Vol. 96, Iss. 26

A watchdog for the Temple University community since 1921.

VOL. 96 ISSUE 26

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

COSBY

Cosby paid his accuser $3.4 million In the retrial of former university trustee Bill Cosby, it was revealed that he paid a former university employee for her silence.

BY GILLIAN McGOLDRICK News Editor

NORRISTOWN, PA. —

B ERIN BLEWETT / THE TEMPLE NEWS

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS

In this year’s Music Issue, The Temple News highlights members of the Temple community who love music. Read more in this issue and online at TEMPLE-NEWS.COM.

ill Cosby paid former Temple employee Andrea Constand $3.36 million in a 2005 civil suit to silence sexual assault allegations.

The dollar amount for the civil suit’s settlement was under wraps until Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele included it in his opening statement at the first day of Cosby’s sexual assault retrial on Monday.

Steele released the amount and provided a timeline of events to the jury — Constand left Temple and approached police in 2005, and the Montgomery County District Attorney’s office decided not to criminally charge Cosby.

In 2015, a judge unsealed some of the details from Cosby’s civil suit, which led the DA’s office to reopen the case later that year.

He argued that this timeline proves Constand approached police before she was paid nearly $3.4 million in 2006. When the DA’s office reopened the case, she agreed to cooperate with the trial, Steele said.

To accommodate the jury, the defense will give its opening statement on Tuesday morning, which will last an hour, Los-Angelesbased attorney Tom Mesereau told the court.

Mesereau will likely use the settlement amount in his opening statement to paint Constand as a greedy liar.

Cosby’s defense is expected to call Marguerite Jackson, a current Temple employee, to testify that Constand told her she could falsely accuse a wealthy man of sexual assault to get money.

Jackson’s testimony was not allowed in Cosby’s first sexual assault trial in June 2017,

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS

RETRIAL | PAGE 3

COMMUNITY

Staff member finds balance in music, tech Robert G. Butts is a student and employee who leaves his mark on communities through music and technology.

BY ERIN BLEWETT

For The Temple News

Robert G. Butts is multilingual but not in the traditional sense.

On any given day, Butts alternates how he communicates through either basic English, computer terminology or music.

“Music is a language too, so a lot of musicians are really good with computers and a lot of computer people are really good with music,” Butts said. “They are kind of related, but you don’t always know that right away.”

Butts, 62, has been the senior technical support specialist for the staff at the Temple Administrative Services Building on Hunting Park Avenue in Tioga for 10 years. He’s also a non-degree seeking student at the Boyer College of Music and Dance.

MUSICIAN | PAGE 8

Rep. Curtis Thomas to retire The nearly 30-year state representative endorsed 2012 public communication alumnus Malcolm Kenyatta to fill his seat in the 181st District.

BY LINDSAY BOWEN

On-Campus Beat Reporter

Curtis Thomas, the 181st District state representative, announced his retirement due to health reasons last Friday at Mt. Olive Holy Temple and endorsed candidate his cousin Malcolm Kenyatta.

Thomas has represented the 181st District, which includes Main Campus, for almost 30 years.

Thomas’s career began after he graduated from Temple, first in 1975 with a degree in secondary education and again in 1977 with a master’s degree in education. Thomas later received his law degree from the University of the District of Columbia’s David A. Clarke School of Law in 1980.

Before this, Thomas was the lead teacher in the Get Set Program at Ruffin Nichols Memorial African Methodist Episcopal Church in 1966 in North Philadelphia. The program helped preschoolers prepare for elementary school.

“I developed a commitment and passion for doing what I could to improve the lives of all people, especially youth,”

VEENA PRARKIYA / THE TEMPLE NEWS State Rep. Curtis Thomas announced his retirement at Mt. Olive Holy Temple in North Philadelphia on Friday. He has represented the 181st District for nearly 30 years.

Thomas said. “I watched parents come pick up their kids [from school] and lay down in the street to avoid bullets between gangs along 11th Street.”

After witnessing gang violence as a young adult, Thomas co-founded the Philadelphia Committee for Services to Youth, which helped to minimize gang violence in North Philadelphia in the 1970s, he said. It also prompted him to complete his undergraduate and gradu-

ate studies at Temple and get his law degree.

“The gang violence was a result of poverty, broken homes, poor self-esteem and a number of other things,” Thomas said.

After he graduated from law school in 1980, Thomas worked as a law clerk in the civil rights division of the U.S. De-

RETIREMENT | PAGE 3

NEWS | PAGES 2-3, 6

OPINION | PAGES 4-5

FEATURES | PAGES 7-14

SPORTS | PAGES 15-18

Temple University Hospital was designated as an LGBTQ health care equality leader by the Human Rights Campaign. Read more on Page 6.

A student reflects on how they mourned the suicide of their favorite band member in a Korean band group earlier this year. Read more on Page 4.

Two jazz ensembles in the Boyer College of Music and Dance will perform at South Kitchen & Jazz Parlor in Spring Garden this month. Read more on Page 7.

Jeremiah Atoki arrives to the football facility every morning at 6 a.m., but he is no longer on the team. Instead, he DJs at practices.

Read more on Page 18.

NEWS TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 2 ON CAMPUS

Students utilize WOAR hotline on campus In October, the sexual assault crisis hotline had not received any calls from students.

BY LINDSAY BOWEN

On-Campus Beat Reporter

Women Organized Against Rape, an organization that offers a 24/7 hotline for sexual assault crisis situations, has received an increase in calls to its satellite office on Main Campus since October when The Temple News reported that no students had yet utilized the hotline.

Monique Howard, the executive director of WOAR, did not provide the specific number of people who have used the 24hour hotline. Because all calls to the hotline are anonymous, it cannot gather much information from callers except their ZIP codes, Howard said.

While there has been an increased number of calls to the hotline, there has not been a need to dispatch a counselor from Temple’s satellite office on Main Campus, Howard said.

WOAR, which partnered with the university in February 2017, offers resources for survivors of sexual assault. It can dispatch a counselor to meet with a student who calls the hotline within 30 minutes to an hour.

In 2017, there were 20 reported incidents of sexual misconduct, wrote Director of Campus Safety Services Charlie Leone in an email to The Temple News. In 2016, there were 14 reported incidents of sexual misconduct.

Of the reports of misconduct in 2017, there were six reported instances of forcible rape — five in on-campus residence halls and one in an off-campus residence. There were 14 reported instances of forcible fondling, three of which were on campus with one in a residence hall, one in a non-campus building and 10 on public property.

Temple Police did not receive any sexual misconduct reports in January through March of this year, Leone wrote.

This academic year, Temple Police investigated sexual assault allegations that occurred at Johnson and Hardwick residence halls, on Fontain Street near 17th on Sept. 22 and an alleged assault in a private residence on 15th Street near Oxford on Oct. 29.

But Howard said when students call the hotline but do not need to meet a counselor, it is “undercover good news” because it means services at the university, like Tuttleman Counseling Services, are working in the

KATHY CHAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS Monique Howard, executive director of Women Organized Against Rape (left), and Nichet Sykes, a court advocate for WOAR, are pushing to increase usage of WOAR’s services for students.

ways that they should.

“If an individual from campus is calling, they are given the services from the hotline so a counselor doesn’t need to be dispatched,” she added.

The satellite office is not associated with the university and was created in response to demands from students who advocated for more accessible sexual assault resources on campus.

The university’s on-campus sexual assault resources have been widely criticized by student organizations this year.

Members of Temple’s Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance were escorted out of a Board of Trustees meeting last month after they criticized the university’s lack of resources for survivors and called out Board Chairman Patrick O’Connor for representing Bill Cosby in a 2005 civil suit regarding sexual assault allegations. O’Connor is listed as a potential witness at Cosby’s retrial that began on Monday.

FMLA and other student organizations

like Student Activists Against Sexual Assault have consistently called on the university to create an on-campus services center for sexual assault survivors. The university maintains it will not create such a center because of the stigma that would prevent people from entering a building dedicated to sexual assault services. “[WOAR] is a resource that continues to be utilized and Temple remains committed to this ongoing collaboration that meets the needs of our students,” wrote Valerie Harrison, the senior adviser for equity, diversity and inclusion, in an email to The Temple News.

The increased attention to the needs of sexual assault survivors is not unique to Main Campus. Nationally, social movements have shed light on sexual assault and misconduct this year, which is part of the reason more students are using the hotline, Howard said.

“It’s the #MeToo movement, the increase of sexual harassment allegations, the

Time’s Up movement and at the same time we’re doing a lot on social media and getting out on the street and raising visibility and awareness,” she added.

Only 15.8 to 35 percent of all sexual assaults are reported to law enforcement nationally, according to Maryland Coalition Against Sexual Assault. Rape is the most underreported crime, Howard said.

In Philadelphia, the number of sexual assaults reported to police decreased by 6 percent in 2017, WHYY reported.

“Hopefully with the #MeToo movement, the Time’s Up movement, the increase in visibility in our partnership and organization, reports will go up,” she added. “That doesn’t necessarily mean that the rapes increase, it just means the reporting will catch up to the actual crime.”

Students can call WOAR’s hotline at 215-985-3333. lindsay.bowen@temple.edu @lindsay_bow

COMMUNITY

Students redesign vacant lots in North Kensington Architecture and community development students are working with Rowan University to redevelop the lots.

BY LAURA SMYTHE For The Temple News

Students and professors from the architecture and community development departments are crafting redevelopment plans for five vacant lots in North Kensington as part of a project called the Brownfields AreaWide Planning Program.

The project is funded by a $200,000 grant from the United States Environmental Protection Agency and is done in collaboration with the New Kensington Community Development Corporation, Rowan University and the consulting firm Econsult Solutions.

Architecture professor Sally Harrison said the project aims to give Kensington residents a voice in the neighborhood’s development process and create plans reflecting their redevelopment preferences.

She and several of her students are sketching the community’s ideas for the lots, which included parks, playgrounds and artist studios, that they hope to present at a community meeting in June. When the plans are finalized, the architecture team will create official renderings.

Harrison said the drawing process involves lots of back-and-forth conversation with Kensington residents.

“You don’t want to just drop something on people,” Harrison said. “We may have misinterpreted their ideas or they may have not said exactly what they wanted. It’s a process. You need to be interactive about it.”

News Desk 215.204.7419 news@temple-news.com

A brownfield is a property where expansion, redevelopment or reuse might be complicated by hazardous substances, pollutants or contaminants. The EPA grant comes from an annual program providing communities with funding to conceptualize how to use post-industrial vacant sites. The Kensington project was selected by the EPA in 2015.

In February, students in the community development course Placemaking: Revitalizing Urban Communities organized a workshop with Kensington residents and potential developers to discuss redevelopment ideas. Students facilitated discussions to fine-tune details of community ideas, like how to incorporate lighting and fences to make the plans preferable for community residents.

“They had an idea of what they wanted, but we prompted people to vocalize what they saw in their head,” said Rachel Lewis, a senior community development major who is in the class.

Lynn Mandarano, the planning and community development professor who teaches the Placemaking course, said the workshop aimed to develop win-win solutions for Kensington residents and property developers.

Kensington residents proposed ideas like parks and community centers while developers proposed options like residential housing, restaurants and a distillery.

“There’s hardly any job opportunities up in that area, and the post-industrial sites are serving as part of the open-air drug market,” Mandarano said. “We saw an opportunity that if we could work with New Kensington Community Development [Corporation] as

our local partner to really help the residents there understand the development process, as well as different ideas on how the sites could be redeveloped.”

Mandarano said the lots were selected because of the neighborhood’s extensive post-industrial history that polluted the ground. She said the Kensington area have seen decades of disinvestment that has worsened residents’ quality of life.

In Spring 2016, Mandarano and students in her graduate planning studio worked with the New Kensington Community Development Corporation to spur community engagement by setting up focus groups with Kensington residents.

“Our proposal was really unique in that we wanted to engage the community very robustly, soliciting their ideas, understanding how the vacant land impacted their quality of life and what their ideas would be on how to redevelop these areas,” Mandarono said.

Participants were asked to take pictures of their neighborhood, showing how the vacant lots impacted their lives. Some said they didn’t feel comfortable walking down certain blocks due to things like poor lighting, drug use or litter. They also photographed aspects of their neighborhood or other neighborhoods they liked.

“It was giving them a different way of expressing how they would like to see their neighborhood developed and what kind of public investments they would like,” Mandarono said.

Harrison said the attitude among Kensington residents toward redevelopment is generally positive, but they also have some

concerns.

“On the one hand, they’re very excited that someone is shining the light on a neighborhood that’s been bereft,” Harrison said.

“On the other hand, they’re concerned about issues of gentrification and that ‘powers that be’ are going to take over their neighborhood and they won’t be heard.”

When starting the project, Lewis said she and other students were worried about being perceived as outsiders coming into the Kensington neighborhood and telling residents what to do.

“I purposely chose the words I used and the way I phrased things in general to show that I’m not trying to tell them what to do,” Lewis said. “This is about what they want.

Once someone has decided that you are not in it for their best interests, they might be less receptive to you, so it’s really important to make it clear that you want what people want.”

So far, no developers have been chosen to work on the brownfield lots. Instead, the students are working on creating official conceptual plans that reflect the community’s wishes, which will be shown to developers when a lot is purchased. The conceptual planning project will run through the end of the year.

“The residents of this area get a say in what they would like, and they’ll have a very professional rendering to show what they specifically want,” Lewis said. “Not what’s good for the housing economy, but what they would like.” laura.smythe@temple.edu @lcs_smythe

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

NEWS TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 3

TSG

Allocations process confusing for student orgs IgniteTU said it will make allocations more accessible for student organizations.

BY ALYSSA BIEDERMAN TSG Beat Reporter

Leaders of IgniteTU, the ticket that won the Temple Student Government executive election last Friday and will represent the student body for the 2018-19 academic year, said they will fix the allocations process, which some student organizations find confusing.

Allocations are the funding TSG distributes to organizations to host events and purchase necessary supplies.

For the 2017-18 academic year, the Allocations Committee was tasked with managing $140,000 to give to student organizations. This money comes from the General Activities fee that all undergraduates pay each semester.

It is allocated by the university after TSG’s allocations chairs request university funding during the summer, The Temple News reported in September.

IgniteTU will make accessing allocations easier for organizations by eliminating General Assembly meetings, which as of now organization leaders must attend to be eligible to receive allocations. Attending these weekly meetings can be difficult for small organizations that have fewer mem-

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 RETRIAL which ended in a deadlocked jury, but O’Neill ruled to allow Jackson be called as a witness last month. Constand has denied ever knowing Jackson, a Boyer College of Music and Dance academic adviser.

At the time of the 2005 civil suit, Cosby was a trustee at Temple and represented

by Board of Trustees Chairman Patrick O’Connor. Details of deliberations between O’Connor and Cosby will not be released as evidence at trial, as per a ruling by Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas Judge Steven T. O’Neill, but O’Connor could be called as a witness.

Steele introduced the power dynamic between Cosby and Constand at the time of the alleged assault in January 2004 in Cosby’s Montgomery County home: Cosby was a university trustee with a great interest in Temple’s basketball program. Constand was the director of operations for Temple’s women’s basketball team and played basketball herself.

“In this case, there will be evidence of a mentoring relationship that [Cosby] concedes he had with Andrea Constand,” Steele told the jury. “And in that mentoring relationship, that’s where the trust was built.”

His hour-long opening statement outlined the definitions of indecent aggravated assault — which includes drugging and forcibly touching Constand — of which Cosby is charged with three counts. He outlined how Cosby’s own words in a 2005 deposition and in recorded conversations with Constand’s mother, Gianna Constand, to

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 RETIREMENT partment of Health, Education and Welfare.

He later returned to Pennsylvania to serve as a law clerk in Harrisburg.

After former 181st District state Rep. Alphonso Deal died in 1987, Thomas was urged by residents of the 181st District to run for state representative, and he subsequently won in 1988.

Reflecting on his career, Thomas said he would serve as state representative for another 30 years if his health permitted.

“The legislative branch is the most provocative branch in government,” he said.

“Lawmaking gives you a chance not just to impact people who are struggling in your community, but across Pennsylvania.”

In light of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in February, when a former student shot and killed 17 students and staff in Parkland, Florida, Thomas introduced a package of gun safety reform bills in March.

“This is another step in a long effort for the last 10 years to try and bring reasonable

bers, the team said.

“We want to get rid of those [General Assembly meetings],” TSG President-elect Gadi Zimmerman said. “Some small organizations don’t even know what allocations are, and if they miss more than three meetings, they become ineligible. This is money that could really benefit them.”

Co-chairs of the Allocations Committee Dave Drennan and Charlotte Myer said they have received feedback from student organizations that the application process to request allocations is confusing.

“People don’t always understand the process,” said Drennan, a senior economics major. “Whenever someone has questions, we tell them to come meet with us. We try to make ourselves as available as possible.”

Camila Delgado, a junior political science major and treasurer of Phi Sigma Pi, a co-ed honors fraternity that uses allocations to attend a national conference, said it is difficult to find the necessary information and forms to apply for allocations.

“It shouldn’t be this difficult,” Delgado said. “I’ve even searched ‘allocations’ on OwlConnect and been on the TSG website, and I can’t find anything.”

She said the process is especially concerning because she needs to request a specific amount, but that amount cannot be determined until she knows how much the committee is able to give toward their national conference.

“The cost depends on the amount of people we send, because allocations covers our registration,” Delgado added. “How many people we’re able to send depends on how much money they can give us.”

Currently, in order to apply for allocations, an organization must follow four steps: • • • •

Submit a purchase request on OwlConnect at least three Mondays before an event Wait for the allocations committee to approve or deny funding Make changes to the application based on feedback from allocations committee if applicable Wait for the committee to approve or deny funding after edits are made

In applying, organizations can only request funding for daily operations, travel expenses, conference or competition attendance and for events, which have to be “open and advertised” to the entire student body in order to receive funding.

Organizations must make sure they do not ask for more than their organization’s allotted allocation amount or request funding to be used for giveaways, salaries, fundraisers or “luxury items,” like promotional T-shirts.

Organizations must also submit relevant documents with each purchase request,

which can include invoices for supplies, professional service agreement forms with external vendors and conference registration forms.

Drennan and Myer said the only alteration they made to the allocations guidelines this academic year was incorporating a purchase request spreadsheet to make the allocations process more organized.

They said they did not make more changes because alterations can make the process more confusing.

“We want to make sure the student [organizations] don’t have to grapple with anything too new,” said Myer, a senior political science major. “Any kind of jarring changes can really throw [organizations] off, and it can be a problem.”

Drennan and Myer said they will edit guidelines and offer the edits to incoming Allocations Committee chairs as suggestions.

“Once we’re out, we’re out,” Drennan said. “Our biggest goal with allocations is a smooth transition from year to year. We want to provide solid feedback going forward, because that’s not really something we can say we got coming in.”

IgniteTU has not yet appointed Allocations Committee chairs for the 2018-19 academic year. alyssa.biederman@temple.edu @BiedermanAlyssa

prove that Cosby admitted his own guilt and knowledge to his alleged assault of Andrea Constand.

He also introduced to the jury what a common scheme, plan or design and absence of mistake is, which his team plans to use in arguments to prove Cosby had a specific plan to hurt women. The District Attorney’s office will call five women to the witness stand to prove this.

The five women have accusations that are similar to the ones Andrea Constand has brought against Cosby: They were mentored

by Cosby for several weeks, then invited over to a setting he was familiar with and given wine or pills to relax. Then, they were suddenly paralyzed or unconscious and unable to consent.

Opening statements began after nearly six hours of delay to reinterview each of the jurors to address a motion filed by the defense Friday.

In this motion, it alleges that a potential juror overheard the seated juror No. 11 on Wednesday saying “I just think he’s guilty,” the Inquirer reported.

The jurors — seven men and five women — took the oath to be fair and impartial around 2:30 p.m. on Monday so the trial could finally be under way. One man and one woman is Black on the jury panel, making it the same racial and gender makeup as Cosby’s June trial. The six alternates – four men and two women, three of whom are Black — also took the oath.

After the six-hour-long delay, O’Neill said that all 12 jurors maintained that they can remain fair and impartial, but he had not yet issued a ruling on juror No. 11 at the end

of the day on Monday. This juror remained seated and took an oath along with the rest of the panel.

Outside the courthouse, however, protesters expressed their support for Andrea Constand and other Cosby accusers.

A topless woman painted with dozens of names of Cosby’s accusers was arrested outside as Cosby was arriving to the Montgomery County Courthouse. The 39-year-old woman Nicolle Rochelle from Little Falls, New Jersey, was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct after breaking through a barricade as Cosby entered the building.

Cosby’s retrial is expected to be a month

long.

“We are very confident that you will be able to make the right decision,” Steele said to the jury, in closing of his opening statement. “We’re very confident that you all will be able to do justice in this case. We are very confident that you will convict the defendant on three counts of indecent aggravated assault for what he did to Andrea Constand in January 2004.”

sense to my colleagues about this whole issue of gun violence,” he said.

The bills in the package would prohibit people with a history of mental illness from buying guns, raise the age limit on buying guns from 18 to 21 years old, illegalize large capacity magazines and introduce a statewide school safety commission to evaluate safety in public schools.

“We should treat these shootings at our schools as issues of homeland security,” Thomas said. “We should never have a situation where kids have to worry about whether they’re going to live or die when they’re in school.”

Thomas has seen many legislative accomplishments in his career, including the Pennsylvania Primary Healthcare Loan Repayment Program, which expanded primary care practitioners to urban and rural Pennsylvania. He also worked to expand worker’s compensation to firefighters, police and emergency personnel who were infected by Hepatitis C while on duty in 2013.

Thomas is most proud of the Check Casher Licensing Law, passed in 1998, which requires check-cashing businesses to

be licensed, provides penalties for money­-laundering activities and restricts predatory payday loans. He is also proud of the Philadelphia Housing Trust Fund, passed in 2005, which allows the city to raise money for new housing developments, mortgage foreclosure assistance, eviction support and the homeless.

Kenyatta, a 2012 public communication alumnus, is running for Thomas’ seat on May 15 alongside Democratic candidates Alex Deering, Gilberto Gonzalez, Lewis C. Nash, Lewis Thomas III and Kenneth Walker Jr., as well as Republican Milton Street. “[Kenyatta] is young, energetic, a visionary and is willing to work with other people,” Thomas said. “I think that many of the issues we are confronted with like gentrification, somebody like Malcolm is needed.”

In a statement, Kenyatta said he is grateful for Thomas’s endorsement and is looking forward to “building on to his record of success.”

“Few legislators can point to his history of success, whether it’s increasing affordable housing, standing up against predatory lenders or even most recently, the compre-

hensive gun bill package he rolled out to try to keep our communities safe,” Kenyatta said in a statement.

Charlene Scott, who lives on 11th Street near Oxford, supported Thomas since she moved to the area 25 years ago. “[Thomas] is a strong leader, and he speaks up,” Scott said. “He comes to community meetings. If we have problems and need help, we can call his office and it wasn’t a sham. That’s the kind of person you want to lead for you in the state. But sadly he’s leaving, and we just hope that somebody else will be there to talk to us.”

Scott, a veteran with a disability, hopes she’ll be able to get the same assistance from the next state representative. Scott said she plans to vote for Kenyatta in May. “[Kenyatta] has integrity, and that’s hard to find,” Scott said. “I’m not voting for the rest of them because I watched them grow up and they show no conscious for the law or the rules, and I don’t want them to represent me.”

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Bill Cosby, a former university trustee, enters the Montgomery County Courthouse for the first day of his sexual assault retrial on Monday.

gillian@temple.edu @gill_mcgoldrick

lindsay.bowen@temple.edu @lindsay_bow

News Desk 215.204.7419 news@temple-news.com

OPINION TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 4

A watchdog for the Temple University community since 1921.

Michaela Winberg Editor-in-Chief Grace Shallow Managing Editor Jenny Roberts Supervising Editor Julie Christie Enterprise Editor Gillian McGoldrick News Editor Jayna Schaffer Opinion Editor

The Temple News is an editorially independent weekly publication serving the Temple University community.

Unsigned editorial content represents the opinion of The Temple News.

Adjacent commentary is reflective of their authors, not The Temple News.

Emily Scott Features Editor Evan Easterling Sports Editor Kelly Brennan Asst. News Editor Tom Ignudo Asst. Sports Editor Ian Walker Asst. Features Editor Will Bleier Copy Editor Shannon Hutchinson Multimedia Editor Jake Cepis Assistant Multimedia Editor

Visit us online at temple-news.com.

Becoming the luckiest fan A student remembers personally receiving a souvenir from the lead singer of her favorite band.

BY MONICA MELLON

Send submissions to letters@temple-news.com.

The Temple News is located at: Student Center, Room 243

Sydney Schaefer Photography Editor Jamie Cottrell Asst. Photography Editor Courtney Redmon Design Editor Greta Anderson Designer Jen Wells Designer Mira Wise Advertising Manager Finnian Saylor Business & Marketing Manager Valentina Wrisley Asst. Business & Mktg Manager

1755 N. 13th St. Philadelphia, PA 19122

EDITORIAL

O’Connor: Break the silence on Cosby ONLINE Read this week’s editorial at temple-news.com.

CORRECTIONS In a story that ran on Page 3 in the April 3 issue with the headline “Katz School of Medicine opens Alzheimer’s Center,” Dr. Domenico Praticò’s name was misspelled.

A cutline accompanying a story that ran on Page 1 in the April 3 issue with the headline “Church: ‘We will rebuild’” misstated who is in the photos that Fred Tookes is holding. Tookes’ late father, pastor Ernest Tookes, and Bishop S. C. Johnson, who founded the Apostolic Faith Church, are pictured.

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.

L

ast summer, my favorite band, Third Eye Blind, hosted a special reunion tour commemorating the 20th anniversary of its self-titled album. The band spent the summer traveling across the country for the Summer Gods Tour.

The post-grunge ’90s band made a promise to perform the complete lineup of its self-titled album. And since this was the album that turned me into a fan with songs like “Semi-Charmed Life,” “How’s It Going to Be” and “Jumper,” I knew I couldn’t miss it.

I had my tickets for multiple shows months in advance. And I was excited the band was stopping at Festival Pier on Christopher Columbus Boulevard, my favorite venue.

Aside from playing the complete album, another special part of the tour was that lead singer Stephan Jenkins promised to return to the stage wearing a tour T-shirt during the encore. At the very end of the show, Jenkins would take the shirt off and hand it to one lucky fan.

The day of the concert, my mom, youngest sister and I waited outside the venue for hours to make sure we could claim our spot in the front row. Thankfully our waiting paid off: We snagged a spot right at the barricade.

To show my love and support for Third Eye Blind, I wore my favorite T-shirt, which reads, “lol you’re not Stephan Jenkins.”

Our positioning in the front of the stage made it the prime spot for Jenkins to notice us.

The sun started to set as Third

COURTNEY REDMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS

Eye Blind finally came on stage.

The band opened with a few songs from its other albums, like “We Are Drugs” and “Blue,” but stayed true to its promise to play the selftitled album in its entirety.

Jenkins also stayed true to his commitment to wear the band’s pink Summer Gods Tour shirt.

Most of the other fans in the front row had been to multiple shows and were eagerly waiting for Jenkins to toss the shirt into the crowd.

Time seemed to slow down as he began to walk toward me and glanced down to read my shirt.

I felt my mom and sister pulling on my shirt to make it easier for him to read. He laughed and then started to take off the T-shirt he was wearing.

I knew exactly what was happening, but it seemed too good to be true.

At last, he gave the tour shirt to me. I was shaking, holding on to

my new favorite shirt, listening to the people around me cheering.

The Summer Gods Tour was really important to me and was one of the best concerts I have ever attended. Having such a unique and special memory just makes it so much better.

At the end of the show, Jenkins explained the significance of the last song on the self-titled album, “God of Wine,” and why he found it important to make sure the song was played last. The song was also one of my favorites on the album, so having it become the soundtrack to one of the coolest moments of my life was beautiful.

I still hold onto this shirt as a unique reminder of that magical night and a perfect symbol of my connection to the band. monica.mellon@temple.edu @MonicaMellon

Mourning a singer across language barrier, oceans A student reflects on the suicide of their favorite band member of SHINee, a Korean group.

BY SIANI COLÓN

O

n Dec. 18, 2017, I woke up expecting the day to be like every other Monday. I checked my text messages, like usual, but when I looked in my group chat I knew something was very wrong.

Only two of my friends were awake at the time, but they were both filled with panic — they had read in the news that something had happened to Kim Jonghyun, a member of the Korean pop, also known as K-pop, group SHINee. My heart immediately sank to my stomach, and my mind jumped to the worst-case scenario. But I hoped I was wrong. Twitter was in a flurry of sadness as fans discovered he was being transported to the hospital for attempting suicide.

There was so much misinformation going around, with some fans believing he was still alive, and Jonghyun’s friends and colleagues deleting condolences they had posted. Everyone was confused — and clinging onto hope.

All the hope I had was lost the moment his agency, SM Entertainment, released its statement confirming his death that same day.

I was glad the rest of my family had already left for the day so they wouldn’t hear my crying.

“This is actually happening,” I thought to myself.

I wanted to stay home and cry,

letters@temple-news.com

but I knew I had to wipe my tears, lace my boots and head to campus.

Some may ask, “How could you possibly mourn someone you’ve never met? How can you cry for someone whose language you couldn’t even understand?”

Although my friends now know me to be a die-hard fan of BTS, a seven-member K-pop boy band, I became a fan of Korean pop music back in 2009. I had attended a show on the Jonas Brothers’ Lines, Vines, and Trying Times Tour, not knowing the opening act was going to be a Korean girl band called Wonder Girls.

I disconnected from Wonder Girls for a bit as their United States promotions fizzled out, and I didn’t hear much about them. But, during my sophomore year of high school, Psy’s “Gangnam Style,” which mocked the wealthy lifestyle of the Gangnam neighborhood in the Korean capital of Seoul, exploded on airwaves around the world. I thought to look into K-pop again.

I was disappointed that Wonder Girls were on hiatus at the time, but I got into groups like Red Velvet, f(x) and EXO. When I found the group SHINee, I immediately fell in love with them. The eccentric fashion and choreography in the music video for “Dream Girl,” a colorful video with an electro-funk vibe, awed me, and when Jonghyun was on the screen, he was my favorite.

The lyrics being in a different language has never hindered me from loving SHINee or recognizing the group’s talent. Many Ko-

COURTNEY REDMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS

rean fans even translate lyrics, interviews and social media posts so fans from across the globe can stay updated.

SHINee goes above and beyond with its work as the band members sing passionately while performing complex, synchronized choreography. They helped write and produce all of their albums, which never stuck to one genre. Unlike some groups who only see each other as colleagues, the members of SHINee view each other as brothers, and they extend that familial love to their fanbase.

There’s so much music outside the bubble of the U.S., and I’m thankful that artists like SHINee gave me the opportunity to learn about a culture other than my own.

I had the chance to support Jonghyun, who never failed to bring a smile to my face.

Despite his high-profile sta-

tus, Jonghyun was someone who was open-minded, whimsical and wasn’t afraid to be bold. He never hid his struggles with depression and was honest with the world. He owned up to his mistakes whenever he may have offended someone and always wanted to do better.

He reminded us that we shouldn’t bottle up how we feel.

As I mourned, I didn’t know how to stop crying. Every time I thought I calmed down, news of his death would bombard me on social media. I couldn’t escape it.

Strangely enough, it was his music that comforted me. It was difficult to listen at first, as he was a lead vocal for SHINee, but I forced myself to do it. I was one of many who streamed his solo albums that day, just wanting to hear his voice again.

I listened through his entire discography, although his album

Story Op. 2 was on repeat. Hearing his gentle voice croon “You did a good job today, you worked so hard” in his song “End of A Day” gave pause to my mourning.

It saddens me that I’ll never see him perform live. SHINee is continuing to promote itself with the four remaining members, and I’ll continue to support the band, but I can’t see myself in a crowd of fans waving the pearl aqua lightsticks and screaming chants as I look to the stage and see a space where Jonghyun could be.

For me, Jonghyun was a light in dark times, and I’m grateful he shared his gift with fans. His music will continue to impact so many even though he is no longer with us. siani.colon@temple.edu

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

OPINION TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 5

From high school on, keeping Fiona Apple close

COURTNEY REDMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS

A student writes about how a singer-songwriter impacts her everyday life.

T

BY BASIA WILSON

hree years ago, a friend of mine recommended I check out alternative singer-songwriter and pianist Fiona Apple. But first, he suggested I watch her famous speech from the 1997 MTV Video Music Awards.

She had just won Best New Artist. But instead of reading through a long list of people she’d like to thank, as musicians typically do at award ceremonies, Fiona Apple chose to deliver a statement about society.

My friend told me to watch the video because Fiona Apple started with a quote by Maya Angelou — an author and poet we both adore.

“Maya Angelou said that we as human beings at our best can only create opportunities,” Fiona Apple

said. “And I’m going to use this opportunity the way that I want to use it.”

In her speech, Fiona Apple stressed the importance of resisting the urge to stifle your true self for the sake of being accepted.

“You shouldn’t model your life about what you think we think is cool,” she said.

Instead, she suggested her fans embrace their individuality: “Go with yourself.”

After watching the video of her speech, I immediately admired her personality. She exuded honesty and originality, and I was excited to get to listen to her music. I started with “Tidal,” her debut album from 1996.

I felt a weight tugging at my heart as I listened to “Sullen Girl.”

Thanking my dad for a love of music A student appreciates her musical upbringing and how it has influenced her.

BY RAE BURACH

I

grew up in a home where silence was a rarity. There was always music radiating from the stereo in the living room — the one that my father taught me to use as soon as I was tall enough to reach it.

We’d sit in front of the shelves with his thousands of CDs, and I’d pick which ones I wanted to hear.

He’d remind me how to take the shiny discs out of their covers without scratching them, and we’d load them into the six-CD shuffler and press play.

There was always at least one Beatles album in the mix, and I was conditioned at a young age to know which band member was singing on any given song. A framed picture of the members — John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr — still hangs in the front entrance of my home as a reminder of what my family holds near and dear.

When there were no CDs playing, my dad was making his own music. He started playing the drums when he was 14 years old, and he’s been in a band ever since. I grew up going to his gigs, dancing to his beats and feeling my bedroom floor shake from his practice sessions in the basement.

His musician friends are like family to me — they’ve seen me grow up. Likewise, I feel like I’ve seen my dad grow and change as a musician throughout the years. He’s joined bands, collaborated with new musicians and played on a produced album.

When I was young, I would beg him to give me drum lessons. He taught me simple beats to practice.

I still play every once in a while, but

I leave it to him to be the greatest drummer in the world.

My dad’s musical background infiltrates every aspect of his life, thus infiltrating mine. When he starts listening to a new band, he plays it for me. We’ll talk about the lyrics together, or compare the sound to that of other artists. His wardrobe consists primarily of worn-out band T-shirts because he buys a shirt at every concert he attends. Since he brought me to my first concert as a kid, I too have acquired a ridiculous amount of band gear.

I miss my musical home when I’m at school. My dad and I are still trying to get used to the distance.

He’ll load new CDs onto flash drives and mail them to me or bring them when he comes to visit. He’ll send me links to videos he wants me to watch or tell me about upcoming shows we should go to together. Most of all, I hate missing his bands’ gigs.

It’s hard to describe the feeling I get when I watch my dad play.

Drumming is such an important part of his life, and it’s clear by the way his face lights up when he’s behind his set. He closes his eyes and feels the music throughout his bones; his nose scrunches, his eyebrows dance and his body sways.

He’s taught me what it means to be passionate about something. Nothing compares to watching someone you love do what they love.

I was brought up with the idea that music is everything. My family isn’t religious, and music is as close as we get to worship. It is a tremendous part of the relationship I have with my dad, and it’s the reason he feels more like a best friend than a father. I love music because of him, and that’s something for which I’ll be forever grateful. rbur@temple.edu

“It’s calm under the waves,” she sings, “in the blue of my oblivion.”

Her sadness landed heavily on the piano keys.

And what starts as a haunting melody in “Pale September” blooms into a beautiful song about emotional vulnerability: “All my armor falling down, in a pile at my feet, and my winter giving way to warm, as I’m singing him to sleep.”

I found “Tidal” to be profound and complex. Her talent was impressive for her age, many critics said — citing the fact that she was only 18 years old at the time of its release. I was 19 when I first discovered it, so her age didn’t matter much to me. I believed it was great music, regardless.

As I gradually found the rest of Fiona Apple’s albums, I couldn’t help but wonder what it was like to hear them when they first came out.

Two years ago, during the 20year anniversary of “Tidal,” plenty of older fans took to music blogs and other websites to reminisce about the album’s release. They expressed finding joy, reassurance and courage in Fiona Apple’s lyrics.

But some people’s praise felt more like backhanded compliments.

People voiced admiration for her music, but some were also dismissive — deeming “Tidal” a product of teenage angst that was simply a good soundtrack for their rebellious high school phases.

This disappointed me. How

could someone’s understanding of such a talented, mature artist be so reductive and limited?

I can admit I’ve had times where I associated a song with a specific phase. I remember two summers ago when I desperately tried and failed to breathe life back into a crumbling relationship. I put “Not About Love” on repeat, a song from Fiona Apple’s 2005 album “Extraordinary Machine.”

“This is not about love, ‘cause I am not in love,” Fiona Apple declared. I sang along until it felt real — searching for a solution in her confident voice, the clash of cymbals, piano and thumping drums.

But even after I stepped out of that phase, my affection for Fiona Apple’s music did not dwindle.

Because Fiona Apple has always expressed such a wide array of emotions to which I could relate, my respect for her music evolved instead.

As I’ve reached womanhood, I’ve especially admired Fiona Apple’s willingness to explore anger in her music. I’ve learned being able to talk about rage rather than be forced into silence is not just liberating, but also necessary.

In “Limp,” a song from her 1999 album “When the Pawn,” Fiona Apple confesses to an aggressor, “You feed the beast I have within me. … You fondle my trigger, then you blame my gun.”

The piano is steady and deliberate as she considers this truth.

Then the song accelerates as she reacts, trusting that the tables will turn.

“It won’t be long till you’ll be lying limp in your own hand,” she sings.

Instead of passively going along with the unreasonable demands of others — something women are often conditioned to do — Fiona Apple put emphasis on confronting what’s unfair. Thinking about the social spaces I inhabit as a woman, I was moved by her ability to step up and move on from a situation that was not serving her.

And her choice to stand up for herself echoes the advice she shared during her VMA speech: “Go with yourself.”

My friend and I still reflect on this piece of wisdom, quoting lyrics and reminding each other to stay true to ourselves when we have a dilemma.

These past few years, I’ve come to realize the truisms, affirmations and emotions embedded in Fiona Apple’s music are applicable to more than temporary hardships.

Instead, her music has become a consistent rhythm and source of inspiration in my day-to-day life.

And I plan on continuing these lessons with me. basia.serafina.wilson@temple.edu

Frank Ocean: my unofficial mentor A student is uplifted by Frank Ocean’s status as a prominent artist who is also a bisexual man of color.

BY TYLER PEREZ

T

he first time that I listened to “Chanel”

by Frank Ocean, I was mesmerized. I was in love with the song, the lyrics and more than anything, with the artist.

After a few glittering piano keys, Frank Ocean opens “Chanel” with one of the most beautiful verses I have ever had the pleasure of hearing: “My guy pretty like a girl, and he got fight stories to tell.

I see both sides like Chanel.”

As a bisexual person of color, I find songs like “Chanel” to serve as a reflection of my life: an unabridged conversation on the intricate intersection between race, gender and sexuality. The lyrics are so charged, intimate and poetic that they resonate with me on a personal level, and I feel as though I can identify with Frank Ocean’s own story.

“Chanel” is not the first time that Frank Ocean has been open about his sexuality, and it’s surely not the only song that makes me feel this level of intimacy. Over the course of two full-length albums, a visual album, a mixtape and an episodic collection of singles, the 30-year-old musician has spoken frequently about his personal journey toward self-understanding and self-acceptance with his sexuality.

It’s no surprise, then, that songs like “Bad Religion,” “Thinkin Bout You” and “Good Guy” just so happen to be some of my favorite songs of all time.

More than anything, Frank Ocean has been a

COURTNEY REDMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS

role model to me: an unofficial mentor whose lyrics were like religious texts to a teenage boy struggling to navigate the complex world of love and heartbreak, sexuality and fluidity, self-love and self-understanding.

Beyond his poetic, open lyrics, he represents how race and sexuality can often work against each other. As a young, Latinx boy raised by the teachings of a conservative religion, understanding my sexuality was a complicated and intimidating process.

This is why it was amazing to be able to see a bisexual man of color, one who’s been considered one of the most important musicians of the decade, wearing mascara in the music video for his hit song “Nikes.”

For LGBTQ people of color, there are very few celebrities in the world right now that adequately represent the complex intersection of their identities, let alone someone as musically and poetically innovative as Frank Ocean.

And being able to listen to one of his songs and find intimate parts of my own story in his lyrics is a beautiful feeling. Whenever Frank Ocean releases his next album, whether that is in two days or 20 years, I am confident that it will be another reflection of not only his personal story, but of my own. tyler.perez@temple.edu @perezodent

letters@temple-news.com

NEWS TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 6 TSG

IgniteTU wins 2018-19 TSG executive elections The team will remove General Assembly meetings and work with Aramark to give extra meal swipes to students experiencing food insecurity.

BY ALYSSA BIEDERMAN TSG Beat Reporter

IgniteTU was elected to the Temple Student Government administration for the 2018-19 academic year.

Elections Commissioner Daritza Santana announced the winners on Friday in The Reel in the Student Center to a group of about 50 students, current TSG members and campaign members.

The team will be officially inducted as TSG administration on April 30 at the final General Assembly meeting of the 2017-18 academic year.

IgniteTU is made up of President-elect Gadi Zimmerman, Vice President-elect of Services Trent Reardon and Vice Presidentelect of External Affairs Cameron Kaczor.

“We were just so happy that all the hard work we’ve put in these past two weeks is finally coming to life,” said Kaczor, a sophomore psychology major and TSG’s current secretary.

The team won by 629 votes over VoiceTU. Another team, UniteTU, withdrew two days before the election after one of its candidates resigned, citing inclusion concerns.

“This team is incredible,” said Zimmerman, a junior financial planning major and

KATHY CHAN / THE TEMPLE NEWS The 2018-10 Student Body President-elect Gadi Zimmerman of IgniteTU meets with his fellow campaign members on Sunday in the Student Center.

current president of the student organization Challah for Hunger. “It’s not just the three [candidates], it’s the 20-some people on this team and the voters who supported us.”

After multiple requests, VoiceTU declined to comment.

This election had a lower voter turnout than the 2017 elections, with 4,505 votes cast — 693 fewer than last year. This is still the third-highest turnout since TSG began tracking voting numbers in 2004.

IgniteTU will release applications for executive board positions this week. The

team said it wants dedicated and passionate students to apply, even if they have no prior experience with TSG. “We want strong teamwork and communication,” Zimmerman said. “Leadership is a great quality, but you have to make sure you’re able to work with a team. I know a big complaint in the current administration is the lack of communication, and we want to emphasize how to fix that going into next year.”

IgniteTU wants to develop a good relationship with Aramark, remove General

Assembly meetings, institute weekly block clean-ups and plan monthly community forums by the start of Fall 2018.

IgniteTU’s platform also includes increasing security and lighting at the Temple University Regional Rail station, creating a student liaison position for the Board of Trustees and working with Aramark to give extra meal swipes to students experiencing food insecurity. The team will focus on creating a Mental Health Awareness Week and improving transfer student orientation and resources.

IgniteTU said the first things the team will focus on is replacing General Assembly meetings, and reforming Parliament to make the body more autonomous.

“We want to make sure we’re fixing [TSG] internally before we do anything outside,” said Reardon, a junior public health major and TSG’s current promotions manager.

Only 16 Parliament members were elected for the 2018-19 academic year, leaving 20 seats unfilled. Reardon said many students have never heard of Parliament, and IgniteTU will advertise it more to generate student interest.

“A lot of people don’t even know what Parliament is,” Reardon said. “We want to build some respect for them and get some fresh faces in.” alyssa.biederman@temple.edu @BiedermanAlyssa

RESEARCH

TUH designated as leader in LGBTQ healthcare equality TUH received a perfect score based on its policies and procedures regarding LGBTQ treatment options.

BY MADISON SEITCHIK For The Temple News

Temple University Hospital is now designated an LGBTQ Healthcare Equality Leader.

The Human Rights Campaign 2018 Healthcare Equality Index survey is used to assess a health care facility’s inclusion of LGBTQ patients and employees.

Of the 626 healthcare facilities that participated in the HEI 2018 survey, 418 were designated as Healthcare Equality Leaders, according to a release by TUH. In order to become a Healthcare Equality Leader, the facility must score perfectly on a 100-point scale. The previous year, TUH took the 2017 HEI and received a score of 60 out of 100 points based on its

policies and procedures regarding LGBTQ treatment.

After receiving the results of the survey in 2017, the hospital implemented a task force to improve its inclusion and accessibility for LGBTQ patients.

The hospital focused on improving its education around using correct pronouns and other barriers LGBTQ people may face, using LGBTQ training modules from the Human Rights Campaign.

The task force is also trying to establish an LGBTQ care center, said Ben Moore, the co-founder and co-chair of the Temple Health LGBTQ Alliance Task Force.

Moore hopes it will be up and running early next year.

The care center would provide more services and procedures for people in the LGBTQ community, like primary care for hormone therapy replacements. TUH cannot yet provide gender confirmation surgery, but plans to do so af-

ter the center opens.

The task force has improved the Lewis Katz School of Medicine curricula by providing up-to-date trainings to students so they are prepared to care for LGBTQ patients.

The hospital also provides resources for self-identified LGBTQ applicants in their residency programs by sending the task force to meet with them to let them know that this is an inclusive, supportive environment.

LGBTQ students at the Katz School of Medicine and at the College of Public Health appreciate TUH’s efforts.

“It really shows me that the university and the entire establishment as a whole really has a focus and a support for that community,” said Holly Rubinson, a sophomore nursing major who identifies as a lesbian. “So to be an LGBTQIA nurse working in a hospital that really supports that community...I’m

ADVERTISEMENT

able to see patients that are of that certain community and the struggles that they’re going through. As a nursing student who is in their position in some ways, I am able to relate and provide better care.”

“Philadelphia, as an entire city, is of course very progressive,” Rubinson added. “And to now see that…Temple doctors and nurses have done certain things to make it that they are ranked in this area is amazing to see. It makes me want to work there.”

TUH also established a transgender advisory board in 2017, which is based in the community and chaired by two Philadelphia residents. The board oversees the hospital to ensure it’s in line with the needs of transgender people.

The board meets monthly and focuses on implementing the best medical practices for the transgender community.

“I am just really, really proud to be a part of this,” said Linda John-

son, the co-chair of the transgender advisory board. “We’re doing something that will be lasting, and I think we’re making a big push and we’re making a big statement by doing this initiative, especially in North Philadelphia.”

Moore’s goal is to have other facilities in the Temple Health System, like the Katz School of Medicine, pass the HEI survey by next year.

“It should be fairly easy, because we’re all under the same umbrella so there’s a lot of different areas that could really take advantage,” Moore said.

“For the first time I feel like Temple is breaching a gap,” Johnson said. “I’m very impressed with this and I’m very proud to be apart of the committee and try and make this a better environment that’s more receptive to the transgender population and the LGBTQ.” madison.seitchik@temple.edu

ADVERTISEMENT

GRADUATING IN MAY? Discounts on Tuition & Housing

May 14 - June 25 (6 weeks) • May 14 - July 25 (10 weeks) June 27 - August 8 (6 weeks) Internships & Independent Studies (12 weeks) Take at least one class in Hammonton, Manahawkin or Woodbine & get THREE COURSES for the PRICE OF TWO! Classes in: Galloway • Hammonton • Manahawkin • Woodbine

PUT IT IN PRINT. GRADVERTISE WITH US. FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT ADVERTISING@TEMPLE-NEWS.COM

stockton.edu/summer18 Stockton is an Equal Opportunity Institution

News Desk 215.204.7419 news@temple-news.com

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 7

School of Rock founder becomes the student The School of Rock founder created a nationwide music education franchise.

BY IAN WALKER

Assistant Features Editor

D

uring a conference with his professor Mary Levy, first-year law student Paul Green recorded the conversation as she critiqued his legal brief.

“She’s just like, ‘Oh no, no, that’s not how you spell that, no. Apostrophe! Apostrophe!’, and I’m just there laughing,” Green said. “She’s like, ‘Paul, no one ever laughs when I’m tearing apart their paper, and you’re so not defensive.’ I’m like, ‘This is what I’m paying for.’”

Levy said she’s never had a student so open to feedback.

“It’s delightful to him when I do that so he can see how to improve it, how to get better,” she added.

Green, a Port Richmond native and founder of the nationwide music education program School of Rock, returned to Philadelphia in August 2017 to attend the Beasley School of Law, while also starting a new Roxborough-based music school, The Paul Green Rock Academy.

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Paul Green, a first-year law student, teaches music at The Paul Green Rock Academy in Roxborough on April 4. Green is the founder of the School of Rock franchise, which has brought rock music lessons and a chance to perform at concert venues to middle and high schoolers all over the country.

ROCK | PAGE 11

PEOPLE YOU SHOULD KNOW

Student protests DACA repeal in Washington A sophomore political science major was arrested twice during protests this semester.

BY EMMA PADNER

For The Temple News

During Tyler Lum’s spring break, he spent a night in jail.

Lum, a sophomore political science major, was arrested with an estimated 80 other people during protests in Washington, D.C. in front of the Capitol Building. The protests were against President Donald Trump’s repeal of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals — most often referred to as DACA — in September 2017.

This semester, he ran for student body president on the VoiceTU ticket, which lost to IgniteTU last week.

DACA, an executive order by

former President Barack Obama, protects immigrant children who came to the United States without documentation. It allows them to renew their legal status every two years to avoid deportation and to receive work permits.

Lum began participating in protests for Dreamers, the group of people protected by DACA, in December 2017, but became aware of the issue in September when Trump rescinded the program.

Trump gave Congress until March 5 to find a solution, but this was unsuccessful. Two federal court orders in January and February allowed DACA recipients to apply for two-year renewals of their permits again.

Lum came to the U.S. from Malaysia when he was 7 years old.

ACTIVISM | PAGE 13

MELISSA RESURRECCION / THE TEMPLE NEWS Musicians in Jazz Band Number 4 rehearse in Presser Hall on April 3. The group prepared for its show on April 17 at South Kitchen & Jazz Parlor, a jazz club and restaurant on Broad Street near Green.

Students perform at jazz bar Boyer’s Jazz Band Number 4 will perform at South Kitchen & Jazz Parlor on April 17.

BY AYOOLUWA ARIYO For The Temple News

COURTESY / VIVIANNE PECKHAM Tyler Lum (center), a sophomore political science major, was arrested with an estimated 80 other people during DACA protests in front of the Capitol Building over spring break.

On a school day in 2015 at Cheltenham High School, Bill Saurman, remembers hearing jazz music that captured his attention.

It was coming from the Temple University Jazz Band led by Terell Stafford, director of the jazz studies program in the Boyer College of Music and Dance. The song was an arrangement from “E.S.P.,” a jazz album

by Miles Davis.

“I remember the energy and the sounds that came out of that band was just so energizing,” said Saurman, who is also a trombon-

ist. “It was like a high. I wanted to be part of that energy so much. ... That’s what got Temple on my radar.”

Saurman, now a freshman jazz performance major, is one of 17 students that play in Jazz Band Number 4, a jazz ensemble at Boyer. Saurman plays lead trombone with the group, and has also been part of several student bands that have played at South Kitchen & Jazz Parlor, a restaurant and bar on Broad Street near Green with live jazz music.

On April 17, Jazz Band Number 4, will perform at the restaurant, along with the New Orleans Jazz Ensemble, which is also a student group from Boyer.

Danielle Avicolli, a junior jazz performance major and a vocalist with Jazz Band Number

4, grew up listening to the music of her father, who sang jazz.

But in college Avicolli chose to pursue classical music. She spent two years studying at Ithaca College in New York before transferring to Temple to pursue jazz in the fall.

“I realized I hated classical music,” Avicolli said. “So I auditioned and came here, and I’m very glad that I did. Being immersed in constant jazz and the feeling of jazz just makes me love music much more.”

Avicolli auditioned and became a member of Jazz Band Number 4 shortly after she got into Boyer’s jazz performance program.

“It was definitely a very good decision on my end,” Avicolli

JAZZ | PAGE 9

BANDAGES | PAGE 9

LIVE IN PHILLY | PAGE 10

BSU | PAGE 11

POETRY | PAGE 13

A bioengineering professor has created a 3D printer that makes personalized bandages that mold to patients’ skin.

Temple Project Haiti, a student organization, hosted a charity auction for a Haitian orphanage in Old City on Friday.

The Black Student Union is hosting its third annual BSU Week, which includes a film screening and photo shoot.

Temple hosted the College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational last weekend. Babel, Temple’s poetry collective, won two awards.

FEATURES TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 8

ADVERTISEMENT

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 MUSICIAN

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

MORE THAN A

MASTER’S DEGREE The University of Scranton, a Catholic, Jesuit institution, is a nationally recognized university known for outstanding academics, state-of-the-art facilities, and an exceptional sense of community.

The University offers more than 30 graduate programs accredited by 10 professional associations.

GR A DUAT E PROG RA M S IN CLUD E • Accountancy (MAcc) • Business Administration

(MBA and DBA) • Chemistry (MS) • Counseling (MS) • Education (MS) • Finance (MS)

• Health Administration (MHA) • Health Informatics (MS) • Human Resources (MS) • Nursing (MSN and DNP) • Physical Therapy (DPT) • Software Engineering (MS) • Theology (MA)

scranton.edu/gradeducation gradadmissions@scranton.edu

Shine On!

He said for him, music and technology go hand in hand. Butts plays trumpet, drums, guitar and piano, but he said he can “make noise on almost anything.”

During the past few years, he has released a spiritual Christmas album and two other singles.

He was born in Washington, D.C., but he has lived in New Jersey for the last 20 years.

Butts first attended Temple as a music major after he graduated high school in the 1970s, but dropped out soon after because he didn’t think he had what it took to become “the next big star.”

“Whenever I get the chance, I tell kids that if they think they want to stop going to college for a while, that they should stay in for as long as they can,” Butts said. “Once you get out and start living your life, it’s harder to get back into it.”

After leaving Temple, Butts worked as a manager at large department stores like Macy’s, Staples and Gimbels, which was once the largest department store in the country before it closed in 1987.

A constant in his life was a love of technology and music. Butts got his first computer in 1989. At the time, he said people didn’t believe he owned a computer because it was so uncommon.

He initially purchased the computer for his children to use and for his own music recording. Although technology had always interested him, Butts said he eventually realized that he wanted to embrace it as a career.

“At some point, I realized that this would be the future, and I wanted to be in on it,” Butts said. “I didn’t ever think it was something I would do as a job.”

Now, Butts helps people resolve computer issues at TASB. Ann-Marie Anderson, the marketing director for Temple University Press — which is housed in TASB — said one of Butts’ strengths is his ability to explain computer technology in an accessible way.

“Robert is our go-to guy,” Anderson said. “He has to be relied upon for a lot, and whenever there’s a quirk or something, he’s on it.”

But beyond his technical role, Butts

also brings his musical skills into the workplace. During the annual staff holiday party at TASB, Butts plays piano.

Butts started taking classes at Boyer eight years ago. He has dozens of college credits from taking classes like music theory, but he isn’t working toward a degree. Butts said that his musical skills have benefited from working alongside other Boyer students.

“I always took classes that were interesting to me or what I needed at the time, and that’s kind of what I’m still doing,” he said.

Butts likes to live his life through the lens of a “jazz sensibility.”

He said, for him, jazz sensibility is making something new out of what already exists. It’s about “working with whatever you have.”

“When a jazz artist tries to do a song, they don’t try to do it in a way that others have done it,” Butts said. “If Ella Fitzgerald sings a song that a hundred other people have covered, she doesn’t try to do it the way they do. She sings it the way Ella Fitzgerald sings it.”

He is taking this current semester off to apply some of his music education outside the classroom. Butts performs as a duo and trio at corporate events, leads the music at his church and helps people develop demos in his home studio. He primarily plays jazz music, but he plays hymns and Christian rock at church.

Butts plays the piano and leads the music at Milestone Church in Magnolia, New Jersey. He began playing there when the church’s pianist left the congregation. Music is how Butts stays connected to God, he said.

“I love playing in church,” Butts said.

“I don’t necessarily like being the boss, but on the other hand, it also means I have the opportunity to help develop the others.”

Despite all his other responsibilities, music is an essential part of his identity and how he sees the world.

“Music for me is a very important part of my life because music allows me to express my feelings and also to experience the feelings of others,” Butts said.

“Music is something that helps me to relate with all different kinds of people.” erin.blewett@temple.edu

ADVERTISEMENT

Join Us for

Summer Classes!

Credit Classes Start: May 21, June 11 & July 2

In-Person, Online or Hybrid Bucks.edu/Summer

Bucks SMART. County Community College

PERKASIE

•

NEWTOWN

features@temple-news.com

•

BRISTOL

•

ONLINE

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

FEATURES TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 9

ON CAMPUS

Professor develops individual 3D-printed bandages The printer uses electrospinning technology to print bandages directly onto a person’s skin.

BY KALEKIDAN DEREJE For The Temple News

Jonathan Gerstenhaber wants to make medical devices more personal. That’s what he did by developing 3D-printed bandages.

Gerstenhaber, a bioengineering professor, along with the help of other engineering faculty and students, created a 3D printer that uses electrospinning technology to print bandages directly onto a patient’s skin, making them fit the individual’s physical form.

Electrospinning technology is a production method used to make polymer fiber, which is a synthetic material.

On March 25, Gerstenhaber presented a demonstration of the prototype — which consists of a larger robotic piece made from additional 3D-printed components — at The Franklin Institute.

Gerstenhaber drew inspiration from a presentation made by Peter Lelkes, the bioengineering department chair, while he was pursuing his Ph.D. in bioengineering at Temple last year. He said Lelkes’ work focused on bone regeneration using fabrics made from cytosine, one of the bases found in DNA. “What he found was that suddenly he had an ability to lay these fabrics on holes drilled in skulls of mice, and they could heal them,” Gerstenhaber said. “[The holes were] big enough that they wouldn’t [normally] heal on a mouse.”

When Gerstenhaber saw the presentation, he started to think

about individualizing dental and jaw implants, many of which are standardized.

“All of their implants were either flat, or perfectly round, something they could do without having a complicated robot do it for them because they were limited,” Gerstenhaber said. “[Prosthetic companies] couldn’t make any realistic examples of any of these use scenarios because the tools didn’t exist.”

Branching off from Lelkes’ project, Gerstenhaber wanted to develop a flexible bandage for serious wounds that would not only stop bleeding, but also quickly regenerate the skin.

“I was like, ‘Wow, I’m making this tool to make my life easier, but it’s going to open this whole new avenue of research,’” Gerstenhaber said.

His bandages are made with a soy protein, which helps tissue heal faster than it would if covered by a conventional bandage. The technique is being researched in labs within the College of Engineering. The participating scientists are testing the bandages to ensure they have the capability of helping external tissue regenerate.

When applied with water, the white bandages adhere to the skin in an almost invisible fashion.

Then, when the patient moves, the bandage moves with them, almost as though it were part of their skin.

“We’ve mainly been looking at burns, and the sorts of wounds that don’t heal well, and when they heal, they sort of heal like very bad skin,” Gerstenhaber said.

Some other bioengineering professors, as well as undergraduate and graduate students, have contributed to the project under

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 JAZZ said. “I didn’t know how to sing in front of a big band, [but] here I’m developing skills to use my voice as more of an instrument, which is the whole point of vocal jazz.”

“I’ve been able to find a strength in my voice,” she added. “I’m more...confident in singing in front of a big band.”

Avicolli said South has created a “link” for Boyer students to go listen to live music by their peers and professors.

“I think South is the one [place] that Temple University pairs with most often… [to] listen to certain groups of students here who have gotten together and created combos and bands together and it kind of spirals and the connections grow,” Avicolli said.

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Jonathan Gerstenhaber, a bioengineering professor, explains the methodology behind the 3D-bandage printer in an engineering lab on Main Campus on March 28.

the supervision of Lelkes and bioengineering professor Yah-el Harel.

Baran Arig, a sophomore bioengineering major, started working on the bandage project as a freshman.

Arig, who conducted research on electrospinning in high school, said he wanted to continue his study of the technology.

“For the most part, what I am doing is I am making a viscous solution for the electrospinner,” Arig said. “I am spinning these solutions to create these electrospun scaffolds that can be looked at through

Saurman said South often brings in great jazz musicians to perform.

“That’s definitely one of the few places where it’s got kind of a jazz thing going on,” Saurman said. “They have a lot more contemporary smooth jazz and funk guests in their venue, because that was the goal, that South is supporting contemporary jazz more than other places.”

He’s played at South a few times too with friends and colleagues. He’s also played at other jazz clubs in the city including Chris’ Jazz Cafe, The Philadelphia Clef Club of Jazz and Performing Arts and the Kimmel Center.

South is a popular and respected jazz club among Temple’s jazz students and the Philadelphia jazz community. A number of independent jazz bands made up of stu-

a microscope.”

In addition to the main printing prototype, Gerstenhaber and his colleagues have also constructed a modified, handheld version of the 3D printer. The handheld printer is closer to being ready for market than the full-size 3D printer.

The larger version is still undergoing some alterations to improve its efficiency. Personalizing the bandages requires a time-consuming scan of the targeted area.

Gerstenhaber said he hopes that in the future, the handheld model will become a household

dents and faculty members from Boyer have played there.

Avicolli said Philadelphia’s jazz clubs are well known in the jazz community.

“I think, because there are so few that we all just respect them because that’s our source of income that’s our life,” Avicolli said.

Saurman describes the jazz scene in Philadelphia as “vibrant and beautiful.” He added that there’s a great history of jazz in Philadelphia, stemming from the influence of notable artists like John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, Pat Martino and John Swana.

“Some people would [ask] questions like, ‘Is jazz dying?’ and really if you’re here in Philly, I beg to disagree,” Saurman said.

It’s important to Avicolli and Saurman to find gigs and play at shows off campus. It

staple, but for now he and his team are focused on bringing it to market.

While Gerstenhaber recognizes all medical devices, like physical implants or skin grafts, are important, he said tissue regeneration is the greatest solution to healing wounds.

“If I can allow your body to heal itself, that’s really the best thing I can give to you,” Gerstenhaber said. “Especially if that healing is natural and is complete.” kalekidan.dereje@temple.edu

helps them gain real-life experience in performance that they otherwise might not gain in the classroom, they said.

“You’re also establishing yourself in the scene and if you play well, do all the professional things you’ll also start to gain reputation,” Saurman said. “People start to take notice and then that’s how you start getting more and more and work within this particular scene.” “[It’s] also literally part of our education,” Avicolli said. “I think our education here at Temple is really, really important...but it doesn’t stop here. It continues on with our actual, real-life gigs.” ayooluwa.ariyo@temple.edu

ADVERTISEMENT

NEW! ast Breakef to Order

Custom

Offer Valid for a limited time.

Mad

features@temple-news.com

FEATURES PAGE 10

TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

Student club hosts charity auction for Haitian orphanage

ERIN BLEWETT / THE TEMPLE NEWS The student organization Temple Project Haiti hosted a charity auction at East End Salon in Old City on Friday. The hair salon was converted into a gallery space where sponsors fundraised for the Saint Francis Xavier Orphanage in Artibonite, Haiti. Every spring break, the student organization volunteers at the orphanage. “We fundraise for them all year long and we do different events like bake sales, selling cupcakes and other things,� said group member Annissa Juste, who is a junior political science major.

Temple Project Haiti formed after a 7.0 magnitude earthquake devastated Haiti in 2010. In the past, the group has helped the orphanage access clean water and plant a garden.

The charity auction featured paintings, photos, glassware, sketches of art that patrons could buy to support the group. The space showcased work from Temple, Philadelphia and international artists.

ADVERTISEMENT

features@temple-news.com

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

FEATURES TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 11

ON CAMPUS

BSU dedicates week of events to Black culture The Black Student Union is hosting its third annual BSU Week of events.

“WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE SONG?”

BY CLAIRE BRENNAN For The Temple News

For Black Student Union President Kourtney Thompson, her student organization helps foster a feeling of “togetherness” among Black students on Main Campus.

“We have a safe space agreement where we consistently promote a space where you can come and kind of say how you feel,” said Thompson, a junior advertising major.

This week, the organization will host its third annual BSU Week. Admission is free for all the week’s events.

“That week is centered around Blackness and Black culture,” Thompson said. “The week is to essentially give [the Black student community] content and events that are specifically marketed to them and created for them.”

For this year’s installment, the BSU adopted a mixtape theme, where each event will relate to a particular song.

On Monday, the BSU kicked off the week with “What’s the Scenario,” a discussion series named after the song “Scenario” by A Tribe Called Quest.

The discussion questioned how what-if scenarios would impact Black people like “What if Hillary [Clinton] won?”, said Gabe Jones, a sophomore marketing major and the BSU’s marketing and promotions chair.

“We try to make an environment that’s not class-like, where you feel like you’re being lectured at that whole time,” Thompson said. “It’s more like we’re giving you information, and you can discuss what you think about it and [how] it affects you personally and the world around you.”

The BSU holds discussions similar to Monday’s program as part of its weekly meetings for its 75 general body members and 10 executive board members. While discussions sometimes cover serious issues, like environmental racism, Jones said the topics vary.

“We just had one on Black cartoons, we’ve had one on conspiracy theories, stuff like that,” Jones said. “Our upcoming discussion is on Black philanthropy.”

Some discussions earlier in the semester have been focused on family dynamics in the Black community, hate speech compared to free speech and beauty standards.

“We like to bring up things that will affect our community that most people won’t want to talk about,” said Sariyah Andrews, a sophomore Africology and African American studies major and BSU’s event coordinator.

Tuesday’s event is a photo shoot for members of several campus minority organizations. Groups including the Progressive NAACP, the Student Organization for Caribbean Awareness and the Organization of African Students will gather at the Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity, Advocacy and Leadership on Broad Street near Diamond at 4 p.m. The BSU hopes to use the pictures from the photoshoot to create an independent student or-

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 ROCK Green founded the Paul Green School of Rock in Philadelphia in 1998 to provide middle and high schoolers with music lessons and the chance to perform as bands at music venues. In the next decade, dozens of School of Rock franchises were established across the country.

In 2010, he sold the company.

He then spent several years living in Woodstock, New York, where he founded the first iteration of The Paul Green Rock Academy.

Last year, he sold his stake in that business and moved to Philadelphia with his wife Lisa and their son to attend Beasley and open the new school in Roxborough.

Before he founded the first School of Rock, Green said no other models for group music education existed.

“Lessons were something that happened in the back of a crappy guitar store,” Green said. “I stumbled into a gap. I said, ‘There’s an opportunity to codify music les-

IFEOMA ILOKA Freshman Public health

The song is called ‘Yur Luv’ [by Nigerian singer Tekno.] … I like the beat, and the lyrics are nice. … It’s like a catchy song, and it has a happy feeling to it, like it makes me want to dance.

VEENA PRAKRIYA / THE TEMPLE NEWS Kourtney Thompson (top) and Sariyah Andrews, members of the Black Student Union, are hosting the BSU Week.

ganization yearbook.

Andrews said the photo shoot is meant to promote “Black Boy Joy” and “Black Girl Magic,” which are social media movements that celebrate Black people.

“We’re gonna have a photoshoot in the IDEAL office just to...show everyone that we care about them at Black Temple and show them they can feel empowered,” Andrews said.

BSU Week will also include a dance workshop on Wednesday at 6 p.m. in Morgan D301, where junior communication studies major Celine Corbie will teach attendees choreography to the song “Tempo” by Chris Brown. The following day, the organization will host a screening of “Straight Outta Compton” at 7 p.m. in Room 200C of the Student Center.

The week will conclude with Friday’s Black Business Marketplace, a gathering of 22 Blackowned businesses and campus minority organizations at 5 p.m. in Student Center Room 200C. The collection of 20 vendors will include groups like Maschine Life Empire, a Philadelphiabased rap group with its own clothing line, and sophomore psychology major Zeina Fofana, who runs her own art business called Art By Zay. Fofana will sell her work and create live paintings at the marketplace.

The week’s events are intended to be fun but also serve a greater purpose of uniting people of color on campus, Andrews said.

“Seeing those white faces, seeing people that don’t look like you is hard,” Andrews said. “I take pride in using my position to connect everyone who is a person of color on this campus.” claire.brennan@temple.edu

sons for kids.’”

Now a law student, Green said he hopes to practice law to help other artists and entrepreneurs protect their creations.

Green, who studied philosophy as an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania, added he also wants to study law because of his interest in argumentation.

Listening to a professor like Levy teach law feels like “listening to a concert pianist,” he said.

“Because he’s a performer, he really responds to a good performance,” Levy said. “As a matter of fact, one day I gave a lecture and he actually did clap.”

Outside of his legal studies, Green conducts weekly group rehearsals for Rock Academy in a rehearsal space on Ridge Avenue near Leverington. The group will perform its debut concerts on June 9 and 10 at The Fire, a music venue on Girard Avenue near 4th Street.

Since beginning rehearsals in February, Green has worked with his 14 students on learning 50 songs, including popular classic rock songs like Elton John’s “Rock-

et Man” and Led Zeppelin’s “The Lemon Song.”

Each song he chose, Green said, is meant to teach a particular musical skill, like improvisation or singing harmonies.

When explaining these concepts to his students, Green employs dozens of unusual, off-thecuff analogies. As his students improvised over a blues chord progression during last Wednesday’s rehearsal, Green compared the importance of developing motifs in improvisation to playing a fighting video game.

“If you find [an attack] combo that works, keep doing the combo until it stops,” Green said.

Many of Green’s students, like 14-year-old drummer Joe Guller, started at the School of Rock before auditioning for Rock Academy.

In his audition, Guller said Green warned him about the commitment the program demanded.

Knowing his reputation as a critical teacher, he expected Green to be like actor J.K. Simmons in the film “Whiplash,” who plays the role

MATT CROFT

Senior Mechanical engineering

‘Hide The Wine’ by Carly Pearce. It’s like country music. … It’s just really catchy, it’s on the radio. Everything here at Temple, it’s so difficult and classes just are really stressful, and this [song] is just like talking about simple, simple stuff. … I had always been more of like a rock ’n’ roll, metal guy, and I started dating this girl. She just blasts [country] all the time and so I actually came to like it.

MUHAMMAD ALQAHTANI Freshman Mechanical engineering

I like [‘Batelbak Haja’ by Iraqi-Saudi Arabian singer Majid Al Muhandis] because he’s the best [singer] in my country. … I like his voice. It’s unique. … The rhythm, there’s nothing like it.

of a verbally abusive music instructor.

But Guller said his initial expectations were wrong.

“I was kind of surprised like how much nicer he was, because he made himself out to be like ‘Whiplash,’” Guller said. “I thought it was going to be a lot more hectic than what it is, but I still like it.”

At Beasley, Green has a different reputation. Many of his peers know him for his passion and desire to meet everyone.

“He’s one of the most popular people at the law school by far,” said Stephen Vanyo, a first-year law student. “Everybody likes him.

He’s friends with professors, he’s friends with students, he’s friends with support staff.”

Last fall, Vanyo and first-year law student Dan Blabolil, who play drums and bass respectively, formed a band with Green called The Mailbox Rule. The name refers to a legal term they learned in their contracts course.

In February, the group served as the house band for Beasley’s student talent show, playing short

musical interludes between performances. The group will perform again on May 10 at The Fire for a live karaoke night to honor graduating Beasley students.

For Green, whether a person studies law or music, it’s essential to understand your weaknesses in order to improve.

“Unfortunately, the two most important words in teaching kids music are, ‘You suck,’” Green said.

“You don’t say it, you show it.”

To prove this to his students, he played them the recording of Levy critiquing his work.

“He wants his students to know that what he’s doing to them is not anything other than what he is subjecting himself to,” Levy said. ian.walker@temple.edu @ian_walker12 Editor’s Note: Ian Walker previously took lessons at the School of Rock in Cherry Hill, New Jersey.

features@temple-news.com

FEATURES TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 12

Alumna, jazz bassist creates ‘indie jazz’ fusion Nicole Saphos, a 2012 jazz studies alumna, released her EP “Buzz & Bloom” in March.

BY EMMA KULICZKOWSKI For The Temple News

When Nicole Saphos returns to Philadelphia in late April to perform at the Center City Jazz Festival, it will be her first time performing in the city since her college graduation six years ago.

Saphos, a full-time jazz bassist and singer-songwriter, will perform at the seventh annual Center City Jazz Festival on April 28. She will play with her trio at Chris’ Jazz Cafe on Sansom Street near Broad.

“I’m so excited because the festival started in 2012, which was the year that I left Philly,” said Saphos, a 2012 jazz studies alumna. “So I’ve never even been to this festival. I’m super, super psyched about it.”

On March 30, Saphos released her second solo jazz EP “Buzz & Bloom.” The EP features seven original songs that were inspired by her recent life experiences, like her engagement and a physical injury.

It was supported in part by a grant from the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County, and can be purchased on CD or vinyl and is available on iTunes, Spotify and Bandcamp.

After the release of her first EP, “Tiptoe,” in November 2016, Saphos suffered a moderate concussion. For about a month, Saphos was unable to read or listen to music like normal.

“That whole month changed my perspective on how I listened to music and how I would play and practice, so that was a big part of it,” Saphos said.

Saphos has been playing bass since she was 11 years old. She originally wanted to the play the cello, but her middle school orchestra teacher chose the bass for her when he noticed she had bigger hands that would better fit the instrument.

“Once I started playing, it stuck with me,” said Saphos, who now lives in Washington, D.C. Saphos was born in Nutley, New Jersey. She moved to Los Angeles when she was 7 years old in 1997.

She started playing jazz music in high school, after her love for the genre developed through the lens of musical theater. She listened to music from plays like “Annie Get Your Gun” and “Gypsy.”

“From a really early age I was listening to musical theater so it was kind of a gateway to jazz,” Saphos said. “It was very appealing music to me.”

“Tiptoe” contained what Saphos called “straightforward jazz.”

“Buzz & Bloom” takes a different approach. “‘Buzz & Bloom’ is kind of a jazz hybrid,” Saphos said. “I’m calling it indie jazz. It has much more pop and folk influence combined with jazz.

Her recent EP was released with Local Woman Records, a label based in Washington, D.C. The title was inspired by American poet Adrienne Rich’s poem, “Thirtythree,” which includes the phrase “buzz and bloom.” Rich’s poem focuses on coming to terms with aging and questioning her future.

“That phrase became something of a creativity mantra for me,” Saphos said. “Anxiety is a common theme throughout the al-

bum. … [It’s] kind of how you use your anxiety in a positive way as opposed to letting it put you in a stall in your progress.”

In addition to playing bass in her songs, Saphos also sings. While at Temple, she studied with Joanna Pascale her junior and senior year, who is a jazz voice professor at the Boyer College of Music and Dance.

“I had been a huge admirer of her and her voice for a long time,” Saphos said. “I was getting to a place where I wanted to do playing and singing. She helped me work a lot of stuff out, especially at the beginning of retraining my voice.”

Saphos said that she first became interested in releasing original music toward the end of her career at Boyer when she created her trio in 2011.

Her trio includes her husband, Ele Rubenstein, on drums and John Lee on guitar.

Saphos said that after applying for the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County grant, writing up all the songs and recording them, the album took about a year to finish.

Dave Sanders, a 2012 jazz studies alumnus, became friends with Saphos in 2008 during their freshman year. He said he enjoyed her new EP. “The fact that it’s all original is really cool,” Sanders said. “Not everyone does that, especially in the jazz world. It’s cool to have a full album of originals.”

Some of her favorite classes included ones she took with jazz studies professor Ben Schachter and Dan Monaghan’s theory classes.

Monaghan, who is also a jazz studies professor, remembers Sa-

COURTESY / NICOLE SAPHOS Nicole Saphos, a 2012 jazz studies alumna, released her EP, “Buzz and Bloom,” on March 30. Saphos will perform at the Center City Jazz Festival on April 28.

phos in his classes, which she took three semesters in a row. After seeing what she has done after graduation, he’s excited that her career took off.

“As an educator, that’s what you hope for,” Monaghan said.

“You want your students to take the information that they gain and then want them to go find their own voice and to pursue this craft.

She’s the total success story.” emma.kuliczkowski@temple.edu

ADVERTISEMENT CHECK OUT THE TEMPLE NEWS 2017-18 STAFF PICKS. THE PLAYLIST IS AVAILABLE ON SPOTIFY UNDER “2018 TTN MUSIC PICKS.” SONG

ARTIST

STAFF MEMBER

Garden (Say It Like Dat)

SZA

Michaela Winberg, Editor-in-Chief

TOKYO

BROCKHAMPTON

Grace Shallow, Managing Editor

Getaway Car

Taylor Swift

Jenny Roberts, Supervising Editor

Get Away

George Ezra

Julie Christie, Enterprise Editor

High Horse

Kacey Musgraves

Gillian McGoldrick, News Editor

Slow Disco

St. Vincent

Kelly Brennan, Asst. News Editor

The Tide

Pale Waves

Jayna Schaffer, Opinion Editor

Till Death

Japanese Breakfast

Emily Scott, Features Editor

black screen

LCD Soundsystem

Ian Walker, Asst. Features Editor

Boomerang

Jidenna

Evan Easterling, Sports Editor

ELEMENT.

Kendrick Lamar

Tom Ignudo, Asst. Sports Editor

DNA.

Kendrick Lamar

Will Bleier, Copy Editor

Fred Astaire

Jukebox the Ghost

Shannon Hutchinson, Multimedia Editor

Just Can’t Get Enough

Sheer Mag

Jake Cepis, Asst. Multimedia Editor

Woman

Kesha

Sydney Schaefer, Photo Editor

Drinkin’ Problem

Midland

Jamie Cottrell, Asst. Photo Editor

When You Die

MGMT

Courtney Redmon, Design Editor

Stay For It

RL Grime

Greta Anderson, Designer

Walls Could Talk

Halsey

Jen Wells, Designer

Breathe - Lauv Remix

Astrid S

Finnian Saylor, Business & Marketing Manager

God’s Plan

Drake

Valentina Wrisley, Asst. Business & Marketing Manager

Naked

Ella Mai

Mira Wise, Advertising Manager

Music & Lyrics by William Finn | Book by Rachel Sheinkin Conceived by Rebecca Feldman | Directed by Amina Robinson Musical Direction by Steven Gross | Choreographed by Dann Dunn

April 18 - 29, 2018 Randall Theater

2020 N 13th Street, Philadelphia PA 19122

tfma.temple.edu/events • box office 215.204.1122 features@temple-news.com

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

FEATURES TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 13

ON CAMPUS

Temple hosts college poetry slam, wins two awards Spoken word poets from around the country came to compete in CUPSI 2018.

BY BRIANNA BAKER For The Temple News

In between rounds at the 2018 College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational, host and Philadelphia-based poet Kai Davis wanted to bring the energy up in the room. She led the crowd in a verse of North Philadelphia rapper Meek Mill’s “Dreams and Nightmares.”

Everyone from Babel, Temple’s performance poetry group, rapped along with her.

Temple hosted the 2018 CUPSI from Wednesday to Saturday in the Student Center and the Temple Performing Arts Center.

Organized by the Association of College Unions International, the spoken word tournament has visited a different college every year since it was founded in 2001. This year, teams from 66 schools participated.

“We are international winning artists, so for CUPSI to be here means so much,” said sophomore public relations major Natalia Garay. “We’ve worked so hard for it, and we work so hard for it every year.”

Garay is Babel’s social media and event coordinator.

New York University’s team took home the grand title at the finals, held on Saturday

at TPAC. The finals and subsequent award ceremony were hosted by Davis, a 2016 Africology and African American studies and English alumna and the former creative director of Babel.

Temple’s team, which consisted entirely of Babel members, came in second place in Friday’s semifinals. During Saturday’s award ceremony, the group also took home the Best Poem award for its piece “Meek Free,” about how the rapper’s arrest represents Philadelphia’s broader systemic racial injustices. Babel members also won the Best Love Poem award for “Genesis.”

Temple won CUPSI in 2016 at the University of Texas at Austin and won in a fourway tie in 2017 at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Junior political science major and CUPSI competitor Veronica Nocella was proud of Temple’s semifinals achievement.

“The performance was really electric, and I think that was the help of the audience,” she said. “We had a lot of people from Philly show up, not only people from Babel.

So it was good to have that much family that were also in the audience to just help keep our spirits high.”

CUPSI teams compete in a series of bouts, consisting of four rounds. In each round, a team sends up one poet or group of poets to a perform a piece. Each poem is

ERIN BLEWETT / THE TEMPLE NEWS Vei Vei Thomas (left), a Wellesley College freshman cognitive and linguistic sciences major, and Sara Nwafor, a Wellesley College sophomore women and gender studies major, perform together during the College Union Poetry Slam Invitational finals on Saturday in the Temple Performing Arts Center.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7 ACTIVISM His mother is a U.S. citizen, so he was automatically granted citizenship.

“Growing up with the understanding of the immigrant story, and the idea that there is the American dream still out there, I think is definitely something that ties into why I was so passionate about the issue,” Lum said.

When DACA was rescinded, Lum, who is TSG’s director of government affairs, said TSG worked to find resources for students at Temple who may have been affected, whether it was legal help or counseling.

“We were trying to figure out if there was a way to help out with the tuition for these students, because if they lose their status they struggle with trying to pay for schooling,” Lum said.

Lum first made the trip to Washington, D.C., in December with Student Body President Tyrell Mann-Barnes. They both assumed it was for an academic conference, because Mann-Barnes had met the organizer the summer before at a leadership conference.

When they arrived at the church, they realized that United We Dream was a grassroots organization, and they would be doing more than learning about activism.

While in Washington, D.C., Lum participated in political sit-ins, which are protests where demonstrators take over a space.

The goal of each sit-in was to gain media attention and put pressure on elected officials by occupying their offices.

“Whenever you occupy their office, not only does it disrupt what they are trying to do, but if they are trying to come off to the media as people who are friendly to undocumented people, they don’t want to call the Capitol Police on you,” Lum said. “It puts them in a very weird position when you shut down their office and...they have to make a decision of how much they are going to tolerate the people.”

During the office sit-ins, the group would sing songs and chant, “Undocumented, unafraid” and “Up, up with liberation, down, down with deportation,” in order to share their message and comfort the undocumented people who were telling their stories.

then judged on a scale of one to 10 by five random audience members, selected before each bout, who have no affiliation with the competing schools.

Preliminary bouts take place the first two days of CUPSI, followed by semifinals on the third day and the final stage on the fourth. NYU competed against Stanford University, Virginia Commonwealth University and Wellesley College in Saturday’s finals.

Though competition is an important aspect of CUPSI, participants can also attend supplementary activities during the fourday event. These include writing workshops, ice cream socials, open mics and themed slams, like the Nerd Slam and Head to Head Haiku Slam.

These activities help foster one of Garay’s favorite parts of CUPSI: the sense of community.

“We are always very excited for CUPSI, solely for the fact that we get to see our friends,” she said. “We are friends with a lot of other universities, and we get to see them and we get to support them and hear new poems from them.”

ACUI Educational Program Manager Kim Pho said this encouraging community is especially important in slam poetry, which often tackles sensitive topics.

“When you talk about race, when you

talk about LGBTQ issues, when you talk about religion, like these identity pieces of what makes a person a person, this is just a way that students can reclaim who they are and share that with the world,” she said. “Especially in a world where it’s not so common or it’s not fully accepted.”

Ugochi Egonu, a freshman creative writing major at NYU, writes about race and womanhood in her work. In one group piece, she and her teammates spoke about how most college parties aren’t welcoming to people of color, women or the LGBTQ community.

“To me, poetry is one of the avenues I use to tell my own stories and to give voice to the things that I thought made me voiceless,” she said.

Egonu said she enjoyed her time at Temple during CUPSI, and found that the sense of community in slam poetry was especially strong in Philadelphia.

“I am honestly so impressed and amazed by all the beautiful love they show for each other and they all show for their own stories,” she said. “I’m glad I got to witness that and be a part of that, and I hope to be welcome when I come back.” brianna.nicole.baker@temple.edu

ERIN BLEWETT / THE TEMPLE NEWS A group of New York University students performs at the College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational finals on Saturday in the Temple Performing Arts Center. The team took home the grand title.

When Lum returned to Washington, D.C., with United We Dream in March, he was asked by group members if he was willing to get arrested.

“As somebody who is in this country with a certain level of privilege, I think that the very least I can do is speak up and say something,” Lum said. “If that includes me being arrested, if that’s what the community feels is necessary for the movement, then I think that’s something I can easily contribute.”

In March, Lum protested with the group outside the Capitol Building. The group shut down an intersection of New Jersey and Independence avenues by tying group members together with PVC piping, chains and clips.

When the police arrived, all of the members that were chained to each other, including Lum, were charged with resisting arrest.

Lum spent the night in a jail cell with nearly 30 people who were involved in the protest.

“That was a really eye-opening moment for me, because I saw how poorly they treat people within a jail,” Lum said. “It’s very much the same way that they treat a lot of

immigrants at detention centers, whenever they are going to be deported.”

Mann-Barnes said he learned how to use his own privilege to empower undocumented people through Lum’s activism.

“I really admire the work that Tyler does, and how he does it selflessly,” Mann-Barnes said. “I think it’s important that when people traditionally have privilege or some type of power, that they not only use it to help elevate other people, but they are also willing to give it up to be sure that people all have equal rights in general, and I just adore that so much and I do applaud him for his work.”

Lum has not been contacted by the organization since the protests in March, but he hopes to stay involved with DACA protests.

“If you asked me four months ago if I would have have gotten arrested, gone to jail and missed school so much, I would have thought you were crazy,” Lum said.

“But sometimes whenever you meet a cause that you really care about, it’s worth it, and I would go back down in a heartbeat.” emma.padner@temple.edu

ADVERTISEMENT

features@temple-news.com

FEATURES TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 14 EVENTS

‘Benifest’ celebrates the life of Jenna Burleigh On Thursday night, a concert was held at The Trocadero Theatre to benefit Jenna’s Blessing Bags.

BY VALERIE DOWRET & VALERIE McINTYRE For The Temple News

In every backpack given out through the Jenna’s Blessing Bags Foundation, Jenna Burleigh’s parents include a tag with a line she once wrote on her blog.

“I truly believe in the good in people and the magic that can be found in all of us,” it reads. “I will always fight for what’s right. I will always fight for equality for all.”

On Thursday night, Benifest 3: Jenna’s Blessing Bags, was held at the Trocadero Theatre on Arch Street near 10th. Benifest 3, which is part of a series of benefit concerts, fundraised for Jenna’s Blessing Bags, a foundation that distributes backpacks full of clothes, toiletries and nonperishable foods to people affected by homelessness in major cities. It was started by Ed and Jaqui Burleigh in memory of their daughter, Jenna.

In August, Jenna, a junior film and media arts major, was murdered off campus. Joshua Hupperterz, a former advertising student, was charged with her murder and is currently awaiting trial.

The Burleighs founded Jenna’s Blessing Bags in September 2017, less than a week after her death.

The foundation was modeled after Jenna’s own service. She would give out bags with supplies to help homeless people in Philadelphia.

Chapters were also started by the Burleigh family in Colorado and Massachusetts.

“She was always getting involved in things and looking to help others that needed it,” said Karla Pisarcik, Jenna’s childhood friend. “She recognized that she had a voice, and she really wanted to be able to use that and help others through her privilege.”

When Benifest’s founder Mason Payonk, who is dating Pisarcik, heard about Jenna’s Blessing Bags, Payonk knew he wanted to dedicate his third Benifest to the foundation.

“Once we heard from her parents and they announced that they were starting a foundation, Mason was like, ‘This is a perfect cause to dedicate Benifest 3 to,’ and then we started planning it basically ever since then,” Pisarcik said.

Benifest 3 drew artists from Philadelphia and New Jersey, including Alexander Charles, Schilly, Wes Phoenix, Kenif Muse, Chuck$oDope and Scottie Kash, to the Trocadero Balcony to perform.

Payonk said he invited live musicians and bands to perform at the event to capture Jenna’s positive and cheerful personality.

“The first person I reached out to was Schilly because he has a very funky upbeat sound, and from what I heard from everyone who knew Jenna, that was kind of her cup of tea,” Payonk said. “She was always upbeat, listening to fun music like that.”

Payonk, who estimates the event raised $1,000, began Benifest

VALERIE McINTYRE / THE TEMPLE NEWS A crowd gathers at The Trocadero in Chinatown for a night of music to benefit Jenna’s Blessing Bags on Thursday.

in January 2017 and held the first concert to raise money for the Tim Langan Brain Aneurysm Foundation, which a close friend’s father started after having a brain aneurysm.

Pisarcik and Jenna met in the sixth grade and remained friends ever since.

“We were really close throughout middle school and high school,” Pisarcik said. “I could trust her and...I really haven’t had many

friends like that in my life since I met her, and [I think about] how special that really is.”

Pisarcik said Jenna was an activist. She attended the 2017 Women’s March on Philadelphia.

She also spoke out regularly about LGBTQ issues and the stigma surrounding mental health in blog posts.

Several people, including Jaqui Burleigh, wore cat ears to the event, like ones Jenna that wore.

Ed Burleigh said the event’s atmosphere was positive and festive, just like Jenna’s personality.

“Everyone just had a truly great time,” Ed Burleigh said. “Jenna’s friends, Temple students, family and all of her supporters were just together having a wonderful time.” features@temple-news.com @TheTempleNews

ADVERTISEMENT

features@temple-news.com

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

SPORTS TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 15

WOMEN’S TENNIS

Sophomore hopes to become a business owner Kristina Titova wants to open her own hotel in Italy when she is older.

BY SEAN McGEEHAN For The Temple News

When Kristina Titova was a high school freshman, she attended a large business event at a Hilton Hotel near her hometown of Novosibirsk in Russia’s Siberian region.

At the event, people discussed how to run a business in the United States. When they talked about the hotel business, Titova immediately became intrigued.

“I went there to listen to some people talking about America and companies in America, and I really liked it,” Titova said. “I liked business, and I liked the way they were explaining things about hotels.”

The sophomore tennis player and business management major hopes to one day open her own hotel in Italy. Although Titova travels often, she has never been to Italy. She thinks it is a beautiful country, and therefore a great place to open a hotel.

Her mother, Evgenia, has a similar dream, hoping to one day open her own bakery in Italy.

Titova’s mother is one of her biggest supporters, she said. She also gets support from her childhood friends in Russia, despite the 11-hour time difference between her hometown and the East Coast.

Before she pursues opening a hotel, Titova is focused on her studies. She hopes to earn her master’s degree and then possibly her Ph.D. Titova is in her first year at Temple after transferring from Hampton University in Virginia. She played in the Pirates’ top singles position and posted an 11-5 record in Spring 2017.

She was inspired to come to Temple because of its tennis program and the Fox School of Business’s reputation, she said.

She believes what she has learned in her finance classes will prepare her for the future. Titova hasn’t taken any international business classes yet, she said, but she thinks they’ll also help.

In addition to what she has learned off the court, Titova believes she can transfer the lessons she learned on the court into the business world.

There are three specific values tennis has enforced that she’ll need in business: consistency, patience and knowledge, she said.

“In tennis, you need to play patiently and smartly,” Titova added. “Those are the two most important things.”

Titova is one of the Owls’ best players this season. She usually competes as the No. 2 player in singles. This year, Titova has a 5-4 singles record. Her latest win came against University of Delaware senior Amanda Studnicki on March 16.

Titova is currently battling injuries,

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / FILE PHOTO Sophomore Kristina Titova prepares to hit a return shot during practice on Feb. 23 at Legacy Tennis Center in East Falls.

which kept her out for the team’s latest match on Friday against La Salle, coach Steve Mauro said. But the team hopes to have her back soon for the American Athletic Conference tournament from April 18-21 in Dallas.

After losing her first two singles matches of the spring, Titova won her next four decisions.

“She’s a very determined player, and her work ethic is very good on the court,” Mauro said. “I could see her have that same tenacity in the business world. I can definitely see that carrying over later in life.” sean.patrick.mcgeehan@temple.edu

ADVERTISEMENT

MEN’S BASKETBALL

Enechionyia to play in senior showcase

Discounts on Tuition & Housing

May 14 - June 25 (6 weeks) • May 14 - July 25 (10 weeks) June 27 - August 8 (6 weeks) Internships & Independent Studies (12 weeks) Take at least one class in Hammonton, Manahawkin or Woodbine & get THREE COURSES for the PRICE OF TWO! Classes in: Galloway • Hammonton • Manahawkin • Woodbine

stockton.edu/summer18 Stockton is an Equal Opportunity Institution

Former forward Obi Enechionyia will play in the Portsmouth Invitational Tournament at Churchland High School in Portsmouth, Virginia, from Wednesday to Saturday.

The PIT invites 64 men’s college basketball seniors to participate in a four-day, 12-game tournament in front of representatives from every NBA team. The event will be streamed on the PIT website.

Enechionyia averaged 10.8 points and 5.8 rebounds per game during his senior year.

Temple’s season ended in a 63-57 loss to Penn State in the National Invitation Tournament at the Bryce Jordan Center in University Park, Pennsylvania on March 14.

Enechionyia finished his career at Temple with 1,296 points, which ranks 33rd on the program’s all-time list. His 614 rebounds rank 23rd in Temple history, while his 170 blocks puts him seventh all-time.

NBA players like Minnesota Timberwolves shooting guard Jimmy Butler, who is a fourtime NBA All-Star, and Brooklyn Nets point guard Jeremy Lin participated in the PIT. -Tom Ignudo

FOOTBALL

Team to host annual bone marrow drive The Owls will host their annual bone marrow drive on Wednesday in the Student Center from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

The football program has helped more than 1,000 people register for bone marrow registry since it began the drive in 2008. More than 350 patients each day in the United States learn they’re infected with blood cancer.

In 2008, former Villanova coach Andy Talley started the drive on the Wildcats’ campus, which spread throughout college football.

Volunteers will take part in a cheek swab test and fill out paperwork in order to register as a potential bone marrow donor.

People who can’t make the drive but are still interested in joining the registry can do so at OwlSports.com.

-Tom Ignudo

sports@temple-news.com @TTN_Sports

SPORTS TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 16 LACROSSE

Owls under heavy attack during losing streak Temple has lost its past three games by a combined score of 47-14.

BY JAY NEEMEYER

Lacrosse Beat Reporter

The Owls’ final Big East Conference season got off to a promising start. They upset nationally ranked University of Denver, then they beat Cincinnati in double overtime.

But in their past three games, the Owls have begun to struggle. They have been outscored 47-14 in three losses to Marquette University, the University of Florida and Connecticut.

The losing streak has dropped Temple (7-6, 2-3 Big East) to a tie for sixth place in the 10-team Big East with four conference games remaining, starting with Saturday’s matchup against Butler University (1-12, 0-5 Big East) in Indiana.

Coach Bonnie Rosen believes deficiencies in offensive production, draw controls and defense have contributed to the losing streak.

“We’re getting hit on three fronts right now,” Rosen said. “I think our defense is learning faster than our offense in a game, so we’re still not scoring enough goals.”

In each of the three losses, the Owls allowed multiple goals in the first 10 minutes and had to climb out of a deep hole. Marquette started its 16-4 win on March 31 in Milwaukee on a 4-0 run.

Florida, the No. 6 team in the Intercollegiate Women’s Lacrosse Coaches Association poll, scored five goals in the first 10 minutes of its 15-3 win last Wednesday.

UConn started Saturday’s game on a 9-0 run on the way to a 16-7 win at Howarth

Field.

During the losing streak, the Owls haven’t totaled 15 or more shots on goal in any game, while the opponents each peppered more than 20 shots on cage. Temple has also turned the ball over at a high rate.

It had 18 turnovers at Marquette and 23 against both Florida and Connecticut.

“It’s taking our defense too many possessions to understand what they’re playing against, and then it’s taking our offense too many possessions to figure out how they’re going to score,” Rosen said. “And the combination is leading to games opening up too fast on us.”

Following the 16-4 loss to Marquette, Rosen said her team was simply outplayed.

“Very clearly, we need to increase the strength of our skillset, finishing under pressure, under physicality and finishing offensively,” Rosen said after the game.

In Saturday’s game against UConn, the two teams played physically, combining for seven yellow cards.

“I would expect to see it for the rest of the season,” senior attacker and co-captain Kira Gensler said. “Teams are going to be able to see how we handle physicality, and we need to understand that it’s not going to let up. If anything, it’s going to come harder.”

“Every game, and more importantly every possession, matters” for Temple’s young team, Rosen said.

Sophomore goalkeeper Maryn Lowell has started every game. Only sophomore midfielder Maddie Gebert has more than 20 goals so far. Sophomore attacker and midfielder Olivia Thompson is the secondleading scorer with 17 goals and five assists.

Sophomore defender and co-captain Kara Nakrasius leads the team in draw controls

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Senior attacker Kira Gensler (right) shields the ball from a defender during Temple’s 9-8 double-overtime win against Cincinnati on March 24 at Howarth Field.

with 48.

There are four games left on the Owls’ regular-season schedule. Three of the four teams — Vanderbilt University, Villanova University and Georgetown University — are ranked in the top 50 in Division I in goals per game.

One of the Owls’ remaining conference games is against a team that holds playoff position in the top four of the standings.

Temple will play third-place Georgetown, which is No. 23 in the IWLCA poll, to close the regular season on April 28 at Howarth Field.

“I think raising the level of competition, the level of accountability, is going to be

huge going into the next four games that we have left,” Gensler said.

Temple has six days between the UConn game and the Butler game. It only had three days between the Marquette and Florida games and two days from its matchup with the Gators to the game against UConn.

“Since we’ve been traveling so much lately, it will be good to have five full practices before our next game,” junior midfielder Amber Lambeth said. “We’ll work hard this week, and hopefully we can have a good end of the season.” jay.neemeyer@temple.edu @neemeyer_j

MEN’S TENNIS

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 18

AAC seeding still in the balance

ATOKI

Temple’s final conference match is on the road on Saturday against nationally ranked Memphis.

BY ALEX McGINLEY

Men’s Tennis Beat Reporter

Temple remained undefeated at Legacy Tennis Center this season by beating Connecticut on March 31 and defeating La Salle, 7-0, on Friday.

The Owls’ 4-1 win against UConn marked their first conference win of the season.

“It was really important for the seeding for the conference tournament because right now we don’t have to play the No. 1 seed,” junior Alberto Caceres Casas said. “But it was just another match like the other ones this season. They’re just as important.”

The Owls (11-8, 1-1 American Athletic Conference) only have one conference match remaining this season against Memphis on Saturday in Tennessee.

Memphis was ranked No. 17 in the April 3 Intercollegiate Tennis Association poll and has an 11-match winning streak. Memphis and two other American Athletic Conference teams — No. 38 Central Florida (108, 1-1 The American) and No. 26 Tulane (15-6, 3-1 The American) — are ranked in the ITA poll.

The Tigers (16-4, 4-0 The American) have two athletes ranked among the ITA’s top 125 singles players. Senior Ryan Peniston is ranked 47th and senior Andrew Watson is ranked 110th.

Peniston and Watson are each ranked 43rd in the ITA’s top 90 doubles combinations. They have a 10-7 record this spring. One of Peniston and Watson’s wins is a 6-1 victory on March 7 against Tulane sophomore Ewan Moore and senior Constantin Schmitz, the No. 54 doubles pair in the ITA. Temple’s matchup against Memphis will not be the first time Temple faces a ranked team this season. On Jan. 21, Temple lost to then-No. 12 University of Virginia, 4-3.

sports@temple-news.com @TTN_Sports

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Junior Alberto Caceres Casas hits a shot during the Owls’ 7-0 win against La Salle on Friday at Legacy Tennis Center in East Falls.

Coach Steve Mauro said his team is up to the challenge. The Owls have faced Memphis in each of their past three seasons. The Tigers were ranked in the ITA poll each time and never conceded a point to Temple.

“Memphis is going to be a really big match,” Mauro said. “They’re a very strong team. They’re always top 50 in the country. It’s tough going there and playing on their courts, but the guys are really motivated for it.”

If Temple beats Memphis, it would clinch its first winning record in conference play since the 2013-14 season. During that season, the Owls only played one conference match, a 5-1 victory against UConn on March 29, 2014.

Before the 2013-14 campaign, Temple last had a winning conference record during the 2012-13 season when it finished with a 4-3 record in its final season in the Atlantic 10 Conference.

The Owls’ only conference loss this season came against East Carolina on Feb. 16. Senior Thomas Sevel and sophomore Eric Biscoveanu didn’t play in the 5-2 loss. Sevel also missed the matchup against UConn due to an arm injury. Sevel suffered the injury in Temple’s 6-1 loss to Drexel on March 29 and was forced

to concede his match as a result.

Junior Uladzimir Dorash also missed the match against UConn and will be out for the rest of the season with a pectoral injury. Dorash has not played since March 17.

Mauro said the rest of the team needs to stay healthy to give it the best chance of winning the conference tournament, which is from April 19-22 in Dallas.

“Anytime we’ve been healthy, I don’t think we lost a match,” Mauro said. “We need to be healthy. Unfortunately, Uladzimir is going to be out for the rest of the season. But, hopefully, the other guys can step up and take his spot.”

Freshman Mark Wallner said the team’s win against UConn (4-13, 0-1 The American) previewed what the conference tournament atmosphere will look like.

“They were one of the weakest [teams],” Wallner said. “The other teams in the conference tournament are going to be really good. It kind of gave us an insight of the audience and how loud the cheering is going to be.” alex.mcginley@temple.edu @mcginley_alex

hard, so I guess he might be doing Atoki spends every night before practice assembling the playlist, and he still arrives at Edberg-Olson Hall at 6 a.m. before practices.

Before Temple hits the field, Atoki checks his phone to see if he has any last-minute song requests and grabs some breakfast.

Redshirt-junior defensive back Kareem Ali said he texts Atoki every night before practice with song suggestions, like “Hardaway” by Derez Deshon.

“He knows when to put them on, too,” Ali said. “He sees everybody getting the vibe, getting the moment to the song.”

During practice, Scott Wallace, director of football operations, announces when stations or drills change over a microphone. When the periods switch, Atoki strategically plays different songs.

When Temple does seven-on-seven drills, Atoki plays up-tempo music from artists like Meek Mill or Playboi Carti. Atoki plays tough music like from hiphop duo M.O.P. if the Owls are in red-zone drills, because they’ll be hitting each other. During individual drills, Atoki plays relaxed music, he said.

“It gives me a lot of energy,” said redshirt-junior running back Jager Gardner, who has been Atoki’s roommate throughout college. “This was a craft he’s been working on a while, and now he can just broadcast it to us. He picked up new equipment. Before, he was just doing it on a computer. Now, he’s got everything.”

Atoki’s inspiration to make music stems from his family. His uncle played the piano, and his grandmother sang in a choir.

But Atoki is a self-taught DJ. In high school, Atoki played around with vocals and instrumentals using “edjing Mix,” a DJ app on his iPhone.

In 2015, when Atoki was a freshman, he sent 45-minute pregame warmup mixes to upperclassmen on the team like former linebackers Tyler Matakevich and Haason Reddick and former cornerback Tavon Young.

Atoki started to play the same mixes in the locker room for everyone to hear before games in 2016. He continued to do that last season and included some of redshirt-senior running back David Hood’s work.

Hood goes by the rap name Trizzy Tre Hood. His SoundCloud account boasts 46 tracks and 226 followers.

“I worked with him at a party when I performed, and he DJed,” Hood said. “He just always asks for my songs to play when he’s DJing.”

Atoki wants to find a job and continue to DJ during Temple’s practices throughout the season before he accepts his Comcast position in 2019. He also wants to DJ in the locker room prior to kickoff.

“Atoki found his niche,” Ali said. “He’s the DJ for the spring. He’s still around the guys, he still gives advice, he’s still there to talk, he’s still one of us. I’m just glad he’s enjoying himself.” thomas.ignudo@temple.edu @TomIgnudo

temple-news.com @thetemplenews

SPORTS TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 17

CLUB WOMEN’S VOLLEYBALL

Former D-I walk-on returns to court at the club level Senior setter Geena Bevenour was a Division I rower before joining the club volleyball team.

BY DAN WILSON

For The Temple News

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Senior setter Geena Bevenour (left) practices in Pearson Hall on April 2.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 18 HOOD cas said. Hood said Lucas told him he could have gained 150 or 200 yards against Central Florida on Nov. 18 instead of 81.

“The toughest thing for this position specifically is you can have a lot of success and not do things the right way,” Lucas said. “So it’s kind of reeling him back in, letting those guys back in to understand the success wasn’t a byproduct of doing things the right way, but if you would have done it the right way, the result would have been better.”

If a professional football career doesn’t pan out, Hood’s Plan B is music. Hood used the computer program GarageBand to mix and master songs from his freshman year of high school to sophomore year of college before deciding he wanted more advanced software.

This year, he began working with Kenneth Earle, a 2012 broadcasting, telecommunications and mass media alumnus who produces music under the stage name Kenny Dinero $.

Earle said the first time they worked together in the studio, Hood freestyled over five of Earle’s beats.

“One of the key things that stands out to me about him is just the energy and the passion that he has for just doing it, for just being an artist,” Earle said.

In August 2017, Hood released his “More Time More Effort” mixtape. He is holding his 3-year-old son David Hood IV on the cover.

David Hood III goes home to South Jersey to see his son after Saturday practices. In summers, he spends whole weekends with his son.

“I think that’s one thing that’s going to stick in his brain as a child,” David Hood III’s mother, Lisa, told The Temple News in July. “Even as a little boy, he’s going to remember going to his dad’s school, going through the locker room and different things about school. So he always tries to be a great role model even in the midst of being a student as well.”

Recently, David Hood III has rapped with teammates like freshman wideout Sean Ryan and redshirt-freshman defensive lineman Malik Burns.

He is working on a mixtape, but he hasn’t set a release date.

“Everything has got to be at my own pace for me to feel comfortable,” David Hood III said. “I can’t make my music with restraints on time. If it takes three hours, it takes three hours. If it takes an hour, it takes an hour. If it takes 10 minutes, it takes 10 minutes. Like, you never know. So I just need time and my own way of doing things.” evan.easterling@temple.edu @Evan_Easterling

Geena Bevenour briefly had to leave a club volleyball practice this season to give a presentation for one of her two on-campus jobs.

“Most people probably would’ve been done for the day, but she literally sprinted there and back in like 10-15 minutes,” said senior setter and club president Alicia Kradzinski. “She’s an incredibly committed team player.”

Bevenour, now a senior setter on the club team, walked onto Temple’s Division I squad as a freshman after graduating from Pope John Paul II High School in Montgomery County.

She spent both her freshman and sophomore seasons on the team, but she never entered a match. After two years, Bevenour and the coaching staff decided it’d be best for her to leave the team because she wouldn’t play.

“I loved practicing with that team every day for two years, as I’m a very competitive person,” Bevenour said. “The coaches were very open and honest about the fact that I would never really get any playing time because of other recruits who were on the team.”

Two years later, as Bevenour approaches her graduation with a degree in media studies and production, she’s still glad she decided to leave the team. Playing club volleyball, which is less of a time commitment than Division I, has allowed her to compete, hold two on-campus jobs and study abroad in Dublin in Spring 2017.

Unlike at the Division I level, Bevenour has a student coach in Kradzinski, who is also one of her roommates.

The two have known each other since eighth grade, when they played on the same

Philadelphia Volleyball Academy team.

They also battled against each other in high school. Kradzinski played for Lansdale Catholic High School, which is about a 40-minute drive from Pope John Paul II High School.

“She’s really developed into a great leader in the time that I’ve known her,” Kradzinski said. “She’s also very good at taking initiative on the court.”

Bevenour is in her element on the volleyball court, but she took a break from the sport after leaving the Division I team.

At first, she decided to try rowing in Spring 2016 after associate head strength and conditioning coach Sam Whitney recommended it because of her natural athleticism.

Her transition to rowing was successful. In her first year, Bevenour was a member of the Third Varsity 8 boat that won a gold medal at the 2016 American Athletic Conference championships.

But after the 2016 season, Bevenour’s desire to continue rowing simply wasn’t there.

“I really like and prefer playing in a game sport,” Bevenour said. “Rowing was very methodical, and it just wasn’t my cup of tea.”

Bevenour decided to come back to her favorite sport at the club level. Despite no longer being a Division I volleyball player, Bevenour never fails to bring Division I intensity and competitiveness, Kradzinski said.

“We’re competitive, but we also have a lot of fun on the club team,” Kradzinski added.

“When Geena is playing, she keeps the intensity at the forefront of everyone’s mind.”

“Geena is always very encouraging and vocal during a match,” senior right side hitter Olivia Aizen said. “She is also really talented and a very hard worker, the type of player anyone would want on their team.” danielwilson20@temple.edu @dan_wilson4

CLUB ICE HOCKEY

Deal in progress for new club rink Temple hopes to move to a rink in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, to cut travel time to home games.

BY DONOVAN HUGEL

Track and Field Beat Reporter

During the past three seasons, the club hockey team played its home games at two different rinks. The Owls have always looked for a more special place to call “home,” senior defenseman and club president Ryan Dumbach said.

Next season, they may just find one.

The team is negotiating a contract with The Rink on Old York Road in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, where it has practiced in the past. Zach Burkhardt, club vice president and junior goaltender, said The Rink on Old York Road would be more convenient because players can drive there from Main Campus in about 20 minutes.

During the 2015-16 and 2017-18 seasons, Temple played at the Flyers Skate Zone in Northeast Philadelphia. In the 2016-17 season, the Owls played at Revolution Ice Gardens in Bucks County. It takes at least 30 minutes to drive to both of those rinks from Main Campus.

Burkhardt said Temple shared this past year’s rink with about 15 youth teams, a few middle school and high school teams and La Salle’s club men’s hockey team.

Because of the rink’s limited availability, the team never had much say on when it could practice or play games, Dumbach said.

“We felt like we were a visiting team in our own home rink,” assistant coach and general manager Brandon Richards said. “Somewhere that we could call our own and have that respect throughout the rink as the premier team there was the main goal.”

The team is looking to raise about $10,000 to secure the new rink through a fundraiser, Dumbach said. The money will go toward upgrading the locker room at The Rink on Old York Road and providing a better experience for players on game and practice days, he added.

Burkhardt said practices often start-

SYDNEY SCHAEFER / THE TEMPLE NEWS Temple is negotiating a deal to practice and play home games at The Rink on Old York Road in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, during the 2018-19 season.

ed after 10 p.m. and keep players on the ice until 11:30 p.m.

“As a result of all of that, we wouldn’t get back to campus until well after midnight,” he added. “Having the availability to dictate what time we’re practicing and when we’re back on campus...was a huge factor in our decision-making.”

The Owls believe that changing rinks could push the team to a higher level in the near future. Temple’s 201718 season ended in the first round of the Eastern Collegiate Hockey Association playoffs after a 3-0 loss to Villanova on Feb. 23 in Aston, Pennsylvania.

Dumbach thinks the move could help bring recruits to the program.

“We want to paint the walls in the school colors, put the logo on the locker room floor and give each player a personal stall,” Dumbach said. “We’d like to settle at this rink for the future of the

team. Recruiting is huge for us, and we want to bring them and show them the locker room and show them that they’re going to be a part of this team.”

Burkhardt said he thinks the team will find consistency at The Rink on Old York Road for the first time in three years.

“I feel like we’re 100 percent going to stick with this place,” Burkhardt said.

“They’ve already shown us inside, and we haven’t even signed the full contract yet. We really feel welcome there. Obviously, there’s going to be some kinks along the way. But if we can iron them all out in the first year and get our business done, I think it’s going to be huge for all parties involved.” donovan.hugel@temple.edu

sports@temple-news.com @TTN_Sports

TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2018

PAGE 18

FOOTBALL

Player goes from tackles to turntables Former linebacker Jeremiah Atoki DJs during Temple football’s spring practices.

BY TOM IGNUDO

Assistant Sports Editor

A

s senior safety Delvon Randall walked down the sideline after he intercepted a pass during a spring practice, Jeremiah Atoki shouted at him from the balcony of Edberg-Olson Hall.

“How many you going to get this year?” Atoki said to Temple’s 2017 leader in interceptions.

“I wanna get eight,” Randall told him.

Atoki, a former linebacker, isn’t on Temple’s roster anymore, but he is still part of the team. Instead of participating in drills on the field, Atoki now spends every practice on the balcony as Temple’s DJ. Midway through last season, Atoki approached coach Geoff Collins in his office. He told Collins he didn’t want to play football anymore because he wanted to spend that time working. Once spring camp arrived, Collins asked Atoki if he wanted to stick around as the DJ. “I came in here as the [linebacker]...I changed to [wide receiver], and now I’m the DJ,” Atoki

said. “Coach Collins still treats me like a player.”

Atoki originally planned to enlist in the Army after college. His mother and step-father were both in the military, he said. But instead, Atoki plans to start a job at Comcast in sales in 2019. He is expected to graduate with an adult and organizational development degree this summer.

Atoki recorded nine tackles in 23 career games in the 2016 and 2017 seasons. He mostly played on special teams during his career and also played at linebacker.

Atoki spent time in the DJ role during the 2016 season under former coach Matt Rhule. A broken hand kept Atoki out of the lineup as the Owls went on to win the American Athletic Conference championship against Navy. “[Collins] didn’t want to take football away from me,” Atoki said.

“He knew that I didn’t want to play anymore, just because I wanted to work. He knew that I could bring the atmosphere and DJ because I did it before.”

“He’s up there just spinning it, doing an unbelievable job,” Collins said. “I question the song selection sometimes, but our kids seem to be dancing and enjoying and playing

ATOKI | PAGE 16

JAMIE COTTRELL / THE TEMPLE NEWS Former linebacker and senior adult and organizational development major Jeremiah Atoki DJs during football practice at Chodoff Field on April 3.

FOOTBALL

Rapping is senior’s passion off the field Running back David Hood III has been rapping since he was in the third grade.

BY EVAN EASTERLING Sports Editor

When David Hood III was in the third grade at the now-closed Oceanside Charter School in Atlantic City, New Jersey, he was one of the youngest students in an educational rap group.

It allowed the school to get about a dozen children thinking positively about education, Hood said. His part of the rap started with, “My name is Lil Tre,” he said.

“Lil Tre” is now Trizzy Tre Hood. The redshirt-senior running back spends some of his time off the field rapping in his room, where he has a microphone and an Apple desktop computer with the Logic Pro X music program to help him make music. He has been uploading songs to SoundCloud for two years.

“I’ve been doing music for a very long time, and it’s just stuck with me,” Hood said. “And I’ve played football for a very long time also. It’s just football takes up more of your time, and you can be more flexible with your art, with your music.”

After he graduated with a media studies and production degree in December, Hood is taking classes as a graduate student. He said this allows him more free time than in past seasons.

He is using some of that time to write music. Hood said he writes lyrics in his phone every day, whenever he thinks of a line.

Hood’s musical influences include Lil Wayne, Lil Durk, Jay-Z and 2Pac. Hood has a Tupac Shakur quote from an interview he did with Vibe Magazine in 1996 tattooed on his right arm.

“I have no fear,” Shakur said. “I have only ambition. I want mine, and I’ll do anything to protect and feed my family.”

Hood is using part of his extra time this year to plan his future.

Plan A is a professional football career. Last year, Hood played in all 13 games, led Temple with 638 yards rushing and tied with senior Ryquell Armstead for a team-high five rushing touchdowns.

Hood could have gained more yards last year if he waited for holes to open at the line of scrimmage, running backs coach Tony Lu-

HOOD | PAGE 17

JESSE KINNAMON / THE TEMPLE NEWS Redshirt-senior running back David Hood III uses music equipment in his room and writes lyrics every day.

CLUB SPORTS | PAGE 17

CLUB ICE HOCKEY | PAGE 17

LACROSSE | PAGE 16

MEN’S TENNIS | PAGE 16

Geena Bevenour never played as a walk-on setter for the Division I volleyball team. After a stint as a rower, she returned to the court at the club level.

Temple’s club leadership is negotiating to practice and play its home games at a rink in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, to cut commuting time.

Temple won its first two Big East Conference games, which included an upset against a nationally ranked team, but it has since lost its past three games.

If Temple upsets nationally ranked Memphis on Saturday, it will record its first winning season in conference play since the 2013-14 campaign.