2010-04-28

Showers 49/40

THE TUFTS DAILY

Where You Read It First Est. 1980 TUFTSDAILY.COM

VOLUME LIX, NUMBER 56

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 28, 2010

No clear frontrunner for Mass. governor

Referenda vote back on today’s ballot

MARTHA SHANAHAN

BY

Daily Editorial Board

Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick (D) is facing an intensifying gubernatorial race with a twoway challenge from Republican Charles Baker and Independent Timothy Cahill.

A recent poll showed that 60 percent of people disapprove of the direction in which the state is heading, according to Rick Gorka, a spokesman for the Baker campaign.

Patrick was elected in 2006 in what Press Secretary for Patrick’s campaign Alex Goldstein called “a grassroots movement.”

In this election, Patrick is emphasizing the need to build on reforms made during his first term in office, according to Goldstein.

“The governor has been able

to enact real and lasting reform,” Goldstein told the Daily. “He has reformed ethics and lobbying laws, overhauled the state transportation system and signed education reform that makes students the top priority. He also enacted Massachusetts health care reform … 400,000 people are now covered that weren’t previously.”

Patrick is running on the premise that another term in office would allow him to further many of his reforms.

“There is still work to be done,” Goldstein said, “and when it comes down to it, our campaign is really about finishing what we started.”

As an incumbent, Goldstein said, Patrick is up against a nationwide dissatisfaction with the status see GOVERNOR, page 2

Bacow meets with students to curb campus drinking culture BY

KATHERINE SAWYER

Daily Editorial Board

University President Lawrence Bacow is taking an active role in reshaping the campus drinking culture in an effort to combat the dangerous student mentality that he believes has led to

incidents of widespread alcohol abuse, such as last spring’s mass casualty incident.

This semester, Bacow has been meeting with students who have been taken to the hospital by Tufts Emergency Medical see TEMS, page 2

TIEN TIEN/TUFTS DAILY

University President Lawrence Bacow meets with students taken to the hospital by TEMS to discuss the dangerous drinking culture on campus.

BY

ELLEN KAN

Daily Editorial Board

Students logging in to WebCenter shortly after midnight to cast their vote for Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate president also found on the ballot four referenda that were slated to be voted on in a separate election on Monday, May 3.

The addition of the four referenda to today’s ballot marked the third time the date for the vote was changed. A TCU Judiciary ruling last night paved the way for a Tufts Election Commission (ECOM) decision to bring forward the referenda vote to its originally intended date.

On hearing ECOM’s initial announcement that four referenda would be placed on today’s presidential ballot, juniors Christopher Snyder and David Peck on April 22 filed a complaint asking that the referenda be taken off the ballot due to violations of bylaws.

They cited in particular bylaws specifying that referenda be received and explained briefly on ECOM’s website at least seven academic days before the vote, and that ECOM advertise the full text of the referenda seven days before the vote.

The Judiciary never heard the complaint, however, because ECOM of its own accord pushed back the vote for the referenda to a separate May 3 election.

This decision raised concerns that a separate, special election for the referenda would not draw sufficient voter participation for its results to be valid. A minimum 25 percent turnout is required for the election’s results to hold.

The referenda vote was of special interest because the third and fourth referenda concern proposed changes to the Senate’s community representative position, a matter that, along with the issue of minority representation, has been extensively debated.

This prompted outgoing TCU

JAMES CHOCA/TUFTS DAILY

Following last night’s TCU Judiciary ruling, ECOM put four referenda on today’s presidential ballot that were previously scheduled for a May 3 special election.

President Brandon Rattiner, a senior, to appeal ECOM’s decision and file a complaint with the Judiciary motioning for the referenda to be put back on today’s ballot.

“It requires 25 percent of the student body [to vote] for the referenda to pass, and there’s just no way we would have gotten that on Monday,” Rattiner said.

The Judiciary at last night’s hearing of Rattiner’s appeal voted 3-1 to give ECOM the final say over the date of the vote, paving the way for this latest date change.

“In a 3-1 decision, the [Judiciary] has decided that the date the referenda are to be placed on the ballot is ultimately at the discretion of ECOM,” the Judiciary said in a statement to involved parties explaining the ruling. “Due to the youth, confusion, and lack of precedent surrounding the ECOM bylaws in question, we will not find it inappropriate if ECOM decides to shift the date of voting to April 28.”

The statement further expressed the sentiment that it was not the Judiciary’s place to impose a date for the vote.

“The [Judiciary] would be overstepping its jurisdiction to

force ECOM to move the date …

Unless ECOM decides in the next few hours to move the election to [April 28], it will take place on May 3,” the statement said.

ECOM Chair Sharon Chen, a sophomore, informed the Daily that ECOM did make that decision to return the referenda to today’s ballot. Chen could not be reached for further comment at press time.

Rattiner applauded ECOM’s decision. “The people on ECOM acted admirably; they knew they made a mistake [in changing the date of the election] and did the right thing by putting [the referenda] back on the ballot,” he said.

Snyder, however, disagreed and expressed his disappointment that the bylaws were ignored.

“I think that it’s politics over procedure; however, I didn’t have the time to continue fighting to uphold the integrity of the process with … my academic commitments,” Snyder said. “In terms of turnout, just raw turnout, this date is better than May 3, and it’s just unfortunate that ECOM rules had to be set aside in the process to get at this outcome.”

Snyder further urged students to ensure they had see REFERENDA, page 2

Newly expanded Mr. Fraternity event hopes to draw larger crowd Alpha Omicron Pi (AOPi) on Thursday will hold its third annual “Mr. Fraternity” event, which brings together members of the Greek community to raise money for charity.

Members of Tufts’ fraternities will participate in the pageant show, and the proceeds will go to the Arthritis Foundation, according to President of AOPi Kaitlin Zack, a junior.

Sorority members will collect money for each specific contestant during the event, according to Zack, which factors into the final score.

“Part of the score is how much money they can raise,” Zack said.

The competition consists of four parts, according to Zack. The brothers will

compete in Greekwear, in which contestants can wear anything from a toga to their Greek letters, a talent competition, a formal wear portion and a question and-answer-session.

The three presidents of Tufts’ sororities will judge the event, she added.

The event has expanded since its creation three years ago. “The venue has been getting bigger,” Zack said. “[First] we were in Hotung, last year we were in Cabot, and this year we’ll be in Dewick.”

In addition, this year’s competition will feature more contestants. “This year, we have a representative from all the fraternities, and last year we had only nine [representatives],” Zack said.

Inside this issue Positive psychology is a growing field.

see FEATURES, page 3

According to Zack, AOPi expects about 400 people at the event.

“It’s a fun event, and all the money is donated to our national philanthropy cause, the Arthritis Foundation,” Zack said. “Another point of pride is that it’s really one of the only events that involves all of the Greek community.”

AOPi has chosen arthritis research as its cause specifically because of the disease’s catastrophic effects and the lack of a cure. “[Arthritis] is a very debilitating disease that has no known cure and … affects a lot of children as well as older people, and that’s our main focus,” Zack said.

She expects an entertaining competition. “Zeta Psi won last year, so I’m very

interested in what they’ll do this year.”

Junior Philip Lautman, Zeta Psi’s contestant this year for the fundraiser, expects another victory. “We hope to wow the crowd,” Lautman said. “I’ve got a great dance routine worked out.”

Freshman Moe Barry, the contestant from Alpha Tau Omega, said that he hopes that people donate to the cause.

“I’m hoping it goes well, if I win that’s great, and in the end it’s a charitable event, so the most important thing is that enough people show up and participate,” he said.

Tickets cost $5 and are available for sale in the Mayer Campus Center.

—by Martha Shanahan

Today’s Sections The softball team is one step closer to taking the NESCAC East with its victory over Trinity on Monday. see SPORTS, back

News Features Arts & Living Comics

1 3 5 9

Editorial | Letters Op-Ed Classifieds Sports

10 11 15 Back

THE TUFTS DAILY

2 Police Briefs CANNON WARS Tufts University Police Department (TUPD) officers at 11:30 p.m. on April 22 heard people yelling near the cannon by Ballou Hall. Upon arriving at the scene, officers discovered 15 to 20 students arguing about which group was going to paint the cannon. TUPD Sgt. Robert McCarthy said the argument occurred between members of Sigma Nu and Alpha Tau Omega.

“One group painted it, and then the other group wanted to after them,” McCarthy said. He said that the argument was eventually resolved.

AN ALARM-ING VISITOR TUPD responded at 2:45 a.m. on April 24 to a break-in at a house on the corner of Fairmount and Capen Streets.

A resident, upon hearing her house alarm, looked downstairs to discover an unknown male in the hall. She described the male as about 5’7” with short, dark hair. The resident ran to her room, locked the door and called TUPD officers, who searched the area but did not find any suspects.

BLAME IT ON THE ALCOHOL A TUPD officer at 8 p.m. on April 24 overheard a conversation between two students in Cohen Auditorium about alcohol.

“One of our officers heard people talking about not being drunk yet,” McCarthy said. The incident happened shortly before a Tufts Dance Collective show on Saturday at 9:30 pm.

The officer searched the downstairs area of the building and discovered that

students had been drinking in the dressing and practice areas in the basement of Aidekman Arts Center. The officer confiscated a bottle of vodka, a bottle of rum and a case of beer from the rooms.

No students were found to have alcohol.

LOST AND FOUND TUPD received a call at 11:40 p.m. on April 24 from the Zeta Psi fraternity house at 80 Professors Row for a breaking and entering in progress. Students saw two uninvited males enter the building and saw another who tried to gain access through the fire escape. The Zeta Psi brothers chased the males away and discovered that one had dropped his cell phone, allowing TUPD to identify him.

“We did get a report from there that one student did lose his laptop,” McCarthy said.

BONGS AWAY TUPD officers received a call at 12:30 a.m. on April 26 from a resident assistant (RA) from Wren Hall who had found two bongs in a bathroom. A TUPD officer and the RA confronted the student who was believed to own one of the bongs. The student, who was also found to have a bag of marijuana, admitted that one belonged to him but said that the other belonged to a friend. The bongs and marijuana were confiscated.

—compiled by Corinne Segal

An interactive map is available at tuftsdaily.com

Campaigns try to emulate Brown’s grassroots victory GOVERNOR continued from page 1

quo that stems from the economic climate.

“One of the challenges that faces incumbents across the country is [that] the global economic collapse has really hammered people,” Goldstein said. “A lot of [indicators] are showing that the Massachusetts economy is improving faster than the rest of the country.”

While facing the governor is a challenge, the fact that the people of Massachusetts have indicated disapproval with Patrick’s administration gives the Baker campaign an edge, according to Gorka.

“It’s always an uphill battle when you’re facing an incumbent,” Gorka told the Daily. “[The poll] shows that the people in charge have run the state poorly, and we need a change of leadership.”

Baker, the former president and CEO of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, has emphasized his record of fiscal responsibility and the need for a shift from the policies of the Patrick administration.

Taxes, spending and the economy are the three principle issues of the race, according to Gorka, and he emphasized Baker’s experience in all three. “[Baker is] the only candidate that has any credibility in these issues,” Gorka said.

Gorka highlighted Baker’s experience as Massachusetts secretary of administration and finance as essential to the race’s main issues. “[Baker] is the only man in this race that can reform state government so it runs efficiently and effectively,” Gorka said.

Cahill faces difficulties as an independent candidate, according to Milli Feldman, a spokesperson for Cahill’s campaign. An independent has yet to win a statewide election in Massachusetts, she added.

Cahill is the current Massachusetts treasurer.

“The major challenge is not having the backing of a major political party, and that includes the financial support and infrastructure,” Feldman told the Daily.

However, Feldman believes that Cahill’s experience as treasurer will outweigh the challenges of running as an independent.

“Having been in the state government, he’s been able to build a huge grassroots organization with over 13,000 volunteers getting the vote out and being active in their communities,” Feldman said.

She added that the campaign is optimis-

tic about the continuation of Cahill’s recent upward trends in the polls.

“You’re going to see a shift,” Feldman said.

“One of the constants has been a positive favorability rating, and … hopefully by running a positive, issues-based campaign, and as he meets more people and gets his message out, we’ll be able to keep those favorability ratings high.”

Feldman agreed with Gorka that economic issues are among the primary concerns of voters in this election and emphasized that Cahill aims to balance spending with saving.

“One of the principle issues is the economy and getting the local communities back on track,” she said. “Our primary goal is getting people back to work.”

Gorka said that Baker views the recent victory of Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) as a sign of dissatisfaction with the existing financial management trends in Massachusetts.

“Scott Brown’s election was definitely about fiscal responsibility, and we definitely see that as being a big theme in our race. [It was] primarily a rejection of the status quo,” Gorka said. “People were angry … about explosive spending, and it’s the same thing that’s happening now on Beacon Hill.”

Goldstein said that Patrick hopes to emulate the interactive nature of Brown’s campaign. “[Patrick] has a lot of respect for what Scott Brown did,” Goldstein said. “This is a campaign that believes in that neighborto-neighbor, one-on-one contact. [Patrick] visited 22 events in 18 cities and towns over the kickoff weekend of the campaign. He has really been everywhere, in every corner of the state.”

Feldman said that Cahill has also been drawing inspiration from the outcome of the Senate election. “[After the Senate race], we’ve seen a strong surge in the use of the word ‘independent’ and defining what ‘independent’ means,” Feldman said. “One of the benefits of being an Independent is that he’s not beholden to a party or forced to adhere to the party’s restrictions.”

Lieutenant governors in Massachusetts are elected separately from the governor. Patrick is campaigning alongside current Lt. Gov. Timothy Murray, his running mate, and Baker chose State Sen. Richard Tisei as his partner.

Cahill is running with Paul Loscocco, an attorney and former state representative.

State elections for governor and U.S. congressmen will be held Nov. 2.

NEWS

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Bacow says sustainable change must be initiated by students TEMS continued from page 1

Services (TEMS) and discussing each student’s situation.

“I’ve been periodically meeting this year with students who get transported for alcohol, asking them to come in to talk to me about circumstances that put them passed out at the base of the Alumni Steps at 3 a.m. on a Sunday morning,” Bacow told the Daily.

He added that he felt it was his duty to try to counteract the mentality that leads to this type of behavior.

“There is a dangerous drinking culture at Tufts, and we’re working to combat it,” Bacow said. “If we didn’t, we would not be doing our job.”

Technical Services Manager for Public Safety Geoffrey Bartlett applauds Bacow’s involvement and hopes that it will lead to a positive change in the drinking culture on campus.

“The fact that President Bacow is personally meeting with students should signal that he cares deeply about this issue,” Bartlett said. “Tufts is dealing with a serious challenge that faces many campuses.”

In his discussions with students who have required help from TEMS, Bacow asks each student to make two commitments about changing his or her behavior and Tufts’ drinking culture.

“I look them in the eye and … the last thing I say to them is that I want you to make me two promises,” Bacow said. “The first promise is you’re not going to put yourself in this situation again.”

Everyone readily accepts the first promise, Bacow said.

The second commitment, however, is more difficult but essential to changing the drinking culture at Tufts, he added.

Bacow makes each student promise to speak up in situations involving dangerous drinking and to try to prevent other incidents from occurring.

“I say ... I want you to be a better friend to your friends than they were to you,” Bacow said. “You would never let a friend get in a car drunk with their keys; you take their keys away from them, and you would stop them from doing that. So why do you let a friend drink to excess to such a degree that they’re putting their life at risk?”

Interacting with students who have survived dangerous drinking situations, like alcohol poisoning, has reinforced Bacow’s belief that the drinking culture needs to change.

According to Bacow, students set the expectations for drinking on campus.

He believe that the drinking culture will change only if students create new social norms for drinking.

“We are capable of creating expectations, but most of those come from within, and I think students have to be a big part of the solution,” Bacow said.

In response to the idea of having more mandatory alcohol education, Bacow

said that increased programming would not change drinking on campus without a change in the collective mentality of students.

“The notion that we can just do a better job of teaching about alcohol education during orientation and the problem will go away is, I think, ridiculous,” Bacow said. “We will continue to try and do it, and we should teach as we do, but giving people a two-hour talk at the beginning of their freshman year isn’t going to solve the problem.”

The problem will only be solved, Bacow reiterated, when students intervene in potentially dangerous situations and prevent friends from drinking in excess.

According to an anonymous freshman who was taken to the hospital by TEMS this semester, the drinking problem relates to people not understanding their alcohol limits, something that cannot be easily taught.

“I think [the problem is] that people don’t know how to handle their alcohol, and things get out of control,” she said.

The student did not get the opportunity to meet with Bacow, but instead met with Judicial Affairs Officer Veronica Carter and Director of Health Education Ian Wong.

Bacow cited an incident in which a student died of alcohol poisoning during his tenure at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) as pivotal in shaping his stance on alcohol.

“I had the experience during my tenure at MIT of having a student die from alcohol poisoning,” Bacow said. “I remember meeting with his parents, I remember meeting with his friends who were drinking with him on the night that he consumed to excess, and it’s not an experience I want to go through again.”

Bartlett agreed with Bacow’s views, adding that while students should continue to call TEMS in case of emergency, peer intervention is the most effective way to change the drinking culture on campus.

“Students need to take responsibility for adopting safe, healthy behaviors and call out their peers who behave in ways that are unsafe or unhealthy,” Bartlett said.

“I continue to strongly encourage students to call for help when someone needs medical attention, but it would be much better if peers intervened before EMS is needed. Tell your friends when they’ve had enough, and lead by example.”

Last spring’s mass casualty incident highlighted the problems with the campus drinking culture, Bacow said, and reflected poorly on Tufts.

“It wasn’t just that it was a mass casualty incident — you had students who were throwing up on nurses, you had students who were being abusive to folks in the emergency room because they were so drunk they couldn’t control themselves,” Bacow said. “That doesn’t give Tufts a particularly good name and doesn’t speak well for Tufts students anywhere.”

Ellen Kan and Michael Del Moro contributed reporting to this article.

Students to vote on referenda in today’s ballot REFERENDA continued from page 1

enough information to make an educated vote on the four referenda.

The first referendum calls for changes to the language of the TCU constitution and to the referendum process itself, most notably eliminating the minimum 25 percent turnout requirement for the passage of referenda and adding procedures needed for referenda to be placed on ballots.

The second referendum restructures a number of TCU committees, adds provisions for the election of a TCU webmaster and representatives to the Boston Intercollegiate Leadership Council, and revises the qualifications listed for certain positions.

The third and fourth referenda contain competing proposals for the Senate’s community representative position. The position came under scrutiny when questions were raised about the current community representative system, including representatives’ current lack of full voting powers on Senate — they do not have the

power to vote on fiscal matters.

Rattiner convened a Diversity Task Force to study the matter, and the proposal that emerged as referendum four, which establishes procedures for granting and electing community representatives, creates a new Diversity and Community Affairs Officer position on the Executive Board and grants four initial community representative positions to the Africana; Latino; Asian American; and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Centers.

A competing proposal, the Community Empowerment and Equality Model, was developed in the process, partially by dissenting task force members. The proposal, encompassed by referendum three, shares many similarities with that of the task force’s, with the primary difference being that it would grant community representatives full senator voting rights.

Other differences between the two include the procedures for selecting community representatives and the DCA. Full text of all the referenda are available through links on the ballot and on ECOM’s website.

Features

3

tuftsdaily.com

Class teaches those enrolled to see the sunny side of life BY

CARTER ROGERS

Daily Editorial Board

Many might associate psychology first and foremost with the study of disorders and mental illnesses, but one Experimental College class is focusing on a more optimistic branch of the field.

“Positive Psychology: Theory and Application,” is a new course taught

by Debra Levy, a teaching fellow at the Department of Psychology at Harvard University. Levy is also a personal life coach who teaches individuals and organizations to use positive psychology in their lives.

Positive psychology is a relatively new branch of the science. Its origins are relatively recent and can be traced to 1998, when Martin Seligman, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, chose it as his theme during his year as president of the American Psychological Association.

“I realized that my profession was halfbaked. It wasn’t enough for us to nullify disabling conditions and get to zero. We needed to ask, “‘What are the enabling conditions that make human beings flourish? How do we get from zero to plus five?’”

Seligman once said in an interview with Time magazine.

Positive psychology focuses on what actions people can take to improve their happiness levels and satisfaction with life.

“Positive psychology is the study of why are happy people happy, why are successful people successful, what contributes to healthy development?” Levy said. “The field of psychology, since World War II, has really looked at what goes wrong, so mostly at abnormal development. Why are people anxious, why are people depressed?”

According to Levy, research conducted by Seligman found that people who focused on three good things that happened to them every day were happier during difficult times.

“One thing that does is it gets you to change your focus. It gets you to change your focus to what is working and what is going right,” Levy said.

A key to positive psychology is optimism, according to Levy. “Optimism is: Look, finals are going to be hard, but you’re going to get through it. Optimism helps people look at challenging times as temporary and contained,” Levy said.

“Pessimistic interpretations say … ‘Oh this is awful, these are the worst times … my life is always this stressful and nothing good will ever happen.’”

ARIELLE BARAN

Daily Staff Writer

The transition to college can be an entrance into treacherous territory, as students are faced with more complex academic material and an abundance of independence and no parental supervision. Particularly for out-of-state and international students who are now hundreds or even thousands of miles from their families for the first time, the confusion of newly attained self-reliance is compounded by the emotional impact of the physical distance from home and even a sense of loss of one’s national identity and culture.

Tufts Counseling and Mental Health Service (CMHS), along with other student-driven organizations on campus like Ears for Peers exist to assist students with a variety of issues, particularly the transition to independent life on a college campus far from home.

Ears for Peers is an anonymous hotline run by students for students that is open every night from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m.

“Its purpose is to give all students

The waiting game

I

COURTESY DEBRA LEVY

Debra Levy hopes her positive psychology course has taught students some of the secrets to happiness.

Levy was the lead teaching fellow in Lecturer Tal Ben-Shahar’s course Positive Psychology at Harvard from 2007 to 2009.

While Ben-Shahar was at Harvard, the class was the most popular class at the university, with 855 students enrolled in 2006, according to the Boston Globe. BenShahar has since taken a lecturer position at the University of Pennsylvania.

Levy approached the ExCollege about

teaching the class, as she wanted to teach positive psychology in a more intimate setting. “It’s a perfect match for a positive psychology course because by nature of teaching it, it’s experiential learning,” Levy said.

Levy hopes the course can return to the ExCollege next spring semester, see POSITIVE, page 4

On-campus counseling services help students cope with homesickness and other difficulties BY

JESSIE BORKAN | COLLEGE IS AS COLLEGE DOES

a person they can talk to,” junior Izzy Eccles, Ears for Peers public relations and marketing coordinator, said “Freshmen in particular can find college life confusing and although they have many new friends, they’re not always comfortable opening up with new people about their problems or worries.”

Ears for Peers listens to students and refers them to resources including CMHS, the Tufts University Police Department, Academic Student Resources, The Office of Residential Life and Learning and the Group of Six. Hayeon Choi, a freshman from South Korea, spent this year adjusting to life in the United States and has faced numerous struggles along the way, including developing time management skills in a less-crowded schedule (Choi’s school in South Korea started at 7:40 a.m. and didn’t end until 10 p.m.), as well as adapting to an environment where she must speak English.

“Before I came here, I was nervous about how to study and how to socialize with people, and I thought the cultural difference was going to be very big. I was

afraid I was going to have to think about what I was going to talk about because I wouldn’t have that much common knowledge,” Choi said.

Choi said that her fellow Korean friends at Tufts have had similar difficulties. “Students won’t go to class and start just missing class,” Choi said.

“Being far away would make them rely more on other things like drinking and drugs. I’ve seen some of my friends need to take a gap year because they’re having such a hard time.”

Choi has gotten involved in extracurricular organizations like Tufts Mock Trial and Korean Students Association to help her cope with all the changes.

Despite not coming from abroad, freshman Brittany Neff from Santa Monica, Calif. has had a challenging second semester, made all the more difficult by how far she is from home.

An active member of the Tufts volleyball team, Neff spent much of the past semester bedridden with a serious case of mononucleosis. While dealing see DIFFICULTIES, page 4

hate waiting so much. If waiting and I were sitting next to one another on a train, I would put in my headphones and not exchange pleasantries. Luckily, I live in a society built on instant gratification, so I have to interact with waiting less and less, but there are still times when it’s unavoidable.

There is no worse feeling for me than my flight getting delayed, or arriving somewhere too early (which is probably why I am pathologically late). Missing a bus is disproportionately upsetting to me because the prospect of having to wait for the next one seems nearly unbearable. I know everyone does it — I see people waiting all the time.

We wait to get into concerts, at the grocery store, for that guy in English to notice us, for our deadbeat friends to pay us back. You might even be waiting as you read this — for class to start, for it to end, for your Spring Fling tickets (by the way, could someone please tell me who or what Drake is?) Maybe waiting is your downtime; a small price to pay; some time to think; perhaps it’s a chance to practice good posture or to people-watch. Whatever it is for you, for me, waiting is something to avoid at all costs. Why? Because I equate “waiting” with “wasting.”

In a period of our lives that is very much finite, the fear of wasting time is monstrous. Every time there is a fire on the Red Line (more common than you’d think) and I am stuck underground for an extra 25 minutes, the part of me that is scared of growing up mourns the loss of that half-hour in what is supposed to be the best four years of my life. Every time that heralded period is brought down by a mundane interval of waiting, I can’t help but think that the rest of my life will be that much worse now that the best part of it is muddied by a little more wasted time.

I know this sounds ridiculous, but think about it. Even you, dear freshman, are not immune to the constant declarations by our elders that they would literally kill someone to relive their college years. At least when we were teenagers, everyone was saying they would never want to do that again. How are we supposed to feel when the end of our golden age (and I don’t mean the one where you get to join AARP) is in sight even as we begin it?

Even as my fear of wasting time lives on, I find myself in a consistent and more fundamental state of waiting nearly all the time. I am waiting to hear back about jobs, waiting for graduation, waiting to finish classes and get my diploma and move out of my house and to a new city — I am waiting for the other shoe to drop, to find out what life becomes when it loses the structure that college has so benevolently bestowed upon us.

In the meantime, the last weeks of my college career are flying by. I can guarantee that some weeks of yours are, too — they just happen to be the middle weeks, or the relatively early weeks of a four-year period you can never recreate, or when you really think about it, of an entire life in which no two days will ever be the same, unless you are Bill Murray in “Groundhog Day” (1993).

So, stop waiting, and start living. Every minute spent in line, in limbo, or in unrequited love needn’t be a waste, and the college years needn’t be the best four of your life, but they’re still pretty damn good, so enjoy them — I know I have.

Jessie Borkan is a senior majoring in psychology. She can be reached at Jessie.

Borkan@tufts.edu.

THE TUFTS DAILY

4

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

FEATURES

Positive psychology is a growing field POSITIVE continued from page 3

whether or not she teaches it.

Readings for the course include “The How of Happiness” (2007)

by Sonja Lyubomirski, “Creating Your Best Life” (2009) by Caroline Adams and Ben-Shahar’s own “Happier: Learn the Secrets to Daily Joy and Lasting Fulfillment” (2007).

Levy acknowledges that some findings of positive psychology may seem like common knowledge but stressed the field’s importance. “In some ways it’s like, ‘Yeah that’s obvious,’ but … the scientific research has proven that it’s effective. Part of our class is that we want to introduce people to the range of different strategies and interventions people can use to pick the one that’s right for them,” Levy said.

“A big part of the field is that people need to know their strengths and use them,” Levy said, citing cross-cultural studies which found that people possess a combination of 24 character strengths.

The University of Pennsylvania has a free online survey (available at Authentichappiness.sas. upenn.edu) that ranks these 24 strengths (such as leadership, fairness and caution) in participants and gives them their top five, or signature strengths.

“Research has found that people that know their strengths do better and that we need to know our strengths more,” Levy said.

According to Levy, the discipline of positive psychology overlaps heavily with other disciplines, especially cognitive psychology. “It’s an eclectic group of psychologists to begin with,” Levy said. The only psychology program in the country to give a master’s degree in positive psychology is University of Pennsylvania, and Claremont College in California is the only school to offer a doctoral degree in the field, according to Levy.

As positive psychology is such a new field, Levy admits it has not yet reached full-scale acceptance among other psychologists, but thinks this is a common phenomenon.

“When behaviorists started, people said ‘Oh, what’s with behaviorists, what are you doing with pavlovian tests?’ I actually think the field of positive psychology is gaining ground as it becomes bigger and more known and more and more research happens,” Levy said.

“This isn’t new age kind of science. This isn’t like ‘The Secret’ [2006]; This is a field within psychology that’s research-based,” she added.

Only about a third of the students in the class are psychology majors, according to Levy.

“People who have never taken a psychology course before have chosen the class, and the class has been very interactive,” Levy said.

One way students were interactive was by planning a Positive Psychology Day for their final project, which is occurring today.

“We’re doing Positive Psychology Day at the end of the semester; when people are often obviously

stressed out,” Levy said.

Sophomore Julia Zinberg, a psychology major, is one of the students who will be working to spread positive psychology today.

Students will be promoting the day with flyers, posters and positive psychology t-shirts. There will be a savoring board in Tisch library, where students can write down good things that happened to them during the day that they want to savor. “[Savoring] is something that has been proven to increase happiness significantly, so that’s part of positive psychology,” Zinberg said.

Students planning Positive Psychology Day also created a Facebook.com event and encouraged students to post positive things that happened to them that day on the event’s wall.

Students in the class will be performing “random acts of kindness” that include giving people free hugs and leaving post-it notes with compliments on them around campus.

“It’s a branch of psych that’s pretty new. There’s no classes offered in the psychology department at Tufts [about positive psychology],” Zinberg said.

“It’s a really good branch of psych to study, because I feel like it adds more of a balance to the discipline by focusing on what makes people happy versus; what makes them unhappy and how to fix that. It’s very practical. What you learn in it is things you can implement; to improve your life long-term,” Zinberg said.

Freshman Sydney Rubin and about half the students in the class decided to work on a website to promote positive psychology for their final project, PositivePsych.webs.com.

“For each of the ideas that we brainstormed, we had to do research on it to see how feasible it was. I was assigned to the website and once I saw how easy it was it sort of took off from there and I thought it was a really good idea,” Rubin said.

The website serves to inform visitors about the basics of positive psychology and how they can use it in their everyday life. It also includes a list of articles about recent news in the field of positive psychology.

“As a class, we always figured that these are really good tips that college students in particular can use,” Rubin said.

The website stresses that students suffering from stress, anxiety or depression should still seek counseling. “Obviously, it’s not a counseling thing, but we thought it would be a good idea to have some sort of resource there that anyone at Tufts and even outside of Tufts can use,” Rubin said.

Rubin was one of the students who does not have a background in psychology, but took the class because it seemed like an interesting topic.

“I think that it pertains so much to life, so I’m not really sure what I’m going to major in, but I know the stuff you learn from positive psychology is about how to live your life and how to think; so it’s for people from all disciplines,” Rubin said.

DANAI MACRIDI/TUFTS DAILY

Counseling and Mental Health Services works to help students make adjustments when away from home.

Both peers and experts help students through difficult times DIFFICULTIES continued from page 3

with fevers and extreme exhaustion, Neff also faced the losses of her uncle and a close family friend.

“It was really hard having these things happen at home and not being home for them and being really sick,” Neff said.

“I’ve seen a counselor several times and Tufts has lots of programs like Ears for Peers for students. They try to reach out to students but you really have to make the first effort.”

Neff ended up dropping two classes because of the time she missed while sick and even considered withdrawing for the remainder of the semester after talking with her dean. Since spring break, Neff has met with a counselor through CMHS and has become more involved with the Women’s Center and other organizations on campus.

CMHS Supervising Clinician

and Training Director Julie Jampel said that students seek counseling to deal with a variety of adjustments.

“Students often notice changes when they are away from their home situation,” Jampel said.

“When you’ve lived with something everyday, things don’t necessarily stand out so then when someone comes to college and has had different experiences than their roommates or friends, then they start to recognize those differences.”

Freshman Dan Kim started visiting CMHS a week before spring break. “It’s really helped, because at some point I stopped using my friends for support. An objective perspective has helped me take a step back and look at the situation rather than obsessing over an emotion,” Kim said.

Kim came out as gay to his parents over Thanksgiving break and has been dealing with the subsequent adjustments to his

relationship with them.

“Once I came out to them everything changed, because for a while my whole relationship with my parents became easily avoidable for me because of the physical distance,” he said.

“It was something that I wanted to avoid. The conversations became so heavy. They were all about homosexuality. It moved away from normal conversations kids have with their parents.”

Finding ways to relieve stress has helped Kim cope. Writing poetry, singing, going for walks and relaxing on the library roof at night have been stress relievers for Kim, along with his weekly CMHS sessions.

Neff stressed the importance of feeling a sense of belonging among peers to create a home away from home.

“I think it’s really important, making communities for yourself that you belong to,” she said.

Arts & Living

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tuftsdaily.com

INTERVIEW

ZACH DRUCKER AND CHRIS POLDOIAN | BAD SAMARITANS

‘Winter’s Bone’ director speaks about newest film BY

Couples retreat!

W

CATHERINE SCOTT

Daily Editorial Board

This year’s independent film to watch, “Winter’s Bone,” screened last Friday night at the Somerville Theatre as part of the Independent Film Festival of Boston. The film won the Grand Jury Prize earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival, and it also snagged the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award at the festival for director Debra Granik and co-writer Anne Rosellini.

“Winter’s Bone” is Granik’s second feature film after another Sundance winner, “Down to the Bone” (2004) — a breakout film for recent Oscar nominee Vera Farmiga that won her the Sundance award for Best Dramatic Performance and won the Directing Award for Granik.

“Winter’s Bone” is about Ree, played masterfully by Jennifer Lawrence, a teenage girl charged with taking care of her invalid mother and two younger siblings since her drug-dealing father took off. Ree discovers that her father has put their house up for bail, and if he doesn’t show up for court in a week, Ree and her family will be ejected from their home. She goes on a manhunt in the hope of convincing her father to do what’s right, but she discovers a deeper conspiracy among her kin and neighbors.

Director Debra Granik was in Boston promoting her film and sat down with the Daily to answer a few questions about her new film and the process of making independent films.

Catherine Scott: Why did you think it was important that you show this Missouri Ozarks life to people? Because there’s been a lot of controversy, with “Precious” last year and now something like this, over poverty being shown on

ROADSIDEATTRACTIONS.COM

Debra Granik talks about her newest independent film, “Winter’s Bone.” screen. What redemptive qualities do they might have this town life and a you think that sort of life might have private hill life, meaning when they get home, they are maybe heating their for people, if any? house with a wood stove.

There’s a lot of contrasts, and it did Debra Granik: It never started with the idea of seeking out a person who feel interesting and rich to say, “In lives with very limited resources. It 2010, there are these communities was coming out of the novel by Daniel that still exist.” Someone can have this Woodrell, and he is describing a kind duality of having a satellite dish in of mixed situation in hill culture where their yard, but that doesn’t conflict people may have land but not a lot of with the fact that they also augment fluid cash. People may have some land their whole winter food source with that I would call difficult land, hard- wild game. It was eye-opening, as an scrabble land. It’s not like it’s really East Coast person, that squirrel is not suited for farming or whatnot. And exotic. It’s not gross; it’s not weird. It’s then they have a day job; they may just a commonly obtainable source of work in a Wal-Mart that’s somehow in the 25-mile radius of their place, so see GRANIK, page 6

TV REVIEW

GALLERY REVIEW

‘Party Down’ serves up a second season of laughs BY

REBECCA GOLDBERG Daily Editorial Board

In the world of premium cable, most halfhour comedies — like Showtime’s “Weeds” and “United States of Tara,” or HBO’s “Hung”

Party Down Starring Adam Scott, Ken Marino, Megan Mullally, Lizzy Caplan Airs Fridays at 10 p.m. on Starz and “How to Make It In America” — tend to not elicit many laughs out loud, instead choosing to simply tell more grounded, melo-

dramatic or serious stories in a shorter format. On the other hand, “Party Down,” Starz’s first original effort, delivers laughs in spades and became the funniest show on TV last year. The show launched its anticipated second season last week.

The series follows one branch of Party Down Catering, a company that serves the Los Angeles area. Each team member is either a Hollywood hopeful or a neverwas disillusioned by the punishing system of the entertainment industry. Anchoring the hilarious ensemble is Adam Scott as Henry Pollard, who had a glimpse of stardom when he coined an obnoxious catchphrase in a beer ad. As season two bows, he has to swalsee PARTY, page 6

Shutting doors opens eyes in short film BY

ANNA MAJESKI

Daily Staff Writer

What can we create meaning from?

What activities in life are just banal and unnecessary, and what can we find

Matt Sheridan Smith: Untitled (open/shut) At the Media Test Wall, through May 3 MIT List Visual Arts Center #20 Ames Street Building E15, Atrium Level, Cambridge 617-253-4680 something greater in? Since the time of Marcel Duchamp, artists have declared insignificant and everyday objects as art, and whatever the reception may have been initially, a porcelain urinal is now accepted as a witty and insightful masterpiece. This groundbreaking movement at the beginning of the 20th century is now almost commonplace, but the pushing of the boundaries of art continues. Artists are still interested in the objects we take advantage of, and they have come to question even the simplest of life’s actions.

New York artist Matt Sheridan Smith

STARZ.COM

The hapless crew of “Party Down” features familiar faces.

see GALLERY, page 6

hy does America love Hollywood?

Why do People magazines fly off the shelves faster than “Harry Potter” books, and why does Perez Hilton’s website get more hits than Robot Unicorn Attack? Well, it all boils down to one simple reason — no, not Miley Cyrus.

People love Hollywood because Hollywood is sexy. And we’re not talking about your average eighth-grade-health-teacher sexy. We’re talking about the Megan Fox (oh, she’s nasty!), Demi and Ashton (Twitter, lolz) and Johnny Depp (what a rebel!) sexy.

One important component of moviemaking is finding the right onscreen couple. Picture this: two lovers shipwrecked in the ocean, clinging to a door that only supports one. The man (played by Woody Allen) remains in the water, submerging most of his body and subsequently dying of hypothermia — the ultimate sacrifice. The woman (Rosie O’Donnell) emotionally promises ol’ Woody that she will live on without him.

This memorable scene from the romantic epic “Titanic” (1997) would just not be the same without its stars, Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio. Their onscreen chemistry was so real and heart-wrenching that Chuck Norris was brought to tears — even though he has no tear ducts because he roundhousekicked himself in the face once.

Casting directors must avoid film faux pas when selecting actors and actresses for their films. Firstly, studio execs must not make ludicrous couples. On date night, moviegoers are more or less looking for realism. That’s why they choose romantic comedies over “The Chronicles of Riddick” (2004).

Recently, the rom-com genre has seen a lot of mismatching, like the pairing of 40-yearold J.Lo with hunky 30-something Alex O’Loughlin in “The Back-Up Plan” (2010).

O’Loughlin’s from the Outback and, though you might be fooled by the rocks that she got, Jenny is from the Block. If you wouldn’t see a couple being linked on eHarmony.com, they probably won’t make the best romantic duo.

Instead, films should be going for comparable actors to play love interests. In “Date Night” (2010), comedy golden girl Tina Fey and goofball extraordinaire Steve Carell team up to play the Fosters, an average married couple from Jersey whose lives get flipturned upside down when they are mistaken for blackmailers. Though the plot and action sequences of the film faltered, Carell and Fey anchored the film with their complementary comedic acting. Truly a match made in NBC heaven.

Another example of a classic couple is that of Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal in “Brokeback Mountain” (2005). Though no one would have guessed it, Donnie Darko and the rough-edged Aussie made for one steamy pair. Both excelled in playing rugged cowboys with repressed homosexual feelings. The two fed off of each other brilliantly as Ledger starred as the resistant Ennis being pressured

by Gyllenhaal’s Jack. Ang Lee won the Oscar for Best Director due to this film, but we give the award to casting director Avy Kaufman.

One common mistake filmmakers make is to put real-life lovers in films together.

Though actors often find love with their costars, pairing lovers is ludicrous. Would we pay good money to see Flavor Flav and his current stripper fiancée, Liz, star in a film together? Well, probably. But would we pay even more money to see Flavor Flav with 20 raunchy, SoCo-guzzling harlots named Spunkeey? Yup. Take “The Break Up” (2006), for example.

The film starred Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston as a couple in a rocky relationship.

The film was just as asinine as Aniston’s relationship choices. John Mayer’s not the one, girl! The only film that pulled off true chemistry was “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” (2005). What can we say? Brangelina is fine.

Zach Drucker is a sophomore majoring in International Relations, and Chris Poldoian is a sophomore who has not yet declared a major.

They can be reached at Zachary.Drucker@tufts. edu and Christopher.Poldoian@tufts.edu.

THE TUFTS DAILY

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Wednesday, April 28, 2010

ARTS & LIVING

Series of shutting doors highlights real life repetitions

Talented ensemble a highlight of ‘Party Down’ PARTY

GALLERY

continued from page 5

continued from page 5

low his cynicism in his new role as the new catering team leader.

His job is to rein in the outsized characters on his team.

Kyle (Ryan Hansen), a dim, blond model-actor-singer is often at odds with Roman (Martin Starr), a droll aspiring screenwriter who only writes “hard sci-fi.” Ron (Ken Marino), the deluded former team leader, begs his way back onto the team, and Casey (Lizzy Caplan), a comedian whose past romantic history with Henry elevates the general awkwardness.

Lydia (Megan Mullally), an airheaded stage mother, rounds out the group.

Mullally is a new addition to the cast this season, filling the hole left

by Jane Lynch, who had to bow out to pursue her breakout role on “Glee.” Lynch, whose recent success is wholly deserved, turned in great work last year as the wacky former actress Constance and left big shoes for Mullally to fill. In the season premiere, Lydia still has not fully gelled with the ensemble.

The greatest strength of “Party Down” is the chemistry of the strong ensemble of underrated comedy actors, culled from many diverse corners of Hollywood. The season premiere, “Jackal Onassis Backstage Party,” spent too much time laying new narrative groundwork to adequately feature characters like Kyle and Ron, but when the show runs on all cylinders, every member of the cast feels vital. It remains to be seen whether Mullally will be able to integrate herself as well as Lynch or Jennifer Coolidge, Lynch’s temporary season-one replacement.

“Party Down” comes from three writers who worked on “Veronica

continues the great tradition of finding meaning in the everyday in his short film, “Untitled (open/ shut)” (2008), currently displayed on Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Media Test Wall. The film is about seven minutes long and runs on a continuous loop in the Whittaker Building’s lobby. “Untitled (open/shut)” explores the meaning of not just everyday objects but everyday actions through reworking something familiar: a film. Smith recalls the question about what constitutes art, but he also changes the nature of this questioning by doing it in a new media format.

Smith has reedited French director Robert Bresson’s movie “L’Argent” (1983), which is based on Leo Tolstoy’s novella “The Counterfeit Note.” The movie is about a boy whose father refuses to give him an advance on his allowance, so he decides to use forged bills in a shop. The shop owner, who realizes they are fake, passes the bills on to an unknowing serviceman.

Consequentially, the serviceman is arrested, and his life falls apart — eventually pushing him to murder.

Though the wall label gives the back-story of the movie, almost none of this is evident through Smith’s short. Instead, what Smith has done is take every scene in the movie in which someone opens, goes through or closes a door and edits them together. What results is a series of slamming or creaking doors, with brief glances of characters in between.

The result of this experiment is a choppy and disconcerting experience. A series of slamming doors will be followed by a character who pauses and looks intently at the

LISA-COOLEY.COM

Matt Sheridan Smith’s short film explores passageways with opening doors. viewer before his door shuts. The viewer is passed from room to room in quick succession along with the characters, and one of the more striking parts of the movie is the feeling of a lack of control. There is no movement leading up to the transition from room to room or into and out of buildings — it just happens. An inexorable movement from place to place begins to feel more and more disturbing.

This lack of control reflects in many ways the lack of control of the central character in both Bresson’s film and Smith’s short. The serviceman’s life has been changed without his consent, and the viewer is placed in his position of helplessness by Smith’s work. This helplessness is reinforced by the fact that, of all the characters in the short, the serviceman is the one who opens his own door the least. Instead, his door is often opened by someone else — a policeman, a lawyer, a judge — all people who push him onward without his input.

Reflected, too, in Smith’s short is a commentary on the circulation of money and freedom of movement.

Most obviously, it is the passing of the counterfeit money that dooms the serviceman to his lack of freedom. Furthermore, the fact that the (rich) boy is not punished at all for his actions suggests a more sinister commentary on the modern world.

Through the depiction of an everyday and seemingly unimportant action, Smith has created an entire world of barriers and openings that reflect a key element of our society: movement. No one really stops to think about all of the doors they pass through in a day, but Smith’s highlighting of this simple action is a nod to the importance of circulation — of being able or unable to enter into spaces and of maintaining or creating barriers. The barrier presented by the door becomes a metaphor for class mobility and a society which is still filled with closed doors for unfortunate individuals.

Granik was big winner at Sundance with ‘Winter’s Bone’ GRANIK continued from page 5

an edible, wild game.

And these were things that were very unknown to me, but I didn’t think to myself, “I want to definitely make a film in a place I don’t know.”

That’s both a plus and a minus. It also scares you; you don’t want to get it wrong as an outsider. You don’t want to botch it.

In terms of the representation of differences in socioeconomic situations, I’m always rooting for that. I personally am not motivated to tell a story that comes out of the “90210” lifestyle. That’s also something I don’t know, and it gets overexposed. I think American lives without the buffers are not as much explored.

CS: Why did you choose to show mostly the private hill life then in the film versus the public town life you spoke of?

DG: We actually tried to shoot a scene in a place like a Wal-Mart — also just to show that it was 2009. So much of the housing stock and the vehicles are older. You can’t always tell what year it is. We don’t have cell phones in the film. That wasn’t purposeful in the sense that there’s a couple of cell phones that are represented in the scene at the cattle auction. It wasn’t like that was forbidden. If someone had used a cell phone in the scene at the bar, that would’ve been fine. We weren’t trying to make it seem like it was a different time. We actually felt anxious that we wanted people to know it was contemporary. But because of the confines of the story, because the idea that she had one week to solve this, we didn’t have hardly any room for these extra scenes.

CS: What were you trying to do with

all of the kinship systems shown in the film, especially those among the female characters?

Mars” (2004-2007) and the actor Paul Rudd. Together, the creators have enough cache to score the show a host of excellent guest stars who invariably play personalities at the weekly parties that the team caters. Standout performances from the first season include those from Coolidge, Kristen Bell, JK Simmons and Steven Weber. The new batch of episodes will feature the returns of Bell and Simmons, as well as Steve Guttenberg and a one-episode reprise for Lynch.

Taking a page from the Judd Apatow school of comedy — which launched Starr and Lynch — the tone of “Party Down” is laidback and sarcastic, with dialogue that sounds like it could have been improvised (even though it usually isn’t). The writers have a lot of fun with the inherent bitterness of the main characters, and they’re not afraid to offer further punishment. However, the show never fails to offer big laughs. In “Jackal Onassis Backstage Party,” Roman and a Marilyn Mansonesque rock star switch places for a night, and the sight of the gangly Starr toppling over in Goth getup is undeniably riotous.

Critics who have seen the rest of Season 2 agree that “Jackal Onassis” is perhaps the weakest of the new set of episodes. If that is true, there remains little doubt that “Party Down” will continue its reign as one of TV’s very best comedies on any network.

Though there certainly aren’t many college students who pay the premium price for Starz, the network has several episodes from the new season streaming for free at Starz.com and on Netflix Instant as soon as or even before episodes air. It’s a great opportunity to glimpse one of TV’s hidden gems.

Enjoy the Daily?

Want to see more?

DG: Most of that content is in the book, for sure, because that’s not something I would have really known to create.

It’s not like I can conjure part of my life experience, but I will say that I didn’t feel like I was trying to say something with that, other than it interested me. I was relieved in the end that the women did the right thing. Some people were like, “Oh, women-on-women violence, what do you make of that?” If there is some little curve where Mehrab in the end has to look within herself and figure out what would be a more acceptable ending to her part of the story, I was very relieved that in the end, the character, in her own difficult way, is able to relate to this girl. The actress that played her [Dale Dickey] brought this quality, and she said to me that she could see in Ree how she may have been as a very strong girl herself.

CS: What’s it like to watch both of your films do well at a prestigious film festival like Sundance, and then try to translate that to box office success?

DG: Well, one of my teachers always said that if you’re making a small movie, you don’t have to work so hard to get the money back. What that means in terms of my films is that I don’t have to make millions and millions of dollars; I just need to make enough so that everyone who worked on the film can get money for their living, and enough to pay back the investors. So, when you win all of these awards, you’re constantly pinching yourself thinking it’s too good to be true, but at the same time, you’re thinking about needing to get a trailer made, needing to find a distributor ... all of these things that you need to sell a movie to the public.

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“Sounds like a Job for THE 99” An evening with Tufts alumnus Dr. Naif Al-Mutawa, creator of THE 99, the world's first superhero comic books based on Islamic culture and society.

Will THE 99 emerge as the next powerhouse of children’s entertainment? Come and meet the man who hopes to create the next Pokemon by creating a market that few global media companies have tackled head on.

Kuwaiti Dr. Naif Al-Mutawa is CEO of Teshkeel Media Group and the creator of THE 99-the first group of superheroes inspired by Islamic culture and history. The series promotes universal themes of tolerance, teamwork and appreciation of diversity. Since its creation, THE 99 has received universal acclaim of the worldwide press with FORBES identifying THE 99 as one of ‘The Top 20 Trends Sweeping the Globe’.

The creator of THE 99 has received countless accolades and has been awarded a UNESCO prize for literature in the service of tolerance. Dr. Naif Al-Mutawa is also the recipient of The Festival Internacional de Humour e Quadrinhos Comics Award presented at Cartoons & Comics Festival in Brazil, The Ecademy Award from Columbia University School of Business, The Eliot-Pearson Award for Excellence in Children’s Media from Tufts University, The UN Alliance of Civilizations “Marketplace of Ideas” Award and “The Schwab Foundation Social Entrepreneurship Award”, 2009 presented at the World Economic Forum on The Middle East, Dead Sea, Jordan. Recently, Dr. Al-Mutawa was named one of the 500 most influential Muslims in the World and one of the 36 most influential Muslims in the media.

During the lecture Dr. Al-Mutawa will share his entrepreneurial journey with THE 99 from idea, to comic book series in 8 languages and counting, to a theme park that has opened its doors in Kuwait to a global animation series co-produced by media giant Endemol and written by the top names in Hollywood.

www. t he99. org

www.t he 99.o rg

Moderator: Jonathan Wilson, Fletcher Professor of Rhetoric and Debate, Director of the Center for the Humanities (CHAT) Co-sponsored with: CHAT, the Middle Eastern Studies Major, and the International Relations Program

Thursday, April 29, 2010 at 5:30 pm Coolidge Room, Ballou Hall, Tufts University Open to the Public :cf acfY ]bZcfaUh]cb WcbhUWh. \hhd.##ZUfYgWYbhYf"hiZhg"YXi

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Wednesday, April 28, 2010

EDITORIAL | LETTERS

EDITORIAL

Bacow’s approach to TEMS commendable Tufts’ recent efforts to reform the drinking culture that appears to define undergraduate social life have been numerous. The university has instituted an online alcohol education course for incoming undergraduates to take before matriculation, replaced the warning that students previously received for a first drinking offense with automatic level-one disciplinary probation and most recently mandated that Spring Fling be a dry event, among other developments. However, one of the more effective and important of these efforts may be one of the least well-known — University President Lawrence Bacow’s meetings with students who have required assistance from Tufts Emergency Medical Services ( TEMS) for alcohol-related problems.

This practice is commendable.

Adding a personal element to the TEMS process transforms it from disciplinary to rehabilitative; discussions help students internalize the dangers of their actions and persuade them to avoid a repeat offense better than

any online program or straightforward punishment can. As a university official who was forced to deal with a student dying from alcohol poisoning during his tenure at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Bacow undoubtedly has valuable insights to share with students who have required assistance from TEMS, and he can present to them guidance that they would not otherwise consider if they were only presented with an impersonal course or lecture. The gravity of meeting with the university’s president undoubtedly serves as a wakeup call for students that is far more likely to have a personal impact than being reprimanded by other authorities, such as resident assistants. At the very least, the potential embarrassment and shame of having to talk with Bacow twice and explain that they ignored the promises they made to him would likely reduce recidivism.

It is therefore in the university’s interest to continue this practice.

Being rowdy and lacking self-control are certainly not reputations that Tufts

wants its students to develop, and it is very important for the administration to work to prevent that. Personally reaching out to the students most responsible for this image demonstrates to prospective applicants, students’ families and the larger Medford/Somerville community that the administration is committed to engaging this issue on all levels and will give individual attention to each and every student who needs it.

Almost as important as the meetings’ effects on alcohol safety within the Tufts student community is the perception of personal involvement it creates among the larger community.

Whether they are right or not, some of Tufts’ alcohol policies — such as the university’s decisions surrounding Spring Fling — produce resentment among many students. This can create animosity toward disciplinary measures that seem to be coming from a faceless organization. The Daily commends Bacow for his personal efforts to reduce the level of harmful drinking on campus.

general effectiveness directly relate to minority representation. This past year, I saw at least two specific concerns — one about changes to the Voices of Tufts diversity recruitment program and one about metal detector use at campus events — that appeared to be handled solely by arranging meetings with administrators. With Voices in particular, the Office of Undergraduate Admissions showed little interest in addressing the concerns, so aside from talking with other administrators, that was that, based on what I observed at Senate meetings.

Senate was never asked to take a formal stance on either issue. If I hadn’t gone to every Senate meeting this academic year, I would’ve thought that Senate didn’t care about these concerns. Having been to the meetings, I know that Senate doesn’t not care, but I think these were missed opportunities to demonstrate to the student body, and to minority communities in particular, that Senate engages in issues presented to it.

ERIN MARSHALL

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LETTER TO THE EDITOR Dear Editor, After reading Charles Skold and Nadia Nibbs’ op-ed “Yes on 3” in yesterday’s Tufts Daily, I wanted to make two comments.

First, I do not see in the text of Referendum 3 a provision allowing groups to “identify their own core group of leaders” to submit to a student-wide vote, as the op-ed says. The referendum text allows for the Center director (for Center-affiliated reps) to review candidates, but does not allow for any candidate to be eliminated prior to the student body vote.

Second, my concerns about Senate’s

EDITORIAL POLICY Editorials that appear on this page are written by the editorialists, and individual editors are not necessarily responsible for, or in agreement with, the policies and editorials of The Tufts Daily. The content of letters, advertisements, signed columns, cartoons and graphics does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Tufts Daily editorial board.

Sincerely, Christopher Snyder Class of 2011

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Letters must be submitted by 4 p.m. and should be handed into the Daily office or sent to letters@tuftsdaily.com. All letters must be word processed and include the writer’s name and telephone number. There is a 450-word limit and letters must be verified. The editors reserve the right to edit letters for clarity, space and length.

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Wednesday, April 28, 2010

THE TUFTS DAILY

Why we are voting for Lauren Levine

BY ALEXANDRA LIS-PERLIS AND XAVIER MALINA

While this is a rebuttal to the election endorsement of junior Sam Wallis in yesterday’s Tufts Daily, we cannot agree more with the assertion that we must move beyond petty analysis of campaign strategies, dispense with preconceived notions and focus on the candidates themselves. That being said, we would like to remind readers that those who wrote that endorsement are no more qualified to assess these candidates than you or us, and they are, despite being unidentified by the guidelines of editorial writing, students just like us.

Much has been said of how similar the two candidates’ platforms are.

As I see it, this couldn’t be further from the truth. We question the grasp that the Daily editorial board has over the workings of the Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate. Anyone familiar with how change happens through student government at Tufts (which we are only privy to because of our own initiatives to learn more about this body that handles our student activities payments) will tell you that a president who assumes office with a detailed and overworked set of ideas may doom the body to an unproductive and frustrating year.

On Senate, serving with the president are 34 other Senators who are loathe to have a leader who too stringently spells out exactly what it is they should be doing that year. As opposed to getting too tied to campaign-generated projects, it is important that a candidate stay open to forming the agenda of the year after they are elected and able to collaborate with the whole Senate body. We question the practicality of

Sam’s ideas, but more importantly we wonder why one of his biggest campaign points is a late-night diner that is dubiously plausible, costly and not something more in line with the role and purpose of the TCU president.

We would argue, however, that the qualifications and experience that these two candidates profess make them both capable and prepared to take an executive position in the Senate next year. Still, we think it is unwise to capitalize on the lack of knowledge of many students concerning Senate and what exactly a position like the president’s entails. More than anything, the person that is elected TCU president is looked at to set the tone for the year, and we have gathered from the debates and the platforms of these two candidates would set drastically different ones.

While we believe that Wallis is a respected senator who will continue to motivate members of committees to push forward on these projects that are the core of his platform, we believe Lauren Levine is prepared to go a step further and hold the body accountable to the mission of being the voice of all students. Yesterday’s editorial cited presidents of the past who have run on messages focused on overarching issues in the TCU, claiming they were ultimately unrealistic goals that were never pragmatic ideas for only a year in office. However, I would like to point out that if these students had attended the presidential debate on Monday night, they would have heard Levine herself say she does not believe these greater issues can be tackled in her term alone.

Many successful endeavors of Senate have started with one student’s idea:

the library roof renovation into a green space, the creation of Hotung Café and the upcoming renovation of the Mayer Campus Center are just a few examples. There is no reason why Levine cannot be the catalyst for a Senate that addresses itself to concerns that affect all students.

Lauren has shown through her past three years at Tufts that she can produce noticeable improvements for students. She has worked to eliminate ticket costs on campus, to rework the TCU financial system in the wake of a $1 million embezzlement scandal, to enhance freshman orientation and increase school spirit by planning and implementing events like Nighttime Quad Reception and Springcoming and has funded student initiatives like a cabin for the Tufts Mountain Club and an overhaul of the WMFO radio studio.

As president, Lauren will preside over similar projects to help students, but more importantly, she will set a tone for all Senates that follow — ensuring that recognizing and addressing the concerns of all students is the body’s chief goal.

In the end, it is the difference between choosing a president who will work within the limited, historical bounds of Senate, or a president who, able to handle herself within those bounds, will also expand the meaning and power of Senate to enhance its relevance to all students.

Alexandra Lis-Perlis is a freshman who has not yet declared a major. Xavier Malina is a senior majoring in political science and is a member of the TCU Senate, as well as a member of Levine’s TCU Presidential Campaign team.

Casting a vote for all of us

BY ADAM WELDAI AND ANTONELLA SCARANO

Every year we come together and take part in the one election that engages the entire student body toward one common goal. We as a student body help set the tone for what our student government will pursue, strive for and ultimately accomplish. There are so many issues that are ongoing at Tufts, what should prompt any of us to care about the Tufts Community Union (TCU) presidential election, let alone even go out and vote? Every day we’re on campus, we’re presented with reasons why we love Tufts and places where we think things could be improved. Amid the rigor of our coursework and the many extracurriculars that we all take part in, the average student doesn’t have much time to care about what student government does for them. We, as a senate, should be taking a different approach: Rather than telling the student body what we’re doing, let’s show them.

Feasible and practical ways to improve the student experience on campus should be the top priority of the TCU Senate. The body exists to not only help make our Tufts experience better, but also to help each and every student group accomplish what it wants to do. We don’t want to just read about what Senate is doing in a newsletter or an e-mail; we want to feel the changes that are making our experiences better. We want to be able to get on a bus that will take us straight to Boston for the night or

up to a group retreat at the Loj. We want to connect to wireless Internet wherever we are on campus, bettering our academic and social life. We want to have a place to go on campus that is open later than we would like to admit that we’re not only still up — but still hungry. More importantly, with our votes in this election we want to know that we, as seniors, are helping to make Tufts a better place for not only the classmates we’re bidding farewell to, but also the future classes that will live on the Hill.

Tufts can and should be a better place, and the TCU Senate can play a real part in helping us get there.

Discussions don’t matter as much as the actions that follow. We as a senate body have the toolkit — we just don’t know how to build the shed.

The Senate could be used much more effectively to help students build a better community at Tufts and help move Tufts into the future. We need more people who are passionate about improving the Tufts experience — people like Senator and TCU presidential candidate junior Sam Wallis — to accomplish just that.

During his time at Tufts, Sam has fiercely advocated for what is best for the student body, and we would expect nothing less from him as the TCU president, ensuring that the senate body looks out for the needs of all of the members of our community.

Sam represents the best of what the TCU Senate can offer. As Chair of the Senate Services Committee, he has

11

OP-ED

experience working on and managing projects such as the expansion of wireless in dorms, seeing them through to the very end. He has experience working in the treasury and budgeting student groups, who are the lifeblood of this university. Sam tackled the issue of costs being too high for students to keep up with the economy before the issue permeated our way of life by establishing things such as the value menu we see in Hotung Café today.

Sam is the person we trust to make sure the Senate spends the next year working hard for all of us.

As students, senators and members of the Tufts community, we have both worked alongside Sam on a variety of Senate and non-Senate-related projects, and we have seen the grit and enthusiasm he brings to each and every thing he does. He is a true leader and someone who will be able to effectively feel the pulse of the student community and transfer that to the administration.

Fellow Jumbos, today we cast our votes for Sam Wallis. We hope you will do so too.

Adam Weldai is a senior majoring in American studies; he is the outgoing TCU Senate trustee representative to the Board of Trustees Committee of University Advancement. Antonella Scarano is a senior majoring in political science; she is the outgoing TCU Senate vice president.

They are both co-campaign managers on Wallis’ presidential campaign.

LET THE CAMPUS KNOW WHAT MATTERS TO YOU. The Op-Ed section of the Daily, an open forum for campus editorial commentary, is printed Monday through Thursday. Submissions are welcome from all members of the Tufts community. We accept opinion articles on any aspect of campus life, as well as articles on national or international news. Opinion pieces should be between 600 and 1,200 words. Please send submissions, with a contact number, to oped@tuftsdaily.com. Feel free to e-mail us with any questions.

TEDDY MINCH | OFF MIC

Immigration consternation

T

he sideshow that is Arizona state politics took a turn for the even stranger last Friday when Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, a Republican, signed a controversial immigration bill into law. The bill makes it a crime under Arizona state law to be in the country illegally. Illegal immigration is now, in fact, illegal — which raises the question, then, of what it was beforehand.

Such a bizarre law makes sense only within the context of Arizona’s illegal immigration battle in Maricopa County, the state’s most populous county that is home to both Phoenix and the majority of Arizona’s 460,000 illegal immigrants. It was here where, five years ago, Maricopa County’s now-infamous Sheriff Joe Arpaio began enforcing Arizona’s “Coyote law.” The law made smuggling illegal immigrants across the U.S./Mexico border a felony punishable by up to two years of jail time. It also classified those smuggled as “coconspirators” subject to the same penalties as the smugglers themselves.

The new law passed last Friday gives cops the authority to stop anyone suspected of being in the country illegally and, if the suspected person can’t produce proper identification, detain him or her. It is now a crime in Arizona to not have proper identification at all times, punishable by a jail sentence of up to six months and a fine of $2,500.

Brewer, facing a tight “re-election” campaign, signed the bill in hopes that it would make her appear more conservative to voters as she seeks to win her first actual election. She replaced Janet Napolitano (D-Ariz.), as per the state’s line of succession, after Napolitano left to run the Department of Homeland Security last year. In focusing on the politics of it all, she missed a minor element of the bill, namely its complete lack of constitutionality.

If sheriff’s deputies could distinguish illegal immigrants from legal Mexican-Americans with 100 percent accuracy, this law could work. Illegal immigrants are not protected by the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unlawful search and seizure — they are not here legally and have no constitutional rights.

Whether or not that violates human rights, however, is debatable.

But there’s no way to tell an illegal immigrant from a legal citizen or immigrant just by looks. The chance of a legal, MexicanAmerican citizen or immigrant being detained just because he can’t find his driver’s license is quite substantial. A bill permitting such a gross violation of American citizens’ constitutional rights is absolutely unacceptable.

But even more important than the bill’s unconstitutionality is that fact that it won’t work. Illegal immigrants have fled violence and a terrible economy, often risking death in doing so — a six-month jail sentence is not going to convince anyone to stay in Mexico.

What it will do, however, is contribute further to the manifestation of the fundamental problem of Mexican immigration to the United States: The prevalence of entire pockets of cities and states where illegal immigrants never mix with the remainder of society, speak only Spanish and ultimately refuse to assimilate into American culture.

Threatening illegal immigrants with jail time will only exacerbate that cultural divergence further and lead to more recalcitrant anti-assimilation sentiment. It will also lead to even less tax revenue from illegal immigrants that would support the public services they already enjoy for virtually nothing — the everpresent threat of arrest will cause a drop in sales tax revenue.

In short, Arizona’s new immigration law is nothing but a thinly veiled political maneuver to which Jan Brewer has pinned her political hopes. On top of that, it’s entirely unconstitutional and clearly violates the Fourth Amendment. But most importantly, it won’t actually reduce illegal immigration. Perhaps Sheriff Joe summed this whole circus up best in a recent interview, responding to criticisms of the new law. He said he had been enforcing immigration law “with no problems,” paused, and added, “except with the Justice Department.”

Teddy Minch is a senior majoring in political science. He hosts “The Rundown,” a talk show from 3 to 5 p.m. every Friday on WMFO. He can be reached at Theodore.Minch@tufts.edu.

OP-ED POLICY The Op-Ed Op-ed section of the Tufts Daily, an open forum for campus editorial commentary, is printed Monday through Thursday. Op-Ed Op-ed welcomes submissions from all members of the Tufts community. Opinion articles on campus, national and international issues should be 600 to 1,200 words in length. All material is subject to editorial discretion, and is not guaranteed to appear in The Tufts Daily. All material should be submitted by no later than 1 p.m. on the day prior to the desired day of publication. Material must be submitted via e-mail (oped@tuftsdaily.com) attached in .doc or .docx format. Questions and concerns should be directed to the Op-Ed Op-ed editors. The opinions expressed in the Op-ed Op-Ed section do not necessarily represent the opinions of the Tufts Daily itself.

12

THE TUFTS DAILY

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Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Candidate Statement: Lauren Levine I’m running for President because I love Tufts. As much as I love it, I know that there’s a lot that needs to be done in order to improve Tufts for all of us. That’s why I’ve spent most of my time at Tufts on Senate. I’ve come to realize, though, that I have goals that can’t be accomplished as just a TCU Senator. These require more lobbying power with the administration, and they require a position of high visibility within the entire student body. The President is the face of students and she or he must be able to keep an eye on the big picture. Many of our campus issues are not just solved by a project; they require a campus dialogue and discussions with administrators. I want to work for the long term happiness of Tufts students - not just a quick fix to some simple issues. Issues such as diversity, education quality, a non-transparent administration, school unity, and many others are ignored year after year by student leaders. If I wanted to solely accomplish small projects, I wouldn't run for President. I intend to do more than that. I want to be a voice for students to the administration. I want to understand and fix overarching problems on this campus. I also want to motivate the 34 other members of Senate to think creatively and manage their own projects to improve student life on campus. Senate has many members with a lot of potential, and I know I have what it takes to lead them each toward a productive year.

I think that one of the biggest problems facing senate is our lack of communication with the student body. No one knows what’s happening with Senate and, as a result, no one on Senate is really in touch with student opinions on campus. I have a simple but crucial proposal to fix this: a Senate newsletter. I want all the relevant information about Senate to go to your email inbox every Monday in bullet-point form.

That way, you'll be aware of the important issues we're discussing and projects we're working on. And you can have the opportunity to reply and tell me what you think about it all (or opt out if you don’t want to know at all). However, I don’t think this is a replacement for face-to-face communication. One of the best parts of campaign season is that Senators go around to all sorts of people on campus and talk about issues. This shouldn't end after spring semester is over. That’s why I’ll hold weekly “fireside” chats with different communities and groups on campus. Whether it's Houston Hall, Tufts Ballroom Dancing, or ALAS, every group on campus deserves a chance to talk about the issues one-on-one with the TCU President.

A problem facing our school is our lack of community. While many of us wear Tufts sweatshirts, so rarely do we cohere as one community.

Many people feel excluded at Tufts, or feel as if they don't quite fit into the greater whole. I think it's time that we all felt the spirit for Tufts that we deserve. We should feel a connection to this school and a long-lasting sense of pride and attachment towards it. Knowing that there are some people at Tufts who don't love it as much as I do makes me feel committed to spreading spirit and fostering a better sense of community. We need to look at groups that find themselves excluded on a daily basis, like athletes, engineers and minority communities.

Senate needs to do specific outreach to these groups. We need to stop ignoring the fact that we boast diversity yet don’t promote acceptance or understanding – cutting Voices (formerly Telescope) and offering only a few classes on these topic were not steps in the right direction. We need programming at athletic games –events that everyone can have fun at and come together with Tufts pride for. There once was a tug-of-war competition at every football game, and games were well attended – why did so many of our fun traditions end? We need a student portal for programming so that student groups can collaborate on events rather than overlapping and over-programming.

But, these are only my ideas. With your input next year, I hope to find more ways to make everyone feel a part of our community.

I'm qualified, I have ideas, I care, and I know that I can make a difference on this campus.

Cast your vote TODAY on WebCenter!

To vote, or if you have any questions or concerns, please visit http://ase.tufts.edu/ecom/ or email us at ecom@tufts.edu

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

THE TUFTS DAILY

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Candidate Statement: Sam Wallis Hey guys, My name is Sam Wallis and I am a junior at Tufts. This spring semester I’ve had the opportunity to study abroad in Israel where I’ve really been able to learn what it’s like to live outside of the States. It has been great to immerse myself in a different culture.

That was why it was a difficult decision to choose to run for President from abroad.

Though I’ve been a member of the Senate for three years, I had a lot of questions about running for President, but when I started reaching out to friends and other students about the sort of things we might talk about on the campaign, I got really excited about putting forth the ideas I was hearing. I went abroad to really immerse myself in Israel, but looking back on my decision to give up a few weeks of that I am really happy to have gotten involved in the campaign and talk with students I might not otherwise have met.

At Tufts I have been involved with a few groups on campus besides Senate, notably the Tufts Democrats and the Tufts Roundtable. In 2008 I had the opportunity to go to New Hampshire with the Dems to support then-senator Barack Obama at the New Hampshire debate. After that debate, we ended up meeting Obama in the back of a pizza parlor. I had only been at Tufts for a few weeks, and I learned then how many opportunities we have available to us as students here.

The other major group I’ve been involved with on campus is the Tufts Roundtable. When I first got to Tufts the campus was reeling from the publication the year before of an inflammatory satirical piece. But the opportunity was lost to have a thoughtful discussion on race, religion and class because the proper channels just didn’t exist. That is why we founded the Roundtable; we wanted to create a forum where students could debate ideas in a respectful way without partisan labels. Though I’ve been happy to watch the Roundtable grow from a nonpartisan magazine to an online community, there are still a lot of changes that need to be made on campus to provide the proper channels for these discussions to occur.

The experience of founding and working with the Roundtable gave me a different perspective on campus from Senate, and taught me what Senate should be about: students.

One of the things Tufts prides itself on is the involvement of its students. But because groups are so involved in many different groups, we fail to come together into one large Tufts community. Many students have talked to me about ways to bring niche communities together including transfer students, off campus students, international students, Group of 6 members, and even Alumni who are a part of the Tufts community as well. Schools across the country are working on the same thing, and we should definitely view this issue in context and learn what has worked at other schools.

Now, I am running for President because from the conversations I’ve had in the past months and my experiences on campus, I’ve really seen that we can redefine the Senate’s mission to support students and groups in fulfilling their missions. There are so many resources available to students at Tufts, but we never fully utilize them. For example, we have the Loj and the new Trips Cabin, but we never provided a way for students to access it. That is why one of the ideas I’m proposing is for the Senate to buy a van or bus to help students get up to there. Another resource we have that could be put to better use is Hotung Cage. This space was recently renovated, but unfortunately it closes early most nights. That is why I propose converting it into a Late Night Diner to allow students to make it the center of campus it was intended to be. And though Tufts offers us a great education, there are so many resources that go untapped, including course evaluations and research opportunities.

All of the ideas that have been driving my campaign have come from students. Many of them come out of projects I’ve worked on over the last few years, especially the ideas we’ve generated involving reducing costs on campus.

I know we can do all of these things with the proper leadership. I have a record of getting things done, and as President I will set a tone for the Senate and mission to get things done on students’ behalf.

You can check out all of my proposals at samwallisfortufts.com, and I would be happy to answer any questions at Samuel.Wallis@tufts.edu

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THE TUFTS DAILY

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Wednesday, April 28, 2010

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Every gift to the Student Fund will be matched by $50*.

To make a gift:

t visit the Student Fund table in the Campus Center from 10 am to 2 pm; t return this slip with your contribution to: Tisch Library, or Hillel;

t call 627-4930 to make a gift by credit card; or t visit www.tufts.edu/givenow (check the “student” box, provide your contact information, and select the “Tufts Student Fund” in Gift Designation 3).

To learn more about the Tufts Student Fund, please email studentfund@tufts.edu or call 617-627-4930. *Through the generosity of two alumni, gifts will now be matched up to $35,000.

Complete this tear-off slip and return it with your contribution to a donation box in one of the following locations: Tisch Library Circulation Desk, Hillel Center Front Desk.

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Wednesday, April 28, 2010 Event

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In playoffs, first team to steal a game on the road often emerges victorious EASTERN CONFERENCE continued from page 19

Celtics took a commanding 3-0 lead on the Miami Heat going into Game 4 on Sunday afternoon. The Heat had been having a hard time finding offense from other players besides Dwyane Wade; through the first four games, Wade has 135 points, while the next highest Heat player is Michael Beasley, with 50 points.

Wade exploded for 46 points in Game 4 and forced the series to a Game 5 in Boston. Wade shot 5-of-7 from three-point range and 16-of-24 from the field, officially taking his team on his back and extending the series at least another game.

The Celtics have surprised many doubters who believed they were a washed-up, slower version of the 2007 championship team. They have been getting balanced scoring from their Big Three, although it is safe to say that Rajon Rondo has replaced Kevin Garnett as the third member of the group. Rondo is averaging 14.8 points and 9.8 assists per game, leading a Celtics team that has not been afraid of the transition game and has outscored the Heat by an average of

almost eight points per game.

The most intriguing series thus far in the Eastern Conference has been the series between the Atlanta Hawks and Milwaukee Bucks. The Hawks took the first two games at home by 10 points each time, but the Bucks responded in Game 3 with an 18-point victory at home and followed that up with a 111-104 victory on Monday night. Rookie Brandon Jennings has lifted the Bucks with his crafty play at point guard, averaging 19.8 points per game. John Salmons has continued his outstanding play, providing the Bucks with valuable minutes and a go-to scorer in the series. Carlos Delfino, the sharpshooter from Argentina, ripped off 22 points in Game 4 including 6-of-8 from three-point range.

Home-court advantage has played a huge role in this series, and it seems that the team that can steal a game on the road first will come out victorious. Although the Hawks can win the series without winning on the road, they do not want to force a Game 7 with a hungry Bucks team that has low expectations and millions of people to prove wrong.

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Jumbos confident about chances at semis SAILING continued from page 20

behind and keep a solid lead when we were ahead.

“We paid a lot of attention to the wind and current and kept our heads out of the boat to be aware what was going on the race course,” she continued. “Once we figured out that the left was where you wanted to be, that worked well and we caught on sooner than other people.”

The A Division boat, meanwhile, did not fare comparatively as well, but Tufts ended up finishing eighth in the division with 76 points, more than good enough to give the Jumbos the semifinal spot. Junior skipper Catherine Swanson led the way for the A Division, sailing in all 10 races and teaming up with sophomore Katie Booras, junior captain Meghan Pesch and junior Sara Carnahan along the way. Tufts’ best finish was a second-place showing in the seventh race, as the Jumbos finished in the top five three times over the course of the weekend.

The Jumbos ultimately ended up in a fifth-place tie with Yale at 115 points overall, but since Tufts outdistanced the Bulldogs in 11 of the 20 total races, they were awarded fifth and consequently a bid to the semifinals in Wisconsin in late May. The national finals take place at the same venue shortly thereafter.

“It was really exciting,” Watkins said.

“I don’t normally sail on the women’s team, but they’ve been working hard and, for us, getting to Nationals is the ultimate goal. Having one of the qualifying spots for semis shows that all that hard work is paying off.”

With its own semifinal bid locked up the weekend prior, members of the co-ed sailing team captured a thirdplace finish out of 18 teams at the Admirals Cup in Kings Point, N.Y. Racing in three divisions, the Jumbos tuned up appropriately for next weekend’s ICSA Semi-Final Dinghy Championships at Charleston, S.C., as the squad edged out St. Mary’s by just one point.

Over the course of 18 races, seniors Rachael Brill and Tomas Hornos sailed in the A Division and took home a fourth-place finish. Sailing in 420s on the first day and in FJs on the second, the pair had a trio of second- and thirdplace showings in the races. Brill and Hornos finished in the top 10 on 14 separate occasions, earning 128 total points, just two behind third-place College of Charleston.

In a rare three-division regatta, freshman Will Hutchings single-handedly sailed a laser boat in the C Division, capturing fourth place with 112 points.

Hutchings kicked off the regatta with a win in the first race and followed it up with another win in race 12. All told, the first-year finished outside the top nine just twice.

“Any weaknesses we had on the first day were due to the temperature,” Brill said. “It felt like 70 degrees, and all of a sudden the wind picked up and the temperature dropped and we just froze.

Will got really cold and when you’re that cold, it’s pretty hard to concentrate.”

The B Division boat of senior co-captain Andrew Criezis and rookie Mariel Marchand, sailing in FJs on Saturday and 420s on Sunday, took home 10th place. The highlight for the pair was second-place showings in races seven and 10, though they faltered toward the regatta’s end, finishing outside the top 10 in four of the last five races as well as receiving a disqualification in the eighth race.

“Andrew and Mariel don’t normally sail together, but Mariel is up-and-coming and did an awesome job,” Brill said.

“There was no wind on the first day, so everyone was laying out and tanning on the dock, and then at 2:45 we went out and all of a sudden the wind picked up to 20 knots. So in FJ’s in the B Division they were doing really well against people who had heavier combinations. It was really nice to see them being really competitive.”

Hobart & William Smith won the regatta with 276 points, well ahead of runner-up College of Charleston, which finished with 333.

With their semifinal bid all wrapped up, members of the co-ed squad will have to place inside the top nine at Charleston to have a shot at the Gill National Dinghy Championships in early June at the University of Wisconsin.

For now, though, the focus is all on the semifinals this weekend, where the Jumbos believe they have a good shot to reach nationals.

“I don’t want to say anything to jinx it, but I think if both A and B Division are on top of our game, we have a pretty good chance,” Brill said. “The wind [in Charleston] is pretty consistent; it’s definitely not shifty like it is at quarterfinals. It’s a little different from what we’re used to, but as long as we have good boat speed and are smart about our races I think we’re in good shape.”

There’s Something New In Medford Square We roast all of our coffee right in our shop. Come check us out!

Show your Tufts ID & get a free medium coffee with any pastry purchase! ~ Coffee, espresso drinks & yummy pastries ~ Open 7am-7pm M-F; Weekends 8am-2pm Mystic Coffee Roaster LLC 30 Riverside Avenue, Medford, MA 02155

THE TUFTS DAILY

16

SPORTS

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Join us for a concert featuring singers from the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) Who: Since the 1950s, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has run outstanding performance groups called Lehakot Tsva'iyot (Army Ensembles). Many IDF singers go on to become famous Israeli musicians. If you want a different perspective on the IDF, come check them out! Shir Appeal and S-Factor will open and perform with the soldiers!

When: Wednesday, April 28, 2010, 8:00pm - 9:30pm Where: Sophia Gordon Food: YES, we will also have a dessert reception to follow

Please contact hillary.sieber@gmail.com with question

THE TUFTS DAILY

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

17

SPORTS

Jumbos shift their focus to upcoming New England Championships CREW continued from page 20

we started behind, we were ahead on the turns and we had a couple feet on them by the straightaway,” junior Bianca Velayo said. “We had almost a length on them and in the last 500, Smith started their sprint and they tried to make a move on us, but we pulled it out. It was really exciting.”

While the second varsity eight’s race against Wellesley ended in a loss of 26 seconds, the Tufts squad took pride in its efforts against Smith, which consumed most of the rowers’ energy in the adrenaline-pumping finish.

“We could’ve had Wellesley, but our tank was empty, and it was hard to supply the power,” Velayo said. “The weekend was still a success, though, and I think we left

with positive sentiments about our capabilities and our performance.”

For the novice squad, Tufts split the A and B boats into two events, with the A boats competing against Smith and Wellesley under the third varsity eight heading. Though the mostly first-year squad experienced one of its first losses of the season against the Pioneers in an 8:03.568:13.26 finish, a strong 18-second margin of victory over the Blue later that day spoke to the overall strength of the first-year rowers.

“Novice teams from other schools are often comprised of walk-ons and inexperienced rowers, but our squad is more than half experienced rowers,” Woodard said. “It’s definitely part of the reason why they’re doing so great this year.”

The Jumbos head to Lake

Quinsigamond in Worcester for the New England Rowing Championships, an event that can catapult top teams to the NCAA tournament. Though the regatta brings together over 36 Div. I, NESCAC and non-conference opponents, Tufts is setting its sights on just a few schools to hopefully make it to NCAAs. “Our biggest competitions are Smith, Wellesley and Wesleyan and we’re interested to see who comes out on top this weekend,” Woodard said.

“We’re out to get UNH, and I think that’s attainable,” Velayo added. “They’re a fast crew, but I think we’ve been making so much progress that they’re not out of sight. If we continue to race like we have been, I think grand finals is a legitimate option.”

GILLIAN HODES/TUFTS DAILY

The women’s crew team will look to follow up a strong performance at the Spirit Regatta when it competes in the New England Rowing Championships in Worcester, Mass. this weekend.

Minus coach Karl, Nuggets look completely lost on defensive end WESTERN CONFERENCE continued from page 19

another year away from contending after suffering a myriad of injuries throughout the season, including a knee injury to star Brandon Roy that was likely to force him to miss most, if not all, of the postseason. After stealing Game 1 in Phoenix behind the sublime performance of Andre Miller, the Blazers saw the Suns destroy them in the next two games, including Game 3 in the Rose Garden, where Portland usually is tough to beat.

Portland appeared to be in danger of falling behind 3-1 before Roy heroically returned Saturday, just eight days after an operation to repair his torn meniscus muscle, and inspired his squad to victory. While Roy provided the storyline, LaMarcus Aldridge has been the key to Portland’s success.

That was clear in Saturday’s 96-87 victory, as Aldridge’s 31-point, 11-rebound performance helped Portland knot the series up. Aldridge has stepped up into Roy’s role as his team’s top scoring option, and Nate McMillan has received great contributions from the likes of Jerryd Bayless, starting in place of Roy, and Nicolas Batum. And Kevin Pritchard still looks like a genius for swiping Marcus Camby at the trade deadline to solve the hole in the middle

of the Blazers’ roster after injuries to Greg Oden and Joel Pryzbilla, as Camby has been his usual dominant self on the glass and on defense with 11.8 boards a game and 1.4 blocks.

Even though Phoenix responded to take back the series lead headed into Game 6, the Suns will have to go back to Portland and try to win another game, something that is never an easy task. If this series goes seven games, Portland can still steal the second-round bid.

From two teams unexpectedly back in their series, we jump to a pair of teams many had pegged as title threats that are now on their last legs, one loss away from seeing their seasons end. Those teams are the Dallas Mavericks and the Denver Nuggets.

Both teams are victims of poor matchups.

Dallas was saddled with the burden of another series versus the San Antonio Spurs; the two teams had played one another four times in the playoffs since 2001 prior to this meeting.

Last season, the Mavs beat the Spurs 4-1 in the first round, but San Antonio has what Dallas is missing: four titles in the Tim Duncan era.

But thanks to Mark Cuban’s fortification of the Dallas roster at the deadline, with the move to grab Caron Butler and Brendan Haywood, Dallas looked like it had its best shot to get back to the finals since its debacle of a loss in

2006. Coupled with Jason Kidd’s new found shooting touch, the continued excellence of Dirk Nowitzki and a deep bench, few people expected a San Antonio team minus a fully healthy Tony Parker to push the Mavs.

But since its win in Game 1, Dallas has fallen apart. San Antonio has imposed its will on its in-state opponent and has taken a commanding 3-1 lead in the series. It is the Spurs who have looked like title contenders, while the Mavs are left with a myriad of questions.

Kidd has struggled with his shot all series, and was abused in Game 4 defensively by George Hill, who had 29 points to lead San Antonio. It says something when Dallas holds Tim Duncan to just four points and the Spurs still earn the victory.

It doesn’t help if a team is deep if most of its players are struggling. Dallas looks like it will be making an early exit from these playoffs, as the Spurs had the chance to close the series out Tuesday night.

Much like the Mavs, the Nuggets’ playoff run got off to a strong start with a 126-113 victory in Denver. But since then, the Jazz have controlled the series and are up 3-1. Deron Williams has been nothing short of sensational for Utah, averaging almost 27 points a game along with 12 assists. Despite the losses

` SCHEDULE | April 28 - May 4 WED

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of defensive stalwart Andrei Kirilenko to injury before the series and Mehmet Okur after going down in Game 1, the Jazz have received great play up front from Carlos Boozer and Paul Millsap.

Denver, meanwhile, has looked lost without George Karl behind the bench, as its coach recovers from throat cancer. It has been particularly noticeable on the defensive end, where the Jazz have averaged more than 112 points a game. Not that Denver had been a great defensive team in the regular season, but it has looked even worse in the playoffs. The Nuggets’ struggles have not been limited to the defensive end, as they have averaged more than 16 turnovers in three losses.

As talented a team as Denver is offensively, it cannot win if that is the only facet of the game it is performing well in. The Nuggets will need to regroup if they want to survive past tonight’s Game 5.

Going into these playoffs, most people understood that the West had the most likelihood of offering some upsets, with the one and eight seeds separated by only seven games in the standings. Parity is one thing, but these results are still surprising. But there is no telling whether they will stand. That is the intrigue of these playoffs.

Santone picks up second win over Trinity in eight days SOFTBALL continued from page 20

Baseball

vs. Newbury 3 p.m.

at Bentley 3 p.m.

at Springfield Middlebury (2) (2) 12 p.m.

12 p.m.

Softball

vs. Babson (2) 3 p.m.

at Colby 4 p.m.

at Colby (2) 12 p.m.

Men's Lacrosse

vs. Bowdoin 7 p.m.

NESCAC first round TBA

Women’s Lacrosse

at. Bowdoin 7 p.m.

NESCAC first round TBA

Men's Track & Field

Women’s Track & Field

N.E. Div. III Champs

N.E. Div. III Champs

N.E. Div. III Champs

N.E. Div. III Champs

at Bentley 3 p.m.

Santone said. “The wind definitely helped on that one. It may have been going out of it wasn’t for that.”

Santone struck out the next Bantams hitter, but would not be so lucky against freshman first baseman Kerry McCarthy.

McCarthy got just enough of a pitch, dropping it in front of the charging Iuppa. Nardella came around to score, and the Bantams had the lead.

In the bottom of the inning, junior catcher Julia Silberman led off with a double, as the Jumbos looked to bounce back instantaneously. But with Santone coming to the plate, Tufts coach Cheryl Milligan chose not to bunt the runner over. Santone popped out to right, and while the Jumbos did load the bases with a pair of walks, Poulos was once again able to escape.

“Coach had said to the team, ‘prepare to see a bunt signal,’” Santone said. “I was definitely mentally prepared to go up and bunt. But when she gave me the hit away signal I was ready for that too. The ball just didn’t go as far as I wanted it too.”

After senior captain Casey Sullivan led off the bottom of the fifth by dropping a bloop double right on the left field line, the Jumbos switched strategies, this time bunting her over to third with one out.

But it would not matter, as Tong’s home run would have driven in Sullivan either way.

Trinity threatened one last time in the top of sixth, putting runners on the corners with two outs. Senior outfielder Erika Klotz put a slow roller on the ground but Sullivan made the play look easy, charging the ball and firing to first. The Bantams then went down complacently 1-2-3 in the seventh.

Santone was something of a magician in the delayed series, the most recent game of which was postponed from April 18, going 2-0 with a 0.93 ERA in the series despite surrendering 17 hits. The Bantams threatened almost constantly, but never seemed to break through.

With the win, the Jumbos now control their destiny in the NESCAC East. A sweep of Colby this weekend would give them their sixth straight regular season title. But it is no time to relax, as a single loss could drop them into a three way tie with Trinity and Bowdoin, putting their postseason life in jeopardy.

“A lot of it is just energy,” Santone said. “We need to remember that the Colby games are equally important.

If we lose three times to Colby we are in just as much trouble.

We have shown that we can lose to those kinds of teams.

If we keep up our energy right from the beginning, we can definitely get the job done.”

THE TUFTS DAILY

18

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

SPORTS

The Department of Romance Languages presents

The 2010

LANGSAM-BARSAM-SIMCHES Lecture

2010 Senior Honors Thesis Exchange

“The Novel without the Letter E and the Unlikely Collaboration of Borges and Georges Perec”

e by

Pablo M. Ruiz

Assistant Professor, Tufts University

Wednesday, April 28, 2010 Olin Center, Room 011 6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.

Reception to follow in Laminan Lounge.

Come celebrate with thesis writers and

hear about their fascinating research in

political science, history, and

international relations!

Date: Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Time: 12 PM – 1:20 PM

Place: Sophia Gordon Multipurpose Room

A light lunch will be served.

Students considering writing a thesis

are encouraged to attend!

Sponsored by: History Department | International Relations Program

Political Science Department| Office of Undergraduate Education

Contact 617-627-3289 for more info.

In English - Free admission - Open to the public!

Want the most current campus news?

I wish I knew who won that women’s basketball game last night! And how active are Jumbos in the ROTC?

Follow us on Twitter! To stay in the know, follow @TuftsDaily and @TuftsDailySport

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

THE TUFTS DAILY

19

SPORTS

INSIDE THE NBA: WESTERN CONFERENCE

ETHAN LANDY | CALL ME JUNIOR

The young and the desperate While Thunder show signs of life, Mavs and Nuggets’ title hopes dwindling BY

ETHAN LANDY

Daily Editorial Board

There are two sides to every story.

Therefore, one team cannot emerge unless it is at the expense of another. And that, in a nutshell, is the NBA playoffs.

On one side of the Western Conference are two teams most spectators left for dead last week that have surged back to make their series competitive, while on the other sits a pair of squads that have seen their hopes of gaining a berth in the NBA Finals nearly dissolved.

Let’s start with the good, and that begins with the Oklahoma City Thunder. Given a fighting chance in this series to compete with the mighty Los Angeles Lakers, the Thunder has done much more than that. It is now tied at 2-2 in this series heading into last night’s game in L.A. While evening things out with the defending champs is impressive enough, how it occurred is the real story.

Oklahoma City kept things close in its two losses in Los Angeles and then eked out a 101-96 win in Game 3 back home in front of a raucous crowd at the Ford Center. But in Game 4, the Thunder unleashed its fury on the Lakers and demolished the West’s top seed by 21 points, 110-89.

The Thunder is being carried by its superstar Kevin Durant, who has clearly embraced the limelight of his first playoff appearance.

And he has done it on both ends of the floor, averaging 26.8 points a game and guarding Kobe Bryant down the stretch in the key Game 3 victory.

It certainly doesn’t hurt Durant that he gets to play with by far the best point guard in this series, Russell Westbrook. The former UCLA Bruin has almost 22 points per game over the first four contests and had added 5.3 assists and 6.5 rebounds a game as well.

But the biggest difference in this series is the quality minutes Oklahoma City has received from its bench players. Serge Ibaka has continued to be the presence in the post many thought the Thunder lacked, while rookie James Harden has provided a scoring punch. Couple that with the toughness of Nick Collison on the block and the continued improvement of another rookie,

I

MCT

Averaging 26.8 points and 9.3 rebounds per game thus far in his first NBA playoff appearance, Kevin Durant was a key reason why the Thunder were able to tie up their opening round series against the Lakers heading into last night’s Game 5.

Eric Maynor, as Westbrook’s backup, and the young Thunder have some talent in reserve.

While the Lakers may have Lamar Odom, they need the likes of Shannon Brown, Jordan Farmar and Luke Walton to provide more of a spark in order to stave off the Thunder.

The Portland Trail Blazers were in a similar boat as Oklahoma City. This was another young team — albeit one with more experience — that most people assumed was see WESTERN CONFERENCE, page 17

INSIDE THE NBA: EASTERN CONFERENCE

Magic easily dispatch Bobcats with sweep Milwaukee Bucks, Atlanta Hawks locked in tight race BY

ALEX SCAROS

Daily Staff Writer

Out West, the NBA Playoffs have been filled with surprises. The seventh-seeded San Antonio Spurs are up three games to one on the Dallas Mavericks, and the fifth-seeded Utah Jazz are up on the dynamic Denver Nuggets, 3-1. The East has been exciting, but the results have turned out more or less as expected. The Orlando Magic just completed a four-game sweep of the Charlotte Bobcats on Monday and will face the winner of the Hawks-Bucks series.

The Magic played their brand of basketball and showed very few flaws in their game. Averaging 94.8 points per game as a team, the Magic won the four games by an average of nearly 10 points, largely due to their 37.5 percent shooting from three compared to the Bobcats’ 27.9. The Magic weren’t led by Dwight Howard, but instead

by Jameer Nelson, who averaged 23.8 points per game and shot 42.9 percent from the long range.

Howard has been seriously underachieving, averaging just 9.8 points and 9.3 rebounds per game, and has only been playing 26.5 minutes per game due to foul trouble in all four games. In the next round, Howard will have to establish his inside presence because both the Hawks and the Bucks have great perimeter defenses that will put more pressure on the Magic shooters than the Bobcats did.

In the 1-8 matchup, the Cavaliers have been handling the Bulls as most had expected. Cleveland is scoring at will, averaging 108.8 points per game and shooting nearly 50 percent from

Trading in tradition

MCT

Brandon Jennings, left, and Mike Bibby are waging a contentious battle to get their teams past the first round of the NBA playoffs. the field. The Cavs took the first two games in Cleveland by double digits, but in Game 3, the Bulls battled with the Cavs and fended off a late fourthquarter run to win 108-106.

In Game 4, the Cavs came out unleashing everything they had, ripping the nets with 48 percent shooting from three en route to a 121-98 victory. LeBron James had another “typical LeBron” night, dropping 37 points, 12 rebounds and 11 assists. James went

into the locker room at the end of the first quarter to get a bruised elbow looked at, but it didn’t seem to bother him after he came back into the game.

Antawn Jamison added 24 points and seven rebounds, while Mo Williams and Anthony Parker tacked on a combined 31 points while shooting 5-of-9 from 3-point-range.

In the 4-5 matchup, the Boston see EASTERN CONFERENCE, page 15

’m a sucker for tradition.

It’s why I still haven’t completely gotten over the NBA moving the first round of the playoffs to seven games, even if it means more chances to watch Kevin Durant. Plus, “Tradition” is the best song in “Fiddler on the Roof” (1964) ever since Gwen Stefani ruined “If I Were a Rich Man.” Sure, maybe it is simply because I hate change; I’m still frustrated that I haven’t figured out what I am supposed to call Puff Daddy after all these years.

But traditions are meant to be lasting, and I have a hard time accepting anything different.

Which is why I am having trouble moving past the fact that Saturday could mark the last time that one of the best events in sports occurs before an extreme makeover. By the first Saturday in May next year, the Kentucky Derby could be run under the lights at Churchill Downs. If not next year, it will occur soon. Famed trainer D. Wayne Lukas described the move as “inevitable.”

Why did I spend so much time talking about tradition? There is no other event in sports that is marked more by that word than the Kentucky Derby.

Forget the Masters and its “Tradition unlike any other” slogan. You can raise me Augusta National and its green jacket and I will counter with Churchill, “My Old Kentucky Home,” mint juleps and hats so outrageous that it puts any trucker ensemble Ashton Kutcher could have ever worn to shame (and me to shame, as well, for another ridiculously outdated pop-culture reference).

It isn’t like running the Derby at 9 p.m. is going to change all that. I’m sure that you will still get the same drunken crowd in the infield and celebrities in the grandstands. But it won’t feel the same. It is obvious that the move to primetime is about nothing more than greed.

Horse racing is always trying to promote itself to a larger audience, even though the Derby has steadily increased its viewership over the last few years, including last year when Mine That Bird came out of nowhere to win the race as a 50-1 longshot. But after the success that the NFL draft had with its move to primetime, it seems logical that other sporting events might follow suit.

Still, the Derby is different. The NFL already has a large fan base that is invested in its sport. In my mind, you aren’t going to increase viewership on a Saturday night. Early trials last spring at Churchill may have brought more spectators for racing under the lights, but I don’t think they will add to television revenue.

It is a gimmick move. Anything that is new and novel will sell well early, but I would bet that eventually night racing won’t be as much of a spectacle. Once that novelty wears off, all you will be left with are the same issues without the sunlight. And as someone who has lost way too much money at Suffolk Downs, I can tell you that the weather is my number one excuse for going there every time.

I have no problem with wanting to attract more fans to the Sport of Kings.

But what makes horse racing what it is are traditions like what you see at the Derby. Dressing up for the Derby during the day is like going to church, only with more drinking and gambling. If you move the Derby to the nighttime, it is just like another outing.

And it shouldn’t be. The Kentucky Derby may be the nation’s oldest continuously run sporting event, but if it wants to be the real “Tradition unlike any other,” it has to stand by what makes it special. OK, so there is nothing really wrong with change. But why mess with a good thing?

Ethan Landy is a senior majoring in English. He can be reached at ethan.landy@ tufts.edu.

Sports

20

INSIDE Inside the NBA 19 Call Me Junior 19

tuftsdaily.com

SOFTBALL

WOMEN’S CREW

Tong’s homer puts destiny in Jumbos’ hands Jumbos fare Squeaker over Trinity solidifies Tufts’ hold on first place in East well at final tune-up BY

ETHAN STURM

Senior Staff Writer

While it is a common cliché to say that “softball is a game of inches,” those watching Tufts’ Monday after-

BY

batter and an error by Poulos herself.

But after a strikeout and a groundout, Poulos was able to escape the inning unscathed.

The two teams combined for six hits in the first three frames, but could not seem to breakthrough. Then in the top of the fourth, Trinity finally had that break through. With one out, junior Bantams co-captain Nicole Nardella laced a line drive to deep centerfield.

Sophomore centerfielder Lizzy Iuppa gave chase, but was not able to get to it. The ball slammed off the wall, as did Iuppa with almost as much force.

She bounced back up, but Nardella had already cruised into second with a double.

“I thought it was going out too,”

In this past weekend’s third-annual Spirit Regatta on the Malden River, the women’s crew team may have not taken home the Cup, but solid wins against toptier opponents across all events made it a successful weekend before New Englands on Saturday.

Competing for the Spirit Cup, Tufts raced against Wellesley and nationally ranked No. 7 Smith. Against the No. 8 Wellesley Blue, the Jumbos’ varsity eight boat fell by a 16-second margin in the 7:14.37-7:30.91 finish. However, against Smith, senior captain Kate Woodard led the crew to a close 7:34.06 finish, just shy of the Pioneers’ 7:29.48 time. The deadheat finish provides much-needed confidence going into one of the most important events of the season: this weekend’s New England Rowing Championships.

“The competition is always stiff, and the three schools we competed against have really improved over the past few years,” Woodard said. “Smith is ranked highly, and we’re not ranked at all, and they beat us by only three or four seconds. That’s a pretty small margin, so we were excited about that and how we weren’t that far off from such a highly ranked team.”

In the second varsity eight races, the Jumbos saw mixed results and tight finishes against the Pioneers and the Blue. In its first race, the second varsity eight squad began trailing Smith but used the inside lane in turns to gain a short lead that it maintained until the finish line. And while the Pioneers made a last-ditch sprint at the end of the track, the Jumbos kept up their momentum for a close 7:37.177:39.09 victory.

“In the second varsity race, we had the inside turn advantage, so even though

see SOFTBALL, page 17

see CREW, page 17

SOFTBALL (17-11, 7-2 NESCAC East) Spicer Field, Monday Trinity Tufts

1 2

noon game against Trinity saw just how true the saying really is.

Down 1-0 to the Bantams in the bottom of the fifth, Tufts senior right fielder Stefanie Tong stepped up to the plate with a runner on third and one out. Finding a pitch in her zone, she went after it, getting slightly under it.

The ball towered down the left-field line, finally coming down squarely on top of the fence. It caromed off the wall’s apex before safely continuing over, giving the Jumbos a 2-1 lead that they would not relinquish, and along with it the inside track to the NESCAC East title.

“I wasn’t looking for that pitch, but it was a higher pitch so I just pulled the trigger,” Tong said. “I was looking outside because that’s where she was all day. I didn’t think it was going to go out, but I could feel it was a well-hit ball.”

The 2-1 Tufts victory capped off an exciting three-game set between the two squads that featured three games decided by a total of three runs. Trinity had taken the first game a week ago, 6-5, with the Jumbos responding later that day 3-2. Due to rain, the rubber match was put off a week, but the game was well worth the wait.

The pitching matchup was a duel between the winning pitchers in each game of the doubleheader. Tufts went

MICHAEL SPERA

Daily Editorial Board

VIRGINIA BLEDSOE/TUFTS DAILY

Senior right fielder Stefanie Tong hit a two-run homer just over the left-field fence on Monday, keying the softball team’s 2-1 win over Trinity. Seeking their sixth consecutive NESCAC East crown, the Jumbos are now one up in the loss column with three division games remaining. with veteran junior Izzie Santone, who had given up only one earned run in eight innings the week before, while Trinity countered with sophomore Katherine Poulos.

The early innings of the game were a series of missed opportunities on both sides. Trinity put two runners on with one out in the top of the first before a ripped line drive flew right into the glove of freshman second baseman Emily Beinecke, who flipped to first for the double play.

“It kept them from scoring a run in the first inning, which was huge,” said Santone of the double play. “If they can set that tone, they have the advantage.

It turned the game in our favor.”

Meanwhile, in the bottom of the second, the Jumbos loaded the bases with only one out after a single, a hit

SAILING

Tufts women earn semifinal bid with fifth-place finish

Allen, Barron rack up NESCAC track and field awards

Co-ed team tunes up for Charleston at Kings Point BY

ALEX PREWITT

Daily Editorial Board

Last week, the co-ed sailing team earned a national semifinals berth thanks to a hardfought regatta at Conn. College.

On Saturday, less than 60 miles away, the women’s team followed suit, securing a spot in the upcoming ICSA National Championship semifinals with a fifth-place finish out of 13 teams at the New England Championships on the water in Providence, R.I. A stellar performance in the B Division ultimately gave the Jumbos their slot in the semifinals. Senior skipper Peggy Tautz, junior crew Margaret Rew and senior crew Jennifer Watkins all teamed up to give Tufts an eight-point victory in the B Division. It was a consistently strong weekend for the trio, in which they nailed down two runner-up finishes and two victories, including one in the last race, which gave them the 39-point total necessary to capture first.

Rew, who raced in the first six races, and Watkins, who

COURTESY GOJUMBOS.COM

Coach Ethan Barron was named Coach of the Year following the conference championships on Saturday.

COURTESY KEN LEGLER

Riding the winds of fortune, the Tufts women’s sailing team landed spots in the national semifinals thanks to strong performances over the weekend.

The co-ed squad, meanwhile, tuned up for its own semifinal appearance. took over for the final four, were instrumental for the B Division boat, which finished below fourth in just two of the 10 races. Though a gorgeous first day gave way to a drizzly, damp start to Sunday’s races, it did not phase the victorious

B boat.

“We had pretty good conditions, so that helped I think,” Watkins said. “We had good starts a lot of the time and tried to make gains when we were see SAILING, page 15

At the end of the NESCAC track and field season, the Jumbos have proven why they are one of the premier programs in the region. Following the conference championships at the Ellis Oval and Dussault Track this past Saturday, the NESCAC Track & Field All-Conference Teams were announced, and Tufts collected two prestigious awards.

Receiving the women’s Rookie Most Outstanding Performer honor was freshman Kelly Allen, who claimed first at the meet with schoolrecord marks in both the discus (143’5”) and javelin (120’6”).

She also collected second in the

shot put (40’7.5”) and fifth in the hammer (136’4”). All four distances were personal-bests for Allen, who is now preparing for the New England Div. III Championships, to be held at Tufts this weekend.

On the men’s side, coach Ethan Barron was named Coach of the Year after guiding his squad to second at the conference meet, just 12 points behind champion Williams. It is the fourth time in the past five years that Barron has brought home the top conference coaching honor after winning three straight from 2006-2008.

—by Evan Cooper