The Rice Thresher | Wednesday, April 8, 2015

Suitable for ages 17-22 Pitman Fellowship winners curate ‘Fissure Price’ exhibition at the Rice Media Center. see A&E p. 5

Life’s A Mitch Stand up for creativity and personal academic success.

Literally. see Ops p. 4

INSIDE

Sprint, don’t walk

Rice offers new environment studies minor next fall

Natalie Beazant aims to make Rice history by reaching the elite eight at the NCAA Championships.

See Sports p. 7

See P. 2

student-run

volume 99, issue no. 24

since 1916

wednesday, april 8, 2015

Admission rate decreases slightly for Class of 2019 Christy Leos

Munoz said each year’s class to excel more than the last.

“We’re attracting incredibly wellqualified students,” Munoz said. “The students who are applying to Rice, their qualifying academic records in terms of their grade performance, the rigor of the courses they’ve taken and their test scores are just breathtaking.

As a future alum, you want each class behind you to be better than you were because this only raises the value of your degree.”

Rice’s admission rate has decreased over the last couple of years, according to Munoz.

“Our admit rate over the last eight years has gone from around 25 to 26 percent, down to a low 15 percent and that includes even the fact that we were growing,” Munoz said.

Recently, Rice was listed at 29th in desirability in the 2015 Top 100 Colleges by Student Choice, a report by GradReports that considers only acceptance and enrollment, or yield, rate. Last year, Rice had a yield rate of 37.9 percent when 978 of 2,581 accepted students chose to attend.

“Anytime Rice is put in favorable light … adds to increasing the percep0see ADMISSIONS, page 3

Thresher Staff

courtesy pete souza/the white house

Josh Earnest, Sid Richardson Class of 1997, speaks with President Obama at the Oval Office. Earnest said his experiences at Rice broadened his horizions in his journey to becoming the White House press secretary.

Rice alumnus Josh Earnest recalls path to White House Tina Nazerian

Assistant News Editor

When Josh Earnest first moved from Houston to Washington, D.C. in January 2001, he spent about six weeks sleeping on the floor of a friend’s spare bedroom.

He had no job prospects, only a few contacts and friends and had left the life he had known since graduation — working in politics in Houston.

What he found, however, were new possibilities.

“I drove here from Houston,” Earnest (Sid Richardson ‘97) said. “And I still remember driving around town and even driving in front of the White House at that point sort of thinking about how what a tremendous experience and honor it would be to work at the White House.”

Now, as White House press secretary, the 38-year-old Kansas City, Missouri native wakes up early to prepare for the White House’s daily press briefings, where he answers reporters’ questions about both the administration and its reaction to current

events. Meetings pack his mornings, such as a 7:45 a.m. meeting with senior White House staff during which he asks them questions about news he had read about the night before.

“It’s an opportunity for me to … ask the national security advisor or the president’s top homeland security advisor about news that occurred overnight that’s related to national security,” Earnest, dressed in a dark suit and green tie, said in his West Wing office.

Earnest said he received thorough academic training and learned a lot about writing as a political science and policy studies major at Rice. His extracurriculars included some writing for the Thresher and serving as campus-wide Beer Bike coordinator.

“My Rice experience ... genuinely broadened my horizons,” Earnest said.

During his senior year, Earnest took a course that sent him to Israel and Gaza for spring break. In Jerusalem, he went to a memorial dedicated to the Holocaust’s lost children at Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust museum.

In Gaza, Earnest visited locals and

learned about the territory’s public health conditions when he went to a center for deaf children. One of his first times overseas, the trip deeply impacted him.

“I learned a lot about [the IsraeliPalestinian] situation, and it continues to form the basis of a lot of my knowledge about that situation that I draw upon in the context of this job in particular,” Earnest said.

However, Earnest did more than just advance his knowledge of public policy and politics in and out of the classroom. His favorite memory at Sid Richardson College was going to what used to be an annual early-winter “tower party,” in which every floor would have a different theme, such as a piano bar theme or a country western theme.

Prior to being named White House press secretary, Earnest’s jobs included being then-Senator Barack Obama’s Iowa communications director and working for Jay Carney, now his predecessor, as the principal deputy press secretary.

0see EARNEST, page 2

Budde named commencement speaker Jieya Wen

Thresher Staff

Dennis Budde

Dennis Budde, a Baker College senior, will speak about improvisation as the student convocation speaker at the commencement ceremony on May 16. “[My speech] is about improvising and making sure that you leave some room for improvisation in your life,” Budde said. “But you also need to make sure you’re sticking to your plans and working hard. … Appreciate the balance.”

Budde said he plans to talk about how he discovered improvisation in college. His experience in comedy groups, particularly Rice’s Kinda Sketchy, will be a major part of his speech.

“I’m in the sketch comedy group here and I joined it freshmen year,” Budde said. “The people that I met in theater are the ones who encouraged me to start doing sketch comedy, and if I had just been just trying to stick to my plan, I wouldn’t have done that – it wasn’t anything 0see BUDDE, page 3

Rice University acceptance letters have been distributed and the campus is gearing up for the roughly 2,600 students invited for Owl Days. For the Class of 2019, there were 17,900 applications, and Rice admitted around 14.7 percent, according to Chris Munoz, vice president for enrollment.

Munoz said that determining the exact admission rate is currently in preliminary stages and that the exact number of students attending Rice will not be known until May. “Why [the admittance rate] could change is related to if we elect to take anyone off the waitlist,” Munoz said.

Students admitted through the regular decision process may decide before May 1 to attend a different university, and some waitlisted students may decide not to accept a Rice admission offer. Munoz said his office refers to this as the “summer melt process.” “[The admission rate] could go up higher, but again this is speculation because we don’t know of how many students we’ve admitted up to May 1 who are going to make a commitment,” Munoz said.

Rice Admissions Selectivity by Year Class of

4 200

1583 accepted 6802 applied

5 200

1580 accepted 6742 applied

6 200 7 200

TOTAL APPLICANTS TOTAL ACCEPTED

1682 accepted 7079 applied 1821 accepted 7501 applied

8 200

1802 accepted 8106 applied

9 200

1970 accepted 7890 applied

0 201

2080 accepted 8776 applied 2251 accepted 8968 applied

1 201

2255 accepted 9813 applied

2

201

2495 accepted 11172 applied

3 201

2639 accepted 12393 applied

4 201

2600 accepted 13816 applied

5 201

2528 accepted 15133 applied

6 201

2581 accepted 15415 applied

7 201 8 201

2677 accepted 17728 applied

9 201

~2650 accepted ~17900 applied

5,000

10,000

15,000

2 NEWS

the Rice Thresher

0EARNEST FROM PAGE 1 “I wouldn’t say that every step of my career has been easy, by any means,” Earnest said. “But I don’t think there’s anything that I regret.”

Earnest’s ascent to the press secretary position became a real possibility when Carney left the White House. Very few people knew Carney was stepping down.

“I had been involved in an interview process that had only involved a small number of people,” Earnest said.

Right before he found out he got the job, which he assumed on June 20, 2014, Earnest was in the middle of an energetic discussion in his office with Jonathan Karl, the chief White House correspondent for ABC News.

Brian Mosteller, one of the president’s assistants, opened his office door and told him he was needed upstairs, not wanting to say the president wanted to see Earnest in front of the reporter. Earnest asked Mosteller if he needed to come up immediately, and Mosteller said he did. As Karl started to leave the office, so did Earnest. Earnest, who was not wearing his suit jacket, had taken one step out of his office when Mosteller looked at him and said, “Don’t you think you should put on your suit jacket?”

“I thought, oh, yeah, I guess I probably should,” Earnest said. “So I reached for my jacket, and went into the Oval Office and had a conversation with the president, where he offered me the job.”

After Earnest returned to his office, he saw that he had missed calls from his wife, Natalie Wyeth, who was then six months pregnant with their first child. She was dealing with an air conditioning repairman at their new townhouse in Alexandria, Virginia.

“I called her back, and I said — she obviously knew what was going on — and I said, sweetheart, I’m sorry I wasn’t here to take your calls, but I have the best possible excuse for not being by my cell phone,” Earnest said. “And

Wednesday, April 8, 2015

she knew exactly what I was talking about and she was very excited.”

Earnest has had to answer hundreds of questions during his time at White House press briefings, but his favorite response came after 2015 Super Bowl semi-playoff. Referencing New England Patriots’ Tom Brady’s press conference after “DeflateGate,” Earnest answered a CNN reporter, “The one thing I can tell you is that for years it’s been clear that there is no risk that I was gonna take Tom Brady’s job as quarterback of the New England Patriots, but I can tell you that as of today, it’s pretty clear that there’s no risk of him taking my job, either.”

His line on Brady elicited comments from many people, including emails from Earnest’s two brothers and friends from other jobs — and a response from the president on Air Force One before traveling to India.

“I was sitting in the conference room,” Earnest said. “And I could hear the president get on the plane and bellow down the hallway, ‘Josh, why [are] you being so mean to Tom Brady?’”

Earnest encouraged Rice students to take their academic pursuits seriously, but not too seriously, and to take advantage of as many opportunities at the university as they can to expand their horizons — including faculty.

Earnest, who was not a “political junkie” as a teenager, said he got his first political job because of his advisor at Rice, Robert Stein, the Lena Gohlham Fox Professor of political science. Stein not only influenced his interest in public policy and politics, but also introduced him to people involved in politics around town.

“You can’t put a price tag on something like that,” Earnest said. “Somebody who’s willing to inspire you in that way, and who’s willing to mentor you in that way.”

Stein said Earnest was a smart and empathetic student whom “everybody” wanted to work with on class team papers. And Stein’s reaction when he found out his former student had become the White House press secretary?

Not shocked at all.

“Trust me, this kid was born to have a political career.”

Environmental studies minor to launch fall 2015 Salem Hagdu

For the Thresher

A new environmental studies minor will be available to undergraduate students next fall, according to Dominic Boyer, co-chair of the Environmental Studies Faculty Working Group.

Rice currently offers several degree programs related to environmental issues: an energy and water sustainability minor, an environmental earth science track within the earth science major and an environmental studies second major. However, the second major requires students take at least thirteen 300-400 level courses, making it difficult for students from other majors to add.

Boyer, director of the Center for Energy and Environmental Research in the Human Sciences and a professor of anthropology, said there is room for a holistic environmental studies minor in Rice’s current offerings. “[The environmental studies major is] very very heavy on the science component and lighter on the humanities and social sciences component, so we kept hearing from students that these programs were all very effective in a more narrow sense, but if a student wanted to get an introduction to environmental problems more holistically and comprehensively, they were not as effective,” Boyer said.

The new environmental studies minor will serve as an introduction to environmental issues for students of all majors. Boyer said the working group designed it to be interdisciplinary, with courses from a wide variety of departments.

“38 different departments and programs [teach] courses related to environment and sustainability issues, which is a lot of departments,” Boyer said.

The minor will use current faculty and will not require Rice to hire, according to Boyer.

To develop the minor, the working group asked for student and faculty input on current environmental studies course. Boyer said he never heard anyone oppose the idea of a more holistically conceived minor, and that both students and professors were overwhelmingly in favor of an environmental studies minor. The working group also

placed questions related to the minor on the fall 2014 Survey of All Students.

“When we asked if students supported forming an environmental studies minor, 61 percent said yes and about 300 students said they would have considered taking the minor had it been available to them when they started at Rice,” Boyer said.

Rice Environmental Society president Ashley Ugarte said the minor was a great step for Rice. She and other students participated in the town hall meeting and showed student support for the minor.

300 students said they would have considered ... the minor had it been available.

Dominic Boyer ENST Working Group

“I’m really excited. It’s great. You know something that students and the administration have been working on,” Ugarte, a Martel College senior, said. “If I could start over and take this minor, I would.”

Boyer said in the past few days, six or seven students have contacted him about the minor. Seniors who have already taken the courses cross-listed in the minor and in their own degree programs need to take only the new Environment, Culture and Society (ENST 100) core course to complete the minor. Boyer said he cannot determine how many students will be taking the courses next year, but is hopeful because the numbers on the survey show there is demand for the minor.

The working group consists of faculty from the schools of Architecture, Engineering, Humanities, Natural Sciences and Social Sciences.

Wednesday, April 8, 2015

NEWS

the Rice Thresher

0ADMISSION

YIELD RATE

(enrolled/accepted)

FROM PAGE 1 tion of the quality and [desirability] of a Rice degree,” Munoz said. “However, U.S. News has the most recognition for its university rankings.”

McMurtry College senior Grant Patterson said he didn’t give rankings much weight.

“When I was looking at schools, I wasn’t really looking at anything besides the U.S. News rankings, and even then, I was skeptical of rankings in general,” Patterson said. “I was more concerned with visiting the school and whether I could picture myself there.”

Patterson said school prestige, if not at the top, didn’t mean much.

“A school is either prestigious or it’s not, and the rankings don’t really matter,” Patterson said. “Rank 17th or 10, it doesn’t really matter.”

The Student Admission Council aids the Rice Admission Office in recruitment and yield events, SAC director Timothy Chang said. The SAC works to promote Rice, answer questions and help prospective students decide if Rice is the best fit for them.

“SAC members serve as ambassadors for Rice both on and off campus through a variety of mediums,” Chang, a Baker College junior, said.

ACCEPTANCE RATE

45% 41.8

40%

41.6

39.7

40.3

39.3

38.5

Thresher Staff

RiceX completed a major milestone in the form of a successful motor on March 22, a large step towards their goal of creating and launching a hybrid rocket this summer.

RiceX began the year with less than $1,000 in their budget and no set goals for the year.

Lovett College junior and RiceX president Sarah Hernandez said Brown College freshman Andrew Gatherer’s interest in the club helped spur their growth.

“Andrew emailed me even before school started with questions about how to get involved in RiceX. The club wasn’t serious at all back then, but after getting his messages, I felt like I couldn’t let this kid down,” Hernandez said.

With a keen desire to build a functioning rocket, Hernandez, Gatherer and other committed team members actively recruited members and generated interest in the club. These efforts allowed the club to expand significantly. They were able to recruit many younger undergraduate students in particular: The team consists mainly of freshmen and sophomores, alongside one junior and one senior.

According to Hernandez, one of the factors limiting their success was the lack of funding for the project. To raise money, they worked to get sponsorships from outside organizations.

“At certain points, students were paying with personal funds for parts to build the project in hopes that, as their project grew, it would acquire more funding,” Hernandez said.

The two biggest successes of RiceX so far have been the model rocket launched about a month ago, as well as the more recent successful motor test.

At their single allotted table in the Oshman Engineering Design Kitchen, members of RiceX

37.0

36.6

35%

35.0

34.4

35.8

37.9

36.0

TBD 35.5

33.0

30% 25% 23.3

23.4

23.8

25.1

25.0

24.3

23.7

23.0

22.2

20%

22.3

21.3 18.8 16.7

15%

16.7 15.1

Class of 2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

RiceX prepares for first rocket launch Sapna Suresh

3

constructed the engine. According to Gatherer, each piece of the engine was machined in house, including the nozzle, body and ejector plate. Additionally, they made the fuel out of a mixture of candle wax, rubber and nitrous oxide.

“Not more than approximately 10 other universities in the nation have been able to construct a hybrid rocket motor,” Gatherer said.

Not more than 10 other universities have been able to construct a hybrid rocket motor.

Andrew Gatherer Propulsion Team Lead

As members of RiceX’s avionics and aerodynamics teams work toward a launch this summer, they hope to gain greater funding from the Brown School of Engineering and outside organizations, as well as acquire a larger workspace, accoording to Gatherer.

Additionally, they plan on traveling to the Intercollegiate Rocket Engineering Competition, where they will see the different kinds of rockets that other top universities around the country are developing.

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

0BUDDE FROM PAGE 1 I ever thought about doing. But instead I went for it. I improvised and it turned my life around.”

Budde said he has always been interested in performing and writing. One of his writing principles, “the smaller you go, the bigger your audience ends up being,” helped him decide on the content of his speech.

“If you are trying to make some big blanket statement then you will just get something wrong,” Budde said. “So I decided that I’ll just talk about something that’s important to me that I’ve personally learned and hoped that it worked.”

2015

2016

2017

2018

14.8

2019

One of the messages he wants to deliver to the graduating class is the balance between planning and improvisation, Budde said.

“People don’t really think about improvising in their lives so much,” Budde said.

“You want to set up your five-year plan and leave no room for improvisation. Maybe what you are doing next is what you had always been planning on doing, but don’t force yourself to stick with it if it’s not what you want.”

Budde said it is important to him that the audience has fun listening to his speech.

“One of the problems is that commencement speeches in general don’t keep people interested,” Budde said. “With that in mind, I really tried to make [my speech] entertaining as well.”

4

A Letter from your new Editor in Chief Dear Readers, My name is Andrew Ta, and this is the second issue of the Rice Thresher for which I am Editor in Chief. I began my tenure with the Trasher, and look forward to repeating its success for issues to come. As a Jones College junior majoring in biochemistry and cell biology, I definitely have what it takes to serve the paper well. In all seriousness, I have worked for the Thresher for three years, transitioning from staff writer to news editor during my freshman year.

I hope to accelerate the Thresher’s transition to modernity while refining what lies at the core of the paper: accurate and timely investigative reporting.

In the age of Yik Yak and Snapchat, when social media reports and hearsay are taken as fact, the Thresher’s job to dispel rumors and clarify misconceptions is more important than ever. One of my goals as Editor in Chief is to more quickly publish quality articles on relevant topics.

I will work with a new online editor and developer to increase online and mobile content delivery. At the same time, I am looking to transform the Thresher website into one that can better facilitate campus discussion.

This past year, the Thresher has worked to gain your trust as a reputable news source. The paper has helped increase awareness of issues such as controversial Honor Council spending, Title IX incidences and Rice’s attempts to address sexual assault. Joined by Managing Editor and Will Rice College sophomore Yasna Haghdoost, who has previously led the news section with me, I will deliver the respectable and relevant journalism Rice deserves. In addition to quick and accurate reporting, we aim to focus on in-depth pieces that will clarify under-reported campus issues, and look to maintain coverage on topics of interest to readers.

Within the Thresher, in order to facilitate worthy content and drive readership, I plan to grow and develop a sustainable staff through increased revenue generation and a greater focus on recruitment and retention.

Through dialogue and a strong relationships with groups such as the Student Association, college presidents and chief justices, Honor Council and the University Court, the Thresher will bring perspective to issues of student governance. I look forward to both working more closely with student organizations and administration and providing a critical and unbiased voice on important subjects.

This will be an exciting year and I’m eager to earnestly begin. If you ever have any thoughts or criticism regarding the Thresher, I’m always open to discussion.

Stop me on campus, or shoot a message to thresher@rice.edu.

Stand up How long have you been sitting there?

Weeks ago I asked myself and calculated: I sat through 85% of a typical weekday while awake (14 hours). The 15% (2.5 hours) consisted of walking between classes, serveries, dorms and study spots, bathroom trips and the odd pacing during a phone call. Now, I wondered, should this ratio stay?

Most folks don’t regularly monitor their sitting. They sit. It is a natural position, no?

It sits midway between reclining, a sleeping pose, and standing, an active pose. More than a midpoint, so many activities (working, eating, recreating) default to sitting.

I bet you can more easily list what you do when you don’t sit. The thoughtlessness with which we sit likely built sitting’s postural monopoly, and thinking about sitting may lead us to chip away at the monopoly.

Standing is a fine, hale pose, but it is mostly relegated to waiting. Little other reason exists to stand still for a while because standing possesses such potential for movement. Cocktail parties leverage this potential, and so do you if you work standing: You feel free to literally step away from the work at any time. I do this sometimes to gather thoughts or pace around with an idea. If thoughts and ideas move, shouldn’t you?

Sitting encourages stasis. You might sit for a while to avoid the effort to stand.

Furniture impedes the habit of standing. Chairs and benches, maybe the most frequently redesigned objects, overpopulate the world, and they are functionally iconic: You know a chair’s proper operation when you see it. Standing folks have not chairs but high tables, or are they countertops? They are functionally ambiguous. Oftentimes you

see high tables paired unwillingly with high chairs.

Despite this bias, some landscape architects distort or dissolve bench seating in their projects, and two standing computer stations in Fondren (albeit the 15-minute express printing stations) gently nudge the default from sitting to standing.

But who needs pre-made furniture when you have makeshift? Here is one way to create a standing desk: 1 Remove a stack of books from Fondren.

2 Stack books on a table you normally sit at (calibrate stack to your height).

3 Set work on books.

4 Toss the chair you normally work in out of sight.

This crude and barely portable solution invites revision and improvement. Especially on a college campus, we should challenge the image of students hunched over a desk, buried in books. They could be standing, head above the books. Sitting need not be endemic to the academic.

Yasna Haghdoost* Managing Editor Miles Kruppa* Senior Editor news Anita Alem* Editor Drew Keller Assistant Editor Justin Park Designer

“Sensual grind.”

– Marcel Merwin, Photo Editor

“Promiscuous, yet sophisitcated. Altogether seductive.”

– Anita Alem, News Editor, POET

“HammerTa.”

– Andrew Ta, Editor in Chief

“The Whip.”

– Claire Elestwani, Creative Director

“Extremely Aggressive Booty Pop.” – Yasna Haghdoost, Managing Editor

“The fist pump punctuated by the head nod.”

“Moving your arms like you’re using a walker.”

Mitch Mackowiak is a Lovett College sophomore and the Thresher opinions editor

– Miles Kruppa, Senior Editor

“Awkwardly jumping up and down because I’m not drunk enough.”

– Sarah Nyquist, Sports Designer

“Do I look like a dancer?”

– Drew Keller, News Editor

“The Jersey Turnpike.”

– Kaylen Strench, A&E Editor

“The Jitterbug.”

– Sophie Newman, A&E Editor

“Yiking.”

– Reed Thornburg, Backpage Editor

“Moonwalking out of the room.”

– Carrie Jiang, A&E Designer

“Slow to fast fist pump.”

– Maddy Adams, Sports Editor

“Any dance moves performed in A Charlie Brown Christmas.”

– Mitch Mackowiak, Opinions Editor

“Grinding, but ironically.”

– Jasmine Lin, Copy Editor

“I don’t even know a dance move.”

– Justin Park, News Designer

“Standing awkwardly in the corner.”

– Evan Neustater, Sports Editor

Andrew Ta

Andrew Ta* Editor in Chief

What’s your favorite dance move?

– Julianne Wey, Copy Editor

Sincerely,

Editorial Staff

ASK THE STAFF

cartoon by carrie jiang

opinions Mitch Mackowiak* Editor sports Maddy Adams Editor Evan Neustater Editor Sarah Nyquist Designer art Carrie Jiang Art Director Marcel Merwin Photo Editor Claire Elestwani Illustrator arts & entertainment Sophie Newman Editor Kaylen Strench Editor

copy Jasmine Lin Editor Julianne Wey Editor backpage Reed Thornburg Editor business William Byers Manager advertising Cynthia Bau Manager * indicates member of the Editorial Board

The Rice Thresher, the official student newspaper at Rice University since 1916, is published each Wednesday during the school year, except during examination periods and holidays, by the students of Rice University.

Letters to the Editor must be received by 5 p.m. the Friday prior to publication and must be signed, including college and year if the writer is a Rice student. The Thresher reserves the rights to edit letters for content and length and to place letters on its website.

Editorial and business offices are located on the second floor of the Ley Student Center: 6100 Main St., MS-524 Houston, TX 77005-1892 Phone (713) 348-4801 Email: thresher@rice.edu Website: www.ricethresher.org Unsigned editorials represent the majority opinion of the Thresher editorial staff. All other opinion pieces represent solely the opinion of the piece’s author.

The Thresher is a member of the ACP, TIPA and CNBAM © Copyright 2015

arts

ENTERTAINMENT

5

KTRU prepares for 24th annual outdoor show Sophie Newman A&E Editor

marcel merwin/thresher

‘I’ll Tell You What the Coloreds Want. It’s Three Things. (Get Big or Get Out),’ by student artist Amiri Boykin, joins pieces by fellow students Yutian He and Dorin Azerad in their exhibition, ‘Fissure Price,’ in the Rice Media Center. The students were the 2015 recipients of the Mavis C. Pitman Exhibition Fellowship.

Students debut ‘Fissure Price’ exhibition Kaylen Strench A&E Editor

This spring, a fresh collection of pieces are taking over the Rice Media Center. “Fissure Price,” a diverse yet surprisingly unified exhibition, is the result of collaboration among this year’s Mavis C. Pitman Exhibition Fellowship winners: Martel College senior Yutian He, McMurtry College junior Dorin Azerad and Jones College senior Amiri Boykin. The visual and dramatic arts majors were each awarded cash prizes to support the creation of original works and their subsequent display in the Media Center. Though all three artists created distinct pieces, they were required to work together to curate a joint exhibition with a single name and theme.

He’s installation, “Reconstructed Destruction,” built from intricately folded and burnt paper, explores the tension between destruction and restoration. She said she was inspired by a summer research project she completed last year on disaster relief and reconstruction in Sri Lanka and Indonesia.

“Both of these places have been affected by severe natural disasters,” He said. “Sri Lanka by the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami, and Indonesia, because it’s very seismically active, by volcanoes and earthquakes. I was very moved by concept of the magnitudes and extremities of time and space.”

In order to construct her work, He burned bits of paper with a propane tank, put out the

THE WEEKLY SCENE The editors’ picks for this week’s best events. Time to explore the wonderful world of Houston.

flame quickly and then intricately folded the slips into various patterns.

“Natural features can take a long time to form but natural disasters can destroy in an instant,” He said. “I tried to process these thoughts by using different speeds of creation, fast and slow — fast being the burning of paper and slow being the meticulous and painstaking folding and creasing of the paper.”

We really wanted our exhibition to be casual and welcoming. We didn’t want something ‘high art’ and exclusive.

Yutian He Martel College Junior

Azerad’s piece, “SHATTERED,” features striking photographs of broken glass. She said the work analyzes the concept that pieces can be exquisite apart from a greater whole.

“My idea was that broken pieces aren’t necessarily part of a greater whole,” Azerad said.

“Parts have their own life when broken apart.”

In order to construct her work, Azerad smashed glass bottles, sorted through the pieces and then arranged them on a light table and photographed them. She explained the process was tedious and required close attention to detail.

“There was a lot of challenge in perfecting the technique,” Azerad said. “When you’re working with such small pieces of glass and you’re trying to make sure the images are high quality when blown up, you have to go back and re-photograph a lot, figuring out which lenses and lightings work best.”

Finally, Boykin used everything from magnets to bottle caps to human hair to create his complex work “sem titulo,” a mixed media piece including three sculptures, a video triptych, two short films and a QR code trio. He said his work explores a variety of themes relating to American cultural practices and values.

“Some of it is tongue-in-cheek, other parts much more obscure and directed,” Boykin said.

“The material figures in the gallery ... are extensions of much larger, multilayered elements that house, but aren’t limited to, critiques [of] consumerism, health, excess, capitalism, wealth, globalization and the constructs of race, nations and identity in a transnational environment.”

Boykin said his decision to use so many elements was a deliberate choice based on the complexity of his subject matter.

7890see PITMAN, page 6

In the wake of announcing its return to the airwaves, Rice’s official student-run radio station, KTRU, now prepares for the 24th Annual Outdoor Show, which will be held on April 11. KTRU prides itself on exposing local, underground artists, and the 2015 show promises an indie-electro beat with headliners Objekt, Bok Bok, GoldLink and Ex Hex. Fat Tony, Stalls, Deep Cuts, Heaven Spacey and Battle of the Bands winner Fire Alarm.

Returning artist FLCON FCKER will be providing visual entertainment.

Concert manager Jake Levens said his goal for this year’s show is to incorporate more electronic music into the lineup, something the station hasn’t done in years past.

“One of the things that I had in mind this year was bringing in more representation of electronic music,” Levens, a Will Rice College senior, said. “In the past we’ve had XXYYXX and FLCON FCKER, but in general, it’s skewed more toward indie rock. There were a lot of reasons to do that in the past, but this year, I thought, what if we explore some different options?”

Levens predicts that the headliner GoldLink will be a crowd favorite.

“GoldLink, I think, is going to be one of the biggest hits at the show,” he said. “[GoldLink] calls it ‘future bounce music,’ and basically it’s these really wild beats that he kind of just flies through rapping. It’s a lot of fun and it’s really high-energy.”

Accompanying the EDM will be local visual artist and musician FLCON FCKR, who played at last year’s show.

“As soon as it gets dark enough to be projecting, we’re going to have some weird, glitched-out madness going on behind the artists,” Levens said. “It’s especially important because we’re using [disc jockeys], and that’s a major audio-visual experience.”

Levens hopes that the risks KTRU is taking with the EDM lineup will pay off.

“We’re taking some risks this year with the lineup by having Objekt and Bok Bok there,” Levens said. “But ultimately I hope it works out, and that people stick around and watch the whole thing.”

In addition to the music scene, the show will also feature student organization booths, sponsor booths and food trucks.

Outgoing station manager Sal Tijerina said KTRU has plans to make this year’s show especially attractive with the food truck lineup.

“We are aiming to make this a huge event,” Tijerina, a Lovett College senior, said. “We’ve got some really awesome food trucks, like Oh My Gogi, that everybody loves. So that could even be an attraction in itself.”

According to Tijerina, KTRU also wants to make a special effort to connect to the Houston community this year, who has greeted KTRU’s return to the radio with enthusiasm.

“We’re definitely going to make an effort to really tap into the community this year, especially in light of recent news of us returning to FM,” Tijerina said. “A lot of the community was very excited to hear that we’re coming back, and we want to make sure that they know we appreciate it.”

ART CAR PARADE

LATIN JAZZ

INDIEFEST

SWAN LAKE

Most people know that Houston can be funky, but this Saturday, April 11, the city will reach a new level. A variety of cars transformed into works of art will drive down Allen Parkway in the Houston Art Car Parade. It is a true Houston tradition not to be missed.

There’s nothing quite like a little jazz to put you in the mood for the weekend. Fortunately, this Friday, April 10, you won’t have to go far to find some. Rice University bands will be playing a Latin jazz concert 4-6 p.m. outside Brochstein Pavillion, featuring local Latin jazz players and students. Dancing is encouraged.

Time to drop Netflix for a weekend and enjoy some quality indie films at matinee prices. The 48th Annual WorldFest-Houston International Film Festival boasts 51 features and over 116 shorts. Films screen April 10-19. Check website for movie descriptions.

What’s better than a worldrenowned Russian ballet performing a world-renowned Russian masterpiece? Probably nothing. If you enjoy Swan Lake, catch the Saint Petersburg Theatre Russian Ballet on Saturday, April 11 and Sunday, April 12 at 7 p.m.

Downtown Houston Up and down Allen Parkway thehoustonartcarparade.com

Rice University Brochstein Outdoor Pavillion bands.blogs.rice.edu/events

AMC Studio 30 at Dunvale 2949 Dunvale worldfest.org

Jones Hall 615 Louisiana St. houstonfirsttheaters.com

6 A&E

Wednesday, April 8, 2015

the Rice Thresher

WHAT’S HIP RIGHT NOW ART SCENE: Google Street Art

BOOK:

The Only Ones

by kaylen strench

TRENDING: Pebble Time

TECH:

Dash Button

courtesy google

In a phrase: View 10,000 pieces of badass street art from around the globe.

Where to find it: streetart.withgoogle.com The magic of street art is that you can’t find it in museums; you have to stumble upon it. It is symbolically and literally connected to the place where it is made: It can’t be moved or transported across the world.

These aspects are key to the medium, but they also restrict viewership of the works to the lucky few who are able to visit them.

Google Art is attempting to tackle this limitation by collecting and displaying photographs of graffiti, murals and other street art from around the globe. The website offers several options to explore the art, including a map where you can narrow the choice of pieces based on place of origin and audio tours that create a guided online exhibit of the works. The project has made a few industry critics uneasy, especially those fearing the art may be exploited for corporate profit. Others, however, see it as an essential way to preserve art history and share art with people around the world.

courtesy aaron starmer

courtesy pebble

In a phrase: Brave New World with more heart.

Where to find it: amazon.com, any bookstore

In a phrase: Famous smartwatch with a ridiculously long battery life.

Where to find it: Sources say it will hit the mainstream market in May.

Though critical reviews aren’t everything, it’s hard to ignore the landfall of praise for veteran music journalist Carola Dibbell’s debut novel, The Only Ones. NPR’s Jason Heller recently said the book is in the same league as Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, calling it “a debut novel on par with some of the best speculative fiction of the past 30 years.”

The book follows the life of a 19-year-old girl, Inez, who lives in a world set 50 years in the future that has been ravaged by a series of deadly pandemics. Inez is healthy, and she finds that wealthy people are willing to pay her a fortune if she clones herself. When the potential mother of one of the clones dies, Inez decides to raise the baby herself. Critics say the novel is heartbreaking and poetic, wrestling masterfully with the heavy themes of motherhood, genetic engineering and religion.

Kickstarter has made some great things possible (the Veronica Mars movie) and some really stupid things (remember the potato salad?). It’s not clear which category tech company Pebble’s new smartwatch, Pebble Time, will fall in, but at the very least it’s caught the world’s attention. The watch just broke not one, but two Kickstarter records: the fastest project to raise $1 million (one day) and, a week later, the most-funded campaign in the crowdfunding website’s history at over $13.3 million pledges.

78,439 people backed Pebble’s watch, which will sell for around $199 when it hits the market next month. Besides the price, the watch’s main selling points seem to be its sleek construction, color “e-paper” screen and weeklong battery life. Whether it’s worth the Kickstarter hype, however, is yet to be determined.

courtesy amazon

In a phrase: The potential for your 3-yearold to make you broke in a minute flat.

Where to find it: amazon.com It’s the most relatable, modern-American feeling there is: that twinge of annoyance when you reach for a new Keurig hazelnut coffee pod and realize you have run out. Amazon, ruler of the Internet-shopping universe, has set its sights on eradicating this sensation for good with its newest creation, the “Dash Button.” You just adhere the little device to the surface of something you might use up and press it as soon as you think you’re getting close. Voila! The Amazon restocking fairies will send a replacement right your way, automatically charging your card in the process. The device has not been received without some grumbling, especially among critics of capitalism who see it as just another way consumerism can penetrate deeper into our lives. Still, how nice would it be to never again face the conundrum of being stuck on the pot when you’re all out of toilet paper?

0PITMAN FROM PAGE 5 “I wanted to highlight the dichotomies present in the issues I was addressing while also utilizing and referring to a familiar visual aesthetic,” Boykin said. “[I wanted to] make a personal statement against certain historical events by raising awareness about contemporary issues and highlighting their connections. I felt the best way to do this was through mixed media, since my message had mixed sources.”

Once the artists created their pieces, they had to work together to collectively design and curate the exhibition. He said one challenge was deciding how to balance the unity of the exhibition with the unique aspects of each of the works.

“We wanted to ensure that the exhibition clearly exhibited three distinct pieces of work,” He said. “But we decided the fact that all of the mediums we were doing were different would provide its own natural separation, so we also endeavored to have moments in the exhibition when we let our works interweave and interact with each other at visual points.”

Boykin said while he had some initial anxiety about how the pieces would fit together, he was pleased with the end result.

“I was worried my work would clash against [Azerad and He’s pieces],” Boykin said. “But during the installation a natural connection was created between our installations that felt organic and rewarding.”

The three artists met several times to discuss their vision for the exhibition. Besides the name and theme, they also decided that they wanted the opening night of the show and the exhibition itself to be welcoming.

“We really wanted our exhibition to be casual and welcoming,” He said. “We didn’t want something ‘high art’ and exclusive, like a black-tie wine-and-cheese event.”

Boykin said he hopes that students of all majors will take a few minutes to check out the exhibition.

“I hope everybody can make it across our ‘huge’ campus … and really engage in in the exhibition,” Boykin said. “The students are what make this university universally relevant.”

The Mavis C. Pitman Exhibition will be on display in the Rice Media Center until April 16 during normal hours, Monday through Friday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Sports is on Twitter. Get the scoop at twitter.com/ThresherSports

7

Club rowing to host women’s speaker series Aniket Tolpadi Thresher Staff

cherry dong/thresher

Senior Natalie Beazant, named to All-C-USA singles first team in all three of her years at Rice, hopes to conclude her college career with success paralleling her freshman year. Beazant is ranked 21st in the nation in singles and looks to a strong performance in the NCAA Championships.

Beazant looks to finish storied career Juan Saldana Thresher Staff

It didn’t take Natalie Beazant long to position herself among the best women’s tennis players in the country. As a freshman four years ago, Beazant took the conference by storm and earned Player and Freshman of the Year honors, only the fifth player in conference history to achieve both honors in the same year. Throughout the years, the personal accolades have added up for Beazant, who has been named to the All-C-USA singles first team in all three of her years, in addition to a coveted All-American spot in singles.

The road to her current success wasn’t straightforward or easy. Since the age of three, tennis has been an essential part of Beazant’s life; however, her path to where she is today truly began at the age of 11, when her family moved to Florida from England. In Florida, Beazant attended the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, an athletic training institute meant for high-level athletic training. Constantly moving back and forth between England and Florida throughout her childhood, Beazant said she did not know how to go through the college recruitment process.

“Being in America helped me understand the college process a little but I still didn’t fully understand it,” Beazant said. “I was the first in

my family to ever go to college. When I was being recruited, I didn’t know what I was looking for. I feel like I’ve landed on my feet here at Rice [University]. Rice has gone above and beyond my expectations.”

Head Coach Elizabeth Schmidt, who recruited Beazant, has been a constant positive force for Beazant and the women’s tennis team, as have first-year Assistant Coach Taylor Fogleman and his predecessor, Younes Limam. According to Beazant, the team’s coaches are a primary reason that Beazant has succeeded at Rice.

“The coaches have been unbelievable here for the past four years,” Beazant said. “Our head coach, Elizabeth [Schmidt], has been unbelievable. She is an amazing woman and has made my experience here one of the best of my lifetime. We have also had two fantastic assistant coaches since I’ve been here and they have both been fantastic.”

This season, as the team prepares to enter their final match before the conference tournament, Beazant continues to work hard as she seeks to top her best Rice tennis memories. Specifically, she said she seeks to relive the team’s unmatched success during her freshman year.

“Freshman year, we made the sweet 16 at NCAAs,” Beazant said. “We beat Ole Miss at Ole Miss in the second round to make it. The feeling I got when we won that match was one of the

greatest feelings I have ever had with tennis.”

Now, as the team has gained experience and skill over Beazant’s four years, expectations are rising every year, and winning the conference championship, previously a lofty goal, is now a coveted and attainable step for the team.

Beazant said she looks to make Rice history by reaching the elite eight at the NCAA championships — held the same day as her graduation.

“Winning conference is definitely a big goal for us,” Beazant said. “As a team, that is something that we aim for and value as a program.

My personal goal is to not make graduation.

That would mean that we accomplished something that the school has never done before.”

Beazant, currently ranked 21st in the country in singles, seeks to finish her Rice tennis career with a strong performance in the individual NCAA Championships. There, she would compete against the top college tennis players for individual honors. With a strong spring season that currently has her at a singles record of 14-2, Beazant said she has proven she can compete with the best.

“I would love to be able to play at the individual NCAA championships this year,” Beazant said. “It is a great event to be able to play. There are lots of good players and good matches. I would love to be able finish off my Rice career there. It would be a great honor and really exciting.”

The Rice University crew team is hosting the “Row Like a Girl” Women’s Speaker Series this Sunday. The event will feature three former female rowers: Jessica Willey, Wendy Lawrence and Torrey Palmer, an Olympian and former Rice rower.

Willey, a current news reporter for ABC, and Lawrence, a former astronaut, are also former collegiate rowers. The focus of the speaker series is to inspire young women and girls to pursue rowing for the physical, emotional and communal benefits it provides.

The series was initially intended to be a fundraiser for the team. However, the crew team wants to attract as many people as possible, and has made the event free for Rice students.

According to freshman rower Yun Qui Wong, the purpose of the event is to attract more girls to consider rowing.

“Yes, you have to wake up early, train until you drop and give up a lot of time to make way for it, but rarely ever will you find anything else as rewarding,” Wong, a Martel College freshman, said. “The leadership skills, teamwork, friendship, discipline and determination you get out of it is totally worth it, and we aspire to bring more girls into this sport.”

This event serves as part of a larger mission for the Rice crew team. Though Rice crew was a strong team for much of the 1990s, the reality of being located in a region far from most boathouses and without a sports culture characterized by rowing eventually set in. The combination of high costs associated with rowing, the absence of boathouses within a 60-mile radius of campus and the lack of a head coach for much of the 2000s led to a severe decline in the program.

After going roughly 10 years without a head coach, a coaching staff finally arrived less than two years ago. With a new coaching staff came a sense of direction to the program; the team has taken on the dual responsibility of both raising awareness for the sport around the community and making it more accessible to Rice students and the community.

According to sophomore Annie Nordhauser, the speaker series is designed to inspire girls to use sports as a building block for success.

“Our goal for this series is to create an annual event to bring successful female rowers to campus to demonstrate sports as an empowering foundation for lifelong achievement,” Nordhauser, a McMurtry College sophomore, said.

The “Row Like a Girl” Women’s Speaker Series will be held from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Sunday, April 12 at the Rice Memorial Center Grand Hall.

Baseball takes series against conference leader Michael Kidd Thresher Staff

Rice vs. Middle TN

2-1

The Rice University baseball team hosted Middle Tennessee State University this past weekend in a conference series between the two top teams in Conference USA. Coming off a key road victory against Lamar University, the Owls went on to win the weekend series by securing victories at Friday and Sunday’s matchups. Rice posted a 3-1 record over the week to improve to 22-12 on the season (11-4 in C-USA). Rice’s 11-4 conference record is just percentage points away from the top spot in the Conference USA standings held by MTSU and Florida Atlantic University, each at 9-3 in conference.

On Friday night, Rice junior starter Kevin McCanna went 7.2 innings, striking out six batters and allowing just two runs. One of those runs came in the first inning of the ball game on three base hits but Rice quickly responded in the bottom of the second inning. Shortly after in the fifth inning, the Owls tacked on four more runs on a triple by senior infielder Ford Stainback and a two-RBI double by sophomore rightfielder Charlie Warren. Freshman pitcher Ricardo Salinas came into the ball game for the final two innings and secured the victory. Rice won the game 7-2.

On Saturday afternoon, MTSU got to lefthanded junior pitcher Blake Fox early and often by plating seven runs over a span of three innings. Meanwhile, Rice’s offense struggled to get going as the Owls had just two hits through the five innings. In the sixth inning, however, Rice got on the board with a two-run home run by junior first baseman Connor Teykl. In the following inning, Rice cut the deficit to 7-4 after a second home run on the afternoon by freshman outfielder Tristan Grey and a string

of singles. Despite the offensive surge, Rice could not complete the comeback as three double-play balls in key situations hindered any further rallying. Fox was credited with the first loss of his college career. It was his first loss in 43 appearances (185.0 innings), and he had previously posted a 21-0 record to begin his career.

On Sunday afternoon, Rice scored three runs in the first inning off base hits by Stainback and Teykl to take a 3-0 advantage. Rice went on to score four runs in the second inning and sent eight men to the plate to open up a 7-0 lead. The offensive outburst was more than enough for Rice redshirt junior starter Jordan Stephens, who pitched 6.0 innings allowing just three hits. In the eighth inning, an RBI double by Warren stretched the lead to 10-0 and the game was called off via run rule, as is the Sunday travel-day protocol. Stephens received C-USA Co-Pitcher of the Week honors for his performance.

Stainback, a four-starter for the Owls, said the series win against conference-leading Mid-

dle Tennessee should ignite the team down the stretch.

“Obviously [there are] ups and downs in a season, but I think we have just as talented a team if not more talented than in the past years,” Stainback said. “A big series win against Middle Tennessee [can be used] to get us kick-started to string off wins in a crucial part of the schedule for us.”

Rice redshirt junior pitcher Matt Ditman said he feels the Owls played very well against MTSU and feels the team recognized the type of play needed to be successful going into the postseason and beyond.

“Obviously we wish we would have swept [the series] but taking two out of three from a good team is not a bad thing,” Ditman said. “I think we saw elements of what it takes to succeed the rest of the season.”

Rice will head out to Birmingham, Alabama to face the University of Alabama, Birmingham in a Conference USA matchup. The Blazers are currently 18-12 overall (6-6 C-USA). First pitch is scheduled for Friday, April 10 at 6:30 p.m.

8

BACKPAGE

Wednesday, April 8, 2015

the Rice Thresher

E I P S PRO O_R______?

I took the road less traveled, and it has made all the difference.

– Prospie 25 minutes late to an English class or Robert Frost Oh no. Oh no.

– Oliver Twist or Twisted Oliver, the crossfaded prospie A lot of people don’t believe in curses.

A lot of people don’t believe in yellowspotted lizards either, but if one bites you, it doesn’t make a difference whether you believe in it or not.

– Stanley Yelnats or prospie sent to dig holes after being framed for stealing shoes Call me Ishmael.

– Abrahamic prospie or Herman Melville I would prefer not to.

– Prospie about the Sid Richardson party or Herman Melville

Can you guess who said what?

Dude I’m so stoked.

– Prospie about entering Rice, prospie about the Pre-Med Society, prospie about the Ultimate Frisbee Club, prospie about SOCI 211, prospie about breaking up with high school sweetheart, prospie about finding a way to make it work with soon-to-be long distance girlfriend from high school, or a 2002 surfing retrospective of the legendary Kelly Slater I’m up all night to get lucky.

– Pharrell Williams or that one prospie at 6:45 a.m. alone on the Lovett trampoline Moonlight drowns out all but the brightest stars.

– Prospie trying the marijuana for the first time or J.R.R Tolkien Uhhh. Guys. I’m pretty sure I’m the guy who shat himself.

– Tolstoy or THE Lovett Prospie

My mom would FREAK if she found out I went to a party.

– Prospie worried about repercussions of his actions or line from the Disney Channel Original Movie Smart House Dude this is the party of the month, naw that’s I beat Shaq.

– Aaron Carter Mashup or drunk prospie playing beer pong Nants ingonyama bagithi baba Sithi uhhmm ingonyama Nants ingonyama bagithi baba.

– Lion King soundtrack or prospie at Phils concert The limit does not exist.

– Mean Girls or prospie trying way too hard in Math 102 U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A. U.S.A. – Sacred Sigma Chi bonding chant or prospie who thought this was Ohio State orientation

The Backpage is satire and written by Reed Thornburg, and this week Dennis Budde and Andrew Stout collaborated. For comments or questions, please email turnt@rice.edu.

CLASSIFIEDS @rice.edu WANTED Teach for Test Masters! Dynamic and Energetic teachers wanted. Starting pay rate is $20 to $32 per hour. Flexible schedules. We provide all training, all training is paid, and we pay for travel. Email your resume to ricejobs@testmasters.com.

School Pick-up and after care needed for two girls (3 1/2 and 2 1/2) from same school, near Memorial Park. Need play time, dinner time, and bath time. Hours: 3-730. Pay $15/ hr. bbtruxillo@yahoo.com A physician family is looking for a part-time nanny from 6:30pm to 8pm during weekdays.

Girl is 1 yo, boy is 3 yo, both in Daycare right next to Rice campus. Responsibilities: picking up from daycare at 6:30pm, and preferably feed them dinner afterwards (our home is inside TMC right on Holcombe). putao123@ yahoo.com Experienced LSAT tutor, 98 percentile scorer, Georgetown Law graduate. Individualized, high-level, cost-effective tutoring.

Check out my website and LSAT blog with free tips at www.thelsatpro.com.

Paid intern position. Law office near campus. Part-time now and through summer. Please send resume and letter of interest to freddietrich@msn.com.

Need tutor for science and math and homework 5-7 hours per week in rice village area for fourth grade student. Contact khuranas@bellsouth.net AV Technicians Needed: Palmer Memorial Episcopal Church (6221 Main across from Rice University) is looking for several audio/ computer “geeks” to control the soundboard during Sunday worship and edit service recordings. Live theatre or church AV experience is a plus, but not required. High school and college students are encouraged to apply and can be paid for their time. Contact Steven Patterson at spatterson@palmerchurch. org or 713-529-6196.

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