A watchdog for the Temple University community since 1921.
VOL. 96 ISSUE 17
temple-news.com @thetemplenews
TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
Fox loses No. 1 ranking for incorrect data The Fox School of Business selfreported the data error to the U.S. News & World Report last week. BY JULIE CHRISTIE Enterprise Editor
T
he Fox School of Business’s online MBA is no longer ranked first in the nation after the business school “significantly overstated” data from 2017 to the U.S. News & World Report, according to a release from the outlet. Fox self-reported the data error, and the program is now unranked for 2018.
According to Inside Higher Ed, part of the ranking formula gives extra weight to schools that had at least 75 percent of its new students submit their standardized test scores. New students can report the results of standardized tests, like the GMAT or GRE. Fox said it submitted results from 100 percent of its new students, but in reality only 20 percent reported these results. There were 255 entrants in the program this year. The school originally submitted the data in Summer and Fall 2017 and “completed the data verification process, assuring U.S. News
that the data were accurate,” according to the release. Fox then submitted its accurate data to be reviewed. “It was our hope U.S. News & World Report would recalculate its rankings based upon the submission of revised data,” reads a statement from Fox Dean Moshe Porat. “However, we accept the U.S. News & World Report decision.” It is unclear exactly how the error occurred, but, according to the statement, Temple has hired an outside firm “to review all of our school’s data reporting processes, including what happened in this instance, and to make appropriate recommendations.”
The statement did not name the firm that will investigate. The school will remain unranked until the 2019 Online MBA rankings are released, as long as Fox confirms its next batch of data. On Thursday, President Richard Englert started “the wheels turning” to bring in an independent reviewer to analyze the Online MBA information, a university spokesperson wrote in a statement. It will be a “comprehensive look” at the 2018 submission and prior years. “The results of that review will go to the President, and he will take appropriate ac-
UNRANKED | PAGE 6
ADMINISTRATION
COMMUNITY
Former Fox adjunct was charged with sexual misconduct Sombudha Adhikari pleaded guilty to sexual misconduct in 2009 and was hired by Temple in 2013. BY KELLY BRENNAN Assistant News Editor
ICE, which enforces border control, customs, trade and immigration,
A former Fox School of Business adjunct instructor was placed on administrative leave at Rutgers University on Thursday after his 2009 criminal sexual misconduct charge resurfaced, the Daily Targum, Rutgers University’s student newspaper, reported. Sombudha Adhikari taught at Temple from Spring 2013 to 2017, a university spokesperson told The Temple News. In 2009, Adhikari, 49 at the time, pleaded guilty to fourth-degree criminal sexual misconduct for inappropriately grabbing the breasts and inner thighs of a student at Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey. The university declined to comment further for this story. Adhikari could not be reached for comment. Adhikari was released on $5,000 bail, according to court documents. He was fired from Fairleigh Dickinson University after he pleaded guilty, but remained an instructor at Rutgers and went on to instruct at Temple. In 2009, Fairleigh Dickinson University officials did not send an alert to students about the misconduct because they believed Adhikari did not pose a threat to other students, NJ.com reported. Each individual school and college at the university is responsible for hiring its adjunct instructors, wrote Sharon Littleton, associate vice president of human resources, in an email to The Temple News. Employees, staff and faculty are subject to
SANCTUARY | PAGE 6
SEXUAL MISCONDUCT | PAGE 3
SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS The Hernandez family is staying in sanctuary in the Church of the Advocate at Diamond and 18th streets. On Monday, the four children went to school for the first time in six weeks.
Family in sanctuary goes to school Street near 18th with help from the New Sanctuary Movement, an immigrant advocacy group. The family was previously denied asylum in the United States and ordered to leave the country by Dec. 15. Hernandez watched her children leave the church while she stood nearby, wearing an Immigration and Customs Enforcement-issued ankle bracelet that prevents her from straying too far from the church. Risking deportation, the children were driven to school after an 8 a.m. rally led by state Rep. Christopher Rabb, Philadelphia Councilwoman Helen Gym, Legislative Representative of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers Hillary Linardopoulos and Hernandez.
Four children who are staying in sanctuary in the Church of the Advocate went to school for the first time in six weeks on Monday. BY MATTHEW McCANN Community Beat Reporter
Four undocumented children left the Church of the Advocate, where they have been living in sanctuary, for the first time in six weeks to attend school on Monday. The children — Fidel, Keyri, Yoselin and Edwin — and their mother Carmela Apolonio Hernandez, who is also undocumented, took sanctuary at the Church of the Advocate on Diamond
SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Yoselin Artillero Apolonio (right) helps her sister Keyri (left) decorate a notebook with stickers before school.
Students host alternative open mics off campus Two students formed a comedy open mic night in the basement of an off-campus apartment. BY IAN WALKER
Assistant Features Editor
Lyle Drescher stole about a dozen folding chairs from his mother’s house in Maryland to furnish his comedy club. “She asked me to bring back the chairs or else she was going to yell at me more, but she was like two hours away, so what’s she gonna do?” Drescher said. “We just kept the chairs.” Drescher, a sophomore film and media arts major, partnered with Dave Hogsett, a junior film and media arts major, to form Cave, a weekly comedy open mic series, in September 2017. Held in Hogsett’s house on Fontain Street near 15th, the group hosts free open mics, or events where anyone can sign up to perform a five-min-
ute comedy set, on Friday nights. During last Friday’s show, about 20 people performed, including some first-time student comics as well as more established Philadelphia comedians, like Matt Hyams, who founded the online satirical spirituality magazine Egobaby. Drescher and Hogsett said they were compelled to organize the shows after the disbanding of Temple University Comedy Club, a student comedy group, in Spring 2017. The group used to host regular open mics at Saige Cafe, a coffee shop near SEPTA’s Temple University Station. For each Cave performance, attendees gather in the basement of Hogsett’s house, which is sparsely decorated with wall tapestries and a TV displaying Cave’s logo. The logo, created by Summer Semanyk, Hogsett’s girlfriend and a sophomore tourism and hospitality management major, depicts cartoon versions of Hogsett and Drescher inside a cave filled with beady-
COMEDY | PAGE 8
JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Lyle Drescher, a sophomore film and media arts major, performs a comedy set at Cave Open Mic on Fontain Street near 15th on Friday.
NEWS | PAGES 2-3, 6
OPINION | PAGES 4-5
FEATURES | PAGES 7-12
SPORTS | PAGES 13-16
Theft in on-campus buildings has decreased on Main Campus after programming around the issue, Temple Police reported. Read more on Page 3.
A columnist argues that a City Council bill banning bulletproof glass in some local businesses is dangerous. Read more on Page 4.
Three artists traveled to Puerto Rico to document life on the island after hurricanes Maria and Irma struck. Read more on Page 7.
The women’s basketball team signed two high school prospects in November who could contribute as freshmen next season. Read more on Page 16.
NEWS TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 2 ADMINISTRATION
Honorary life trustee Milton Rock has died Milton Rock is the namesake of Boyer College of Music and Dance’s Rock Hall. BY GILLIAN MCGOLDRICK News Editor
Milton Rock, an honorary life trustee and philanthropist, died of natural causes in his Center City home on Saturday, the Inquirer reported. Rock, who died at 96, was a lifelong Philadelphian who graduated from Temple before serving in the Army Air Corps from 1942 to 1945. He was a major influence on the performing arts in Philadelphia. Until his death,
he served as a benefactor for the boards of directors for institutions like Temple, Temple University Health System, the Pennsylvania Ballet, the Rock School for Dance Education and the Curtis Institute of Music. Rock was a leader at Hay Associates, a human resources consulting firm that was sold in 1985. He also owned 15 newspapers in the Philadelphia suburbs, business publications and the Philadelphia City Paper, which folded four years ago, the Inquirer reported. Rock held 30 percent of Hay’s stocks when he agreed to sell the company, which had 5,000 clients and 94 offices in 27 countries. After he earned his Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Rochester, Rock re-
turned to join the TUHS board in 1974. He served as its chairman from 1985 to 1992. He joined the university’s Board of Trustees in 1979 and donated funds to rename Boyer College of Music and Dance’s Rock Hall in 1986. “[Rock’s] support for Temple and Temple University Hospital, both in terms of philanthropy and as a trustee, prompted us to rename Reber Hall as Rock Hall on Main Campus, and Rock Pavillion at Temple Hospital in his honor,” said President Richard Englert in a statement. “Milton Rock’s legacy will be known for decades as patients receive stateof-the-art health care and as audiences enjoy talented Temple musicians in Rock Hall. His impact lives on.” Rock has “impacted thousands of stu-
dents” at Boyer College of Music and Dance, said Robert Stroker, the college’s dean. “In particular, Rock Hall…provides hundreds of educational and performance opportunities for faculty, students and the community each semester, and we are grateful for Dr. Rock’s vision and generosity,” Stroker added. A memorial service for Rock will be held at Temple Performing Arts Center on Feb. 10 at 1 p.m. In lieu of flowers, Rock’s family requested people donate to Temple, the Rock School for Education or the Curtis Institute. . gillian.mcgoldrick@temple.edu @gill_mcgoldrick
EDUCATION
Spreading STEM education in Africa, North Philly The university signed agreements with five Nigerian universities to train their students in aquaponics.
The College of Engineering will collaborate with universities in Nigeria on different STEM programs to solve some of the agricultural issues the country is facing, like desertification, the process of fertile land transforming into desert as a result of drought and poor agriculture. The college signed “memorandums of understanding,” which are formal but not legally binding agreements, with each of the five Nigerian universities. This is the first time in Temple’s history that a college has entered into a formal agreement with institutions in Africa, said Jamie Bracey, director of STEM education, outreach and research. The college plans to send graduate students from Africa to Main Campus to finish their degrees in STEM, while also learning medical and engineering skills.
guri and Modibbo Adama University of Technology. They are located on fertile lands where large amounts of wheat and grains are produced. The university also signed an MOU with North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University to help develop agricultural systems, like aquaponics systems, in Northern Africa. Michigan State University and Clark Atlanta University have also asked to be partners on this project, Bracey said. Keya Sadeghipour, the dean of the College of Engineering, said signing the MOUs is the second step in partnering with these universities. The first step was determining each institution’s goals. The university is already negotiating to bring medical and engineering students from the Nigerian universities to Temple, Bracey said. Medical students from these universities will be trained by the Lewis Katz School of Medicine in surgeries that are common in North Africa. These students may be able to finish their degrees at the university, Sadeghipour said.
THE HISTORY
THE FUTURE OF THE PROJECT
The university’s correspondence with Nigerian schools began when a 2004 electrical engineering alumnus, Yusuf Bashir, went home to Nigeria and recognized his country’s need for improved agricultural systems, which he relayed to Bracey. Africa is experiencing desertification and drought in 15 of its northernmost states, affecting almost 64 percent of the land there, according to a 2015 article in the Journal of Ecology and the Natural Environment. Nigeria currently has no strategies in place to combat the rapid desert encroachment, Bracey said. Bashir was interested in changing the agriculture in his home country through engineering with aquaponics systems, which would allow them to grow crops indoors, Bracey said. Aquaponics systems raise fish and grow plants in one integrated, soil-free system. The waste from fish provide the plants with an organic food source as the plants filter the water for the fish. This system avoids pesticides, weeds, pests, water waste and other problems associated with soil-based gardening. Bashir flew a delegation of eight people from Kaduna, Nigeria, to Temple in August. The university hosted a full day of workshops about how they can support the programs in North Philadelphia and Kaduna. The delegation has been here four times since August.
By August 2018, the College of Engineering is expected to have a fully operational aquaponics system to send to the Kaduna delegation. This aquaponics system is designed to aid the Kaduna delegation’s efforts in the engineering of indoor growing systems, which will combat desertification in Nigeria, Bracey said. “People are going to want to come here and understand how we engineered the systems,” Bracey added. “You can take that shipping container, once it’s outfitted, and pick it up and ship it somewhere else.” Additionally, the university has submitted grant proposals to the National Science Foundation and the State Department for a program that would allow women from Northern Africa and countries in the Middle East to attend Temple and pursue STEM-related fields. The university will be able to bring up to 30 women here to build infrastructure around food, energy and water, Bracey said. The university has garnered support for these international programs from Pall Corporation, Cisco, Philadelphia City Council and Provost JoAnne Epps. “We feel that engineers have no borders,” Sadeghipour said. “Our objective is what good we can do, whether that is [in North Philadelphia], or somewhere in Africa. There are so many similarities between the two, and if they can benefit from all this interaction, why not? And we would definitely benefit from their participation in our program.”
BY LINDSAY BOWEN For The Temple News
THE PARTNERSHIP The five universities across the “bread basket” region of sub-Saharan Africa include Ahmadu Bello University, Kaduna State University, Yobe State University, University of Maidu-
News Desk 215.204.7419 news@temple-news.com
lindsay.bowen@temple.edu @lindsay_bow
COURTESY / COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING The College of Engineering will announce STEM partnerships in local high schools. Students will help set up aquaponics labs in order to zbuild units at their own schools.
The College of Engineering will announce STEM programs in several local high schools during National Engineers Week. BY DYLAN MANDERBACH For The Temple News
While establishing programs in Nigeria, the College of Engineering will also focus on improving STEM programs in North Philadelphia. In February, the College of Engineering will announce STEM partnerships with three high schools near Main Campus. Students at Walter B. Saul High School, Abraham Lincoln High School and George Washington Carver High School of Engineering and Science will work in aquaponics labs, which agricultural systems that raise fish and grow plants together, at Ambler Campus with experts in the aquaponics field. Students will help set up aquaponics labs in order to build units at their own schools. The teens will be given a lesson by an expert in the aquaponics lab, and then will co-construct an aquaponics unit in order to maintain and preserve the agricultural system. Students will learn hands-on agricultural skills. The College of Engineering will announce when it will begin the collaborative STEM program during National Engineers Week on Feb. 18. The Provost’s Office and the College of Engineering will spend $600,000 over a three-year period to fund the program when it begins, and the Pennsylvania Educational Improvement Tax Credit Program invested an additional $200,000 for the partnership. Director of STEM Education, Outreach and Research Jamie Bracey said the project is an early STEM workforce and talent project designed to help underprivileged students. In this program, students will learn about the STEM field and connect with Temple’s resources. “[North Philadelphia] is our home,” Bracey said. “This is where Temple is anchored,
and it’s our responsibility.” The College of Engineering is also looking for ways students can dual enroll at Temple and take entry-level engineering courses for college credit. The college is also developing aquaponic systems in its partnership with five universities in Nigeria to help communities grow crops indoors. Dean of the College of Engineering Keya Sadeghipour said it is important for local high school students to learn that engineering does not always negatively impact agriculture with industrialization and pollution. Engineering can help preserve the environment, too, he said. “The fact is that we are contributing to not only one’s well being, but also to the community,” Sadeghipour said. Paula Miller, who teaches environmental science at Abraham Lincoln High School in Mayfair, said she feels lucky to be a part of the partnership. “This has been a great opportunity for not only myself, because I get to work with teachers [from Temple], but I also get to see the children in a different light, outside of the classroom,” Miller said. Bert Johnson, an environmental science teacher and science chair at Walter B. Saul High School, said that an administrator from the school district contacted Bracey about what he does with aquaponics within his school in an effort to teach STEM students hands-on agricultural skills. Johnson’s STEM work in his classes led Bracey to create this STEM program with local schools. Johnson said he is excited for this STEM collaboration to finally be available for his students. “The important part of teaching is not just content, but application,” Johnson added. “The program is more of a project-based approach than it is conventional, so it puts content to light.” dylan.manderbach@temple.edu
temple-news.com @thetemplenews
NEWS TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 3
TSG
TSG to hold second forum on stadium with community TSG will continue to oppose a stadium if it has a negative impact on the North Philadelphia community. BY ALYSSA BIEDERMAN On-Campus Beat Reporter
Temple Student Government will hold its second community forum on Tuesday to hear residents’ concerns about the proposed oncampus stadium. TSG continues to oppose the construction of a stadium “as long as it has a negative impact on the North Philadelphia community,” according to its platform. In October, The Temple News reported that Student Body President Tyrell Mann-Barnes personally opposes the stadium. “I do not support the construction of a stadium in the middle of a predominantly black and brown residential community,” MannBarnes tweeted from his personal account following President Richard Englert’s State of the University address in September 2017. Englert announced earlier this month that the university will submit its stadium proposal to the Philadelphia City Planning Commission, and the university had communicated with North Philadelphia residents and leaders about the stadium for nearly two years. Leonard Chester, TSG’s local and community affairs director, said the construction of a stadium will negatively affect North Philadelphians because it could “change
the culture” of the neighborhood. “I’m sure there are positives in anything, but we have to think about some of the negatives,” Chester said. “The stadium is going to take over a lot of the lifestyle and change the culture. It’s bad for families.” Although TSG has met with community residents at one other forum, which was heated at times, it has not changed any of its policies, Chester said. TSG created community forums so students could build a dialogue and create relationships with the community, Chester said. University administration is not involved in these forums. At the first community forum in November, some residents told TSG that they are concerned with parking, increased partying and noise on Broad and Norris streets where the university proposed the stadium is built. Ruth Birchett, who is the block captain of the 1900 block of Norris Street and a 1977 education alumna, attended TSG’s first forum and plans to attend the second set of discussions on Tuesday. She said the stadium will exacerbate problems the North Philadelphia community already faces, like noise from students, potholes left by construction and a lack of parking space. “The university has not been a good neighbor like they make themselves out to be,” Birchett said. “They are hand-picking who they speak to and who they don’t speak
SYDNEY SCHAEFER / FILE PHOTO Ruth Birchett (center), the block captain of the 1900 block of Norris Street and a 1977 education alumna, asks a question at TSG’s first community forum on Nov. 14 at Amos Recreation Center on 16th Street near Montgomery Avenue.
to, just enough to get what they want passed.” Ultimately, multiple city agencies will decide if the university can build the facility, but the university and residents will eventually have to meet. Birchett said she wishes TSG would use its power to do more for the community, outside of solely
talking to one another. “I expected to be listening to them, where they were more listening to us,” Birchett added. “This is OK, as long as there’s a bigger give and take. I want to know what they’re up to that might be beneficial to us as a community.” A tweet by TSG on Jan. 19 said the organization hopes to “elevate
[community] voices” in university discussion about the stadium. “Connecting with the community is a beautiful thing,” Chester said. alyssa.biederman@temple.edu @BiedermanAlyssa
CRIME
Temple Police: On-campus theft decreased in 2017 Temple Police instituted several initiatives to decrease crime rates on Main Campus. BY JULIA BOYD
Crime Beat Reporter
The number of reports of stolen items in academic buildings decreased from 298 to 245 in the last two years, Temple Police reported. “Theft is the most common because it’s a crime of opportunity,” said Executive Director of Campus Safety Services Charlie Leone. He added that electronics were the most common personal belonging that was stolen. In situations of theft, TUPD takes the affected student’s information, checks to see if there’s any security camera footage and attempts to narrow down a possible suspect. Although on-campus theft has decreased, some students who have been victims of the crime said they struggled to receive the support they wanted from Campus Safety Services. Senior neuroscience major Trina Van had her laptop stolen during a homecoming event in Fall 2017. Van, who was vice president of Main Campus Program Board at the time, left it in a multipurpose room in the Student Center while attending a celebratory event in a different room.
“It really broke my heart because it was in the middle of a celebration,” Van said. “It’s not like they stole $20 worth of property. We’re talking thousands of dollars.” After she traced a location ping on her laptop, Van said she contacted TUPD to help investigate its Chestnut Hill location, but it was “too far” away for them to retrieve the item. TUPD patrols the area between Susquehanna Avenue and Jefferson Street, ending at 18th Street to the west and 9th Street to the east. After Jefferson Street, TUPD officers patrol up to Girard Avenue between Broad and 13th streets. “I understand theft isn’t always their top priority, but people shouldn’t get away with this without facing the consequences,” Van said. Theft is not as common in classrooms as it is in larger, more open areas, Leone said. Places like Paley Library and the Student Center are often crowded with students during the week, which makes it easier for unattended goods to be stolen. “Most of the stuff that is taken is unattended property,” Leone said. “People will plug phones in anywhere. You can walk down a hall in a building and see a phone plugged in, but no one is there. It makes it very easy for people to take things.”
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 SEXUAL MISCONDUCT background checks if they are in direct contact with minors, operate heavy machinery or handle money. Those hiring the staff and faculty “answer questions” to determine if the background check is necessary, Littleton wrote. Adjunct faculty, like Adhikari, go
With technology increasingly becoming a necessity on a college campus, the expense of theft rises. “Once upon a time, the biggest issue you would have was people stealing your books,” Leone said. “Now, they’re taking $600 worth of property for the same amount of effort.” One of Campus Safety’s Risk Reduction and Advocacy Services’ programs specifically aims at reducing the number of thefts of unattended property by reminding students what could happen to their belongings if they are left alone. About five student workers are paid by TUPD to serve as risk reduction specialists, leaving notes on unguarded possessions that read, “Remember: Do not leave your belongings unattended.” The members wait until the student returns and then educate them on the importance of watching over their things. Leone encouraged students to call TUPD if there is any sign of suspicious activity. “We always prefer if you call,” he said. “If you notice someone walk back and forth a few times eyeing up unattended property, give us a call.” Sophomore education major Alejandro Martinez had an experience with theft in January 2017. “My mom mailed me a letter
through this same process, she added. Some Fox students are concerned with the university’s decision to hire Adhikari after he was charged with sexual misconduct. “Some of these kids are underage,” said Samantha Regan, a senior finance major. “You don’t want that around them. You wouldn’t want to give your university that name. If you know somebody’s background,
BY THE NUMBERS: ON-CAMPUS THEFT
298
reports of stolen items in 2016
245
reports of stolen items in 2017 COURTNEY REDMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS
that had a keychain and a $50 gift card in it,” Martinez said. “When I went to the mailslot, the letter had been ripped open and the gift card was stolen.” The mailslot, which was located inside his 1940 Residence Hall, could only be accessed with a padlock code. Martinez said that the front desk at 1940 Residence Hall told him to file a report to Temple Police, which he did immediately. He has not heard back from them since with any updates. Leone said theft within residence halls is often done by room-
why would you want that at your institution?” “I think that put students at risk,” Regan added. “They should look into students that may have been affected by him.” Julian de Jongh, a sophomore finance major, said it is “horrible” that the university hired someone with a history of sexual misconduct.
mates. He added that since the university implemented stricter OWLcard rules, like swiping to enter a building, the rate of theft has gone down. “I can’t say if [these rules] are directly the reason why, but the numbers are there,” Leone said. julia.boyd@temple.edu @JuliaKBoyd
“They should have not hired him,” he added. “If I was a parent, I would be nervous sending my kid to this school. Schools should do better at background checks.” kelly.brennan@temple.edu @_kellybrennan
News Desk 215.204.7419 news@temple-news.com
OPINION TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 4 RESIDENTIAL LIFE A watchdog for the Temple University community since 1921. Michaela Winberg Editor-in-Chief Grace Shallow Managing Editor Jenny Roberts Supervising Editor Julie Christie Enterprise Editor Gillian McGoldrick News Editor Jayna Schaffer Opinion Editor
The Temple News is an editorially independent weekly publication serving the Temple University community. Unsigned editorial content represents the opinion of The Temple News. Adjacent commentary is reflective of their authors, not The Temple News.
Emily Scott Features Editor Evan Easterling Sports Editor Kelly Brennan Asst. News Editor Tom Ignudo Asst. Sports Editor Ian Walker Asst. Features Editor Amanda Lien Copy Editor Patrick Bilow Copy Editor Ian Schobel Co-Multimedia Editor Abbie Lee Co-Multimedia Editor
Visit us online at temple-news.com. Send submissions to letters@temple-news.com. The Temple News is located at: Student Center, Room 243 1755 N. 13th St.
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EDITORIALS
Reconsider hiring policy In 2013, the university hired an instructor who previously pleaded guilty to sexual misconduct, putting students’ safety at risk. Last Thursday, a former Fox School of Business instructor was placed on administrative leave from Rutgers University after a 2009 sexual misconduct charge against him resurfaced. Sombudha Adhikari started teaching at Temple in Spring 2013 — four years after he pleaded guilty to fourth-degree criminal sexual misconduct. Adhikari admitted he grabbed the breasts and inner thighs of a student at Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey. Adhikari continued to teach at Temple until Spring 2017. The Temple News is concerned about the university’s decision to hire Adhikari as an adjunct professor. Adhikari was allowed to work directly with students for four years. By hiring someone guilty of sexual misconduct against a student, Temple put its students in danger of suffering the same fate. If university officials knew that Adhikari was guilty of sexual misconduct before he was hired, then they shouldn’t have hired him in the first place. If they didn’t
know he was guilty, then it raises an important question: how did Temple miss it? Employees, staff and faculty members are subject to background checks if they are in direct contact with minors, handle money or operate machinery. University staff members who are responsible for hiring faculty and staff can determine independently whether a background check is necessary, wrote Sharon Littleton, associate vice president of human resources at Temple, in an email to The Temple News. Based on that criteria, it doesn’t seem like Temple was obligated to conduct a background check on Adhikari. But perhaps this case should make the university reconsider its policy. A university spokesperson declined to comment further for this story. Without additional explanation from the university, we can only wonder whether the university does all it can to protect students from sexual misconduct by people in positions of power.
University giving back The College of Engineering is working to improve STEM education in North Philadelphia and Nigeria. The College of Engineering is building STEM programs in Nigeria, while working to improve existing ones in the North Philadelphia community. In February, the college will announce STEM partnerships with three high schools near Main Campus. Director of STEM Education, Outreach and Research Jamie Bracey said the project is designed to help underprivileged students learn about the STEM field and connect with Temple’s resources. The college will also develop aquaponic systems in its partnership with the five universities in Nigeria to help communities grow crops indoors. “[North Philadelphia] is our home,” Bracey told The Temple News. “This is where Temple is anchored and it’s our responsibility.” The Temple News commends the university for giving back abroad, but also not forgetting
about helping those in its own backyard. By doing this, Temple is helping pave potential career paths in STEM for students who may not have otherwise been exposed to the field. Bracey is right — it is the university’s duty to give back to the surrounding North Philadelphia area. Since it was founded, Temple has continued to expand farther into the surrounding community. According to the 2016-17 Temple University Fact Book, more than 12,500 students live on or near Main Campus in the heart of North Philadelphia. Since Temple’s presence impacts the lives of so many North Philadelphia residents, it is only fair for the university to give back. The Temple News respects the university’s effort to spread learning into North Philadelphia and across the globe.
Why random roommates work Living with random roommates can be a positive learning experience.
I
look forward to Tuesday nights: my best friends and I plop down on our living room furniture after stuffing ourselves with food from Chipotle or Crisp Kitchen. We laugh hysterically while trying to pay attention to whatever is on TV. And at the end of the night, we walk sleepily down the hall and into our bedrooms, all under the same roof. I feel particularly lucky these nights — I’m grateful that I took a risk by signing up to live in an apartment with three strangers this year. Last sumJAYNA SCHAFFER mer, people I OPINION EDITOR knew kept asking who I’d be living with in the fall. Before the words “random roommates” could even roll off my tongue, I’d see the look of concern forming on their faces. They made me think I made a terrible mistake. But now, I know that my decision was valuable, and I think everyone should branch out and try living with new people. You could end up finding your best friends. “College is kind of the time to intellectually challenge yourself and get out of your comfort zone,” said Jack Ellis, an Owl Team orientation leader and a sophomore communications studies major. “It makes your college [experience] even more enriching if you get to interact with people who aren’t like you or who you don’t know yet.”
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very least, you’ll learn to respect each other. Not every successful roommate match-up is based on commonalities, either. Sometimes, learning about someone who comes from a different background than you can be even more fun and worthwhile. One of my roommates is from Pakistan, and I’m always interested in learning about Pakistani current events or traditions from her. And on the other hand, she got to wrap and receive her firstever Christmas gifts with me and my other roommates, who were raised in America. It’s rewarding to think that we’ve all helped each other learn a little more about the world. In the New York Times, Dalton Conley wrote an opinion piece about how social media and roommate-matching sites have taken away from the random roommate experience. “We tend to value order and control over randomness,” he wrote, “but when we lose randomness, we also lose serendipity.” I couldn’t agree more. Students who search for roommates identical to themselves or who choose to live with familiar faces could miss out on the opportunity to expand their social circle and learn about other people. Though it sounds clichéd, I truly think people cross paths for a reason. Now, after an entire semester surrounded by my new best friends, I’m even more convinced. I hope others consider taking a chance like I did and living with random roommates. jayna@temple.edu @jaynaalexandra_
COMMUNITY
New bill endangers store owners
Forcing store owners to remove bulletproof glass windows puts lives at risk.
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t the end of 2017, Philadelphia City Council passed a law calling for the removal of bulletproof glass that surrounds the cash registers in some local businesses. The bill is set to be enforced by the Department of Licenses & Inspection by 2021. Councilwoman Cindy Bass, who proposed the bill, referred to safety glass in stores as an “indignity” because it is only used in “certain neighborhoods,” reported Fox29. Bass said the glass insults people living in the RACHEL BERSON neighborhoods where these stores are located. But I think the need to protect lives far outweighs the need to protect feelings, in this case. This attack on bulletproof glass is an obvious governmental overreach. It’s not going to shut down most of these Stop-N-Go
CORRECTIONS A previous version of the editorial “Rethink Parliament” stated that 11 students resigned from Parliament during winter break. Only three students resigned during winter break, but there are 11 Parliament seats vacant. A previous version of the article “What’s next for the stadium?” wrongly stated that the ward leader would submit the community’s opinion to the Department of Licenses and Inspections. This is inaccurate and has been updated to reflect the correct information. Accuracy is our business, so when a mistake is made, we’ll correct it as soon as possible. Anyone with inquiries about content in this newspaper can contact Editor-in-Chief Michaela Winberg at editor@temple-news.com or 215-204-6737.
I’ve been lucky enough to find roommates who will shop with me, binge watch “Jersey Shore” with me and even volunteer for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation because they know it’s a cause that means a lot to me. And while I know not everyone’s random roommate experience is this successful, it’s worth a shot. “Your roommate could be a terrible person [or] your best friend for life,” said Alex Stroup, an Owl Team leader and a freshman university studies major. “It just really depends on the effort you put in.” Ellis has kept in touch with the first-year students he worked with as an Owl Team leader for their summer orientation. He said some students choose to use RoomSync, an online compatibility system for roommate matching independent of the university, while others opt to be assigned completely by random. “The students who went in completely random...have had an even better experience, because it’s kind of challenged them to get to know someone very seriously when they first came into college,” Ellis said. “It’s going to challenge them to find out how their interests interact with another person’s interests.” Alex Mayro, a sophomore Chinese major who lives with a random roommate, said while he tends to keep to himself, he enjoys sharing a living space with someone. “We’re pretty considerate to each other,” Mayro said. “It’s a good experience to have under my belt.” When you live with random roommates, you don’t need to become best friends — but at the
ABBY STEINOUR / THE TEMPLE NEWS
stores, but instead will threaten the safety of employees working there. Bulletproof glass is a commonly used safety measure employed in banks and other highsecurity buildings as a precaution. Not allowing certain stores to utilize this protection is unfair. Councilman David Oh said denying store owners safety measures is “illegal and unconstitutional.” “Each person makes a decision about protecting their life and health and the life and health of their employees and customers,” Oh told The Temple News. “I don’t have the right to decide that for them. If they feel the situation is unsafe, then they have the right to make that decision.” Oh said businesses don’t invest money without a purpose, so their choice to spend money on the glass proves that they feel it’s a necessary safeguard. In an interview with Philadelphia weekly, Asian American Licensed Beverage Association of Philadelphia Chairman Adam Xu said the removal of bulletproof glass “is inviting crime, not getting rid of the crime.” I couldn’t agree more with Xu’s statement. This is the removal of a potentially life-saving barrier. Bulletproof glass acts as a deterrent to crime by protecting store owners from forced cooperation during armed robberies. Removing it will make stores easier to target by those with criminal intent. “If I am breaking the law, come after me,” Rich Kim, the owner of Broad Deli on Broad Street near Susquehanna, told The Temple News earlier this month. “But it’s not fair to say, ‘Hey, break down the wall that’s keeping you safe.’”
Bass referred to safety glass in stores as an “indignity,” because it is only used in “certain neighborhoods.” Bass is hinting that the glass insults specific groups of people who shop at these stores. But I think the need to protect lives far outweighs the need to protect feelings, in this case. Eileen Bradley, the community liason for Temple Police, said the dispute stems from a cultural issue. “The community feels like it’s an offense,” she said. “They feel they’re not trusted, and the merchants feel afraid.” Bradley said racial tensions influenced the issue, pointing to the fact that business owners are largely Asian-American, while many of the people raising concerns about the bulletproof glass are African-American. According to Philadelphia Weekly, “Asian American business owners told gruesome tales of customers shooting” while “Black community members blamed these establishments for a litany of neighborhood woes.” While the issue of race relations is certainly an important one, it cannot impact the safety of merchants and customers. Protecting people is far too important to be discarded in favor of easing cultural tension. The removal of bullet-resistant barriers will cause employees and customers to face serious safety concerns. If Bass values the safety of her constituents, she will allow business owners to maintain the barriers. rachel.berson@temple.edu
temple-news.com @thetemplenews
OPINION TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 5 ECONOMICS
Social costs outweigh low clothing prices Consumers should pay attention to how the brands they’re supporting manufacture their clothes.
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ABBY STEINOUR / THE TEMPLE NEWS
Learning to value the mystery of the abstract A student tries to find meaning in the art his classmates find unappealing. BY JOSHUA VICTOR
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enrolled in a course called “Urban Affairs: Art in the City” at the beginning of my sophomore year. The course was worth two credits, and I had heard that the professor was in the business of handing out easy A’s. I settled into the class with the intention of lounging and watching time pass, like the rest of my classmates. The format of the course was repetitive and simple. Each week, we’d cover some concept of art through film, a guest speaker or another medium. And the next week, we’d be responsible for writing a short reaction to what we had covered in class, and each person would share a few comments. Our semester kicked off with a discussion of Leo Tolstoy’s book, “What is Art?” which seeks to identify the underlying purpose of art. Reading a summary of the book captivated me, so I decided to read some excerpts of Tolstoy’s work for myself after class. A particular line struck me. It read, “People who consider the aim of art to be pleasure cannot realize its true meaning and purpose.” By the third week of class, we started learning about abstract art. My professor told us about the exorbitant sums of money offered for various abstract artworks. He asked us for our thoughts: Would we pay millions of dollars for these pieces if our resources allowed? As I looked around the class, I saw that my peers were unimpressed — one particular student appeared heavy with his disdain for the idea of abstract art in general. And no one really cared to object to his comments of disapproval. The political science major in me tried to offer the abstract pieces some much-needed defense, but my words didn’t reflect what I truly thought. I couldn’t blame anyone for being disinterested. It seemed ridiculous to pay that much for seemingly vague scribbles and brushstrokes. But I still had a summary paper to write, so with the help of the internet, I explored the world of abstract art on a deeper level than we had in class. Continuing
on the theme of expensive transactions, I quickly found a piece called “Untitled (Yellow and Blue)” by artist Mark Rothko, which sold for $46.5 million in 2015. The painting was described as “a glowing aurora of shimmering color and light” by the auction house. But what I saw did not match that description. The work consisted of the colors yellow and blue, as one would expect, painted somewhat neatly on an eight-foot canvas. Immediately, I started looking for a justification for the absurdity of the selling price. I thought to myself, “What hidden beauty lies here? There must be some deeper meaning.” I sat there thinking, entranced by the artwork. The hues of yellow and blue gave no response to my question, but they hypnotized me. The art had entered my mind, and I was now fully engaged. After that, I sifted through several different abstract pieces, and each time I lingered longer than just a peek. I didn’t know what I was looking for in the art: beauty or absurdity. But I kept looking anyway. Inwardly, I scoffed at the shoddy portrayals before me. I wondered what Michelangelo would say if someone showed him modern abstract artworks. I wondered how “Untitled (Yellow and Blue)” would look next to the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. But I realized the lack of meaning I found in the abstract artworks drove me to dig deeper and search harder. It felt like a fruitless quest, but I persevered. I heard the words of Tolstoy in the back of my mind, and I realized again that maybe art really wasn’t all about my own sense of pleasure. This abstract art may never live up to my ideas of beauty, but instead maybe it has fulfilled its purpose just by turning me into a silent, intent observer. And thanks to my class, I’ve learned that art doesn’t have to be liked or appreciated by everyone to have meaning. One of these days I think I’ll purchase an abstract work of art — maybe a copy, maybe an original. I may not find it pretty or complex, but I’ll buy it, only to look at it and have others look too. But something tells me I’m going to spend a lot less than $46.5 million for it.
s a struggling college student, H&M’s $13 dollar shirts are my holy grail. In fact, any fashion retailer with low prices is immediately appealing to me. But after I learned about the conditions of these retailers’ factories, it was hard for me to even set foot in an H&M. Turns out, many of these factories expose workers to harsh labor conditions like sexual harassment, long hours and compensation less than the United States minimum wage. College students, as educated consumers, should see past JOY CATO low prices and make an effort to stop supporting companies that contribute to fast fashion. According to the Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights, 70 percent of production in the Next Collections Limited factory — located in Bangladesh — is apparel for Gap and Old Navy. In 2013, the same factory was exposed for beating its workers and paying them as little as 20 to 24 cents per hour. These companies participate in what is known as “fast fashion,” the process by which retailers create and sell clothes in the most cost-efficient ways possible, which often involve exploitative labor and sweatshops in foreign countries. Fast fashion is unethical, and we should avoid purchasing clothing from companies that participate because they put people at risk internationally on a daily basis. “[Fashion retailers] want a factory that can turn designs around by making people work 18-hour days,” said Susan Feinberg, a strategic management professor. According to a report from Vice, H&M’s supplier factories in Cambodia and India allow sexual harassment, low pay and filthy working conditions. Women also reported being fired once their employers found out they were pregnant. Fashion retailers should establish better working conditions at the factories producing their clothes or move their production to the U.S., where labor laws are more strict, requiring at least a $7.25 hourly wage and fair treatment regardless of race, gender or religion. But we, the consumers of these cheap products, are also responsible. We should be looking to be ethical consumers when we buy our clothing, instead of just looking for sales. “We want these new clothes that are really cheap and are really great looking, but that’s impossible,” Feinberg said. If retailers move production to the U.S. or choose factories that pay workers de-
cent wages, our clothes would ultimately become more expensive. But the higher prices should be worth ensuring workers are treated with dignity. We cannot sit idly by while people are being abused to make our clothing. “We tend to identify ourselves as consumers, and we love cheap products,” said Lu Zhang, a global studies and sociology professor. “And we are used to the low price, but we forget the social cost associated with the low price. Many of the social costs are hidden.” Luckily, Temple students have some opportunities to show their support for fair labor practices in the fashion industry. Alex Cove, vice president of the Fashion and Business Club and a junior strategic communications major, tries to inform the club members about ethical fashion business practices. “I try to make it a point to look into where I’m getting my clothes, and I’ve made more of an effort to shop at smaller retailers,” Cove said. According to a university spokesman, Temple is also a member of both the Worker Rights Consortium and Fair Labor Association, organizations committed to protecting workers’ rights domestically and abroad. This means companies producing trademarked Temple products must be members of both organizations, helping to ensure employees are treated and paid fairly. I commend the university for this arrangement. As a state-related institution with more than 40,000 students, the university has a responsibility to take a stance on important moral issues. And the fashion retailers that most of us are supporting, like Forever 21, Gap and H&M, are on the wrong side. It can be challenging for college students to pay attention to this, especially because most of us don’t have a steady income to afford more expensive clothes. But it’s a necessary discussion, because Americans have become acclimated to cheap and fashionable clothes, but we’ve built this privilege on the backs of others. We all need to spread the word and talk to our family and friends about this hidden, uncomfortable topic. “I’m adamant about it and brought it to [the club’s] attention and made it my issue and showed them how important it was to me,” Cove said. “That made them understand how large of an issue it is.” The resolution of this issue is a twoway street between the retailer and the consumer. It involves a change in how brands manufacture their clothes, but also a change in how we buy them. I’m training myself to shop at smaller retailers, and I hope other students start doing the same. joy.cato@temple.edu
joshua.victor@temple.edu @joshuajvictor7
CARTOON
September 6, 2010: The Main Campus Barnes & Noble Bookstore sold Temple merchandise from Alta Gracia Apparel, a manufacturer in the Dominican Republic that pays its workers three times the country’s minimum wage. This week, a student wrote a column arguing against unfair labor practices internationally. Columnist Joy Cato also commended the university for being a member of both the Worker Rights Consortium and Fair Labor Association, organizations committed to protecting workers’ rights.
LILLIAN DURAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS
letters@temple-news.com
NEWS TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 6 COMMUNITY
TUPD expands gang-resistance program The first class at Paul L. Dunbar Elementary School completed the program earlier this month. BY WILL BLEIER
Community Beat Reporter
Temple Police ended its first session of the Gang Resistance Education and Training program at Paul L. Dunbar Elementary School on 12th Street near Cecil B. Moore Avenue earlier this month, making it the second school Temple Police has partnered with to connect with North Philadelphia’s youth. G.R.E.A.T.. is a national program sponsored by the United States Department of Justice that forms relationships between police departments and schools. Police officers intervene in the lives of children living in areas at risk of criminal behavior to educate them on life skills. “It’s about inspiring our youth to do better,” said TUPD Community Relations Officer Leroy Wimberly. “We try to give them guidance in certain areas that they lack, and with us, we’re there to keep them in line and focused on the big picture. It’s like a rush. We have them participating in ways that they never knew.” Wimberly and Gloria West, another community relations officer, lead the program for TUPD. West has worked with multiple grade levels at St. Malachy Catholic School on 11th Street near Thompson for the last two years, while Wimberly just completed his first session with an eighth grade class at Dunbar. They each lead weekly classes at these schools. In 2012, about 40 percent of the city’s murder victims were 24 years old or younger, according to Philadelphia’s Strategic Plan to Prevent Youth Violence, which was created under former Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter’s administration. Temple and Dunbar are located within the 22nd Police District, which has some of the highest rates of crime and poverty in the city, according to police data. West and Wimberly lead exercises that include reenacting scenarios where students may be tempted to behave negatively so they can be better prepared to respond in real situations. “When I initially started working with the children in the community, there was some resistance at first,” West said. “But because the program teaches them how to make better decisions in their lives, I found the children began to understand the program and enjoyed being in the classroom.” The G.R.E.A.T. program’s curriculum focuses on conflict resolution, anger management, positive decision-making
and empathy skills. Tim Adkins, a counselor at Dunbar, said the risks children in North Philadelphia face are unprecedented. “There are a lot of threats that our students are confronted with,” Adkins said. “The most serious and the most emergent being the violence that’s in the neighborhood. There’s a lot of conflict between young people, and the way that they handle conflicts is generally with aggression.” “Teachers are set to a certain curriculum: science, math, English,” Wimberly said. “But we’re outside of that because we bring realistic experiences. Gangs are prevalent, especially at that age group. They are really vulnerable.” Kevin Wimberly, the climate manager at Dunbar, ensures a safe learning environment for students and said having TUPD officers involved at Dunbar is an effective way for teachers to be aware of what children may be experiencing in their homes. “I was able to observe the students develop leadership skills with him,” said Mindy Fisher, a seventh and eighth grade teacher at Dunbar, whose class underwent the G.R.E.A.T. program with Leroy Wimberly. “It was really nice to see them have a positive relationship with someone in a role such as a police officer.” When conflicts arose between students after the completion of the G.R.E.A.T. program, Chris Wasnick, a technology teacher at Dunbar, said he noticed they were utilizing the resolution skills they were taught. “I think it was a successful start,” Dunbar’s Principal Dawn Moore said. “The kids really enjoyed it, they had a graduation and the opportunity to build relationships between the police at Temple and our school.” TUPD’s External Relations Coordinator Monica Hankins-Padilla said determining the success of the program is difficult at this point. “Our department is considering how we can measure our effects on the community,” Hankins-Padilla said. “We would love to be able to follow the children we make contact with up to high school.” In February, Leroy Wimberly will return to Dunbar to lead a fourth grade class through the G.R.E.A.T. program. West will continue teaching at St. Malachy. “At the graduation at Dunbar one of the kids came up to me, and he said, ‘Officer Wimberly, if I had a dad I would want him to be just like you,’” Leroy Wimberly said. “And that’s how I knew I at least touched one.” william.bleier@temple.edu @Will_Bleier
SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS City Councilwoman Helen Gym helps Yoselin Artillero Apolonio, 11, into the car for her first day of school in six weeks. Her family has been staying in sanctuary in the Church of the Advocate on Diamond and 18th streets.
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 SANCTUARY will not enforce its policies at “sensitive locations” like schools and places of worship, according to the agency’s website. “I want you to understand that they are children, and for them to be cooped up in rooms under sanctuary is very, very hard,” Hernandez told the crowd. “They get a little desperate and think that they really need to be free and be able to just walk out. Today they are walking out, but we want to be free. We want to be permanently free.” Officials from the New Sanctuary Movement told the crowd at the church that the children’s school will remain secret for their protection. ICE issued the family a deportation notice in 2015 after they were denied asylum. The family came to the U.S. from Mexico in 2015 to escape violent, organized drug criminals who targeted their family and killed Hernandez’s brother and nephews. The siblings prepared for their first day by helping each other decorate their notebooks with stickers. Yoselin Artillero Apolonio, 11, said she is very excited for art class. “I want to have a better future,” Apolonio told The Temple News. The children said they are nervous to attend school, but remain hopeful because of the support from city officials and residents. “ICE could come in here at any moment,” Rabb said. “There is no law keeping ICE from coming in here right now. … What Carmela is doing is a bold and dangerous thing.” ICE agents could decide to enforce the
order and deport the family at any time, but they have been dissuaded from doing so in churches and schools because of the negative attention that it might draw. Former Mayor Michael Nutter declared Philadelphia a sanctuary city in 2014, meaning city employees like police officers are prohibited from questioning a person’s immigration status. Mayor Jim Kenney, whose term began in January 2016, continued to support the city’s sanctuary status. Earlier this month, the Justice Department sent letters to 23 cities, counties and states, warning them they would be subpoenaed if they did not turn over records of its sanctuary status and undocumented immigrants, Politico reported. Gym has expressed support for the Hernandez family and Philadelphia’s status as a sanctuary city. “Today, these four children are going to do what every single child in Philadelphia has the right to do: to go to school, to study and learn, to come home and feel safe and secure and joyful on these streets,” Gym told the crowd at Monday’s event. “We have to send a message now that when Congress refuses to pass righteous immigration reform, when young people feel terrorized just going to school, then this is an unjust law,” Gym added. “When these young people step forward out of the doors of this sanctuary, they carry more courage than so many people in [Washington,] D.C. right now.” matthew.paul.mccann@temple.edu
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 UNRANKED tion based on those results,” the spokesperson added. In the days since the U.S. News & World Report issued its release, questions have been raised by higher education outlets like Inside Higher Ed and Poets & Quants, a site that focuses on businesses schools. A report by Poets & Quants found that Temple reported that 100 percent of its students had submitted test scores not only in 2017, but also the three years prior. But in 2013, it had only reported 25 percent of its students’ scores. “Administrators at other schools say it would have been improbable, if not impossible, for a school to go from 25% to 100% in a single year between 2013 and 2014, or for that matter, to go to 19.6% this past year from 100% a year earlier,” Poets & Quants reported. julie.christie@temple.edu @ChristieJules ALYSSA BIEDERMAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS Fox School of Business’s Online MBA program lost its No. 1 ranking from the U.S. News & World Report last week. The national recognition still appears on signage, like this advertisement in Alter Hall.
News Desk 215.204.7419 news@temple-news.com
Gillian McGoldrick and Alyssa Biederman contributed reporting.
temple-news.com @thetemplenews
TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 7
EXHIBIT
After storms, defining Puerto Rican narratives Three artists traveled to Puerto Rico last month for an exhibit on display at the Crane Arts Center. BY MAUREEN IPLENSKI For The Temple News
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GRETA ANDERSON / THE TEMPLE NEWS Grimaldi Baez, a 2015 master’s of printmaking alumnus and a Puerto Rico native, is pictured in the exhibit “Extension or Communication: Puerto Rico,” which will be shown at the Crane Arts Center until Feb. 17. Baez traveled to the island in December 2017 with two other artists.
rimaldi Baez was 6 years old when he moved from Puerto Rico to a predominately white, workingclass neighborhood in Massachusetts with his family. It was in this neighborhood where Baez, a 2015 master’s of printmaking alumnus, learned about racism. He said he was once sent to the principal’s office for speaking Spanish. “This type of bigotry transcends pigment,” Baez said. For Baez, the effects of bigotry seem more clear in the wake of hurricanes Irma and Maria, which hit Puerto Rico in August and September 2017. With increased focus on the conditions of Puerto Rico in the media, Baez, Sheldon Abba, a 2013 advertising alumnus, and Ricky Yanas, a Philadelphia artist, all saw an opportunity to reveal the corruption they say has existed in Puerto Rico for years. Focused on the themes of government and economic corruption, the artists are showing a series of mu-
PUERTO RICO | PAGE 12
PEOPLE YOU SHOULD KNOW
ON CAMPUS
Adjunct documents the resilience of Holocaust survivor Larry Hanover spoke on Monday about a memoir he helped write. BY EMILY SCOTT Features Editor
JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS A hand-painted bust of Martin Luther King Jr. is on display in Sullivan Hall outside the Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection through the end of February. The statue is one of nine on display in the city.
MLK bust shown at Blockson Students at CAPA, Girard College and the Overbrook School for the Blind helped paint the busts. BY IAN WALKER
Assistant Features Editor
In 1965, Martin Luther King Jr. came to Main Campus to speak at the Baptist Temple, now known as the Temple Performing Arts Center. A bust of King now stands outside the Charles L. Blockson AfroAmerican Collection in Sullivan Hall, just a few hundred feet away from where he stood more than 50 years ago. The Blockson Collection is a research center on Black history and culture.
“Whenever you get an opportunity to highlight and learn about individuals who really made a difference in our society, it’s always a good thing,” said Diane Turner, the curator of the Blockson Collection. The bust, painted by students from the Philadelphia High School for Creative and Performing Arts on Broad Street near Christian, is one of nine commissioned by Comcast, the world’s largest media corporation based in Philadelphia, to commemorate King and Black History Month. For the project, Comcast partnered with several Philadelphiabased educational and youth organizations, including Girard College, Big Brothers Big Sisters and the
Overbrook School for the Blind. The groups were each given six-foot, fiberglass busts of King to paint. After each bust was decorated, the statues were put on display across Philadelphia, where they will remain until the end of February. Plaques with quotes from King were placed on the pedestals of each statue. When painting the busts, the student groups were prompted to visually interpret their assigned quotations. The sculpture outside the Blockson accompanies a quote that reads: “We must live together as brothers or perish together as fools.” The students painted an ocean scene with bright orange flames stretching
MLK | PAGE 11
Before his family fled Nazi persecution in Cologne, Germany, Fred Behrend’s father returned to a destroyed Jewish temple. He wanted to see if anything remained intact inside the burnt synagogue. On his way out, he found a “yad,” a ritual pointer used to read the Torah, the main religious text in Judaism. He put it in his pocket for safe keeping. More than 60 years later, Behrend watched his granddaughter use it while reading the Torah during her bat mitzvah, a Jewish tradition in
which a girl becomes a woman. “I had tears in my eyes when I sat next to her as she read her parashah [section of the Torah] with the yad my father took out of the burnt synagogue,” Behrend, 91, said. Behrend has countless stories as a Holocaust survivor, and with the help of Larry Hanover, he was able to preserve these stories for generations to come. Hanover, an adjunct journalism instructor and 1988 journalism alumnus, spoke on Monday in Annenberg Hall about his book, “Rebuilt from Broken Glass: A German Jewish Life Remade in America.” Hanover helped write the memoir with the main subject of the book, Behrend, a Jew-
SURVIVOR | PAGE 11
SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Larry Hanover, an adjunct journalism professor, co-wrote “Rebuilt from Broken Glass: A German Jewish Life Remade in America.”
EDUCATION | PAGE 8
SIXERS | PAGE 9
LIVE IN PHILLY | PAGE 10
EXHIBIT | PAGE 12
A senior social work major is helping Mayor Jim Kenney decide who will serve on the School District of Philadelphia’s board.
A 1975 communications and theater alumnus helped write a revived anthem for Philadelphia’s NBA team.
The Penn Museum in University City hosted its 37th annual Chinese New Year celebration on Saturday.
Lisa Marie Patzer, a 2013 master’s of film and media arts alumna, received this year’s Icebox Project Space’s Video Resideny program.
FEATURES TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 8 PEOPLE YOU SHOULD KNOW
Student strives for younger voices in education A senior social work major will help nominate the city’s school board. BY RACHEL McQUISTON For The Temple News
Kimberly Pham was a seventh grader at Stetson Middle School in Kensington when she dropped out of school. She then got in trouble for truancy, which led to her spending a few years in the juvenile justice system. Pham said her Kensington neighborhood didn’t emphasize the importance of education in the mid-2000s. After going to a Philadelphia magnet middle school, she transferred to Stetson, where she said the environment wasn’t conducive to learning, causing her to drop out. “[Stetson] was a total different environment from the middle magnet school, which is only about five blocks [away],” said Pham, a senior social work major. “So I started to become less interested in school when I got to the neighborhood middle school.” Now 25 years old, Pham was nominated earlier this month by Mayor Jim Kenney to submit 27 nominees for nine seats on the city’s upcoming school board. She joins 12 other city parents, educators and activists on the board. The School Reform Commission formed in 2001 as the governing body of the School District of Philadelphia. In November 2017, the SRC voted to dissolve itself. With the creation of a new school board, this will be the first time in 16 years that the school district is under local control. After reviewing applications and holding interviews, the panel will give its recommendations by Feb. 28 to Kenney, who will continue the process from there. Pham hopes her work on the panel will ensure other students don’t have to go through an experi-
ence similar to hers. “[We are looking for] candidates who are really passionate about the community, about the young people who go through our system of public education,” Pham said. Philadelphia’s graduation rate lags behind other big cities like New York City, Los Angeles and Chicago. But for the last three years, the school district’s graduation rate has risen. In the Class of 2017, 67 percent of all students earned diplomas in four years, according to the Inquirer. “I didn’t have the smoothest route, and often a lot of young people encounter those same type of roads,” Pham said. “[I] wanted to ensure other people don’t come across hurdles that we can get rid of in the system.” When Pham left the juvenile justice system, she returned to the school district and enrolled at Thomas A. Edison High School on Luzerne Street near 2nd in North Philadelphia, which she said had a similar atmosphere to Stetson. From there, Pham went through a series of “alternative education programs” and earned her GED in 2010. Through her personal experience in the education system, Pham developed a passion for educational fairness that inspired her to work on educational policy. Pham mentors “opportunity youth,” people ages 16-24 who are not in school or working, to help provide support and opportunities in Philadelphia. She also works with education organizations like Project U-Turn, Opportunity Youth United and the Aspen Institute Forum for Community Solutions. For her work with opportunity youth, Pham hopes that by understanding students and talking to them individually, she can give them more chances than she had growing up. “I do a lot of one-to-one talk-
HANNAH BURNS / THE TEMPLE NEWS Kimberly Pham, a senior social work major, was appointed by Mayor Jim Kenney to nominate 27 people to the School District of Philadelphia’s upcoming board.
ing to the young people face-toface,” Pham said. “I think the big thing that I do is really listen to them. In my position and with the privilege that I have and the opportunities that I have been awarded, how is it that I can pay it forward for this young person?” Pham has used her work in education activism at both a local and national level, as well as her overall “love of the people” to earn a spot on the nominating panel. Pham, who received the position through recommendations by staff in the Office of the Mayor and other city leaders, is the only student on the panel. “[It’s] a fortunate opportunity
to be able to represent Temple and also other young people who aren’t often engaged in social civics and step up for service positions, especially on a voluntary level,” Pham said. “And it requires a lot of work, but it’s a great representation.” Emeka Nwadiora, a public health professor, has taught Pham in three different courses. Nwadiora describes Pham as “bright,” “articulate” and “hard-working.” “I think that she’s very qualified,” Nwadiora said. “I call her a politician in the classroom. I think she’s moving in the direction of being a very powerful political figure.” Not only does Pham hope to
appoint passionate leaders to the school board, but she also wants to see more Philadelphia students help make decisions for the city’s public education system. “More youth leadership and youth voice is something I would like to see,” Pham said. “It’s important that young people are helping leaders, as well as gaining an experience. Policies that support the creation of better learning and high-quality learning environments is really important.” rachel.mcquiston@temple.edu
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 COMEDY eyed rocks. For Drescher and Hogsett, Cave fills an important niche in the city’s comedy scene. Unlike shows at bars, where some people attend primarily to drink, Hogsett said people come to Cave specifically for the comedy. “If you’re going to be here, you have to be here on purpose,” Hogsett said. He added that Cave’s proximity to Main Campus attracts students and encourages a more diverse audience. “Generally at open mics, you’re going see the same faces every week,” Hogsett said. “Cave is different. We get college kids, and we get friends that are supporting [the comedians].” As a freshman, Drescher said he found himself bored on weekends and uninterested in fraternity parties. By forming Cave, he said he’s helped create a social space for people who share his interests. “Doing this is great because I’ve created my version of a good Friday night, which is hanging out with people and doing a cool thing,” Drescher said. Yarlyn Rosario, a senior film and media arts major, attended her first Cave show on Friday. Compared to many performances she’s seen at other comedy clubs, like Good Good Comedy Theatre at 11th and Race streets, she said she appreciated Cave’s intimate atmosphere. “I enjoyed the house environment,” Rosario said. “It’s awesome, [seeing] people that I know from school, supporting creative people.” Drescher said he thinks the experience of Cave is also very different from campus house shows, where groups of students host musical performances.
features@temple-news.com
JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Matt Hyams, 43, performs a stand-up comedy set at Cave Open Mic on Fontain Street near 15th on Friday. Hyams, a Philadelphia comedian, has been a regular at Cave since he first found its events on Facebook.
“It is a linear event,” Drescher said. “It has a beginning and an end. It’s like you’re watching a show, whereas these house shows are more [like] parties.” “There is a community built in automatically,” added Shane Duffner, a senior media studies and production major and Cave’s music and light manager. “You don’t even need an audience for music. You need an audience for stand-up.” David Feinberg, a senior media studies and production major, has performed at Cave shows. He said he likes that the space is conducive to socializing with other comics, especially for people who are under 21. “I started [performing] when I was 19,
and I couldn’t hang out with comics,” Feinberg said. “I had to be quiet at bars because I wasn’t allowed to talk to people or be known or I’d get kicked out.” Feinberg added that he would love to see more places like Cave spring up on other college campuses. In addition to traditional comedians, Cave has also hosted some more unconventional acts. Two weeks ago, NIIC the Singing Dog, a Philadelphia-based performer who wears a neon green dog costume, signed up for a set at Cave. Playing an acoustic guitar, he led the audience in sing-along renditions of popular songs, like “Wonderwall” by the band Oasis.
“I never promise anyone a good time, but I promise them an experience,” Hogsett said. Later in the semester, Hogsett said he might consider hosting a comedy showcase, a paid event with a predetermined list of performers. But Drescher added that any large expansions would contradict the ethos of Cave. “Cave is great because we just like doing it to do it,” Drescher said. “Here, anyone can walk in from the street and say their truths.” ian.walker@temple.edu @ian_walker12
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FEATURES TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 9
Alumnus co-wrote Sixers anthem Randy Childress helped write “Here Come the Sixers” more than 40 years ago. BY VALERIE DOWRET For The Temple News
In 1975, Randy Childress was busy. To help pay his tuition at Temple, he worked odd jobs for the Philadelphia 76ers. One day, he dressed up in a turkey costume for the Thanksgiving Day game and the next he housed then 17-year-old Darryl Dawkins, a former Sixers player, while he was finding a place to live after being drafted to the team. In addition to working and being a full-time student, Childress, a 1975 communications and theater alumnus, played bass in the band Fresh Aire. In Fall 1975, the Sixers assigned Childress another task: write the team’s theme song. He recorded “Here Come the Sixers,” a disco anthem, with his two bandmates at the time, Terry Rocap and Joe Sherwood. “They wanted to bring back that whole magic and the spirit of the team and the fans to kind of put it back in their repertoire,” Childress said. The song played when the Sixers walked onto the court during home games until 1983, when the team won the NBA finals against the Los Angeles Lakers, Childress said. After decades without playing “Here Come the Sixers,” the anthem was revived in 2012. It is now played as the team enters the court and after home wins at the Wells Fargo Center. The three-minute disco pop song has a catchy introduction. “There’s a piano part that starts the song out and it kind of
like gets everybody’s ear,” Rocap said. The introduction is followed by a line from the clavinet, an electric, stringed keyboard popular in the 1970s, which Rocap said is “real funky.” “The song is just infectious after that point,” Rocap said. “It’s like we’ve got you before we even start singing.” The song continues into a verse encouraging listeners to cheer, followed by the chorus. After the chorus the song breaks into a count: “One, two, three, four, five... Sixers!” “Ten, nine, eight, 76ers!” Childress said the Sixers’ management decided that a theme song was in order when talented players like Doug Collins and Steve Mix revived the team after its 9-73 season in 1972-73. “They started winning games,” Childress said. “The excitement was there.” During song-writing sessions in each other’s apartments, Fresh Aire worked on the Sixers song. After watching “Sesame Street” with his toddler, Rocap presented the idea of the counting break in the Sixers anthem. “We kind of took the nucleus of that and then created the rest of the song,” Childress said. After “Here Come the Sixers” began to play at games, Fresh Aire wrote songs for other sports teams — like the Philadelphia Flyers, Atlanta Hawks and Washington Capitals. Fresh Aire even produced a jingle for J & J Snack Food Company, a New Jersey-based snack food manufacturer. Although the songs they wrote for other teams were only played for a year or two, “Here Comes the Sixers” remained alive.
Even though Fresh Aire’s recorded version didn’t play for 30 years, “Here Come the Sixers” still made its presence at the games in other ways over the years. “It never really died,” Childress added. “The organ player played it at the games, the pep band played it in the stands, people would sing it, even though it wasn’t played as a recording over the PA system.” In 2012, Childress said radio stations like WIP, a Philadelphia-based sports radio station, brought back the song on air. That same year, Adam Aron, the 76ers’ CEO, announced that Fresh Aire’s “Here Come the Sixers” would be played again at games. “They brought it back because they wanted to re-instill a certain nostalgia,” Childress said. “Then all of the sudden the Sixers song was their DNA.” Fans still sing the song today. Sixers fan Maura Gallagher, a freshman media studies and production major, said she feels “Here Come the Sixers” unites fans while watching home games. “It’s a fun song that brings people together,” Gallagher added. “If you’re around other Sixers fans everyone will just jump in and sing. ... It brings happy memories.” Childress said fans of the Sixers anthem have showed their appreciation for the tune since it was first heard at games. “Somewhere buried in my stock pile in a box, we’ve got letters from kids back from when it was first written,” Childress said. “[They were] written by third graders and fourth graders, and it was really kind of fun reading these [letters that say] that my favorite thing is...‘Here Come the Sixers.’”
“WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR THE SUPER BOWL?”
DANNY ERIC Junior Marketing
I’m gonna drink every time [Tom] Brady gets hit, and I’m gonna drink every time they say the word “Eagles.” … [I’ll go to] a friend’s house because if I’m drinking that much I don’t want to spend my entire paycheck in a night. … I think we’re gonna be watching the city burn. None of this is gonna be left.
valerie.dowret@temple.edu
JOHNNY GANGOO Freshman Computer science
We have a dorm in 1940, and we have a TV. So we’ll just stream it on the TV and just have a few people over, watch the game. … I’ve been waiting 19 years for this moment. And if they win, I might go crazy. And if they lose, very sad. … I feel like I’ll just be jumping off the wall.
NAOMI LAWSON
Sophomore Chemistry with teaching
HOJUN YU / THE TEMPLE NEWS Top: Joel Embiid, center for the Philadelphia 76ers, steps onto the court prior to the team’s 115-101 win over the Chicago Bulls on Jan. 24 at the Wells Fargo Center. The team plays the song “Here Come the Sixers” when players enter the court and after home wins. Bottom: Ben Simmons, point guard for the 76ers, listens to the national anthem before playing against the Chicago Bulls on Jan. 24.
I’m more of a fan situationally. I’m really glad that I live in a city that’s going to the Super Bowl right now. … I’m not old enough to go to a bar. I feel like if I went to a sports bar that would be probably the best experience, but I can’t get in. … If [the Eagles] win or lose, it’s gonna be kind of buck wild. I don’t really know what’s going to happen because [the NFC Championship] was so intense and really cool and weird, and I can only imagine it’ll be an escalation of that. features@temple-news.com
FEATURES PAGE 10
TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PENN MUSEUM CELEBRATES CHINESE YEAR OF THE DOG
VEENA PRAKRIYA & BINGLIANG LI / THE TEMPLE NEWS The Penn Museum hosted its 37th annual Chinese New Year celebration on Saturday, kicking off the Year of the Dog. The ancient tradition is a part of the 12-year cycle of animals in connection with the Chinese calendar. At the event, a Chinese calligrapher sold cards with people’s names written in Chinese characters and taught visitors how to pronounce their names in Chinese. The event also offered other arts and crafts activities. “It’s really good to teach people about China,” said Tong Sun, an Upper Darby resident, whose father was performing traditional Chinese calligraphy. “Calligraphy... shows them about China’s culture and history.” Attendees also watched performances by kung-fu fighters. “[The event] was great,” said Tara CarrLempky of Mount Airy. “I couldn’t believe the size of the whole thing.”
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FEATURES TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 MLK down the center of King’s jacket, representing his passion, according to a statement from the student group. The motion of the waves is meant to symbolize the civil rights movement. Rose Holden, Comcast’s director of multicultural marketing communications, organized the project. Although she said Comcast always runs a themed advertisement in conjunction with Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Holden said this year’s project was the first time the company spearheaded a collaborative student effort to recognize King. “One of the things you don’t know going in the project [is] how [the students] are going to interact with the art and if it will feel like an assignment or if they’ll be passionate about that,” Holden said. “I was really excited to see it was the latter.” CAPA was commissioned to paint five of the nine busts. Maria Stevens, CAPA’s sculpture teacher, learned about the project when she received an email from her principal outlining Comcast’s plan. Though Stevens said she often receives requests from groups looking for artistic contributions from her students, she knew this project was truly worthwhile. “I could see that this was a great opportunity for students,” Stevens said. “It was community-based, [and] it was about an American icon in our history that was just extremely important.” For each bust, five visual arts students at CAPA collaborated to develop a concept and paint the statue. Paulina Krajewska, a 12th grader from Port Richmond, was tasked with representing the quote, “I have decided to stick with love. … Hate is too great a burden to bear.”
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 SURVIVOR ish native of Germany who left the country for Cuba before relocating to America nearly 70 years ago. Holocaust Remembrance Day was recognized last weekend with numerous events and activities all over the world. The book is written from the perspective of Behrend based on dozens of interviews with Hanover. In 2010, Hanover met Behrend at Congregation Beth El, a synagogue in Voorhees, New Jersey. He was fascinated by Behrend’s stories after hearing him speak to Hebrew school students at the synagogue. “He was so genuine,” Hanover said. “He had stories about the Holocaust, but he also had stories about everything else too, and he was just an incredibly warm guy and an incredible storyteller.” Behrend and his family fled to Cuba after “Kristallnacht,” or the Night of Broken Glass, when antiSemitic forces and German civilians destroyed the property of thousands of Jewish people throughout Nazi Germany in 1938. Nearly 100 people died. Behrend was only 12 years old when he arrived in Cuba. The following year, he’d celebrate his bar mitzvah in Havana. Hanover said the stories Behrend told about the cultural differences between Nazi Germany and Cuba were vivid. In Germany, Behrend lived behind a walled estate. He wasn’t able to have friends because his safety would be at risk. “But when they got to Cuba, it didn’t matter anymore,” Hanover added. “You were safe.” Hanover recalls a story about Behrend sharing a kite with a young Cuban boy in Havana. The boy put his hand out, and Behrend remembered his wonder at the one side of the boy’s hand being black and his palm being white. Behrend said he’d never seen anyone who looked like that. “It was little things like that, there
PAGE 11
Her group decided to paint the Philadelphia skyline across King’s jacket, with a red and blue sky meeting in the center. They wanted the piece to symbolize “togetherness,” Krajewska said. Though she has previously shown some of her art publicly, Krajewska said she has never participated in such a large-scale project before. The statue is on display inside the School District of Philadelphia’s office on Broad Street near Callowhill. “Seeing it in a place where people can just walk by and see it, it’s exciting,” Krajewska said. For Ethan Holland, an 11thgrader from Mt. Airy, being included in the project felt like a privilege. “Being able to paint on someone that has an impact on everyone… it’s just a huge honor,” Holland said. “They’ve assigned you for a reason, because they know you’re good at art, and they want you to make Martin Luther King recognizable with your talent.” Holland’s group chose to paint a scene of blooming flowers to illustrate King’s “bright” effect on the country, he said. Near the base of the statue, red and purple vines adorned with flower buds wrap around the pedestal. As the vines move up the statue, they bloom into yellow sunflowers and lilies surrounded by greenery. Their sculpture is inside City Hall. “We decided to put flowers, too, to represent how he bloomed, to go with the idea of how he enlightened everyone,” Holland said.
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Ayo Ariyo and Emily Scott contributed reporting.
was such a wonderment about him,” Hanover said. “It was his first friend.” Starting in 2010, Hanover went to Behrend’s home in New Jersey during the summer to help him write and go over original documents and family chronicles that date back to 1490. Behrend was surprised when Hanover said he wanted to help him write about his life. He spent his life selling air conditioning units in New York City. He never thought he could be a writer, but he knew telling stories about the Holocaust was important. “I am always shocked and amazed when I find out how many people don’t know anything about the Holocaust,” Behrend said. “There are very few of us who are still alive and are able to tell our stories as representing what we went through.” Per the advice of journalism professor Carolyn Kitch, Hanover sought support from a university publisher. The book was picked up by Purdue University Press and published in July 2017. It was important to Hanover to attempt to verify Behrend’s 80-yearold memories. He used several documents from the U.S. Army and his passport when he left Germany for Cuba. The book was peer reviewed by multiple people at Purdue and found to be authentic, Hanover said. For Behrend, the book is more than just a comprehensive diary. He hopes his story also brings a message of resilience. “It is important for people to understand the Holocaust, for no other reason than we are going through the same thing today in Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq,” Behrend said. “We have the same story all over again.” “It’s unfortunate that the world never learns from its past,” Behrend added. “I would like to remind people of their past because it is being repeated again today.” emily.ivy.scott@temple.edu @emilyivyscott
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FEATURES TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 12 EXHIBIT
Alumna uses digital media to explore surveillance Lisa Marie Patzer is the Icebox Project Space’s inaugural recipient of its Video Residency Program. BY VERONICA THOMAS For The Temple News
In 1967, the United States Supreme Court heard the case Katz v. United States, in which citizens’ “right to privacy” was in question as FBI agents eavesdropped on Charles Katz’s private conversation in a phone booth. The court decided 7-1 that the FBI violated Katz’s Fourth Amendment right, which protects individuals and their belongings from unreasonable searches and seizures without a warrant. Lisa Marie Patzer, a 2013 master’s of film and media arts alumna, said this historical moment inspired her recent artwork. “As a culture, we are becoming more and more comfortable with technology, seamlessly crossing various thresholds between what is public and private about our lives,” Patzer wrote in an email. Last month, the Icebox Project Space — a contemporary multimedia gallery at the Crane Arts Center on American Street near Master — announced that Patzer is the recipient of its 2018 Video Residency Program. The program, in its inaugural year, provides support for artists to create work using the gallery’s multimedia projection system. Patzer’s installation in the space, “A Reasonable Expectation of Privacy,” explores the Katz v. United States case. The video installation — which will consist of a 100-by20-foot video project that will play on loop. The project will showcase the ways in which surveillance technology can influence how people interact with one another in private and public spaces. The opening reception will be held at the Icebox Project Space in July, and the video will be on display until the end of the month. Patzer is currently producing the installation. The end goal is to have the audience question what a reasonable expectation of privacy is in 2018. “I hope my audience reflects more on themselves and their surroundings,” said Patzer, who also works as the director of web communications for the Penn Wharton Public Policy Initiative. “I want to create more dialogue on what’s happening right
now in our society in terms of surveillance.” The digital media artist’s past exhibits include videographies and interactive new media projects, like “Profile Bot,” which was on display at the Philadelphia Museum of Art last year. The exhibit allowed participants to submit a photograph of themselves to a robot, which would then draw the individual using abstract lines and dots. The exhibit commented on the reductive and flawed process of automation, a technology process performed without human assistance, she said. “Right now I’m fully invested in the Icebox Residency and seeing what comes of it, because it’s a little bit of a mystery,” she added. “It’s a great opportunity and a fantastic space. I am very fortunate to have it.” At a young age, Patzer was surrounded by artists. Her mother is a musician and her great uncle is a painter. She said she was brought up working on different types of creative activities, like music and theater. Upon finishing high school in the mid1990s, Patzer’s interest in emerging digital media developed into the process of marrying technology and art. “My experience in theater and music had evolved into performance art when I began recording myself with a camera,” Patzer said. “This kind of led down the path of video art and the relationship between technology and the body.” Patzer has used web, video and mixed media to create projects that question the relationship between personal and public space, as well as identity politics, technology and independence in the 21st century. Timothy Belknap and Ryan McCartney have been the co-directors of Icebox since 2013. McCartney said choosing the recipient for the video residency was “not an easy decision” because of the strong competition and compelling work from many different artists. “We ultimately chose Lisa Marie Patzer because of the high quality of her work, her ambition, both in scale and content, and specifically in regarding exactly how she would utilize the time allotted with the residency,” McCartney wrote in an email. Patzer said she is most excited about the “technical and spatial aspects to the gallery.” “They have a sophisticated video system,” Patzer said. “I’m creating site-specific work and so I’m going into the space. ... I’m
SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Lisa Marie Patzer, a 2013 master’s of film and media arts alumna, is the recipient of the 2018 Video Residency Program from the Icebox Project Space, a contemporary multimedia gallery at the Crane Arts Center on American Street near Master.
figuring out what works and what doesn’t.” Patzer hopes her work will provoke her audience to reflect on themselves. “Technology has changed the way we experience ourselves in our society,” Patzer said. “I want to continue to explore how we use technology as a tool to make work, but
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 PUERTO RICO
Law professor hosts Asian tea sampling in Anderson Hall John Smagula, a law professor and director of Temple’s Rule of Law Program in China, will present a tasting of green, white, black and oolong teas on Wednesday from 3 to 4:30 p.m. in Room 821 of Anderson Hall. Smagula is a certified tea specialist in both China and the United States. As a director of the Rule of Law Program, Smagula has developed and taught legal education programs for Chinese government officials and commercial lawyers. -Ian Walker
Vanderbilt professor to discuss Black men’s health Derek Griffith, a medicine, health and society professor at Vanderbilt University, will lead a discussion on manhood and Black men’s health on Thursday from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. in Room 992 of Ritter Annex. The talk will reflect on 50 years of progress in health care for Black men since the 1968 Memphis sanitation strike, where hundreds of Black sanitation workers protested unjust working conditions and demanded a right to unionize. Griffith is the director of the Center for Research on Men’s Health at Vanderbilt University. Currently, he is directing interventions and research on weight loss tailored to African-American and Latino men.
rals, videos and photographs taken on film in “Extension or Communication: Puerto Rico” an exhibit at the Crane Arts Center on American Street near Master. The exhibit runs through Feb. 17. President Donald Trump’s response to the storms in Puerto Rico was slower than his response to Hurricane Harvey, which hit Texas in August 2017. He visited Texas four days after the storm made landfall, but didn’t visit Puerto Rico until two weeks after Hurricane Maria. Trump signed a relief bill that gave up to $4.9 billion in loans to help Puerto Rico’s government. But today, nearly 500,000 people are still without power on the island. “It’s a colonial paradigm that we are looking at,” Baez said. “There have been many people throughout American history who have been marginalized, and who have been dominated by a hegemonic culture.” Baez, Abba and Yanas traveled to Puerto Rico for 10 days in December 2017 to take photographs, gather artifacts and record video for the exhibit. During their stay, the artists explored the urban communities of San Juan and the mountainous villages of rural Puerto Rico to investigate the living conditions of residents across the island.
also exploring how it functions and impacts our lives.” veronica.elizabeth.thomas@temple.edu
The family they stayed with when they visited Puerto Rico had just received a tarp from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. It was used as a temporary roof for the family, Abba said. The three artists tried to capture the struggles between Puerto Rican and American mainland powers in their exhibit. Among the mix of images within the gallery was a photograph of a storm-beaten McDonalds in Puerto Rico next to a photograph of an abandoned sugarcane factory. This juxtaposition was in an effort to explore the effects American corporations have had on Puerto Rico. “The...sugarcane factory used to be one of the largest on the island, but it hasn’t been running for a long time,” Abba said. “It is in complete disrepair, and even now there’s still an underground pool of black oil just sitting there.” During their trip, Abba said the artists almost didn’t notice the factory when they drove by it. They first noticed a farmer and his son working on the land where the abandoned factory once stood. “It was interesting to see that narrative, to see the resiliencies of these people...and to see how people organize themselves to manage with the issues they’re facing,” Abba said. In an effort to move past the devastation of the hurricanes, Puerto Ricans have attempted to rebuild their communities through supportive action, cultivation of
crops and construction efforts. “If you go into San Juan, all the buildings are covered in a fresh layer of paint,” Abba said. “You’ll see the greenery of community gardens popping up, and new foliage appearing. But then you’ll see a shredded billboard, or one lamppost might be off.” Puerto Rican residents continue to confront homelessness, poverty and food shortages months after the initial devastation. Viewers of the exhibit have the opportunity to explore their relationship with the current state of Puerto Rico. “Our goal here is to define some of the narratives that we gathered and then [attempt] to open them up in a way that other artists and individuals can identify with them, and expand upon,” Abba said. Since October, Baez has raised nearly $14,000 to assist those in Puerto Rico through GoFundMe, a crowd-funding website. The funds will be used to purchase portable solar lights and water filters for those living without electricity and clean water sources. He said this project is a way to reflect on his childhood. “This whole project is a return for me,” Baez said. “It’s been something that has been with me for a long time.” maureen.iplenski@temple.edu
-Veronica Thomas
features@temple-news.com
temple-news.com @thetemplenews
SPORTS TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 13
MEN’S SOCCER
Philadelphia Soccer Six recognizes Owls
SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Assistant coach Aaron McKie (center) sits next to sophomore guard Quinton Rose during the Owls’ 85-57 win on Sunday against Connecticut at the Liacouras Center.
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 16 ROSE without the basketball, being able to set a screen,” he added. “So all of those things become important.” McKie sits closest to the players on the bench during games. While on the bench, he tries to keep the younger players in the right mindset and engaged. When Rose subs off the floor, McKie said he tells him to slow down because sometimes he tries to do too much on the court. Rose leads Temple in turnovers with 58. The next closest player is redshirt-senior guard Josh Brown with 38. Rose often has the ball, which contributes to his tendency to turn over the ball. His usage percentage — a measure of how many plays end with a player shooting, turning the ball over or getting to the free-throw line — is a team-high 26.1 percent. McKie also wants Rose to move without the basketball more in the half-
court offense. After Temple’s 60-51 victory against Penn on Jan. 20, coach Fran Dunphy said the ball was “stuck” on some possessions. For a player like Rose, who is gifted with the basketball and able to make plays off the bounce, it can be difficult to create opportunities without the ball in his hands, McKie said. While McKie is critical of Rose in some areas, he still sees a developing
young player with a bright future ahead. “He’s going to be fine,” McKie said. “He’s still a young basketball player. He’s learning on the fly.” “I think he’s one of the better guards in the country,” Alston said. “And if he continues to play like this, I think the sky is the limit.”
Temple received several awards at the Philadelphia Soccer Six Awards banquet last week. The Philadelphia Soccer Six named former coach David MacWilliams the Bill Harris Coach of the Year recipient. The Owls finished with a 9-8-1 record and made it to the postseason for the first time since 2015. They lost to Southern Methodist, 4-0, in the first round of the American Athletic Conference tournament. Senior midfielder Divin Fula Luzolo and redshirt-senior defender Mark Grasela each earned spots on the 2017 Soccer Six All-Star Team. Freshman forward Alan Camacho Soto received the William “Bill” Wilkinson Freshman of the Year award. Camacho Soto scored five goals and totaled 11 points, which were both good for second on the team. Camacho Soto also landed on the 2017 Soccer Six All-Rookie Team with freshman defender Darri Sigthorsson. Sigthorsson started 11 games and finished the season with one assist.
thomas.ignudo@temple.edu @TomIgnudo
2016-17
2017-18
Points per game
10.1
14.2
Field goal %
4.3
44.5
Minutes per game
24.8
32.1
3-point %
29.6
38.6 COURTNEY REDMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS
-Tom Ignudo
MICHAEL BARSHTEYN / FILE PHOTO Freshman forward Alan Camacho Soto runs during a game against Duquesne University at the Temple Sports Complex in October 2017.
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The preseason Big East Conference coaches poll slotted Temple fourth out of the league’s 10 teams on Friday. The top four teams in the conference reach the Big East tournament. Temple went 13-5 last season, which included a 13-2 start to tie its best start since 1997. Four of the Owls’ five losses came against teams ranked in the Intercollegiate Women’s Lacrosse Coaches Association Top 20. Temple made its second straight Big East tournament last season. The Owls lost to No. 2 University of Florida in the semifinal round. Senior defender and co-captain Nicole Latgis earned unanimous selection to the conference’s preseason team. Latgis started all 18 games last season and earned selection to the Big East’s second team. She led the Owls with 26 caused turnovers. In Big East play, Latgis led the league with three ground balls per game. Temple will start its season on Feb. 10 at 1 p.m. at Howarth Field against Rutgers University. The Owls beat Rutgers, 13-11, to start the 2017 season. -Evan Easterling
sports@temple-news.com @TTN_Sports
SPORTS TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 14 VOLLEYBALL
Campaign to fund cross-country trip for national tryout Former outside hitter Izzy Rapacz and freshman defensive specialist Averi Salvador will try out for Team USA in March. BY MICHAEL ZINGRONE Fencing Beat Reporter
The volleyball program is raising money with the crowd-funding platform OwlCrowd to send two of its athletes to Colorado Springs, Colorado, to try out for USA Volleyball. The team has already raised 60 percent of its $5,000 goal. Money raised from the campaign will cover this year’s and next year’s cost of sending athletes to the tryout, coach Bakeer Ganesharatnam said. Freshman defensive specialist Averi Salvador and former outside hitter Izzy Rapacz will represent Temple at the tryout from March 2-4 at the U.S. Olympic Training Center. This marks the second straight year Temple will send an athlete to the tryouts. Last year, Rapacz was the lone Temple representative out of 238 high school and college athletes. Rapacz, who played her senior season in 2017, will share a room with Salvador at this year’s tryout. “We can both get a lot out of something like this,” said Rapacz, who earned two firstteam American Athletic Conference honors during her career. “For me, it helps me as I want to further my career and play professionally after college. At this tryout, I get to make some connections and get to show my talents alongside of some the nation’s best.” Rapacz is eligible for the U.S. Women’s Senior National Team, a squad to be filled with players who’ve completed their college eligibility and want to play for Team USA full time. Salvador is eligible for the three U.S. Collegiate National Teams. One team will play in Asia in May, one will play in Europe in July and one will play in Detroit from June 22 to July 1. “Averi has gotten off to an amazing start to her career,” Rapacz said. “She plays fast and smart, and for her to go against some top-level competition, it will only help her to start tapping into her full potential of being one of the better players in the nation by the time she is an upperclassman.” Ganesharatnam also sees the tryout as a chance for Salvador to grow as a player especially because she is key for the program’s future. Salvador played all 30 matches, made
CHIA YU LIAO / FILE PHOTO Freshman defensive specialist Averi Salvador (left) dives for the ball as senior outside hitter Izzy Rapacz watches during the Owls’ 3-0 win against Houston on Oct. 27 at McGonigle Hall.
six starts and averaged 1.94 digs per set in 2017. The volleyball program announced its OwlCrowd campaign on Twitter on Jan. 18. A total of 12 donations have amounted to $3,000, as of Monday. The campaign will be online until Feb. 18. Last year, the program ran an internal fundraiser to send Rapacz to the tryout, Ganesharatnam said. About $1,200-$1,500 covers the cost of one person’s entire trip, he said. Ganesharatnam hopes reaching the fundraising goal would kickstart an effort of sending athletes to Colorado for “multiple years down the line.” “This is something we wouldn’t hesitate
ALEXA WILLIAMSON
MARISSA MACKINS
23 points per game
18.3 points per game
12 rebounds per game
4.3 rebounds per game COURTNEY REDMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS
Williamson averaged 36.4 points per game in a five-game span this month. Mackins averages 7.8 assists and 3.4 steals per game this season, according to MaxPreps.
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 16 WILLIAMSON fense as well. Williamson set her school’s singlegame record for the first time on Dec. 21 with 40 points against Burgettstown Area High School. She beat the record again when she scored 46 of her team’s 63 points against Aliquippa High School on Jan. 4. In addition to Williamson’s game fitting well with Temple, she liked the opportunity to have freshman guard Desiree Oliver as a teammate. Williamson lives in the Pittsburgh area and plays Amateur Athletic Union basketball with the Western PA Bruins, Oliver’s former team. “I’ve known of Desi for a couple years and got to know her more over the summer,” Williamson said. “Before she left for college, she’d come to our AAU practices and practice with us to help us out. Unfortunately, I never got to play with her but I am looking forward to playing with her at Temple.”
sports@temple-news.com @TTN_Sports
Williamson also developed a good relationship with Veney and coach Tonya Cardoza. Veney said the coaching staff has had its eye on Williamson since her freshman year. The coaches and Williamson talked often throughout the recruiting process, she added. Veney stressed the importance of building a rapport with a recruit because the coaching staff plays into a recruit’s decision. It worked with Williamson. “Coach Cardoza and coach Way really made my recruiting process with Temple very informative and comfortable,” Williamson said. “I feel they are very genuine in their interest with me playing for them.” “I am confident and happy with my decision,” she added. “It definitely was the best fit for me and the best match for the type of basketball I am used to playing.” maura.razanauskas@temple.edu @CaptainAMAURAca
to get involved with year in and year out,” Ganesharatnam said. “With Averi being a freshman, she is obviously set up to attend for a few years down the line. But whether it is Averi or another athlete, we would love to be able to represent Temple at an event like this.” During the first two days of the tryout, the athletes will rotate through drill stations for coaches and scouts to evaluate their talent. On the final day, each athlete will be placed on a team for a tournament, bracketstyle competition, Rapacz said. “I am ready to have some fun this year,” Rapacz said. “I will definitely be more comfortable this time around, and I feel confi-
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 16 MACKINS liamson — a 6-foot-1-inch forward from Houston, Pennsylvania. Mackins is the only guard in the class, and her skill set has Temple’s coaches ready for her to step on the court and make an immediate impact next season. “Marissa can just flat-out score,” associate head coach Way Veney said. “She’s a triplethreat kid who can shoot it, and she’ll benefit and get some playing time early because she’s a combo guard. She can play the point or the shooting guard and get her into the offense.” Mackins averaged 18.3 points and 4.8 assists per game last season for Carolina Prep Academy, which she transferred to for her junior season from Southern Durham High School. She won the Big 8 Conference coPlayer of the Year award in March 2016 at Southern Durham. This season, Mackins is averaging 15.7 points and 7.8 assists per game, according to MaxPreps. “I’m a threat on and off the ball, around the perimeter, mid-range and even in the paint,” Mackins said. “I love the confidence the coaching staff already has in me. It is incredible the way they believe in me so much.” Cardoza lucked into finding Mackins at her AAU tournament, and Veney considers her a “diamond in the rough” because she was under the radar for many top programs. Besides Temple, Mackins had offers from Florida International University and Old Dominion University. Florida International hasn’t made the NCAA Tournament since 2002, and Old Dominion hasn’t qualified since 2008. Finding under-recruited players like Mackins has been crucial to Temple’s three straight seasons of 20 or more wins. The coaches know they won’t beat out some of the top teams, like American Athletic Conference
dent in my ability to play good volleyball and really make this experience benefit me now and in the long run.” Rapacz believes having Salvador with her this time will enhance the experience for the two. “Last year, I went a day early to make sure to meet my roommate and the other athletes,” Rapacz said. “Now I am rooming with Averi, so we don’t need to try so hard to be comfortable. We will both be there for each other and doing things with a friend is always going to make things better as a whole.” michael.zingrone@temple.edu @mjzingrone
opponent Connecticut, for the top players. Despite the Owls being 0-9 against Connecticut under Cardoza, the coaching staff uses the opportunity to face the 11-time national champions as a recruiting ploy. “Playing UConn twice a year is something I’d call a recruiting advantage for us,” Veney said. “We can just tell the kids we’re recruiting, ‘Hey, to be the best you got to beat the best, and we play the best twice a year.’ Playing UConn twice also gives us more TV games, which we can use too for players from further away so they can have their family still watch them if they can’t make it to the games.” Recruiting comes down to fit — making sure the school has the right on-court system, the right major and the right culture for a player. Because Temple is in the sixth-largest city in the country, the coaching staff has to make sure recruits from smaller towns can handle it. That was a concern for Mackins. “Being in that big of a city was overwhelming at first,” Mackins said. “I’m from a small town so I was just in awe. It’s such a beautiful city, especially at night.” Temple’s 2018 recruiting class will join a young team, with three starters and three bench players entering their sophomore years. Senior guard Alliya Butts, who is out for the season with a torn ACL and is the program’s eighth all-time scorer, will also return to the court. “Next season we’re still going to be a young team, but we’ll be a young and experienced team,” Veney said. “Sure we’re taking our bumps and bruises now, but that’ll help us develop as a team with all these young players thrown right into the fire.” kevinschaeffer@temple.edu @_kevinschaeffer
temple-news.com @thetemplenews
SPORTS TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 15
MEN’S BASKETBALL
Graduate manager to have game-time family reunion Sierra McDuffie will watch her brother play on Thursday when the Owls face Wichita State. BY EVAN EASTERLING Sports Editor
Derek McDuffie bought a house in Paterson, New Jersey with the dream of his kids having a childhood like his own, when neighbors often came to his childhood home and played sports. To replicate that experience, McDuffie had a blacktop laid in his backyard for a basketball court with two hoops. Sierra McDuffie, one of Derek McDuffie’s two daughters, practiced her skills to help earn a spot on Division II Felician University’s team from 201216 before becoming a Temple graduate manager before last season. Her younger brother Markis McDuffie, 20, is a junior forward for Wichita State, the No. 16 team in the Associated Press Top 25 Poll. Temple will play the first of its two matchups against Wichita State on Thursday at the Liacouras Center, where at least 25 family members will see the siblings. The Owls will travel to face Wichita State on Feb. 15. When the American Athletic Conference voted to add Wichita State in April, players, coaches and analysts considered the implications of the Shockers men’s basketball program joining the league on a streak of six straight NCAA Tournament appearances. But Sierra McDuffie just wanted to find out when she would be able to see her brother play in person for the first time since the 2016 Missouri Valley Conference tournament. “That was my biggest thought, and I was wondering, ‘Are we going to go to them, or they come to us?’” Sierra McDuffie said in November. “I haven’t been to Wichita yet for a
home game and I heard their home games are fantastic, like the crowd is crazy...so I can’t wait to go experience it.” Each Wichita State player is given an allotment of four tickets for each game for family and friends, Derek McDuffie said. Because only two other Shockers besides Markis McDuffie are from the East Coast, his teammates gave him their tickets for Thursday’s game so more of his family members can attend. They did the same when Wichita State played Seton Hall University on Dec. 19, 2015, in Newark, New Jersey, and about 30 family members attended, Derek McDuffie said. On Thursday, they’ll watch Markis McDuffie face redshirt-senior guard Josh Brown, his former high school teammate at St. Anthony in Jersey City, New Jersey. “It’s going to be great,” Markis McDuffie said at American Athletic Conference Basketball Media Day on Oct. 16. “It’s exciting to have a new team like us in the conference, and just to play against these guys local to where I’m from is great.” Markis McDuffie was 5 or 6 years old when his father laid the blacktop in his backyard, Derek McDuffie said. In addition to basketball, Markis McDuffie played baseball growing up and was a pitcher like his dad, who played at Voorhees College in South Carolina. Both he and Sierra McDuffie, however, shifted their primary focus to basketball after they had growth spurts. Their father coached them until high school and took them to work out with a trainer after some of their high school practices, Derek McDuffie said. Markis and his twin sister Mońe are close, Sierra McDuffie
SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Graduate manager Sierra McDuffie (right) and UConn coach Kevin Ollie talk during the Owls’ 85-57 win on Sunday at the Liacouras Center.
said. But he formed a different type of bond with Sierra through basketball. “He had my family to talk to like my father and uncles and everything like that, but me and him could just combine together, play against each other,” Sierra McDuffie said. While Thursday will be a family reunion for the McDuffies, both siblings have jobs to do. As a graduate manager, Sierra McDuffie has to help with game preparation. She is assigned to help an assistant coach for each game. Before the Owls’ 85-57 win against Connecticut on Sunday, for example, Sierra McDuffie helped
assistant coach Aaron McKie prepare by making clips from one of the Huskies’ past games. She also takes night classes three times per week as she works toward earning her master’s in sports business. She plans to graduate in May. Markis McDuffie will try to help the Shockers win their third straight game. Wichita State (17-4, 7-2 The American) is a top-25 Ratings Percentage Index team and in second place in the conference as it tries to make its seventh straight NCAA Tournament. Markis McDuffie, who led the Shockers in scoring and rebounding last season, missed the first 11 games of the 2017-18 season due
to a stress fracture in his left foot. Since his return, the Shockers are 8-2. For Derek McDuffie and his wife Sandra, Thursday is a night to celebrate their children’s accomplishments. “It’s a great atmosphere to go out, it’s good to watch the game,” Derek McDuffie said. “I’m really more proud of the fact that both of my kids are there, great position[s] and having an opportunity to experience this.” evan.easterling@temple.edu @Evan_Easterling
GYMNASTICS
After injury, sophomore hones vault, floor skills Jaylene Everett has earned career-highs on the floor and vault this season. BY MATT VENDER
Gymnastics Beat Reporter
When Jaylene Everett was just 4 years old, her mother signed her up for gymnastics. “I was just always a hyper kid,” Everett said. “I was always climbing on everything. My mom was like, ‘We’re going to throw you in a sport where you can run around all day.’ And I just stuck with it.” Everett had been a multi-sport athlete until she quit soccer in sixth grade to focus on gymnastics, which increasingly became more of a time commitment. She seems to have picked the right sport. The sophomore all-around recorded the Owls’ second-highest score on vault during their homeopening win on Sunday. Everett earned the Eastern College Athletic Conference Specialist of The Week award on Jan. 16 after notching a career-high 9.825 on the floor exercise against Towson University and the College of William & Mary on Jan. 14 to tie for third. “I was actually really surprised [by the award],” Everett said. “I didn’t get any sort of award for anything last year, so getting this really shows my improvement from last year’s gymnastics to this year. It was really cool.” Everett started the season by setting a career-high on vault with
a 9.825 at the Little Boston Invitational on Jan. 6. She also tied for third on the floor exercise. Last season, Everett didn’t earn any individual event titles and never scored higher than a 9.775 on vault. Her average floor exercise score is 9.769, up from 9.658 last year. What caused Everett’s jump from her freshman to sophomore season? “Definitely my confidence levels are a lot higher since I’m doing similar routines from last year to this year,” Everett said. “My overall form [has improved] too. I’ve been working on perfecting my skills.” Coach Umme Salim-Beasley allows her gymnasts to go home during summers. Everett, however, stayed on campus in Summer 2017, took classes and worked out in the afternoons. She trained with a few of her teammates, assistant coach Michael Rosso and Salim-Beasley. “I think it helped a lot,” Everett said. “It was a very relaxed tone, coming in here in the summer. We always had a lot of fun. ... We were always just going out and doing our skills without any pressure.” A shoulder injury Everett sustained in October forced her to practice only floor and vault. Everett was sidelined from all competition for “three to four weeks” following the injury, Salim-Beasley said, and she has stopped competing in any bar or balance beam events. Salim-Beasley said the change has helped Everett focus more closely on the events in which she
MIKE NGUYEN / THE TEMPLE NEWS Sophomore all-around Jaylene Everett runs into her vault routine during Sunday’s win against Cornell University, Southeast Missouri State University and Ithaca College at McGonigle Hall.
is capable of competing. Everett has started to practice on the balance beam and could add more events to her repertoire when she’s fully healthy, Salim-Beasley said. “The consistency isn’t where it needs to be for her to get into the lineup,” Salim-Beasley said. “She’s training that event with the intention of being able to, in the future, get into a lineup in that event.” Everett, who verbally committed to Temple (7-2) as a junior in high school despite interest from Towson University, has taken on more of a leadership role in her
second season. She said she tries to help Temple’s eight freshmen as much as she can. “I’m always there for advice, giving them little tips,” Everett said. “Telling them stuff like, ‘Don’t panic over these assignments. You’re going to make it through. Preseason isn’t as bad as you think.’ I just try to be moral support.” Tori Edwards, a freshman allaround from Haymarket, Virginia, said Everett has helped her adjust to life as a Division I athlete. “She’s the person I go to if I’m ever freaking out,” Edwards said.
“When your brain is all over the place, she helps you get back into reasoning.” Despite setting career-best marks early this season, Everett believes that she can top her scores again. “I definitely think my scores still have room for improvement on the two events that I compete,” Everett said. matthew.vender@temple.edu @Matt_Vender
sports@temple-news.com @TTN_Sports
TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 2018
PAGE 16
MEN’S BASKETBALL
Rose takes 1,000 shots per day, finds ‘sweet spot’ The sophomore guard has increased his 3-point percentage by 9 percent from last season. BY TOM IGNUDO
Assistant Sports Editor
A
fter last season ended, Quinton Rose wanted to improve one specific skill: his
3-point shot. When he briefly went home to Rochester, New York, after the spring semester, he worked with his former Amateur Athletic Union coach Kevan Sheppard. The sophomore guard and Sheppard worked at Rose’s former high school, Bishop Kearney in Rochester, getting up 500 to 1,000 3-pointers off screens each day. The work has translated. Rose leads Temple with 14.2 points per game and is second with a 38.6 3-point percentage — a 9 percent increase from last season. “Confidence is the biggest difference,” Rose said. “When that’s falling, it makes everything else offensively a lot easier.” Junior guard Shizz Alston Jr. took a similar jump from his freshman season to his sophomore season. After averaging two points per game as a freshman, Alston led the Owls in scoring the following season. “I stayed here my freshman summer, and he did the same thing,” Alston said. “Just staying in the gym during the summertime and putting the work in, getting stronger and then you become more confident. Once you become more confident, then your production on the court increases.” During the summer, Rose, Alston and sophomore guard Al-
ani Moore II worked on improving their strokes from beyond the arc at Pearson Hall. Like Rose did with Sheppard in his hometown, the three guards ran off ball screens and practiced catchand-shoot 3-pointers. The trio also played 3-point games to keep their workouts competitive. Each 3-pointer sunk counted as 10 points, and they would play up to 100. Alston said the purpose of the game was to adapt to hitting big shots under pressure and closing out games. So who took the crown most of the time? “It was always me,” Alston said jokingly. “I would tell the guys to find your sweet spot,” he added. “Find your shot. Find a spot where you feel the most comfortable at.” Rose averaged double-digit point totals three out of his four years in high school, including 20.9 points per game during his senior season. The 6-foot-8-inch guard said he was able to do most of his damage at the high school level off layups and fastbreak dunks because his athleticism made it easy for him to get to the basket. But at the college level, he has been trying to mold himself into an all-around offensive threat. “They get into college and realize you can’t get to the basket as much as you could when you were in high school,” assistant coach Aaron McKie said. “There are other things you’re gonna have to do out on the court.” “[This] means being able to make a shot, being able to play
ROSE | PAGE 13
SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Sophomore guard Quinton Rose (right) shoots over Connecticut graduate guard Antwoine Anderson during the Owls’ 85-57 win on Sunday at the Liacouras Center.
WOMEN’S BASKETBALL
Incoming recruits could make immediate impact Alexa Williamson has scored 40 points or more in two games for ChartiersHouston High School. BY MAURA RAZANAUSKAS
Women’s Basketball Beat Reporter
Associate head coach Way Veney described incoming recruit Alexa Williamson’s intensity and work ethic as “a coach’s dream.” That drive propelled her to set a single-game scoring record of 40 points at Chartiers-Houston High School in Houston, Pennsylvania — and break it herself less than a month later. “I think she plays with a lot of energy,” said Veney, who is also the team’s recruiting coordinator. “Her motor, she just never stops.” The 6-foot-1-inch senior forward has shown it through her stat line during her high school games. In her junior season, she helped lead her team to a regional championship, by averaging a double-double with 23 points and 12 rebounds per game. Now in her final high school season, Williamson has elevated her play. She averages 26 points and 14 rebounds per game. Williamson’s style of play will give the Owls a needed boost next season, Veney said. “She’s just a presence in general because of her athleticism,” Veney said. “She’s going to be a good defender because she can protect the paint. She can
Recruiting coordinator Way Veney called North Carolina guard Marissa Mackins a “triple-threat” player.
block shots. She’s going to be a kid that’s going to have an immediate impact inside for us both on the offensive and defensive end.” This season, Williamson averages eight blocks per game. Temple averages just two blocks per game, and its leading shot-blocker —sophomore center Shannen Atkinson — averages 0.9 blocks. “My style of play would be pushing the ball in transition and running the floor,” Williamson said. “My role on the court is to rebound and play good defense.” Williamson is one of two incoming recruits — North Carolina guard Marissa Mackins is the other. Williamson sees her game as a good fit for Temple’s program because the Owls like to run a fast-paced offense and score transition points. Even with Williamson’s defensive skill set, she has made waves on of-
WILLIAMSON | PAGE 14
BY KEVIN SCHAEFFER
Women’s Basketball Beat Reporter
At an American Athletic Union tournament, coach Tonya Cardoza was scouting a potential recruiting target in Summer 2014. But she didn’t expect to be blown away by a guard playing on the court behind the one she was watching. The guard who caught Cardoza’s eye was Marissa Mackins. And from that tournament on, Mackins became a top target for Temple until she signed her National Letter of Intent in November. “I picked Temple because it just felt like home,” said Mackins, a 5-foot-8-inch guard from Carolina Prep Academy in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. “I really felt I was meant to be there. The recruiting process was long, but it was interesting. And I felt a lot of love from all the coaching staffs interested in me, but I just felt it from Temple the most.” Mackins is one of two incoming high school signees, joining Alexa WilDESIGN BY COURTNEY REDMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS PHOTOS COURTESY OF ROBERT CASH & MARISSA MACKINS
MACKINS | PAGE 14
MEN’S BASKETBALL | PAGE 15
VOLLEYBALL | PAGE 14
GYMNASTICS | PAGE 13
BRIEFS | PAGE 13
Graduate manager Sierra McDuffie’s family will attend Thursday’s game against Wichita State, where her brother plays.
A crowd-funding campaign will help send two players to Colorado Springs, Colorado, in March for Team USA tryouts.
Sophomore all-around Jaylene Everett earned Eastern College Athletic Conference Specialist of the Week distinction earlier this season.
The preseason Big East Conference lacrosse coaches poll predicts Temple to finish fourth, which would give the Owls their third straight playoff appearance.