Vol. 96, Iss. 24

A watchdog for the Temple University community since 1921.

VOL. 96 ISSUE 24

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PEOPLE YOU SHOULD KNOW

STADIUM

STADIUM DETAILS RELEASED

The university’s stadium presentation includes the most up-to-date renderings of the proposed on-campus facility.

BY WILL BLEIER & GILLIAN McGOLDRICK

O SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Myrna Bloom, a 1972 painting and sculpture alumna, stands in her apartment at The Watermark at Logan Square. Bloom has turned her apartment into an open gallery to showcase her artwork.

Living with relics of the past Myrna Bloom, 79, has turned her high-rise Center City apartment into a public art gallery.

BY CLAIRE BRENNAN For The Temple News

In Myrna Bloom’s one-bedroom apartment, she hangs paintings that tell the story of her life.

Every morning, Bloom, a 79-yearold painter and sculpture artist, fights the isolation that comes with living alone in the later years of her life, with relics of her past: 157 paintings and prints.

These works include a portrait of her mother and a painting of chairs, made up of Bloom’s written thoughts.

“I like seeing my work,” Bloom said.

“It’s me, it’s all part of me and that’s comforting.”

Last December, Bloom, a 1972 painting and sculpture alumna, opened her apartment at The Watermark at Logan Square to the public as a gallery by ap-

For The Temple News

n Monday, The Temple News sat down with Dozie Ibeh, the associate vice president of Temple’s Project Delivery Group, and Bill Bergman, the vice president of public affairs, to see Temple’s stadium presentation — one that was meant to be shown at the university’s town hall last month.

The town hall was cut short due to interruptions from protesters, so the presentation was never shown publicly.

The presentation, filled with new renderings of the university’s proposed on-campus stadium, included the most detailed look to date at the 35,000-seat stadium and how it would affect Main Campus and the North Philadelphia community.

Ibeh outlined the university’s proposal which includes: adding several retail spaces, building one-third of the stadium’s seating below sidewalk level, creating several tailgating locations on Main Campus, completing a legally required and binding community benefits agreement and addressing issues like student partying.

The project would take 20 to 24 months to build. Bergman and Ibeh said the university has informally presented the project to several city agencies and hopes to have all required city approvals by June.

THE STADIUM

lery showings on the fourth floor of her apartment building, which was open to the public, she moved her work into her

The university would build a plaza to enter the stadium on Broad Street and Polett Walk.

Several retail space opportunities — one of which the university envisions as a restaurant open to the public — would be on both sides of the stairs leading into the plaza, which would stretch along Broad Street from Norris Street

ART | PAGE 9

STADIUM | PAGE 2

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS More than 150 paintings and prints hang on the walls of Myrna Bloom’s bedroom in her apartment at The Watermark at Logan Square.

pointment through her email. Bloom lives on the 24th floor of the Watermark, an independent retirement community in Center City.

After starting with a couple gal-

TSG

FOOTBALL

TSG tickets detail their platforms The three campaigns mention issues like the stadium, sustainability and mental health resources.

BY ALYSSA BIEDERMAN TSG Beat Reporter

Campaigning for the 2018-19 election season officially began last Wednesday.

The three executive campaigns — IgniteTU, UniteTU and VoiceTU — have released their platforms online, and were given a chance to formally introduce themselves at the first debate last Thursday.

Each team outlined the goals that, if elected, they hoped to implement to improve students’ lives. Here’s what you need to know about each team.

PLATFORMS | PAGE 6 WATCH OUR INTERVIEWS WITH EACH TEAM ON TEMPLE-NEWS.COM

Owls to fundraise for gun violence victims Proceeds will benefit the Florida high school where there was a mass shooting last month.

BY TOM IGNUDO

Assistant Sports Editor

Redshirt-junior defensive lineman Dana Levine changed his jersey from No. 51 to No. 17 this season. For Levine, the number has sentimental value.

At the age of 17, his grandfather died.

That same year, Levine tore his meniscus.

Levine also wears the number to represent the 17 people who were killed last month in the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

“I’m from Florida, so my number represents them,” Levine said. “Now, I get to put all 17 of those [people] on my back every day I practice. Anything I do, those 17 [people] are with me.”

Levine, redshirt-senior defensive lineman Freddie Booth-Lloyd, junior wideout Randle Jones, redshirt-freshman quarterback Todd Centeio and redshirtsophomore wideout Freddie Johnson, all Florida natives, are organizing a fundraiser for Marjory Stoneman Douglas.

Per NCAA rules, the players will have

GENEVA HEFFERNAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS Redshirt-junior defensive lineman Dana Levine, who is from Hallandale, Florida, laughs with teammates during practice on Saturday at Chodoff Field.

to coordinate their effort with the athletic department’s compliance staff. Senior Associate Athletic Director of Compliance and Student-Athlete Affairs Kristy Bannon Sromovsky has not yet met with the athletes, said Senior Associate Athletic Director of Strategic Communications Larry Dougherty.

“It affected us a lot because we love our state, and to see stuff like that is tragic,” Booth-Lloyd said. “For [Levine] to switch his number to 17, that’s a big honor for him.”

Nikolas Cruz, a former student of

PARKLAND | PAGE 13

NEWS | PAGES 2-3, 6

OPINION | PAGES 4-5

FEATURES | PAGES 7-12

SPORTS | PAGES 13-16

Several student organizations in the Fox School of Business will host a food drive for the Cherry Pantry. Read more on Page 3.

A columnist argued that silencing student protestors is dangerous and unconstitutional. Read more on Page 4.

Thousands of people took to the streets in cities throughout the world, including Philadelphia, for the March For Our Lives.

Read more on Page 7.

Sophomore midfielder Maddie Gebert leads the lacrosse team with 19 goals this season, including Saturday’s gamewinner. Read more on Page 16.

NEWS TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 2 CONSTRUCTION

Charles Library endowed by $10 million gift The library, set to open in May 2019, is endowed by a gift from university trustee Steve Charles.

BY LINDSAY BOWEN

On-Campus Beat Reporter

Steve Charles, a university trustee and 1980 advertising alumnus, donated $10 million to the new library set to open in May 2019. It will be named the Charles Library after the trustee.

Charles’s donation is one the largest individual donations in Temple’s history.

The donation will be invested into an endowment that will provide funds for recruiting and training library staff, maintaining the building, purchasing literary collections, supporting new technologies and advancing community outreach, public programs and partnerships.

Charles Library, which is a $170 million project, will be a four-story building with more than 210,000 square feet spanning an entire city block between Liacouras Walk and 13th Street and Polett Walk and Norris Street.

The Albert M. Greenfield Foundation also recently gifted Temple Libraries $1 million to open a “special collections research center reading room” on the first floor of Charles Library and provide long-term funding for maintenance of the space.

While the library is set to

open in May 2019, it was originally scheduled to be completed in October 2018, but its completion date has been pushed back several times.

Jerry Leva, the vice president of planning and capital projects, told The Temple News in November 2017 that the new library will have sustainable components, like a green roof and more efficient heating and cooling systems.

Additionally, Charles Library will have robots that bring students books on command. Only 10 percent of the library’s books will be directly accessible to students, while the other 2 million books will be stored in a compact space only accessible to the robot cranes, WHYY reported in April 2016.

Charles donated these funds after he spoke with Dean of Libraries Joe Lucia at a Board of Trustees holiday party in December 2017.

“We got to talking, and he was explaining this vision of the library which is all about leveraging the current technology and the way we interact today, and that just really captured my imagination,” Charles said.

Charles said he hopes that students will be able to work together and collaborate in the library in ways that are similar to how leading companies operate.

Designers are planning to have “maker spaces” for students to work on projects, much like the breakout rooms in the TECH Cen-

COLLEEN CLAGGETT / THE TEMPLE NEWS University trustee Steve Charles donated $10 million to endow the new library, which will be named the Charles Library.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 STADIUM to Polett Walk.

There would be two main entrances: one on Broad Street and Polett Walk and another on Broad and Norris streets. Ibeh said these are strategically located to minimize foot traffic in North Philadelphia.

On two sides, the stadium would be built 25 feet “below grade,” or below sidewalk level, so it would not extend higher than the height of surrounding rowhomes. Because of this, one-third of the seating would be below sidewalk level and built into the ground.

“We are able to achieve this by going below grade at an additional cost, I would even say a significant financial cost to the university,” Ibeh said.

The cost to build into the ground is included in the budget and will not extend the university’s $130 million price tag for the project.

Facing North 16th Street, a multipurpose building separate from the stadium would feature academic and research space, as well as game day suites and press boxes.

The building would be constructed 45 feet from the sidewalk and include a small traffic loop to allow drop-offs, reducing traffic concerns. One entrance to this building would be accessed by walking along the Polett Walk plaza to 16th and Berks streets, so students would not need to walk through the community.

The facade of the stadium will feature pilaster, or siding, to match adjacent rowhomes. Landscaping and streets around the stadium’s perimeter would also be improved.

THE GAME DAY EXPERIENCE The university has deemed several locations on Main Campus as “game-day fun

News Desk 215.204.7419 news@temple-news.com

• • • • • • • • • • •

COURTESY / BETSY MANNING Trustee Steve Charles (left), Dean of Libraries Joe Lucia and Associate Director of Construction Julia Mullin tour the new Charles Library, which is set to open in May 2019.

ter, Charles said.

“I would hope some years from now students might say, ‘We dreamed that up in the Charles’,” he added. “That would be awesome.”

After graduating from Temple in 1980, Charles cofounded immixGroup, a firm that helps technology companies conduct business with the federal government.

In 2011, Charles established the Steve Charles Endowed Scholarship Fund in Lew Klein College of Media and Communication, which provides scholarships to incoming freshmen who have financial need and an interest in studying entrepreneurship.

And in 2016, Charles joined the Board of Trustees and donated $2 million to establish the Steve Charles Chair in Media, Cities and Solutions in Klein, which focuses on solutions-based journalism and media to make a positive impact in urban centers like Philadelphia.

The chair is currently filled by Marc Lamont-Hill, a CNN commentator.

“It’s been really great seeing life at a university from the administrative and management side,” Charles said. “It’s different

Anderson/Gladfelter Terrace Library Quad Pollet Walk Johnson/Hardwick Plaza Columbia Park Mitten Hall Morgan Hall STAR Complex Liacouras Walk Founder’s Garden Lenfest Circle (Bell Tower area)

zones” for tailgating and other activities.

The locations are as follows: In each of these game-day zones, the university food service provider Aramark would be contracted to provide food.

Temple is aiming to match Tulane University or the University of Mississippi, where most tailgating activities take place on campus, Bergman said.

He envisions most of the tailgating activities will occur inside buildings, like on the indoor field at the STAR Complex on 15th Street near Montgomery Avenue, Bergman added.

The university is open to the possibility of allowing tailgating to occur in universityowned parking lots, as long as attendees do not use additional parking spaces, he added.

MITIGATING COMMUNITY IMPACT Bergman said North Philadelphia residents are primarily concerned with the potential issues of noise, lighting and trash.

To address lighting issues, Ibeh said the university will utilize LED lighting with shrouds around each bulb to focus the brightness only on the field. The “horseshoeshaped” design of the stadium will help redirect noise south toward campus and City Hall and away from North Philadelphia homes, Ibeh added.

from seeing things from the side of a student. That circling back to education from the side of administration and management is kind of like taking it full circle.”

Anne Harlow, a research librarian for dance, music and theater, is excited about the large donation to the new library.

“My initial reaction, truthfully, I cried tears of joy,” Harlow said.

“I’m so happy and grateful to Steve Charles, and I think of the impact on tens of thousands of students.

I think in the future, that every year there will be a new cohort of students, researchers and community members benefitting from this gift.”

Harlow said she hopes the donation will allow the library to continue to have a first-rate staff and interdisciplinary programs that are relevant to research and open to students and community residents.

“I see a very welcoming, glowing beam of light now, and in the future that will never dim down,” she added. “I hope students will discover truth, do research and work together for the greater good.”

Many students are looking

In the university’s ongoing traffic study for the city’s Streets Department, Temple analyzed traffic from 24 streets near the proposed stadium to determine where to reroute traffic on 15th Street. The stadium, if built, would block the street from Norris Street to Montgomery Avenue. The university has not publicly stated the study’s start date.

At its peak, about 315 cars drive on 15th Street between Norris and Montgomery Avenue per hour. The study determined Broad Street experiences 2,500 to 3,000 cars per hour at its busiest, with the potential capacity of about 5,000 cars per hour. Ibeh said traffic from 15th Street could be “rerouted back to Broad Street.”

Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board agents would be contracted by the university to enforce issues relating to underage drinking, Bergman said. Additional police and security resources would be stationed in the community to control tailgating and parking problems.

“Once we find locations on campus to tailgate, we have to ensure that there is not crazy parties, or anything like that happening in the neighborhood,” Bergman said.

“We’d have additional police in the neighborhood, along with the state agents that we would contract.”

From the pending traffic study, Ibeh said the university determined it would require 5,000 parking spaces for game day, after considering the number of people who would drive to games, as well as the attendees who live on campus and those who would take public transportation.

The university owns 5,295 parking spaces, Ibeh said, and there are more potential parking spots in lots that are not owned

by Temple.

Ibeh said the university is taking it “one

forward to what the new library has to offer, too, like Lady Carmela Robinson, a senior risk management major. She thinks the new library will encourage future students to come to Temple.

“I heard that they’ll have a lot of innovative initiatives, so that’ll definitely help students with their learning experience,” Robinson said. “The current library is really outdated, and I personally don’t like to study there.”

Yasir Rodgers, a freshman film and media arts major, is also looking forward to the new library.

“I don’t really like the old library,” Rodgers said. “It’s old and musty. I’m excited to study in a new, fresh space.”

Charles said he hopes the library will be a place for collaboration among students from different fields.

“Innovation and even invention happens at the intersections of disciplines,” he added. “Hopefully this will be the place where more of that will happen, and that’s where value is created.” lindsay.bowen@temple.edu @lindsay_bow

step further” and assigning a specific parking lot for game days when attendees buy their tickets. This will help avoid people parking along residential streets in North Philadelphia.

COMMUNITY INVESTMENT The stadium would create job openings for community residents, Bergman said. Potential employment would become available in construction and again upon completion in maintenance and retail work.

The football team would only use the stadium for Temple’s six annual home games, but the university would be open to hosting local high school championship football games.

Bergman also referenced President Richard Englert’s opening remarks at the town hall, where he committed to making “a significant investment” in Amos Recreation Center. The center is adjacent to the proposed stadium site.

“We would gladly talk to the neighbors and the city about what services need to be improved at Amos,” Bergman said. “We have heard from neighbors that they are not happy with the condition of the playground.”

A commitment to renovate the center would be a part of the community benefits agreement, Bergman said.

Ibeh said the stadium would include a community garden along Norris Street, maintained by the university. The community would have an opportunity to help with its design.

The full presentation will be made available to the public soon, Bergman said. news@temple-news.com @TheTempleNews

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

NEWS TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 3

ON CAMPUS

Fox students host food drive for Cherry Pantry Four Fox student organizations are collecting food for the food pantry this week.

BY LINDSAY BOWEN

On-Campus Beat Reporter

Student organizations from the Fox School of Business started a food drive on Monday that will run through Friday for the Cherry Pantry.

Students can donate food from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Alter Hall atrium.

The Cherry Pantry, a food pantry open for all students, opened on Feb. 19. The pantry aims to combat food insecurity on campus and allows students to take food anonymously for free.

People are free to stop by Alter Hall and donate non-perishable food items like pasta, granola bars, rice, crackers, canned fruits and vegetables and juice.

Four student organizations that organized the food drive: Temple University Business English Lingua Franca, Fox Professional Speakers, Fox Accounting Association and the Temple chapter of the American Statistical Organization.

Matt Shade, a sophomore statistical science and data analytics major and AmStat community service chair, said it was important for his organization to get involved in the food drive because food insecurity is “a problem with a simple solution.”

“There are so many people that will benefit from Cherry Pantry and it means a lot

to me that AmStat is getting involved,” Shade said. “If we can be a part of something that will benefit the Temple community, it means even more.”

Laurie Fitzpatrick, a professor of marketing and supply chain management, has worked closely with the student organizations to help organize the food drive.

She said she got involved with the Cherry Pantry by donating food as soon as it opened.

Fitzpatrick added that she experienced food insecurity as an undergraduate fine arts student at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. This experience inspired her to help out with the pantry.

“Something like Cherry Pantry would’ve helped me a lot, so I’m really thrilled to be able to help now,” she added.

Fox has previously hosted successful food drives for Philabundance, a Philadelphia food pantry, Fitzpatrick said.

Michelle Martin, an administrative manager in Student Affairs and an adviser for the Cherry Pantry, said there have been campus-wide food drives at athletic games since the pantry opened, but there hasn’t been a week-long drive.

University Housing and Residential Life hosted a food drive event to benefit the pantry on Monday, and the Residence Hall Association will host a drive in April, Martin said.

In the first two weeks of its February opening, the pantry was used by three to five students per day. In the past few weeks, however, that number has increased to five

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Food sits on the shelves of the Cherry Pantry on the second floor of the Student Center. This week, Fox School of Business student organizations are collecting food to donate to the pantry.

to 10 students, Martin said.

“For being such a new pantry, those are good numbers that suggest that the word is out there and that students are starting to be aware that they can use it as a resource,” Martin added.

“So far, we’ve been getting a lot of donations, and some of that may be because we’re such a new pantry and people are really excited about it,” she said. “Hopefully, we can continue to have the same enthusiasm about

it beyond the first month or two of it being open.”

The Cherry Pantry is open for student use on Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 1 to 5 p.m. and Thursdays from 4 to 8 p.m. People can donate non-perishable food items directly to the pantry during these times and on Mondays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. lindsay.bowen@temple.edu @lindsay_bow

ON CAMPUS

Report: Temple a ‘top producer’ of Fulbright awards The university is hosting Fulbright Week to inform students about the application process for the program.

BY LINDSAY BOWEN

On-Campus Beat Reporter

Temple was named one of the top producers of Fulbright finalists with 10 students receiving grants in 2017, according to the United States Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

This year’s 2017-18 group of finalists is the largest the university has ever had.

“All along, Temple students have had the ability to do this, it’s just that there hasn’t been a fulltime dedicated person helping students apply,” said Barbara Gorka, the university’s director of scholarship development and fellowship advising.

The Fulbright U.S. Student Program is the largest U.S. exchange program, providing grants to undergraduate seniors, graduate students, doctoral candidates and recent graduates. Through this program, students are able to pur-

sue international graduate studies and teach English at universities and primary and secondary schools in more than 140 countries.

Gorka is hosting Fulbright Week, this week, with events each day through Thursday. Fulbright Week is a week of information sessions open to all students to learn about the program. These sessions will cover topics like how students can use grant money, what makes a competitive Fulbright candidate and what students need to think about if they want to apply, Gorka said.

There are three remaining one-hour sessions open to all students, regardless of class standing, with two on Tuesday.

Gorka recommended students begin preparing to apply for a Fulbright Program at least one year in advance to be a competitive candidate. The next application cycle will be for the 2019-2020 program year.

Gorka hosted two overview informational sessions on Monday. She will also host a session for law and pre-law students, another for English teaching assistantships and one for research, study and

arts grants throughout the week.

Each year, the Fulbright Program awards about 1,900 grants in all fields of study. These grants cover the cost of round-trip transportation to the host country, room and board and health benefits.

In certain countries, grants will cover additional expenses, like book and research costs and full or partial tuition for students attending graduate school.

Gorka is responsible for mentoring and helping students apply for scholarship programs like the Fulbright Program and the Truman Scholarship, which is awarded to 55 to 65 college students who are active in their communities and plan to pursue a career in public service. Two students were national finalists for the Truman Scholarship this year.

Gorka said the Fulbright Program is a perfect fit for Temple students.

“Fulbright cares about students who have a global mindset, who get involved in their community, who have already done research, or who have already had experience teaching or tutoring,” she added. “Temple students get

involved in Philadelphia and the Temple community.”

Temple’s Department of Spanish and Portuguese is one of the largest producers of Fulbright students at the university. Four of the 10 Temple finalists for the 2017-18 year are students or instructors from the department.

Gorka said students must consider how their research or English teaching assistantship is going to fulfill the Fulbright mission of increasing cultural understanding between people of the U.S. and people of other countries.

“It’s about how students can put together a proposal, how they can get involved with their host community,” she added. “It’s not just about teaching English or doing research. The Fulbright Program wants you to be an integral part of the community to fulfill that mission of cultural exchange and understanding.”

Elaina Hawkins, a senior secondary education world languages major focusing on Spanish, is a semi-finalist for the 2018-19 Fulbright Program and hopes to complete an English teaching assistantship in Spain.

Hawkins heard about the Fulbright program after she received emails from Gorka last March.

She hopes to teach in Spain for one year, and then return to teach Spanish in the Philadelphia area.

“The Fulbright seems like a good next step, and if I get it, it will definitely help with future career choices and options,” Hawkins said. “I hope to get more experience teaching English and learn more about Spanish culture.”

After studying abroad in Spring 2017 in Oviedo, Spain, Hawkins realized there is much more to Spain and the Spanish language.

“I’d like to be able to immerse myself in a part of Spanish culture that is not really known by the rest of world and be able to share that with my future students,” she added. “From that, I hope to learn about other South American cultures and work toward creating a globally centered classroom.” lindsay.bowen@temple.edu @lindsay_bow

ADMINISTRATION

First vice provost for admissions, financial aid appointed Shawn Abbott will fill the new position after working for New York University and the Department of State.

BY KILEY BATENHORST For The Temple News

Shawn Abbott was appointed vice provost for admissions, financial aid and enrollment management, effective May 14, Provost JoAnne Epps announced in February.

Abbott will be the first to hold this position at the university.

Before relocating to Philadelphia, Abbott will finish out Spring 2018 at New York University, where he has served as the assistant vice president and dean of admissions since 2010.

“The possibilities of where Temple could go in the next decade and beyond just really excite me,” he said. “I’m also really excited about being part of [the] renaissance of North Philadelphia, which I’ve kind of watched from afar.”

Temple has broken its record for most freshman applications received consecutively for the last four years, with 36,840 applications in Fall 2017. In the school year prior, 82 percent of full-time undergraduates received financial aid.

“Shawn’s impeccable credentials are matched by his passion for urban universities and Temple’s mission of expanding access to an excellent education,” Epps said in a statement. “This makes him a perfect fit not only to continue our innovative admissions

efforts but also to help ensure our students limit their debt by graduating on time.”

Abbott’s first worked in higher education as the assistant director of alumni relations at Drexel University. He also held positions at Boston University, Columbia University and Stanford University.

In his career, Abbott has also been affiliated with the United States Department of State, where he works as a consultant within the Office of Overseas Schools. In this position, Abbott travels to visit schools in the Middle East and North Africa to provide counseling and advising to students about U.S. admissions and financial aid process.

It has allowed him to visit 15 to 20 different cities, he added.

“I help families who are stationed abroad

for whatever reason, whether they’re in the military or they’re in the foreign service, to really help them navigate the admissions process back in the United States,” Abbott said. “It’s great exposure for the university as well.”

Abbott said he is “deliriously excited” to arrive on campus. He added that he intends to spend the first several months getting to know students and faculty, as well as getting reacquainted with Philadelphia.

“I’ve always been enamored with Temple from afar,” Abbott said. “I spent some time in Philadelphia right after college, and Temple was one of the very first universities that I encountered above and beyond my own.” kiley.batenhorst@temple.edu

News Desk 215.204.7419 news@temple-news.com

OPINION TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 4 POLITICS A watchdog for the Temple University community since 1921.

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EDITORIALS

Temple: Keep marching The March For Our Lives could make a positive impact on Main Campus and in the North Philadelphia community.

On Saturday, thousands of people gathered at Lombard Circle for Philadelphia’s March For Our Lives, one of more than 800 marches held across the globe to protest gun violence and call for gun control.

The marches were prompted by students who survived the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida on Feb. 14 that left 17 dead.

We commend Temple students who attended — and even spoke at — the political event. It is especially relevant because gun violence is a harsh reality that occurs in the surrounding North Philadelphia community.

From last March until now, there have been an estimated 1,305 people injured or killed by a shooting in Philadelphia. The youngest was a

6-year-old, just blocks from Main Campus at 23rd and Norris streets.

Not only would gun control protect kids injured or killed in mass school shootings, it would lessen the trauma caused by guns on the streets of North Philadelphia.

Saturday’s protest is not the last one that the Temple community will partake in.

More than 300 students and faculty will walk out of classes to bring awareness to gun violence on April 20, according to a Facebook event page.

The Temple News is proud to see members of the university and its surrounding neighborhood continuing to shed light on this important issue.

But we call on them to pay necessary attention to the harm that guns have consistently inflicted upon our neighbors.

Stadium concerns linger The Temple News reminds the university of past requests after seeing its most recent stadium presentation.

On Monday, The Temple News sat down with Vice President of Public Affairs Bill Bergman and Dozie Ibeh, the associate vice president of Temple’s Project Delivery Group, to go through Temple’s stadium presentation.

It was supposed to be shown at Temple’s town hall in early March, but the event ended after 13 minutes due to protester disruption.

The presentation details the stadium’s infrastructure — like its two entrances intentionally located to minimize foot traffic in North Philadelphia — and Temple’s community outreach plans.

The Temple News appreciates that administrators finally shared some of the information we’ve been trying to obtain for months — and we’re now invited to Temple’s meetings with community residents, allowing us to provide another needed aspect of coverage.

But we still have concerns.

Bergman said Temple aims to have all city approvals

for the stadium and a required, legally binding community benefits agreement sorted out

by June. This means the university has a lot of ground to cover in two months.

It’s been three weeks since Temple’s town hall, but the presentation is still not available to the public — though Bergman said it will be “soon.”

If Temple expects to negotiate an agreement with community leaders about the stadium, it must make all relevant information — including the presentation, the results of the $1.25 million feasibility study and an ongoing traffic study — available to the public immediately.

We’ve requested a lot from Temple regarding the stadium: transparency, consideration of students’ and community residents’ concerns and more public meetings with North Philadelphia residents.

With its self-imposed, two-month deadline looming, it’s more important than ever for Temple to follow through on these requests.

CORRECTIONS 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.

letters@temple-news.com

Don’t silence student protests Preventing students from peacefully protesting is unconstitutional and dangerous.

O

n Saturday, more than 800 March For Our Lives protests were held across the globe. These efforts were largely influenced by students and in response to a mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida that occurred last month and resulted in 17 deaths.

And while many in the country have been reinvigorated in RACHEL BERSON pushing for better gun control laws, shootings are still happening. Just last week, yet another school shooting took place at Great Mills High School in Maryland, injuring one student and killing two others, including the gunman.

Both last month and last week, I couldn’t help asking myself, “How much more is it going to take before we see change?” And I see many other young people on the news and on campus asking themselves the same question.

On March 14, while I watched news coverage of the National School Walkout, in which students across the country left their schools at 10 a.m. to protest gun violence, I felt proud of my generation for standing up and demanding political change.

Unfortunately, many schools and adults are suppressing this activism, which is vital to democracy and any chance of reform. Several high schools threatened sanctions for students participating in the walkout, including Pennridge High

School in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, which issued 225 detentions.

Several politicians have also criticized anti-gun violence protests, like Pennsylvania State Rep. Daryl Metcalfe, who questioned if the Parkland shooting survivors and organizers of the March For Our Lives were actually students.

And some schools promoted a “Walk up, not out” campaign, encouraging students to reach out to lonely kids at school as an alternative to protesting.

While this sentiment sounds good in theory, it depoliticizes the message of walking out by turning it into a vague anti-bullying afterthought. “Walk up, not out” puts all the responsibility of addressing school shootings on students.

Adults who are in power should not rob students of their constitutional right to peacefully assemble.

They’re sending a message that our voices don’t matter, when in reality, we are the voice of the future — capable of pushing for gun control reform among other needed changes.

Peter Ditzler, a freshman film and media arts major, frequently posts on the event page of Temple University Walkout to Protest Gun Violence. On April 20, more than 300 students and faculty will walk out of classes and protest gun violence from noon to 2 p.m.

He’s impressed by the students who were involved in National Walkout Day and those continuing to call for reform at events like Saturday’s March for Our Lives.

“I’m thankful for what they’re doing,” Ditzler said. “And I’m proud to be in the same generation as them.”

When Temple students protest next month, I hope professors don’t penalize the students who choose

to participate in the protest.

The courage and tenacity demonstrated by student protesters give me hope that this mission will not fade as quickly as National Rifle Association-funded lawmakers might wish.

It’s significant that, rather than simply mourning and moving on, students are intent on making political change.

Aryeh Botwinick, a political science professor, believes that the ability of young people to protest and have a voice is incredibly important to the country’s political processes.

“I think that’s what a democracy is about,” Botwinick said. “Authority rests on consent. That’s the organizing principle of liberal democracy. It has to be grounded in the consent of the governed.”

“These are the principles upon which our government was founded,” he added.

And these policies affect students even if they can’t vote. So it’s important they have some kind of platform to voice their opinions.

“A lot of people marching might not even be of voting age,” Ditzler said. “[But] they’re of an age that they can conduct these walkouts and marches and they can try to sway the people that can vote.”

The backlash these students have faced for taking action only further proves the need to allow and amplify student protest.

Hopefully we will continue to see students at Temple and across the nation peacefully exercising their civil rights to accomplish political change. rachel.berson@temple.edu

FEMINISM

Representation in Barbie dolls: a step toward gender equality The new collection of dolls will educate and motivate the young girls who play with them.

A

s Women’s History Month comes to a close, I can’t help but think about the famous women who have inspired me, from Oprah Winfrey, who dedicates her life in the spotlight to empowering women, to Rosa Parks who stood up to racial discrimination, even when all the odds were stacked against her.

Earlier this month, in honor of International Women’s Day, JOY CATO Barbie’s manfacturer, Mattel, announced its Inspiring Women collection, a series of dolls that showcase historical female role models in an effort to encourage young girls to pursue their goals.

The notable women imagined in doll form include Mexican artist and activist Frida Kahlo, recordbreaking aviator Amelia Earhart and African-American NASA mathematician Katherine Johnson.

I never connected with Barbie dolls growing up because none of them seemed to look like me, so I appreciate Mattel’s effort to provide diverse icons known for something other than a pretty face. And I think these dolls will do exactly what the creators are hoping: let young girls know that they are powerful.

According to a survey conducted by Mattel, 86 percent of mothers across the globe are concerned about the types of role models their daughters are exposed to.

In response to the survey results, Mattel released three new dolls in the Inspiring Women collection and 14 in its pre-existing Shero collection. The dolls in the Inspiring Women collection feature historic role models, while the dolls in the Shero collection features role models of today.

Some women honored in the Shero collection include Gabby Douglas, the first woman of color to win the individual all-around competition for gymnastics, Patty Jenkins, the director of “Wonder Woman” and Ashley Graham, a “curvy model” and body positivity advocate.

Providing these dolls to girls at a young age can help them think beyond their makeup and clothes — the focus of past Barbies — and instead encourage them to celebrate their intellect and ambition.

Ladan Abbasi, a senior civil engineering major and president of the Society of Women Engineers, said she grew up with no female role models in the engineering field.

If Abbasi had a Barbie that was celebrating a woman’s engineering achievements, it would have helped her realize all of the opportunities available to her, she said.

“I hope these Barbies give girls the chance to see that they are worth more than what they display on the outside,” Abbasi said. “You can have a meaningful career and a family. And you can grow up to be a hero just like the dolls that they are playing with.”

It’s safe to say that 2017 brought a new wave of feminism — from

the first annual Women’s March to countless women coming forward about sexual harassment as part of the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements. These changes show that women are empowering each other.

And I hope the new series of Barbies will not only inspire young girls to break stereotypes, but also contribute to the momentum of the current feminist movement.

As girls learn about a doll modeled after 17-year-old Chloe Kim, who became the youngest woman to win a gold medal in snowboarding at the 2018 Olympic Winter Games in PyeongChang, the next generation of motivated feminists will rise.

“Kids as young as 26 months old start to identify toys by gender,” said Jean Boyer, an early childhood education professor. “How parents mediate toys can absolutely influence going against stereotypes.”

“The idea is to be hopeful that having a doll can signal kids that women have other gender roles than have been assigned to them in the past,” Boyer said. “I think that’s the hope, but we need to see what happens.”

I hope these Barbies help girls learn their worth and power at a young age so they can achieve their goals as adults. I think these dolls, which show girls the powerful women who came before them, will help create lasting change in our society and in the girls who will grow up to lead future generations. joy.cato@temple.edu

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

OPINION TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 5

Admiring the gentle giants of the sea A student admires humpback whales for their strength and mildness.

BY BASIA WILSON

W

hen dating someone new, the inevitable and awkward getting-to-know-you questions always come up in the first few conversations. So when a conversation on a first date veered toward the topic of which animal I’d choose to be if given the chance, I already had an answer prepared.

My date said he’s always admired wolves. He appreciated their fierce will to survive and strength.

I respected this choice. I too find wolves remarkable. I like their bright eyes and their persistence. I like the idea that on the night of a full moon, somewhere a wolf is howling, even if it’s a cheesy image to call to mind.

But I wouldn’t want to be anything like a wolf. I don’t like the thought of having to be menacing or ferocious — for my survival to be so reliant on toughness. If I could be any animal, I’d want a life so much bigger than that. Literally.

So when my date asked me which animal I’d like to be, I confidently told him, “I’d want to be a humpback whale.”

He raised his eyebrows and threw me a look of surprise. But I was so confident in my answer. I’ve found whales marvelous ever since I was a child.

In elementary school, Friday was my favorite day of the week. Not just because it meant the weekend was here, but also because every Friday we got a new issue of Scholastic News — a small magazine for stu-

COURTNEY REDMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS

dents with articles about history, science and more.

I was always intrigued by issues featuring a story about animals, especially when the story focused on ocean life. I tried hard to imagine what life must be like immersed in a big, blue world.

The magazine often inspired me to go home after school and watch shows on National Geographic and Animal Planet, hoping there would an episode about marine animals. I celebrated the moment when a breaching whale graced my TV screen.

And when I learned that the average blue whale is the length of two school buses, my little world flipped. I went to school with this fact lingering in my mind, especially when the big yellow buses lined up for field trips.

I suddenly had a new perspective on how small my being was compared to the rest of the world’s creatures, and how precious it was to exist alongside such colossal animals.

All of this should’ve frightened me when I was a kid. After all, I was afraid of the sharks at the aquarium for quite some time.

But the magnitude of whales didn’t scare me at all because I had also learned how friendly many of them are.

For instance, I’ve grown to associate humpback whales with beauty and ease for the way they communicate through song.

And when two humpbacks prepare to mate, they do more than sing: they often twirl about the water in a serenading ballet.

When I first saw videos of this, I couldn’t help but smile at their grace — the way they

seemed to move in perpetual slow motion.

And humpback whales typically don’t swat their prey with their hefty fins or put up a fight with a show of their great force when hunting. They simply open their tremendous mouths and scale the ocean to swallow krill, a small crustacean like shrimp, as they swim.

It amazed me that a creature could be capable of so much force, but rarely capitalize on this power to instill fear or create devastation the way other animals might — including humans.

In fact, a phenomenon regarding the behavior of humpback whales has left biologists baffled. Humpback whales have been intervening in fights on behalf of smaller prey trying to defend themselves from vicious predators, like orcas.

Scientists have been searching for explanations for this behavior, and empathy is not out of the question. This makes perfect sense to me, given how sophisticated humpbacks have proven themselves to be.

While it may be impossible to know exactly why humpback whales choose to display such compassion, I’ve always seen their generosity as something to aspire to.

When I explained my appreciation for humpback whales to my date, he was no longer bewildered by my choice. He agreed it made sense.

To live life as a creature known by its heft but admired for its kindness seems like an honorable way to exist in the world. I obviously can’t become my favorite animal, but I can certainly take the effortlessness and benevolence of humpbacks as inspiration in my own life. basia.serafina.wilson@temple.edu

A student is concerned about the inclusivity of Greek life.

Greek life has always been a polarizing issue. It seems like people either love it and can’t wait to get involved or do not see its appeal at all.

For this reason, I’ve noticed there’s a gap between the people who participate in Greek life and those who do not. Since witnessing bid day — when people who are in recruitment are officially invited to a specific fraternity or sorority — and “big reveals” on my Instagram feed, where new members are introduced to someone who will act as their older sibling, I’ve begun thinking about how Greek life is built around exclusivity.

Some people don’t get chosen by a chapter they may have been set on.

And some people don’t get chosen at all. It’ possible this rejection is based on looks. According to the Huffington Post, the Alpha Chi Omega sorority chapter at University of Southern California sorority had “appearance guidelines” that were used when meeting potential members: strict rules for things like eyeliner color and eyebrow thickness.

That seems elitist to me. Those who aren’t deemed a good fit are obviously not going to be allowed to participate.

While rejection is a part of life, I think the part that haunts me about this type of rejection in particular is not knowing what makes someone a “good fit.”

This vastly differs from other, more inclusive clubs at Temple, where anyone can join, or where there are more specific guidelines like required skills or experience to justify who gets a position.

Once initiated into Greek life, among other things, members commonly throw and attend exclusive parties where only approved people — members of Greek life — are allowed to attend. And if they want to allow outsiders, those outsiders must pay a fee.

The subjective selectivity sur-

rounding Greek life events again reminds me that it is up to fraternities and sororities who they choose to include in festivities. Inevitably, this can create a sort of bubble, where members of Greek life tend to avoid mingling with those outside, furthering the gap between those in fraternities and sororities and those who are not.

Diversity is another concern I have about Greek life. According to a 2010 study at Mississippi State University, only 3.8 percent of fraternity members on three college campuses were non-white.

I can’t help but notice that most of the people sporting attire adorned with letters of the Greek alphabet on campus or social media are white.

And my exclusivity concerns don’t stop with impacting people of color.

Since members of Greek life are often required to pay fees and buy things for their “littles” or “bigs,” lowincome students may also be discouraged from joining.

According to the online news publication Seattle Post-Intelligencer, sorority members are expected to pay around $500 in “dues” each semester. And they are also expected to pay dues as alumnae.

This letter is not meant to say that Greek life is all bad and that those involved are wrong for participating.

Fraternities and sororities make great strides in supporting charities and helping students break out of their shells to become friends.

But in order to make Greek life less elitist, I think people from diverse backgrounds should be given more of a chance to participate. While student organizations reserve the right to admit members based on their own rules, the requirements should be transparent and accessible.

Myra Mirza is a junior computer science major and can be reached at myramirza@temple.edu.

March 24, 1966: Sigma Phi Epsilon, Delta Sigma Pi and Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity pledges engaged in a competition among one another to “instill spirit” in fraternity brothers and pledges.

This week, a student wrote a Letter to the Editor about her concerns with Greek life culture and its guidelines.

MONICA LOUGH / THE TEMPLE NEWS

The data analytics company, Cambridge Analytica, used data without permission from 50 million Facebook accounts to create personality profiles of users and manipulate the content they saw during the 2016 presidential election.

letters@temple-news.com

NEWS TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 6 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 PLATFORMS

SAFETY

COSBY

Cosby’s defense team motions to remove judge Bill Cosby’s defense team wants Montgomery County Court of Commons Pleas Judge Steven T. O’Neill taken off of Cosby’s sexaul assault retrial, alleging he is biased because of his wife’s advocacy for sexual assault survivors, the Inquirer reported.

His defense attorneys filed a motion last week that states O’Neill’s recent decisions show partiality and that he should recuse himself from the trial. Jury selection for the trial will begin on April 2 in Norristown.

O’Neill’s wife, Deborah O’Neill, is a coordinator at a sexual trauma outreach program at the University of Pennsylvania and financially contributed to a group last year that supports Andrea Constand, the central accuser in the case, and other accusers of Cosby.

The group, called V-Day UPenn, plans to protest outside the Montgomery County Courthouse during the retrial, the Inquirer reported.

O’Neill will allow five of Cosby’s additional accusers to testify against the former trustee at his upcoming retrial.

He denied several motions filed by the defense earlier this month — including a motion to allow them three more months to prepare for the trial.

The former university trustee is charged for allegedly sexually assaulting Constand, a former Temple employee, in his Montgomery County home in 2005.

-Kelly Brennan

CRIME

Pretrial conference for Joshua Hupperterz to be held on Tuesday A pretrial conference for former advertising student Joshua Hupperterz is scheduled for Tuesday morning at 9 a.m. at the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas. Hupperterz is charged for allegedly killing junior film and media arts major Jenna Burleigh in his off-campus apartment in August.

At a pretrial conference in February, Hupperterz’s defense attorney David Nenner told The Temple News that his client maintains he did not kill Burleigh, but was involved in moving Burleigh’s body, which was found in a storage container in Wayne County, Pennsylvania — more than 100 miles from Main Campus.

Police say Burleigh died inside Hupperterz’s off-campus apartment on 16th Street near Cecil B. Moore Avenue from blunt force trauma and strangulation.

Hupperterz is charged with murder, tampering with a corpse and other drug-related offenses.

Nenner said at a pretrial conference in February that he is still investigating Hupperterz’s roommate, Jack Miley, who was subpoenaed by the defense at a seven-hour preliminary hearing in November, but did not show.

-Kelly Brennan

News Desk 215.204.7419 news@temple-news.com

IgniteTU wants to increase onand off-campus safety by expanding TUPD’s patrol borders, add security and lighting to the Regional Rail station, improve the efficiency of the university’s shuttle service FLIGHT and promote police professionalism on campus.

UniteTU will enhance on-campus safety by increasing the number of AED defibrillators in buildings and “continuing to address students’ safety concerns.”

VoiceTU said it wants to implement active shooter drills. In June 2017, Temple Police conducted an active shooter drill on the Main and Health Sciences campuses.

Voice TU presidential candidate Tyler Lum said recent school shootings have affected his feelings of safety in the classroom.

“As a large university within Philadelphia, there is a risk that there is going to be a mass shooter,” he added. “Some safety things we can implement are basic, non-partisan things, like putting locks on doors.”

RESOURCES IgniteTU wants to create additional resources for transfer students by improving orientation and mentorship programs. The team also wants to provide resources for students struggling with substance use disorders by accelerating the implementation of Parliament’s current on-campus recovery housing initiative.

The campaign aims to help students experiencing food or housing insecurity by creating a “Swipe Out Hunger” program that gives students extra meal swipes.

On its platform, IgniteTU also promises to advocate for more funding and walk-in hours for Tuttleman Counseling Services. The ticket wants to create a Mental Wellness Week, and add mental health discussions to new student orientation.

“I definitely think that creating a conversation with incoming students is really important, especially given the tragedies we experienced this year,” said Trent Reardon, the IgniteTU vice presidential candidate of services. “Destigmatizing the conversation, teaching students the resources they can utilize, things like that are really important.”

UniteTU wants to improve mental and physical health on campus by developing a suicide prevention training program, adding talks about mental health to orientation and improving appointment times at Student Health Services.

The team also wants to prevent overdose deaths by promoting Narcan training for students and faculty. In December 2017, Parliament passed a binding resolution that called on the Wellness Resource Center to teach students to administer Narcan.

The ticket aims to advocate for LGBTQ students by creating more gender-neutral restrooms and housing around campus. The university added gender-neutral housing in Fall 2017.

UniteTU promises to advertise the Cherry Pantry and host fundraisers for students experiencing food insecurity if elected.

VoiceTU said it wants to create childcare options on or near campus, allow students to include their preferred names on their OWLcards and promote affordable housing oncampus.

VoiceTU said it will help students with addiction, mental illness and other “crises” by expanding oncampus resources and providing more safe spaces. It will also advocate for a crisis center to aid these students.

“We as the student government should have the power to improve the lives of students mentally and physically,” Bridget Warlea, vice presidential candidate of external

affairs said.

SUSTAINABILITY IgniteTU wants to make dining halls plastic-free by 2020 and speed up Temple’s promise to be carbon neutral by 2050. The team also wants to get students and faculty involved by creating monthly block clean-ups and installing a compost facility for use by students and community residents.

UniteTU has no sustainability efforts on its platform.

VoiceTU wants to evaluate recycling options on campus and advocate for more LEED-certified buildings, which is already a university policy for all new construction projects.

STADIUM All three teams oppose the university’s current stadium proposal and said they will advocate against it.

During Thursday’s debate, Lum of VoiceTU said he is “hardcore anti-stadium” until the university addresses the North Philadelphia community’s concerns.

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS

VoiceTU TEAM • • •

PLATFORM •

•

BOARD OF TRUSTEES The teams disagreed on how to best advocate for student needs to the Board.

IgniteTU wants to create a “student liaison” position unaffiliated with TSG — in addition to the student body president’s existing role as liaison — to advocate for the interests of the student body at Board meetings. This student would not receive a vote.

UniteTU said it feels a voting seat is not necessary at the first debate, and would advocate for grassroots activism by the student body.

“One vote will not make a huge difference to these individuals on the Board of Trustees,” said Danny Borine, UniteTU’s presidential candidate. “By bringing up the entire student body, that is how you can get the power. The voice of everybody is where the student lies, not just with one voting seat.”

VoiceTU wants to maintain TSG’s current seat on the Board for the student body president, but the campaign hopes to turn it into a voting seat.

•

TSG REFORM IgniteTU wants to eliminate General Assembly meetings in favor of non-mandatory town halls and speakers. The team also wants to reform the current impeachment system and give Parliament a budget so the body has more autonomy.

“The issue with the current administration is miscommunication,” said Cameron Kaczor, vice presidential candidate of external affairs for IgniteTU. “IgniteTU will emphasize communication to minimize conflict. We will try everything within our power to create a cohesive, effective legislative and executive branch.”

UniteTU wants to limit disruption among members of TSG. “I believe that infighting is pointless,” said Adrienne Hines, the UniteTU vice presidential candidate of external affairs. “We need to have a very united group of TSG officials and we need to have transparency.”

VoiceTU said it wants to make TSG and Parliament more accessible to the student body by improving communication and allowing ideas to be presented at General Assembly meetings.

The next debate will be held on April 2. Students can vote on April 4 and 5, and the winning ticket will be announced on April 6. alyssa.biederman@temple.edu @BiedermanAlyssa

Unite students and the North Philadelphia community by pushing for a voting seat on the Board of Trustees, raising awareness of available resources for LGBTQIA+ and transfer students and survivors of sexual assault or misconduct Make Temple more sustainable, allocate space for students in crisis situations, expand professional development services, reform TSG’s Ethics Board and establish a TSG communications team Advocate for students by promoting mental health services, creating affordable housing and implementing active shooter drills

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS

UniteTU TEAM • • •

President: Danny Borine (center), junior political science and criminal justice major Vice President of Services: Venise Salcedo (left), junior public health major Vice President of External Affairs: Adrienne Hines (right), junior political science major

PLATFORM •

CONTINUING PROGRAMS All three teams said they would continue community forums, the Peer-Mentorship Program and Sexual Assault Prevention Week put in place by the current TSG administration.

President: Tyler Lum (center), sophomore political science major and TSG’s director of Government Affairs.

Vice President of Services: Almas Ayaz (left), junior supply chain management major and TSG’s director of Campus Life and Diversity Vice President of External Affairs: Bridget Warlea (right), junior legal studies major and speaker of Parliament

•

•

Support students by advocating for ADA regulations in older facilities, providing scholarships for students who are refugees, making college more affordable for all students and promoting scholarships for students with unpaid internships Improve resources for students struggling with mental and physical illness, survivors of sexual assault or misconduct, students with substance use disorders, students who identify as LGBTQIA+ and students facing housing or food insecurity Be accountable by improving the university’s relationship with the North Philadelphia community and expand existing community resources

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS

IgniteTU TEAM • • •

President: Gadi Zimmerman (right), junior financial planning major, president of Challah for Hunger Vice President of Services: Trent Reardon (left), junior public health major and TSG’s promotions manager Vice President of External Affairs: Cameron Kaczor (center), sophomore psychology major and TSG’s secretary

PLATFORM • •

•

Enhance campus safety, resources for students with mental illness and substance use disorders and the university’s sustainability efforts Amplify student voices about mental illness and food and housing insecurity, and community voices by continuing monthly forums and advocating for “transparency” from the administration in discussions about the proposed on-campus stadium Empower student organizations by reforming weekly General Assembly meetings and Parliament by providing the body a budget and eliminating the Speaker of Parliament position

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 7

EVENTS

Philly march rallies youth ‘ready to make change’ On Saturday, thousands of people took to the streets for the city’s March For Our Lives.

BY ERIN BLEWETT & EMMA PADNER For The Temple News

S

tanding before thousands of people on Christopher Columbus Boulevard on Saturday, sophomore political science major Benjamin Aitoumeziane spoke about the importance of gun control.

“My message to the Baby Boomer legislators who think more guns is the solution: Start packing,” said Aitoumeziane, who is the director of external affairs for Temple College Democrats, in his speech. “For all of the young people who are ready to make change: Run for office, protest, make noise, get arrested and, most importantly, vote.”

Protesters met at the corner of 5th and Market streets on Saturday to participate in March For Our Lives Philadelphia, one of more than 800 marches held across the globe to protest gun violence and call for gun control.

These marches were spurred by the advocacy of students who survived the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Doug-

MARCH | PAGE 11

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Princess Rahman, 18, leads march attendees in a chant prior to the start of Philadelphia’s March For Our Lives at 5th and Market streets on Saturday morning.

PEOPLE YOU SHOULD KNOW

PEOPLE YOU SHOULD KNOW

‘Donnie Strong’: Students raise funds for classmate A first-year master’s of speechlanguage-hearing student was recently diagnosed with cancer.

BY MICHAELA ALTHOUSE For The Temple News

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Jimmy Stinsman, a sophomore sport and recreation management major and assistant baseball coach at St. Joseph’s Preparatory School, pitches during batting practice in the Kelly Field House on Girard Avenue near 17th Street.

Student ‘couldn’t let go’ of dream to coach baseball Sophomore sport and recreation management major Jimmy Stinsman is an assistant baseball coach at St. Joe’s Prep.

BY EVAN EASTERLING Sports Editor

For the first three years of his career at Roman Catholic High School at Broad and Vine streets, baseball tryouts ended the same way for Jimmy Stinsman: He got cut and missed the team.

Each time this happened, the sophomore sport and recreation management major wanted to stay involved as team manager, keeping statistics. During his senior year of high school in 2016, Stinsman decided not to try out and instead dedicated himself to the managerial role.

“After my first year, I knew that regardless of my role, even though I wasn’t playing, the team and everything took full appreciation of

me and wanted me to be around,” Stinsman said.

“And it was something that I knew I had to do, and I couldn’t let go.”

Stinsman’s work as a manager established his relationship with former Roman Catholic coach Anthony Valucci, who was hired in August 2017 to coach at St. Joseph’s Preparatory School on Girard Avenue near 17th Street.

Shortly after taking over the baseball program at St. Joseph’s Prep, Valucci added Stinsman to his varsity staff as an assistant coach. It’s the first step toward Stinsman’s dream of becoming a head baseball coach.

“It was something that I said to myself I always dreamed of and I couldn’t turn it down,” Stinsman said.

Valucci, 34, began coaching at age 20 and has hired several young coaches during his career. Some of them simply wanted to get to the

BASEBALL | PAGE 9

Donnie Thomas has had a lifelong passion for helping people.

As a child, he watched his aunt have a stroke and was tasked with helping her regain her ability to speak.

It’s something the first-year master’s of speech-language-hearing student has held on to today, especially while helping students as a resident coordinator with University Housing and Residential Life.

Thomas worked as a resident assistant in Johnson Hall and 1940 Residence Hall. At Morgan Hall, he was a resident coordinator, a graduate position which assists in the management of the residential life program.

Now, Thomas is learning to receive assistance himself. In January, Thomas, 22, was diagnosed with classical Hodgkin’s nodular sclerosis, a type of lymphoma that involves abnormally large cells and tends to start at the lymph nodes.

His aunt began a Facebook fundraiser called Hope for Donnie earlier this month to pay for the medical costs of treatment. Just two weeks after its creation, Temple students, staff, family members and friends already raised more than $8,800 out of the $10,000 goal, as of Monday.

The page is filled with sentiments like “Donnie Strong” and “Stay strong, Donnie! Your friends at Temple are thinking of you!”

“Sicknesses really are a group effort,” said Thomas, who received his undergraduate degree in speech-language-hearing from Temple in 2017.

“You can’t get through them alone.”

Thomas received his official diagnosis on Jan. 15. Before this, he

suffered from frequent illnesses, all with inconsistent symptoms until one morning he could barely breathe and was rushed to the hospital.

Thomas decided to take a leave of absence from Temple and moved home to the Poconos to live with his mother, JoAnne Picarello, as he undergoes rounds of chemotherapy once every two weeks.

He said, at first, his doctors were worried about his lack of response to treatment and the abnormally large tumor in his chest, which forced him to spend a few weeks moving back and forth between his house and the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Northeast Philadelphia. Now, he is stabilized and has adopted a consistent treatment routine.

As medical costs began to mount, Picarello’s sister, Caroline Wilson, approached her to ask if she could start a fundraiser on Facebook to help pay for the treatment.

“Caroline said to me, ‘You do so much for everybody, please let us be able to help you,’” said Picarello, who has done charity work for cancer treatment research in the past.

Some donations came from hometown community members returning the favor of his mother’s frequent charity work, friends, co-workers and even people the family had never met.

One of the largest contributions came from Thomas’s fellow speechlanguage-hearing students and professors at Temple. A friend of Thomas’s and a first year master’s of speech-language-hearing student, Sonali Shah, raised $1,000 in contributions from other students in the program.

“Donnie is a really important member of our class,” Shah said. “He was sort of everyone’s favorite person.

He really left a big hole in the program after leaving, and all of us just miss

CHARITY | PAGE 9

GENDER | PAGE 8

FILM | PAGE 8

LIVE IN PHILLY | PAGE 10

BIKING | PAGE 12

Professors and administrators are finding ways to be more inclusive of students’ gender identities and personal pronouns.

A 2001 master’s of film and media arts alumna is now the executive director of ARRAY Alliance, which is director Ava DuVernay’s production company.

The National Constitution Center hosted Scout Day, featuring activities for all ages and levels of boy scouts on Saturday.

A therapeutic recreation professor created a program that helps people with mental health issues access and use the city’s bike share program.

FEATURES TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 8 ON CAMPUS

Faculty ‘unlearning’ the gender binary system Professors and administrators are finding ways to ask students about their personal pronouns.

BY CLAIRE WOLTERS For The Temple News

At the beginning of each semester, political science professor Heath Fogg Davis asks his students to write down their personal pronouns on note cards so he doesn’t misgender anyone.

Misgendering is the act of blatantly or unintentionally referring to someone by incorrect gender pronouns.

Davis, a transgender man, took up this approach this year to promote gender diversity and inclusivity in the classroom. He puts a lot of thought into the way he asks students about their gender identities.

Davis has researched and written extensively on the role of gender identity in society. From his studies and his own experience, he chose to have his students write down their pronouns rather than say them aloud to avoid singling out someone who may be genderqueer, or outing someone who may not be ready to share their pronouns with the class.

Along with Davis, professors and administrators are finding ways to be more inclusive and thoughtful of students’ gender identities.

“We’ll see how it works,” Davis said. “I want to see what the students’ feedback is, but I think that it can be helpful if everybody does it. Then it becomes kind of a universal design, and people don’t feel singled out.”

The phrase “universal design” refers to the elimination of unnecessary references to gender in society. In his 2017 book “Beyond Trans: Does Gender Matter?” Davis discusses how minimizing public references to gender can help create a more equitable society.

“My argument in the book is not that we try to live beyond gender, but [to minimize] the formal use of gender and gender policies because of the ways it infringes on people’s individual autonomy,” Davis said. “In an ideal world, I wish that we all used a gender-

neutral pronoun.”

The pronouns they/them are considered all-inclusive or gender-neutral pronouns, meaning that they can apply to people of any gender.

Charlie Catacalos, a sophomore anthropology major and the treasurer of Queer People of Color, has had professors ask students to say their pronouns aloud.

Catacolos, whose personal pronouns are they/them, said they had mixed feelings about this approach because, while this was effective in preventing misgendering, it singled them out.

“I’ve also had professors ask [students] to write down their names and pronouns,” Catacalos said. “I liked that because you don’t have to just say it in front of the whole class, but the professor will know, and they can even subtly correct people.”

In a greater effort to promote gender inclusivity on campus, the Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity, Advocacy and Leadership suggests that students and faculty have a line of their email signatures with their personal pronouns to discourage misgendering.

Nu’Rodney Prad, the director of student engagement at IDEAL, said discussion of gender pronoun usage started in IDEAL’s Safe Zone training. Created in 2008, Safe Zone is a five-hour training program that educates participants on issues impacting the LGBTQIA community and methods of advocacy. The training can be taken as a single five-hour program or split into multiple sessions and is open to students, faculty and staff.

In 2012, information on pronoun usage was incorporated into the training.

“We want folks to be educated and to understand the meaning behind it,” Prad said. “The binary system of gender and sex has been just socialized into our society. It’s the fabric of how we think. It’s how we write our papers. [Safe Zone is] kind of like unlearning all this stuff we’ve learned about the binary system.”

IDEAL provides training on how to verbally ask people for their pronouns. When a

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Nu’Rodney Prad, the director of student engagement for the Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity, Advocacy and Leadership holds a variety of pronoun identification buttons in his office on Monday.

people introduce themselves, Prad suggests they first share their own pronouns to make the other person feel welcome to say their pronouns as well.

He added that if a person feels uncomfortable asking for or telling their own pronouns, they should use they/them pronouns to refer to another person rather than assuming and risking misgendering them.

Some students have also made an effort to be more inclusive. The websites of IgniteTU and UniteTU, two of the three tickets running in the 2018-19 Temple Student Government election, include team members’ personal pronouns.

Though Prad identifies with the pronouns he, him and his, he is not opposed to using gender-neutral language to refer to himself.

Using inclusive language and correct pronouns, Prad said, is an issue of identity

and respect.

“You don’t know necessarily what trauma can be triggered when someone is mispronounced or misgendered,” Prad said. “It could create different moments of disdain to where they have been picked on as a child, to maybe how they had been disowned by their family, to how they repetitively have to explain over and over again what it means.”

So far, Prad said several departments at Temple have undergone Safe Zone training.

He added that he’s been impressed by the number of questions he has received from departments asking for more suggestions to promote inclusivity.

“We can always do more,” Prad said. “I think we are on the verge of being transformative.” claire.wolters@temple.edu

PEOPLE YOU SHOULD KNOW

Producing films by ‘those who go unnoticed’ in the industry Maori Karmael Holmes, the founder of the BlackStar Film Festival, is now the executive director of ARRAY Alliance.

BY VERONICA THOMAS For The Temple News

In the midst of the #MeToo movement, which focuses on sexual assault awareness and gender parity in Hollywood, Maori Karmael Holmes wants to “amplify the voices of Black and brown filmmakers” for a more progressive industry.

“Women filmmakers and filmmakers of color are not the gatekeepers of this industry,” said Holmes, a 2001 master’s of film and media arts alumna. “So I think oftentimes their work is overlooked or misunderstood or they’re being asked to conform to some kind of stereotypical storytelling style.”

Holmes founded the annual BlackStar

COURTESY / ADACHI PIMENTEL Maori Karmael Holmes, a 2001 master’s of film and media arts alumna, is the executive director of ARRAY Alliance, which is focused on promoting Black artists’ films.

features@temple-news.com

Film Festival, a Philadelphia-based festival for global independent films, in 2012. The festival focuses on films made by Black artists from around the world about the African diaspora and indigenous communities, according to its website.

In February, Holmes began working as the executive director of ARRAY Alliance, which was founded by film director Ava DuVernay in 2010. ARRAY is an independent film distributor and resource collective for independent films made by women and people of color from underrepresented communities.

DuVernay has directed the award-winning films “13th” and “Selma.”

With the support from donors and fundraising directed by Holmes, ARRAY strives to highlight independent and underground filmmakers to provide varied voices, stories and images in cinema.

Holmes said she first created BlackStar as a “curatorial project” for people who normally wouldn’t have their work recognized at a film festival. “[It’s] for those who go unnoticed or ignored by the mainstream film industry,” Holmes said. “You go to Temple, you get an MFA, you make a film. The next trajectory is to take it to festival, and oftentimes it only lives in a festival circuit and then it goes away and disappears.”

“In a local context, BlackStar is important to Philadelphia so that people in Philly get an opportunity to see these films,” Holmes added.

Holmes, a California native, came to Philadelphia after studying history at American University in Washington, D.C. She said she was drawn to Temple for its success in producing documentary filmmakers and for the fellowship she was offered.

But even before college, Holmes discovered her interest in film as a middle schooler while watching documentaries on HBO and VH1.

“There was a part of me that really

wanted to make [documentaries] initially,” Holmes said. “There was always some kind of storytelling, arranging my Barbies, making up stories, writing fictionalized accounts.

I was always creating worlds in some way.”

Holmes has created several short films and documentaries, including her 2005 documentary “Scene Not Heard: Women in Philadelphia Hip Hop,” which recounts the influential women that framed the hip-hop genre in Philadelphia.

After finishing at Temple, Holmes was offered a job at the Institute of Contemporary Art in University City, where she worked as the director of academic and public partnerships. She said this job provided her with additional knowledge about creating and curating events in gallery and exhibition spaces.

“I was able to conceive a public program, identify audiences,” Holmes said. “I was [also] responsible for visitor experience and how one feels greeted. ... So it really was a beautiful position drawing on all the experience that I had.”

After working with producer and digital media maker Sara Zia Ebrahimi on “KINOWATT,” a series of film screenings about social change in 2011, Holmes wanted to work on a new collaborative film project.

This sparked her idea for BlackStar.

“I was interested in pursuing an independent idea that was focused on...African films, and then I started looking for titles that expanded to the African diaspora,” Holmes said. “Within a month or so, I had a whole festival on my hands.”

At first, Holmes wanted the project to be a one-day screening event, but soon realized that so many films interested her that she decided to include them all in a four-day festival.

“When I realized that I had 40 films that I was interested in that had not screened in Philadelphia...it felt like there was a need to launch this festival,” Holmes said. “And because it was so successful, we continued to

do it.”

This year, the festival will be held Aug. 2 through 5 at World Cafe Live, ICA and the Pearlstein Gallery at Drexel University.

Denise Beek, a 2007 communications and mass media alumna, is BlackStar’s previous managing director and its current communications director. Beek met Holmes when she was her adjunct instructor at Temple.

Beek said Holmes brought a higher level of selectiveness in the process for choosing films for the festival.

“I think what Maori and the rest of the screening committee look for is an aesthetic excellence and production quality,” Beek said. “Does it look like there is intention behind the way the film was shot?”

“Is it a story that we feel portrays the Black experience?” she added. “Will it drive dialogue or educate people? Those are the kinds of questions we ask.”

Holmes moved back to California in early February to work with ARRAY Alliance, where she will organize events and fundraisers for the benefit of up-and-coming filmmakers.

“We know that we’re interested in supporting the communities that support these filmmakers and figuring out how to focus on crew members and craftspeople of the industry,” Holmes said. “All of this is important because of the cultural impact of whose stories we get to tell.”

Holmes said she would tell future filmmakers and producers to “follow your own North Star.”

“Figure out your own terms of success not thinking that there is a map that someone else can set for you,” Holmes said. “You should definitely collaborate with people, learn from other people’s journeys, but not to measure your success against someone else’s.” veronica.elizabeth.thomas@temple.edu

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

FEATURES TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 ART own apartment permanently earlier this year. This was partly because she wasn’t allowed to show her sculptures in the apartment building’s space, as it’s a hazard to transport and display them.

“It’s a lot of work schlepping, taking down everything and putting everything back,” Bloom said.

“I thought, ‘Let me see if I can get everybody up here.’”

Every wall is covered in her print, acrylic and oil works. Since then, her gallery has become a fulltime gig, and many of her sculptures and paintings are available for purchase.

Although retired, she finds time to show her gallery to all those who inquire to see her work, any day of the week, as long as she’s home.

Bloom has lived in the Philadelphia area for the majority of her life, only leaving her home in Dresher, Pennsylvania, for Boca Raton, Florida, with her late second husband, Richard Marcus, in 2009. She moved back to Philadelphia in 2014.

Moving the gallery to Bloom’s apartment has made way for some serious organizing and change in her life, she said. By playing the role of the artist, museum guide and curator, Bloom must also make sure to label, organize and redo her guide every time something sells or she creates something new.

In the apartment, all of the artwork has its place, ordered by theme, importance and other qualifiers — like how the light hits the canvas.

“The light is so important,”

PAGE 9

Bloom said. “The sky is my favorite part of nature. I get to see the sunrise [out] of this window every morning which is glorious. The way the light hits everything affects it dramatically.”

Bloom said the functionality of a one-bedroom apartment that doubles as a gallery is questionable, but it’s worth it to her because most of her work is about her own personal narrative.

“Sometimes it’s very tiring... [with] running around, cleaning up, doing the dishes,” Bloom added. “But [the visitor’s] response is so wonderful, and that’s thrilling for me. I get tired, it’s tiring, but it’s very happy.”

While Bloom has received fewer inquiries to see her work since opening up her home in December, she has a steady stream of five to 10 visitors per week.

Bloom didn’t start her formal art education until later in life.

After her two sons were born, she started going to painting classes in the evening and quickly saw art as a professional career option. She started studying at Tyler School of Art in 1968.

Bloom has only ever worked in the art world. For 25 years, she worked on her craft and sold books about oriental rugs.

After graduating, she spent eight years at the Barnes Foundation, an art museum then located in Merion, Pennsylvania, taking a seminar and eventually presenting a lecture on oriental rugs.

Rina Malerman, a 1953 printing, sculpture and painting alumna, met Bloom while they were both studying at the Barnes Foundation.

“Myrna was very intense, very focused, a wonderful artist and a

good student,” she said.

Although the seminar Malerman and Bloom took was not collaborative, the two worked closely outside classes.

“When we visited alone, together, we would discuss the paintings and talk about what we learned,” Malerman said.

Rina and her husband, Newt Malerman, a 1953 sculpture alumnus, continue to support Bloom.

Newt Malerman designed Bloom’s website and the couple bought one of Bloom’s sculptures.

Bloom pops up in her own work as much as the little pieces of her life. A massive, circular canvas hangs above her bed of an inversely colored, pixelated portrait of a younger, red-headed Bloom.

A favorite painting among Bloom’s visitors, “The East-West Room,” hangs next to her television. The painting depicts Bloom’s well-decorated living room in her former home in Dresher. Out of all her paintings, she said she most associates herself with that one.

“It took me over 600 hours to paint, so I better love it,” Bloom said. “It was two and a half years of steady work because of the details in the rug.”

The only time she really strayed from the art world was when she needed to take care of her late second husband, Marcus.

“There were years where I couldn’t do art,” Bloom said. “My husband got dementia, which took up a lot of time. But I’m back and I’m happy.

“I hope I can do this for a while, as long as my health holds up,” she added.

“DO PROFESSORS ASK FOR YOUR PERSONAL PRONOUNS?”

MAYA BRANCH

Freshman Human development and community engagement

[Writing down pronouns] would be helpful because some people might not be comfortable like outing themselves as maybe like trans[gender] in front of a whole classroom, but it is definitely something that’s important in validating someone’s identity. So I think more professors should definitely do it to make sure it’s a safe space for everyone.

JARED MAHONEY Sophomore History

claire.brennan@temple.edu

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 CHARITY him.”

After gathering the money on their own, the group later added it to the larger Facebook fundraiser.

“It’s just a great feeling to know that everyone is so supportive, especially because they still reach out to me to this day to say that they miss me and it’s not the same without me,” Thomas said.

Thomas spent most of his time outside of school working as a resident coordinator, but he said he’s lucky to have a job he’s so passionate about.

He said he first got involved in “res life” during his freshman year, and since then it’s remained a large part of his Temple experience. Even off the clock, Thomas said he was very involved with the students in his building and fellow staff, who have always served as a support system for him. They’d often hang out and go out to dinner together, he said.

Picarello said she loved picking Thomas up at his residence hall and hearing about how much her son loved the school and his community of fellow students, teachers and even administrators.

Thomas hopes to return to

My English teacher...would ask for pronouns for everyone just to make sure everyone was comfortable. … It’s like a small thing that helps people who are struggling with that. … It’s not like too much of a change [for the class.]

MEGAN MILFORD Sophomore Secondary education

COURTESY / DONNIE THOMAS Donnie Thomas, a first-year master’s of speech-language-hearing student, was diagnosed with classical Hodgkin’s nodular sclerosis in January. Several people from Temple helped raise funds for him.

Temple next semester. After he receives his master’s degree, he plans to work with adults who lost their ability to speak as well as children who struggle with communication and speech.

In the meantime, both Thomas and Picarello said they feel truly grateful for the emotional support and the knowledge that they have

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 BASEBALL varsity level as quickly as they could, he said.

“Jimmy is different,” Valucci said. “He wants to learn everything. That’s how I was when I was young. ... I saw a lot of me in him.

So I felt like it was great to give him the opportunity.”

Valucci’s first coaching position was for a team of 17-year-olds in Delaware County in the Babe Ruth League, a nonprofit that sponsors more than 60,000 teams internationally. Because he was so close in age to the players, he had to ensure they respected him as a coach.

Stinsman is experiencing the same dynamic this year. His age, however, makes players more comfortable approaching him, Valucci said.

St. Joseph’s Prep senior third baseman and outfielder Luke Donaphon said Stins-

a whole community behind them.

“I know that if I didn’t have the strong support like I do, I wouldn’t be doing as well as I am today,” Thomas said. michaela.althouse@temple.edu @michaela_kla

man knows what it takes to succeed in the Philadelphia Catholic League because of his experience as a high school manager.

“I would like to say I know what it takes, but I definitely don’t,” Donaphon said. “So it’s good to have him around to teach us the ways.”

Stinsman tried to coach last year at his alma mater, but he needed to be at least 21 years old to be employed at Roman Catholic.

Instead, Valucci helped him earn a job as an umpire.

He umpired mostly at the freshman and junior varsity levels before he worked as the home-plate umpire at a game at Lansdale Catholic High School in Montgomery County. “[Umpiring is] definitely a different picture,” Stinsman said. “You still know what’s basically going through these kids’ minds, and you see them every day going out there trying their best. But [it] also opens up to you

My one professor did it for [my Gender in America class], so obviously it was like important for the subject material of the class. … You said your name, your preferred pronoun. ... Those were the professors that I think had more of a connection with the class and weren’t just there...to teach the course material.

sides that you never really imagined, where now umpiring, you’re the one who has to make the decisions.”

Umpiring was a way to meet new people and stay involved with baseball, Stinsman said. But his lifelong goal is to coach.

Jesse James Murphy — who grew up with Stinsman in Philadelphia’s Roxborough neighborhood and played for Roman Catholic — noticed Stinsman had an advanced knowledge of baseball during their first two years of high school.

The two played American Legion summer baseball for the Roxborough Bandits.

Stinsman could tell where a batter was more likely to hit the ball based off his swing path alone, Murphy said.

“He knows the game really well, and he just loves just being around it,” said Murphy, who is a sophomore infielder at Cabrini University, a Division III team.

At St. Joseph’s Prep, Stinsman does ev-

erything from hitting fly balls to outfielders, smacking ground balls to infielders and throwing batting practice. He also traveled with the team for its trip to the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex in Orlando, Florida, to practice and play scrimmages from March 15-19.

Stinsman wants to learn about the details of running a program, like budgeting, scheduling games and conducting practices, Valucci said. He’ll have to do all of those tasks if he becomes a head coach one day.

“I definitely think this experience is something that I’m obviously trying to get the most of and I’m trying to learn a lot, and I feel as if so far, I definitely learned a lot,” Stinsman said. “I’m thankful for the situation that I’m in and the opportunity that Anthony has given me.” evan.easterling@temple.edu @Evan_Easterling

features@temple-news.com

FEATURES PAGE 10

TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

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JOCELYN BURNS / THE TEMPLE NEWS

Boy Scouts explore Constitution Center The National Constitution Center on Arch Street near 5th hosted Boy Scout and Cub Scout Day for all ages and levels of scouts on Saturday. The scouts participated in several activities, presentations and a self-guided museum exploration to gain their “Citizenship in the Nation” badge. Some of the programming also focused on what it would be like to be the United States president.

Bucks County Boy Scout Ethan Harding, 12, expressed his excitement about the new badge.

“I’ll get three merit patches if I complete all of today’s activities,” Harding said.

Scouts are invited to this day once a year, one Saturday in March for Boy Scouts. For Girl Scouts, there is a separate Saturday event, which was held on March 10. Troops from New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania were in attendance.

The scouts were eager to explore the Constitution Center and gain a new badge. Samuel Calderon, 10, said playing an American trivia game was his favorite part of the day.

For brothers Jonas and Mason McDevitt from Malvern, Pennsylvania, the day was a chance for them to think about what they would do if they were president.

“If I was president I would make it so kids wouldn’t have to do any homework and all kids would have debit cards,” said Jonas McDevitt, 10.

features@temple-news.com

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

FEATURES TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 11

COLLEEN CLAGGETT / THE TEMPLE NEWS A March For Our Lives attendee holds up her sign calling out President Donald Trump as she walks on Christopher Columbus Boulevard on Saturday.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 MARCH las High School in Parkland, Florida on Feb. 14 that left 17 dead. Students from the school organized the national march in Washington, D.C, which drew hundreds of thousands of people.

Attendees marched through Old City, stopping near South Street and Columbus Boulevard for a rally with speakers including Sen. Bob Casey and Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro.

Student organizers of the Philadelphia march, like 16-year-old Ethan Block, a sophomore at Hopewell Valley Central High School in Pennington, New Jersey, also spoke.

“What we’re doing here today is not something that everybody will forget about in a week,” Block said during his speech. “This is not something that flies under the radar and goes unnoticed. What we’re doing here today will go down in history.”

Hunter-Willow Jones, an incoming freshman, said she felt emboldened by the fact that high school students are spearheading the movement against gun violence.

“It’s because it is completely student-run,” Jones said. “That’s what makes this protest different.”

For Janae Whaley, a freshman education major, the march was an inspiring moment.

“As an education major, this is a big deal to me,” Whaley said. “It’s just really empowering to be a part of a young generation rising up against what’s going on.”

That sentiment was echoed by countless attendees at the march and rally.

A group of girls who attend John

COLLEEN CLAGGETT / THE TEMPLE NEWS March For Our Lives attendees hold up their signs during the march on Saturday morning in Old City.

W. Hallahan Catholic Girls’ High School near Spring Garden marched because they are hopeful that their voices can make a difference.

“This is one of the only ways we can voice our opinions without any repercussions,” said 16-year-old DeOvionne Brown.

“We are the future,” said Brown’s classmate, Madeline Urbine. “It’s really empowering. We have the power to make a change.”

Speakers at the march emphasized the importance of gun reform legislation, voting presence and equal media coverage of all types of gun violence, not just school shootings.

Block called for “extensive reform” and said that supporters of the movement “will not settle for baby steps” toward stricter gun laws.

Shapiro said he supports the movement to end gun violence — whether it’s in schools or in Philadelphia neighborhoods.

“We gather here in a city where we saw 300-plus homicides on our streets last year,” Shapiro said during the rally.

“I have a very simple message today: It doesn’t have to be this way.”

Representatives from organizations like HeadCount, which works with musicians to promote democratic participation, encouraged participants to register to vote along the route and at the rally.

Many members of the audience were reduced to tears when the father of a Marjory Stoneman Douglas student and survivor, Mark Timpone, took the stage to share a part of his son’s experience at the school on Feb. 14.

“My son bumped into the shooter in the stairwell,” Timpone said. “[He] was busy reloading, and my son ran

back up the stairs and a teacher unlocked the classroom door for him and one other student. If there was one more round in that 30-round magazine, my son might have died that day.”

Prior to the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting, Timpone said he owned an AR-15 rifle, which he purchased from an unlicensed dealer at a Fort Lauderdale gun show. He purchased the gun legally, but it was not registered with law enforcement.

Timpone expressed his remorse to a silent crowd.

“Was it wrong?” he said. “Yes, and I own that.”

A few days after the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas, Timpone said he surrendered his rifle to authorities.

Several other speakers at the march, including 1996 Marjory Stoneman Douglas alumna Rebecca Salus, referenced a quote from the high school’s namesake about the significance of activism at the beginning of her speech.

Douglas, an American journalist, was an active advocate for issues like women’s suffrage until her death in 1998 at 108 years old.

“Be a nuisance where it counts,” the quote reads. “Do your part to inform and stimulate the public to join your action. Be depressed, discouraged, disappointed at failure and the disheartening effects of ignorance, greed, corruption and bad politics. But never give up.”

“Who could have known the meaning her words would hold for her namesake high school and for an entire generation of students?” Salus said. features@temple-news.com @TheTempleNews

MAGGIE LOESCH / THE TEMPLE NEWS A boy holds up a sign reading “AM I NEXT?” on top of a shooting target during the March For Our Lives in Philadelphia on Saturday.

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HAVE YOU CONVERTED TO JUDAISM? Then you may be entitled to a subsidy of 50% of tuition and fees for four courses in Judaic Studies.

For more information, please write: SKLAUSNE@UPENN.EDU or go to ALQIRQISANIFUND.COM

OLIVIA O’NEILL / THE TEMPLE NEWS March For Our Lives attendees make their way down Front Street from Market on Saturday morning.

features@temple-news.com

FEATURES TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 12 FACULTY

Program links mental health patients with biking A therapeutic recreation professor helped start a biking program for people receiving mental health treatment.

BY BRIANNA BAKER For The Temple News

Growing up in Topeka, Kansas, Gretchen Snethen associated bikes with freedom.

She used them to get around her hometown without having to rely on anyone else.

“I could bike on my own to my friend’s house,” Snethen said. “We were no longer confined to the house or requiring our parents to take us places.”

Now, the therapeutic recreation professor is working to bring that freedom to people who have mental illnesses.

In Summer 2016, Snethen pioneered ICAN:BIKE, a program that helps people with psychiatric disabilities and mental health issues in Philadelphia access and use the city’s bike share program, Indego.

Snethen is the assistant director of the Temple University Collaborative on Community Inclusion of Individuals With Psychiatric Disabilities. Funded by the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research, the collaborative develops and tests methods for promoting mental health patients’ community participation.

ICAN:BIKE developed as a spin-off of another one of Snethen’s projects for the Collaborative, I-CAN, or Independence through Community Access and Navigation.

The I-CAN intervention helped participants identify leisure and recreation activities and help them access community resources, from movie theaters to art classes, so they could independently participate.

In interviews for I-CAN, many people expressed interest in exercise or physical activity, Snethen said. When asked about barriers to accessing preferred activities and community resources, transportation to the activities was a common response.

Biking seemed like the perfect intersection of exercise and lack of transportation, Snethen said.

She added that the program was also

motivated by the proven link between improved mental health and exercise.

According to the American Psychological Association, exercise can help alleviate long-term depression. The Alzheimer’s Association also endorses physical activity as a potential way to reduce the risk of dementia.

Snethen and the collaborative’s recreational therapist, Brandon Snead, reached out to COMHAR, a Philadelphia-based mental health service agency, to ask if they could recruit participants by presenting the idea for ICAN:BIKE at the agency’s community meeting. After collecting a group of four participants, the pilot program began in July 2016.

Since then, there have been two groups — each have had eight to 10 participants.

Snead and Snethen first taught a series of classes on the basics of Indego use. Participants learned how to find Indego stations, sign up for membership, fit and use helmets and ride the bikes.

They then taught participants safety precautions and rules of the road, including how to use hand signals and ride over trolley tracks and cobblestones. Often, Snethen said, this entailed dispelling misconceptions participants had about urban biking.

“A lot of folks had these old wives’ tales, like you should bike against traffic so that people see you, or just bike the sidewalks, which is technically illegal in Philadelphia,” Snethen said.

After practicing in a parking lot on Main Campus, Snethen and Snead led one group ride around the city. All participants left with a six-month pass for Indego.

“We were just trying to figure out, like logistically, does this work?” Snethen said.

“What do people need in order to feel confident and successful?”

Instead of planning all the trips himself, Snead said he encourages the group members to map out their own routes based on destinations that interest them. During one ride, he said, they stopped at a library to sign participants up for library cards. On another, they got off their bikes to use the hammocks at Spruce Street Harbor Park.

The goal of the project was to have the

ICAN:BIKE participants ride along the Schuylkill River Trail in Fall 2017.

riders eventually be able to bike on their own.

“It’s a structured outing that we do, but we try to leave the consumers with as many opportunities to choose as possible, because they’re going to be making those choices without us very soon,” Snead said.

After receiving positive feedback from participants, Snethen and Snead led two larger sessions in the summer and fall last year. These rides also included COMHAR’s staff, who the collaborative trained to begin leading the program.

Following the third session in the fall, COMHAR took over management of ICAN:BIKE. The agency plans to start group rides again in the spring or summer.

Louis Walker, a 46-year-old Germantown resident who participated in last year’s summer session, had never ridden a bike prior to the program. Having signed up to get more exercise, he said the program also helped him make friends and has given him the confidence to use Indego on his own.

“I just really enjoy biking, and I want to help other people in the Germantown area bike and go out to new parts of the city,”

COURTESY / GRETCHEN SNETHEN

Walker said.

Though COMHAR is now in charge of the day-to-day operations of the program, the collaborative continues to work on ICAN:BIKE. Snethen said she and her coworkers are creating a manual to help mental health agencies in other cities implement a similar program. They are also working to secure grant funding to perform a larger analysis of the outcome data to determine whether the program actually improves mental health.

Snethen attributes the success of the program to how it defies expectations of traditional mental health group sessions, and it allows participants to identify with something other than their psychiatric disabilities.

“It’s no longer about, ‘I’m a person with mental illness,’” Snethen said. “It’s, ‘Oh, I’m a biker, just like everyone else.’ If all you’re talking about is your problems, then it’s hard to see people in that light where they’re competent and they’re confident and they’re successful.” brianna.nicole.baker@temple.edu

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T H E U N I V E RS I TY O F S C R A N TO N

ON CAMPUS

WalkTU event to kick off Sexual Assault Awareness Month

S U M M E R AT

SCRANTON HAVE A TOUGH COURSE COMING UP NEXT YEAR? OR A GENERAL EDUCATION REQUIREMENT YOU NEED TO FULFILL? We invite you to consider a summer course at The University of Scranton.

With the convenience of on-campus and online courses, at a reduced tuition rate, a summer course can help you get ahead.

2018 DATES: SUMMER I: 5/30-6/28, SUMMER II: 7/9-8/6 TUITION RATE: $597 per credit 47% OFF the regular tuition rate Of approximately 60 courses being offered this summer, about half are online.

Please note that students enrolled at another college or university will need approval from the home college for all courses to be taken at The University of Scranton.

For more information visit scranton.edu/summer features@temple-news.com

Students, staff and faculty will gather in O’Connor Plaza on Wednesday for WalkTU, the Wellness Resource Center’s second annual event to recognize Sexual Assault Awareness Month. Registration begins at 11:30 a.m. and the event will run from noon to 1:30 p.m. Participants can also visit resource tables and participate in a community arts project.

Later in the day, keynote speaker Chimi Boyd-Keyes, a consultant and trainer for sexual assault and domestic violence education programs, will conduct two educational workshops. Her first workshop will be held from 4 to 5 p.m. in Room 223 of the Student Center and address interpersonal violence. The second workshop will be held from 8 to 9:30 p.m. in Room 200 of the Student Center and focus on preventing sexual violence.

Participants can register for the event on WalkTU’s website.

-Ian Walker

ON CAMPUS

Veterans celebration marks National Vietnam War Veterans Day To recognize National Vietnam War Veterans Day, members of the university’s Veterans Task Force and Temple military service members will host “Veterans Honoring Veterans: All Heroes Tribute” on Thursday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. in Room 200C of the Student Center. The event, which is co-sponsored by the Military and Veteran Services Center and the Army ROTC Program, is a celebration honoring Temple alumni, staff and students who served in the U.S. Armed Forces during the Vietnam War. The program will include a Vietnam veterans tribute video and a presentation of Vietnam veteran lapel pins. Participants can register for the event on the “Veterans Honoring Veterans: All Heroes Tribute” Eventbrite page.

-Ian Walker temple-news.com @thetemplenews

SPORTS TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 13

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 PARKLAND Marjory Stoneman Douglas, allegedly killed 17 people and injured at least 15 more with an AR-15 rifle on Feb. 14.

Three of the 10 deadliest shootings in modern United States history, including the incident at the Florida high school, have occurred within the last five months.

On Saturday, people across the globe, including in Philadelphia, participated in March For Our Lives, a walk organized largely by students to call for stricter gun control.

Levine said he would’ve participated in the march if not for football practice.

“Anything that brings us together, and makes us stronger as one, I’m always with it,” Levine said.

Levine’s father, a Miami police officer, called him about 30 minutes after the Parkland shooting.

Levine’s high school was about a 35-minute drive from the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas. He said he immediately thought about his sister and cousins after he heard of the shooting.

“They could’ve came to my school and just did the same thing,” Levine said.

“So that really hurts when you think about it.”

Junior linebacker Sam Franklin also spoke with one of his parents on the day of the Parkland shooting.

Franklin said he called his mother when he heard the news to check on her and his cousins. He is a graduate of Citrus High School, which is about four hours from Marjory Stoneman Douglas.

“We’re a big community type of program,” Franklin said. “So if there’s anything that we can do in the community, that’s what we do.”

Levine said because he’s on the football team, he can use his platform to dis-

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 16 HOCKENBERRY new players about what the journey to professional baseball looks like. He said it is his favorite moment he has had as coach so far.

Hockenberry twice reached the Double-A level during his minor-league career. He had a 5.79 ERA in three games with the Reading Fightin’ Phils in 2016.

Hockenberry pitched in a majorleague spring training game last year against the New York Yankees and started the regular season in Reading. He ended his career with a 6.62 ERA in his final season playing at the Double-A and Class A levels.

After being released in July, Hockenberry returned to his home in Old City and began his normal winter routine of working at All-Star Baseball Academy in Broomall, Pennsylvania.

In late August, Hockenberry received a call from Phillies pitching coordinator Rafael Chaves as he drove to All-Star Baseball Academy asking him if he wanted to be a pitching coach. Hockenberry

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GYMNASTICS

Salim-Beasley wins conference Coach of the Year award

GENEVA HEFFERNAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS Redshirt-freshman quarterback Todd Centeio throws a pass during practice on Saturday at Chodoff Field. Centeio and other players from Florida are coordinating a fundraiser for Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

cuss issues that some communities can’t.

“We have that ability to be able to go encourage other people to join, and that’s what we want to make the fundraising for,” Levine said. “We have the voice to speak. So we might as well take advantage

and use it, so we can help our communities and whoever’s communities that we can help.”

was in shock. He pulled his Ford Focus off to the the side of the road to collect himself before he ultimately accepted the offer.

Hockenberry’s girlfriend Brianna Greco was relieved that he took the job.

“I don’t have to worry about him saying, ‘Hey, I got released,’ because that day was probably the worst,” Greco said. “He was a lot more confident going into this new year than he’s ever been. Even as a coach, you have to prove yourself, but in a sense, it’s a whole new ballgame.”

Hockenberry said he has had a great experience so far. In his first game as a coach, the Phillies’ rookies shutout Oakton Community College, an Illinois school with two campuses, in an exhibition game.

Early in his coaching career, Hockenberry has worked with players from community colleges, independent league teams and international squads who received invitations to spring training. He said he also has “been hanging out and doing every little thing they ask,” like unwrapping about 300 baseballs for pitchers to use.

Regardless of a player being a rookie or a veteran, Hockenberry expects that every player listens the same way. In his spring training speech, he told the players he understood that veterans might look down on him because he didn’t make it to the majors.

But Hockenberry encouraged them to learn from his perspective because he went through something he hopes they never have to experience.

“I can tell you right now, I’m good at what I do because I know how hard it is to get to the big leagues because I never got there,” he said.

As Hockenberry continues his spring training, he is looking forward to the Gulf Coast League opening competitive play in early June.

“I’m going to get to work with a lot of guys who will one day have the opportunity to play in the big leagues,” Hockenberry said. “People don’t understand what we go through trying to chase a dream that we’ve had since the first time we picked up a ball.”

thomas.ignudo@temple.edu @TomIgnudo

jonathan.michalski@temple.edu

The Owls’ season concluded with Saturday’s Eastern College Athletic Conference Division I Women’s Gymnastics Championship at The Palestra. The day of competition included a presentation of awards voted on by the conference’s coaches.

Umme Salim-Beasley won the 2018 Coach of the Year award for guiding the Owls to a record-breaking season.

Temple entered the ECAC championship on a streak of three meets with scores of 195 or better. The Owls had a historic weekend in March to start that stretch.

On March 9, the team scored 49.150 on the floor against Penn and the University of Maryland at McGonigle Hall to set a program record. The Owls also set a then-program record with a 195.800 team score.

They broke both their floor and team score marks just two days later with a 49.300 on the floor and a 196.05 team score.

In the final regular-season meet in Ohio on March 16, Temple scored 195 points or higher for the first time on the road.

Salim-Beasley became Temple’s coach in April 2015. In her first season, Temple’s season-high score was 192.525 at the 2016 ECAC championship. The Owls had 14 individual event scores of 9.8 or higher, an improvement from nine in the 2015 season.

Last season, Temple recorded its first team score of 194 or higher. The Owls had 36 individual scores of 9.8 or higher and beat the University of Pittsburgh for the first time since 1995. Alexa Phillip won the school’s first uneven bars title at the ECAC championship as a junior last year.

-Evan Easterling

FOOTBALL

Robby Anderson’s trial hearing postponed Former Temple wide receiver and current New York Jets wideout Robby Anderson’s pretrial hearing originally scheduled for Monday has been moved to Aug. 6, ESPN reported on Sunday.

The hearing stems from Anderson’s May 2017 arrest at Rolling Loud Festival, a music event in Miami. Anderson was charged with a felony of resisting arrest with violence plus account of obstruction of a police officer.

That incident was the first of Anderson’s two arrests within the past year in his home state of Florida. On Jan. 19, Anderson was arrested and received nine charges, including driving 105 miles per hour in a 45 mile-perhour zone and threatening to sexually assault the police officer’s wife.

Three of the nine charges, for all of which Anderson pled not guilty in late January, are felonies.

Anderson had 70 catches for 939 yards and seven receiving touchdowns in 2015 as a senior at Temple. The New York Jets signed him as an undrafted free agent before the 2016 season.

Anderson has played in all 32 of the Jets’ games in the past two seasons. He led the Jets with 941 yards receiving in 2017.

Jets CEO and chairman Christopher Johnson told reporters at the NFL league meetings last weekend that he is disappointed in Anderson, but he deserves his teammates’ support. He added that he wants Anderson on the team, but he wouldn’t prevent coaches from releasing him if they sought to do so.

-Evan Easterling

sports@temple-news.com @TTN_Sports

SPORTS TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 14 WOMEN’S TENNIS

Mauro switches doubles pairs in win against Lehigh Temple won the doubles point for the fifth time this season in Saturday’s 7-0 win.

BY ALEX McGINLEY For The Temple News

Doubles play has been a predictor of Temple’s success this season.

So far this season, Temple has a 4-1 record when it earns the doubles point. The Owls also tied in doubles during their 5-2 win against UConn on March 2 in Storrs, Connecticut.

Saturday’s road match against Lehigh University (7-6, 1-0 Patriot League) is the latest example of the trend. Freshman Oyku Boz and sophomore Kristina Titova beat Mountain Hawks sophomore Sibel Can and freshman Paula Gonzalez in the second flight.

Seniors Alina Abdurakhimova and Monet Stuckey-Willis beat senior Briana Maravich and junior Grace Lin in the third position.

Then, Temple (6-6, 2-1 American Athletic Conference) won all six singles matches to earn a 7-0 victory, its third shutout win of the season. The effort put the Owls back in the win column after they lost back-to-back matches to the University of Delaware and Penn last weekend.

After those losses, coach Steve Mauro said his team occasionally went for big shots too early in points and needed to improve its patience.

“They did a good job,” Mauro said after Saturday’s match. “We did a good job against a very good Lehigh team. To beat them 7-0 was a good win.”

Against Lehigh, Mauro changed one of the doubles combinations. Stuckey-Willis and Abdurakhimova paired up for the first time since the Owls’ 5-1 loss to George Washing-

ton University on Feb. 3.

Despite being teammates for four seasons, the two hadn’t played together before this spring.

Junior Alice Patch and senior Rimpledeep Kaur played in just their second match together in their 7-5 loss to Lehigh senior Christina Auyeung and freshman Casey Zhong.

They’ve played doubles together in backto-back matches. Their first match was a win against Penn freshman Jimena RodriguezBenito and junior OJ Singh on March 17.

In matches when the Owls lose the doubles point, they have a 1-5 record. In three of those matches, however, Temple didn’t field three doubles pairs because some players were either out sick or injured. “[They] feel comfortable playing with one another, especially doubles teams,” Mauro said. “When we were not healthy, we would put different doubles combinations, and now girls are able to practice with the same player.”

In matches when Temple only had two doubles pairs instead of three, like in its loss to George Washington, the team started at a disadvantage. The opponent would earn an automatic victory and need to win only one match to earn the doubles point, while Temple would have needed to win both.

All eight players on the Owls’ roster competed against Lehigh. Patch said the Owls are more of a complete team when they are fully healthy.

Temple has a 6-3 record in matches when it has at least six players.

“It’s been very important,” Patch said.

“Having a full team means that we have everyone starting. Everyone’s got full energy. I think it has really helped us.” alex.mcginley@temple.edu

GENEVA HEFFERNAN / FILE PHOTO Junior Alice Patch practices at Legacy Tennis Center in East Falls on Feb. 13.

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / FILE PHOTO Senior Rimpledeep Kaur practices on Feb. 23 at Legacy Tennis Center in East Falls.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 16 PICOZZI

GENEVA HEFFERNAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS Sophomore midfielder Maddie Gebert cradles the ball during the Owls’ 10-9 victory against the University of Denver on March 18.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 16 GEBERT finishing my shots this year,” Gebert said. “Because I know last year I got a couple opportunities to shoot in different games, but I only ended up finishing on one of them. I knew if I had opportunities this year I needed to be able to finish on them.”

Gebert prefers to take a running shot on her free-position opportunities, but a tally she called one of her most memorable goals this season came differently.

Gebert only took a single step off the eight-meter mark before she ripped a shot into the top corner to give the Owls a two-goal lead in their 10-9 win on March 18 against the University of Denver, then the No. 22 team in the Intercollegiate Women’s Lacrosse Coaches Association poll.

During her senior season at Owen J. Roberts High School in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, Gebert scored a game-winner in similar fashion in the District 1 semifinals against Bishop Shanahan High School.

“I hadn’t scored all game,” Gebert said. “So I just stood there and I shot.

I shot as hard as I could because I was just so frustrated, and it went in.”

On Saturday against Cincinnati,

sports@temple-news.com @TTN_Sports

Gebert scored a goal that surpassed the one she scored against Denver as the most memorable. She won the game for the Owls in double overtime with a drive from above the 12-meter arc.

Gebert carried the ball near the eight-meter mark, dodged her defender and put the ball in the net. Her teammates were hugging her within seconds of the goal.

“We actually planned for that one twice now,” Gebert said. “The plan was to let it rotate, let it rotate [and] hit me up top.”

Temple lost four of its top five goal scorers last season to graduation.

And senior attacker Nicole Barretta scored 13 goals in the first four games before also leaving the team for personal reasons.

Rosen said the team will depend on Gebert as one of its top offensive producers in the future. She leads Temple with three game-winning goals.

“I think Maddie’s play so far has helped steady our game, but I expect her to really be someone to be counted on to lead the team for years to come,” Rosen said. jay.neemeyer@temple.edu @neemeyer_j

his first in a 34-10 victory against East Carolina on Oct. 7. He made all six of his starts at left guard in place of redshirt-junior offensive lineman Jovahn Fair, who suffered an injury during Temple’s 29-21 win against UMass on Sept. 15.

After last season, the Owls also lost former offensive linemen Brian Carter and Adrian Sullivan, who combined for 15 starts in 2017, to graduation. Picozzi, Fair and redshirt-sophomore offensive lineman Matt Hennessy are expected to be the starters on the interior offensive line heading into the 2018 season.

“Those three inside are as good as anybody that are going to play in our conference,” offensive coordinator Dave Patenaude said. “They’re smart, they’re tough and they understand what to do. And they do a great job of communicating.”

Before Picozzi started games last season, he needed to increase his weight.

Wiesehan compared Piccozzi’s ability to put on weight to former offensive lineman Cole Boozer’s transition from tight end to offensive lineman. During his redshirt-junior season in 2016, Boozer added 30 pounds to his frame. He started every game at right tackle for the Owls last season.

When Picozzi graduated high school, he said he weighed about 260 pounds. He bumped

up his weight to 300 pounds before the start of the 2017 season. “[Picozzi] got here as this smaller guy, really athletic, really tough and now he’s put the weight on and now he’s a really powerful guy as well,” Hennessy said. “He’s the real deal.”

Picozzi and Hennessy each woke up at 5 a.m. prior to spring football practices last year to lift weights. The two also drank protein shakes and ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches after every practice.

“It was just food, food, food, food all last spring and working out and getting that extra lift in,” Picozzi said. “And I think it really paid off for both of us. We both really got our weight up.

And we’re both doing pretty good.”

As Picozzi prioritized adding weight, he also had to maintain his athleticism at 300 pounds.

Redshirt-senior defensive lineman Freddie Booth-Lloyd lines up against Picozzi in the trenches during practice. He’s taken notice of Picozzi’s improvements on the offensive line.

“Now that he has his weight, he’s a little more powerful,” Booth-Lloyd said. “All that together with his speed and his hand speed and everything, all his toolkit, he’s doing good. And I’m very impressed with what he has become today.” thomas.ignudo@temple.edu @TomIgnudo

GENEVA HEFFERNAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS Redshirt-sophomore offensive lineman Vincent Picozzi practices at Chodoff Field on March 17.

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

SPORTS TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 15

MEN’S TENNIS

Alumnus wins award from USTA for service Fazal Syed, who played for Temple from 1995-98, ran an interfaith tennis event in September.

BY JONATHAN MICHALSKI For The Temple News

COURTESY / FAZAL SYED Fazal Syed coaches a child at Level 7 Tennis Academy in Malvern, Pennsylvania.

Fazal Syed has always wanted to give back to the Philadelphia tennis community since he came to the United States from India in 1995.

He played for Temple from 199598 before starting a four-year professional career. Now, he is a coach at Level 7 Tennis Academy, a training facility for children between the ages of 3 and 18 that Syed founded in Malvern, Pennsylvania.

Syed was recognized at an awards ceremony this month for his desire to build character in children learning tennis by the United States Tennis Association’s Middle States section.

Syed received the 2017 Middle States Professional of the Year award, which is given to an individual who shows exceptional character and leadership within their community and tennis coaching, according to the USTA. “It’s just a prize, but it also inspires me to do more,” Syed said. “I want to serve better. I want to serve more people. ... My personal goal is to have 10 players better than me coming out of this region. That way, I will be able to someway repay my gift that I have gotten by coming to America.”

Syed left India at age 18 to play for Temple and pursue a professional ten-

nis career.

While at Temple, Syed played in the top singles and doubles spots and served as the team captain in 1997 and 1998. He earned All-Atlantic 10 Conference honors in the 1996, 1997 and 1998 seasons. The USTA ranked him as the No. 1 amateur during the 1997-98 season.

While on the professional tour, Syed represented India in the Davis Cup, an international tournament with more than 100 countries, from 19982001. In 2000, he won the grass court championship in India. Syed continued to occasionally play tennis after he stopped touring. He won the USTA Men’s 35 singles grass court championship in 2011 and claimed a doubles title in 2010.

After his career, Syed had a short stint in the banking business that lasted from 2005-08. At the same time, he was teaching tennis. When he returned from a backpacking trip he took to Turkey with a friend in 2010, he was encouraged to coach tennis full-time.

He decided to quit his job as real estate agent and began Level 7 Tennis in 2014.

Syed has worked on several projects and events with Delia Sescioreanu Mask, who played professionally from 2002-05 and is now a community development manager for USTA Middle States.

The two collaborated for a threehour tennis clinic and interfaith sports event called “Love ALL: Get on Court, Build Bridges, Connect Hearts” last September. More than 120 people at-

tended the event, which raised money to support youth programs at the Interfaith Center of Greater Philadelphia — which was founded in 2004 to unite people of different faiths.

“It is refreshing to see Fazal taking the lead bringing people together, and to see what a passion he has for using tennis as a positive influence,” Sescioreanu Mask wrote in an email.

Syed founded Level 7 Tennis on seven virtues: wisdom, contribution, courage, compassion, knowledge, courtesy, courage and industry. The programs aim to improve the skills of all players, whether casual or competitive, and build character.

Syed encourages young people to take on the challenge of being an athlete.

“It tests your motivation and time management skills,” he said. “It shows that you are somebody of passion, someone with discipline and somebody who wants to excel, somebody who is well-rounded. You get to meet different people from fragments of society.”

When Syed helps a player succeed at a task he has taught, he feels he has accomplished his job as a coach.

After receiving his award from the USTA, Syed said hopes to reach more people and improve his community service.

“You are as good as your ability to serve,” Syed said. “In life, you have to serve people well and play your part.” jonathan.michalski@temple.edu

TRACK AND FIELD

Two-sport athlete makes mark on pitch and track Aisha Brown led the soccer team in minutes in Fall 2017 and won the high jump on March 17.

BY DONOVAN HUGEL

Track and Field Beat Reporter

Aisha Brown played in all 18 women’s soccer games last fall and made 17 starts as a defender. She also led the Owls with 1,469 minutes as a freshman.

But when Temple opened its spring season earlier this month against Villanova, Brown didn’t play.

Instead, the two-sport athlete traveled with the track and field team to Charlotte, North Carolina, for the 49er Classic to open the outdoor season on March 16 and 17. Brown won the high jump with a leap of 1.78 meters, which is her personal best.

“The nice thing about Aisha is the 400-meter hurdles and the high jump are two of the only things on her mind right now,” coach Elvis Forde said. “I don’t want to say that she doesn’t think about soccer. But she is so focused on wanting to do really well in track and field that right now I feel like she’s able to compartmentalize the two and focus on the sport that she is in season with.”

Brown is continuing to play both sports, just like she did in high school. During Fall 2017, Brown focused all her attention on coach Seamus O’Connor’s soccer team.

Since the start of the indoor track and field season in December, she has shifted her focus to Forde’s squad.

Brown said the two coaches don’t approach her and try to distract her with thoughts on the other sport.

“They have a great relationship,” Brown said. “My favorite thing is that they talk to each other and they’re willing to work with each other. So I’m not distracted from one because of the other, which is very nice. In the first year that we’re doing this, I think it’ll pay off for both teams.”

So far it has. Brown provided a consistent presence on the soccer team’s back line a year after Temple had to deal with nearly a halfdozen injuries.

On the track, Brown has increased her high jump by 0.18 meters since the Great Dane Classic on Jan. 13 in New York. In addition to her win at the 49er Classic, Brown won the high jump at the Villanova Invitational on Feb. 3 during the indoor season.

Brown was a standout in both track and soccer while competing at Patriot High School in Prince William County, Virginia. She broke the school’s high jump record during her sophomore year and won the state championship in the event the following season.

In soccer, Brown earned allstate honors twice. During her senior year, she played on a defense

that only gave up two goals.

While she was a sophomore in high school, Brown verbally committed to the University of Louisville for soccer. She and coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes had an agreement that when soccer season was over, Brown would have the chance to compete for a walk-on spot as a high jumper for the track and field team, Brown said.

But at the start of Brown’s senior year of high school, FergusonDayes wanted Brown to commit to soccer and drop track and field, Brown said.

Brown decided to decommit from Louisville and reopen her recruitment.

“That was extremely difficult to deal with,” Brown said. “I was thinking that I had everything set for almost two years. I had even bought all the school spirit wear.

Then that all fell apart. I was really stressed out, but I do think that it ended up being for the best.

I don’t regret my decision to come to Temple.”

When Brown decommitted from Louisville, she reached out to Forde and his staff first to see if they would still be interested in a dual-sport athlete.

Forde and O’Connor were both on board with the idea of Brown playing both sports.

“Even though we can’t have her all year ‘round, we’d be better off because as a soccer player, she’s an elite talent,” O’Connor said. “Even

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Freshman jumper Aisha Brown practices at the Student Training and Recreation Complex on Feb. 2.

though we just have her for the fall, the opportunity to have her is, in my opinion, definitely worth it.”

“One of the things that really drew me to Temple was that they allowed me to be on scholarship for both sports,” Brown said.

“I wouldn’t have had any power over my decision at Louisville, but here I’m able to do what I enjoy and it’s encouraged by both staffs.” donovan.hugel@temple.edu

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TUESDAY, MARCH 27, 2018

PAGE 16

FOOTBALL

Former walk-on carves out role on O-line Redshirt sophomore Vincent Picozzi started six games in 2017.

BY TOM IGNUDO

Assistant Sports Editor

C

Redshirt-sophomore offensive lineman Vincent Picozzi gets in his stance during practice at Chodoff Field on March 17.

BASEBALL

GENEVA HEFFERNAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS

hris Wiesehan knew redshirt-sophomore offensive lineman Vincent Picozzi had potential from the moment he saw him in a high school hallway in May 2016.

The Owls’ offensive line coach was immediately intrigued by Picozzi’s 6-foot-4-inch frame.

When Wiesehan met Picozzi at Lansdale Catholic High School in Lansdale, Pennsylvania, he convinced him to attend a football camp.

Picozzi intended to enroll at the Lawrenceville School, a preparatory school in New Jersey, but he decided to walk on to Temple’s roster after he attended the camp.

Wiesehan said Piccozzi’s measurables and results in the 40-yard dash and high jump during the camp were impressive.

“I thought that would be better for me than going to a private school and possibly losing a year of eligibility or anything like that, so I decided to come here,” Picozzi said. “And I think that it’s turned out very well for me.”

Picozzi played in 10 games and made six starts last season, including

PICOZZI | PAGE 14

LACROSSE

Former pitcher shifts to minor-league coach Alumnus Matt Hockenberry, a 2014 draft pick of the Phillies, now coaches in the Phillies organization.

BY JONATHAN MICHALSKI For The Temple News

On the second day of Philadelphia Phillies’ spring training, Matt Hockenberry stood to introduce himself as the pitching coach for the Gulf Coast League West Phillies.

He felt at home as he looked out at the room of players. Just a year ago, Hockenberry had been a player just like them. Because he was so comfortable addressing some of his former teammates, Hockenberry forgot to say his name.

“I literally have the best job in the world because I’m working with and for

the guys and coaches that I played with,” Hockenberry said. “It could not be a better situation.”

The Phillies selected Hockenberry, a 2014 criminal justice alumnus, in the ninth round of the 2014 MLB draft. The right-hander tied the Temple record with 46 career starts from 2011-14. Then, he pitched for the Phillies’ minor-league affiliates for parts of four seasons before being released on July 29, 2017.

“When I got let go, I remember thinking, ‘Oh my God, this actually just happened. What am I gonna do with my life right now?’” Hockenberry said. “You never know when it’s coming.”

During his speech on the second day of spring training, Hockenberry told his

HOCKENBERRY | PAGE 13

GENEVA HEFFERNAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS Sophomore midfielder Maddie Gebert (right) celebrates her game-winning goal with sophomore attacker and midfielder Olivia Thompson during the Owls’ 10-9 victory against the University of Denver on March 18 at Howarth Field.

Midfielder gives Owls scoring Sophomore midfielder Maddie Gebert leads Temple with 19 goals in 10 games.

BY JAY NEEMEYER

Lacrosse Beat Reporter

COURTESY / MATT HOCKENBERRY Former Temple right-handed pitcher Matt Hockenberry (center) coaches players during the Phillies’ spring training in Clearwater, Florida.

As a freshman, Maddie Gebert scored one goal in 17 games.

In the first game of her sophomore season against Rutgers University on Feb. 10, Gebert quickly doubled her 2017 goal total.

The midfielder hasn’t slowed down since.

Gebert leads Temple with 19 goals, including hat-tricks on Feb. 21 and Feb. 25 against St. Joseph’s and Lafayette College.

“Freshman year was a bit of an adjustment for her,” coach Bonnie Rosen said. “And she came back sophomore year ready to take the field. It’s no surprise that she’s playing as well as she’s playing.”

Gebert has a seven-game goal streak.

She has scored in every game this season except in a 17-4 loss to Princeton University on Feb. 17.

She also scored a season-high four goals in a 15-6 win against East Carolina on March 6.

“I think I’ve improved quite a bit this season,” Gebert said. “Getting more confident as each game goes a little bit is helping with that.”

Gebert worked during the offseason to improve her ability to dodge defenders in order to create space and scoring opportunities.

Gebert’s offseason work also helped her improve her shooting accuracy. Her shooting percentage is up to 40.4 percent, which is more than double her 20 percent rate from last season.

She also focused on capitalizing on freeposition shots during training. The work has translated over to game situations. Gebert has scored on 6-of-14 free-position shots this season.

“I worked a lot more on my shooting and

GEBERT | PAGE 14

MEN’S TENNIS | PAGE 15

TRACK AND FIELD | PAGE 15

WOMEN’S TENNIS | PAGE 14

BRIEFS | PAGE 13

Fazal Syed, who won three Atlantic 10 Conference honors during his Temple career from 1995-98, received recognition for an interfaith tennis event he held.

Freshman Aisha Brown, a twosport athlete, led the women’s soccer team in minutes in Fall 2017 and won the high jump in 2018’s first outdoor track event.

Before this season, seniors Monet Stuckey-Willis and Alina Abdurakhimova hadn’t played doubles together. They paired up on Saturday after a lineup change.

Gymnastics coach Umme SalimBeasley won the Eastern College Athletic Conference 2018 Coach of the Year award on Saturday, other news and notes.