TuftsDaily2012-10-10

THE TUFTS DAILY

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External study suggests program changes

by James

Pouliot

Daily Editorial Board

Tufts faculty are debating the direction of the university’s 23 interdisciplinary studies programs following an external review that began last March and suggested major changes in the university’s curriculum.

The external report praised Tufts’ responsiveness to national trends with the Communications and Media Studies, International Relations and Community Health Programs. It encouraged expanding these programs with regular tenure faculty or joint-appointments between schools like Arts and Sciences and the School of Medicine.

However, the report suggested the discontinuation of several interdisciplinary programs, including leadership studies, urban studies, Judaic studies, Asian studies and multimedia arts. The Interdisciplinary Studies major was also put forward for cancellation.

Under the report’s recommendations, the university’s programs that are not cut should undergo an organizational change. These programs should be grouped into

TUFTSDAILY.COM

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

VOLUME LXIV, NUMBER 22

clusters like “Transnational Studies” or moved into existing departments, as with the current interdisciplinary science programs, according to the report.

“The university has not taken steps to ensure that these programs can sustain academic strength and develop their potential,” the committee wrote in the report. “Some programs appear to exist almost in name only.”

The review, conducted by Professors Eric Patashnik of the University of Virginia, Mary Louise Pratt of New York University and J. Timmons Roberts of Brown University, sought to provide an outside perspective on what Tufts can do to better support its interdisciplinary studies programs, according to Dean of Academic Affairs in the School of Arts and Sciences Nancy Bauer.

“What the external people do is to come in and make the case for resources for that unit to the administration,” Bauer said. “It’s not a disciplinary or critical thing at all. It’s, ‘Here’s what we see, what’s going on at our universities, what’s happening in this field and some

Tufts Marathon Team gears up for race in spring

by Jennifer

White

Daily Editorial Board

Though the annual spring Boston Marathon is over six months away, members of the Tufts Marathon Team ( TMT ) are already well into their 30-week training regime. The team, now in its tenth year, will for the second year in a row consist of 100 runners, half the size of the 2010 team.

Formerly known at the President’s Marathon Challenge, TMT has since 2003 supported members of the greater Tufts community as they trained and participated in the 26.2-mile race.

Through a partnership with John Hancock Financial Services, TMT runners are able to bypass the marathon’s time qualification requirements by receiving a charity number in exchange for fundraising for the Friedman School of Nutrition and Science Policy.

The original ten-year contract brokered between the university and its sponsor was extended last spring for two additional years, pro-

Virginia Bledsoe / The Tufts Daily

see MARATHON, page 2

For the second year in a row, the Tufts Marathon Team will only consist of 100 runners for the Boston Marathon in the spring.

see REVIEW, page 2

Ph.D students awarded $10,000 for sustainable energy research

By Wenyi He

Contributing Writer

Joanie Tobin / The Tufts Daily

Two Tufts engineering Ph.D students took home the $10,000 grand prize in this year’s Dow Sustainability Innovation Student Challenge Awards.

Where You Read It First Est. 1980

Corey Shemelya (EG ’10) and Dante DeMeo (E ’08, EG ’11), both fifth-year Tufts engineering Ph.D students, won the $10,000 grand prize in the Dow Sustainability Innovation Student Challenge Awards this year for their fiveyear research project titled “Harvesting Heat — Changing Waste Heat into Usable Electricity.”

Shemelya and DeMeo’s research focuses on thermophotovoltaic ( TPV ) devices that capture heat and turn it into electricity. TPV cells differ from traditional photovoltaic cells, or solar cells, in that they can capture and convert infrared energy or heat into electricity, allowing for more practical uses of the technology.

They conducted their research in the Tufts School of Engineering’s Renewable Energy and Applied Photonics (REAP) Laboratories.

As research into thermovoltaic energy harvesting had not been conducted at Tufts before, challenges included

Inside this issue

see RESEARCH, page 2

Housing scramble starts earlier once again by

Nina Goldman

Daily Editorial Board

The annual rush of sophomores and juniors looking to secure off-campus housing has already kicked off, more than seven months before the leases that students are signing would begin. The housing search in recent years has begun significantly earlier than in the past.

“The whole thing just moved up,” sophomore Ami Wulf said.

“It put a lot of stress on a lot of my friends.”

Wulf, who recently secured a house for next year, was warned by an upperclassman friend that many students were already looking at houses and began his search two weeks ago.

“I heard that people had already started to find leases,” he said. “This is really early compared to when it usually happens.”

Although Office of Residential Life and Learning (ResLife) Director Yolanda King said her office does not keep statistics on how many juniors and seniors live off-campus, she said more students in recent years have sought off-campus living.

“Interest in [off-campus] housing has increased a little as more

students are seeking the experience [of] living off,” King told the Daily in an email.

The increase in number of students living off-campus may be causing students to feel pressure to compete with others for the best housing. Most students are competing for the same type of housing: apartments that are both close to campus and relatively inexpensive, according to Colony Real Estate agent Ross Blouin.

Students this year felt increased pressure to secure housing before the best places were snapped up, Wulf said.

Word spread that a few people had already signed leases, and others felt the need to follow, fighting to secure the closest, cheapest houses available.

“Everybody rushed in and joined,” Wulf said. “The better areas, in general, are gone.”

The first landlord Wulf called had already leased 11 out of his 12 available spaces, Wulf said.

After this year’s stressful housing process, Wulf will take extra precaution when searching next year.

“I hate to be part of a vicious cycle,” he said. “[But] it would be see HOUSING, page 2

Today’s sections

The Responsible Endowment Collective promotes greener investment practices at Tufts.

“Homeland” opens with strong second season that builds on the success of its first.

see FEATURES, page 3

see ARTS, page 5

News Features Arts & Living Editorial | Letters

1 3 5 10

Op-Ed Comics Classifieds Sports

11 12 14 Back

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The Tufts Daily

Students research energy efficiency RESEARCH

continued from page 1

not only funding but also consolidating research capabilities, collaborating with external researchers and finding relevant resources at Tufts, according to Shemelya.

In their project abstract, Shemelya and DeMeo propose developing a longwavelength TPV energy harvester to convert radiated heat into electricity.

The device would be able to create usable energy from a variety of waste heat sources.

“The idea of this technology, thermophotovoltaics, can be used for a lot more applications than the traditional photovoltaic type energy harvester, which usually only captures visible radiation, like what you see on your roof, a solar panel,” DeMeo said.

“Our technology can do infrared radiation as well as visible and opens up a whole new range of applications.”

According to Thomas Vandervelde, assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and REAP Labs director, TPVs first appeared in the 1960s.

However, technological limitations at the time meant that TPVs were unable to reach a commercial market.

Shemelya and DeMeo’s current research has made use of advancements in technological materials that allow an expansion in the reach and utilization of TPVs. “We applied some new material technology that [was] developed through the field of infrared filter detectors, infrared cameras,” Vandervelde said. “We’ve applied that new technology now to the idea of

TPVs, to create devices that are actually functional, usable in a marketable setting.”

Vandervelde said the current research looks at the diagram of harvesting waste heat from processes such as glass and steel making. As the processes release heat into the environment, TPVs allow factories to capture some of the lost energy and recycle it into other factory processes, such as powering lights or heaters, according to Vandervelde.

Shemelya and DeMeo will focus their future research on further decreasing the temperature of source heat and generalizing the technology used.

“By harvesting the waste heat, you basically can improve the efficiency of any device, whether it’s an industry process, your iPhone, blender, dishwasher, home heater,” Vandervelde said. “We can improve the efficiency of the energy cost of running it.”

TPVs have the potential to act as a sort of buffer when switching from a non-renewable to a renewable energy source.

As they do not require completely new energy bases, TPV technology can be applied to current energy sources to increase energy efficiency, according to Shemelya.

“By ... implementing [TPV technology] in current energy sources, you are allowing [a] decrease [in] the amount of waste sources that are needed to produce the same amount of power,” Shemelya said.

“So we are in a unique position where we were trying to create a technology that can act as a buffer while we are trying to move towards completely renewable energy.”

News

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Tufts team to include 100 runners MARATHON

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vided the size of the team was reduced from 200 to 100. John Hancock has agreed to support the Tufts team only through 2015, according to TMT Coach Don Megerle.

“After that, we may disappear,” Megerle said. “[ John Hancock] didn’t want to rubberstamp this, and what we have is a real luxury.”

In the past, interested participants joined the team directly through the TMT website, but this year, marathon hopefuls will need to sign up first with John Hancock online, according to Megerle. The team membership will be finalized in December, he noted, following a qualifying run designed to demonstrate runner’s commitment rather than ability.

Last year, fundraising requirements increased from $1,000 to $1,500 for students and from $2,500 to $5,000 for alumni, parents, faculty and staff.

Megerle believes the increased financial obligation was responsible for last spring’s lower number of non-student participants.

“I think this year will be very similar,” he said. “Graduate students and seniors will make up the majority of the team.”

Megerle anticipates that the team will be composed of about 75 undergraduate and graduate students, and 25 other members of the Tufts community, including parents, alumni, faculty and staff.

Among the runners will be Somerville Mayor Joseph Curtatone, joining the TMT for the third time, Megerle said.

“He trained with us a few years ago,” he said. “He told me that if it weren’t

through running with us he never would have gotten to see and know the Tufts community so well.”

Though he will not run the race in April, University President Anthony Monaco has participated in some of the team’s Sunday training runs this fall.

“It’s been fun,” senior Jackie Cygelman, who is training with TMT, said. “He runs next to some students.

He smiles, waves, chats.”

“This summer we went out and got [Monaco] a decent pair of shoes from Marathon Sports,” Megerle added. “He shows an interest, and he’s really sincere about it.”

Megerle encourages students who do not make the official team, particularly underclassmen, to still train with TMT and run the marathon as “bandits,” or runners in the back of the pack without official numbers.

“I hope that everyone can stick with it,” he said.

Sophomore Isabella Slaby does not anticipate receiving a TMT number but plans to run the race unofficially.

“I’m very excited to be training with them,” Slaby said. “The coach is wonderful. I’ve heard great stories about how good he is. He’s a legend.”

Runners who are not officially a member of TMT can still train with the group and wear the team singlet.

Graduate student Jen Iassogna (LA ’11), who ran with TMT last year, noted the benefits of training with the team afforded to those with and without race numbers.

“I wouldn’t have known how to go about training safely, and I wouldn’t have had the training partners to help push through,” she said.

External committee praises, critiques interdisciplinary programs REVIEW

continued from page 1

suggestions about what you can do given what we’ve learned.’”

Bauer said this was the first time Tufts’ interdisciplinary studies programs have been externally reviewed in her 15 years at Tufts, and stressed the importance of regularly evaluating all academic departments.

“There was some time when the reviews were not conducted as regularly,” Bauer said. “Some departments and programs have not been reviewed for a very long time, but now we’re getting all departments and units on a regular schedule.”

Before the review committee arrived, each of the interdisciplinary programs conducted a self-study in which they evaluated their own functions and identified potential problem areas, according to Director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies (CIS) Sonia Hofkosh.

The review committee used the self-studies to focus on the programs’ immediate problems and released an eight-page report on its findings after the visit, Hofkosh said.

The university is currently discussing its response to the recommendations, according to Bauer. Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences Joanne

Berger-Sweeney in May invited all faculty members to a retreat to discuss the value of interdisciplinary studies.

Bauer noted that faculty at the retreat complained about splitting time between the needs of their departments and the needs of the interdisciplinary programs, which many saw as adding to their existing workloads.

“We have 23 programs with 23 different arrangements of staff,” Bauer said. “In some cases, there’s a staff member who has to support six different programs that are all over campus, because the programs are so tiny. We don’t have any faculty who are hired into [interdisciplinary] programs.”

Bauer said one solution to this problem would be joint appointments between departments and schools, using an agreement called a “Memorandum of Understanding” to lay down explicit rules and expectations about how each faculty member’s time would be used.

In the meantime, the CIS is meeting with the directors of its 23 programs to discuss the data gathered in the external review and the best way to move forward, according to Hofkosh.

“A lot of pieces are going to have to fit together,” Hofkosh said. “It’s a mystery where the undergraduate interdisciplinary work goes.”

With increased demand, students start housing search earlier HOUSING

continued from page 1

a good idea to take a look at it even earlier than this year.”

Rosalee Zammuto is a real estate broker with Ross Real Estate who works in Somerville and Medford and has helped Tufts students find homes to rent over the past seven years. In the past, she rarely saw students beginning their housing search earlier than January.

“They hear that you should book a year in advance,” Zammuto said. “The competition is tough. There are a lot of applicants.”

She believes that the rush to find housing has become too extreme.

“In my opinion, I would say it’s not necessary,” Zammuto said. “Typically two months prior to the move is ample time.”

Blouin agreed that there is a lot of “over eagerness” in the housing process.

He explained that searching for a home between 60 and 90 days before move-in is normally sufficient.

“Nobody usually knows what’s available till 60 days ahead,” Blouin said.

Although Zammuto and Blouin are listed on ResLife’s online Off-Campus Housing Resource Center, few students seek the assistance of real estate agents to find housing. Many instead rely on wordof-mouth and get in contact with older friends’ landlords.

“Word-of-mouth can work any time,” Blouin said. “Most of those owners deal directly with the students.”

Nick Pfosi / The Tufts Daily

Students seeking houses off-campus for next year have already begun their searches.

Features

3

tuftsdaily.com

Alexa Petersen | Jeminist: A Jumbo Feminist

Shiny objects

A Courtesy Dan Jubelirer

Students at Tufts promoting the divestment of University endowments from the fossil fuel industry meet with Boston activists and Bill McKibben in Cambridge.

Students campaign for Tufts endowment to prioritize social responsibility by

Caitlin McClure Daily Staff Writer

A new approach to combating the issue of climate change is springing up on campuses all over the country. Campaigning to divest university endowments of their investments in the fossil fuel industry, Students for a Just and Stable Future (SJSF) teamed up with a new student group, The Responsible Endowment Collective (REC) to spearhead the initiative on campus.

The ideology behind the nationwide divestment campaign stems from Bill McKibben’s article “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math,” published in the July 2012 issue of Rolling Stone, according to SJSF co-president Anna Lello-Smith. Sophomore Dan Jubelirer cited the article as a primary influence on his decision to start the Responsible Endowment Collective at Tufts this semester.

The article lays out statistics that paint a stark picture of the realities of climate change, including one that fossil fuel companies currently burn nearly 2,800 gigatons of carbon, about five times the amount of the global “carbon budget,” the limit on how much oil, coal and gas that can be allowed into the atmosphere.

McKibben rejects current strategies, calling individual efforts to combat climate change too insignificant, and says that change through political channels are as unlikely to happen.

Instead, he suggests students have a unique opportunity to get involved with climate change by focusing on divestment at their universities, LelloSmith, a junior, said.

State and nation-wide organizations with a mission to end the consumption of fossil fuels have embraced and begun to support university divestment campaigns, including 350.org — founded by McKibben — and Better Future Project in Massachusetts.

“The divestment campaign is a broad coalition. We’re bringing these organizations together to support students,” Shea Riester, who is the Massachusetts fossil fuel divestment organizer for 350.org and Better Future Project, said. “It’s about the students and empowering them to take on this issue and supporting them in whatever way we can, but they’re leading the charge.”

University divestment is not a novel idea, but rather a strategy with an established precedent. A 1980s campaign that demanded divestment from companies doing business in South Africa serves as a model for new fossil fuel divestment campaigns currently emerging, according to Riester.

According to McKibben’s article, the initiative first grew on college campuses, reaching municipal and state governments soon thereafter. Resulting in 155 campuses that divested, the movement also sparked various forms of binding economic action — taken by more than 80 cities, 25 states and 19 countries — against the companies present in the South African apartheid regime.

“The hope is that it will start with universities and then ripple out to some local governments and state governments and, eventually, national organizations,” Jubelirer said.

Student leaders of divestment campaigns at Boston-area universities including Boston University, Harvard, Boston College, Northeastern and Brandeis meet weekly to talk about how their campaigns are going and how they can support each other, Riester said.

“It was different [from] anything I’d done before because it felt like a national thing rather than just a thing on the campus,” sophomore Sabrina McMillin, a member of REC, said of her experience at her first meeting.

SJSF and REC will look to bring a two-fold argument for divestment to the table when eventually approaching the Tufts Board of Trustees. First and foremost, they argue that Tufts should choose to divest so student educations are not being subsidized by an industry that is jeopardizing their future, according to Jubelirer.

Second, the campaign relies on a body of new economic research that suggests Tufts will be better off in the long run removing its funds from a dying industry, due to the inevitable pop of the carbon bubble.

In light of these and similar studies, Jubelirer hopes to show the administration that socially-responsible investing does not hurt returns, and that it is possible to earn the same or better returns while prioritizing social good.

The specific changes the campaign will eventually propose to the Board of Trustees are still being formulated.

These ideas, though, will be flexible with the hope of triggering a twosided conversation.

“We’re definitely not proposing we make any investment decisions for the University,” Jubelirer said. “Tufts hires a lot of really smart people to manage their endowment, so we want them to figure out how to invest responsibility and ... in industries that don’t have a severe negative social and environmental impact.”

Only in its first phase, the campaign is looking to gain student support and awareness on campus before going to the administration.

“Short-term, we hope to build student power around this issue,” Jubelirer said. “There [are] so many students who care about environmental issues and social justice issues ... In this first semester, we’d love to organize, educate the campus and get a lot of support.”

The campaign is looking to gain a broad base of student support through a petition currently circulating around campus. An intercollegiate group of students came up with the petition at the end of the summer, according to Lello-Smith.

“We hope that the petition will show the Tufts administration that students don’t want their school to be complicit in global climate change,” Jubelirer said.

According to Jubelirer, education and awareness are primary concerns for the new organization and will be tackled in these early stages.

“We hosted an informal teach-in for our group so we could learn more about the issues — what is the science of climate change, is divestment actually a good idea, is divestment possible — and talking about different organizing strategies,” Jubelirer said.

In addition to building a basic knowledge base among students involved in this campaign in particular, a significant goal of these students is to encourage the student body to be interested in and aware of the issue of divestment.

“We’re going to try to bombard students with this issue by having fun, visible events to get students asking about what we’re doing,” Lello-Smith said.

Despite REC’s admirable goals to combat climate change and the use of fossil fuels, the possibility of divestment on such a large scale remains questionable.

“The bylaws for the University give the responsibility for directing our endowment to our trustees,” Executive Vice President Patricia Campbell said.

Furthermore, Tufts no longer invests directly in companies, but rather invests through fund managers.

This strategic shift complicates the issue for several reasons. According to Campbell, Tufts does not direct how the fund invests that money, and the Board signs a disclosure agreement with these companies.

“Given the way we invest, it would be virtually impossible to assure you [that] we could divest ourselves from what the petition called for in divestment of fossil fuel,” Campbell said.

While the REC and the fossil fuel see ENDOWMENT, page 4

bsentee ballots are out, people.

Early voting has started. Joe Biden’s about to hit the lectern. It’s go time.

Before you check those boxes on your ballot, I have one last plea.

Consider women. If you identify as a woman, consider yourself — the rights over your own body, your own life and your own health. There are so many issues to think about each voting cycle, but I urge you — I just about beg you — to consider women. Our worst-case scenario is an anti-abortion and anti-contraceptive administration that is overly concerned with religious doctrine and under concerned with women’s empowerment and women’s health. That’s the Romney-Ryan administration. Here are the facts.

A researcher could find it quite difficult, in all seriousness, to pin down technicalities of Romney’s thinking on women’s issues because he just simply has spent very little time on it. Mitt Romney’s top strategist said on ABC’s “This Week,” “Mitt Romney is pro-life. He’ll govern as a pro-life president, but you’re going to see the Democrats use all sorts of shiny objects to distract people’s attention from the Obama performance on the economy. This is not a social issue election.”

Little problem, Romney top strategist — I am not a shiny object. Neither are half the people in this country that you just insulted. This quote, while clearly stated inelegantly, demonstrates Romney’s stance on women without a shadow of a doubt. He just really doesn’t care that much. On another note, Romney plans to get rid of Planned Parenthood, which serves 5 million Americans per year.

They have 76 percent of services dedicated to preventing unwanted pregnancy with birth control, family planning and other sources.

They provide 770,000 pap tests per year and 750,000 breast exams, both geared towards cancer prevention. You’ve heard it a million times, but hear it again: Planned Parenthood is the sole source of healthcare for millions of Americans. We simply cannot afford to sacrifice it to ideological quibbles. That’s a small sample of what could come.

Paul Ryan’s stances on women’s rights are more horrifying than Romney’s. Here’s a sprinkling. First, Ryan co-sponsored a personhood bill in the House of Representatives which would have given legal rights to a fetus starting at the moment of conception. This bill would render a number of FDA-approved birth controls illegal for a number of scientific technicalities. In fact, my own birth control, which I’ve taken for six years, would have been outlawed with this bill. It indeed held a particularly urgent and terrifying clarity to me. The additional consequences of the bill are numerous. Second, Ryan supports banning all abortions, without exception for rape or incest. Ryan is either taking a page from Republican Todd Akin’s book, where rape does not cause pregnancy because the woman’s body “shuts it down,” or he is taking a page from Republican Rick Santorum’s book, who thinks that a woman should be forced to keep the baby of her rapist because it’s a beautiful thing that has come out of something awful. Third, in 2010, Ryan compared the Roe v. Wade case to the Dred Scott v. Sandford case, equating the injustice of ruling that slaves were not people to the injustice of ruling that unborn fetuses were not people. That is just blatantly appalling.

So for those who are planning to vote based on the economy or foreign policy or simply because you don’t vote based on social issues, I implore you to consider what will happen to women in this country if the Romney-Ryan ticket comes to office. Don’t let Romney throw us on his roof with the dog and run away with the election. We are not, and never will be, shiny objects of distraction.

Alexa Petersen is a senior majoring in political science and peace and justice studies. She can be reached at Alexa.Petersen@tufts.edu.

The Tufts Daily

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Features

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Increasing awareness of climate change a goal of divestment campaign efforts ENDOWMENT

continuedfrom page 3

divestment campaign are both new to campus this semester, the concept of students taking an interest in the endowment is not.

The Advisory Committee for Endowment Responsibility (ACER) is a small group of students who work with the Board to figure out how student-based proposals can improve the responsibility of the endowment while maintaining its financial responsibility to get the highest returns possible, according to co-president Kelsea Carlson.

In the 2011 spring semester, the group pitched to move $1 million of the endowment’s immediate cash into local banks in the Cambridge area.

“It’s our way of supporting the local community, and they’re getting similar returns, so it’s a win-win,” Carlson, a senior, said.

In the context of a surge of interest in endowment issues in the last several years, ACER hopes to promote campuswide education.

“I think one of the things we started last spring that I want to see continued is we bring in speakers doing this kind of work to educate the rest of the community,” Carlson said.

“I think when Tufts is more aware of these issues there might be more progress.”

ACER is a strong supporter of environmental issues and hopes to put together a proposal for the Board this spring

involving related concerns, but the group does not see divestment as the best way to achieve these goals.

“It’s so hard to measure the use of fossil fuels because they can be used in any stage of the production of a product,” Carlson said. “Moving forward, it might be an interesting proposal instead to provide research on fund managers that are environmentally aware and responsible, do not support the use of fossil fuels and incorporate that into their investment strategy.”

The specific proposals for divestment from SJSF and REC are still in the beginning stages, and the actions this campaign will trigger remain unknown. Alternatives to complete divestment as it is now intended certainly exist and perhaps offer a more realistic compromise between students and the administration.

“The area of corporate social responsibility is a growing and important one,” Campbell said. “I think that’s potentially a positive way for students to be advocates and scholars, in really looking at what makes that feasible and possible.”

The campaign, however, does not plan to throw in the towel easily.

“We are lucky to be part of a growing group of 50 colleges wanting their schools to divest,” Jubelirer said. “Tufts has a massive opportunity to come out strongly against climate change that can really ripple out.”

Committee on Student Life (CSL) is now accepting nominations for the…

2013 WENDELL PHILLIPS AWARD

The Wendell Phillips Memorial Scholarship is one of two prize scholarships (the other being assigned to Harvard University), which were established in 1896 by the Wendell Phillips Memorial Fund Association in honor of Boston’s great preacher and orator. The award is given annually to the junior or senior who has best demonstrated both marked ability as a speaker and a high sense of public responsibility. The recipient of the award receives a cash prize and traditionally is selected as the only student speaker at the Baccalaureate Ceremony in May. Nominees will be invited to apply and following a review of finalists, the Committee on Student Life will select this year’s recipient in March 2013. .

To nominate student(s) e-mail Office for Campus Life at ocl@tufts.edu Student(s) full name, Class Year and Tufts E-Mail (put Wendell Phillips in Subject Line)

Nomination Deadline: October 29, 2012, 5:00 pm Nominated students must be a current Senior or Junior.

Students may nominate themselves or other students.

For further information contact Joseph Golia, Director Office for Campus Life at joseph.golia@tufts.edu or x73212

Arts & Living

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tuftsdaily.com

TV Review

‘Homeland’ continues to thrill, intrigue Show features masterful performances by Lewis and Danes by

Bhushan Deshpande Daily Editorial Board

If the Emmys told you anything, it’s that if you aren’t watching “Homeland” yet, you should be.

Homeland

Starring Damian Lewis, Claire

Danes, Morena Baccarin Airs Sundays at 10 p.m. on Showtime

Premiering on Showtime last fall, the series was instantly lauded by critics.

It stars British actor Damian Lewis as Nicholas Brody, a U.S. Marine who has just been rescued from eight years of alQaeda captivity. The nation and Brody’s family, both of whom have long believed him dead, regard Brody as a war hero — except for CIA officer Carrie Mathison, played by Claire Danes. Carrie, whose superiors don’t think highly of her, believes that Brody has been turned and now works as a double agent for al-Qaeda. The show’s writers do a masterful job of making the audience wholeheartedly believe that Brody is a terrorist one minute, and then believe the exact opposite a minute later. The full truth — or what seems to be the full truth — isn’t revealed until the first season’s finale.

Film Review

‘El Velador’ paints shocking portrait of war-torn Mexico by

starbright31 via Flickr Creative Commons

The relationship between characters played by actors Damian Lewis and Claire Danes is one of ‘Homeland’s’ many highlights.

Six months have passed since that finale, and already Brody has been elected to the House of Representatives where he is floated as a leading candidate for the Vice Presidency. Carrie,

who underwent voluntary electroshock therapy in an attempt to cure her bipolar disorder, is now mentally stable but see HOMELAND, page 6

Opera Review

Paul Perrone

Contributing Writer

Mexican-American documentary filmmaker Natalia Almada’s “El Velador” — in English, “The Night Watchman” —

El Velador Directed by Natalia Almada paints a stark portrait of the Mexican Drug War’s impact on the northern state of Chihuahua.

Almada’s third feature-length film follows Martin, the night watchman for a lavish and continually expanding cemetery located outside of Ciudad Juárez, a city in Chihuahua, where murdered drug lords are laid to rest under extravagant and palatial mausoleums.

The cemetery and its workers live something of a double life. They have access to a heartbreaking, behind-the-scenes glimpse into the violence wrought by the drug war.

During the day, Martin witnesses the labor of construction workers who prepare large batches of graves for the next group of cartel capos to be murdered that week. He hears marching bands blasting traditional Mexican mariachi music at funerals while mourners bid farewell to their beloved family.

One of the movie’s most striking scenes centers on an anguished mother whose son is gunned down. As workers toil away in the shot, her grief-stricken wails — “My son!”

— fill the background. As her voice echoes through the theater, viewers know that there have been and will continue to be innumerable mourning mothers and widows screaming in vain.

Another memorable figure in the documentary is a lovely, unnamed widow. Every day, she drives to and from the cemetery in an expensive sports car — no doubt purchased with drug money.

The young, beautiful woman then devotedly tends to her slain husband’s tomb, wiping its floors, washing its winsee VELADOR, page 6

Courtesy Stu Rosner / Boston Symphony Orchestra

The duet between Walker and Mitchell was a standout moment in an otherwise dull performance.

Technical and production misfires mar ‘Porgy and Bess’ by

Panharith Chhum Contributing Writer

In honor of the 114th birthday of American composer George Gershwin, the Tanglewood Festival Chorus joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra to perform “Porgy and Bess,” the classic “American folk opera” written in African American vernacular that tells the story of the residents of “Catfish Row,” a fictitious town in Charleston, South Carolina.

The performance attempted to tread the line between musical theater and opera, a line that “Porgy and Bess” undoubtedly stands on. The execution, however, was musically static and theatrically dull. It would have been nice to see more attention to the music and less of a focus on the theatrical aspect. By the end of the second act, it appeared that the three-hour performance was already becoming too long.

Under the baton of English conductor Bramwell Tovey, Alfred Walker (Porgy) and Laquita Mitchell (Bess) began the piece with an energetic and highly syncopated theme that quickly went downhill. The piece culminated with the conductor Tovey

taking to an upright piano whose tone was far too dampened for the honky-tonk solo he played on it. The Tanglewood Festival Chorus made whimsical gestures as the scene unfolded, introducing a lighthearted tone to the performance.

As the scene opened, Clara, played

by Angel Blue, sang the hypnotizing lullaby “Summertime” to her baby. The lullaby came back in full force with the aid of the chorus but, rather than give it a fuller texture, the words and sonorities grew harsh and unintelligible. Indeed, the acoustics of Boston Symphony Hall did not lend themself well to the artificial amplification of the performers, especially when multiple performers sang at once.

The mixture of traditional African American music and opera yielded a unique mix of operatic lyricism, colloquial pronunciation, gospel, ragtime and blues. In terms of diversity in popular repertoire, there is no other piece quite like “Porgy and Bess.” The Tanglewood Festival Chorus lent itself well to the gospel-esque call-and-response themes that pervaded the piece. see OPERA, page 6

Megan Clark | Where’s the Craic?

Michael Collins

S

tarring Liam Neeson in the title role, “Michael Collins” (1996) traces historical events spanning from the 1916 Irish rebellion against the British — known as the Easter Rebellion — to the Irish Civil War fought between the “Freestaters” and the “Republicans.” The former supported the establishment of an Irish Free State and accepted Northern Ireland’s inclusion in the United Kingdom, and the latter advocated for a united Irish republic free of British rule. The film also tracks the rise of Michael Collins, the mastermind behind the first successful guerilla war waged against the British in Ireland and the man responsible for shaping the Irish Republican Army, otherwise known as the IRA. Collins also helped negotiate a peace with Britain, resulting in the creation of the Irish Free State under British dominion and the partition of Ireland between the Republic and Northern Ireland. As the unofficial founder of the IRA and a key negotiator of an unsatisfactory compromise with the British, the historical Michael Collins has a complicated legacy.

The film “Michael Collins” is similarly complex and compelling. It was produced in both Ireland and America, with the majority of the budget coming from Warner Bros. and the remainder supplied by the Irish Film Board. Consequently, the film combines narrative elements of Hollywood with an ethos of Irish nationalism.

Liam Neeson gives a tremendous performance, infusing his character with an air of transformation and consistency. He masterfully portrays Collins’ transition from a humorous but pragmatic leader to a broken man whose dreams have been crushed by the conflict over British dominion and the partitioning of Ireland. He complicates this transition by revealing hints of sadness early in the movie and retaining a somewhat jocular tone even at the film’s depressing conclusion. During an early scene, Collins laments his tactical leadership of the IRA and confronts his hatred for the British and himself.

Throughout the scene, Neeson keeps his tall frame motionless and tired but moves his head with his speech, simultaneously conveying Collins’ desperation and energy.

The supporting cast, led by Aidan Quinn, Alan Rickman and Julia Roberts, is also full of excellent performances. Rickman in particular lends both gravity and humor to the plot.

He plays Eamon de Valera, a serious and — in the film’s portrayal — conniving leader in Irish politics. While Rickman’s character continuously challenges Collins, he also provides comic relief when he is broken out of jail disguised as a woman, a scene Rickman plays with dry wit. Aidan Quinn and Julia Roberts play Collins’ best friend and love interest, respectively. They also turn in good enough performances to be nuanced, standalone characters, although Quinn’s acting far exceeds that of Roberts.

The blending of humor and drama, in addition to displaying an awareness of national history, give this film a quintessentially Irish feel. The movie also uses traditional Hollywood elements to strengthen the audience’s connection to the characters. For example, the exploration of the friendship between Michael Collins and Harry Boland (Aidan Quinn) makes this movie enjoyable for those who appreciate character studies but do not necessarily have an interest in Irish history. However, the Hollywoodization of this movie has also made it historically misleading. It inflates Collins’ role in the Anglo-Irish conflict to the point where it eclipses other important figures. It also simplifies the conflict between the Republicans and Freestaters by leading audiences to view the Irish Civil War as a fight over Northern Ireland when other factors actually held more importance.

Next week, I will review “The Wind That Shakes the Barley” (2006) which presents a more nuanced — but biased — exploration of the Irish Civil War.

Megan Clark is a junior majoring in history. She can be reached at Megan.Clark@ tufts.edu.

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Arts & Living

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

‘Velador’ provides window into harsh realities in Mexico VELADOR

continued from page 5

dows, replacing candles and laying flowers in front of his image. Meanwhile, her two children happily play tag among the mausoleums. For these children, sudden death is a fundamental aspect of life.

“El Velador” is a visually striking documentary. The amount

of time the families of slain drug lords invest in creating and maintaining their loved ones’ final resting places is incredible. Crafted beautifully and intricately, and covered with steeples, crosses and gold embellishments, the mausoleums in the cemetery form rows that coalesce into a city of the dead.

Courtesy Altamura Films

Natalia Almada uses “El Velador” to display the endless cycle of violence and death in Mexico.

These ornate edifices are enveloped in a silence that starkly contrasts the clamor from the nearby city. Every so often, the peace and quiet of the cemetery is interrupted by the ringing of bullets from Ciudad Juárez, posing the idea that even in death, these men are barely safe and at peace.

Almada provides no traditional narration or commentary throughout the film. Instead, most dialogue consists of clips from the Mexican news detailing the growing death toll in the war between the notorious cartels and the Mexican Army. Every once in a while, Martin engages in conversation with other cemetery workers, but their conversations focus entirely on death without seeming to play to any scripted narrative. The message viewers will take away from “El Velador,” and seemingly the message Almada intends to project, is that the Mexican Drug War just south of the American border is a failure. Per Almada’s vision, the war is a futile, endless cycle of violence,

Courtesy Altamura Films

“El Velador’s” striking visuals contrast poignantly with its backdrop of drug and gang-related violence. fear and death. It is shocking to see how desensitized and matter-offact Martin and his compatriots are when discussing the killings caused by the war. Then again, this lifestyle is all they have ever known, and it is most likely all they will ever know — unless the Drug War miraculously ceases to exist.

Nearly unhindered by conven-

tional commentary, “El Velador” provides a window into the world of the everyday Mexican citizens who are watching a deadly battle unfold. Though it captures a unique set of circumstances in a very specific part of the world, the universality of human emotion apparent in Almada’s piece makes “El Velador” truly remarkable.

Excessive production plagues performance of ‘Porgy’ OPERA

continued from page 5

In complement with this, there were plenty of opportunities for the residents of “Catfish Row” to sing in full-on reverend style, adding to the colloquial charm of the piece.

Continuing in the show’s lighthearted fashion, there was a fair number of acrobatics throughout the performance — from character Sportin’ Life doing splits, to Maria outwardly fixing her bust, to a strawberry vendor appearing behind the audience.

One outstanding moment in an otherwise drawn-out performance was the duet between Porgy and Bess.

Mitchell’s voice is most aptly suited for arias where her soft but powerful tone is allowed to flow naturally. Both Walker and Mitchell sang with perfect volume, neither one masking the other. Even as she reached the highest registers, her melo-

dies never came out screechy; instead, she maintained a lustrous tone and balance.

The story of “Porgy and Bess” in and of itself is dark and humorous. It makes light of murder and wholly characterizes life in “Catfish Row” as ephemeral. It is not meant to be a gripping love story nor is it meant to be taken too seriously — rather, one should laugh and enjoy. Still, the haphazard attempt at a hybrid musical theater-opera did not do Gershwin justice. Unfortunately, this performance of “Porgy and Bess” was not crisp and its words were often indiscernible. The use of artificial amplification might have seemed like a fair compromise, especially when performers often were not able to directly sing towards the audience, but for an orchestra, chorus and cast of this size, the result was too muddy. The music should have taken precedence over superficial theatrical entertainment.

starbright31 via Flickr Creative Commons

‘Homeland’s actors, pictured above, push the drama to a masterful level.

‘Homeland’ justifies Emmys with phenomenal writing and performances HOMELAND

continued from page 5

has left the CIA and incorrectly believes that she was wrong about Brody. But after Israel bombs Iran’s nuclear facilities, protests spring up across the Middle East and one of Carrie’s old recruits contacts the CIA. Her bosses at the CIA come to bring her back into the game and it’s off to the races.

Watching the two act, one can easily see why Lewis and Danes earned the Emmy Awards for Lead Actor and Actress in a Drama Series, respectively.

Lewis’ character seems to move only from one impossible situation to another, but he does so believably. Not only is Brody forced to speak with and commit a crime for someone who claims to be from al-Qaeda, he also has to admit to his wife that he converted to Islam while in captivity, while dealing with trivial-by-comparison issues like a

rebellious 16-year-old daughter.

It’s almost frightening how well Damian Lewis pulls it off.

Meanwhile, just watching the not-yet-recovered Carrie Mathison go from a sheltered environment with her family to the heart of a rioting Beirut makes the viewer’s heart sink.

The show does a masterful job portraying the effects of bipolar disorder and it also makes the imminent bad outcome of Carrie’s situation painfully obvious. The viewer knows that no matter how quickly Carrie’s espionage skills return during her mission in Lebanon, it’s going to be downhill for Carrie’s sanity from here on out.

Even if all you knew about the show was that it beat out “Mad Men” and a whole host of other great shows for Outstanding Drama Series a few weeks ago, and if you just jumped into the show at the start of this season, you would be hard pressed

to understand why the show was so lauded for its creativity and plausibility last season.

Last season’s writers took great pains to build up the characters to the point where you truly understood their motivations, but they seemed to have thrown that out the window this time around. Brody, who was clearly very conflicted last season about seeking revenge on one of the people who ordered the death of someone he loved, takes almost no pushing before he is willing to help al-Qaeda plan an attack on civilians.

Still, if you aren’t watching “Homeland” yet, you should start.

The show’s first season, only 12 60-minute episodes long, is a masterpiece, and this season is on track to being one as well. The characters are brilliantly acted, the writing is tense and tight and the plot, while flawed, is better than most other dramas. All it takes is a single episode to get hooked.

Vancouver 125 via Flickr Creative Commons

Bramwell Tovey led the Boston Symphony Orchestra in “Porgy and Bess.”

The Tufts Daily

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What is R25 and How it Works!

For All Student Organizations

Come to this informational session on how to most successfully navigate the R25 Room Reservation System. If your student organization uses R25 this program is for you.

Come learn the processes, nuances, and resources of the R25 site. Many tips and tricks will be presented to help you efficiently and effectively reserve space on campus.

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Wednesday October 17 12 noon, Campus Center 203 Monday October 22 12 noon, Campus Center 218

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Wednesday, October 10, 2012

“You’re not disabled by the disabilities you have, you are able by the abilities you have.”

- Oscar Pistorius, South African Olympian

ANDY HOOPER, DAILY MAIL, ZUMA

October is…

NATIONAL DISABILITY AWARENESS MONTH Office of Equal Opportunity

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

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Out and Proud!

We are students, professors, administrators, and staff, and we are just a few of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, same gender loving, queer, intersex, and transgender individuals who are part of the diverse Tufts community. We invite you to join us in celebrating National Coming Out Day Matt Alander, Undergraduate Admissions + Tim Atherton, Assistant Professor, Department of Physics and Astronomy + Michael Baenen, Chief of Staff, Office of the President + Sheryl Barnes, University Information Technology (UIT) + Ben Baum, Undergraduate Admissions + Jocelyn Berger, Queer student, The Fletcher School, MALD 2013 + Kara Bilotta, University Information Technology + Hilary Binda, Queer Tufts teacher at The School of the Museum of Fine Arts + Tom Bourdon, LGBT Center Director + Michelle Bowdler, Senior Director, Health and Wellness + Dominique Brabham, Queer Engineer + Nicky Buxton, Undeclared Sophomore + Nathan Caldwell, gay English & Music major + Ryan Centner, Assistant Professor, Sociology Department + J Ta, Jumbo 2016, Proud BLAST Scholar + Leroy Chan, a gay, cisgender male freshman from Boston with no gay friends (yet) + Andrew Collins, Senior, History, R.E.A.L. Student + Patricia Cordeiro – Athletics + Thom Cox, Tisch Library + R. Jordan Crouser, queer Doctoral Candidate in Computer Science + Caleb Davis, Dept. of Philosophy administrator and Co-Chair, LGBT Faculty and Staff Caucus + Mary Davis, Associate Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning + Laura Doane, Undergraduate Education + Jay Dodd 2014, fratstar drag queen + Michael Downing, Creative Writing + Kendrick Terrell Evans, c/o 2014, Anthropology and Drama, Africana Center Peer Advisor 2012-2013 + Steven Fenton, Communications Coordinator, Boards of Advisors Program + Susan Fuller-DeAmato, Assistant Director, Community Relations + Lenny Goldstein, Associate Director, Tufts Hillel + Joe Golia, Office for Campus Life + Lincoln Giesel, woof + Maya Grodman, pansexual senior majoring in Drama and Peace & Justice Studies + Steph Gauchel, Women’s Center Director + Belle Haggett, Bi-Bio/Music 2013 + Ted Handler, MD/MBA + Ben Hescott, Computer Science Faculty + Drake Jones, trans JD/MPH student at TUSM + Deborah Kaplan, Digital Collections and Archives + Julia C. Keller, Communications Manager, School of Engineering + Heather Klish, University Library Technology + Carly Knitzer, queer freshman + Leah Knobler, Tufts alumna and staff member + Eleni Kontou, Physics grad student + Cleuton Carlos Lopes, gay Tufts undergrad + Rob Mack, Associate Dean of Undergraduate Education + Kris Manjapra, Faculty, History, member of the queer of color community + Rachel E. Mansfield, Queer UIT/COE Contributing Writer + Daniel McCusker, Senior Lecturer, Drama & Dance + Phillip McMullen, Career Director, Fletcher + Emily Mears, LGBT & Latino Center, Staff Assistant + John Michael, Visiting Fellow, Center for Cognitive Studies + Neil Miller, Lecturer in English + Monica Mowery, Biology and Community Health + James Mulder, English Graduate Instructor + George Murphy, Junior + Mathew Nelson, Graduate Student, English Department + Marquel Norton, CD and Clinical Queer of Color + Jacob Passy, gay senior + Edgar Pedroza, Gay Undergraduate Student + Caroline Peeples, quAsian and undeclared freshman + Jess Pfeffer, graduate student in English + C. Daniel Redmond, Ph.d. Candidate, Department of English + Matt Russell, genderqueer Graduate Student, School of Engineering + b, Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Education + Matt Ryan, sophomore + Alexia Sanchez, first-generation Mexican student + Laurence Senelick, Fletcher Professor of Drama and Oratory + Benjamin Serrano, senior, gay, black & Puerto Rican + Matt Shachat, queer in every sense of the word + Christina Sharpe, Associate Professor, English & American Studies + Gina Siesing, Director, UIT Educational & Scholarly Technology Services + James Sims, Gay & Proud Chemical Engineer + Annie Sloan, Senior + Tony Smith, Political Science + Cindy Stewart, Experimental College + Taylor Strelevitz, Member of SPEAC + Team Q + Jonathan Strong, senior lecturer in English + Nandini Talwar, Psychiatrist, Tufts University Counseling and Mental Health Service + Devyn H. Taylor, Senior Anthropology major + Nino Testa, Doctoral Candidate, English Department + Matt Thompson, gay sophomore undergrad + Valerie Ullrich, Fletcherite + David Valdes Greenwood, Lecturer in English + Danielle Renee' Vallejo, an androgyne transgender Tufts Student + Sabina Vaught, Education Department + Jen Wang, Class of 2014, Asian American Community Representative to TCU Senate + Ryan Willison, c/o 2013 + Tabias Wilson, BlaQueerSwagg + Stephen Wright, Arts and Sciences Student + Jill Zellmer, Director of the Office of Equal Opportunity, bisexual +

Tufts National Coming Out Day Celebration!

Wednesday, October 10th, 12 - 1:15 p.m., Lower Campus Center Patio Join QSA and the LGBT Center in Celebrating National Coming Out Day. Allies are especially encouraged to attend!

For more information contact the LGBT Center at x73770 or check out our website:

http://ase.tufts.edu/lgbt

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Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Uphold affirmative action

Rebecca K. Santiago Editor-in-Chief

editorial | op-ed

The Supreme Court begins deliberations today on the case of Fisher v.

Texas, and in the next few days will make a ruling that will have dramatic ramifications for affirmative action policies in U.S. public universities.

Many experts on the Supreme Court have predicted that the Court will reverse public universities’ current right, a right confirmed in the 2003 Supreme Court case Grutter v. Bollinger, to take a candidate’s race into account as one of many factors in the admissions process.

Affirmative action is currently used to ensure a higher level of diversity in student bodies. As the majority decision in the Grutter v. Bollinger case phrased it, taking race into account in admissions furthers a “compelling interest in obtaining the educational benefits that flow from a diverse student body.”

This compelling interest is in danger this week, when eight Supreme Court judges — Justice Elena Kagan has chosen to recuse herself — will hear the case of Abigail Fisher, a recent graduate of Louisiana State University. Fisher

took her case to court in 2008 when she was denied acceptance to University of Texas at Austin (UT) on the basis, according to her, that she was white and therefore not properly safeguarded under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.

Though UT fills most of its student body with students in the top 10 percent of their high school classes — these students gain automatic admission to the Texas public university of their choosing — the rest of the student body is chosen by administrators looking at a holistic “personal achievement index” in which race has been one of many factors since the 2003 Supreme Court ruling.

The end of affirmative action would have dire consequences for minorities in America as well as for the quality of education at public universities.

Marginalized racial groups face a cyclical problem in which one generation’s inability to get ahead in the education world makes going to college just as unattainable, or less attainable, for later

generations as it was for those previous.

Affirmative action policies have seen modest and important successes in the places where they have been implemented. According to its Office of Information Management and Analysis, UT’s fall 2011 enrollment consisted of 20 percent Hispanic students and approximately five percent African American students. Though these numbers appear small, the number of minority students at UT was radically smaller in the years before affirmative action was re-implemented. Adding these minority students to the class helps to reverse generations of unequal access to education, works to reduce the consequent achievement gap and promotes an exchange of ideas and perspectives that only a student body with students of diverse backgrounds can achieve.

With this in mind, we feel that the current Supreme Court should uphold the ruling of the 2003 Court and continue to allow universities the right to include race as one of many factors in the admissions process.

Denise Amisial

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Romney’s immigration switch harms campaign by

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Burke Gibson

The Denver Post published an interview with Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney last Tuesday in which the candidate altered his stance on immigration, promising that if he is elected, he will maintain a program enacted by the Obama administration that prevents the deportation of young illegal immigrants.

While Romney might not be making one of the blatant mistakes he’s become known for this election season, the move holds little political value for his campaign — it won’t impact the Latino vote to any significant extent, and it could potentially alienate his more conservative supporters.

At first glance, supporting Obama’s program seems like a great move for Romney. He comes off as open-minded and sympathetic toward a demographic that has criticized him for being out-oftouch. Changing his stance could also be a sign of compromise in an extremely uncompromising election.

Upon further inspection, however, the decision seems to be almost entirely politically motivated. In light of the fact that Romney has had to put his foot in his mouth more than once while discussing immigration policy, his new position is more a political Band-Aid than a genuine effort to improve important immigration

issues. It should also be noted that rather than adding anything to the debate on the immigration issue, Romney is simply taking one pre-existing program and promising not to cancel it. And he isn’t even referencing actual immigrants. Since the program deals only with younger illegal “immigrants” — most of whom did not choose to come here but were brought to the United States at a young age — this is far from an actual plan to tackle the problem of illegal immigration.

Though making such a politically, rather than ethically, motivated decision might seem harmless, Romney’s new stance could prove detrimental to his campaign and his complete plan for immigration, which he says will be implemented in his first term.

With relatively high Latino populations in swing states such as Colorado and Nevada, the Latino vote will be a major determining factor in the election.

According to a poll by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, however, 69 percent of Latino voters support Obama as of last month. To change the minds of such an overwhelming majority would require much more effort on Romney’s part than agreeing once with Obama — such as creating his own policy and campaigning with it openly.

Obviously, Romney isn’t approaching the Latino voting bloc as effectively as he could be. According to a CNN poll

taken last month, 44 percent of Latino voters consider the economy to be the most important issue facing the country today versus 14 percent who chose immigration. To appeal to a demographic that overwhelmingly supports Obama — who has been criticized for vague and ineffective economic policy — Romney should have focused on this rather than make a small compromise to his immigration policy.

His compromise will, however, be seriously taken into account by another demographic: staunch conservatives, who will interpret the move as weakness on Romney’s part. It also might offend those who strongly believe in rigid antiimmigration policy. This is a group of voters that Romney has locked down.

Though it is unlikely conservatives will instead support Obama, Romney should be keeping them as close as possible.

Romney’s commitment to continue Obama’s immigration program is inconsistent with his previously harsh immigration policy, which could cause problems down the road if he is elected president.

And Romney will have trouble following through on his other initiatives regarding immigration if he has to continue supporting a policy that isn’t consistent with his platform. To truly improve his numbers in the polls, Romney must focus on making concrete and effective policies rather than insignificant compromises.

Correction

The headline for a story published on Tuesday, Oct. 9 entitled “Women’s soccer nabs second victory” is inaccurate. In fact, the women’s soccer team won its third game of the season on Saturday.

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William Shira | Horrifyingly Hilarious

Rope-adebate

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Justin Mccallum / the tufts daily

Fall semester: State of the TCU by

Wyatt Cadley

Last Friday I attended a Q&A session with our new provost, David Harris. I asked the provost a question that should be quite familiar to everyone reading this op-ed: Why Tufts? These two simple words provide us with the occasional opportunity to reflect and examine the greatness of this university. And while we spend a lot of time on this campus discussing grievances, watching a slow bureaucracy and trying to address our school’s inadequacies, I want to begin this piece by highlighting what we have going for us.

In the simplest terms possible: Tufts’ greatest asset is its people. We, as an institution, are led by a world-renowned geneticist and a Board of Trustees comprised of wildly successful and philanthropic individuals. Tufts professors are quite incredible as well — at many colleges, it is the expectation that faculty are either leading scholars in their field or are able to provide personalized mentorship to undergraduates. At Tufts, it is the expectation that our faculty do both, and they do so gladly.

Finally, no conversation about the greatness of Tufts is complete without a discussion of our students.

Tufts students started “Fan the Fire,” an athletic initiative which emphasizes “Spirit, Sports and Service.” We don’t have a “dumb jock” clique at Tufts; we have scholar-athletes with a tradition of serving their community. For 40 years, students on this campus have protested and called for a curriculum which speaks to the diverse experiences of our entire campus population. We do not have a community of angry and bitter activists; we have a community of students who steadfastly stand up for their principles and social justice. Tufts is a place where students stand in the rain to welcome their neighbors on Community Day; where students actively seek to create safe spaces in Greek Houses, classrooms and dorms and where students somehow find a way to top it all off with rigorous and intellectually stimulating classes.

Given these accomplishments, it is no wonder that Provost Harris responded to my question by describing Tufts as a “university poised.” There is no denying that Tufts is capable of greatness, but we have far from peaked. There are still students on this campus who are disappointed with the Tufts experience, our endowment is far from impressive and the list of student grievances is vast. I have thought quite extensively over the past three years about why we are just a “university poised” and not a “university achieved,” and the closest thing I have to an answer is this: The quality of our bureaucracy fails to match the quality of our people.

When an eight-semester residency requirement forces a student to pay for another semester even though he or she has completed all required course credits, the bureaucracy is failing students.

When club sport athletes have to dig deep into their pockets and pay excessively high fees, the bureaucracy is failing students. When students do not have convenient and timely access to grades, syllabi and feedback, the bureaucracy is failing students.

The test for our student government is clear: Can the TCU Senate make the bureaucracy work better? While the year has just begun, many senators have been hard at work effecting change all summer long.

Our treasury has already implemented a number of new changes in response to real student concerns. This year, TCUrecognized student groups will have the opportunity to seek mid-year funding jointly with other student groups, thus empowering a culture of collaboration instead of co-sponsorship. Furthermore, we have tweaked some of our treasury practices to incentivize more responsible spending, thus ensuring that we make the most of every dollar. Our treasury is the envy of our peer student governments, and I know that Matt Roy, Jessie Serrino and Adam Kochman, our new treasury team, will continue a proud treasury tradition.

Outside of the treasury, Senate’s Executive Board has already been active in soliciting student feedback. I had the pleasure of attending a community forum hosted by Logan Cotton, our diversity and community affairs officer; Andrew Nunez, our historian, has been hard at work scheduling some of our major outreach events and Robert Joseph, our parliamentarian, has been going through the constitution and bylaws with a fine-tooth comb.

So what have I been up to as president?

Alongside my vice president, Meredith Goldberg, I’ve been downright aggressive in scheduling preliminary meetings to lay the foundation for a number of campus improvement initiatives. Senate has already launched a new orientation program called “Orientation Extended,” which will hopefully serve as a model for future Tufts orientations. After years of student-led discussions, Tufts finally launched an orientation program and social norms campaign devoted toward highlighting a realistic but safe alcohol culture. Last week, I appointed Tufts’ firstever student community outreach liaison.

Junior Stephen Ruggiero, the new liaison, will be working alongside Tufts’ Office of Community and Government Relations to

improve student relations with our neighboring community.

I have already met with the director of fraternity and sorority affairs to brainstorm a number of relevant Greek Life projects this year. After meeting with Deans Joanne Berger-Sweeney and Nancy Bauer of the School of Arts and Sciences (A&S), an agreement has been reached that Senate will be hosting three open Community Forums alongside A&S with the aim of discussing the future of Critical Studies at Tufts. We have also been actively engaging with the faculty on a number of issues; this partnership will be essential over the course of the year since many of Senate’s potential projects, from JumboDay to reforming undergraduate advising, will need faculty support.

This is all on top of other meetings with TUPD, leaders from the SIS and Trunk teams, Student Affairs, Health Services, President Monaco, many students and much more.

I take my responsibilities as president seriously, and I plan on continuing this aggressive approach while also beginning a series of “Office Hours in Your Corner” to better solicit student feedback.

In closing, I would like to draw a parallel: This is a “Senate poised.” In addition to the aforementioned accomplishments and meetings, the University is in a position to be making some major decisions that will impact student life for decades to come. Our enhanced capital expenditure budget for the next five years, made possible via the sale of a University Century Bond at the end of last year, will quite literally shape our physical campus — and I have already been active in meeting with relevant stakeholders to discuss proposals. Curriculum reforms are finally in the forefront of many administrators’ minds.

And the new university-wide Strategic Planning Committee will likely address issues ranging from entrepreneurship, student research and new opportunities for online learning. These are major initiatives, and our peers deserve a powerful voice to advocate on their behalf. The moment for change is now and the expectations are too high for compliancy.

This year, I encourage everyone on campus to get involved and make their voices heard. I am always open to feedback and encourage you to reach out to me directly via email. If we work together, listen and support one another and stand up for our values, there is no limit to what we can accomplish. Let’s get to work.

Wyatt Cadley is a senior majoring in political science and economics. He is TCU president. He can be reached at Wyatt.

Cadley@tufts.edu.

residential debates are a series of sparring matches between two rhetorical gladiators thrown in front of cameras and an audience. It forces them to interact with one another in a proper public fashion.

According to most accounts, liberal or conservative, Obama got his ass kicked in round one. Chris Matthews was in such bad shape after his breakdown on MSNBC that he was recently found naked running through the wilderness screaming, “It’s over! It’s all over!” But, watching the debate, there was something about Obama’s calm smirk and intensive note-taking while Romney spewed that made me pause and recall a different brawl.

Mohammed Ali’s boxing strategy that he used in the Rumble in the Jungle on October 30, 1974 is one reason he is considered an American legend and George Foreman has been relegated to selling home kitchen appliances. The fight took place in Zaire. It pitted Ali, hungry to regain his title after his suspension for refusing to fight in Vietnam, against the juggernaut George Foreman. Foreman had previously made mincemeat out of the only two boxers to defeat his challenger. For some the outlook was so bleak for Ali that they refused to even go to the fight.

Ali caught Foreman off guard early in the first round with a surprise righthanded punch, and the behemoth quickly began to retaliate with one massive blow for every pair of Ali’s rabbit punches. The second round was different: Foreman dominated. Every exchange took place on the ropes. Ali put up just enough of a defense to keep the referee from coming in and taking mercy. Blow after blow struck but Ali kept covered and survived. He caught Foreman’s face when he could, making it even puffier than usual. But Foreman couldn’t be taken down by a few headshots. This brutal dance on the ropes lasted for the next five rounds.

By the time the eighth-round bell rang, Foreman was spent. He wasn’t used to a fight that would last more than a few rounds. This was uncharted territory, and it required more stamina. Ali came out on fire. He had rested against the ropes with his arms as a cage in front of his face and vital organs. The tables turned. Now a weak Foreman was up against the ropes and Ali began a beating of his own: big right hook, three blows, then a left hook to the jaw and a hard right right in the kissah. Goliath was down. Ali was once more the heavyweight champion. His secret tactic was to appear he was losing while Foreman exhausted himself, and then pounce: Rope-a-dope.

Obama must have an incredible amount of respect for Mohammed Ali, as he has adopted his strategy to the political arena. Don’t count him out.

A recent Gallup poll shows his lead has grown back to 5 percent. Romney may have won if the judging standard is aggressiveness. But there are other criteria. One report counted 27 myths in the 38 minutes Romney spoke. He also turned Big Bird into a fine rosemary and basil roast to serve at his next fundraiser. Obama’s passivity was a tactic: make the governor speak as much as possible. Then the president has more ammunition to attack Romney with in the coming town hall and foreign policy rounds: the rope-adebate. After all, Romney did recently call for involvement with Syria.

The more Romney speaks, the worse he does. All Obama has to do is pounce in the second debate, throw a finishing combo in the third, and he has a knockout on Nov. 6.

William Shira is a senior majoring in peace and justice studies. He can be reached at William.Shira@tufts.edu.

Op-ed Policy The Op-Ed section of The Tufts Daily, an open forum for campus editorial commentary, is printed Monday through Thursday. The Daily welcomes submissions from all members of the Tufts community; the opinions expressed in the Op-Ed section do not necessarily represent the opinions of the Daily itself. Opinion articles on campus, national and international issues should be 600 to 1,200 words in length. Op-Ed cartoons are also welcomed for the Campus Canvas feature. All material is subject to editorial discretion and is not guaranteed to appear in the Daily. All material should be submitted to oped@tuftsdaily.com no later than noon on the day prior to the desired day of publication; authors must submit their telephone numbers and day-of availability for editing questions. Submissions may not be published elsewhere prior to their appearance in the Daily, including but not limited to other on- and off-campus newspapers, magazines, blogs and online news websites, as well as Facebook. Republishing of the same piece in a different source is permissible as long as the Daily is credited with originally running the article.

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12

Comics

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Doonesbury

Crossword

by

Garry Trudeau

Non Sequitur

by

Married to the Sea

www.marriedtothesea.com

SUDOKU Level: Coming home at 2 a.m. and choosing day-old pizza over turning on the stove

Late Night at the Daily

Tuesday’s Solution

Nina: “They were like vegetables for Jesus.”

Want more late-night laughs?

Follow us on Twitter at @LateNiteAtDaily

Please recycle this Daily.

Wiley

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

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Blau, Tan play well, seniors struggle at Bates MEN’S TENNIS

continued from back

andrew morganthaler / Tufts Daily archives

Tufts placed fifth at the Open New England Championship, a marked improvement from last year’s eighth-place finish.

Rand, Marks, Andrews, Wallis secure fifth place overall MEN’S CROSS COUNTRY continued from back

mance proved he is capable of being a force in the region this season, [and] this won’t be the last time he breaks into the 24s.”

Arguably the most impressive individual story, however, on a day rife with tremendous efforts, was penned by junior Jake McCauley, who capped off the scoring for the Jumbos in 63rd place. What makes McCauley’s story particularly compelling is not the place in which he finished, but rather the fact that it was his first ever varsity race.

The last runner to finish sub-26:00 was junior Andrew Shapero, whose time of 25:46 earned him 82nd place.

Senior Sam Haney brought up the rear of the varsity squad, finishing in 115th place in 26:05.

Although none of them scored for Tufts, juniors Brian McLaughlin, Jamie Norton and Bobby McShane of the JV

team all broke the 26-minute mark.

Come championship season, these three — among numerous others on a JV squad replete with up-and-coming talent — may very well have a chance to score in meets and even to be decisive scorers.

“Bobby, Jamie, [and I] all sprinted to the lead pack right off the line, which helped us out tremendously because the race strung out at the front and there was plenty of space to make moves,” McLaughlin said. “Then a Dartmouth guy fell off the pack, and I closed the gap, but everything got spaced out by the end, so I just held my position.”

Tufts’ fifth-place finish was an improvement by three spots over last year’s showing, the product of steady progress and timely recovery from injuries as the season has worn on.

As such, the team’s outstanding finish came as a surprise to no one, least of all senior Adam Brosh.

“The race went almost exactly as I expected,” Brosh said. “We knew we were good enough to make an impact on the race, and we did.”

It was an especially important performance as well because Westfield State is also the site of the Div. III New England Championship on Nov. 10, where Tufts will face off once again against Bowdoin and Williams, the two other NESCAC schools to break the top 10 overall, as well as other stiff competition in teams such as Bates — ranked first in the NESCAC and fifth nationally — and Middlebury.

“We were the best Div. III team on the course by a lot,” Brosh said. “We showed today that we have all the components necessary to have a great postseason.”

For now, though, the Jumbos are focused on maintaining their current upward trajectory, starting with preparation for the Oct. 13 Connecticut College Invitational.

Wins over Bates, Colby show team’s improvements VOLLEYBALL

continued from back

The team then built on that success with a 3-1 Saturday morning victory over Colby, in which Brennan was once again a star for the Jumbos. The sophomore compiled 14 kills and a matchhigh 24 digs, as the Jumbos fought back from a first-set loss to win the following three sets 25-22, 25-15 and 25-9.

Brennan leads the team with 190 kills on the season.

Statistics, however, tell only half the story of what these weekend games mean to the Jumbos’ improvement, and the high-adrenaline 3-2 loss to Bowdoin in the final game of the weekend made that abundantly clear.

The Polar Bears jumped out to a quick 2-0 lead before Tufts turned the game around in a hard-fought rally led

by Lord’s 39 assists and team-high 21 digs. After four sets, the teams were even at 2-2. Although Tufts was able to keep the match close in the last set,

tying at 10-10 and then 13-13, Bowdoin was able to pull out the 15-13 victory for the set and match.

Although a glance at the weekend results on paper seem to show yet another stretch of both highs and lows, this team feels that major progress was made on its path to postseason success.

“I feel like we are really moving on an upward curve, showing how well we can play together,” senior tri-captain Kiersten Ellefsen said. “It’s about raising the bar higher and higher, and then sustaining that level of play.”

The Jumbos can take some satisfaction in how far they pushed a Bowdoin team that currently sits at the top of the NESCAC with a 15-2 overall record and a 6-1 conference record.

Despite not being able to complete the comeback, the sheer effort and persistence speak to the Jumbos’ reestablished aura of confidence after a weekend in which they nearly swept

Maine’s portion of the league.

“We had the grit, the refuse-tolose attitude, to come back [against Bowdoin],” Ellefsen said. “I think our team from two weeks ago would have laid down and lost that third set.”

Now, with a 10-6 overall record and a 5-2 mark in the NESCAC, the Jumbos will face Hamilton at home on Friday, which sits third-to-last in the conference. The team’s weekend accomplishments and mental endurance serve as proof of just how well it can play, and the players need to maintain that same focus moving forward.

“Even though we lost to Bowdoin, I think we feel really good,” Ellefsen said.

“We have proved we can compete with anyone in the NESCAC. Although they snuck away with the win, we can’t wait to see them again.”

Tufts will also get its opportunity for retribution against Bowdoin on Oct. 19 at the Hall of Fame Tournament at Mount Holyoke College.

Ben for battling through a stomach virus this weekend. He’s a guy that will play ten out of ten matches for us no matter how he’s feeling.”

Kenney was also impressed by the play of freshman Nick Telkedzhiev. While he lost a match 3-6, 6-4, 7-10 to last season’s NESCAC Rookie of the Year, Bowdoin’s Kyle Wolstencroft, Kenney believes Telkedzhiev will become a star player in the near future.

Meanwhile, senior tri-captain Andrew Lutz and freshman standout Jay Glickman both entered as number-two seeds in their respective singles flights, but neither were able to make it past their first round opponents.

While disappointed in their results this weekend after putting up strong showings earlier in the year, both Lutz and Glickman could see the silver lining in their defeats.

“These tough matches just show how deep our competition really is in the NESCAC,” Lutz said. “They will certainly give us that extra motivation to work hard for the spring when we see these opponents again.”

For the Jumbos, the standouts of the weekend were sophomore Brian Tan and junior Austin Blau.

Tan, who played as the number-one seed in the Singles D flight, won his first two matches easily on Saturday at 6-3, 6-3 and 2-6, 6-3, (10-3).

Blau also rolled through his first two opponents as he won 6-4, 4-6, (10-3) in the first round and 6-3, 6-4 in the second. Following their standout performances on Saturday, both were enthusiastic for their semi-final matches the next day.

“I had some tough matches against very consistent players and had to just stay calm and remain in the moment,” Blau said on Saturday. “For my next match, I’ll definitely treat my opponent like any other player and enjoy it. I’ll need to make him come up with tough shots and not give up any free points.”

While both Jumbos played well in their semi-final matches, only Tan moved onto the final in his flight, with Blau losing two hard-fought sets, 4-6, 3-6. In the final, Tan attempted to stay with Amherst’s Michael Solimano, but the Lord Jeff pulled away to take the match and the flight title 4-6, 3-6.

“No matter the result, [Tan] serves as a perfect example of someone who learns something new every time he steps onto the court,” Kenney said.

“His composure is textbook and I can’t respect him enough for it.”

In the doubles flights, while all of Tufts’ pairings showed promise early in their matches, none made it past the opening round. The duo of Glickman and Blau had the best shot of winning their first match-up, but were downed in a battle against a tough pair from Amherst, 9-8.

“I am extremely proud of all of the doubles teams,” Kenney said. “Every combo played very well in all aspects of the game and I know that with time they will only get better.”

Lutz believes this was definitely another strong showing for the Jumbos as they continue to prepare for the rapidly approaching dual matches.

“All in all, everyone competed well this weekend,” he said. “We learn more about ourselves and our competition with every match and we look forward to our continued improvement.

We certainly plan on making a run at a championship once duals begin.”

The Tufts Daily

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

15

Sports

Women’s cross country

Strong pack running leads Jumbos to 11th at Open New England Championship by

Matt Rand

Contributing Writer

Even cross country can sometimes be a contact sport, something that was on display Sunday as all seven Jumbos varsity runners went down in a pile-up on a turn 150 meters into the Open New England Championship at Westfield State.

But despite the accident, the Tufts women were able to rebound from the early chaos to place 11th in the field of 37 teams from all divisions.

Boston College was the class of the field, placing five runners in the top 20 to win the title with 45 points, followed by University of Vermont and Dartmouth College with 59 and 139 points, respectively.

“Pile-ups are just part of the sport,” junior Laura Peterson said. “So it was good for us to experience one like that and learn to keep racing through it.”

Among Div. III teams, Tufts placed third, behind only MIT and Williams.

The Engineers placed fifth with 198 points while the Ephs landed in eighth with 248 to beat the Jumbos’ 373. The day gave the Jumbos the opportunity to preview the course that will host the NCAA Div. III Regional Championships on Nov. 10.

The Tufts women took advantage, as the team’s top four runners finished in the top 80 of the 251-runner field. More importantly, they crossed the line within 11 seconds of each other, demonstrating their ability to work together and race as a pack.

Peterson led the way, finishing 59th in a time of 18:34 over the five-kilometer course. Four seconds back in 64th was junior Abby Barker. She was followed by senior tri-captain Lilly Fisher in 68th and freshman Olivia Beltrani in 79th.

The pile-up made running as a pack slightly more difficult, but the women were able to regroup and work together most of the way.

“All of us went down, but I just focused on getting to my feet as quickly as possible and moving up right away,” Barker said. “Although it wasn’t a huge setback, it did cause us to separate slightly, and we had to play catch-up with some of the other teams.”

Closing out the scoring for the Jumbos was junior tri-captain Madeleine Carey, who placed 103rd overall in a time of 19:01.

Senior Julia Hajnoczky and junior Lauren Creath rounded out the varsity squad, placing 108th and 127th respectively.

Coach Kristen Morwick’s team was satisfied with the 11th place finish, an 11-spot improvement from last year’s showing.

Making the feat even more impressive is the fact that the Jumbos were without

Andrew Morganthaler / Tufts Daily Archives

Despite an early crash that saw all their runners fall after just 150 meters, the Jumbos still managed to finish third among Div. III competitors at the Open New England Championship. their top runner from the first two races of were a lot of issues that I hope will the season, as freshman Audrey Gould sat be resolved before Regionals,” Barker said. “Improving course markings and out with tendonitis.

“Even though we were missing our footing in the woods loop would make top runner and our top seven got stuck Regionals a more competitive and enjoyin the pile-up, we still managed to come able race.” away with an 11-spot improvement from Looking ahead, the squad will compete in the Connecticut College Invitational last year’s race,” Peterson said.

“That’s a substantial improvement. on Saturday before the postseason heats [It] shows how far we’ve come in a year,” up with the NESCAC Championship on Oct. 27. The team’s confidence is cerBarker added.

The other primary objective for the tainly high moving forward. squad was to evaluate the course that “We don’t see ourselves as the underwill host the national qualifying meet dog this season,” Peterson said. “We on Nov. 10. Although the flat, fast terrain know we can compete with the top has its perks, opinions are mixed on the teams in our conference, so that is what we are working toward these next few overall quality of the course.

“The course was very fast, but there weeks heading into the postseason.”

DAILY DIGITS

7

Number of runners on the women’s cross country team that took an early tumble in the team’s race at the New England Open this weekend. In the first turn of the race, a massive pileup occurred, and runners from all teams went down, including every varsity member of the Jumbos’ lineup.

The Tufts runners managed to shake off the dirt and recover to finish 11th overall among 37 teams in the meet, placing four runners in the top 80 of the field.

23

Number of shots by which the Tufts field hockey team outshot Conn. College in their Oct. 6 matchup, with the final tally being 24-1. The Jumbos managed to hold the Camels without a shot for the entirety of regulation, and only let up one shot in the extra period in their 1-0 win on Saturday. While the Camels’ goalkeeper was able to keep the first 23 of the Jumbos’ shots out, senior forward Kelsey Perkins finally connected in overtime to clinch the Jumbos’ eighth straight victory.

76

190

Points scored by the New England Patriots over five quarters from the second half of their Week 4 game against the Buffalo Bills through the third quarter of their Week 5 win against the Denver Broncos. Against the Bills, the Patriots went into halftime down 14-7 before exploding for 35 points in the second half en route to a 52-28 win.

However, against the Broncos, the Pats burst out to a 31-7 lead before stagnating offensively and being forced to hang on for the 31-21 win.

Number of kills for sophomore outside hitter Kelly Brennan, who leads the team by a wide margin after 16 more kills in the team’s last match against the Bowdoin Polar Bears. Brennan ranks second in the NESCAC in total kills, and fourth in the conference in kills per game with 3.17.

The sophomore also leads the team in digs and has led the Jumbos to their 10-6 overall record and 5-2 record in the conference, good enough for fourth place in the NESCAC standings.

15

6.1

Strikeouts for Alex Rodriguez of the New York Yankees in his last three playoff series, including 5 through two games in the Yankees’ American League Divisional Series matchup with the Baltimore Orioles. In those series since his explosion in the 2009 playoffs, Rodriguez has gone 7 of 48 at the plate for a whopping .145 batting average to go with his 1-for-33 batting record with runners in scoring position throughout his postseason career.

Yards per carry on rushing plays for the San Francisco 49ers through their first 5 weeks of the season, the second highest total since the AFL-NFL merger of 1970.

Against Buffalo in week 5, the 49ers pounded the Bills into submission with 311 yards on the ground in their 41-3 victory. The Niners stand at 4-1 after 5 weeks, and appear to be the cream of the crop in the NFC West, but will be tested this week against the New York Giants.

Ethan Sturm | Rules of the Game

Any commish you wish

O

n March 2nd, Allan “Bud” Selig made his way to the podium, prepared to change professional baseball forever. Selig, the sport’s ninth commissioner, is more commonly remembered for his gaffes — such as the All-Star game that ended in a tie — than for his successes, which include almost 20 years without any major labor disputes.

His announcement that day was for the implementation of a new playoff system.

Controversy raged as fans and pundits tried to decipher whether the system would improve or lessen the postseason.

With the Divisional Series starting to reach its end, we can now look back at the effect of the changes. But because we are talking about commissioner-related changes here, I thought it’d be fun to introduce my own grading system for them. Each change will receive one of three grades: a Stern, named after NBA Commissioner David Stern, who has succeeded in popularizing his game; a Goodell, named after NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, who terrorizes his sport knowing that we can’t look away; or a Bettman, named after NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman, who is slowly killing his sport with the current lockout.

The additional Wild Card team The biggest of the three changes, the extra Wild Card has revitalized the divisional race. In the past, teams like the Yankees, Red Sox and Rays have gone in knowing that the difference between being a Division Champ and the Wild Card was marginal at best. In fact, Wild Cards have won 10 pennants and five World Series in their 18 years of existence.

But this year, with Wild Cards needing to compete in a play-in game just to reach the final eight, everything was on the line. The AL West and AL East both came down to an intense final day of the season. Meanwhile, the second Wild Card spot turned into a race that, with less than a week to go, seemed to still include half of the National League.

Yes, the argument does remain that with this new system, last year’s frantic final day wouldn’t have mattered. But that seems to be the exception, not the rule. This change definitely passed the test.

Grade: Stern The one-game playoff After 162 games of blood, sweat, tears and chewing tobacco, Selig ruled that the two Wild Card teams would decide who makes the main legs of the playoffs by playing a single game. This ran the risk of magnifying that one contest, turning every little detail into back-page news.

In the end, the critics’ worst fears were realized in the National League. An Atlanta team that had been more impressive all season lost to the Cardinals on the back of a bad throw and a questionable call. The baseball season is a marathon, and postseason results can’t be a sprint decided by one flick of the wrist. But if Selig doesn’t do something, it will happen again and again.

Grade: Goodell Two home games to the lower seed The final change was in the Divisional Series round of the playoffs, where the new system means two games at home for the lower seed followed by three games at home for the higher seed. The likely goal here was to guarantee that the weaker team has the opportunity to make money off of two games.

Fortunately, this new rule will only be in effect this postseason. In terms of actual game play, the rule threatens to give a competitive advantage to the weaker team. If they can just squeeze out their two games with the crowd behind them, they put all of the pressure on the higher seed and only need to steal one of the next three games.

Detroit put Oakland in this exact hole, and the A’s went into last night still having played fewer postseason home games than the Rangers’ team they won the AL West over.

Other series didn’t have this problem, so the verdict remains out on this one-year change.

Grade: Goodell Ethan Sturm is a senior who is majoring in biopsychology. He can be reached at Ethan.

Sturm@tufts.edu or @esturm90.

Sports

16

INSIDE Women’s Cross Country 15

tuftsdaily.com

Volleyball

Volleyball team wins two, drops one in weekend trip to Maine by

Alex Schroeder

Contributing Writer

The Tufts volleyball team returned from its weekend NESCAC play in Maine with more than just the two wins and VOLLEYBALL (10-6 Overall, 5-2 NESCAC) at Brunswick, Maine, Saturday Tufts 15 26 12 20 15 Bowdoin 25 25 20 19 13

— 2 — 3

at Waterville, Maine, Saturday Tufts Colby

22 25 25 25 25 22 15 9

— 3 — 1

at Lewiston, Maine, Friday Tufts Bates

25 24 25 25 21 26 22 19

— 3 — 1

one loss on the scorebooks. After being blanked 3-0 a week ago by UMassBoston, the Jumbos were able to prove their mental stamina in wins against Bates and Colby and a near-comeback loss to Bowdoin, all of which contribute to a much-needed confidence boost heading into the home stretch of the season.

With both major wins and disappointing losses on the season thus far, the Jumbos have made consistency a priority. The trouble for the team comes when its mental foundations break and, consequently, its cohesiveness vanishes.

“In the past, we have had mental struggles with staying consistent,” sophomore Isabel Kuhel said. “In the Bowdoin match especially, we were able to play hard whether we were down two sets or up. We fought to the

Oliver Porter / The Tufts Daily

Even with a close loss to Bowdoin, the volleyball team emerged from its Maine triple-header feeling good about its chances for the rest of the season. end no matter the score.”

Tufts started the weekend with a 3-1 win against Bates on Friday, marked

by performances such as sophomore outside hitter Kelly Brennan’s 13 kills and senior tri-captain Kendall Lord’s

Men’s Tennis

Jumbos turn heads in third fall tournament by

Andy Linder

Contributing Writer

match-high 42 assists. see VOLLEYBALL, page 14

Men’s Cross Country

Tufts posts positive results at Open New Englands

Following two successful showings at the Middlebury Invitational and Williams’ ITA Tournament, coach Jaime Kenney and her squad were ready to get back onto the court for more Div. III. competition. This weekend, the men’s tennis team traveled to Lewiston, Maine to participate in Bates’ Wallach Invitational, hoping to build on their initial success and keep confidence high as the fall season continues.

“Coming into the weekend, I was very excited to head up to Bates,” Kenney said.

“The last two tournaments have been great confidence-builders and practices have been incredible.”

With so many players, the field was broken down into four singles flights and two doubles flights. Tufts’ players were awarded a number of high seeds, including two No. 1’s and two No. 2’s among the singles brackets.

The Jumbos got into a groove early, with the majority of singles players winning their first round match-ups Saturday.

In the Singles A flight, senior Ben Barad defeated his counterpart by a 2-6, 6-2, (10-3) margin. In the Singles D flight, senior tri-captain Mark Westerfield took care of his opponent 6-3, 7-6 (7-2) in the opening round.

Neither player won his secondround match-up, but Kenney was proud of her seniors nonetheless. “[Westerfield] and [Barad] have been absolutely tremendous for us thus far,” Kenney said. “While they both faced tough competitors, [Westerfield] is still an incredible leader and I respect

SCOtt tingley / Tufts Daily archives

On Sunday, the men’s cross country team seized a rare opportunity for a Div. III squad of any sport: the chance to square off against stellar Div. I opponents at the Open New England Championship at Westfield State. And seize it they certainly did.

The Jumbos finished fifth overall and first among Division III squads.

By virtue of having placed four runners in the top 40, Tufts placed fifth out of 37 teams and was outscored only by Dartmouth, Boston College, Yale and Boston University.

With a total of 169 points, the Jumbos edged out the Bowdoin Polar Bears — the second Div. III team and sixth overall to finish — by 62 points.

The impressive charge to the vanguard of all Div. III competitors was led by co-captain Matt Rand, who finished in 15th place overall and first for Tufts with a time of 24:46, and a cadre of upperclassmen who all completed the eight-kilometer course within 30 seconds of one another.

Next across the line in 20th place was senior Kyle Marks who, with a time of 24:58, posted the first sub25:00 time of his career. Behind him arrived senior Tyler Andrews and junior Ben Wallis, with Andrews completing the course only two seconds ahead of Wallis. The two finished in 34th and 37th place, respectively.

“Tyler Andrews stepped up big for us,” Rand, who is also a contributing writer for the Daily, said. “His perfor-

see MEN’S TENNIS, page 14

The men’s tennis team impressed at the Wallach invitational this weekend, showing that they can compete against the best of the NESCAC.

see MEN’S CROSS COUNTRY, page 14

by Sam

Gold

Daily Staff Writer