Monday, May 1, 2017

Moe’s offers cheeseburgers, cheer to the hungry and hungover see FEATURES / PAGE 5

MEN’S TRACK AND FIELD

Jumbos clinch 20 top-five finishes in NESCAC Championships

‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ draws eerie parallels to contemporary United States see ARTS&LIVING / PAGE 6

SEE SPORTS / BACK PAGE

THE

INDEPENDENT

STUDENT

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UNIVERSITY

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T HE T UFTS DAILY

VOLUME LXXIII, NUMBER 58

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Monday, May 1, 2017

MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE, MASS.

Arts and Sciences graduate students to hold unionization vote

by Natasha Mayor

Assistant News Editor

Graduate student employees of Tufts’ School of Arts and Sciences and School of the Museum of Fine Arts (SMFA) will begin the process of voting to unionize with Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 509 today.

Votes will be sent via mail today, and eligible voters will have until May 16 to send their mail-in ballot to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Ballots will be counted by NLRB on May 18, according to an email sent to graduate students by Dean of Arts and Sciences James Glaser and Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Robert Cook.

The election was announced on April 18 when the university received a petition filed with the NLRB on behalf of the union, the email said. More than

RAY BERNOFF / THE TUFTS DAILY

Computer science Ph.D candidate Sam Burck, English Ph.D candidate James Rizzi and psychology Ph.D candidate Eric Fields are part of the group of graduate students pushing for unionization at Tufts.

30 percent of employees signed cards indicating interest in holding an election, according to Tufts Associate General Counsel for Labor and Employment Lili Palacios-Baldwin. After the 30-percent threshold is reached, federal law requires an election to be held.

Graduate students are allowed to unionize after an August NLRB 2016 decision granted private university graduate students the right to do so.

According to a university-provided list of frequently asked questions, all Ph.D. students in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and masters students in the School of Museum of Fine Arts who receive compensation for teaching or conducting research are eligible to be part of the union.

If a majority of students in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences see GRAD STUDENT, page 2

Vice President of Operations Linda Snyder to retire

by Emily Burke

Assistant News Editor

Vice President of Operations Linda Snyder will retire from Tufts at the end of this semester, after about four and a half years at the university. Since beginning her term in 2012, Snyder has overseen facilities services, dining, public safety and campus planning, among other departments.

Current Director of Capital Programs Barb Stein has been appointed as interim vice president. A search is already underway for a new vice president, and the replacement process will take between three and four months, according to Snyder.

“We have begun a search by posting the position of vice president for operations online and widely distributing the job description with many organizations that can bring wide attention among diverse candidates and organizations,” Executive Vice President Patricia Campbell told the Daily in an email. “I expect to have a new VP in place by the start of the fall semester.”

Snyder said that since joining Tufts, several positive changes have been made, which have strengthened the university’s commitment to mindful campus planning and sustainability.

“Tufts has a long and very well-respected commitment to sustainability, and I

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think that that’s been continued in strength while I’ve been here,” Snyder said.

Snyder mentioned specific steps that have been taken to try to reduce Tufts’ environmental impact, including the Sustainability Council, the American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment and the construction of the Central Energy Plant. Snyder explained that steps such as the Central Energy Plant amount to long-term investments for the university.

“Tufts didn’t have to decide to build a new Central Energy Plant with cogeneration and central chilled water. It could’ve just replaced boilers in the old power plant,” Snyder said. “It didn’t have to take that step, and that step is enormously important for the university.”

However, Nicole Joseph, a member of Tufts Labor Coalition (TLC), noted that many employees in Tufts Facilities Services have spoken about the struggle to keep up with these frequent changes to operations systems, which have not necessarily increased efficiency.

“There’s been a lot of history of [worker struggle] on this campus, and a big part of that is because people felt like there were a lot of sudden changes that didn’t make sense to them,” Joseph, a junior, said. “A lot of people don’t think that a lot of the changes that have been made are see SNYDER, page 2

For breaking news, our content archive and exclusive content, visit tuftsdaily.com @tuftsdaily

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Oath Craft Pizza’s Davis Square location, which now accepts Tufts’ JumboCash as a form of payment, is pictured on April 27.

Oath Craft Pizza joins JumboCash program

by Amanda Rose

Contributing Writer

Oath Craft Pizza in Davis Square is the newest off-campus venue to join the JumboCash program. The pizza restaurant approached the university about joining the program a little over a month ago, Oath’s general manager Christopher Ryder recalled.

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“We definitely heard that there were a couple of businesses around Davis that were [accepting] JumboCash,” he said. “I had a couple of students over the summer who worked here, and we wanted to get more of the college experience in the restaurant.”

First-year Tufts Community

NEWS............................................1 FEATURES.................................5 ARTS & LIVING.......................6

see JUMBOCASH, page 3

COMICS.......................................8 OPINION.....................................9 SPORTS............................ BACK

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THE TUFTS DAILY | News | Monday, May 1, 2017

T HE T UFTS D AILY Kathleen Schmidt Editor-in-Chief

EDITORIAL

Jei-Jei Tan Miranda Willson Managing Editors Joe Walsh Executive News Editor Ariel Barbieri-Aghib News Editors Zachary Hertz Gil Jacobson Robert Katz Liam Knox Daniel Nelson Catherine Perloff Emma Steiner Hannah Uebele Charles Bunnell Assistant News Editors Emily Burke Daniel Caron Aneurin Canham-Clyne Juliana Furgala Elie Levine Natasha Mayor Jesse Najarro Minna Trinh Costa Angelakis Executive Features Editor Becca Leibowitz Features Editors Jake Taber Emma Rosenthal Emma Damokosh Assistant Features Editors Zach Essig Elie Levine Jessie Newman Sean Ong Hermes Suen Grace Yuh Eran Sabaner Executive Arts Editor John Gallagher Arts Editors Cassidy Olsen John Fedak Assistant Arts Editors Libby Langsner Setenay Mufti Paige Spangenthal Anita Ramaswamy Executive Opinion Editor Stephen Dennison Cartoonists Shannon Geary Noah Kulak Lydia Ra Miranda Chavez Editorialists Julia Faxon Hannah Kahn Lena Novins-Montague Madeleine Schwartz Daniel Weinstein Eddie Samuels Executive Sports Editor Yuan Jun Chee Sports Editors Maddie Payne Maclyn Senear Liam Finnegan Assistant Sports Editors Savannah Mastrangelo Brad Schussel Sam Weidner Sam Weitzman Ray Bernoff Executive Photo Editor Margot Day Staff Photographers Scott Fitchen Lilia Kang Max Lalanne Rachael Meyer Vintus Okwonko Zachary Sebek Alexis Serino Seohyun Shim Angelie Xiong Sitong Zhang Ezgi Yazici Executive Video Editor Olivia Ireland Executive Video Admin.

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Goals of unionization efforts include better student employee-administrator communication GRAD STUDENT

continued from page 1 vote to unionize, the university must accept the vote, according to teaching assistant and fourth-year Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Physics Anna Phillips. However, for SMFA students, the university can claim that they do not have enough in common with the other graduate students and can challenge their votes, Phillips said.

Phillips explained that after their fifth year, graduate students no longer receive financial assistance in paying their health care bills. Furthermore, she said graduate students do not receive sufficient paid childcare or medical leave.

Phillips said she hopes that unionization would benefit all graduate students equally.

“There’s the general principle that the graduate students are better off all together,” Phillips said. “I expect it to be a collective effort to make the experience of all graduate students at Tufts better.”

Graduate instructor and fourth-year Ph.D. candidate in the Department of English James Rizzi explained the difficulties associated with not being able to communicate directly with top university administrators. He said that unionization would empower graduate students by giving them recourse.

“Right now the situation is such that individual graduate students may come together to ask things of their program director or department heads, who then go up the chain of command until things are negotiated on our behalf, far removed from the people who are actually asking for the things,” Rizzi said. “Forming a union, for me, means having a seat at the table.”

Rizzi also suggested that a unionized graduate student population would make Tufts more enticing to potential students looking to pursue a graduate degree.

“With the cost of living that continues to go up every year, these things are on people’s minds as they make the decision to attend Tufts or take their graduate degree somewhere else,” Rizzi said.

Teaching assistant and first-year Ph.D. student in the Department of Computer Science Sam Burck clarified that although the union provides support, decisions regarding an eventual contract will ultimately lie with the graduate students.

“We are giving them the right to represent us, as in we can’t bring in our own lawyer or negotiator and use them instead, but they don’t get to decide what happens,” Burck said. “They help us come to an agreement with the administration for what’s an acceptable contract and we choose if we want to sign that.”

Dominic Guri, a second-year mechanical engineering Ph.D. candidate, said that he does not think graduate students should be represented by SEIU. He cited a meeting last December, where he said SEIU representatives were unable to state exactly what they would be providing for the graduate students.

“If SEIU is the best option that we have, then we ought not to unionize at all,” Guri said. Guri, as an engineering student, will not be voting in the upcoming election.

Rizzi clarified that the graduate students do not view their relationship with the university as a negative one.

“When we say that a contract offers us

protections, we are not necessarily saying that we’re in an adversarial relationship with the administration,” Rizzi said. “It simply means that we want protection from anything that could happen.”

Glaser expressed some concerns with the decision to unionize. He noted that unionization may blur the line between student and employee and complicate the relationship between graduate students and their departments.

“Up to now, we view teaching opportunities as part of the training that students get as part of their experience here as students,” Glaser said. “We view their participation in laboratories as part of their training in learning the craft of doing research.”

Glaser also noted that unionization may place additional financial burdens on all graduate student employees, though he recognized the need for such a structure.

“If the union forms, whether you voted for the union or you didn’t vote for the union, you will have obligations to the union — whether they’re dues or whether they’re agency fees,” Glaser said.

Rizzi expressed his hope that after educating themselves about the implications of unionization, the majority of students will come to share his viewpoint that a union will benefit them.

“We believe that if the Tufts students do their research and they are not misled or driven into a position where they are fearful, irrationally, we trust them to vote for unionization because we believe it’s in their best interests, and we believe they’ll come to that same conclusion,” Rizzi said.

Students, staff reflect on legacy of outgoing Linda Snyder SNYDER

continued from page 1 efficient, in terms of providing the services they are supposed to on campus.”

Joseph cited the trash buddy system as an example of a project that did not achieve its stated goals. Recycling bins replaced typical trash cans in campus offices, which instead took the form of much smaller “trash buddies,” small containers on the side of the larger cans.

“One of [Snyder’s] rationales for that was that it would mean that people were taking out the trash more on their own and that it would encourage people to not throw as much stuff away, but the trash buddies were so small that a takeout box wouldn’t fit in it,” Joseph said.

According to Joseph, this new waste management system only added unnecessary steps to the disposal process. An aspect of the implementation of the “trash buddy” system had janitors collect trash weekly instead of daily, which Joseph said made janitors’ workloads unnecessarily difficult.

Executive Director of Public Relations Patrick Collins defended the contributions Snyder has made to the operations division.

“We fully support our Operations department and the good work it does to ensure the efficient and smooth function of the university’s essential facilities and services, including campus planning, sustainable waste management and the oversight of all construction and renovation projects,” Collins told the Daily in an email. “In particular, we appreciate the leadership and experience that Linda has brought to bear during her time at Tufts.”

Snyder said she was also proud of the

role that Tufts community input played in operations department decisions during her tenure but acknowledged that the department could do better with student involvement.

“We had students involved in the design of 574 Boston Ave. Their input was really helpful in thinking about how to create informal social spaces. We regularly work with students in the engineering school,” Snyder said.

On the other hand, Joseph said workers do not feel that they have opportunities to contribute their opinions before big changes are made.

Members of TLC, such as Eve Feldberg in an April 25, 2016 Daily op-ed, have also criticized Snyder for her role in 2015 custodial reorganization and lay-offs. The reorganization, which ultimately displaced 18 janitors, was the subject of a 2015 student hunger strike. It was officially implemented

by DTZ, the company to which Tufts contracted out its custodial labor and which has since merged with Cushman & Wakefield (C&W ) Services.

Collins responded that the reorganization was an important, cost-saving change.

“Regarding the reorganization undertaken by the company that provides Tufts with custodial services, as stated previously, the reorganization brought Tufts in line with standards at our peer universities and improved cleaning services while also increasing efficiency,” he said.

Snyder expressed her gratitude to Tufts employees and praised their commitment to making Tufts a better campus.

“I think that the quality of the people that work here is very high. Tufts is just

very lucky to have a strong and committed workforce, and I am very sure that will continue,” Snyder said.

Joseph expressed concern that the main goals of the Operations Division seem to have been to cut costs, and not to focus on the long-term effects this would have on workers and the condition of university facilities.

“Tufts is not sending the message, with the current labor disputes going on on campus, that they are changing for the better in any capacity,” Joseph said. “If that’s the stance they’re still taking right now, I’m not sure if I have good faith in the university with this new hire to respect and uphold workers’ rights.”

Joseph said that, although it is difficult to manage budgets with the problems of overspending in the university and rising tuition, it is the job of the Operations Division to find a solution that works for everyone.

“I think at the end of the day as a new person comes in, I think it’s really important to value the knowledge and skills that people in the department already have. It’s good to bring a fresh set of eyes to something, but also, a lot of people have been working here for a long time and know what works,” Joseph said.

According to Campbell, Snyder has been a successful leader of the Operations Division at Tufts, and it is critical that her replacement continues her work.

“Linda has done a superb job of leading Operations, and I am confident we will find someone equally capable to fill this important position. The quality of our facilities and the effectiveness of operations is critical to the university’s success,” Campbell said.

Monday, May 1, 2017 | News | THE TUFTS DAILY

News

3

TCU Senate looks to increase number of restaurants accepting JumboCash JUMBOCASH

continued from page 1 Union ( TCU) Senator Kevin Gleason, TCU’s Services Committee chair, acted as a liaison between Oath and Tufts Dining Services. Gleason saw the project as part of TCU Senate’s invigorated efforts to increase the number of off-campus venues in the JumboCash program.

After meeting with Director of Dining and Business Services Patti Klos, Gleason learned that most juniors and seniors who live off-campus do not have full meal plans and rely on JumboCash instead. After speaking with upperclassmen senators, Gleason believed he understood why.

“You’re always carrying your [ Tufts ID] card, so it’s more convenient [to spend JumboCash],” Gleason said.

“And parents are more willing to put money in a JumboCash account than a debit card account.”

Gleason said he and other senators posted a survey online this semester asking students where they would like to use JumboCash. Popular results included Boston Burger Company, Tamper, Pokéworks and Mr. Crepe. Because Dining Services does not actively solicit area mer-

chants, according to Klos, Gleason and several other senators in the Services Committee took the initiative themselves.

Using brochures from Dining Services that outline the basics of the JumboCash program, Gleason said he and the Services Committee approached restaurant managers individually.

“We lobby [restaurant managers] instead of waiting for them to come to us,” Gleason said. “They don’t know how to join, so we are the intermediary.”

Klos estimated that with paperwork, installing processing equipment and lags in communication between Dining Services and the restaurant managers, a venue might wait four to six weeks before they can accept JumboCash.

Klos said that expanding the use of JumboCash off-campus has virtually no disadvantages for the school and that the only drawback she anticipates for students is that merchants sometimes charge processing fees.

There are a few obstacles, however, that must be overcome for a restaurant to join the JumboCash program.

“A merchant must decide if [the JumboCash program] fits its business

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model or not,” Klos said. “It requires that you use a dedicated credit card processing terminal to be able to process the transaction, and most places [must] lease that from a company.”

Gleason said that the companies he has approached have sometimes been concerned that accepting JumboCash could hurt business.

“When a company joins JumboCash, the university takes … part of that sale,” he said. “We’ve spoken to three stores, and they’ve considered joining, but the percentage the university takes out of the sale is too high.”

Klos added that this percentage taken out of the sale contributes to the management of the JumboCash system, and the pool of funds allows the university to maintain these relationships.

Howe v e r, Klos said that some restaurants, especially new ones, believe that the required financial adjustments are worth it. Ryder seemed to echo this sentiment, seeing JumboCash as a means to increase business.

“We’re just trying to get into the community any way we can,” Ryder said. “The more, the merrier.”

Since the fusion of the Dining Dollars and Points Plus programs in

2008, the number of businesses that accept JumboCash has grown from six to 22, and that number is still rising.

“We’re really trying to get more places on-board, and I don’t think that has happened for a while,” Gleason said. “It’s definitely going to be a project that is going to continue far into next year.”

Gleason and the Ser vices Committee have been communicating with Boston Burger Company, Mr. Crepe and, most recently, bfresh. Gleason anticipates that bfresh will start accepting JumboCash next semester.

“I’ve been speaking with people [at bfresh] on the corporate level,” Gleason said. “They are working with their financial transaction providers and are just trying to make sure that the JumboCash transactions will match up with their current systems.”

Klos is excited about the expansion of the JumboCash program to supplement on-campus dining options.

“We are doing our best to provide good quality food, opportunities to interact and support for your success,” Klos said. “The program off campus is really to complement and add convenience, with different kinds of foods in different settings.”

4

THE TUFTS DAILY | ADVERTISEMENT | Monday, May 1, 2017

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An Open Letter to the Tufts Administration from Tenured and Tenure-track Faculty Part-time lecturers at Tufts are poised to bargain a new contract with Tufts University. Having negotiated their first Collective Bargaining Agreement in the fall of 2014, this is the next juncture in the process of periodic re-negotiation. It offers a recurring opportunity to acknowledge the important contribution these members of the faculty make to the teaching mission of Tufts University.

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As tenured and tenure-stream faculty, we ask that a special effort be made to continue to improve the working conditions of our part-time lecturer colleagues by supporting progress towards equitable pay, increased job security, and stability. We strongly urge the Tufts administration to embrace this opportunity to demonstrate its commitment to social and economic justice.

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Monday, May 1, 2017

Features

After over 10 years, Moe’s BBQ Trollys offers late-night food, friendly conversation

Dave Stuart, pictured right on Sept. 19, 2014, has been serving his food at Tufts for the last nine years.

by Emma Rosenthal Features Editor

Moe’s BBQ Trollys is an iconic part of Tufts’ nightlife on weekends, feeding students whether they are party-hopping or studying late at night. Dave Stuart, nicknamed “Moe,” operates the truck and is a native of the area, having grown up near Harvard and then moving to Somerville. He has been in the food industry for his whole career, a career that has taken him through a variety of different positions.

“I’ve dealt with food all my life,” Stuart said. “I used to be at a food warehouse, like Costco and BJ’s; my friend opened up the very first one of those in Cambridge back in around ’77. And I managed that food warehouse for people to come and shop in there.”

Stuart then moved from selling food to cooking it. “[That same friend] opened up a delicatessen, and I went up and did all the cooking outside at the grill,” he said. “[I] did that for 10 or 11 years.”

Stuart explained that the food truck industry differs from the restaurant industry, noting that the biggest difference is location.

“A friend of mine owned a restaurant [in Kendall Square] and I’d do a barbecue in front for the deli and every day I’d wait on 400 people just in two hours for lunch. So that’s where you’ll have a large quantity of people,” he said. “I used to be up at Broadway [with the food truck] and they said we were going to get a lot of food trucks. But there’s not enough business there to warrant it. There’s no industry.

There’s not enough business to keep competition there.”

Following his time working in Kendall Square and on Broadway, Stuart decided to try his luck at a different spot with Moe’s BBQ Trollys.

After his brother’s stepson, a Tufts student, insisted he bring his food truck to campus, Stuart finally drove up to Boston Avenue over 10 years ago.

“I figured, you know, when you’re up late at night and if you’re going out to parties, there’s never anything around to eat that late at night. So that’s why I decided to give the school a try,” he said.

Despite his plan, Moe’s wasn’t finding success at its initial location.

“I was originally over on Boston Ave. and I really didn’t do any business,” Stuart said. “Then one night when I went up there, there was a car parked in my spot, so I went around and I ended up going up Packard Ave. and parked up there on the right-hand side. And I enjoyed it and I ended up meeting a lot of nice people there.”

However, Stuart’s venture to Packard Avenue to his spot right outside of Zeta Psi’s fraternity house did not come without obstacles.

“The city found out I was up there and I wasn’t supposed to be working after a certain hour,” he said. “So I had to go get all the permits for late-night working.

And I had them all done the next day and was able to go back up there so I made it Thursday, Friday [and] Saturday nights.”

Stuart has been parking in the same spot ever since. But he didn’t always have the same support from the university that he has now.

“I would shut down around 3 o’clock and clean up around the area. But the university didn’t want me there that late,” he said. “As time went on, the university began to like having me up there.”

Stuart explained that the burger, whether with bacon and cheese or simply plain, is the most popular item on his menu, but that everything on he serves is food that he’s proud to serve and eat.

Apart from his relationship with the university and the iconic food, Stuart has forged relationships with many of the Tufts students who come to him as customers. The friendly chat is not only what draw people to Stuart’s truck, but it is also what draws Stuart to Tufts, he said.

Junior Jake Fiedler has been a longtime customer of Moe’s, and he credited his discovery of the trolley to the unmis-

EVAN SAYLES / THE TUFTS DAILY

takable scent that first caught his attention as a first-year. Fiedler is not only a customer, but he also lived in a fraternity house right next to Stuart’s parking spot, so even when he wasn’t buying a burger, he was social with Stuart.

“When I moved into Zeta [Psi] sophomore year, he was right outside my window, so I would go out and chat with him when he wasn’t too busy,” Fiedler told the Daily in an electronic message.

Stuart echoed the fact that he enjoys speaking with students and passersby.

“When it’s busy, I can’t talk to anybody because I’m waiting on the customers, but when there’s no customers, I love to chit-chat. I really enjoy talking with [students] and I like keeping them joking,” Stuart said. “I enjoy the kids up there. I enjoy doing what I do. I’ve met a lot of nice kids over the years from around the world. And I’ve been able to enjoy myself up there. I try to be nice to everybody.”

Stuart said that he hopes visits to the food truck provide a bit of respite in students’ often stressful lives.

“If you’re under all that pressure at school, you just need a little laugh once in a while, you know? So if I can make [the students] laugh and smile, I’m happy,” Stuart said.

In the absence of fraternities holding on-campus parties, Moe’s has been absent from campus for most of the winter and even now is less consistently around.

Sophomore Emma Phillips, who has been a customer of Moe’s since her first year, explained that she misses Moe’s presence on campus.

“I think he bases his entire business around the whole frat scene, especially because he parked right outside of Zeta [Psi] every night … Everyone knew him,” Phillips said. “I’ve been interacting with some freshmen lately and I’ve been talking about Moe, because I love him. And they have no idea who he is. Which is kind of upsetting to me, because I feel like he was such a big part of the Tufts nightlife.”

5 tuftsdaily.com

Rainbow House 2016-2017 On Queer

R

On space

ecently, we’ve come to realize that Rainbow House is quite small.

Situated in Hillside Apartments, our apartment comes with eight bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen and a common room. We are not wheelchair-accessible, and we have to sit on tables if we all want to meet in the common room.

But we didn’t realize how small the space was until we toured Crafts House. From a foyer the size of our kitchen to a living room larger than one of our doubles, we were rather confused. So we did some research.

According to a Tufts Observer article from March 26, 1998, Rainbow House was requested in fall 1997, approved in the spring and established in fall 1998. The space began in Latin Way and lasted until renovations in 1999, when we were moved to our current location.

According to the university, Rainbow House began in Latin Way because all special interest houses must spend their first year on campus. However, we are one of two remaining houses in a dorm, the other being Green House. We are the smallest of the group houses, which is rather ironic, given that a conservative estimate of 10 percent would project a queer undergraduate population of around 500 students — 1,000 if you include graduate students. So why are we the smallest house?

Our frustration mounted as we continued to read the aforementioned article: “The residents originally had wanted to live in a wood-frame house because, as is explained in their application, they felt that a ‘house would provide the stability and security of a [queer] safe space that would be difficult to achieve in a dormitory or suite.’”

We are expected to be a cultural hub on campus catering to the queer community, and yet most students don’t know we exist, let alone where we are. Even if students knew, we don’t have a front door; you have to bang on our window until somebody hears you.

With all furniture removed, 40 people can stand in our common room. Our kitchen has enough counter space for a dish rack and microwave, meaning we can’t cook large meals. We are not a hub on campus.

We are an apartment that happens to be queer.

So what’s the issue? The university can obviously afford new space. In the past 20 years, Tufts has undergone extensive renovations and expansions, including but not limited to Gantcher Center, Anderson Hall, Bello Field, Sophia Gordon Hall, Tisch gym, a boathouse and the Interfaith Center. There are clearly available houses in the neighborhood, since Kappa Alpha Theta moved into a new university-owned house in 2013.

For 20 years, the university has not respected our requests for space, favoring athletics, sciences and, most egregiously, Greek life. And while we are aware that donations and grants are specific to groups on campus, there is no reason that a university that charges students almost $70,000 per year couldn’t afford a queer house on campus in the past two decades.

So we have a request. Celebrate our 20th anniversary with the one thing we have asked for since our inception: space.

A space to be queer, to form a community and gather and be ourselves and just exist.

Because for 20 years, we have not had the space to do that, and that needs to change.

This article was written by an anonymous member of the Rainbow House. They can be reached at rhousecolumn@gmail.com.

6 tuftsdaily.com

Arts & Living

Antonio Bertolino Art-à-Porter

Monday, May 1, 2017

TELEVISION REVIEW

‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ portrays a dystopian Issey Miyake, the future all too similar to reality engineer of fashion design

F

ew designers have incorporated technology in their work like Japanese fashion designer Issey Miyake, especially famous for his “Pleats Please” line and his “BaoBao” geometric bags. He is a firm believer in the importance of art and museums as inexhaustible sources of inspiration for the fashion industry. Although he ‘retired’ from design in 1997, he still oversees the creative direction of every line in his name, collaborating closely with Dai Fujiwara and now Yoshiyuki Miyamae on all of his clothing lines. Throughout the years, Miyake has shown incredible versatility in his field in terms of his ability to reconcile tradition and innovation on the catwalk.

One of the most iconic instances in which art and technology intertwined on Miyake’s runway was for his SpringSummer 1995 show. The show opened with pieces that were closer to the modes of dressmaking of the time, as the models wore long gowns with a very ’90s color palette. Later during the show, however, the Japanese house sent down the catwalk plissé yellow and green dresses almost resembling paper lanterns, which could effectively be folded flat.

The 1995 show also featured a music ensemble playing live eighth century traditional Japanese music. During the finale, the models started bobbing gently so as to make their dresses bounce up and down, creating a beautiful and almost infantile display of happiness. The groundbreaking technologies Miyake and Fujiwara employed when making these dresses allowed his fashion show to become a piece of performance art, which relied on the intermingling of music, dance and sculpture-like dresses to celebrate beauty and naivety.

Another stunning demonstration of trailblazing technologies in dressmaking that allowed Miyake and Fujiwara to create works of art on the runway took place during his Fall-Winter 2011 fashion show.

This show was a celebration of minimalism in every aspect, including the way the lights led onto an empty, blank runway. The musical accompaniment was also one of the simplest ever, since it was solely made up of nursery songs on piano. While the music played in the background, the designers’ assistants walked onto the runway and started folding long sheets of white paper, which were eventually transformed into origami pieces of clothing. The assistants proceeded to clad the models in these five works of art that were used as a dress, a skirt, a collar, a tailcoat and a peplum jacket. Immediately after, five more models graced the catwalk wearing pieces that were inspired by the previous origami garments but were made out of actual textiles.

Issey Miyake as a fashion house has therefore always been at the forefront of innovation in the industry, using pioneering technologies to produce and send effective works of art down the runway. It is also important to observe that Fujiwara continued Miyake’s legacy when designing for the brand, as they shared the same design philosophy.

Antonio Bertolino is a sophomore who has not yet declared a major. Antonio can be reached at antonio.bertolino@ tufts.edu.

by Julie Doten Staff Writer

“The Handmaid’s Tale” (2017-present), Hulu’s original series based on the 1985 Margaret Atwood novel of the same name, creates a terrifyingly resonant horror story in which women have absolutely no control over their lives or even their own bodies.

The show takes place in a dystopian future where the human race is facing extremely low conception rates and very high infant mortality rates due to environmental pollution. As a result, the totalitarian government of the future forces the few fertile women into an enslaved existence as surrogates for elite families. The role of these “handmaids” is to bear children for the “barren wives” of powerful men in order to ensure the continuation of the human race.

The Christian fundamentalist government of Gilead (formerly the United States) reigns over this repressive society, using biblical punishments – such as “an eye for an eye” – and modern military tactics in order to control the population. The series draws close parallels to issues in the United States’ current political climate, making the show scarily relevant.

Elisabeth Moss stars as the show’s protagonist, Offred, the handmaid of Commander Fred Waterford (Joseph Fiennes). Her inner monologue connects the audience to the reality of this dystopia; the audience follows Offred through her confusion and suffering while trying to survive in this new world. Her reactions echo those of the viewer, lending her perspective a deep resonance and making the show seem eerily realistic at times.

Moss excels as the lead, portraying Offred as a bright, determined woman willing to live through every second of her agony if there is any possibility of one day reuniting with the daughter who was taken from her. The complexity of her character is presented in every scene, always nuanced and never melodramatic.

Another breathtaking portrayal comes from Alexis Bledel as Ofglen, Offred’s shopping partner. Ofglen’s character is a huge departure from Bledel’s recently reprised role of funny and lighthearted Rory Gilmore in Netflix’s “Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life” (2016). Bledel is astonishing in this dark and mature role, capturing Ofglen’s bravery and profound anguish as a lesbian in a society in which homosexuality is punishable by death. Moss and Bledel have thus far carried the more heart-wrenching scenes, but the remainder of the cast has held their own.

The plot of this show is a nightmare for many women, as the handmaids are stripped of all rights and humanity. For example, the handmaids are given new names that distinguish them as property of men: Offred is meant literally as “of Fred.”

Further, the blame for the human race’s new difficulty in reproducing is placed unwaveringly on women – it is always the wives who are referred to as infertile while the fertility of the husbands is never questioned. The handmaids are slut-shamed because of their role in society and are forbidden to read or write.

At the heart of the horror of “The Handmaid’s Tale” is the verisimilitude of the entire story. The creators of the show, working from Atwood’s source material, are highly successful at drawing their viewers in and making this dystopia seem like a near-future possibility rather than a distant

HULU

‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ is narrated through the inner monologue of protagonist Offred (Elizabeth Moss). implausibility. The story is told in a way that truly emphasizes how a dystopian and seemingly imaginary world is actually very close to reality. While the majority of the plot is told from Offred’s perspective during the peak of Gilead’s reign, flashbacks take place in a world that is almost exactly identical to the present-day United States – reminding us where this dystopia originated.

The first three episodes of “The Handmaid’s Tale” are available for streaming on Hulu, with new episodes released every Wednesday. If the beginning of the series is any indication for the direction of the rest of the season, there is no question this show will be a chillingly relevant and captivating work of television.

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Monday, May 1, 2017 | Arts & Living | THE TUFTS DAILY

Arts & Living

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TELEVISION REVIEW

Netflix’s ‘Dear White People’ successfully explores race problems

ADAM ROSE / NETFLIX

Sam (Logan Browning) and Coco (Antoinette Robertson) have a conversation in Netflix’s new TV series ‘Dear White People.’

by John Fedak

Assistant Arts Editor

Netflix has been producing its own shows for years now, and it has seen much success in making its own content. While most of these shows are unique, not many are focused around creating dialogue and giving voices to marginalized groups of people. Enter “Dear White People” (2017– present), one of Netflix’s latest television series based on the 2014 movie of the same name. Unlike some of the company’s other shows, “Dear White People” proves to be a success for its hard-hitting, fearless message that racism is alive and well, and its acting and story prove more than enough to drown out the few clichés the show struggles with.

The series is set at a fictional ninth Ivy League college, named Winchester University, and it follows a number of black students as they struggle to make their voices heard amidst the belief that racism, especially at universities, is a thing of the past. The show revolves around a few core characters, including Samantha ‘Sam’ White (Logan Browning), who hosts a college radio show aptly named “Dear White People.” After a club at Winchester holds a blackface party protesting Sam’s show, she finds herself at the forefront of the protest movement. Sam has secrets — including her white hookup, Gabe Mitchell (John Patrick Amedori) — that may end up hurting her and her cause. The show also focuses on her best friend Joelle Brooks (Ashley Blaine Featherson), her ex-friend Colandrea ‘Coco’

Connors (Antoinette Robertson), aspiring student body president Troy Fairbanks (Brandon P. Bell) and timid journalist Lionel Higgins (DeRon Horton) as they clash over how to deal with the party and address the racism clearly present at Winchester.

While many have protested the show’s message, “Dear White People” is not afraid to talk about the race problems American society still faces today, even on a liberal college campus. Race is typically a taboo subject; people are often mocked and belittled for attempting to point out racially-bound societal issues and are accused of making race an issue when it “doesn’t have to be.” The brilliance of this show is its unabashed insight into the complicated world of race, whether that means championing the efforts of Winchester’s black student groups or exploring the complications and struggles its characters face while trying to navigate their own identities.

Sam’s relationship with Gabe provides the perfect insight into these struggles. After it is revealed at a meeting of black student groups that she has been dating a white person, Sam has to reconcile her personal feelings, her friends’ opinions and her activism on campus — the show clearly screams that nothing about race is easy. Yet while this may seem obvious, it is a message often forgotten in today’s world and one which many people still need to hear.

Unfortunately, the first few episodes don’t feel quite as good as the last; there are too many clichés at first to provide a truly enjoyable experience, and it is only after a few episodes that it feels like the cast finally begins to reveal their talent and open up to the audience — strange for a show that isn’t live and shouldn’t need time to be great.

Luckily, the cast proves strong enough to overcome this, and even if it is disappoint-

ing at first, the show’s progression is more enjoyable because of it.

Another highlight comes from the show’s plot line, which often feels all too similar to the real world. The problems that the show’s characters face are not out of the realm of possibility by any means, and this fact makes the show truly believable, helping draw in its audience without feeling too over-the-top. Indeed, the presence of a group at Winchester dedicated to being “politically incorrect,” the satire magazine Pastiche, hints at the problems faced in the United States today, especially when led by those who proudly label themselves as such.

Again, the message is clear: Racism is alive and race cannot be ignored, even by the characters who actively rage against both of these ideas.

Despite the show’s strength, the fact that a critically-acclaimed series featuring a diverse cast only seems to be possible when the series is specifically about race is troubling, and it speaks to the wide racial gap still present in the entertainment industry today. This problem is not unique to Netflix or to any one industry but rather belongs to our society as a whole. There are voices being silenced because people do not cast people of color in most television and movie roles, but as “Dear White People” proves, these actors are no less talented than their white counterparts; they are simply disadvantaged in a society that often refuses to acknowledge that the United States cannot just sweep race under the rug.

So, dear white people: Watch this show.

Watch it to connect with a side of the United States that you might not be aware of, and please watch it without passing judgment.

There are bigger things at stake than hurt white feelings, anyway.

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THE TUFTS DAILY | Comics | Monday, May 1, 2017

Comics

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Opinion

Monday, May 1, 2017

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LETTER FROM THE EDITORS

A statement on objectivity in journalism Editor’s note: The following is a statement from the Daily’s Inclusivity and Intentionality (I&I) Committee and its Managing Board.

The intended purpose of journalistic objectivity is not to suppose that journalists, by nature of their job, are inherently neutral or balanced — it is a practice used precisely because we are not. As the American Press Institution notes, journalistic objectivity is meant “to develop a consistent method of testing information … precisely so that personal and cultural biases would not undermine the accuracy of [the] work.”

Practices are tied to people, however, and we are not absent of our own biases. On this campus, we are student journalists with certain perspectives and social identities. In many respects, journalism does not do enough to challenge how those biases translate into the work of the people who make up its staff: the writers, photographers, editors and artists.

Though we avoid editorializing (introducing opinion into the reporting of facts), we believe that there is no such thing as a purely objective newspaper. However, there can be such a thing as an accurate, ethical and inclusive one.

As we see an increase in ‘fake news’ and ‘alternative facts,’ reliable information that encompasses the needs and voices of all people — especially

voices that are underserved by systems of power — is more crucial than ever to the survival and construction of a truly equal democratic society. These voices include those of communities of color, the LGBTQ community, adjunct faculty, unionized employees, first-generation college students, undocumented students, students on financial aid and those who are disabled.

A few months ago, the Daily spoke to University of Texas at San Antonio Professor Sonya Aleman, the author of a comprehensive article titled “Locating Whiteness in Journalism Pedagogy.” She explained how “whiteness — an ideological system that prizes white skin and confers privilege — manifests in the academic socialization of journalism students, impinging their ability to reflect the racial disenfranchisement of communities of color.”

‘Whiteness’ is not only about a lack of racial diversity. Aleman and other journalists point to how the way we are taught the practice of journalism often reinforces a system of guidelines and values that prioritize privileged voices and how ‘neutrality’ is an ideological perspective in and of itself, one that stems from whiteness.

“Objectivity is historically rooted in white male perspective — that’s the norm,” she said. “So it reveals how difficult it is to report in ways that feel more authentic and accurate and responsive to

communities and people of color.”

The Daily, like many other spaces on this campus, is primarily white, heterosexual, cisgender and non-disabled.

This lack of diverse representation matters because newspapers cannot accurately cover communities they do not engage with or represent.

The solution cannot rest on the physical diversification of our newsroom alone. It will also require our writers to become better allies, in learning about our readers’ needs and creating critical spaces for campus dialogue.

We want to join news organizations across the United States in exploring how our practices can be revised and re-taught to improve our coverage of all issues along more inclusive lines.

Here’s what we’re going to do: Instead of putting emphasis on a commitment to abstract notions of pure objectivity in training new reporters and writers, we want to challenge ourselves to explore the complex relationship responsible journalists must have with their own power and understanding our position in society.

We begin this process by clearly stating our fundamental objectives.

1) Paint a comprehensive and accurate portrait of the university community and document how it changes over time. Our coverage should reflect our community and describe it fairly, which means we need to speak

with sources from a wide variety of backgrounds and attempt to cover the issues that affect people without turning their lived experiences into political flashpoints.

2) Inform readers of timely news and events. We aim to enable our readers to make better informed decisions within the Tufts community, whether those decisions pertain to campus politics or daily life. We also want to proactively cover the issues that catalyze big news events like protests or strikes.

3) Speak truth to power. Our non-editorial coverage will not carry political agendas, but we recognize that journalism’s public role is valuable in amplifying the voices of underserved people. People, groups and organizations with power, capital and time — for example, the university administration — can do this with or without help from the media.

The Daily’s I&I Committee has been working to make the newsroom a place that is self-critical, supports minority voices, fosters exploratory conversation on our roles as journalists and forms new ideas of journalistic training. These meetings are open to anyone who is curious and we invite all of the Tufts community to engage with us.

Thanks for reading.

Read the rest of our statement online at tuftsdaily.com.

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THE TUFTS DAILY | Opinion | Monday, May 1, 2017

tuftsdaily.com

OP-ED

Erased voices in the backlash of the divestment resolution

by Saba Kohli Dave After the resolution that called for Tufts to divest from Northrop Grumman, Elbit Systems, Hewlett-Packard and G4S passed in the Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate body last Sunday, the campus has an undertone of tension stemming from the split(s) in how different groups view the conflict in Israel-Palestine. The dominant narrative, during and after the resolution hearing, centered around Jewish groups or individual students’ opinions on Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS), the Israeli state, the marginalization of Palestinians and whether or not the resolution should have been held the weekend before Passover.

Dean of the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life Alan Solomont, the Board of Trustees and other administrative staff have condemned the timing of the resolution and the way it did not engage in ‘true’ dialogue and active citizenship. However, if the Tufts administration had looked around the room at the support that the resolution received from non-dominant identities – Asian, black, brown, trans, queer bodies and international students – they would perhaps realize that much of the campus was very much engaged. While righteously bantering over what constitutes “dialogue” and “real active citizenship,” Tufts has once again ignored the connection that many marginalized groups have with instances of injustice. They have literally written out the symbolic stake that these voices have in this issue. We all know that generating a “productive atmosphere for discussion,” as Dean Solomont wrote in his op-ed, only holds true if this atmosphere is well within the confines of Tufts’ sanitized version of activism.

Many op-eds and statements by the administration and students talk about how this resolution was extremely near to Jewish students on campus, which I fully agree with. However, no one – not the administration nor the authors of the op-eds – talked about this issue in an intersectional light. Why was this particular resolution one that so many oppressed identities rallied behind, and why are their emotional labor,

opinions and input toward this issue not included when the concept of “dialogue” comes up? Divesting from these four corporations that directly fund prison, surveillance, weapon and ID technology, profit off of global war, incarceration, military occupation and police violence, is an issue we can relate to all too well.

Though I can’t speak for all queer students, students of color and international students on this issue, I am committed to highlighting some of the voices whom I did speak to, who feel silenced by the rhetoric from both the anti-resolution voices on campus and from the administration.

If we are going to get frowned upon for supporting divestment from four corporations that are actively violating human rights not only in Palestine but around the world, if we are going to be demonized and dismissed as “Social Justice Warriors” by questioning a nation-state whose policies oppress its minorities and if our views are going to be erased from the discussion altogether, then what right does Tufts have to use our bodies as “diversity” and our activism as “civic engagement” in their pamphlets, website, library walls and admissions blurbs?

Audre Lorde said that, “There is no such thing as a single issue struggle, because we do not live single issue lives.” When I asked students from non-dominant identities on this campus why they were in support of the resolution, there was a personal as well as a political dimension to their responses. Starting with myself, a Hindu from India whose rightwing Hindu-nationalist government is using almost identical tactics that the Israeli Defense Force uses against Palestinians to suppress Kashmiris in India-occupied Kashmir, I see myself profoundly implicated in both these violences. Northrop Grumman has a significant presence in India, and my government buys arms from Israel.

Josephine, a senior who identifies as an Asian-American woman from Guahan (Guam), talked about how she grew up in a place which was stolen from the indigenous Chamorus (Chamorros) and is visibly occupied by the U.S. military. She says, “Because I am both com-

plicit in the taking of indigenous land and have experienced the violence of occupation, I wholeheartedly support the passing of the resolution.”

One student from Bosnia sees parallels between U.S. interventionism (often referred to as neocolonialism) promoting religious and ethnic hate in his country and how the United States rhetoric reinforces asymmetrical conflict in Israel-Palestine by funding the Israeli government. The student also talked about how it is unacceptable for administrations to choose which human rights violations to ignore and which to ‘deem worthy’ of support.

Senior David Ferrandiz Vallejo and junior MJ Griego refer to how the resolution is a start in holding Israel, the U.S and other regimes around the world accountable for the violence that they enact, aid and support in many areas of the world.

Senior Jonathan Moore expressed that this issue is both personal and political in his statement: “I supported the resolution not because I am allegiant to the survival of this university but because I am allegiant to the survival of Palestinians, the survival of Africans in Israeli territory and all peoples dying under the many-tentacled violence of [a] capitalist empire.”

Though the Tufts administration has been criticizing multiple student perspectives supporting the resolution, TCU Senate for passing the resolution as well as Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace for authoring the resolution, it has not shown any effort to understand some of our voices and what our perception of the campus atmosphere after the passing of the resolution has been. The intersectional nature of the support for this resolution clearly demonstrates that we are working across lines of difference. Without meaning to be “too political,” Tufts has chosen a side in this debate and has demonized student activists while doing it.

Senior Anissa Waterhouse pointed out that, “Every single day on this campus, people of color and other marginalized voices and bodies, must face a barrage of violence and trauma.

The thing I find to be most concerning in the days following the divestment resolution is the amount of violence

inflicted upon my friends who have shown support for the resolution. I have consoled friends through hateful emails, Facebook messages, profanities in comment sections of op-eds and outright threats. On this campus, groups that center marginalized voices and/or have a mission to combat domestic and global oppression are often labeled as extremist, disruptive and combative, while other groups rarely face serious repercussions.”

If the administration is troubled by the ‘cavalier attitude toward free speech,’ as Dean Solomont wrote, that those who support the resolution have allegedly been promoting, I ask the administration and trustees to look at themselves and the way they silence, dismiss and shut down arguments that they don’t like. I call out the contradictory nature of this university, which promotes itself as being a campus where minorities (“diverse students”) can exist and thrive but instead undermines the civic engagement that many students of color, low-income students and queer students are invested in. When these voices are actively telling the campus that they feel violated by the racist, classist, homophobic and transphobic atmosphere of Greek life, the university does not support us. When Tufts Labor Coalition works at all hours to highlight the dehumanizing treatment of janitors, construction and dining hall workers, many of whom are people of color and/or immigrants, Tufts looks the other way. When black students and those who supported them were protesting the extremely low enrollment of black students, they received so much resistance before the administration finally heard them out. Now, the campus and administration take their lack of dialogue further by actively condemning students who stood up in support of the resolution. The backlash from this resolution being passed is just another example of a complete disregard for the legitimate concerns of marginalized peoples on this campus and the administration’s complacency in funding human rights violations worldwide.

This op-ed incorporated input from Anissa Waterhouse, Anjali Nair, Cristina Vasquez-Muñiz, Jonathan Jacob Moore, MJ Griego, Made Bacchus, Marko Vukovic, Josephine Ong, David Ferrandiz Vallejo, Mile Kristev and others.

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Monday, May 1, 2017 | Sports | THE TUFTS DAILY

Sports

Jumbos claim six first-place finishes at NESCAC Championships MEN'S TRACK AND FIELD

continued from back DiMaiti was followed by senior tri-captain sprinter Nick Usoff who placed second, first-year long-sprinter/hurdler Billy Witrock who finished fifth and sophomore thrower/hurdler Henry Hintermeister who placed seventh. Together, the four Jumbos earned the team 24 combined points in the event. Junior jumper Stefan Duvivier repeated his success from last year’s NESCAC Championships and won the high jump, posting a mark of 1.98 meters.

The Tufts relay teams also contributed vital points to the team’s overall score. The 4×100 team, consisting of junior sprinter Patrick Milne, Kardonsky, Miller and Jones posted a time of 42.15 to come second in the event. The 4×400 team, comprised of DiMaiti, Witrock, sophomore mid-distance runner Thomas Doyle and firstyear long sprinter Jordan Abate, as well

as the 4×800 team, made up of sophomore mid-distance runners Colin Raposo, Hiroti Watanabe and Christian Swenson and first-year mid-distance runner Jackson Mihm, both placed third with times of 3:21.90 and 7:51.01, respectively. The relay teams garnered 20 points for the Jumbos.

In total, Tufts earned 164 team points to finish second, just behind Williams’ team total of 175. Williams successfully defended their NESCAC title.

Even though the Jumbos had great success at the NESCAC Championships, Usoff thinks the team hasn’t even shown their full potential yet.

“We were missing a few guys this weekend that are looking to contribute a lot next weekend,” Usoff said.

“So I think if anything, [this meet] was an underrepresentation of what we’re capable of.”

Nichols thinks the team’s form from the NESCAC Championships will carry on throughout the postseason.

Max Goder-Reiser Out of Left Field

“Our strongest performers are still looking to improve and snag some nationals spots,” Nichols said.

“It definitely stings not to have won yesterday, and a lot of people ended their season yesterday, but the people who remain are really looking forward to the remaining championship meets for sure and are in shape to maintain and improve upon their current marks.”

DiMaiti shared a similar sentiment about the postseason.

“I think we have been focused on the long term and really planning on performing during championship season,” DiMaiti said. “We have a lot of energy and we are all excited by how deep our team is. After a solid performance yesterday, I know we are looking forward to the Div. III New England Championships next weekend.”

Tufts will compete at the New England Div. III Championships, hosted by Williams, on May 5 and 6.

Jumbos clinch first in NESCAC East Division BASEBALL

continued from back a single from junior outfielder Stephan White, plating Knight. During the next at bat, Day hit a home run to right field for three RBIs. Finally, junior infielder Boomer Saraga grounded out to second base, plating Shackelford to end the inning.

First-year Brad Marchetti pitched two scoreless innings and earned his first win on the season. Classmate Elias Varinos pitched the seventh and eighth innings, both of which were 1-2-3 innings.

After a week of wins, the Jumbos are ranked No. 10 nationally and have the best record in the NESCAC conference across both divisions. Tufts also boasts the highest number of runs scored in the NESCAC in conference games, with 92.

“We want to make sure we are working on things as hitters because the playoffs are about who is playing their best baseball at the end of the year,” Brown said. “We have four games to get to playing our best baseball, get our bullpen going and get our hitting consistent, and I think we are getting close to that.”

Now 25-5-1 and 9-3 in the conference, the team will face Eastern Connecticut State on May 1 and Plymouth State on May 2. On May 7, they will host Middlebury in their last conference match-up of the season before the NESCAC Championships.

11

BEN KIM / THE TUFTS DAILY

Senior pitcher Speros Varinos throws a fastball in the opening of a game against Bates on April 29.

I

Bottom of the ninth

n Ted Williams’ final at-bat, he homered to center field in the eighth inning, capping the end of his 19-year career in Boston the only way he knew how. Williams, as he had done in every home run before this, refused to tip his cap to the fans and simply took his spot in the dugout. Nothing too flashy for the Kid. In Derek Jeter’s last at-bat at Yankee Stadium, as we all remember, he hit a walk-off single on the first pitch in a moment that can only be described as a fairy tale. Even as a Sox fan, I vividly remember sitting at a desk in Ginn Library, surrounded by studious Fletcher students, my mouth agape at the fact that he had just done that. A fitting end to the career of a guy who hit a home run for his 3,000th hit.

In Eddie Murray’s final at-bat, he grounded into a 5-4-3 double play in the bottom of the ninth after pinch hitting for Antonio Osuno.

Maybe Murray’s last at-bat is a more fitting comparison to the conclusion of my sportswriting career at the Daily. As this is my last column, I wanted to go ahead and make some big, bold predictions.

Mike Trout, noted meteorology geek, will continue to be the best player in baseball, accumulating five 10+ WAR seasons. This will cement him as a Hall-of-Famer, before he will suddenly retire to join his local weather team back in New Jersey, leaving the world of baseball stunned.

Chris Sale will finish this season with 350+ strikeouts, reaching a mark no pitcher has since Randy Johnson’s 2001 Cy Young winning season. Sale will also lead the league in cut-up jerseys after finishing the season 3-22 because the Red Sox can’t seem to score any damn runs for him. I’m not bitter, I promise.

Eric ‘God’ Thames will never fail a drug test for the rest of his MLB career. He’ll finish with 600+ home runs and lead the Milwaukee Brewers to their first of what will be three consecutive World Series championships from 2020 to 2022. Thames will then return to Korea at the age of 45 and win a few more MVP awards.

The “Baby Bombers,” Gary Sanchez, Aaron Judge and the rest of the young Yankees crew, will take turns for the next 15 years winning MVPs, Rookie of the Year awards and driving me crazy as they mash dingers over the Monster.

Finally, maybe the boldest (and most serious?) prediction yet, by 2030, baseball will reclaim its status as America’s most beloved sport after a 71-year old Roger Goodell will finally admit there is nothing the NFL can do to stop the head trauma inherently linked to football.

So that’s it. Thank you to everyone who has read “Out of Left Field” during the past year. Hopefully I was able to impart some baseball knowledge and at least one of you likes the game a little bit more. It’s a beautiful sport that allows us to experience childlike moments of ecstasy, and hopefully more people now realize that.

Max Goder-Reiser is a senior majoring in biology. He can be reached at max.goder_ reiser@tufts.edu.

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Sports

Monday, May 1, 2017

MEN'S TRACK AND FIELD

Jumbos take second at NESCACs, look ahead to New England Championships

by Liam Finnegan

Assistant Sports Editor

On Saturday, Tufts competed in the NESCAC Championships at Bowdoin in Brunswick, Maine. The team claimed six NESCAC titles as well as a number of other high-ranking times to finish second at the meet.

Senior tri-captain distance runner Luke O’Connor placed first in the 3,000-meter steeplechase with a time of 8:58.46. This earned him his third straight NESCAC title and was also the best time of his career, improving upon his season-best time of 9:03.24, as he finished six seconds ahead of second-place Ben Torda of Bowdoin. Later in the day, O’Connor went on to finish fourth in the 5,000-meter run with a time of 15:05.99 to wrap up a successful performance.

Senior distance runner Tim Nichols won the 10,000-meter run with a time of 30:47.31, earning the first NESCAC title of his career. Nichols also finished second in the 5,000-meter run with a time of 14:54.20, narrowly beating the third place runner by half a second.

“I basically wanted to chill out for at least the first half of the race and then grind really hard for two miles to put some distance on the field and then slow the last mile down to a controlled pace,” Nichols said. “Knowing I had the 5k later in the day, I wanted to do as little work as I had to in order to win.”

Nichols was excited about the addition of his first NESCAC title to his vast collection of track and field awards.

“It definitely feels like it’s taken a little too long, but the NESCAC had

really strong distance runners during my time so it makes sense,” Nichols said. “I’m glad to have finally achieved it though.”

Sophomore hurdler/jumper Josh Etkind ran a 14.53 in the 110-meter hurdles to take first place and claim his first NESCAC title. Meanwhile, classmate mid-distance runner Anthony Kardonsky placed first in the 100-meter dash, running a 10.85 to earn another NESCAC title for Tufts. The race was dominated by the Jumbos, with firstyear short sprinter Robert Jones placing third, sophomore sprinter Tommy Miller placing sixth and sophomore sprinter Brandon Levenstein placing seventh. The runners earned a total of 21 points for the Jumbos in the 100meter event alone.

The Jumbos were dominant in the 400-meter hurdles as well. Junior hurdler Andrew DiMaiti came first in the event with a time of 54.15 to earn the first NESCAC title of his career.

“I have been working hard to improve my form and my steps in between the hurdles so I could run a smoother, faster race,” DiMaiti said. “[On Saturday], my plan was just to execute as I have been doing recently in practice and make sure to attack each hurdle without slowing down or stuttering. I was very excited and proud to finally win a NESCAC title. It has been a goal of mine to win one since I arrived at Tufts.

I was disappointed that we just missed winning the team championship, but we definitely gave it our all and had a hard-fought meet.” see MEN'S TRACK AND FIELD, page 11

BEN KIM / THE TUFTS DAILY

Junior Shant Mahrokhian competes in the long jump at a meet on April 15.

BASEBALL

Tufts sweeps Bates, goes 4-0 in dominant weekend

by Savannah Mastrangelo Assistant Sports Editor

After junior first baseman Nick Falkson hit a walk-off, two-run homer in the bottom of the ninth in the final game, Tufts completed its sweep of Bates in a three-game series and clinched the NESCAC East Division pennant for the fourth consecutive season. The team faced Bates once on Friday followed by a double-header on Saturday and won 4-3, 9-1 and 6-4, respectively. The Jumbos also defeated Eastern Nazarene on Thursday by their second-largest margin of the season, 23-2.

Bates got on the scoreboard early in the final contest, scoring three runs in the top of the first, but in the bottom of the frame Tufts responded with a run after Falkson stole second and senior outfielder Oscar Kutch scored on a wild pitch. The Jumbos tied it up in the bottom of the second with a single from senior second baseman Tom Petry, scoring in first-year catcher Ryan Day, and a sacrifice fly to left field from Kutch plating junior shortstop Christian Zazzali.

The game remained at a draw until the sixth inning, when senior tri-captain outfielder Harry Brown scored an

unearned run on a passed ball. The run handed Tufts a 4-3 lead. At the top of the ninth, junior pitcher Ian Kinney replaced first-year pitcher Elias Varinos, and Bates’ senior infielder Brendan Fox singled to center field, plating the tying run and evening the score 4-4. Kutch grounded to shortstop to start off the bottom frame, and at the next at-bat, junior third baseman Tommy O’Hara was hit by a pitch.

With O’Hara on base, Falkson stepped to the plate and crushed a home run down the left field line for two runs, winning the game and the series with a walk-off home run.

“Our only thought was winning every inning because we only had to win one [game in the series] to be in [the playoffs], so we had a lot of confidence going,” Brown said. “When we were losing the first game, we were just thinking that if we win these last three innings, we will win the game and this mentality worked for us.”

In the first seven-inning game of the day, Bates put up one run in the first to start the game, but junior left fielder Mike McLaughlin retaliated with a home run to right field in the second frame to tie the game 1-1. Sophomore infielder Will Shackelford followed the homer with a single to center field,

plating sophomore infielder Casey Santos-Ocampo.

The game opened up for the Jumbos in the third inning after McLaughlin singled to left field, plating O’Hara, and junior outfielder Malcolm Nachmanoff reached on a fielder’s choice scoring in Falkson for two RBIs. At the next at-bat, Santos-Ocampo hit a double down the right-field line, plating McLaughlin for an unearned run. Finally, Petry singled to right field for two additional RBIs, completing the five-run inning.

The Jumbos tacked on two more runs in the fifth and sixth innings, and clinched the 9-1 victory. Senior tri-captain pitcher Tim Superko started the game and was relieved by firstyear pitcher Brad Marchetti in the fifth inning.

In the first and lowest-scoring game of the series, Tufts entered the bottom of the eighth trailing Bates 3-2. O’Hara grounded out to first base for the first out of the inning. After Falkson walked, Santos-Ocampo reached on a fielder’s choice, plating Falkson. After Zazzali hit a fly ball to shortstop for the second out, Day stepped to the plate and singled down the right side, plating McLaughlin for the winning run.

“I don’t think everyone is ever too

stressed in close games. You just go out and do your best, and when we are clicking, everything goes well,” O’Hara said. “It is fun to play against good baseball teams in tough competitions like [Bates].”

Kinney then closed out the game in a 1-2-3 inning, clinching his fifth save of the season. Tri-captain pitcher Speros Varinos started the game and clinched his eighth win allowing just six hits and three runs and earned seven strikeouts and no walks.

Against Eastern Nazarene, Tufts posted six runs in both the second and fourth frames, and five runs in the seventh, defeating Nazarene 23-2. Zazzali, O’Hara, McLaughlin, Santos-Ocampo and sophomore catcher Eric Schnepf all had doubles on the game. O’Hara had his fourth home run on the season.

“It just all clicked for us … we wanted to win every inning, so that was our mentality,” Brown said. “We had a high run margin and a big weekend coming up and so we didn’t take our foot off of the gas.”

The first-years had a great showing in the seventh inning, as first-year infielder JP Knight started off the inning with a single to left field. This was followed by see BASEBALL, page 11