIDs and other health epidemics,” said Professor of Comparative American Studies Wendy Kozol. “Her student-centered pedagogy along with her warmth and generosity both in and outside the classroom made her a much sought-after professor. I remember long lines of students waiting to see her during office hours and just about any other time.”

Raimondo says that she’s excited to work at Oglethorpe because of its diverse student community and opportunity to build an equitable and inclusive environment for learning. Still, Raimondo will miss Oberlin. “​​Oberlin is a very special place — at its best, the model for what an engaged learning community can be,” Raimondo wrote. “I hope that students will continue to cultivate kindness, gratitude, and dialogue across difference as a part of their passionate commitments to social change — this is the kind of leadership the world desperately needs.”

COVID-19 Update Ella Moxley News Editor

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Oberlin College Updates

Ohio Updates

Between Dec. 6 and Dec. 12, the College’s internal testing documented four COVID-19 cases among students. During the same period, the College was also notified of four new COVID-19 cases from outside testing sources.

Yesterday, the College held a booster clinic at Hales Gymnasium. All 480 clinic appointments were booked. Students who have received their booster shot can reupload their vaccine card to the Student Health Portal, and faculty and staff can upload theirs via a form on Oberview.

COVID-19 continued to spread on many college campuses this week, prompting Cornell, Georgetown, New York, and Princeton Universities to host more final exams online and close early for winter break after experiencing upticks in cases.

Oberlin has not experienced a similar rise in cases over the last reporting period.

President Carmen Twillie Ambar reassured students that the College is continuing to modulate its COVID-19 approach according to guidance from public health officials.

“We need to move away from concern about cases and begin to focus on whether there were any serious illnesses or hospitalizations as a result of COVID,” President Ambar said in an ObieSafe video update to the campus community on Tuesday. “As always, we will continue to evaluate all of our policies and approaches with guidance from global, national, and local healthcare professionals.”

Ohio continues to experience a rise in COVID-19 cases. Between Nov. 18 and Dec. 16, the state of Ohio recorded 177,593 new cases and 6,545 hospitalizations.

Currently, there are 783.2 cases per 100,000 Ohio residents, up from 718.5 last week and 601.1 two weeks ago.

High rates of COVID-19 cases are stretching hospital resources across the state, with hospitalization rates reaching near record levels for the entire pandemic.

About 47 percent of COVID-19 cases are located in the greater Cleveland, Akron, and Canton areas.

On Tuesday, Cleveland Clinic announced that the hospital was nearly at capacity with 786 people hospitalized with COVID-19. Most patients are unvaccinated.

According to the Ohio Department of Health, the rise in COVID-19 cases is likely not caused by the newly discovered Omicron variant. From Nov. 21 to Dec. 4, 99.5 percent of cases were of the Delta variant while just 0.5 percent were of the Omicron variant.

Health officials are urging Ohioans to get vaccinated as soon as possible to avoid further upticks in cases that might occur as people travel and gather for the holidays.

Currently, 58.95 percent of Ohioans have received their first dose of a vaccine and approximately 54 percent of residents have completed both doses.

December 17, 2021

OPINIONS Established 1874

The Counseling Center’s Website Needs Immediate Improvement Celeste Wicks I was poking around for cheap therapy options. This was a big step. Since, like many students, I don’t have in-state insurance, a car, or a trust fund, private practice is out of my budget. I really have one option. I searched “Oberlin College Counseling,” expecting zen web design and an appointment schedule.

Instead, I felt excluded, disheartened, and put off. The website should be taken down immediately and rewritten.

What it should be: Inviting and reassuring, with a simple link for making an appointment.

What it was like for me: Excluding: I clicked the tab marked “Sexual Abuse.” It starts with a narrow definition of what qualifies as sexual abuse.

Because I was an adult when the abuse started, my experiences didn’t make the cut. Sex abuse only happens to children and adolescents? I didn’t know they wanted me to understand my abuse as sexual assualt. Assault seems like a word for an action rather than an ongoing relationship. Was there no tab for me? As I read their definitions of abuse, I felt an urge to close my laptop; the language was anatomically specific and violent.

Why did they bother defining any of it? When someone wants therapy, can’t they make an appointment without diagnoses for what’s bugging them?

I went to the Counseling Center for help. If I was confused about the definition of sexual abuse, I’d go to Google.

Disheartening: I read on. Apparently sex abuse means you will absolutely need exhausting and expensive, long-term therapy — YEARS of therapy. Oberlin’s Counseling is presented as a brief way to “shore up.” Not comforting.

Off-Putting: To be fair, they do list another option for survivors — we can read a book!

“Bibliotherapy is a place many people start, and The Courage to Heal and The Courage to Heal Workbook are commonly used first books.” Yikes. I knew the sordid history of this book. Why didn’t they? The Courage to Heal: A Guide for Women Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse

is an infamous and widely discredited self-help book written by a poet — not a therapist — 30 years ago.

“The book has been criticized for being used primarily by incompetent therapists,” says Wikipedia. It’s a shame that the same author who didn’t realize I had access to Google didn’t know about Wikipedia. Could’ve saved them the embarrassment.

The problems aren’t isolated to the “Sexual Abuse” tab. Each “Specific Issues” page also needs to be rewritten.

Rigid: Presenting rigid, pathologizing, or unsubstantiated definitions as norms was a pattern.

Weird: Resources were sparse and well ... weird. The “Sexual Abuse” page lists “Resources” but it is only one website “designed to assist and empower men.”

This odd resource simultaneously relegates men to an afterthought and fails to address the existence of gender diversity. Also, all of us could use more than one resource and a 30-year-old book.

Thankfully, we have options!

- Uncallable crisis lines - Unnamed area coordinators, who are presented as the ideal suicide prevention squad - Lots of religious (Christian) resources. Weird!

Poorly-Written: The best page by far is “Bipolar Disorder.” Sadly, this is because it is a copy-pasted six-sentence blurb from the National Institute of Mental Health website.

Dangerous: Under “Self Inflicted Violence,” the Counseling Center explicitly enumerates 10 ways to self-harm. Isn’t this irresponsible and potentially dangerous?

But that would only be for people who bother to read the website, and I think they have made sure very few people do.

Making a better website shouldn’t be too difficult. It’s mostly about cutting pages. And to the Counseling Center — Hi! Competence and Wikipedia are at the top of my résumé. Shoot me an email. I’d be happy to help.

SUBMISSIONS POLICY

The Oberlin Review appreciates and welcomes letters to the editors and op-ed submissions.

All submissions are printed at the discretion of the Editorial Board. All submissions must be received by Wednesday at 4:30 p.m. at opinions@oberlinreview.org or Wilder Box 90 for inclusion in that week’s issue. Letters may not exceed 600 words and op-eds may not exceed 800 words, except with consent of the Editorial Board. All submissions must include contact information, with full names and any relevant titles, for all signers. All writers must individually confirm authorship on electronic submissions. The Review reserves the right to edit all submissions for clarity, length, grammar, accuracy, strength of argument and in consultation with Review style. Editors will work with contributors to edit pieces and will clear major edits with the authors prior to publication. Editors will contact authors of letters to the editors in the event of edits for anything other than style and grammar. Headlines are printed at the discretion of the Editorial Board. Opinions expressed in editorials, letters, op-eds, columns, cartoons or other Opinions pieces do not necessarily reflect those of the staff of the Review. The Review will not print advertisements on its Opinions pages. The Review defines an advertisement as any submission that has the main intent of bringing direct monetary gain to a contributor.

The Oberlin Review | December 17, 2021

Volume 151, Number 9

Editorial Board Editors-in-Chief

Anisa Curry Vietze

Kushagra Kar

Managing Editor Gigi Ewing

Opinions Editor Arman Luczkow

Presidential Initiative Model For Administrator, Student Collaboration In summer 2020, President Carmen Twillie Ambar announced a Presidential Initiative on Racial Equity and Diversity that “seeks to address issues of violence, police-community relationships, and racial injustices.”

By establishing an umbrella for future projects to fall under, President Ambar encouraged the campus community to start an ongoing conversation about diversity and equity. Notably, by September of that year, the Conservatory released a plan to increase diversity and equity within programming and pedagogy.

The latest project from the Presidential Initiative is the recently announced Center for Race, Equity, and Inclusion. According to President Ambar’s announcement of the Center, it “will bring together academic opportunities, co-curricular experiences, career programming, mentorship, community building, and civic engagement.” Every one of those elements will have direct benefits to students on campus and, crucially, make Oberlin a hub for pressing conversations.

After a college experience marked by financial cuts and pandemic precautions, this Editorial Board is heartened to hear plans for this new Center. The Center brings together everything that Oberlin professes to be: justice-oriented, committed to racial and social equity, and rooted in the community. The Presidential Initiative itself is led by a commission of administrators, faculty, and students. The Conservatory action plan was made in consultation with the Black Musicians’ Guild. Once the new Center for Race, Equity, and Inclusion is up and running, students will be invited to work in or engage in fellowships through the space.

In addition to its own merits as a necessary articulation of the College’s commitment to racial justice and equity, the Presidential Initiative is a model for how administrators can work with students in an engaging and productive manner. Often, students say they see a pattern of crucial work falling on their shoulders. In the past five years, students have seen elements of student life that should be handled by the College being neglected. The JED Campus mental health program was deprioritized by the College and mostly fell on student workers. When students’ belongings were lost in the shutdown of campus due to COVID-19, Residential Education was unable to work out the logistics to reconnect students with their belongings. A year after students first left campus in March 2020, the College increased its efforts to return student belongings, yet it only did so after months of urging by Student Senate and other Obies. However, the Presidential Initiative marks a new precedent: administrators and students working together, non-adversarially, in pursuit of a common goal.

What’s most exciting about the Initiative’s ongoing work is the prospect of what’s to come, with a slew of updates slated for release in the upcoming months. For us, it’s also meaningful how President Ambar — the most prominent face of the College — directly interacts with the community. Be it through Instagram updates from Organ Pump and the Hanukkah Dreidel tournament or workout sessions with various sports teams, students have the opportunity to interact and connect with her in a way that transforms this institutional figurehead into a leader who cares.

These are more than the public appearances administrators are wont to make; they’re deliberate acts of engagement with the variety of microcosms within our college. It means that students aren’t just dependent on the availability of office hours to share their thoughts with their president, and the head of our college isn’t waiting passively for input from others.

While, as we have previously written about, criticism is crucial to consistently evolving as a community, it is equally important to reflect on the movements toward positive change. This Editorial Board takes heart in the steps the Office of the President makes — particularly in its Presidential Initiative. The direct, open, and student-centered approach of the Office serves as an example of a transparent relationship between students and administrators, and provides a means through which to strengthen these relationships. We hope that this project is the first of many opportunities for open collaboration between administrators, students, and faculty on issues of deep importance to our community.

Editorials are the responsibility of the Review Editorial Board — the Editors-in-Chief, Managing Editor, and Opinions Editor — and do not necessarily reflect the views of the staff of the Review.

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Opi n ions

College’s Financial Struggles Exacerbated By Lack of Alumni Donations Emma Benardete Contributing Opinions Editor Over the course of this semester, I have been privy to a fair amount of discourse surrounding Oberlin’s financial situation. Specifically, I have heard students criticize the way the College is handling its finances, asking why it can’t tap more into the endowment, and protesting specific cost-cutting measures the administration takes in order to balance the budget. While this is a critical conversation to have as the College passes costs onto students and employees in the form of high fees and low pay, it is important to consider why the College is having financial trouble in the first place. It is possible that, as many students claim, mismanagement of the endowment is a contributing factor. However, a much clearer and potentially more important factor in the financial strain Oberlin is facing is a lack of donations from our alumni.

From 2013 until 2019, Forbes released the Grateful Grad Index, a 100-point scale that considers the percentage of alumni that give to a school and the median alumni donation size.

The magazine lists the top 200 private, nonprofit colleges by that measure.

While the claim that the formula can really measure gratitude is debatable, it is a useful source of data on how alumni donation rates compare across colleges. According to the most recent iteration of the index, Oberlin ranks 43rd, with a seven-year median donation of $11,918 and a three-year alumni giving rate of 22 percent for a score of 90. While that may seem impressive, it puts us in 12th place out of our 16 peer institutions.

One thing this metric fails to take into account is the opportunity for different types of non-monetary success. Many Obies make significantly less money than graduates of our peer institutions, typically opting to go into academia or public service over higher-paying jobs in the private sector. While this is a point of pride for the College — our slogan is, after all, “Think one person can change the world? So do we” — it also makes it difficult to remain financially stable without having to make dramatic changes to the budget. The Grateful Grads Index of a given institution is positively correlated with the median salary of that school’s alumni at 34 years old (about 12 years after graduation). In fact, adjusting for income, Oberlin moves up to sixth place among our peers. Yet while low alumni salaries play a role in our lack of donations, having a slew of extremely wealthy alumni is not the goal of our institution. The people who make the biggest difference in the world aren’t the ones who make millions.

All this being said, Oberlin’s lowend alumni salary numbers don’t necessarily mean we are doomed to a lack of donations forever. There are plenty of factors not related to alumni wealth that the College can focus on.

For alumni who do have means, the College can concentrate on standing out as a worthy recipient of donations.

Where people donate their money is largely determined by which organizations they deem to be the worthiest

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of their gifts.

“Oberlin is just one of 1.2 million nonprofit organizations in the U.S.,” the office of Vice President for Advancement Mike Grzesiak wrote in an email to the Review. “Across nonprofits the rate of participation in philanthropy has declined over the past few years. Today’s donors are pulled in countless directions (disaster relief, political campaigns, pandemic, social movements, etc.) and their philanthropy can vary from cause to cause.”

If Oberlin is going to improve — or even sustain — our donation numbers, we will have to come up with better ways to highlight why donating is so important.

“The best way to improve financial support for Oberlin, and any institution, for that matter, is to communicate the importance and impact of a donor’s gift,” Grzesiak wrote. “At Oberlin, we work to demonstrate how philanthropy makes a difference in students’ lives, whether in the classroom, in a time of emergency or financial need, or on the stage, field, or court.”

The Oberlin website highlights that almost nine out of 10 unrestricted donor dollars go toward financial aid, which is a good first step, but it isn’t enough. Plenty of potential donors have withheld support because of what they see as inefficient use of funds, especially in the wake of the austerity measures taken during the pandemic. It becomes a vicious cycle: the institution doesn’t receive enough in donations to balance the budget, so it has to pare down spending and make difficult, and sometimes misguided, decisions about where to cut costs.

Alumni hear about these changes and decide, rightly or not, that the College is taking poorly thought-out measures and being irresponsible with its finances. Because of this, they hold back a portion or all of their donation, putting even more financial strain on the institution, which then has to make more difficult decisions. Thus, the cycle continues. We can escape this rhythm, but it will require the administration to make more careful financial decisions. Alumni will also have to cut the administration a bit of slack and provide some of the funds to get the ball rolling in a better direction.

Another important thing to keep in mind is that we have to demonstrate how donations to Oberlin impact the world outside of Oberlin.

“With regard to inspiring alumni giving (and participation), we best serve the students and faculty of Oberlin when we are able to tell of their achievements, successes, and impact on the world and relate that to how philanthropy helps make those achievements and successes possible,” Grzesiak wrote.

If we can find ways to tell meaningful stories of alumni who have used what they learned at Oberlin to become Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winners, professors, journalists, politicians, and diplomats, and we can articulate what Oberlin programs shaped them and helped them achieve what they did, we can inspire alumni to donate so that the College can contribute to the next generation of changemakers.

“Uncensored” Unofficial Oberlin Facebook Group Incites Bullying, Censorship Melissa Landa, OC ’86 Marta Braiterman Tanenbaum, OC ’72 Frieda Fuchs On Sept. 21, 2018, The Oberlin Review published a piece called “Alumni Claim Censorship on Facebook.” The article discussed the formation of an alternative Facebook group, the Uncensored Unofficial Oberlin Alumni Discussion Group, created by Oberlin alumnus Robert Hayes, and others, after several alumni had been censored and banned from the Alumni Association’s digital community group. Hayes was quoted as saying, “It is my hope that the unofficial group we are building, where governance is transparent and open discussions are encouraged, will become a place for … necessary conversations.” Unfortunately, as we have discovered, the unofficial group has become a site for online bullying, defamation, and censorship.

After joining the Oberlin Committee for Justice for Mahallati’s Victims, the three of us — all Jewish — began posting articles about Professor of Religion and Nancy Schrom Dye Chair in Middle East and North African Studies Mohammad Jafar Mahallati. We posted Amnesty International’s report that identifies him as covering up crimes against humanity. We posted accounts from the family members of those killed in the 1988 prison massacres, and we brought attention to the protest against Mahallati’s crimes that was approaching on Nov. 2. We were met with great hostility, including an accusation that we were agents of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee only concerned about Mahallati’s anti-Israel statements and using the families’ human rights campaign for our own purposes and an accusation that we were lying about the families’ involvement in the protest. On another occasion, a hostile alumnus referenced “allegations and unsupported statements of Melissa Simone Landa and the groups/individuals she invokes” and then proceeded to state that he could find no support for those allegations.

Two weeks later, on Nov. 2, Landa spoke as an alumni representative at the protest against Mahallati, which was organized by the Oberlin Committee for Justice for Mahallati’s Victims.

Hours later, Rica Mendes, the administrator of the Facebook group, muted Landa, rendering her unable to post or comment in the group.

Referring to the group rule about transparency, Frieda Fuchs asked Mendes for an explanation for Landa’s removal and was soon joined by several others, prompting several members of the group to make insulting comments about their demands. In one instance, alumna Lily Manshel commented, “Lmao, why are there 5 different posts complaining about one annoying person being muted,” to which Mendes replied, “nailed it.”

Several days later, Mendes finally responded to Fuchs and others by presenting a litany of accusations against Landa and a notice that Landa was now permanently banned from the group.

The accusations were presented without evidence and dated back several years, curiously emerging now, as Landa had become a spokesperson for the Iranian families.

Fuchs was later notified by Mendes

that she was banned as well, with the ruling that she had “harassed” the moderators with her repeated demands.

Tanenbaum, who had been censored as well and was limited to one comment per hour, pointed out that Mendes has a personal history with Landa and was not able to objectively moderate. In response, an individual with the screen name Luty Hayes launched into a tirade against Tanenbaum and “every single member of Melissa’s coterie,” writing, “None of you have contributed anything of notable value. Nothing. …

Not all of you have lied or misrepresented or broken rules; some of you are just torpedoes for the people who do.”

Shortly after Tanenbaum’s comment was posted, Mendes muted her entirely.

The Uncensored Unofficial Oberlin Alumni Discussion Group has silenced the voices of the three Oberlin Committee members working for Mahallati’s dismissal, in effect aligning themselves with the efforts of the Oberlin administration to protect him. The group has also shown that its claims of unbiased moderation, transparency, and open discussion are empty ones. Moderation is arbitrary and vindictive, rules are optional, and hostility abounds.

We three were active members of this “uncensored” group — members who followed the rules and relied on group participation to voice our concerns about the deteriorating values of Oberlin College. In the past, we had written about the antisemitism of Professor Joy Karega and the administration’s refusal to take action against it and the discrimination against Jewish students who support Israel. This time, we were posting articles about the war crimes, antisemitism, and anti-Baha’i proclamations of Professor Mahallati.

The official Oberlin alumni Facebook group had already banned our posts and articles for being “critical of the College.” Now this alternative, “unofficial” alumni group with 2,500 members permitted the “moderators” to silence comments by banning the three of us. If people think alumni should weigh in on Jewish life on campus, how does this extreme degree of conformity allow any free speech among alumni regarding Israel, the rights of Zionist Jewish students, or faculty bias? Why was it so threatening to the official and unofficial alumni pages to post alumni-authored articles about campus antisemitism?

It’s time for the “uncensored” discussion group to reevaluate its mission and its administration and welcome us back. If it does not, its members need to decide whether to remain associated with a group that treats some of its members with such animosity and disdain. They also need to weigh the value of an Oberlin group that does not welcome discussion of an Oberlin faculty member who has been identified by Amnesty International as covering up crimes against humanity and found, by The Oberlin Review, to have “irrefutable” evidence against him. The group’s members who have watched our mistreatment in silence need to consider the words of Booker T. Washington: “A lie doesn’t become truth, wrong doesn’t become right, and evil doesn’t become good, just because it’s accepted by a majority.”

Comic: A Perfect Storm

LETTERS TO THE EDITORS College Should Not Alter Maya Lin’s Sustainable Landscape Project

Holly Yelton, Staff Cartoonist

Dear Moderates: Young Progressives Are Not The Scapegoats You’re Looking For Emily Vaughan As a whole, the Democratic Party is in quite the precarious position at the moment. The Supreme Court is controlled by conservatives, we are hanging onto the Senate by a thread, and our majority in the House of Representatives is nowhere near strong enough to resist a possible red wave in 2022. All the while, moderates like President Joe Biden are chipping away at the promises of progressive policy that got them elected, like forgiving student debt. They have failed to follow through on this promise, instead choosing to wring their hands and say that there isn’t room in the budget, then turn around and increase military spending during peacetime. Federal student loan payments have been suspended since March 2020, and the economy has not collapsed as a result. Despite this, payments will be restarting in February 2022, with no forgiveness anywhere in sight. Still, moderates clutch their metaphorical pearls to their necks when progressives run against them in primary elections, claiming that it opens their seats up to challenges from Republican candidates.

The biggest factor contributing to wins for progressives is not that moderates are failing to keep up with demands for progressive policy, but instead that they are failing to bring to fruition the promises of progressive policy that they make during their campaigns. In terms of strategy, this is an excellent one — for losing votes and support. How can they expect to win reelection when they show contempt for the policies that got them elected once they reach office?

It is only natural that progressives like myself are going to criticize moderates like Biden.

If I don’t have faith that a candidate will vote for and introduce legislation that I support, why shouldn’t I campaign against them in primary elections? Why should I compromise my political and ethical beliefs? Primary elections are an opportunity to support the candidate within your party who most closely aligns with your individual beliefs. I will be supporting progressive candidates in the upcoming primary elections. While I’m not a huge fan of the moderate candidates running, I will vote for them in November if they become the party’s nominees. I do this out of an understanding of the consequences of abstaining from voting or voting third party. This is a common mindset amongst progressives, and I observed it while on campus during the 2020 election.

I don’t think that enough progessive voters will refrain from voting for moderate candiThe Oberlin Review | December 17, 2021

dates to seriously diminish the chances of a Democrat winning the 2022 Ohio Senate race.

That said, if I as a progressive am expected to compromise my beliefs for the greater good of the party, then I expect moderates to do the same when progressive candidates receive nominations, and vote for them even if they are “too progressive.”

Additionally, I find the idea grossly offensive that I, a young person who has been following electoral politics since the age of thirteen, am “in the ‘honeymoon phase’ of [my] political action,” as last week’s Review piece “Moderate Candidates Are Worth Our Time” called it. It’s worth noting that I am nowhere near the most politically active or experienced person on campus. Voting means having a say in the future of hundreds of millions of people, as well as myself. This is not a responsibility that I take lightly. In the past six years of following politics and two years of voting, I have both learned and unlearned many beliefs and ideas.

One of the things that I have learned in the past few years is that we as Democrats must abandon the idea that just because a place has copious Trump signs or is otherwise conservative, it is a battle that has already been lost.

We must also abandon the belief that because a place is generally conservative, moderates will see more success than progressives. The former is harmful, divisive rhetoric that leaves people feeling looked over and down upon.

For example, many Democrats in Pennsylvania overlook rural, traditionally conservative areas and spend little time campaigning in them, despite the fact that they do have supporters in these areas. They then struggle to bring out voters in those areas. Putting in face time is known to be a good way to gain voters.

Showing up demonstrates to these people that they matter, and progressive candidates know how to do that. Showing up everywhere has been central to progressive Senate candidate John Fetterman’s campaign. He has made it a mission of his to visit every one of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties not only once, but many times throughout his campaign. To the latter point, he has had people come out to support him in every single county, and is by far the most successful Democrat in the race.

Progressive candidates can absolutely be successful in less reliably blue areas. They just need to play their cards right, especially as moderates appear to be failing to do so.

The Review’s article (“College Alters Maya Lin’s Vision for Post-Fossil Fuel Landscape,” The Oberlin Review, Nov. 12, 2021) indicates that the College and Conservatory say that alterations will be minor. But how, after accepting the design, can we renege on our agreement? And how can we, in good conscience and in good taste, say that we know better how this piece of land should be presented to the College and to the City of Oberlin than an artist of Ms. Lin’s stature?

I can’t see how altering the plans of a famed architectural artist and creator like this could possibly be to our institution’s advantage. As an alumnus of the College who is concerned with Oberlin’s sustainability efforts, I was dismayed to read of this decision. To me, it represents shortsightedness, if not total tone-deafness.

I have to wonder if other, unnamed forces were brought to bear here. But even if they were not, it strikes me as a failure of the College and Conservatory to take into account what would be the likely reaction of many who hear about it. I urge the administration to reconsider.

– Paul Safyan, OC ’68

Arredondo Interview Harmful, Offensive The interview published two weeks ago, (“Off the Cuff with David Arredondo, Oberlin Admissions Director to Lorain County Republican Chairman,” The Oberlin Review, Dec. 3, 2021), with Lorain County Republican Party Chairman David Arredondo represents a dangerous step to the right for the Review. It was bizarre to read statements by Arredondo like “[At Oberlin] I got exposed to political correctness, people who claim to be victims,” and “here at Oberlin, as Republicans, we were in the closet.” Not to mention, “It was also shameful to lose Vietnam … letting Third World countries push us around.” I could not believe that the interviewer did not follow up on these offensive comments and that the Review chose to publish the interview in the first place.

The interviewee displayed a deep bigotry towards marginalized communities in the U.S. and other countries as well as a complete lack of understanding of history. The Review allowed these views to be presented without any criticism or even clarification that the views were offensive.

Over the summer, Lorain County was the first stop in Donald Trump’s post-presidential rally tour. Many students and community members expressed fear over having far-right extremists so close by and reported getting harassed by Trump supporters while walking around town. The subject of the interview was a Republican National Convention delegate for Donald Trump in 2020. At no point was he questioned on his support for Trump or whether he was involved in bringing Trump to Lorain County.

The Review should apologize for allowing such views to be expressed so uncritically and should work to promote voices usually ignored by our white supremacist society. The Review should give a platform to these voices, not perspectives espousing bigotry.

– Sam Beesley

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T h i s We e k

Winter Term

Around 1,558 students will be completin — more students than ever before. Due Winter Term is now being held from Jan. 2 Term, this year will feature a full roster o daily social, academic, and co-curricular a Term website in the coming weeks.

10 Things to Do If You’re Staying in Oberl Article and Graphics by Anna Harberger, This Week Editor If you are trying to figure out how to spend the extra time in Oberlin, look no further! For the holidays, the Review is gifting our readers a quick list of activities, outings, and events to liven up the winter break.

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W hen it’s just way too cold and you need to stay in, gather some folks in person or over Zoom and throw a game night! If you find yourself in a living room with some friends, try starting a DIY game of Pictionary or charades. If you prefer gathering remotely, check out free, online versions of classic board games like Monopoly, Cards Against Humanity, or Scrabble that you can play with friends from the comfort of your own beds. Pair game night with frothy mugs of hot chocolate, a glass or two of eggnog, and plenty of snacks.

If it happens to be on the warmer side — as warm as Ohio can get in January — plan a picnic and bring it to Tappan Square or the Arboretum! Gather groceries from IGA — or Meijer if you’re feeling adventurous and have access to a car — and assemble a spread of your favorite fruits, cheese, crackers, and dips. I highly recommend cracking open a pomegranate and grabbing some goat cheese for a delicious and festive charcuterie experience.

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Got music on your mind? Put your playlists to the test and sign up for an interim show with WOBC-FM. If listening to music is more your thing, upcoming concerts to check out in Oberlin this winter will regularly be posted on oberlin.edu/ events.

Prioritize self-care! Use the extra time to switch up your morning or evening routines. Whether it’s trying out yoga or meditation, or simply making yourself a cup of tea in the morning: see what works for you. If you’re looking for some selfcare outside the house, treat yourself to a pastry at Blue Rooster Bakehouse, or queue your go-to comfort album and take a walk around town.

Get together with some friends and plan a night out in Cleveland. From dive bars and independent movie theaters to art museums and architectural landmarks, there are plenty of fun and budget-friendly things to do around the city. Don’t have a car? Check out the Oberlin EV CarShare program to rent a 2020 Chevrolet Bolt.

Located behind the Police Department in the Oberlin City Hall parking lot, this program is available to any Oberlin resident or College student with a valid driver’s license. Here are my reccomendations:

–Happy Dog: 5801 Detroit Avenue –Cleveland Museum of Art: 11150 East Boulevard –Algebra Tea House: 2136 Murray Hill Road –Cleveland Institute of Art Cinematheque: 11610 Euclid Avenue

From Director of Winter Term and Global Learning Deanna Bergdo

“If you missed the November application deadline, it’s not too late to participate in Winter Term. group projects that still have seats remaining. Applications for those projects will remain open until applications are also available. Prior to requesting an application for an individual project, interested s website. To request an individual project application, students should email wterm@oberlin.edu and a As a reminder, for students who live on campus during the fall and/or spring semesters and are enro their meal plan during Winter Term. But, everyone who is staying on campus during Winter Term mu 8

ng their Winter Term projects on campus this year to adjustments made to the 2021–22 academic year, 25 through Feb. 17. According to the Office of Winter of on-campus events where students can meet up for activities. Event details will be posted on the Winter

lin

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If you’re looking to get off campus or want to check out stores you might f ind at the mall, Crocker Park is a shopping center in Westlake. About 30 minutes away from campus. There, you’ll find a Trader Joe’s, Apple Store, and plenty of other retailers and restaurants.

Photo by Michael Hastings

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For something fun off campus during the daytime, try out ice skating, roller skating, mini golf, or rock climbing at these locations, all within 10–15 miles of campus:

Looking to serve the community?

Volunteer at Oberlin Community Services to help out with their sustainability initiatives, food distribution, and other services. Organizations like Oasis Animal Shelter and the Boys and Girls Club also take volunteers through applications on their respective websites.

–Country Skateland: 45841 OH-303, Oberlin –North Park Ice Arena: 901 Duffey Street, Elyria –Alien Vacation Mini Golf Attraction at Castle Noel: 260 South Court Street, Medina –On the Rocks Climbing Gym: 8701 Leavitt Road, Elyria

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Check out campus spaces for picking up new skills, hobbies, and other creative endeavors. Try your hand at clay-throwing at the Pottery Co-op, located behind Mudd Center, or make something new and unexpected at the Student Makerspace in Wilder 329. Need materials?

Take advantage of the 10% discount at Ginko’s Gallery, available for all students enrolled in an art class.

Take a hike! If you need to get away for a few days, stock up on CLIF bars, nut butter, and canned food for a camping trip to Cuyahoga Valley National Park. For more information on renting equipment, supplies, and other types of gear, visit the Oberlin Outings Club office in Wilder 404 or send their officers an email at ococ@oberlin.edu. For more low-key hiking, head to the Southern and Northern Loop Trails at Carlisle Metro Park. Moderate-level hikers may enjoy exploring the Kipton Reservation Trail in the Oberlin area.

orf:

Students who have not yet registered are invited to join one of the on-campus all seats are filled. On-campus and off-campus U.S. domestic individual project students should review the project guidelines and toolkits available on the Oberlin ask for either an on-campus or off-campus application. olled in a meal plan, there are no additional charges for living on campus and using ust complete the Residential Education Winter Term Housing Form,” The Oberlin Review | December 17, 2021

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A r t s & C u ltu r e

December 17, 2021

ARTS & CULTURE Established 1874

Volume 151, Number 9

Solarity Celebrates 10th Anniversary with Bloom

Musical artist Tommy Genesis will headline Solarity.

Lilyanna D’Amato Arts & Culture Editor This Saturday, Solarity will host rappers Tommy Genesis and Duckwrth — alongside a plethora of student performers — in its 10th-anniversary rendition, Bloom.

Solarity, which is a student-run group, holds a large concert event each semester in an effort to unite the campus and curate a welcoming safe space for collec-

Photo by Andi Elloway tive artistic expression. This will be the first Solarity for most first- and second-years, who were not on campus for Solstice, Solarity’s summer festival, due to the College’s three-semester plan.

Kate Steifman, College third-year and one of Solarity’s co-chairs, said this is the biggest event the College has seen since the onset of the pandemic. While the original headliner, St. Louis rapper Smino, had to drop out of the event earlier in the week, the concert will

still be the largest Solarity to date.

“We’re going to have the most acts that we’ve ever had this semester,” Steifman said. “It’s definitely the biggest budget we’ve ever had. It’s the big 10th anniversary, and we’re all so excited. We’re gonna make it pretty big. We’re putting on eight acts during the show, which is a really big undertaking.”

College third-year and Solarity’s other co-chair Erzsi Misangyi is excited to introduce the new students to the event. While they’re excited about bringing artists to campus, Misangyi is most looking forward to showing them all of the student performance groups.

“We wanted to put on a big show so that everyone could just kind of like have a night to enjoy,” Misangyi said. “There’s a lot of people on campus that just have never experienced Solarity and we wanted to make the 10th anniversary a big deal. … I’m excited for OCTaiko and [College third-year] Reggie [Goudeau] to perform.

We have AndWhat!? performing, and OCircus is going to be doing some stuff. Kopano is performing and Tali is our closing DJ. A bunch of really amazing student acts.”

Ahead of the commemorative anniversary, Assistant Director of Student Activities and Solarity’s faculty advisor Sean Lehlbach reminisces on the event’s origin.

Prior to the advent of Solarity, Oberlin didn’t really have any school-wide events of the same scale.

“In the spring of 2011, the event originated to highlight student art and performance,” Lehlbach said.

“They used to have huge art installations. But through the years, it has evolved into having that student art in performance in varying ways in addition to larger acts.

See Saturday’s, page 12

Next to Normal Student Production Opens at Kander Theater Sydney Rosensaft Senior Staff Writer The Oberlin Theater department will stage Brian Yorkey’s 2008 musical Next to Normal from Dec. 16 through Dec. 19 at Kander Theater. Directed by College fourth-year Emily Newmark, the play revolves around a family coping with the struggles of mental illness and opens as the mother of the family, Diana, is diagnosed with bipolar disorder. After going off her medication, she exhibits symptoms of mania and experiences delusions. Over the course of the show, Diana sees multiple doctors and tries various kinds of treatment while each family member grapples with learning to live with Diana’s mental illness.

This show dovetails Newmark’s two academic interests: psychology and theater. Newmark knew early on that she wanted to direct this production for her Theater capstone.

“I’m an avid theatergoer,” Newmark said. “I think activism through theater is really powerful. The mental health topics discussed were along my path here at Oberlin as a culminating project between my two majors.”

The Kander Theater, which typically hosts capstone performances, is a simple black box theater with a small, elevated platform for a stage that makes for an especially engaging venue for this production. For the majority of the show, actors perform on the floor, pulling audience members directly into the family dynamics throughout the story arc.

Kiva Wise, College fourth-year and stage manager, discussed the advantages of staging performances in the space.

“The Kander is where all student directing capstones go up,” Wise said. “The space itself is quite flexible physically, as the risers for the seating can be config-

10

ured a lot of different ways. … The particular setup we’re using is called thrust, which means we have an audience on three sides.”

The cast have gotten very close after two months of six rehearsals per week, three hours a day — the timeline was compressed due to the Kander Theater’s show schedule. The size of the cast and tight space result in an intimate staging of the show.

Anna Cohen, College second-year, plays Natalie, a high school senior dealing with a sick mother while trying to find her footing in the world. Cohen explained how the close nature of the show added to her experience.

“It is like having a second family,” Cohen said. “Performing in a show as demanding as this, both emotionally and time-wise, it has been really important for the six of us to bond.”

Aside from a little input from Newmark’s advisor, Next to Normal is entirely student-run. College third-year Ethan Smith-Cohen took on the role of musical director, deliberating crucial musical elements of the performance. Smith-Cohen noted how this production is a conglomerate of everyone’s vision; each student involved had a hand in creating the musical on stage this weekend.

“Emily is the director and has her own vision, and I’m the music director and have my own music ideas to put in,” Smith-Cohen said. “But the thing that I really love about theater is that it’s more than just any one person’s vision.”

Especially in a story that raises sensitive topics surrounding mental health, a conversational aspect between the director and actors is important. Next to Normal is an emotionally taxing story that easily affects people. Newmark did not want actors to get bogged down by drawing too deeply from their own men-

tal health struggles.

“We had a lot of conversations about how we were going to go about talking about mental health within the rehearsal room,” Newmark said. “Making sure that the actors were not pulling from pieces of their own life was really important to me.”

Emily picked Next to Normal for her capstone because the entire cast and crew knows that mental health, although difficult at times, is a worthwhile subject to portray theatrically. However, the conversation about mental health has shifted since the show was written­, now offering a more inclusive, accepting space for people dealing with mental illness.

“The show is meaningful,” Smith-Cohen said. “But in that same vein, the show was written in 2008. The ways in which we discuss mental health and the ways that the show discusses mental health have diverged.”

For example, some of the characters in the performance serve as caricatures of specific mental disorders, depicting

them falsely and harmfully. Newmark aims to address these inconsistencies in a talk-back after each show.

“We’re going to talk with the audience about the changes that have been made since this was written, in the mental health sphere, and say, ‘Here’s why it’s important to talk about the media representation of mental health versus the reality of it,’” Newmark said.

Newmark wants the show to be a powerful experience for the audience and hopes that they can use it as a jumpingoff point for broader discussions surrounding mental health.

“My hope is to start a conversation about mental health activism,” Newmark said. “[At Oberlin], we’re really lucky to talk about mental health all the time, but it’s also really important to make sure we’re aware that those conversations are cultivated from a place of research and activism.”

Next to Normal runs through this Sunday, Dec. 19. Tickets can be purchased online at the Arts at Oberlin website.

College fourth-year Emily Newmark is directing Brian Yorkey’s 2008 musical Next to Normal, which will run through Dec. 19 in the Kander Theater.

Photo by Clarissa Heart

ON THE RECORD

Theo Croker, OC ’07: Trumpeter, Composer

Theo Croker Indigo Stevens

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Grammy-nominated trumpeter, composer, and bandleader Theo Croker, OC ’07, returned to Oberlin on Dec. 15 for a performance at Finney Chapel. Since 2006, Croker has released five studio albums: The Fundamentals (2006), In the Tradition (2009), AfroPhysicist (2014), Escape Velocity (2016), and Star People Nation (2019). In his latest album, BLK2LIFE || A FUTURE PAST (2021), Croker blends post-bop, funk, and electronic music to explore the universal origins of Blackness. Croker has also been featured on J. Cole’s 4 Your Eyez Only (2016), Common’s Black America Again (2016), and Ari Lennox’s debut album Shea Butter Baby (2019).

What intrigued you about the trumpet?

It’s just brass. To me, the trumpet has a lot of dynamics to it. It always had a lot of expression. The trumpet players I first was hip to — even before I was into jazz or playing trumpet — were my grandfather, of course, and also people like Dizzy Gillespie, Lee Morgan, Clifford Brown, and Miles Davis, those kinds of sounds. To me, even the Gloria Estefan album Mi Tierra just struck me and pulled me in. My older brother played the trumpet for a while too, and I used to want to do everything my big brother did, so I used to sneak into his room and play his trumpet.

Courtesy of Jeff Dunn

I transferred before the last two years of high school to a school called Douglas School of the Arts in Jacksonville, FL. That’s where I met Scott Dickinson, Wilbert Neal, Jamison Ross, Larry Wilson, Alphonso Horne, Ulysses Owens Jr. — cats like that. We were all classmates up there. I went there because that was the compromise to me not running away from home to go to New York at 15. Florida’s got a crazy music education program. The public schools are pathetic, but it’s amazing how good all the music programs are. I know a lot of great educators here.

What were some of your early influences outside of the trumpet?

Musically, some of my early influences were people like Björk. I liked

her album called Vespertine. When I first heard that album, my mind immediately opened up to more electronic music; before then, I wasn’t tryna hear that. People like Outkast and Mos Def were influences as well.

I grew up hearing rap, hip-hop, and R&B on the radio — that’s what we generally listened to in my family — but hearing the Outkast album Aquemini, the Mos Def album Black on Both Sides, and the one that came before that pulled me really into deep hiphop. Not that Tupac wasn’t deep, but Tupac and Biggie — we heard them on the radio. That was culture music, our Black cultural pop. I got deeper into the underground, things like Black Star, Slum Village, and eventually Wu-Tang Clan. The way I learned music in my household was listening to records. My brother was really into hip-hop, R&B, and electronic music.

My father was really into classic funk and soul: Earth, Wind & Fire; Parliament-Funkadelic; Donald Byrd’s Street Lady; Gato Barbieri; John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme. That was his language: the real straight-ahead jazz and the funk soul era. My mom was really into Latin music and Stevie Wonder. Apparently she was into The Beatles, too, but I think she kept that to herself.

Which faculty members impacted you the most during your time here?

There’s really influential people there like Justin Emeka. Super influential! He did something really important at the time. I used to live in Afrikan Heritage House, and I remember when Justin Emeka came to the College and started a Capoeira class. He had a general one but also See Theo Croker, page 13

Oberlin A Cappella Groups Host End-of-Year Concerts Erika Scharf As winter break approaches, the College’s five a cappella groups are hosting end-of-semester concerts. Nothing But Treble held its end-of-semester concert on Dec. 11 at Fairchild Chapel, performing songs such as “Nobody” by Japanese-American singer-songwriter Mitski and “Telephone” by Lady Gaga and Beyoncé.

Sierra Colbert, College first-year and Nothing But Treble member, says that being able to put on a show like the end-of-semester concert with her group was really fun.

“I think that one of the most exciting things was that it was just our group’s concert, and I think, as a group, we were able to feel more comfortable with each individual song,” Colbert said. “Just like all the other groups, it was just us, and we were able to have a larger repertoire of music, and we could really demonstrate all the work we’d been doing and not have to worry as much about the one or two songs that we were doing on that night.”

The five Oberlin a cappella groups — Nothing But Treble, The Acapelicans, Pitch Please, ’Round Midnight, and The Obertones — have all previously performed together twice

The Oberlin Review | December 17, 2021

this semester. The first time was in a concert at Finney Chapel for Parents and Family Weekend, and the second was at Dye Lecture Hall as part of the “study break” performance, held annually during midterms. As Colbert mentioned, each group only performs one or two songs during these joint concerts, whereas in a full-length concert, they would perform around seven or eight songs.

College fourth-year Emily Fiorentino, another Nothing But Tremble member, said that while COVID-19 has made the concert preparation process challenging and frustrating, the opportunity to perform in an indoor, in-person concert is unparalleled.

“This has definitely been a strange semester for us, to say the least,” Fiorentino said. “Our biggest challenges have definitely been the threat of COVID, but I’m really proud of the fact that we had seven songs ready for our concert.”

This weekend, Fairchild Chapel will host multiple a cappella concerts, with Pitch Please performing there on Friday, Dec. 17 at 8 p.m. and The Acapelicans performing on Sunday, Dec. 19 at 8 p.m.

Courtesy of Christy Chen

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A r t s & C u lt u r e

Saturday Solarity will Feature Tommy Genesis, DuckWrth Continued from page 10 It’s grown into featuring these larger headlining-type musical acts that come to campus. That was definitely a void for the campus. Some schools have spring flings or fall fests and we hadn’t really had that before. Now, it is all about serving the Oberlin community and offering them a unique space to have fun.”

This year, though, College fourthyear, Solarity Treasurer, and event Cochair Perry Mayo, said that booking for the event has been especially trying, mostly due to rising COVID-19 cases and increased campus-wide safety concerns.

“Preparation for this year was a bit crazy, just because we didn’t know what was going to happen with COVID,” Mayo said. “We weren’t sure what kind of safety materials we might need and what rules we might have to enforce, so that was definitely a little precarious.

But, we mostly followed the usual process. We narrowed down artists that we thought the student body might want and reached out to them. Once we decided on a theme, we started working on promotions and figuring out what kind of safety materials we would need for the show.”

They added that it’s been especially difficult to find student performers for the event. While Solarity has show-

cased student performance groups like AndWhat!? and OCircus several times over the past few years, they haven’t seen a ton of new performers.

“It was kind of a bummer because we always want to find new student performers, like musicians, bands, dancers, or emcees,” Mayo said. “I think the challenge is mostly that the [first- and second-years] never had a Solarity. I’m not sure they really know what it is.

We’re hoping that once Saturday comes around, they’ll understand and get more excited about the opportunity to perform at such a large event. Hopefully, in the spring, we can get a whole new crop of people.”

Following Solstice over the summer, the event and those in attendance received backlash over the concert’s relaxed COVID-19 precautions. In the days after the event, a few students voiced concerns that people who had recently attended Chicago’s largest music festival, Lollapalooza, also attended Solstice directly afterward, though the College released a statement saying there was “no evidence that attendees at either event [were] at increased risk, as there was no confirmation of exposure.” As Solarity prepares for Saturday, Steifman reflected on the College’s summer Obie-

Safe policies and the controversy surrounding the Solstice.

“We were in such limbo with Oberlin COVID regulations [over the summer] because there wasn’t really anything in place,” Steifman said. “Because we’re a student organization, we don’t really have the authority to tell people what to do outside of what the school is enforcing. Early in the summer, there was no mask mandate, so Solarity couldn’t have a mask mandate. With Bloom, it’s totally different, because we’re still following the school’s rules. But obviously now we have a lot more rules to follow.”

In order to mitigate COVID-19 concerns, the concert is instituting a few extra safety measures in addition to the College’s general mask mandate. Misangyi went over some of the new policies.

“We’re setting up a six-foot barricade between the audience and the performer,” Misangyi said. “We’ll have safety kits — bags which will include masks and ear plugs — for people at the door.

Instead of having open water stations we’re going to provide water bottles.”

In addition, Solarity will also employ vibe watchers, trained student volunteers who will be stationed in the audience to enforce the mask mandate and

watch for disorderly conduct.

“The vibe watchers are trained volunteers who will act as the liaison between a student and Campus Safety,” Steifman said. “We’re trying to mitigate COVID spread by putting out a lot of safety information; a lot of stuff about consent, a lot of stuff about COVID, a lot of stuff about alcohol and drug safety. We do a lot of work with PRSM and the Students for Sensible Drug Policy. We’re just trying to put out as much information as possible so that people are in a good headspace for the event.”

In an email to the Review, Steifman also wanted to remind concertgoers that Solarity is releasing a set of community guidelines that attendees must read and sign in order to be admitted into the event. The guidelines cover respect, consent, COVID-19 safety, and substance safety expectations for the concert, and will also include phone numbers for Campus Safety and the Counseling Center. Below is a QR code linked to the community guidelines.

Junior and Senior Recitals: Culminating a Conservatory Education Nikki Keating From indie rock shows at the Cat in the Cream to Organ Pump’s monthly bellows throughout Finney Chapel, Oberlin is largely defined and enlivened by music.

Though recent and upcoming performances from Grammy-nominated trumpeters and hip-hop icons alike warrant a tizzy, the most integral aspect of Oberlin’s music scene is undoubtedly underlined by a particularly prolific sect of Oberlin’s student body. With approximately 500 concerts on campus each year, Oberlin’s Conservatory presents a wide variety of assiduously-honed musical innovations and performances.

Junior and senior recitals provide an apt opportunity for the Oberlin community to appreciate the Conservatory students’ musical genius.

Conservatory fifth-year and Jazz Piano major Matei Predescu’s senior recital paid homage to both their idols and their own artistic maturation. The curation of their repertoire reflected the vectors of their past, present, and future as a musician.

“I chose all the pieces myself,” Predescu said. “I tried to find compositions and songs from musicians that were really instrumental in my own self-discovery and in my passion for music. They’re all composers and musicians who I’ve just studied really intensely and who I really admire and respect and just form a huge part of my … artistic direction overall.”

There’s no one way to construct a performance that encapsulates years of artistic growth. Students work in close tandem with professors and peers in order to curate and actualize their repertoires, and often decide to collaborate with each other. Many student-musicians also showcase solo work within larger orchestral pieces, a tactful means of expanding the bounds of style and genre.

In light of this flexibility, many Conservatory students cook up completely signature musical recipes.

Last year, double-degree fourth-year and Viola major Rituparna Mukherjee utilized her junior recital as an opportunity to hybridize her artistry and love for Lil Uzi Vert.

“I’ve been lucky enough to have a teacher who has been totally open with me playing jazz [for] my recital and really exploring what I want to do and what I want to play,” she said. “Like last year for my junior recital, I played Lil Uzi.” Junior recitals represent a milestone of the measures and level of practice and skill improvement that the students have undergone in their previous 2–3 years.

These recitals serve as Conservatory students’ first independent performance, marking a novel milestone in their collegiate music career. The process and instru-

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Conservatory third-year and Saxophone major Christian Wilson performs for their junior recital in the Birenbaum Innovation and Performance Space.

Photo by Khadijah Halliday, Photo Editor mentation of these performances allow them to contemplate and solidify the trajectory of their imminent careers and artistic identity on both a private and public scale.

For their first two years, Conservatory third-year and Trumpet major Sam Atlas regarded junior recitals with a distant and daunting mysticism. Now, with their recital around the corner, they’re more prepared than they thought they would be.

“This recital is especially important to me because I’ve seen so many people get up and do their recitals before, and I have never felt anywhere near ready to do something like that,” Atlas said. “It’s always been very nerve-wracking for me to watch other people go up there and be like, ‘How am I gonna do this one day?’ But now I actually feel more ready, and I feel like I’m able to do this.”

Atlas has put in long hours to prepare for their recital, and they have no doubts about the payoff. They believe that junior and senior recitals are a necessary challenge for Conservatory students to gauge their endurance and limits as performers.

“I feel like it’s important to be able to play for a long amount of time,” Atlas said. “And that’s one of the biggest challenges with recitals for us, because we can’t play for hours upon hours. I think it’s just good practice; once you start getting older, you gain the ability to be

able to play in front of more people because junior and senior recitals are definitely not just a requirement here — they’re a requirement for almost every music school.”

This year’s recitals mark a particularly exciting moment: it’s the first time many Conservatory third- and fourth-years are performing in front of a live audience since COVID-19. Students are now allowed to perform in front of a masked audience, allowing for an intimacy between performer and audience largely unachievable during Oberlin’s Zoom era.

“It’s amazing. This past weekend, so many of my friends had their recitals in person, and they were forced to have their recitals over Zoom last year,” Mukherjee said. “To get to see all of their recitals and see audiences’ live reactions in the moment — I mean, it’s unparalleled.”

Recitals open with students’ homage to their Conservatory education, reflections that often hit close to home for fourth- and fifth-years. In her senior recital this year, Mukherjee hopes to communicate the ties between music, her own identity, and larger tenets of the human condition.

“The overarching message is that we all are so special and every single human being is so important,” she said. “I guess I’m just trying to share who I am and what I love in my last performance. That’s the message that I just want people to know.”

Visiting Musician Theo Croker, OC ’07 on Musical Inspiration

Continued from page 11

another one for maybe just six, seven, or eight Black, male students. The whole part of it was his wanting to foster and develop our Black manhood. He pushed us harder than any other class and instilled in us a lot of values on being powerful, young, Black men. Another person would be Theater and Africana Studies Professor Caroline Jackson Smith. She was super influential on my mind and mentality. I took a film class with her, and though I didn’t know what I’d be getting into, I’ve still got 15 books from her class. She really helped me

understand Black cinema. Being welcomed and allowed to study in that circle of academia, being respected there, having to write papers, and being tasked to maintain all those things really influenced me to not be afraid to step outside of music.

What inspired you to create an Afrocentric album? How did you come to this concept?

Well, I think the concept of Afrocentrism is false at its core because the whole world copies Black culture and is influenced by Black cul-

ture. You can walk into a coffee shop in Williamsburg and be surrounded by wealthy white people listening to Biggie Smalls. It wasn’t really Afrocentric, and it wasn’t me really thinking about “Africa” as much as me trying to not avoid the truth that this is Black-influenced music. It’s always gonna be Black music, and I think I was just embracing that. Conceptually, I wanted to make an album that played like a movie, and the most popular story in any movie is the hero’s journey. That’s a classic format for a movie — this would be a great con-

versation to have with Caroline Jackson Smith. Me knowing that stuff and having an understanding beyond the origins of Greek mythology is actually Keynesian spirituality. I thought I’d take inspiration from the original hero story, the hero who took the eye of Horace and became Ra, which is actually the story of humanity and how humanity evolves into divinity. It’s the story of how you die and become God of your own universe, which is like every Marvel movie you’ve ever seen! It’s Eternals, Thor, Star Wars; I wanted to do that musically.

Oberlin Local Businesses Offer Creative Gift Ideas Maeve Woltring Arts & Culture Editor College students are typically not the best gift-givers, as the end-of-semester frenzy often takes precedence over holiday spirit. Fortunately for all you stress-riddled Scrooges, this semester’s schedule offers some extra time to find the perfect student budget-friendly tchotchkes to gift your friends and family. With finals falling after winter break, the Oberlin student body has the novel opportunity to shop for holiday gifts outside of Mudd study breaks. But if you’re like me, this opportunity might simply threaten to illuminate the impressive extent of your procrastination. Enter this time-efficient cure-all: the Oberlin guide to gift giving. From a stroll downtown to a scroll through the Oberlin Pottery Co-op’s Instagram feed, the answer to your holiday prayers may be just down the block.

Nestled on Main Street is All Things Great, a stockpiled wonderland of great consignment. According to shop owner Laurel Kirtz, All Things Great is all about mutualistic exchange. Her business model: reduce waste, supply service, and opportunize peace of mind. To put it simply, Laurel Kirtz knows her stuff. Born and bred in Oberlin, Kirtz has been in the thrift game since the ripe old age of 19, though her path toward a career in consignment was not straightforward. Her journey started with house cleaning and led to work in decluttering, a gig that established a long-standing amity between Kirtz and other people’s overlooked objects. Kirtz can pick good linen out of a sea of polyester, and she would never sell you a polyurethane-soled shoe. Though she has a particular affinity for ’20s wear and mending old furs, Kirtz’s store title rings true: she collects, sells, and repairs pretty much everything.

“From new to old, from something you can wear to something that you can decorate your home with to something that you actually need, we have the

Laurel Kirtz, owner of local consignment shop All Things Great, sits in front of her carefully curated shoe collection.

Photo by Maeve Woltring The Oberlin Review | December 17, 2021

finest selection,” Kirtz said. “It’s a mix of traditional thrift store items, curated vintage boutique, and a classic resale shop. … I focus on quality.”

Kirtz’s command and repertoire of objects transcends the material — years of mining, studying, and repairing other people’s stuff bears an interpersonal insight that she undoubtedly implements in her store’s goals and curation. She regards her racks of shoes and drawers of baubles with a nearly familial tenderness, perhaps born from a close consideration of their origins.

“Part of being a stuff-handler is about handling other people’s psychological obstacles,” Kirtz said.

“It’s often about quality, which is why I’ll put ‘hundred percent cotton’ on a tag or ‘wool blend’. I’ll let you know what the ingredients are so that you know what you’re buying.”

When prompted to select a favorite contender for a Christmas gift, Kirtz was nearly at a loss — there’s simply too much to choose from. I left her store with a pair of silver hoops and woolen mittens in arm, but on another day I would’ve gone for the floor length silk slip hanging on the back wall.

And maybe a grecian urn and some vintage cowboy boots for good measure.

Elsewhere on Main Street sits a wacky and whimsical Oberlin retail staple: Ratsy’s. For the past 16 years, owner Ratsy Kemp has offered inventory true to her slogan, “Never be Normal”. Kemp’s business began as a vintage store, but her collection quickly shed any easy categorization. A peruse through Ratsy’s is akin to entering the dreamscape of Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium, but with a Tim Burton-esque twist.

“I started making weird things,” she said. “I have dinosaur people; I have emotional support limbs.

I put together weird packages of limbs and now teeth. Sometimes I make the earrings. My boyfriend puts together the weird planter heads.”

The aforementioned “planter head” refers to a potted plant sprouting not only a vacant-eyed,

scalped baby doll head, but a tiny arm and a shelf of fungi. If you’re looking for a more conventional gift, however, Ratsy suggests her cheeky collection of mugs, socks, and mysteriously designated “weird toothbrushes.”

Closer to home and crafted by loving student hands is the Oberlin Pottery Co-op. Co-op president and College third-year Luke Stenberg has been a member since their first year, and though they have surely honed their pottery skills over the past three years, they said that the co-op requires no initial skill level. Co-op work hours are mandatory for members, but the small cover fee is not. Members are welcome in the studio 24/7, with enough materials at their disposal to sculpt and throw to their heart’s content. Stenberg’s suggestion? Join the community to pour a little extra love into your gifting game.

“Anyone can join no matter what experience level,” they said. “People shouldn’t be scared to try pottery because they can learn so easily with office hours and online materials. If you’re trying to make a really nice gift that’s handmade and it’s also super functional, pottery is perfect.”

This isn’t to say that the co-op solely offers a space for students to create their own work – they also sell unclaimed pottery at campus events such as TGIF and Maker’s Market. This past weekend, they held a special annual event — Empty Mugs— during which Oberlin students and community members had the chance to peruse a vast selection of work, and put their money to a noble cause. The co-op is partnered with Oberlin Community Services, so all of the collective’s proceeds are distributed to the Oberlin community.

If you’re pressed for time and missed last weekend’s event, it’s not too late! The co-op is launching an online sale on their Instagram this coming weekend.

Ratsy’s thrift and gift shop on Main Street boasts a vibrant variety of quirky curios and funky fashion.

Photo by Maeve Woltring

Oberlin Pottery Co-op sells leftover pottery at both in-person and online events alike and donates all proceeds to Oberlin Community Services.

Photo by Luke Stenberg

13

S p or t s IN THE LOCKER ROOM

Phoebe von Conta, Fourth-Year and Track Star

On Monday, College fourth-year Phoebe von Conta was named North Coast Athletic Conference Women’s Indoor Track Distance/Middle Distance Runner of the Week for the second week in a row. With an impressive cross country season, von Conta is leading the conference with a ranking of 25th in the country in the 3,000-meter event with a time of 10:42.08. The NCAC also recognized her last week when she placed first in the mile in her season-opening indoor track meet with a time of 5:25.07, the best in the region and conference and 13th nationally. Off the field, von Conta participates in co-ops and holds leadership positions in the Green Edge Fund and the Spanish in the Elementary Schools program.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Kathleen Kelleher Senior Staff Writer You’ve had a great cross country season and you were recently named the NCAC Player of the Week for the second time — how does that feel?

It’s fun to celebrate the end of cross country in the indoor context. Going from cross country to track is always a quick transition for me, but I’ve never had a complete season for cross country before because I’ve been injured for the past two years. I’ve had intermittent seasons, so this was the first cross country season where I was able to compete in every race — I never had to take time off, which was really a big deal. As an injured person, I went through so much in prior cross country seasons, and it was really nice to do something completely. Moving indoors, there was so much momentum that we all had from a really wonderful season. I was able to carry that to the two races that we had, which were very fun and kind of shocked me into the right mindset for track. Now I’m on my two-week break, and then we’ll start again next year.

During your time at Oberlin, have you been involved in any organizations or communities other than athletics?

I’ve been involved in organizations for each of my majors, Environmental Studies and Hispanic Studies.

For Environmental Studies, I’ve been on the board for Green Edge Fund my whole time as a student at Oberlin. I joined in the spring of my first year, and I’ve held a bunch of different positions since then —

Phoebe von Conta

right now, I’m the treasurer. In the Hispanic Studies department, I’ve participated in the Spanish in the Elementary Schools program for a while. I did a year of teaching in person, and then I did it remotely during my third year. Now for my fourth year, we’re back in person, and I’ve been able to take a leadership role in that and oversee the student volunteers. It’s a really sweet group of people, and I love getting to know the Oberlin community through the program.

I try to be involved in different student organizations and I’m also part of a co-op.

How long have you been running cross country?

I’ve been running since seventh grade.

What made you get into it and decide you wanted to run in college?

I was pretty dead set on a few different schools in my area, and hadn’t thought about going to the Midwest ’cause I’m from the East. I got recruited for Oberlin’s cross country and track team by the coach.

When I received the letter, I put it in the recycling bin and almost moved on. My mom fished it out and was like, “You should really look at this school. It’s kind of wacky.” I did, and I came here and visited, and I fell in love with the team and the community at Oberlin.

It was the most perfect day — everything aligned.

After that, I knew that Oberlin would offer me a

Courtesy of GoYeo

space to be someone who’s passionate about the studies I’m doing here along with being someone who can run and push themselves in a more competitive context with people who are doing something similar. I also wanted to be connected to the music opportunities here, which I feel a lot of people at Oberlin are attracted to. I found that every other space I went to, it was like, “You’re an athlete or you’re something, or you’re this; you can’t be all three.” I found that Oberlin offered that for me.

As a fourth-year, do you feel you got a fulfilling student-athlete experience despite the lack of a regular season last year? What is your future after college looking like?

It felt like having a pause in the middle of everything; it was startling and I don’t necessarily feel like I’m done yet. It’s very weird because I was injured my first and second seasons of cross country, and then had no season my third year, so I do feel that there’s unfinished business, but I’m satisfied with the way it’s gone. I’m grateful for the time that I have now to see it through, especially with the team I’m with. As far as my future after college, I would really love to take a break before going back to school because four semesters straight is kind of a grind. I’m just applying to some fellowships and seeing where that takes me. I have a lot of different ideas. We’ll see.

SAAC Hosts First Athlete Social Since Start of Pandemic Zoe Kuzbari Sports Editor This past Sunday, Oberlin’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee held its first-ever athlete social. The event was designed to bring student-athletes together after many months of the pandemic forced teams apart.

The plan was originally for students to gather in Philips gym for pizza, hot chocolate, and karaoke, but the event ended up being more competitive, with teams coming together to play a variety of games.

Fourth-year baseball player and SAAC Co-chair David Fineman believes the event went well.

“The athlete social was a great way to bring all the athletes together to be able to bond and have a fun time,” Fineman said. “Especially after the past couple of years with COVID, it was nice to have everyone together for the first time. I think it went very well — a lot more people than we thought showed up and everyone had a lot of fun socializing, playing games, and listening to music.”

Head Volleyball Coach Erica Rau, the faculty advisor who oversees SAAC, shared similar sentiments to Fineman and said the goal of the event was to create a space for all athletes to come together after a difficult year.

“We had over 100 athletes in attendance and the vibe in the gym was a lot of fun,” she said. “I look forward to continuing this as part of one of our department traditions and expanding the event next year.

It’s a great way to celebrate all of our athletes and the tight-knit community we strive to foster.”

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The women’s lacrosse team poses together at Student-Athlete Advisory Committee’s athlete social.

Photo by Zoe Kuzbari

Athlete Alumni Bring Oberlin Pride to Admissions’s Staff River Schiff Senior Staff Writer Some people see student-athletes as the epitome of school spirit as they are responsible for representing their schools through competition. While this is true to an extent, competition also brings teammates closer together and allows student-athletes to develop a unique connection to the College.

Oberlin’s strong athletic community has led numerous athletics alumni to work for the College as admissions counselors post-graduation, where they continue to foster school spirit.

Women’s lacrosse alumna Leah Crowther, OC ’21, feels honored to have been offered the opportunity to join the Office of Admissions, seeing Oberlin in a way she never thought possible.

“Being an athlete was central to who I was at Oberlin,” Crowther said. “I have now met so many different people in the many corners of Oberlin, which made me realize how much we don’t know about as athletes.”

As a student, her knowledge beyond the scope of athletics was very limited, but now she experiences the whole of Oberlin with a similar sense of pride she felt out on the field.

“I think something that’s really unique about Oberlin is that students are really excited to tell you why they love Oberlin,” she said. “Whenever anyone visits, current students are ecstatic to share their experiences. As an alum, I feel there’s a huge appreciation that comes from Oberlin that I didn’t realize people were missing out on at other schools.”

She cites her experience as a recent graduate as a factor in cultivating this appreciation, especially in comparison to other schools.

“I’m just now having conversations

with my high school friends about their experiences and learning how Oberlin is set apart from other institutions, especially others who pride themselves on liberal arts,” she said. “One such opportunity is research, something which I think prospective students don’t think to ask about. I love to shed light on these unknowns, and to teach prospective students the questions they should be asking in the admissions process.”

Having been introduced to the plethora of opportunities that Oberlin has to offer, Crowther uses her knowledge to fuel the decision-making process of student-athletes whose main interest isn’t their sport.

“I feel very representative of those people,” she said. “I used to be just a representative of athletes, but now I get a lot more questions from academics to campus safety to specific departmental opportunities.”

Sydney Garvis, OC ’18, also a women’s lacrosse alumna, reiterates the excitement that comes with working in admissions and getting to know every facet of what the school has to offer. A lot of pride comes with experiencing it firsthand.

“I was really excited to enjoy the school in a different capacity,” Garvis said. “Being both an athlete and a student takes a lot of time, especially with the inconsistency in my schedule. I work outside the 9–5, but it’s still nice to have a separation between extracurriculars and school.”

School pride is a prominent component of her job, similar to how it was as an athlete. Although in different capacities, both admissions and sports have allowed her to spread her love for the school and what it means to be an Obie.

“The pride I had as a student was very limited to the team and going to other

Women’s lacrosse alumna Sydney Garvis OC ’18 poses at Oberlin’s admissions stand.

Courtesy of Sydney Garvis

schools to represent who we were,” Garvis said. “It’s really so much fun to go to a high school and talk to students who are excited about Oberlin. We get to put them in touch with students who are already here, who are all ecstatic to speak about their experiences.”

For Judd Wexler, OC ’21, working in the Office of Admissions was an integral part of his College experience.

Since his first year, he has worked in a variety of positions, including admissions ambassador, interviewer, senior fellow, and now a counselor.

“I like to meet prospective families and learn about why they choose Oberlin,” he said. “There’s the inviting, welcoming community that makes Oberlin, Oberlin. It’s nice to pitch that to people.”

Having been a committed member of the bowling and fencing club teams, Wexler takes pride in teaching prospective students about opportunities they have to stay active in ways they may not have anticipated.

“I think it’s really nice to talk to

students who want to stay physically active and compete at a high level without being on a varsity team,” he said.

“In Oberlin, we are encouraged to try things out that we may end up loving.”

Wexler had joined the bowling class his first year, encouraged by his Peer Advising Leader.

“The class was taught by [Thomas] Reed, a longtime faculty member who taught us life lessons through bowling,” he said. “Even the classes give the ability to stay active without the competitiveness. I also got an opportunity to meet other athletes who just want to be more active in that capacity.”

Whether a varsity or club athlete, the Oberlin athletics alumni who are now admissions ambassadors take pride in sharing what Oberlin means to them.

They speak about the opportunities that the College has to offer and take part in the community as well. They continue to be important representatives of our school, whether that opportunity comes on the field, in a bowling alley, or in the office.

Guide to Northeast Ohio’s Outdoor Winter Activities Continued from page 16

open fire for riders to warm up before, in between, or after their rides. Reservations are required and can be made at clevelandmetroparks.com.

Boston Mills and Brandywine Ski Resorts, Peninsula Approximate driving time from Oberlin: 47 minutes Activities: Downhill and terrain skiing and snowboarding, snow tubing Sister ski resorts Boston Mills and Brandywine are just a few miles apart from each other in the Cuyahoga Valley region of Ohio. The resorts, famous for their downhill skiing and snowboarding opportunities, use manufactured snow for their surfaces so they can stay open even if there has not been recent snowfall. The resorts offer 18 tracks of different lengths, inclines, and terrains for all levels of skiers and snowboarders. Ski and snowboard rentals are available and can be done online or in person. The Brandywine resort also has a snow tubing park.

Chapin Forest, Kirtland Approximate driving time from Oberlin: one hour Activities: Cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, winter hiking, sledding One of the best cross-country skiing destinations in Northeast Ohio is Chapin Forest Reservation, managed by the Lake Metroparks. The beautiful forest has almost six miles of hiking trails that are a part of the Buckeye Trail, a 1,444 mile hiking trail that loops around the entire state of Ohio. In the winter, Chapin Forest’s trails turn into an ideal cross-country skiing spot when snowfall hits. The scenic paths offer terrain with some dips and turns, but they are still safe for a beginning cross-country The Oberlin Review | December 17, 2021

Chapin Forest is a great place to explore in the winter months.

skier. Chapin Forest also offers snowshoeing, sledding, and a walk under the lights along a one mile stretch of the trail from dusk until the park’s closing time at 11 p.m. Pine Lodge Ski Center, which manages rentals at the forest, now uses a reservation system for renting skis and snowshoes. Be sure to check the forecast for the park even if there is no snow in Oberlin. Areas to the east of Cleveland along Lake Erie may receive up to twice as much snow per year than areas west of Cleveland due to lake effect snow patterns.

Cross-country skiing and sledding in Oberlin:

Photo by John Elrod

Approximate driving time from Oberlin: No driving required! Right here in town!

You can cross-country ski on the Oberlin Bike Path and the Oberlin College Community Trail if there has been significant snowfall. The mound behind the soccer practice fields, unofficially titled “Mount Oberlin,” is the most popular sledding location in Oberlin and can be a fun place to take a break on a snowy day.

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December 17, 2021

SPORTS Established 1874

Volume 151, Number 9

Spring Sport-Athletes Must Remain on Explore Ohio’s Campus to Train During Winter Term 2022 Winter Sports Activities

Child learns how to play hockey at North Park Ice Arena.

Courtesy of Elyria Youth Hockey

Second-year Maya Blevins cradles the ball up the field.

Zoe Kuzbari Sports Editor For this upcoming Winter Term, the women’s lacrosse team will be traveling to Florida to train and play their season opener. While this is a great opportunity for the squad to travel together and start off their first regular season in the past two years, many second-year players point out that this was not what they had expected their Winter Term project to look like.

Student-athletes who play for a spring sport are expected to be with their teammates for this Winter Term, a change from previous years. While winter sports teams are normally expected to be on campus for Winter Term, spring sports athletes are allowed to go elsewhere. However, this year the academic calendar was shifted and Winter Term falls from Jan. 25 through Feb. 17, during spring preseason.

Spending Winter Term on campus might be particularly disappointing for second-year student-athletes, who did not get an opportunity to do an individual Winter Term project of their choosing during their first year. Last year, incoming firstyears were required to enroll in the Critical Skills for New Obies project in August. Second-year on the women’s soccer and women’s lacrosse teams Maya Blevins did this mandatory summer “Winter Term” project and spent January at home.

“My freshman year I was not able to create my own Winter Term project,” she said. “This was because they changed our freshman orientation to be in August over Zoom. This included at least one [Peer Advising Leaders] PAL meeting a week and multiple seminars. This was helpful, but I wish we had the opportunity to learn this stuff on campus and in person. It felt like more of a chore rather than a chosen Winter Term project.”

Abbie Patchen, a second-year on the field hockey and women’s lacrosse teams, was also required to enroll in the Critical Skills for New Obies project.

“This was mostly completed before I came to campus and was entirely on Zoom,” she said. “I spent the break that normally would have been Winter Term at home.”

This year, the athletes on the women’s lacrosse team will participate in a Winter Term project titled Relaxation, Joy, and Flow. The project is being sponsored by Head Women’s Lacrosse Coach Kim Russell for the entire team. In between practices and strength training, the team will be practicing yoga, learning breathing techniques, and participating in community service.

Patchen says that the team will be returning to

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Courtesy of Maya Blevins

campus at the beginning of February and traveling to Florida to train for preseason and compete in their first game. She feels fortunate to be able to get out of the Oberlin cold and says she’s looking forward to spending some time in the sun with her teammates.

“I’m excited to spend time with my teammates without the distractions of classes and other activities,” she said. “We haven’t had the opportunity to go on any trips together yet and many alumni and upperclassmen have talked about those trips being some of the best bonding experiences they had as a part of the team.”

Second-year Emilie Jones, on the field hockey and women’s lacrosse team, says that Winter Term was a huge factor for her in deciding where she wanted to commit for college.

“I didn’t find a similar thing at any other school I looked at, so I thought that the opportunity was really incredible, especially because it seemed like you could really make a fun project out of anything that interested you,” Jones said. “I remember people telling me Winter Term tales about skiing or baking at home and then some others on visiting a different country and having all of these amazing adventures. I definitely didn’t see the pandemic coming, so I had a lot of ideas and expectations about it, but I would say I think that the school has helped us out a lot, and I really can’t wait for this year.”

Both Jones’ teammates Patchen and Blevins shared similar sentiments about looking forward to Winter Term as incoming first-years.

“I definitely did not expect this to be my Oberlin Winter Term experience,” Patchen said. “When I was learning about Oberlin, I remember being given advice about the three Winter Terms: do one for yourself, one for your career, and one for your community. That really stuck with me and was what I had planned on pursuing. However, after this year I will only have one more to complete and so far I have not done any that I set out to do.”

Although Jones knows this was not the plan she initially had anticipated, she is simply grateful to spend time with her friends and travel despite the chaos and restrictions the pandemic has caused.

“I think last year’s restrictions on Winter Term for first-years was really difficult, so having the chance to spend time with my team and go on a trip with them is super fun and exciting,” she said. “I think that the school is really doing its best under these difficult circumstances, and I think if the pandemic taught us all something, it’s to really cherish the time that you get in these four years, especially with a team that’s essentially a second family.”

John Elrod Contributing Sports Editor One of the best parts about living in an area of the world with four distinct seasons is that there are unique outdoor activities associated with each one.

There are multiple ways to take advantage of the winter in Northeast Ohio. You can find great places to do different types of skiing, snowboarding, snowshoeing, ice skating, and winter hiking within approximately one hour of Oberlin.

North Park Ice Arena, Elyria Driving time from Oberlin: 20 minutes Activities: Ice skating While Oberlin no longer has an ice rink — Williams Ice Rink was converted to Williams Field House in 2009 — there is still an opportunity to ice skate nearby. North Park Ice Arena, run by the City of Elyria, offers affordable pricing for skating and rentals that cost under $10. Open-ice times are offered several days a week and can be found on the City of Elyria website.

Big Met Golf Course, Fairview Park Approximate driving time from Oberlin: 29 minutes Activities: Cross-country skiing, snowshoeing Run by the Cleveland Metroparks, Big Met is a golf course that becomes a great place for cross-country skiing and snowshoeing when snow falls along the Rocky River in the winter. The wide fairways offer space to ski, and the gentle rolling hills of the course make for a fun terrain. Big Met offers ski and snowshoe rentals that are available upon arrival, with relatively affordable prices.

Crocker Park Real Ice Skating Rink, Westlake Approximate driving time from Oberlin: 33 minutes Activities: Ice skating Crocker Park, known for its stores and restaurants, features an outdoor, ice-skating rink in front of the Regal Cinemas in Union Square during the winter. It is open now until Feb. 21 and, including rental skates, costs $12 per person.

Toboggan Chutes, Strongsville Approximate driving time from Oberlin: 35 minutes Activities: Tobogganing The Strongsville Toboggan Chutes at Mill Stream Run Reservation are a pair of 700 foot ice tracks that take riders at speeds of up to 50 miles per hour on traditional toboggan sleds. Located at the bottom of the tracks, the Chalet offers snacks and an See Guide, page 15